Sir, Bowenoid papulosis is a disease presenting with fleshy, usually pigmented papules involving the genitalia of both sexes. In vulvar lesions, the term vulvar intraepithelial neoplasia (VIN3) is also used to describe the same condition. Histological examination reveals a picture consistent with carcinoma in situ, although the course of the disease appears to be benign. Association with oncogenic human papillomavirus (HPV 16, 18, 33) has been demonstrated. In the past, excisional surgery, electrocoagulation, cryotherapy and 5-fluorouracil have been used in the treatment of the condition with varying degrees of success. A 38-year-old woman was referred to our clinic with a 4-year history of pruritic skin lesions on her labia majora. She had previously been treated with podophyllin without any benefit. The molecular biological examination of the vaginal mucosa had been negative in terms of HPV typing (groups 6/11, 16/18, 31/33). However, HPV 31/33 was detected in the cervical smear (Hybrid Capture II test). Previous treatment with erbium laser, KTP 532 mm laser and podophyllin had been unsuccessful. On examination, erythema and numerous small papules were detectable on the labia minora and majora as well as in the clitoral and perianal area, each papule 1±3 mm in diameter (Fig. 1). The dermatohistopathological examination of several biopsies taken from these sites showed a uniform pattern with bowenoid epithelial changes, thus supporting the clinical diagnosis of bowenoid papulosis (Fig. 2). Treatment with imiquimod was initiated with a regimen different from that recommended for the treatment of genital warts. Imiquimod cream 5% was applied to affected areas on alternate days for 10 days until the skin became visibly irritated. The cream was now applied once daily for another 10 days, but washed off after 2 h each time. This treatment led towards complete clinical resolution within 8 weeks (Fig. 3). Histology performed 1 month, 6 months and 18 months after treatment demonstrated the absence of any precancerous epidermal changes (Fig. 4). The lympho histiocytic dermal infiltrate observed 1 month after treatment decreased in density in the control biopsies taken 6 and 18 months after treatment. Colposcopy performed 10 months after treatment showed minor acetic-white areas around the portio. No low-risk or high-risk HPV material was detected on the cervix (Hybrid Capture II test). More than 18 months after treatment the patient continues to be clinically clear. Imiquimod is a topical immune response modifier so far registered for the treatment of condylomata acuminata. Imiquimod directly induces antiviral and immunomodulating cytokines such as interferon-a, tumour necrosis factor-a and different interleukins from monocytes, macrophages and dendritic cells. Its effect on the innate immune response and the activation of Th1-immunity are responsible for its acute


Price volatility, reflecting the ability to absorb exogenous supply- or demand shocks, is an important dimension of market performance. In this paper we present a model to study the factors determining the price volatility of markets of basic foodstuffs in pre industrial societies. This model is used to explain the development of price volatility on markets in countries around the Mediterranean between 580 BC and 1800 AD. This is the region for which we have the oldest evidence of functioning markets (from Mesopotamia), so that we can track their development in time over a period of more than 2000 years. We find a break in market performance: medieval markets had a much lower level of volatility than ancient markets--a fact we try to explain within our model. Moreover, we suggest that this reduction in price volatility may have had important consequences for the economic behavior of farmers: price variability had to be reduced to the level that we find for the post-1000 period to induce farmers to specialize.


Molecular modeling analysis performed by k nearest neighbor molecular field analysis (kNN MFA) to recognize the necessary structural requirements of 1,3-diaryl propenone derivatives in 3D chemical space for adjusting modulation of the antimalarial activity. In study 14 compounds were selected randomly, using sphere exclusion (SE) algorithm and random selection method struture divided into training and test set. kNN-MFA methodology with stepwise (SW), simulated annealing (SA) and genetic algorithm (GA) was used for building the QSAR models. Predictive models were generated with SW-kNN MFA. The most significant model 1 is having internal predictivity 64.24% (q2 = 64.24) and external predictivity 61.57 % (pred_r2 = 0.61.57). Model showed that steric (S_584), and electrostatic (E-295) interactions play important role in determining DPP IV inhibitory activity.


The diamondback moth (DBM), Plutella xylostella, is a global economic pest of brassicas whose pest status has been exacerbated by climate change and variability. Southern African small-scale farmers are battling to cope with increasing pressure from the pest due to limited exposure to sustainable control options. The current paper critically analysed literature with a climate change and sustainability lens. The results show that research in Southern Africa (SA) remains largely constrained despite the region's long acquaintance with the insect pest. Dependency on broad-spectrum insecticides, the absence of insecticide resistance management strategies, climate change, little research attention, poor regional research collaboration and coordination, and lack of clear policy support frameworks, are the core limitations to effective DBM management. Advances in Integrated Pest Management (IPM) technologies and climate-smart agriculture (CSA) techniques for sustainable pest management have not benefitted small-scale horticultural farmers despite the farmers' high vulnerability to crop losses due to pest attack. IPM adoption was mainly limited by lack of locally-developed packages, lack of stakeholders' concept appreciation, limited alternatives to chemical control, knowledge paucity on biocontrol, climate mismatch between biocontrol agents' origin and release sites, and poor research expertise and funding. We discuss these challenges in light of climate change and variability impacts on small-scale farmers in SA and recommend climate-smart, holistic, and sustainable homegrown IPM options propelled through IPM-Farmer Field School approaches for widespread and sustainable adoption.


Objective: The analysis of accessibility and quality of providing medical and social care for aged population. Methods: The analysis of the work of institutions of medical and social care has been carried out. According to the time-study of the working day of nurses the characteristics of nursing personnel have been determined. Results: Data on the arrangement of medical aid at home for aged patients of the Saratov region have been provided. The importance of nursing personnel in the system of complex medical and social care has been assessed and the main areas of nursing activity have been found out. Conclusion: The article has been stated that creation of quality control system for nursing personnel is of great necessity to provide effective medical and social care.


The faceted search paradigm allows to intuitively categorize the search results along orthogonal facets. Such facets, for example, can group the results along authors, publication year, or topics in case of digital libraries. One open issue, however, is how facets themselves can be organized and presented, especially if a facet is highly dynamic and is too large to be presented at once. In this paper we demonstrate the Semantic GrowBag approach to automatically organize facets, namely a topic facet, for community-specific document collections. The approach uses the documents' metadata tags to extract information about prevalent topics and then applies PageRank to determine intrinsic relations between these topics as supported by a collection's documents. We discuss a short use case for topics extracted for computer science documents in the DBLP collection and show that we can even determine a topic's development over time to enable a customizable organization of the topic facet. Given that facets have to be individually adapted to different users, user groups, or communities our algorithm is an important step towards automatic facet organization.


MR 2251-178 was the first quasar initially discovered in X-rays, and the first one found to host a warm absorber. The quasar turned out to be an outstanding object in many respects. It has a high ratio of X-ray/optical luminosity, is surrounded by the largest quasar emission-line nebula known, and is located in the outskirts of a cluster of galaxies. Here, we present results from an analysis of the X-ray spectral, temporal, and spatial properties of this source and its environment based on deep ROSAT observations. Remarkably, we do not detect any excess X-ray cold absorption expected to originate from the giant gas nebula surrounding MR 2251-178. This excludes the presence of a huge HI envelope around the quasar. The X-ray spectrum of MR 2251-178 is best fit by a warm-absorbed powerlaw with an ionization parameter $\log U = 0.5$ and a column density $\log N_{\rm w} = 22.6$ which, however, cannot be the same material as the giant optical emission line nebula. The mean (0.1-2.4) keV X-ray luminosity amounts to 10 45 erg/s. A spatial analysis shows that the bulk of the X-ray emission from the quasar is consistent with a point source, as expected in view of the powerlaw-shaped X-ray spectrum and the rapid X-ray variability we detect. In addition, extended emission appears at weak emission levels, including a bridge between the quasar and the cD galaxy of the cluster. The X-ray emission from the intra-cluster medium is weak or absent. We derive an upper limit on the X-ray luminosity of $L_{\rm x} \le 1.6 10^{42}$ erg/s, weaker than other clusters of comparable richness. None of the other member galaxies of the cluster to which MR 2251-178 belongs, are detected in X-rays. However, east of the quasar there is a significant excess of X-ray sources, several of them without optical counterparts on the UK Schmidt plates.


This article considers some theological reasons why there is a Centre for Sustainable Communities at the Faculty of Theology, University of Pretoria. The role of the Centre is discussed within the global and local search for sustainability; the world-wide trend in churches towards a missional approach, which emphasises the church's life-giving role in all areas of life, and the theological reflection on the relationship between the church community and the civil community, so reflecting on the role of the local church to promote life in its fullness in the community. The Centre for Sustainable Communities (Centre) was established at the Faculty of Theology, University of Pretoria, in 2014. The Centre is intended to develop resources for local congregations to promote life in its fullness in local communities in southern Africa in an effective and meaningful way. In this article attention is given to the theological reasons for its establishment and where it is being positioned in the wider field of sustainability institutions. Attention will be given to the following: • The position of the Centre in the global search for sustainability. • Life in its fullness in the emerging 21st century missional paradigm. • The Christian community as agent of life in its fullness in the civil community.


