GWAS have identified 108 loci that confer risk for schizophrenia, but risk mechanisms for individual loci are largely unknown. Using developmental, genetic, and illness-based RNA sequencing expression analysis, we characterized the human brain transcriptome around these loci and found enrichment for developmentally regulated genes with novel examples of shifting isoform usage across pre- and post-natal life. We found widespread expression quantitative trait loci (eQTLs), including many with transcript specificity and previously unannotated sequence that were independently replicated. We leveraged this eQTL database to show that 48.1% of risk variants for schizophrenia associated with nearby expression. Within patients and controls, we implemented a novel algorithm for RNA quality adjustment, and identified 237 genes significantly associated with diagnosis that replicated in an independent case-control dataset. These genes implicated synaptic processes and were strongly regulated in early development (p < 10-20). These data offer new targets for modeling schizophrenia risk in cellular systems.


Introduction: The aim of this study was to compare the effect between different levels of ultrasonic tip activation on the depth of epoxy resin-based sealer (AH plus) dentinal tubules penetration. Materials and Methods: Extracted single-rooted premolars (n = 60) were randomly allocated into three groups and instrumented following the same protocol. Group 1 (control), the sealer was mixed with 0.1% Rhodamine B dye and placed using size 20 K-file. In Group 2, the sealer was passively activated using ultrasonic tip (ISO 25) 10 s mesiodistally and buccolingually at 2 mm from the apex. In Group 3, the sealer was activated in a similar manner at 4 mm from the apex. Samples were sectioned horizontally at 2 mm, 4 mm, and 6 mm from the apex and analyzed using a stereomicroscope for tubular dentine sealer penetration. The cross-sectional area (μm2) was measured with software to get the percentage of sealer penetration, and presences of voids were recorded. Results: Significant lesser percentage of sealer penetration into the dentinal tubules was observed between the control group and both the experimental groups (P = 0.00) at 2 mm, 4 mm, and 6 mm from the apex. There was no significant difference in the percentage of sealer penetration into the dentinal tubules between both the experimental groups (P > 0.05). The presence of voids between all groups was not statistically significant (P > 0.05). Conclusion: Passive ultrasonic activation of sealer placement resulted in deeper sealer penetration into the dentinal tubules even at a higher level of tip activation (4 mm).


The stability of the international reserve currency's purchasing power is less a question of what serves as that currency and more a question of the international adjustment mechanism, as well as the compatibility of export-led development strategies with international payment balances. According to Senior Scholar Jan Kregel, export-led growth and free capital flows are the real causes of sustained international imbalances. The only way out of this predicament is to shift to domestic demand–led development strategies—and capital flows will have to be part of the solution.


Objectives: The aim of the present study was to determine the efficacy of an anger management training on adjustment skills in a sample of high school male students with significant anger management problems, and proneness to aggression and violence due to drastic expression of anger. Method: The State-Trait Anger Inventory was administered to 170 grade 2 and 3 high school students as a screening tool. Subjects who scored at the 75th percentile or higher in this test were considered as the target population, from whom 32 individuals were randomly selected and divided into two groups. The anger management training program was administered to 16 members of the group as a screening instrument. Students' Adjustment Questionnaire was used to measure adjustment skills. Data were analyzed using covariance analysis. Results: The observed F proportion was statistically significant (p<0.01). After the control or modification of the pretest's contribution, the mean scores of the two groups were different in post-tests. This study showed that 58% of changes in maladjustment scores in individuals in post- test are explained through anger management training program and the maladjustment scores of individuals in pretest, with a 27% specific share of experiment variable. Conclusion: Anger management training program can


This paper provides a set of requirements for the technology development of a solar sail propelled Interstellar Heliopause Probe mission. The mission is placed in the context of other outer solar systems missions, ranging from a Kuiper Belt mission through to an Oort cloud mission. Mission requirements are defined and a detailed parametric trajectory analysis and launch date scan performed. Through analysis of the complete mission trade space a set of critical technology development requirements are identified which include an advanced lightweight composite High-Gain Antenna, a high-efficiency Ka-band travelling-wave tube amplifier and a radioisotope thermoelectric generator with power density of approximately 12 W/kg. It is also shown that the Interstellar Heliopause Probe mission necessitates the use of a spinning sail, limiting the direct application of current hardware development activities. A Kuiper Belt mission is then considered as a pre-curser to the Interstellar Heliopause Probe, while it is also shown through study of an Oort cloud mission that the Interstellar Heliopause Probe mission is the likely end-goal of any future solar sail technology development program. As such, the technology requirements identified to enable the Interstellar Heliopause Probe must be enabled through all prior missions, with each mission acting as an enabling facilitator towards the next.


Video watching time is a crucial measure for studying user watching behavior in online Internet video-on-demand (VoD) systems. It is important for system planning, user engagement understanding, and system quality evaluation. However, due to the limited access of user data in large-scale streaming systems, a systematic measurement, analysis, and modeling of video watching time is still missing. In this paper, we measure PPLive, one of the most popular commercial Internet VoD systems in China, over a three week period. We collect accurate user watching data of more than 100 million streaming sessions of more than 100 thousand distinct videos. Based on the measurement data, we characterize the distribution of watching time of different types of videos and reveal a number of interesting characteristics regarding the relation between video watching time and various video-related features (including video type, duration, and popularity). We further build a suite of mathematical models for characterizing these relationships. Extensive performance evaluation shows the high accuracy of these models as compared with commonly used data-mining based models. Our measurement and modeling results bring forth important insights for simulation, design, deployment, and evaluation of Internet VoD systems.


We give a general procedure to construct "algebro-geometric Feynman rules", that is, characters of the Connes–Kreimer Hopf algebra of Feynman graphs that factor through a Grothendieck ring of immersed conical varieties, via the class of the complement of the affine graph hypersurface. In particular, this maps to the usual Grothendieck ring of varieties, defining "motivic Feynman rules". We also construct an algebro-geometric Feynman rule with values in a polynomial ring, which does not factor through the usual Grothendieck ring, and which is defined in terms of characteristic classes of singular varieties. This invariant recovers, as a special value, the Euler characteristic of the projective graph hypersurface complement. The main result underlying the construction of this invariant is a formula for the characteristic classes of the join of two projective varieties. We discuss the BPHZ renormalization procedure in this algebro-geometric context and some motivic zeta functions arising from the partition functions associated to motivic Feynman rules.