Recent theories posit that physiological signals contribute to corporeal awareness - the basic feeling that one has a body (body ownership) which acts according to one's will (body agency) and occupies a specific position (body location). Combining physiological recordings with immersive virtual reality, we found that an ecological mapping of real respiratory patterns onto a virtual body illusorily changes corporeal awareness. This new way of inducing a respiratory bodily illusion, called 'embreathment', revealed that breathing is almost as important as visual appearance for inducing body ownership, and more important than any other cue for body agency. These effects were moderated by individual levels of interoception, as assessed through a standard heartbeat counting task and a new 'pneumoception' task. By showing that respiratory, visual and spatial signals exert a specific and weighted influence on the fundamental feeling that one is an embodied agent, we pave the way for a comprehensive hierarchical model of corporeal awareness.


Performance of the company is a major criterion in the assessment of business organizations in achieving the desired results in a gradual period of time.In a corporate environment has implemented supply chain management, collaboration between internal resources with external resourceshave led to the exchange of information flow, goods or services and the flow of money that everything requires an integrated transaction management. This paper focuses on the strategic role of information technology both the application and use of information systems to support the activities of the supply chain management companyin order to improve the performance of the company. Some of the issues discussed in this paper is the importance of information technology in delivering benefits to the company,approach in the application, and development in the future. By applying information technology, the results of the description in this paper can provide a significant contribution to the company applying the supply chain-managementthe performance of companies in general, because the transaction management is an effective tool in providing corporate profits become a major part of the application of information technology. Keywords: information technology, supply chain management, corporate performance


Graphene is a two-dimensional hexagonal lattice made of carbon atoms with remarkable electronic, mechanical, and optical properties. Such material facilitates the development of novel electronic materials. Adding impurities or doping is an effective way to improve the properties of graphene. The investigation thus far has been limited to elemental (atomic or ionic) doped graphene. There have been many studies conducted on elemental doped graphene. However there is no known comprehensive single study that reports on graphene doped with a vast array of elements across the periodic table. The existence of a comprehensive report on elemental doped graphene will greatly aid researchers in making quick predictions of the characteristics of the elemental doped graphene. The two investigated aspects of this doping are the stability and electronic energy band gap (band gap). Stability is the bond strength between dopant and graphene. Band gap is the energy required for the material to conduct electricity. Investigation is carried out by means of computational simulation using the density functional theory framework, which is presently one of the most promising approaches for computation of the electronic structure of matter. The simulation uses small clusters of carbon sheets and covers the first 103 elements in the periodic table of elements. It includes two categories, substitutional and adatom doping. Substitutional doping is substituting an atom in the carbon sheet with another element, while adatom doping is adding element on the carbon sheet surface. Substitutional doping showed the highest stability on elements in group 14 (Carbon, Silicon, Germanium, Tin, and Lead) and the lowest stability on noble gases. Each adatom element showed a position preference on the carbon sheet surface. Band gap trends for each group in the periodic table of elements are also presented in this study.


This commentary extends the work of Zellweger and Kammerlander by describing how the relationships they hypothesize might be operationalized and tested. It more clearly defines and provides suggestions for how to measure the heterogeneity and complexity of family members and family relationships. It discusses how to operationalize the scope, scale, and complexity of assets controlled by the family, and the characteristics of agents who manage the process. In addition the commentary discusses outcome measures for the family such as family wealth, family communication, family happiness, and family functionality. It describes financial and operational measures of performance for the businesses controlled by the family. The commentary concludes by discussing outcome measures for individual family members and for the agents they employ.


The United States has asymmetric regulation of the provision of broadband Internet access service. A cable television system operator is not regulated in its sale of cable modem service. In contrast, an incumbent local exchange carrier (ILEC) that offers digital subscriber line (DSL) service faces price regulation as well as the obligation to offer competitors the use of its broadband network on a wholesale (or, unbundled) basis so that they may offer, in the retail market, DSL services that compete with the ILEC's own retail offering to consumers. The social costs of asymmetric regulation are by now familiar. Such regulation leads not to deregulation, but to an enduring managed competition far more complex to administer than traditional regulation of a monopoly service provider ever was. The alternative to asymmetric regulation is either symmetric regulation or symmetric freedom from regulation. Assuming that the latter alternative is preferred, what actual steps would be taken to abolish asymmetric regulation of ILEC provision of broadband Internet access? The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) could remove asymmetric regulation that the agency itself previously imposed. The FCC could declare that broadband Internet access service is not a telecommunications service, subject to numerous regulations applicable to ILECs, but rather an information service, which is free of such regulations. Amid considerable controversy, the FCC invited public comment on such a reclassification in February 2002. Or the FCC could use its power under section 10 of the Communications Act to forbear from regulating ILEC provision of broadband Internet access. A third, and more incremental, approach would be for the FCC to declare ILECs nondominant in the provision of advanced services, such as broadband Internet access. Non-dominant carriers are exempt from price-cap or rate-of-return regulation, as well as the obligation to file tariffs and to establish the reasonableness of those tariffs through the submission of cost data. Much, if not all, of the economic analysis required to determine whether a carrier is nondominant also would be relevant to the FCC's decision whether to forbear from regulating a particular service or whether to reclassify the service in question as unregulated. Although the FCC did not receive its authority under section 10 to forbear from regulation until 1996, the agency has evaluated petitions for nondominance for a longer time and consequently has distilled a body of law on the subject. In this Article, we evaluate the case against asymmetric regulation of broadband Internet access through the lens of the FCC's approach to deciding petitions for non-dominance. We examine the economic evidence relevant to whether ILECs are non-dominant in the provision of mass-market broadband services, the most familiar of which is DSL service. We use a nested-logit discrete-choice model to produce econometric estimates of the own-price elasticity of demand for DSL service and the cross-price elasticity of demand for cable modem service with respect to DSL service. Our findings suggest that demand for DSL service is price-elastic, that DSL and cable modems are in the same product market, and that DSL providers lack market power. The FCC would advance the public interest by ruling that the ILECs are non-dominant in the mass-market broadband services market.


The theory of insurance is considered here when an insured individual may be able to sue another party for the losses that the insured suffered—and thus when an insured has a potential source of compensation in addition to insurance coverage. Insurance policies reflect this possibility through so-called subrogation provisions that give insurers the right to step into the shoes of insureds and to bring suits against injurers. In a basic case, the optimal subrogation provisions involve full retention by the insurer of the proceeds from a successful suit and the pursuit of all positive expected value suits. This eliminates litigation risks for insureds and results in lower premiums—financed by the litigation income of insurers, including from suits that insureds would not otherwise have brought. Moreover, optimal subrogation provisions are characterized in the presence of moral hazard, administrative costs, and non-monetary losses, and it is demonstrated that optimal provisions entail sharing litigation proceeds with insureds in the first two cases but not when losses are non-monetary. (JEL G22, K13, K41)


This short Essay explores when ignorance can be supported or even coerced by law, and when it cannot. In the end, although freedom from thought has much to offer to the development of privacy and dignitary rights, interests in self-ignorance are better handled through norms than through law. Like other forms of privacy, First Amendment commitments are likely to frustrate legal efforts to support or coerce self-ignorance. If a speaker wishes to disclose information, the government is unlikely to be able to interfere with that disclosure unless the speaker's interests are demonstrably weak. However, when both the speaker and the listener prefer silence, government compulsion of information disclosure will offend privacy and First Amendment principles alike.


Contemporary engaged Buddhist scholars typically claim either that Buddhism always endorsed social activism, or that its non-endorsement of such activism represented an unwitting lack of progress. This article examines several classical South Asian Buddhist texts that explicitly reject social and political activism. These texts argue for this rejection on the grounds that the most important sources of suffering are not something that activism can fix, and that political involvement interferes with the tranquility required for liberation. The article then examines the history of engaged Buddhism in order to identify why this rejection of activism has not yet been taken sufficiently seriously. 1 Department of Philosophy, Boston University. Email: firstname.lastname@example.com. 240 Lele, Disengaged Buddhism


You've heard of the "Great Books"? These are their evil opposites. From Machiavelli's The Prince to Karl Marx's The Communist Manifesto to Alfred Kinsey's Sexual Behavior in the Human Male, these "influential" books have led to war, genocide, totalitarian oppression, family breakdown, and disastrous social experiments. And yet these authors' bad ideas are still popular and pervasive--in fact, they might influence your own thinking without your realizing it. Here with the antidote is Professor Benjamin Wiker. In his scintillating new book, 10 Books That Screwed Up the World (And 5 Others That Didn't Help), he seizes each of these evil books by its malignant heart and exposes it to the light of day. In this witty, learned, and provocative expose, you'll learn: * Why Machiavelli's The Prince was the inspiration for a long list of tyrannies (Stalin had it on his nightstand) * How Descartes' Discourse on Method "proved" God's existence only by making Him a creation of our own ego * How Hobbes' Leviathan led to the belief that we have a "right" to whatever we want * Why Marx and Engels's Communist Manifesto could win the award for the most malicious book ever written * How Darwin's The Descent of Man proves he intended "survival of the fittest" to be applied to human society * How Nietzsche's Beyond Good and Evil issued the call for a world ruled solely by the "will to power" * How Hitler's Mein Kampf was a kind of "spiritualized Darwinism" that accounts for his genocidal anti-Semitism * How the pansexual paradise described in Margaret Mead's Coming of Age in Samoa turned out to be a creation of her own sexual confusions and aspirations * Why Alfred Kinsey's Sexual Behavior in the Human Male was simply autobiography masquerading as science Witty, shocking, and instructive, 10 Books That Screwed Up the World offers a quick education on the worst ideas in human history--and how we can avoid them in the future.


Firefighting operations are characterised by high time pressures, a high degree of task and environment uncertainty, life-or-death situations, and the continuous emergence of novel events. Despite this, the factors considered most demanding to firefighters and the strategies that lead to effective management of physiological and psychological stressors at the fire scene are yet to be fully understood.

To address this issue, study 1 utilised a qualitative approach employing a series of focus groups and individual interviews to establish the operational tasks considered to be most demanding by firefighters. Results showed that stressors could be classified into five higher order categories dominated by the physical demands of wearing self-contained breathing apparatus (SCBA) and firefighting activities. Coping responses were grouped by problem-focused and emotion-focused techniques (Lazarus and Folkman, 1984), and also considered coping strategies at early, mid and late career stages. Study 2 utilised a longitudinal approach to examine the development of SCBA specific coping strategies with trainee firefighters over a 12-month period. Stressors were characterised by five higher-order stressors present throughout, and the firefighters reported high levels of control over the task and satisfaction with their performance despite task severity. Study 3 consisted of data collection undertaken during a series of commonly encountered SCBA tasks, including a comparison of novice and experienced firefighters during a single live firefighting task, and experienced firefighters undertaking a series of frequently encountered SCBA tasks. Results found that there were significant changes in cardiovascular and psychological responses of both novice and experienced firefighters following a live firefighting task. There was also a series of significant responses in experienced personnel completing concurrent guideline, search and rescue, and live firefighting tasks. The final study (study 4) considered the demands of SCBA from a command and control perspective. Incorporating a purpose-built incident command suite, the task was found to require high levels of mental and temporal demand but minimal levels of physical demand or frustration. Of the four roles examined, the incident commanders displayed highest levels of task demands, stress, and state anxiety.

The programme of work in this thesis highlights the complex environments firefighters face, the importance of on-scene coping techniques, and the methodological difficulties involved when attempting to capture and analyse data within this population.


Nearly finished sequences for model organisms provide a foundation from which to explore genomic diversity among other taxonomic groups. We explore genome-wide microsynteny patterns between the rice sequence and two sorghum physical maps that integrate genetic markers, bacterial artificial chromosome (BAC) fingerprints, and BAC hybridization data. The sorghum maps largely tile a genomic component containing 41% of BACs but 80% of single-copy genes that shows conserved microsynteny with rice and partially tile a nonsyntenic component containing 46% of BACs but only 13% of single-copy genes. The remaining BACs are centromeric (4%) or unassigned (8%). The two genomic components correspond to cytologically discernible "euchromatin" and "heterochromatin." Gene and repetitive DNA distributions support this classification. Greater microcolinearity in recombinogenic (euchromatic) than nonrecombinogenic (heterochromatic) regions is consistent with the hypothesis that genomic rearrangements are usually deleterious, thus more likely to persist in nonrecombinogenic regions by virtue of Muller's ratchet. Interchromosomal centromeric rearrangements may have fostered diploidization of a polyploid cereal progenitor. Model plant sequences better guide studies of related genomes in recombinogenic than nonrecombinogenic regions. Bridging of 35 physical gaps in the rice sequence by sorghum BAC contigs illustrates reciprocal benefits of comparative approaches that extend at least across the cereals and perhaps beyond.


To date, terrestrial archives of long-term climatic change within the Arctic have widely been restricted to ice cores from Greenland and, more recently, sediments from Lake El'gygytgyn in northeast Arctic Russia. Sediments from this lake contain a paleoclimate record of glacial-interglacial cycles during the last three million years. Low-resolution studies at this lake have suggested that changes observed during Transition IV (the transition from marine isotope stage (MIS) 10 to MIS 9) are of greater amplitude than any observed since. In this study, geochemical parameters are used to infer past climatic conditions thus providing the first high-resolution analyses of Transition IV from a terrestrial Arctic setting. These results demonstrate that a significant shift in climate was subsequently followed by a rapid increase in biogenic silica (BSi) production. Following this sharp increase, bioproductivity remained high, but variable, for over a thousand years. This study reveals differences in the timing and magnitude of change within the ratio of silica to titanium (Si/Ti) and BSi records that would not be apparent in lower resolution studies. This has significant implications for the increasingly common use of Si/Ti data as an alternative to traditional BSi measurements.


In tropical rainforests environmental conditions vary dramatically from the ground to the canopy, resulting in a marked stratification in the way vertical space is used by organisms, but research work is often limited to the understorey layer. Aerial insectivorous bats are a highly diverse group that plays key roles in the ecology of rainforests, but their use of vertical space remains elusive.
Using automatic ultrasound recording stations placed in the canopy, subcanopy and understorey we tested if bat activity and species diversity are vertically stratified, both in the forest interior and near the edges of water bodies. These patterns were tested separately for individual species, and for two functional groups – open space and edge space bats.
Insectivorous bat activity increased by roughly seven fold, and species diversity doubled, from the understorey to the canopy. Both edge space and open space bats were more active in the upper strata, but this tendency was much more accentuated in the latter. Myotis riparius was the only species with greater activity near the understorey. These patterns were altered at the edges of water bodies, where vertical stratification was much less marked.
The observed patterns are parsimoniously explained by constraints imposed by vegetation clutter that change across strata, which affect bat species differently. Only bats better adapted to closed spaces are usually capable of foraging within the understorey, whereas the majority of species can exploit the free spaces immediately below the canopy; open space bats seem to concentrate their activity above the canopy. This importance of the inter strata open spaces for bat foraging highlights the need to preserve pristine stratified rainforests, as even selective logging usually disrupts vertical stratification. Moreover, the concentration of insectivorous bats at the upper strata of rainforests underlines the need to include canopy level sampling in ecological studies.


The process of constructing a fixed-length conventional test frequently focuses on maximizing internal consistency reliability by selecting test items that are of average difficulty and high discrimination (a "peaked" test). The effect of constructing such a test, when viewed from the perspective of item response theory, is test scores that are precise for examinees whose trait levels are near the point at which the test is peaked; as examinee trait levels deviate from the mean, the precision of their scores decreases substantially. Results of a small simulation study demonstrate that when peaked tests are "off target" for an examinee, their scores are biased and have spuriously high standard deviations, reflecting substantial amounts of error. These errors can reduce the correlations of these kinds of scores with other variables and adversely affect the results of standard statistical tests. By contrast, scores from adaptive tests are essentially unbiased and have standard deviations that are much closer to true values. Basic concepts of adaptive testing are introduced and fully adaptive computerized tests (CATs) based on IRT are described. Several examples of response records from CATs are discussed to illustrate how CATs function. Some operational issues, including item exposure, content balancing, and enemy items are also briefly discussed. It is concluded that because CAT constructs a unique test for examinee, scores from CATs will be more precise and should provide better data for social science research and applications.


The majority of the five million people that live in the deltaic Indian Sundarbans face continuous uncertainties in relation to their shelter, livelihoods, and health. Climate change is one of the key factors aggravating this situation. While scientific evidence exists regarding climatic changes in the Sundarbans, scientists and experts often disagree about how the resulting key challenges should be addressed. The communities in the Sundarbans hold considerable knowledge about these uncertainties and their complex socioeconomic and ecological origins. However, this knowledge is often bypassed in planning and policy. It is vital that the communities' knowledge and that of experts and scientists be brought together to improve livelihood adaptation and disaster response, and promote more socially just and sustainable outcomes in this vulnerable coastal region of India. Bringing Together Voices to Address Climate Change Uncertainty in the Indian Sundarbans


The measures contained in the 1988 Education Reform Act have transformed the educational landscape of state schooling. This thesis examines two policies contained in the Reform Act, that of the abolition of the Inner London Education Authority and the introduction of local management of schools in inner London from a perspective founded in anti-racist, feminist and social justice approaches. Using case study as a research tool, the thesis builds on an analysis of data collected from a variety of sources. In particular, the thesis uses data collected from interviews with a sample of local government officers, governors, and headteachers in the inner London boroughs, statistical evidence and content analysis of policy documents. The analysis places these two policies within the wider context of the restructuring of the welfare state and the changes in the relationships between national and local government. In particular, it argues that the abolition of the Inner London Education Authority represented the clearest example of the Conservative Government's philosophy to local government, education and schools. Drawing on the analysis from the interviews and documentary evidence, it examines the rationale behind the abolition of ILEA and the introduction of local management in inner London schools. It argues that both the abolition and the introduction of local management of schools were critical to the introduction and implementation of a market in education. Furthermore, it examines the impact of local management on the management of schools with a particular emphasis on issues of gender and 'race' and discusses some of the implications local management has had for developing strategies to address inequalities in education. As a postscript, the thesis identities some of the key elements of local management that are likely to continue under the new Labour Government.