In Vancouver last Winter, the United States proved its competitive spirit by winning more medals--gold, silver, and bronze--at the Winter Olympic Games than any other country, although the German member of our research team insists on pointing out that Canada and Germany both won more gold medals than the United States. But if there is some dispute about which Olympic medals to count, there is no question about American math performance: the United States does not deserve even a paper medal. Maintaining our productivity as a nation depends importantly on developing a highly qualified cadre of scientists, engineers, entrepreneurs, and other professionals. To realize that objective requires a system of schooling that produces students with advanced math and science skills. To see how well schools in the United States do at producing high-achieving math students, we compared the percentage of U.S. students in the high-school graduating Class of 2009 with advanced skills in mathematics to percentages of similarly high achievers in other countries. Unfortunately, we found that the percentage of students in the U.S. Class of 2009 who were highly accomplished in math is well below that of most countries with which the United States generally compares itself. No fewer than 30 of the 56 other countries that participated in the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) math test, including most of the world's industrialized nations, had a larger percentage of students who scored at the international equivalent of the advanced level on our own National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) tests. Moreover, while the percentage of students scoring at the advanced level on NAEP varies considerably among the 50 states, not even the best state does well in international comparison. A 2005 report from the National Academy of Sciences, Rising Above the Gathering Storm, succinctly put the issue into perspective: "Although many people assume that the United States will always be a world leader in science and technology, this may not continue to be the case inasmuch as great minds and ideas exist throughout the world." The Demand for High Achievers The gap between the burgeoning business demand for a highly accomplished workforce and a lagging education system has steadily widened. Even as the United States was struggling with a near 10 percent unemployment rate in the summer of 2010, businesses complained that they could not find workers with needed skills. New York Times writer Motoko Rich explained, "The problem ... is a mismatch between the kind of skilled workers needed and the ranks of the unemployed." Skill shortages have severe consequences for a nation's overall productivity. Two of the authors of this report have shown elsewhere that countries with students who perform at higher levels in math and science show larger rates of increase in economic productivity than do otherwise similar countries with lower-performing students (see "Education and Economic Growth," research, Spring 2008). Public discourse has tended to focus on the need to address low achievement, particularly among disadvantaged students. Both federal funding and the accountability elements of No Child Left Behind (NCLB) have stressed the importance of bringing every student up to a minimum level of proficiency. As great as this need may be, there is no less need to lift more students, no matter their socioeconomic background, to high levels of educational accomplishment. In 2006, the Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) Education Coalition was formed to "raise awareness in Congress, the Administration, and other organizations about the critical role that STEM education plays in enabling the U.S. to remain the economic and technological leader of the global marketplace for the 21st Century." In the words of a National Academy of Sciences report that jump-started the coalition's formation, the nation needs to "increase" its "talent pool by improving K-12 science and mathematics education. …


Large-eddy simulations of a pocket of open cells (POC) based on VOCALS Regional Experiment (REx) NSF C-130 Research Flight 06 are analyzed and compared with aircraft observations. A doubly-periodic domain 192 km× 24 km with 125 m horizontal and 5 m vertical grid spacing near the capping inversion is used. The POC is realized in the model as a fixed 96 km wide region of reduced cloud droplet number concentration ( Nc) based on observed values; initialization and forcing are otherwise uniform across the domain. The model reproduces aircraftobserved differences in boundary-layer structure and precipitation organization between a well-mixed overcast region and a decoupled POC with open-cell precipitating cumuli, although the simulated cloud cover is too large in the POC. A sensitivity study in whichNc is allowed to advect following the turbulent flow gives nearly identical results over the 16 h length of the simulation (which starts at night and goes into the next afternoon). The simulated entrainment rate is nearly a factor of two smaller in the less turbulent POC than in the more turbulent overcast region. However, the inversion rises at a nearly uniform rate across the domain because powerful buoyancy restoring forces counteract horizontal inversion height gradients. A secondary circulation develops in the model that diverts subsiding free-tropospheric air away from the POC into the surrounding overcast region, counterbalancing the weaker entrainment in the POC with locally weaker subsidence. Correspondence to: A. Berner (email@example.com)


A large literature has developed on the distinction between hard and soft information with much of this literature focused on displacement of soft information with hard information. We investigate whether the propensity of loan officers at local branches to incorporate soft information in the credit scoring process is affected by the geographical distance between the branch and the bank's headquarters. We find that hardening soft information is significantly sensitive to branch-to-headquarters distance. We also find that organizational distance affects time for loan approval, increasing approval time for applicants receiving a good credit score (i.e. low probability of default) originated at distant branches and reducing approval time for applicants with poor credit scores (i.e. high probability of default). Finally, we find that on average organizational distance has no direct impact on the likelihood of the occurrence of negative credit events. However, the final rating being equal, the hardening of soft information has an influence on loan performance that varies with organizational distance. Overall, our findings are consistent with the presence of spatially based communication frictions within banking organizations.


This paper is an empirical study on Harry Markowitz work on Modern Portfolio Theory. The model introduced by him assumes the normality of assets' return. We examined the OMX Large Cap List1 by mathematical and statistical methods for normality of assets' returns. We studied the effect of the parameters, Skewness and Kurtosis for different time series data. We tried to figure it out which data series is better to construct a portfolio and how these extra parameters can make us better informed in our investments.