Experiments on free-living and captive Kestrels were set up to investigate the effect of food and condition on laying date and clutch size, and to distinguish between the income and capital models. Kestrels showed the same seasonal decrease in clutch size in different areas (Flevoland and Lauwersmeer) and in different years (early and late). Juveniles and adults had the same distribution of laying dates and laid the same number of eggs in any particular date interval. The seasonal decline in clutch size found between individuals was also found within individuals, breeding in different years. Feeding experiments in the field, early and late in the breeding season, advanced the mean date of laying by 10 and 6 days respectively, compared with controls. However, the advance depended on the actual food situation: in low vole years experimental birds laid three weeks earlier than controls, in high vole years experimental and control birds had no significant difference in laying date. The advance in laying date was associated with a change in the number of eggs, and clutch size did not deviate from the expected size for the date. Food experiments in the laboratory supported these findings: food supply had a direct effect on the date of laying but not on the number of eggs. Body mass of laying females with surplus food was higher than in their controls (specially of late breeders) and did not vary with date over two months, still late surplus fed breeders laid smaller clutches. The data do support neither the income model (rate of energy supply during laying determines clutch size) nor the capital model (condition of the laying female determines clutch size). We propose that food availability determines the laying date and the number of eggs is determined by date itself. Whether body mass as an indicator of condition is causally involved in determining laying date or is merely correlated with food supply can not presently be established.


Public libraries make an important contribution to the wellbeing of local people often acting as community hubs by reducing the isolation felt by vulnerable members of society through promoting social interaction and supporting the wider needs of local communities. However, access to libraries is threatened in Wales, as elsewhere in the UK, by uncertainty stemming from changes in local government service delivery models, austerity-driven cuts in public spending, changing demands on the service from the public and the potential impacts of new developments in digital services and technologies. Drawing on network-based analysis of changes to library services in a predominantly rural authority in South-West Wales, the aim of this paper is to demonstrate how Geographical Information Systems can be used to monitor the impacts of alternative models of provision currently being considered by library authorities. By examining the spatial impacts of changes in services following a period of re-configuration in this library authority, we point the way to methods that enable levels of provision that meet community needs to be sought during times of budgetary pressures and proposed changes to the delivery of public services.


Haunted by representations of black women that resist the reality of the body's vulnerability, Kimberly Juanita Brown traces slavery's afterlife in black women's literary and visual cultural productions. Brown draws on black feminist theory, visual culture studies, literary criticism, and critical race theory to explore contemporary visual and literary representations of black women's bodies that embrace and foreground the body's vulnerability and slavery's inherent violence. She shows how writers such as Gayl Jones, Toni Morrison, Audre Lorde, and Jamaica Kincaid, along with visual artists Carrie Mae Weems and Maria Magdalena Campos-Pons, highlight the scarred and broken bodies of black women by repeating, passing down, and making visible the residues of slavery's existence and cruelty. Their work not only provides a corrective to those who refuse to acknowledge that vulnerability, but empowers black women to create their own subjectivities. In The Repeating Body , Brown returns black women to the center of discourses of slavery, thereby providing the means with which to more fully understand slavery's history and its penetrating reach into modern American life.


This paper shows that the Framers empowering Congress to act by "securing for limited Times to…Inventors the exclusive Right to their…Discoveries" understood that the exclusive patent right is not "granted" but is a preexistent right emanating from the inventor – not from Congress. This exclusive right is only secured by statute, as part of the patent bargain in exchange for the inventor's public disclosure of the invention. Therefore the right adjudicated in administrative validity review of issued patents is a "private right." It is shown that the notion of post-issuance administrative "error correction" is fiction, as it overlooks the irreversible and uncorrectable exchange of rights upon patent issuance. It is concluded that only Article III courts can extinguish such private rights and that arguments advanced by proponents of post-issuance administrative patent revocation are therefore deficient in supporting the constitutionality of such proceedings.


Invoking Rimini Protocoll's theatrical performance "Remote Vilnius" in this article the phenomenological experience aesthetics is analyzed, which creates preconditions for the experience of public urban spaces. Phenomenological experience is interpreted on the basis of Charles Baudelaire's and Walter Benjamin's flâneur concept and the nomad concepts of Gilles Deleuz and Felix Guattari. The flâneur definition is used to describe the sovereignty of the participants based on anonymity and bodily participation, and the definition of the nomad is related to the identity of the viewer demolishing individual experiences and such an internal desubjectification, in which a new form of self-perception/discovery is possible. It is argued that the insights of the abovementioned authors may be correlated with the phenomenological return to the objects themselves.


The criticism of Roman women, particularly from the Late Republic to the early dynasties of the Principate, was a constant in the literary and historie al accounts of ancient Roman society. This censure has previously been either attributed to the cultural misogyny inherent in a patriarchal society or treated disparately for the anecdotal content without a survey of themes and tropes found in the criticisms. When the material is gathered together and examined as a whole, several themes and patterns emerge from the episodes involving the disparagement of women close to power. Such women were criticized for their involvement in politics (often through influence over powerful men), administration, and the military. The criticisms were motivated by various anxieties experienced by the male elite, such as the disparity between cultural ideal for Roman women and the reality, the conflict between the domus and the res publica, and the overarching anxiety about the burgeoning monarchy (and women's place in it) developing in the Late Republic and coming into fruition with the Principate of Augustus, as it related to Roman ideas of tyranny. Chapter Two examines the themes of criticism in the accounts of strong Julio-Claudian female figures, Livia, Messalina, and Agrippina Minor. Chapter Three explores the origins of these criticisms in the anecdotes of public female action in the Republic, with particular emphasis on the triumviral period. Chapter Four deals with the women accompanying Roman officiaIs into the provinces (which were a kind of monarchy) to show that the themes and tropes in the censure of Roman women close to power were uniform across time period and geographicallocation.


From 1956 to 1960 in the Planned Parenthood Consultation Clinic of Keio University Japan 108 successful pregnancies resulted from a single insemination with a donors semen. Patient age averaged 29.5 years; average sterile period 5.37 years. Most had regular menstruation. 12 had suffered from tuberculosis 1 from nephritis 1 from pyelitis 2 cystitis and 1 purpura. In 5 cases a suspension operation of the uterus had been done and in 11 appendectomies. Pelvic examination revealed hypoplasia of the uteri in 61 cases extreme in 6. There was displacement of the uterus in 51 cases. Hysterosalpingography showed unilateral occlusion of a fallopian tube in 3 spasm of the tubes in 12 adhesions in 3 and stenosis in 3. All endometrial biopsies showed secretory endothelium. Within 3 cycles after repeated insemination 65% became pregnant; within 6 cycles 88.9%. The longest period was 12 cycles. Basal body temperatures showed 30.5% became pregnant on day of ovulation 65.7% between inseminations done a day before and a day after ovulation 87% from Day 8 to Day 22 after onset of previous menstruation; pregnancies occurred from Day 10 to Day 23. For individuals with maximum cervical mucus pregnancy most often occurred. Patients showing luteal insufficiency were given oral hormone therapy. The earliest positive Asheim-Zondek reaction was on Day 36 after the last period Day 25 after insemination. This was Day 20 after rise in body temperature. Miscarriage resulted in 14 instances (12.9%); 9 had shown luteal insufficiency. Among 60 deliveries 47 were normal 1 premature 9 cesarean 1 forceps delivery and 2 stillbirths. Of 50 newborn 32 were male and 26 female. When insemination was done before calculated ovulation 68% were male; when after 75% were female. Pregnancy in the 6 cases with extreme uterine hypoplasia was noteworthy. It was concluded that the active period of sperm is longer than formerly believed. The cervical mucus was a better indicator than basal body temperature for estimation of ovulation. Fewer pregnancies occurred and miscarriages were more frequent when insufficiency of luteal function had been shown.


This study was aimed at developing a Bahasa Melayu grammar learning portal for Form Two students (BMGLP). A developmental approach was used in this study. Needs analysis was carried out on the Bahasa Melayu teachers and Form Two students. The results of needs analysis on Form Two students showed that they preferred topics such as question answering techniques, and proverbs. The Delphi technique using consensus of experts in Bahasa Melayu was carried out in three rounds. The findings have resulted in successful development of a Bahasa Melayu Grammar Learning Portal for Form Two students. Hence it can be concluded that the BMGLP was successfully developed and can help students to acquire Bahasa Melayu grammar eficiently. Lastly, based on the findings, it is suggested that teachers and students use use web portal materials as supplementary resources to diversify their learning activities besides enriching their knowledge of Bahasa Melayu grammar.


The application of transcatheter aortic valve replacement (TAVR) has expanded rapidly over the last decade as a less invasive option for the treatment of severe aortic stenosis. In order to perform successful TAVR, vascular access must be obtained with a large-bore catheter to deliver the transcatheter valve to the aortic annulus. Several techniques have been developed for this purpose including transfemoral (TF), trans-aortic, trans-apical, trans-caval, trans-carotid, and trans-axillary (TAx) with varying degrees of success. Among them, TF access is the most common and preferred method owing to its superior and well-established outcomes. However, in the setting of diseased iliofemoral arterial vessels, severe tortuosity, or iliofemoral arteries of insufficient caliber, TF access may not be possible. In these scenarios, one of the aforementioned alternative access routes needs to be considered. TAx-TAVR is an attractive alternative because it can be accomplished via access to a peripheral vessel as opposed to needing to enter the pericardial space or thoracic cavity. In addition, the open surgical cut-down procedure used to expose the axillary artery is familiar to cardiac surgeons who are accustomed to cannulating it for cardiopulmonary bypass. With advancements in TAVR technology including the evolution of delivery systems and corresponding smaller sheath sizes, total percutaneous access via the axillary artery is gaining substantial attention. In this review, we outline key aspects of patient selection, imaging and procedural techniques, and examine contemporary clinical outcomes with this approach.