The mass defect of a substance can be used in mass spectral analysis to identify peaks as likely belonging to a compound class, such as peptides, if the mass defect is within the known range for that compound class. For peptides, a range of possible mass defects was calculated previously, using a set of theoretical peptides, where all possible amino acid combinations were considered (Mann , M. Abstract from the 43(rd) Annual Conference on Mass Spectrometry and Allied Topics; Conference Proceedings , 1995). We compare that range of theoretical peptide mass defects to new values obtained from in silico tryptic digests of proteins that are abundant in human serum and human seminal fluid. The range of mass defect values encompassing 95% of peptides for the human protein data sets was found to be up to 50% smaller than the previously reported mass defect range for the theoretical peptides. The smaller range established for human tryptic peptides can be used to improve peptide mass defect filters by excluding more species that are not likely to be peptides, thus improving filter selectivity for peptides during proteomic data analysis.


Comprehensive knowledge about healthcare policy should be encouraged among Thai people. Especially, compensation policy without proving fault on adverse events is useful for Thais. Various documents related to the compensation policy that have been reviewed are able to develop this policy. This study used the method of documentary analysis from Thai healthcare compensation policy during 2004-2016. It presented preliminary compensation regulations from the past until now. This presented operational data, analysis and synthesis of regulations, discussions, problems and suggestions. Results of documentary analysis explained the process of compensation policy as follows: 1) Regulations of preliminary compensation funds, 2) Concept and objectives of allocated funds, 3) Definition of damage, 4) Scope and conditions of damage, 5) Types of damage payment rates, 6) Procedures of the rights to claim, 7) Process of considering and deciding on preliminary compensation, 8) Appeals process of claimants, 9) Number of claimants in each year, 10) Rates of accepted claimants in three periods, 11) Types of files to claim, 12) Budgets of preliminary compensation funds, 13) Rates of allocated and actually paid budgets, 14) Satisfaction to initial assistance mechanism, and 15) Number of medical lawsuits that were sued. All details above should benefit the development of the compensation policy appropriate to the Thai people.


The story of the ancient Greeks is one of the most improbable success stories in world history. A small group of people inhabiting a country poor in resources and divided into hundreds of quarreling states created one of the most remarkable civilizations. Comprehensive and balanced, A Brief History of Ancient Greece: Politics, Society, and Culture, Second Edition is a shorter version of the authors' highly successful Ancient Greece: A Political, Social, and Cultural History, Second Edition (OUP, 2008). Four leading authorities on the classical world offer a lively and up-to-date account of Greek civilization and history in all its complexity and variety, covering the entire period from the Bronze Age through the Hellenistic Era, and integrating the most recent research in archaeology, comparative anthropology, and social history. They show how the early Greeks borrowed from their neighbors but eventually developed a distinctive culture all their own, one that was marked by astonishing creativity, versatility, and resilience. The authors go on to trace the complex and surprising evolution of Greek civilization to its eventual dissolution as it merged with a variety of other cultures. Using physical evidence from archaeology, the written testimony of literary texts and inscriptions, and anthropological models based on comparative studies, this compact volume provides an account of the Greek world that is thoughtful and sophisticated yet accessible to students and general readers with little or no knowledge of Greece. Ideal for courses in Greek Civilization and Ancient Greek History, A Brief History of Ancient Greece, Second Edition offers a revised art program featuring more than 125 illustrations and 17 original maps, along with a new 8-page full color photo insert. Numerous "document boxes" provide primary source material and updated suggested readings provide students with additional resources. Also new to this edition, key terms have been boldfaced at their first appearance and listed at the end of the chapter; each one is defined in the expanded glossary. And, for the first time, a Companion Website for students will accompany the text.


Events that are described as "disasters" are those that cause severe impacts on human activities. Severe impacts can be reduced, and some can be eliminated for practical purposes, through suitable strategies. The aim of this paper is to discuss different ways to facilitate a comprehensive approach from policy level through middle and down to operational management. We will further discuss how the comprehensive approach can identify which business processes should not be, or can be, interrupted, integrating business continuity into overall strategy, and describe techniques to insure continuity of critical business processes. Part of this paper's report is our research, which includes interviews with executives knowledgeable about their corporations' crisis management planning. Recent literature and curricula for emergency management professionals now emphasise mitigation and recovery. In conjunction, directives from senior management and regulatory agencies are impelling a comprehensive management approach. One logical result is that business continuity has become one of several strategies used to reduce the impacts of disasters. The authors advocate using senior management's perspective to select criteria that can identify which business processes require the business continuity strategy. They believe managers at the policy level should facilitate using the comprehensive approach by setting the criteria for the next two levels" managers to apply. The authors expand the discussion, noting "strategy" is applied differently at each of the three management levels. The authors propose seven impact categories that can determine when to apply business continuity or another strategy. They conclude by outlining management techniques to incorporate business continuity into overall strategy.


ABSTRACT In this paper we describe the results of various numerical simulations of sideways or horizontal convection. Specifically, a two-dimensional Boussinesq fluid is both heated and cooled from its upper surface, but the walls and the bottom of the tank are insulating and have no flux of heat through them. We perform experiments with a range of Rayleigh numbers up to 1011, obtained by systematically reducing the diffusivity. We also explore the effects of a nonlinear equation of state and of a mechanical force imposed on the top surface at a fixed Rayleigh number. We find that, when there is no mechanical forcing, both the energy dissipation and the strength of the circulation itself monotonically fall with decreasing diffusivity. At Rayleigh numbers greater than 1010 the flow is unsteady; however, the eddying flow is still much weaker than the steady flow at smaller Rayleigh numbers. At high Rayleigh numbers, the stratification and the mean circulation are increasingly confined to a thin layer at the upper surface, with the layer thickness decreasing according to Ra−1/5. There is no evidence that the flow ever enters a regime that is independent of Rayleigh number. Using a nonlinear equation of state makes little difference to the flow phenomenology at a moderate Rayleigh number. The addition of an imposed stress at the upper surface makes a significant difference in the flow. A strong, energy-dissipating circulation can be maintained even at Ra = 109, and the stratification extends more deeply into the fluid than in the unstressed case. Overall, our results are consistent with the notion that in the absence of mechanical forcing a fluid that is heated and cooled from above cannot maintain a deep stratification or a strong sustained flow at high Rayleigh numbers, even if the interior flow is unsteady.