Context: We describe a case of paraneoplastic neurologic syndrome, namely N-Methyl-D-Aspartic acid receptor antibody associated limbic encephalitis, a rare cause of altered mental status in the young. Case Report: A 28 year old Caucasian female nurse presented with acute onset difficulty with word finding and increasing confusion and agitation. She also had visual hallucinations, transient episodes of unresponsiveness, and lingual dyskinesias. Workup including blood, imaging and regular cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) studies was unremarkable. She subsequently developed complex partial seizures. Computerized Tomography scan of chest/abdomen/pelvis revealed a dermoid cyst of the left ovary and CSF N-Methyl-D-Aspartic acid receptor antibody returned positive confirming the diagnosis of paraneoplastic NMDA receptor antibody associated limbic encephalitis. She was treated with methylprednisolone therapy along with plasmapheresis and a left salpingo-opherectomy was performed. The patient showed significant improvement with respect to her cognitive function and had no more seizures. Conclusion: N-Methyl-D-Aspartic acid receptor antibody associated limbic encephalitis is a rare paraneoplastic neurologic syndrome with symptoms including psychiatric manifestations, seizures, language disturbances and autonomic instability. It develops due to antibody induced decrease in N-Methyl-D-Aspartic acid receptors. There is a significant association with ovarian teratoma in >50% female cases. Treatment includes resection of tumor, glucocorticoids, plasmapheresis and Intravenous Immunoglobulin therapy.


The origin of this essay is a presentation the author made at the Office of the Attorney General of the State of Texas on December 10, 2008. This essay is derived from the author's presentation, which originally was entitled "A Brief and Highly Selective History of American Legal Education and Jurisprudence. " In this essay, the author provides an overview of the history and development of legal education in America, emphasizing the establishment and evolution of the case method of instruction in American law schools and focusing on the influence of American jurisprudence on the development of legal education in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Drawing on Christopher Columbus Langdell, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., Benjamin N. Cardozo, and Karl N. Llewellyn (among others), the author discusses the impact that American legal education has had on American jurisprudence and the reciprocal impact that American jurisprudence has had on both the means and the ends of legal education in the United States. The author concludes with a brief exploration of the direction of American legal education in the early twenty-first century.


A field experiment was carried out to evaluate the influence of foliar application of iron on growth and physiological parameters of wheat (Triticum aestivum L. Alex cultivar) at various growth stages, during the growing season 20122013 at Didactic Station, Timisoara, Romania. The experiment was laid out in a randomized complete block design with three replications. Wheat plants were exposed to four treatments: control (T1), Fe applied to plants at Feekes growth stage 2 (T2), Fe applied to plants at Feekes growth stage 9 (T3), Fe applied to plants at growth stage Feekes 2 and 9 (T4). The treatments were foliar application of Fe (1000 mg L -1 ) using iron chelate [Fe-DTPA (6% Fe)]. Foliar solution of Fe was sprayed with a hand held pump sprayer at the rate of 1.2 L plot -1 on plant foliage. Soil samples were collected before sowing of crop from 0-25 cm depth and analyzed for chemical and physical properties. Data analysis showed that there were significant differences among treatments on plant height, number of plants, flag leaf area and flag leaf chlorophyll content. The highest plant height (88 cm), number of plants m -2 (418), flag leaf area (30 cm 2 ) and chlorophyll (59.3 SPAD value) were obtained from the foliar application of Fe at Feekes GS 2 and Feekes GS 9 (T4), in comparison with the control. The data suggest that foliar application of Fe during vegetative growth stages can maximize plant growth and development of wheat.


The pre‐Bötzinger complex (pre‐BötC) is hypothesized to be the site for respiratory rhythm generation in mammals. Studies examining the cellular mechanisms mediating rhythm generation have focused on the role of chemically mediated synaptic interactions; however, electrotonic synaptic interactions (i.e., electrotonic coupling), which occur by means of gap junctions, may also play a role. Here, we used immunoblot and immunohistochemical analyses to determine whether the pre‐BötC contains the gap junction proteins necessary for electrotonic communication and whether the presence and distribution of these gap junction proteins show a developmental change in expression. We found that both connexin26 (Cx26) and connexin32 (Cx32) were expressed in pre‐BötC neurons of neonatal and adult rats; however, the relative amounts and their distribution varied by age. Cx26 labeling was seen in a high proportion of pre‐BötC neurons in neonatal rats ≤ 7 days postnatal (P7) but declined with increasing age. In contrast, Cx32 labeling was sparse in pre‐BötC neurons of neonatal rats ≤ P7, but increased with increasing age; the highest proportion was seen in adult rats. These data suggest the potential for gap junctional communication in the pre‐BötC of both neonatal and adult rats, and we propose that the gap junction proteins Cx26 and Cx32 form the neuroanatomic substrate for this gap junctional communication, which may be important in the synchronization of neural activity generating respiratory rhythm.J. Comp. Neurol. 440:12–19, 2001. © 2001 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.


Neonicotinoid insecticides kill bees. Or do they? The European Union has approved a moratorium – though manufacturers say there is no evidence to implicate their product. But they demand experiments that cannot be performed, says Dave Goulson, subject their own data to no statistical analysis, and spuriously reject good evidence that does exist. So how strong is the link between these chemicals and the decline of our bees?


This action research paper examines the relationship between explicit vocabulary instruction and reading comprehension, specifically with English Language Learners (ELL). The research took place in a second and fourth grade classroom in the same school in central Minnesota. Students took pretests and posttests for grade level comprehension and vocabulary assessments. Students would then receive explicit vocabulary instruction throughout the week. Finally, students would complete the same assessments as were completed at the beginning of Student surveys were also used to measure confidence and motivation. Data was collected in the form of pretest and posttest scores for grade level comprehension and vocabulary assessments, student surveys, and Fountas and Pinnell assessments. Study results suggest that explicit vocabulary instruction does have an effect on reading comprehension and that ELLs showed a greater degree of growth than non-ELLs. However, more research needs to be conducted to verifythat the results were because of vocabulary instruction rather than students making gains from other reading areas. After completing this research, a next possible step would be to continue collecting data to increase the sample size. Another step would be to create a control group and only use explicit vocabulary instruction with some of the students and then compare data from both groups.


An important step in projecting future climate change impacts on extremes involves quantifying the underlying probability distribution functions (PDFs) of climate variables. However, doing so can prove challenging when multiple models and large domains are considered. Here an approach to PDF quantification using k‐means clustering is considered. A standard clustering algorithm (with k = 5 clusters) is applied to 33 years of daily January surface temperature from two state‐of‐the‐art reanalysis products, the North American Regional Reanalysis and the Modern Era Retrospective Analysis for Research and Applications. The resulting cluster assignments yield spatially coherent patterns that can be broadly related to distinct climate regimes over North America, e.g., low variability over the tropical oceans or temperature advection across stronger or weaker gradients. This technique has the potential to be a useful and intuitive tool for evaluation of model‐simulated PDF structure and could provide insight into projections of future changes in temperature.


ABSTRACT Temporary labour migration has become a fixture in the Philippines affecting the economic make-up of Filipino households through the significant amount of remittances being sent on a regular basis. This stimulated the economy and improved the well-being of household members through enhanced expenditures in various family sustenance activities. This study highlights how the Overseas Filipino Worker (OFW)-dependent households use the remittances they received in terms of business creation. Human capital and entrepreneurial ideas are accumulated when working overseas, which can be used for business creation such as micro-stores or a more complex business model. Engaging in business further augments household income of OFW households and for most, serve as the incentive for going into business further. By using a qualitative response model approach, this study estimated the effects of remittances on the decision of OFW-dependent households to engage in entrepreneurial activities; and analyzed their behaviour toward business creation. Results provided a framework on their decision-making process regarding the productive use of their remittances. Instead of just spending the money entirely on consumption goods, they could actually use the money to invest in more sustainable income generating activities. Moreover, they will have a better idea on how to go about the creation of income generating opportunities. On the other hand, the government would also have a better idea on how to provide support by helping them manage and grow their earned money. (ProQuest: ... denotes formulae omitted.) INTRODUCTION The Philippines is regarded as a manpower exporting economy registering 10 percent of its 90 million people, as of 2009, living and working in at least 200 destinations worldwide as doctors, engineers, nurses, teachers, technicians, production workers, caregivers, entertainers, and domestic workers to name a few. Limited domestic employment opportunities and the high compensation package relative to the Philippines attract many workers, particularly the educated workers, to seek overseas employment. In most cases, according to Macaraeg (2005), Filipino workers are in demand abroad because of their proficiency in English, their training in Western standards of education, their reputation of being hardworking, resourceful, adaptable, and patient employees with a willingness to accept a lower compensation, and as a value added to some employers, their adherence to some Christian values. Temporary labour migration has become a fixture in the country affecting the social, economic and cultural make-up of Filipinos. The magnitude of Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs) is not only the reason for its socio-cultural and economic significance but likewise the huge amount of remittances that they sent to their families on a regular basis. According to the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP), remittance inflows reached over USD 17 billion in 2009 that stimulated the economy and improved the well-being of household members through enhanced expenditures in various family sustenance activities. OFW remittances contribute so much to the economy's growth on a macroeconomic level since it promotes competitiveness in terms of the exchange rate. On a microeconomic level however, the effects vary. Typically, OFWs are forced to work abroad in order to augment family income. Hence, remittances affect a household's consumption patterns, which results to more expenditure on food, education, and leisure. It also enhances the household's propensity to save. Accumulated earnings allow investments that would not have otherwise been made due to credit constraints and large capital requirements (Yang, 2008). The vast opportunities abroad stimulate the desire of Filipinos to earn more. This international migration continues to be an important component of Philippine development especially among households with migrant workers, the proportion of which is steadily increasing (Orbeta, 2008). …