Water mass flow patterns within the 150-1300 m intermediate layer of the western tropical Atlantic were determined from observations during four 1990-1991 Pegasus velocity and CTD hydrographic surveys. Nondivergent flows were analyzed to determine transports. A survey-average 29 Sverdrups (1 Sv = 10$\sp6$m$\sp3$/s) of southern hemisphere water masses flowed northwestward across 44$\sp\circ$W near the equator as part of the subsurface South Equatorial Current (SEC). 21 Sv retroflected anticyclonically around the Amazon Eddy (2$\sp\circ$N 45$\sp\circ$W) and flowed eastward toward the North Equatorial Undercurrent (NEUC). The other 8 Sv moved northwestward within a series of anticyclonic retroflection eddies which periodically separate from the Amazon Eddy. 61 Sv of a northern/southern water mass mixture flowed southeastward across 9$\sp\circ$N as part of the North Equatorial Current (NEC) and bifurcated: 32 Sv turned anticyclonically northwestward, and 29 Sv turned cyclonically around a low (6$\sp\circ$N 44$\sp\circ$W), merged with the southern water, and flowed toward the NEUC. The 50 Sv NEUC, a mixture of mostly southern water, flowed eastward into the interior. The remaining NEC and SEC branches blended to form a 40 Sv northwestward transport across 53$\sp\ circ$W. These observed transports were generally about three times larger than the wind-driven equatorial and tropical gyre return transports (Mayer and Weisberg 1993); suggesting the existance of subgyre-scale recirculation eddies in the western tropics. One of the retroflection eddies was measured during September 1990. Its structure was approximated by a 300 km diameter cylinder which extended vertically through the surface and intermediate layers to 1300 m. During two other surveys, retroflection eddies were identified at the region's northwestern corner. Instantaneous transport associated with an eddy which translated at 10 cm/s was about 30 Sv. Assuming three were generated each year, retroflection eddy translation could account for the 8 Sv alongshore flow through the region. According to water mass budgets, 21 Sv of northern water masses were transformed by mixing within the region. Temperature-salinity relationships indicated this mixing effectively transports the cool, low salinity Antarctic Intermediate Water into the North Atlantic by as yet unknown pathways.


Revealing the parties, the processes and the institutions and, consequently, both the diversity and contingency of the real estate markets, the existing increasing literature emphasises the contemporary numerous links and interdependencies between real estate, land value, planning and town planning policy and even the financial system. This paper is an attempt to understand all the real estate markets, from the most peripheral ones, where the urban rent is the lowest, to the most dense city centres. To gain a better understanding of the real estate market, a process of firstly deconstruction and then reconstruction is used. The process of deconstruction involves identifying various market trends according to property type (principally residential buildings), players and institutions, territorial situations and temporalities based on research conducted in Switzerland. We then developed a meta-synthesis inspired by Fernand Braudel whose works put as much emphasis on day-to-day economic activity as on long-term activity, and on local as well as global issues.


This paper presents visualization of field-measured, time-varying multidimensional earthquake accelerograph readings. Direct volume rendering is used to depict the space-time relationships of seismic readings collected from sensor stations in an intuitive way such that the progress of seismic wave propagation of an earthquake event can be directly observed. The resulting visualization reveals the sequence of seismic wave initiation, propagation, attenuation over time, and energy releasing events. We provide a case study on the magnitude scale Mw 7.6 Chi-Chi earthquake in Taiwan, which is the most thoroughly recorded earthquake event ever in the history. More than 400 stations recorded this event, and the readings from this event increased global strong-motion records five folds. Each station measured east-west, north-south, and vertical component of acceleration for approximately 90 seconds. The sensor network released the initial raw data within minutes after the Chi-Chi mainshock. It is essential to have a visualization system for fast data exploring and analyzing, offering crucial visual analytical information for scientists to make quick judgments. Raw data requires preprocessing before it can be rendered. We generated a sequence of ground-motion wave-field maps of 350 × 200 regular grid covers the entire Taiwan island from the sensor network readings. The result is a total of 1000 ground-motion wave-field maps with 0.1 second interval, forming a 1000 × 350 × 200 volume data set. We show that visualizing the time-varying component of the data spatially uncovers the changing features hidden in the data.


The decomposition of isobutane and the adsorption of isobutylene and isobutane on silica gels containing sodium ions were studied. Silica gels containing various amounts of sodium ions were calcinated at 550 and 750°C, and the residual amounts of "water" remaining after the calcination were determined thermogravimetrically. The results of the determinations were calculated for one hypothetical sodium ion present on the surface of the gel. They indicate that the number of "water" molecules corresponding to one sodium ion, the number of adsorbed hydrocarbon molecules and the number of hydrocarbon molecules reacting at one sodium centre decrease with increasing concentration of sodium ions on the surface of the gel. The highest number of adsorbed and reacting molecules (corresponding to one sodium ion) was observed at low concentrations of sodium accompanied by large numbers of water molecules corresponding statistically to one sodium ion. A mechanism of the surface reactions, based on a model of the surface of the catalyst and on a quantum interpretation of hydrocarbon molecules, is proposed. It differs from the generally accepted mechanism by postulating that the initial step is the formation of a car bani on. In the authors' opinion the decomposition of hydrocarbons is a multicentre reaction. which may involve radicals or radical-ions. The present work is the continuation of studies on silica gels containing alkali metal ions. In previous papers• •) we have reported the results of studies on adsorption of water, ammonia and carbon dioxide on silica gels containing various amounts of sodium and calcinated at various temperatures. In these investigations we have observed that the number of acidic centres on the surface does not decrease with increasing amount of alkali ions added to the gel. The acidity of the surface, determined by the amount of adsorbed ammonia, is a funcion of the amount of added sodium ions, which has *) Institute of Organic Chemistry, Polish Academy of Science, Warsaw, Poland. **) Department of Chemistry, Technical University, Warsaw, Poland. Institute of Organic Chemistry, Polish Academy of Science, Warsaw, Poland.


ENVIRONMENTAL LOSS AND DEGRADATION ARE NEGATIVELY AFFECTING IMPORTANT FUNCTIONAL AVIAN GROUPS, SUCH AS DIURNAL RAPTORS. WE EVALUATED SPATIAL VARIATION OF DIVERSITY IN DIURNAL RAPTORS IN CORE AND BUFFER ZONES IN SELVA EL OCOTE BIOSPHERE RESERVE USING POINT COUNTS AND ELEVATED POINTS FOR OBSERVATION. WE RECORDED 16 DIURNAL RAPTOR SPECIES, 10 IN THE CORE ZONE, 14 IN THE BUFFER ZONE, AND 8 SPECIES OCCURRED IN BOTH ZONES. CHONDROHIERAX UNCINATUS AND BUTEOGALLUS ANTHRACINUS WERE EXCLUSIVE IN THE CORE ZONE AND 6 SPECIES IN THE BUFFER ZONE. CATHARTES AURA AND CORAGYPS ATRATUS WERE THE MORE ABUNDANT SPECIES IN THE CORE ZONE USING POINT COUNTS, AND MICRASTUR RUFICOLLIS USING POINT COUNTS IN THE BUFFER ZONE. THE DIVERSITY INDEX SHOWED THAT CORE ZONE HAD THE HIGHER VALUES COMPARING WITH THE BUFFER ZONE VALUES. ALTHOUGH THE CORE ZONE SUPPORTS A LOWER NUMBER OF SPECIES COMPARED WITH THE BUFFER ZONE, DIVERSITY AND EVENNESS ESTIMATES WERE HIGHER IN THE CORE ZONE. LARGE ANNUAL DEFORESTED RATES WILL BE DETERMINANT ON THE DISTRIBUTION AND DIVERSITY OF RAIN FOREST RAPTORS IN THE REGION.


Artificial intelligence systems are being increasingly deployed due to their potential to increase the efficiency, scale, consistency, fairness, and accuracy of decisions. However, as many of these systems are opaque in their operation, there is a growing demand for such systems to provide explanations for their decisions. Conventional approaches to this problem attempt to expose or discover the inner workings of a machine learning model with the hope that the resulting explanations will be meaningful to the consumer. In contrast, this paper suggests a new approach to this problem. It introduces a simple, practical framework, called Teaching Explanations for Decisions (TED), that provides meaningful explanations that match the mental model of the consumer. We illustrate the generality and effectiveness of this approach with two different examples, resulting in highly accurate explanations with no loss of prediction accuracy for these two examples.


After a long period of vigorous growth--a period in which New England grew faster than the rest of the United States--employment in New England leveled off in 1989. This slowdown represents both a cyclical adjustment and a disturbing erosion in New England's competitive position. ; To help clarify the causes of the downturn and the implications for the region's future development, this article develops a framework for analyzing regional economies, applies that framework to New England and other regions of interest, and examines New England's share of national markets in key industries. The author finds that New England's strong overall growth since 1984 was based on an unsustainable boom in construction, which masked problems in the region's economic base going back at least five years.


Understanding the boundaries of species' ranges and the variations in population dynamics from the centre to margin of a species' range is critical. This study simulated spatial-temporal patterns of birth and death rates and migration across a species' range in different seasons. Our results demonstrated the importance of dispersal and migration in altering birth and death rates, balancing source and sink habitats, and governing expansion or contraction of species' ranges in changing environments. We also showed that the multiple equilibria of metapopulations across a species' range could be easily broken following climatic changes or physical disturbances either local or regional. Although we refer to our models as describing the population dynamics across whole species' range, they should also apply to small-scale habitats (metapopulations) in which species abundance follows a humped pattern or to any ecosystem or landscape where strong central-marginal (C-M) environmental gradients exist. Conservation of both central and marginal populations would therefore be equally important considerations in making management decisions.


FIGHTING THE SO-CALLED "information war" against terrorists and insurgents has cost the U.S. military nearly $1 billion in the past three years.1 But that may not be the highest cost. Congressional questions about the spending for communication programs and news reports about questionable use of contracted public relations firms and journalists have brought to light an undefined area of military operations with little oversight or controls. Not surprisingly, Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, in March 2010, directed an internal assessment of information operations and internal investigations into specific activities.2 In a December 2009 Washington Post column, David Ignatius points out that "the military has funded a range of contractors, specialists, training programs and initiatives," and that the "militarization of information," particularly when hiring "covert contractors," should sound an alarm.3 However, in times of war, when ends may justify means, why shouldn't the military aggressively promulgate positive images of the United States and fight enemy propaganda?4 Why shouldn't the military hire public relations firms to plant unattributed American-friendly articles in foreign media (as alleged in the case of the Lincoln Group in Iraq in 2004)?5 Why shouldn't the military use companies that offer to "do more than just information gathering," merging "reporting, intelligence, connection-peddling, and strategic communications" (as is alleged about International Safety Networks)?6 Contractors who operate journalistic, news, or public relations activities for the military blur the lines between public affairs, journalism, military information support operations (MISO, formerly PSYOP). The dangers of these types of activities seem obvious. They change what are accepted international protections for journalists as non-combatants. They hinder and endanger journalists and render military public affairs ineffective. They rile up conspiracy theorists and provide fodder for anti-American sentiment. A nation that cherishes and promotes freedom of speech and press erodes these values and its credibility when it subjects foreign people to covert media manipulation. In the world of instantaneous news reporting, such activities extend beyond targeted foreign populations and reach U.S. and allied populations. Robert Hastings, a former assistant secretary of defense for public affairs, sees a line that "ought not to be crossed." He notes that "as a constitutional democracy, our government has an obligation to share robust information based on truth without attempting to influence its people," but adds, "We have to remember that public affairs needs to be done by public affairs people. Moreover, if we hire someone to do this type of work, they need to follow the same rules and directives that military public affairs officers follow. We should not be able to hire a surrogate to do otherwise."7 Questionable public information contracts are merely a symptom of an underlying problem within the military: no doctrine exists for strategic communications. This results in ineffective implementation and insufficient training for leaders and public affairs officers. In the absence of doctrine, military organizations experimented with strategic communications during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. In the end, these well-intended schemes might cost the United States its credibility. Why did these ill-advised initiatives become so pervasive? How do we meet the need to communicate in a far-sighted way that is integrated into all operations and demonstrated in not only words but by deeds? What the Military Needs is Some "Strat Comm" The military is in the business of fighting and winning our Nation's wars. Commanders saw a need to fight in the information realm and found innovative ways to do so. They must be innovative not only because of technology and an instantaneous news cycle, but also because there is no doctrine to follow. …


A great many of the most important developments in modern economics were first revealed in the pages of Econometrica. This selection of readings from that journal is the third in a series and contains its editors' choice of the best articles in the general area of macroeconomics and capital theory that appeared in issues dating from 1935 to 1966. A broad range of topics is covered in the 27 articles selected in order to indicate the general extent of the field. A few of the articles were microeconomic in their original intent but have a clear influence on later macroeconomic theory.