Abstract. Observed bimodal distributions of woody cover in western Africa provide evidence that alternative ecosystem states may exist under the same precipitation regimes. In this study, we show that bimodality can also be observed in mean annual shortwave radiation and above-ground biomass, which might closely relate to woody cover due to vegetation–climate interactions. Thus we expect that use of radiation and above-ground biomass enables us to distinguish the two modes of woody cover. However, through conditional histogram analysis, we find that the bimodality of woody cover still can exist under conditions of low mean annual shortwave radiation and low above-ground biomass. It suggests that this specific condition might play a key role in critical transitions between the two modes, while under other conditions no bimodality was found. Based on a land cover map in which anthropogenic land use was removed, six climatic indicators that represent water, energy, climate seasonality and water–radiation coupling are analysed to investigate the coexistence of these indicators with specific land cover types. From this analysis we find that the mean annual precipitation is not sufficient to predict potential land cover change. Indicators of climate seasonality are strongly related to the observed land cover type. However, these indicators cannot predict a stable forest state under the observed climatic conditions, in contrast to observed forest states. A new indicator (the normalized difference of precipitation) successfully expresses the stability of the precipitation regime and can improve the prediction accuracy of forest states. Next we evaluate land cover predictions based on different combinations of climatic indicators. Regions with high potential of land cover transitions are revealed. The results suggest that the tropical forest in the Congo basin may be unstable and shows the possibility of decreasing significantly. An increase in the area covered by savanna and grass is possible, which coincides with the observed regreening of the Sahara.


Beekeeping contributes to rural development by supporting agricultural production through pollination and by providing honey, wax, and other products for home use and sale. It offers a good way for resource-poor farmers in the Hindu Kush Himalayas to obtain income, as it requires only a small start-up investment, can be carried out in a small space close to the home, and generally yields profits within a year of operation. A modern approach to bee management, using frame hives and focusing on high quality, will help farmers benefit most fully from beekeeping. This manual is designed to help provide beekeepers with the up-to-date training they need. It presents an inclusive curriculum developed through ICIMOD's work with partner organizations in Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, and Nepal, supported by the Austrian Development Agency. A wide range of stakeholders – trainers, trainees, government and non-governmental organizations (NGOs), associations and federations, and private entrepreneurs – were engaged in the identification of curriculum needs and in development and testing of the curriculum. The manual covers the full range of beekeeping-related topics, including the use of bees for crop pollination; production of honey, wax and other hive products; honey quality standards; and using value chain and market management to increase beekeepers' benefits. It also includes emerging issues and innovations regarding such subjects as indigenous honeybees, gender and equity, integrated pest management, and bee-related policy. The focus is on participatory hands-on training, with clear explanations in simple language and many illustrations. The manual provides a basic resource for trainers and field extension workers in government and NGOs, universities, vocational training institutes, and private sector organizations, and for local trainers in beekeeping groups, beekeeping resource centres, cooperatives, and associations, for use in training Himalayan farmers. Individual ICIMOD regional member countries are planning local language editions adapted for their countries' specific conditions.


Not too fast, not too slow, somewhere in between In early depictions, dinosaurs lumbered slowly, dragging their tails. More recently, we have imagined them lifting their tails and running. The question boils down to whether dinosaurs had energetic systems closer to those of rapidly metabolizing mammals and birds, or to those of slower reptiles that do not internally regulate their body temperature. However, determining the metabolic rate of extinct organisms is no easy task. Grady et al. analyzed a huge data set on growth rate in both extinct and living species, using a method that considers body temperature and body size. Dinosaur metabolism seems to have been neither fast nor slow, but somewhere in the middle—so, dinosaurs did not fully regulate their internal temperature but they were also not entirely at the whim of the environment; neither slow goliaths nor supercharged reptiles. Science, this issue p. 1268 Analysis of animal growth energetics indicates that dinosaurs had intermediate metabolic rates and elevated but labile temperatures. Were dinosaurs ectotherms or fast-metabolizing endotherms whose activities were unconstrained by temperature? To date, some of the strongest evidence for endothermy comes from the rapid growth rates derived from the analysis of fossil bones. However, these studies are constrained by a lack of comparative data and an appropriate energetic framework. Here we compile data on ontogenetic growth for extant and fossil vertebrates, including all major dinosaur clades. Using a metabolic scaling approach, we find that growth and metabolic rates follow theoretical predictions across clades, although some groups deviate. Moreover, when the effects of size and temperature are considered, dinosaur metabolic rates were intermediate to those of endotherms and ectotherms and closest to those of extant mesotherms. Our results suggest that the modern dichotomy of endothermic versus ectothermic is overly simplistic.


· Job creation in the new EU Member States (NMS) and the EU candidate countries remains low despite high GDP growth in most countries. However, there are significant differences in developments among these countries (most recently between Poland and the other new Member States). · Labour markets in the NMS/candidate countries differ significantly from those of the EU 15 countries in terms of employment rates, employment patterns and unemployment. There are persistently high shares of long-term unemployed, youth unemployment is twice as high as in the EU-15 and there are diverging trends in female and youth employment rates as compared to the EU-15. · The service sector (in particular market services) has become the main source of employment, but in some countries manufacturing employment growth has resumed as well. Job creation (in employment generating services and manufacturing industries) has matched job destruction (in other activities) at least in some of the NMS. · Services are dominated by low-skill sectors, while most high-skill sectors are still underdeveloped; the latter show, however, the most dynamic employment growth both in relative and absolute terms. · Future employment opportunities will arise primarily in market services - particularly in high-skill sectors, while jobs in transport and telecommunications will decline further. There is also scope for new job creation in communal services, especially in health and social services. · Stimulating the creation of part-time jobs - the share of which in total employment in the NMS is negligible compared with the EU-15 - would be conducive to increasing employment, particularly of women. · The educational composition of the NMS labour force is biased in favour of those with medium-level education (i.e. those who have completed upper secondary schooling or training); relative to the EU-15, the NMS have smaller shares of both people with tertiary education (the 'highly educated') and those at most with only basic schooling (the 'low-educated'). Within the group of 'medium-educated' there is a larger proportion who have completed vocational training programmes rather than general upper secondary education compared to the EU-15. · The employment rates of the highly educated in the NMS and the EU-15 are similar, rates for the medium-educated are also much the same in the more advanced NMS (the Czech Republic, Hungary, Slovenia and Slovakia) as in the EU-15 but somewhat lower in the other countries; but employment rates are very low (and, conversely, unemployment is high) for the low-educated (the two exceptions are Slovenia and Romania). · There are a number of structural features accounting for these employment rate differences the primary sector (largely agriculture) accounts for a high proportion of the employment of the low-educated and this sector has lost jobs on a massive scale in most NMS; furthermore there is an 'under-representation' of the low-educated in both industry and market services in the NMS compared to the EU-15. The medium-educated, on the other hand, are particularly strongly represented in the workforce in industry which in turn specializes (as compared with the EU-15) in medium-skill sectors. This provides job opportunities for the medium-educated; however, strong productivity catching-up in industry tends to reduce jobs. Finally, the highly educated are particularly in demand in the high-skill sectors of market services (financial and business services), which have expanded strongly both in the NMS and the EU-15, and in publicly provided services; in fact, the highly educated in the NMS are disproportionately employed in public services (compared to the EU-15) while there is relatively low employment of the highly educated in industry. · Overall, the very low employment rate of the low-educated in the NMS seems to be a function of three factors a high proportion employed in agriculture which is shrinking; a relatively weak representation in the labour-intensive, lower-skill sectors of industry and market services; and, linked to these two factors, a tendency to be out-competed for jobs by the medium-educated in a situation where the latter are in relatively abundant supply and there is much slack in the labour market. · An analysis of occupational structure in the NMS supports this picture there is, in comparison to the EU-15, a smaller share of low-skill manual jobs in agriculture, industry and market services, i.e. the type of jobs which could provide job opportunities for the low-educated. Also in public services, there is a relative under-representation of low-skilled non-manual jobs compared to the situation in the EU-15. This is consistent with the low-educated being substituted by the medium-educated. · Finally, an analysis of changes in the structure of the labour force over the more recent period (1998-2003) and of the younger age cohorts shows significant adjustments in the educational characteristics of the labour force towards an 'upgrading' in educational attainment; however, the speed of change on the demand side is such that the labour market position of the low-educated has deteriorated further. Furthermore, an age cohort analysis indicates that in a number of respects educational attainment levels are adjusting less in the NMS than in the EU-15.