Herodotus was probably right when he argued that wars make history, but whether and when wars make democracy remain open questions. The classics in the democratization literature are surprisingly reticent about the links between war and lasting democracy. Most of our theoretical literature on democratic transitions or democratic consolidation leaves the connection to war either wholly neglected or seriously undertheorized. This is perplexing because so many new and renewed democracies emerge in the context of war. Of the seventy-three democracies founded after 1945 that still exist today, over half emerged either in the immediate aftermath of a war or as a means of bringing an ongoing war to an end. Table 1 shows how many electoral democracies emerged in a postwar setting. The cases in Table 1 are electoral democracies--meaning that they are regimes in which leaders are selected in competitive elections. If we define democracy more strictly and consider only cases in which a full (or nearly full) range of individual liberties is provided, the pattern is the same. Half of all "free" regimes formed after World War II that are still in existence today were formed in the immediate aftermath of war (see Table 2). The percentage of free regimes that were founded in postwar settings was as high ten years ago as it is today, so the existence of "postwar" democracies is far from new. (1) The subject of democratization after war is clearly worthy of close attention. What do we currently know (or think we know) about how war affects democratization? What does the democratization literature teach us about building democracy in postwar settings? I sketch brief answers to both of these questions in the following sections. For the purposes of this article, my definition of democracy corresponds to the definition used most often in the canon of democratization literature: democracy "is a system of governance in which rulers are held accountable . . . by citizens acting indirectly through the competition and cooperation of their elected representatives." (2) Though I acknowledge that this is a minimalist version of a much more complex and multifaceted phenomenon, I focus on electoral democracy because it defines a politically important and numerically large subset of regimes. Can War Be Good for Democracy? The democratization literature portrays the association between war and the transition to democracy as broadly positive. Indeed, wars seem to be associated with democratic transitions whether the state in question is vanquished, victorious, or simply a partner in an inconclusive struggle. It is ironic that a devastating defeat seems to be an especially propitious setting for a transition to be made. Yet several scholars have marshaled sound evidence in favor of this proposition. They remind us that "the great majority of historical examples of successful redemocratization ... are ones in which warfare and conquest play an integral part" (3) that conquest by a democratic power allows for the dismantling of problematic military and political institutions; (4) "that military failure contributed to the downfall or weakening of at least five authoritarian regimes between 1974 and l989" (5); and that "defeat in warfare" often precipitates the elite settlements that lasting democracy requires. (6) The defeats that l ead "most readily" to a democratic regime change are the devastating ones in which "elites are thoroughly replaced." (7) Authoritarian regimes that conduct a war successfully may be toppled too. Victory in wars against "subversion" can eliminate a dictatorship's raison d'etre and provoke a crisis of legitimacy. (8) Surprisingly, elites who face neither victory nor defeat may still make the transition to democracy if their armed struggle appears to be both "costly and inconclusive." (9) Theorists insist that the elite compromise that democracy requires emerges when leaders recognize "that the next round of conflict is likely to visit disaster on all sides. …


Nitrous oxide (N2O) is a greenhouse gas with a global warming potential of 296 CO2 equivalents and is involved in the depletion of the ozone layer. Through studies on emission sources it was revealed that natural and agricultural soils are important sources of N2O emissions and are responsible for about 50 % of the total N2O emitted to the atmosphere. Nitrification and denitrification were shown to be processes responsible for N2O production in and emission from soils. Remarkably, N2O emission patterns from soils often show typical hotspot behaviour at different spatial scales. Hotspots are soil spots which show a disproportionately high emission relative to the surrounding area. Riparian buffer zones (as a whole) are often hotspot ecosystems with high N2O emission in the landscape. Within riparian buffer zones a hotspot pattern of N2O emission has been observed. These hotspots can be responsible for a large fraction of the N2O emission from the entire ecosystem or landscape, while only covering a small fraction of the area . Integration of hotspots in mechanistic models is a big challenge and impossible without knowing the underlying mechanisms and the influencing biotic and biotic characteristics. This study aimed at finding the underlying mechanisms and required conditions for the occurrence of N2O emission hotspot behavior within a riparian buffer zone. The study especially focussed on processes and conditions which are distinct between hotspots and non-hotspots. Therefore, nitrogen transformations were studied to identify the responsible N2O producing process(es). It was found that denitrification is the source of N2O production and emission in the riparian buffer zone. A decreased N2O reduction rather than an increased production was shown to be responsible for the enhanced emissions. The imbalance between production and consumption could not be explained by nitrate and oxygen levels. pH, however appeared to be a major controlling factor of net N2O production in laboratory incubations. Field measurements of pH and N2O revealed that also under heterogeneous soil conditions pH is a controlling factor for N2O emission variability and it was observed that hotspot N2O emission only appears from acidic soil spots. The source of the large variability in soil pH is yet unknown. The possibility of microbial soil denitrification at pH 4 was investigated using a bioreactor, in order to enrich a single microbial species. Rhodanobacter sp. was found to be able to denitrify at pH 4 using soil derived electron donors, implying that soil microbial denitrification at pH 4 is well possible. Discussed is the possibility to extrapolate the mechanism behind N2O emission hotspots to other ecosystems. It seems likely that in a system where denitrification thrives, variability in a single impairing factor (like low pH) may lead to N2O emission hotspots. This knowledge should be used in N2O emission models and riparian buffer strip creation.


Micro-scale heterogeneity in water temperature was examined in 6 upland sites in the Western Cape, South Africa. Hourly water temperature data converted to daily data showed that greatest differences were apparent in daily maximum temperatures between shallow- and deep-water biotopes during the warmest period of the year. Pool depth affected water temperature with deeper pools creating a more stable thermal environment. Groundwater-dependency affected water temperature differences with less groundwater-dependent rivers exhibiting greater differences in daily maximum temperatures. The importance of maintaining instream and riparian habitat, including pools, undercut banks, marginal vegetation, and an intact hyporheos, is discussed, giving examples of organisms utilising such habitats as thermal refugia. Considerations when choosing an appropriate model to simulate water temperatures, including groundwater-dependency, temporal and spatial scale, and study objectives, are discussed. Keywords: water temperature, riverine ecosystems, rivers, thermal regimes, biotic responses, aquatic organisms, micro-scale heterogeneity, modelling


Samuel Kelton Roberts, Jr., Infectious Fear: Politics, Disease, and the Health Effects of Segregation. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2009. Pp. 328. Paper $24.95. Cloth $59.95. Samuel K. Roberts's Infectious Fear investigates the racial politics of tuberculosis, primarily in the Progressive Era, and its legacy on health and urban policy throughout the 20th century. For the first half of the century, tuberculosis was one of the top three causes of black mortality in urban areas (it caused 15 percent of black deaths in 1900). African Americans had higher rates of tuberculosis than whites, and it was generally more deadly, especially for children. Roberts's central argument is that "integral to the project of modern urban public health were theoretical and practical compromises that moved the politics of black health from absolute neglect to qualified inclusion based on specific notions of care, expertise, public utility, citizenship, social control, and responsibility." Tuberculosis is also particularly useful in illustrating the racial construction of disease historically and the medicalization of race. Roberts quotes from W. E. B. Du Bois's pathbreaking work, The Philadelphia Negro (1899) on the so-called racial nature of tuberculosis: "Particularly with regard to consumption, it must be remembered that Negroes are not the first people who have been claimed as its peculiar victims; the Irish were once thought to be doomed by that disease--but that was when Irishmen were unpopular." In Infectious Fear Roberts focuses on the complex politics and negotiations around tuberculosis control and care--between individuals and institutions, the black and white populations, politicians and health experts. Situating his study in Baltimore, a "border city" and a major center of black life, Roberts makes compelling interventions in the historiographies of public health and the African American urban experience. Drawing on a wide range of material from government and charity investigations of tuberculosis to the health and medical literature and case studies of individual consumptives, Roberts effectively situates the politics of tuberculosis in its appropriate historical and geographic contexts. Individual chapters on the historical epidemiology of tuberculosis, racial science, the urban landscape of health, political and economic geography of the disease, surveillance politics, and the focus on the "incorrigible consumptive" effectively build Roberts's case for the centrality of tuberculosis to understanding the politics of black life in 20th-century Baltimore. In 1896 the Baltimore City Council passed the nation's first statute mandating tuberculosis reporting. Moreover, Baltimore was also the nation's early leader in residential segregation ordinances. These firsts are not unrelated. As Roberts points out, the last decades of incurable tuberculosis coincided with the first decades of federal housing and urban renewal policy that exacerbated racial segregation. More than just a coincidence, the uses and abuses of the language of science regarding tubercular infection saturated the political discourse around "housing blight" and its containment, resulting in the wholesale destruction of black neighborhoods by mid-century, or what Roberts calls the "triumph of infectious fear." A historian of medicine at Columbia University Medical School, Roberts builds his arguments through an exhaustive study of the primary and secondary literature and draws on the work of Vanessa Gamble, Keith Wailoo, and other pioneering historians of African American health and social work. …


Three fungal strains were collected from decomposed woods in Kyaukse wood mill and five fungal strains from effluent sludge by continuous pulp and paper industry. Among the accumulated strains, WF4, WF5, WF8, SF1 and SF3 are able to grow up well on agar containing some pieces of powdered bamboo and sawdust indicating that they could utilize these powders as nutrient for their growth. When they were tested for their effectiveness on decolourization of the wastewater from the pulp and paper industry, it indicated that strain WF5 was the most efficient strain which has the ability to decolorize the wastewater by (58%±0.4) and degrade the lignin by (3104±232) respectively.


This report was produced at the request of English Heritage. It was originally written in 2005 prior to publication of Management of Research Projects in the Historic Environment (MoRPHE) (English Heritage 2006) and Strategic Framework for Historical Environment Activities and Programmes in English Heritage (SHAPE) (English Heritage 2008), but submission was delayed as a result of issues concerning the Carlisle City Council lease on Shaddon Mill, which made timetabling impossible. These have now been resolved. The report has therefore been redrafted in the spirit of both MoRPHE and SHAPE, and a Business Case, SHAPE Number, outline Product Description, details of Ownership and Risk Log have been placed with Section 12. In addition, where items in the report are attributable to elements of MoRPHE, the MoRPHE title has been added. This report, in effect, relates to Review Point R3 (English Heritage 2006, 14).

From 1977 to 2001, Carlisle Archaeological Unit (CAU), later Carlisle Archaeology Ltd, University of Bradford (CAL), carried out a great deal of work within the City and District of Carlisle and more widely in Cumbria. When the company ceased trading in August 2001, basic information for most of its projects had not been placed in the public domain, nor was there a coherent overview of the unit's archive. With the demise of CAL, the need for a detailed assessment of the archive became apparent, and English Heritage therefore proposed a three-stage Archives Project, beginning with the compilation of a definitive gazetteer of all CAU/CAL projects. OA North was commissioned to undertake Stage 1 in 2003. The work resulted in the creation of a database containing basic information for all archaeological events, together with a digital location map and a report (OA North 2003), which provided an overview and analysis of the data. The report also contained recommendations and a project design for a detailed Stage 2 assessment of the individual event archives, which OA North was subsequently commissioned to undertake in 2004. The results of Stage 2 are presented in the present report, together with recommendations and an updated project design for a programme of remedial works to be undertaken during Stage 3, prior to final archive deposition.