The thesis has two aims. First to conceptualise the meaning of the idea and practice of 'student feedback' on teaching and learning in higher education (HE). Second, to assess the effectiveness of 'student feedback' in respect of both students' and lecturers' communicative relations and needs and the aims of the contemporary HE policy agenda. Students and lecturers from a variety of HE institutions and subject disciplines were interviewed about their own perceptions and experiences of the purpose, process and demands of 'student feedback'. Analyses and discussion of these data are structured in respect of conclusions drawn from a comprehensive and critical appraisal of the intentions, assumptions and values expressed within HE government policy texts and documents issued by HE statutory agencies in the period 1987-1997. In these texts the idea and practice of 'student feedback' is located within a set of aims symbolised by, and implemented through, the concept 'quality'. 'Quality' is used to progress: efficient and effective management of HE institutions; a reorientation of academic cultures, practices and values; the reduction of professional autonomy, power and control through enforced institutional and national accountability procedures; the representation and empowerment of the student as 'customer'; a reorientation of the purpose of (the) higher education (curriculum); summative and formative evaluation of professional practice in HE teaching. The thesis finds that the student evaluation questionnaire (SEQ) is the dominant method used to elicit students' views on teaching and learning; it is also the subject of greatest interest within empirical research and management texts. The methodological and epistemological premises of the SEQ are compatible with the concept and strategy of 'quality' expressed in HE policy. The SEQ meets the explicit requirements of institutional and national accountability procedures and the practical exigencies consequent on the implementation of these requirements within institutions. Analysis of students' and lecturers' views on the communicative value of the SEQ highlights its inadequacies in respect of dialogue, expression and explanation. Analysis also stresses how students and lecturers experience teaching-learning as a complex, contingent, social and contextual process. Discussion illustrates how the SEQ generates conflict, divisions and tension both at an inter-personal level and within the educational process, and is also a reductionist evaluative practice that is experienced as unhelpful, confusing and disempowering. Lecturers and students associate the SEQ with the 'quality' agenda; narratives in which the SEQ is perceived as a bureaucratic, management-enforced burden on time and administrative resources relate to the controversial nature of this agenda, and yet also conflate with the negative experience of the SEQ. Analysis and discussion expose the letter of policy and statutory texts as legitimating rhetoric, and reveal both the contradictions in, and the inadequate conceptual basis of, the 'quality' agenda. Key issues are: the conditions that provide for student voice and empowerment within decision making and educational processes of teaching- learning; the commitment, values and motivations that underpin and progress professionalism and professional practice in teaching; and, the conditions that provide for support, development and reassurance within the formative activities of both student learning and the enhancement of teaching practice.


Water is a truly unique substance in many respects. It is the only chemical compound that naturally occurs in all three physical states (solid, liquid and vapor) under the thermodynamic conditions typical to the Earth's surface. It plays the principal role in virtually any significant geological and biological processes on our planet. Its outstanding properties as a solvent and its general abundance almost everywhere on the Earth's surface has made it also an integral part of many technological processes since the very beginning of the human civilization.

Aqueous fluids are crucial for the transport and enrichment of ore-forming constituents (Barnes 1997; Planetary Fluids 1990). Quantitative analysis of hydrothermal and metamorphic processes requires information on the physical-chemical, thermodynamic and transport properties of the fluid phases involved (Helgeson 1979, 1981; Sverjensky 1987; Eugster and Baumgartner 1987; Seward and Barnes 1997). These processes encompass a broad range of pressure and temperature conditions and, therefore, detailed understanding of the pressure and temperature dependencies of density, heat capacity, viscosity, diffusivities, and other related properties is necessary in order to develop realistic models of fluid behavior or fluid-mineral interactions.

Aqueous fluids under high-pressure, high-temperature conditions near and above the critical point of water ( P = 22.1 MPa and T = 647 K) are especially important in a variety of geochemical processes. Due to the large compressibility of supercritical fluid, small changes in pressure can produce very substantial changes in density, which, in turn, affect diffusivity, viscosity, dielectric, and solvation properties, thus dramatically influencing the kinetics and mechanisms of chemical reactions in water. Models of hydrothermal convection suggest that the near-critical conditions provide an optimal convective behavior due to unique combination of thermodynamic and transport properties in this region of the phase diagram of water (Norton 1984; Jupp and Schultz 2000 …


In an effort to elevate the international rule of law, international law scholars, especially since the end of the Cold War, have endeavored to determine how best to induce compliance, that is, how to encourage nations to obey international law. For all its advantages, this focus on compliance obscures the role of noncompliance in the international legal system. In the absence of effective mechanisms for decision and control, States sometimes feel obliged to take actions that formally violate existing norms but may nevertheless reflect current or developing expectations of lawfulness or make existing law effective. This is "operational noncompliance" - noncompliance that keeps an imperfectly effective system, such as international law, operational. Though compliance is and should be the norm, those who discount operational noncompliance disregard the tension, which is acute in the international arena, between the necessity in a legal system of maintaining the principle that the law is to be complied with - because otherwise what does it mean to be a law? - and the role of noncompliance in developing new law and in enforcing current law. This Essay explores that tension, arguing that we should recognize that operational noncompliance is and must be a part of the international legal system, as it is currently constituted, and that, in some cases, acts of operational noncompliance are legitimate. The failure to acknowledge the functions of operational noncompliance mythologizes contemporary international law, limits our ability to achieve community policies, and risks making international law irrelevant. Unless and until we have more effective international institutions, we will need to come to terms with noncompliance's role in the international legal system.


The partition of E1A proteins between soluble and structural framework fractions of human cells infected or transformed by subgroup C adenoviruses was investigated by using gentle cell fractionation conditions. A polyclonal antibody raised against a trpE-E1A fusion protein (K.R. Spindler, D.S.E. Rosser, and A. J. Berk, J. Virol. 132-141, 1984) synthesized in Escherichia coli was used to measure the steady-state levels of E1A proteins recovered in the various fractions by immunoblotting. The relative concentration of E1A proteins recovered in the soluble fraction of adenovirus type 2-infected cells was at least fivefold greater than the relative concentration in the corresponding fraction of transformed 293 cells. The observed distribution of E1A proteins was not altered by the sulfhydryl-blocking reagent N-ethylmaleimide. E1A proteins were recovered in nuclear matrix, chromatin, and cytoskeleton fractions after further fractionation of the structural framework fraction. However, the E1A protein species that could be identified by one-dimensional gel electrophoresis were not uniformly distributed among the subcellular fractions examined. The results obtained when fractionation was performed in the presence of the oxidation catalysts Cu2+ or (ortho-phenanthroline)2 Cu2+ indicate that E1A proteins can be efficiently cross-linked, via disulfide bonds, to the structural framework of both adenovirus-infected and adenovirus-transformed cells.


This paper documents the existence of the direct and indirect (via word-of-mouth) effects of service quality on new customer acquisition, usage and retention using behavioral data from the launch of a new video on demand type service. For this technology, service quality - the quality of the signal determining the number of movies available for viewing - is exogenously determined and objectively measured. This information, coupled with location and neighborhood information for each subscriber allows us to measure both the direct and indirect effects of service quality. Our identification strategy for these effects arises from both the main effect of neighbors who have previously adopted and the interaction between the number of neighbors and their realized service quality, while controlling for other geographic and demographic covariates. We find a direct effect of service quality on rental usage and termination behavior. In addition, we find that word of mouth affects about one-fifth of the subscribers with respect to their activation behavior. However, this indirect effect of service quality acts as a double-edged sword as it is asymmetric. We find that the effect of negative word of mouth is twice as high as the effect of positive word of mouth for consumers influenced by word of mouth. We find these effects after controlling for unobserved heterogeneity, marketing activity, distance to retail and demographics. Consumers affected by word of mouth tend to be heavy users once they adopt the service. The implication from these results is that service quality is important for new customer acquisition in the sense that the heavy users tend to be acquired by word of mouth rather than advertising. In terms of profitability, we find that a 10% increase in service quality leads to a 7% increase in customer lifetime value. Finally, for our sample of adopters, we find that word of mouth effects also lead to acceleration in adoption behavior.


In this article we examine the question whether cognate complements (as in dance the tango ) and circumstantial complements (as in climb stairs ) can be regarded as expressing the same semantic role. Halliday has proposed that they do: in his view they both delimit the 'extent', or 'Range', of the process. Traditionally, however, they have been regarded as distinct grammatical categories. Assuming, like Halliday, that grammatical categories are form-meaning couplings, we investigate in corpus data the two types of formal evidence proposed by him for the unified Range category: alternations and selection restrictions on determiners and modifiers. By quantifying the relative frequencies of the alternate constructions, we have found that clauses with cognate complements form the marked option – totalling on average 3.5% – in comparison with intransitives. Clauses with circumstantial complements, by contrast, alternate with intransitive clauses as well as with clauses with prepositional phrase in varying proportions. This shows that the notion of 'location involved in process' can be more strongly or weakly present in the semantics of verbs taking circumstantial complements. The determiners and modifiers of cognate and circumstantial complements also reflect different semantic relations of the complement to the process expressed by the verb. Cognate complements are predominantly indefinite and circumstantial complements more often definite, because the former typically construe a 'new' instance of the process, whereas the latter often express pre-existing locations. Attributive modifiers of the two complement types differ both quantitatively and qualitatively. Cognate complements take more qualitative adjectives, which tend to express the manner in which the process takes place. Circumstantial complements have much less qualitative modification and often express the resistance or facilitation offered by the location to the action being carried out on it. We conclude that the two types of complements express different sorts of entities with different relations to the process.


In the light of technology-driven social change that creates new challenges for universities, this paper considers the potential of mobile learning as a subset of e-learning to effect a paradigm shift in higher education. Universities face exponential growth in demand for higher education, significant decreases in government funding for education, a changing in understanding of the nature of knowledge, changing student demographics and expectations, and global competition. At the same time untethered mobile telephony is connecting large numbers of potential learners to communications networks. A review of some empirical literature on the current status of mobile learning that explores alternatives to help universities fulfil core functions of storage, processing, and disseminating knowledge that can be applied to real life problems, is followed by an examination of the strengths and weaknesses of increased connectivity to mobile communications networks to support constructivist, self-directed quality interactive learning for increasingly mobile learners. This paper also examines whether mobile learning can align the developing technology with changing student expectations and the implications of such an alignment for teaching and institutional strategies. Technologies considered include mobile computing and technology, wireless laptop, hand-held PDAs, and mobile telephony.


In the domain of conservation and promotion of cultural heritage, the development of new information technologies offers new tools for sharing knowledge on heritage building. These tools are destined to help experts to enrich and access information about buildings. This article proposes an approach allowing the automatic transfer of annotations in a set of spatially-oriented photographs (whose positions and orientations in space are estimated) by using 3D information. First of all, an automated image-based 3D reconstruction method produces 3D information (specifically 3D coordinates) by processing photographs of the set. Then, the process of annotations' transfer between images uses this generated 3D information. Finally, this process allows the implementation of the annotations modification. As a consequence, this process provides a simple way to annotate blocs of images all at once instead of one by one.


The blood–testis barrier (BTB), one of the tightest blood–tissue barriers in the mammalian body, creates an immune-privileged site for postmeiotic spermatid development to avoid the production of antibodies against spermatid-specific antigens, many of which express transiently during spermiogenesis and spermiation. However, the BTB undergoes extensive restructuring at stage VIII of the epithelial cycle to facilitate the transit of preleptotene spermatocytes and to prepare for meiosis. This action thus prompted us to investigate whether this stage can be a physiological window for the delivery of therapeutic and/or contraceptive drugs across the BTB to exert their effects at the immune-privileged site. Herein, we report findings that P-glycoprotein, an ATP-dependent efflux drug transporter and an integrated component of the occludin/zonula occludens 1 (ZO-1) adhesion complex at the BTB, structurally interacted with focal adhesion kinase (FAK), creating the occludin/ZO-1/FAK/P-glycoprotein regulatory complex. Interestingly, a knockdown of P-glycoprotein by RNAi was found to impede Sertoli cell BTB function, making the tight junction (TJ) barrier "leaky." This effect was mediated by changes in the protein phosphorylation status of occludin via the action of FAK, thereby affecting the endocytic vesicle-mediated protein trafficking events that destabilized the TJ barrier. However, the silencing of P-glycoprotein, although capable of impeding drug transport across the BTB and TJ permeability barrier function, was not able to induce the BTB to be "freely" permeable to adjudin. These findings indicate that P-glycoprotein is involved in BTB restructuring during spermatogenesis but that P-glycoprotein–mediated restructuring does not "open up" the BTB to make it freely permeable to drugs.


The global food system makes a significant contribution to climate changing greenhouse gas emissions with all stages in the supply chain, from agricultural production through processing, distribution, retailing, home food preparation and waste, playing a part. It also gives rise to other major environmental impacts, including biodiversity loss and water extraction and pollution. Policy makers are increasingly aware of the need to address these concerns, but at the same time they are faced with a growing burden of food security and nutrition-related problems, and tasked with ensuring that there is enough food to meet the needs of a growing global population. In short, more people need to be fed better, with less environmental impact. How might this be achieved? Broadly, three main 'takes' or perspectives, on the issues and their interactions, appear to be emerging. Depending on one's view point, the problem can be conceptualised as a production challenge, in which case there is a need to change how food is produced by improving the unit efficiency of food production; a consumption challenge, which requires changes to the dietary drivers that determine food production; or a socio-economic challenge, which requires changes in how the food system is governed. This paper considers these perspectives in turn, their implications for nutrition and climate change, and their strengths and weaknesses. Finally, an argument is made for a reorientation of policy thinking which uses the insights provided by all three perspectives, rather than, as is the situation today, privileging one over the other. Food security: Nutrition: Climate change: Greenhouse gas: Meat and dairy


This paper provides a unique snapshot of the exposures of EU banks to shadow banking entities within the global financial system. Drawing on a rich and novel dataset, the paper documents the cross-sector and cross-border linkages and considers which are the most relevant for systemic risk monitoring. From a macroprudential perspective, the identification of potential feedback and contagion channels arising from the linkages of banks and shadow banking entities is particularly challenging when shadow banking entities are domiciled in different jurisdictions. The analysis shows that many of the EU banks' exposures are towards non-EU entities, particularly US-domiciled shadow banking entities. At the individual level, banks' exposures are diversified although this diversification leads to high overlap across different types of shadow banking entities.


The doctoral research project is titled 'An Exploration of the Relationship of Organisational Culture and Enterprise System Success and sought to address the research gap identified in the literature between organisational culture literature and Information System success literature. This is a research project which is funded by the Australian Research Council in conjunction with industry. The industry sponsors for this research were SAP AG, SAP USA and SAP ANZ.
The research project adopted a multi-method research design, grounded in practice, in order to surface any reported relationship between Enterprise Systems Success (ESS) and Organisational Culture (OC). A critical part of the study was to identify who could report on this relationship. Partners in implementation include internal change managers, internal consultants, vendor consultants and implementation partner consultants. Representatives from each of these constituents were interviewed, covering a range of industry sectors and Enterprise Systems vendor organisations. The first phase of the research was to qualitatively assess the perception of these participants on the role of culture to Enterprise Systems Success. This phase used open, axial and selective coding of the responses obtained in a semi-structured interview.
The next phase of the research was to gather quantitative measures of Organisational Culture and Enterprise Systems Success. The Organisational Culture Assessment Inventory (OCAI) of Cameron and Quinn was selected to gather quantitative data on Organisational Culture. The Enterprise Systems Success instrument of Gable, Sedera and Chan was selected to measure the perception of ESS because of its proven reliability and validity.
Each of these data sets were then analysed to determine if an association existed between the cultures of organisations that achieved most success with the Enterprise System as opposed to the culture types reported of organisations that achieved the least success with the ES. These findings then assisted in the development of a model of interaction between OC and ESS.
Finally, the relationship of OC to ESS was explored in a rich case study of one large firm, to determine if the consultant's reported relationships could be identified in the subcultures of the organisation.
The key findings of this study were:
1.
There was a relationship reported between culture type and success types. The findings a-e below represent findings using the culture definitions from Cameron & Quinn's culture instrument:
a.
clan cultures which emphasised the behaviours of development of others were related to reports of ESS
b.
hierarchical cultures which emphasised the behaviours of control and coordination were related to reports of ESS
c.
hierarchical cultures which were poor in the execution of control and coordination were related to reports of the least success with ES
d.
market cultures which emphasised (internal) competitiveness were strongly related to reports of least success with ES
e.
literature attributes of continuous improvement (CI), flexibility (F) and innovation (I), which are often described as antecedents to innovation success and are found in the culture type of adhocracy, were reported as strongly related to success of ES, but the culture type of adhocracy was not reported as being present in the quantitative data describing consultant experiences with enterprises which had implemented ES.
2.
that the literature supported theoretical reasons for the above findings
3.
that these patterns of association were found in the case study.
The research supports the proposition that there is a relationship between Organisational Culture type and ESS. Certain culture types practice behaviours that correspond to reported necessary behaviours for innovation success and ESS, whilst other culture types practice behaviours that correspond to behaviours for failure of innovation and of ES failure. A model of and explanation for this relationship was proposed as a result of the findings. Future research is now required to empirically test this model.


Obesity develops due to energy (food) intake exceeding energy expenditure. Nutrients that reduce the positive energy balance are thus being considered as therapies to combat obesity. Here, we review the literature related to the physiological, cellular and endocrine effects of intake of whey proteins, namely α-lactalbumin, β-lactoglobulin, glycomacropeptide and lactoferrin. Moreover, we discuss how dietary composition and obesity may influence whey protein effects on the above parameters. Evidence suggests that intake of whey proteins causes a decrease in energy intake, increase in energy expenditure, influence insulin sensitivity and glucose homeostasis and alter lipid metabolism in the adipose, liver and muscle. These physiological changes are accompanied by alterations in the plasma levels of energy balance related hormones (cholecystokinin, ghrelin, insulin and glucagon-like peptide-1) and the expression of catabolic and anabolic genes in the above tissue in the direction to cause a negative energy balance.


This essay uses the Australian proactive approach to regulating attorneys as a springboard to discussing the role of proactive regulation of lawyers in advancing public protection. The essay provides information on the genesis and implementation of "proactive management-based regulation, the system in Australia. The essay reviews key research findings from empirical studies on the impact of the new system on complaints registered against lawyers and the conduct of lawyers in firms. The essay suggests possibilities for using management-based principles to improve lawyer regulation and conduct in the United States and other jurisdictions. The author concludes with a challenge for regulators and regulated persons to transform the heavy reliance on a "disciplinary" approach that largely swoops in after alleged misconduct to an "integrity" system in which lawyers and regulators work in partnership to raise the ethical bar in the interest of public protection.