Early prediction of hand function is crucial for efficient rehabilitation of cervical spinal cord injury (cSCI). This study investigated correlations between ulnar somatosensory evoked potentials (ulnar SSEPs) and functional outcome of hand function following acute traumatic cervical cord injury. Neurological assessment of sensory scores and hand function were compared with five ulnar SSEP categories of similar persistence and quality in 365 patients throughout the first year after cSCI. Of the 365 patients, 218 (68%) exhibited ulnar SSEP potentials at any one stage during the year, and in 147 patients (40.3%) ulnar SSEPs were obtainable at every assessment stage. While ulnar SSEP latency and amplitude assessments remained largely unchanged over time in the majority of patients, hand function improved remarkably during the first year following cSCI. One year outcome of hand function was predetermined by ulnar SSEP category due to distinct differences in the ulnar SSEP parameters. Additionally, an early prognostic group allocation by ulnar SSEP criteria at the first assessment stage within 4 weeks after spinal trauma allowed reliable prediction of hand function outcome after 1 year. We conclude that early assessment of ulnar SSEP as a non-invasive and objective neurophysiological test is a valuable marker of prospective hand function and independence 1 year after cSCI. This could be most relevant for planning neurorehabilitation, and in prospective clinical SCI trials.


Unsustainable fishing in marine systems creates fisheries management and conservation challenges, with implications for ecosystem health, livelihoods, economies, and seafood supply. Thus there is a need for management approaches that can support productive fisheries and healthy ecosystems. Property rights, and particularly spatial rights or territorial use rights in fisheries (TURFs), are increasingly proposed as a solution. It has been suggested that TURFs may align fishers' incentives with long-term stewardship, resulting in improved yields and positive conservation outcomes. Here we examined this idea by reviewing existing theoretical and empirical evidence for TURF performance in achieving both fisheries and conservation goals, and find equivocal evidence that TURFs can consistently deliver on this promise. We then explored the potential to improve outcomes by implementing no-take marine reserves with TURFs ("TURF-reserves"). We evaluated theoretical and empirical evidence in the literature and develop a simulation model to examine tradeoffs for achieving conservation and fishery objectives. With our model, we examined different management regimes (e.g., open access vs TURFs), harvest controls within the TURF (e.g., selectivity and harvest rate restrictions), and varying reserve sizes. We found that combining reserves with TURFs does not eliminate the tradeoff between fisheries and conservation goals if the TURF already effectively controls fishing pressure. However, given the results from our literature review, many TURFs may not achieve effective fisheries management. Thus, TURF-reserves may be better able to balance fisheries and conservation goals relative to TURF-only systems, but outcomes will depend on target species mobility, TURF size, and fishing intensity outside the TURF-reserve.


A high-resolution record of sediment magnetic properties and stable oxygen isotopes has been determined from marine isotope stage (MIS) 6 to the Holocene (170 ka to present day) for hemipelagic sediments (Site 1014 of Ocean Drilling Program Leg 167) from a subbasin west of the Tanner Basin, off the coast of southern California. The spacing between samples is 10 cm. The sedimentation rate in the top 20 m of the sequence was determined to be 12 cm/k.y. We have taken the intensity of anhysteretic remanent magnetization (ARM) as a measure of the concentration of magnetic minerals. The quantity of magnetic material increased during transitions from warm to cool periods; this change is inferred to have resulted from increased shelf erosion during lower sea levels. During interglacials and possibly interstadials, a reduction occurred in the quantity of magnetic material in the sediment, and magnetic susceptibility therefore dropped. This decrease seems to have resulted from dilution of the magnetic fraction due to increased biogenic deposition during these warm intervals. The ratio of ARM to ARM after 15 mT alternating-field demagnetization (ARM/ARM[15]) is used as a coercivity indicator. The magnetic properties of the sediments from the subbasin west of the Tanner Basin are largely determined by two climatically controlled fluxes of magnetic material. Large and magnetically softer titanohematite grains were deposited during times of decreasing sea level when the concentration of magnetic particles was elevated. Small magnetite grains (<2 μm) control the magnetic properties in sediments deposited during transgressions and times of high sea levels, when detrital titanohematite content was low. The ARM/ARM[15] ratio leads the δ18O curve by 0.3–0.8 m. This offset between the rock magnetic coercivity parameter and intervals of climatic change represents evidence for authigenic growth of magnetite grains near the Fe-redox boundary. The Fe-redox boundary appears to have been at 0.8 m depth during MIS 3 and at 0.3 m during MIS 5. Authigenic growth of magnetite is associated with rapid climate events as recorded by planktonic foraminiferal assemblage shifts. These relationships may have resulted from changes in oxygen concentrations in intermediate-depth waters associated with the climate shifts. Therefore the ratio of ARM/ARM[15] is suggested to be a new indicator (proxy) of past changes in oxygen levels of intermediate water.


Abstract Field studies on the east side of Mount Katahdin, Maine, from 2001 to 2004, and an appraisal of published and unpublished Katahdin records from previous work documented 203 different bryophytes (131 mosses and 72 liverworts) for subalpine conifer forest, alpine tundra and cirque walls, and krummholz in between. This work represents the only recent investigation of a high altitude bryoflora in the mountains of the northeastern United States. Two mosses (Hygrohypnum smithii, Pohlia tundrae) are new to this region, and six others, including Neckera oligocarpa, are new records for Maine. Investigations of Grimmia (4 spp.), Cynodontium (2 spp.) and Kiaeria (2 spp.) clarified the application of taxonomic concepts for these mosses relative to previous published work. In conjuction with parallel studies of Katahdin lichens, eight habitats were specified for the study area. These habitats were largely the same places as those recognized for lichens. The eight habitats differed in the number of Arctic mosses and in unique occurrences of various mosses and liverworts. Mean Arctic-boreal-cool temperate values, introduced as an analytical tool to evaluate the distributional affinities of Kathadin lichens, were calculated for bryophytes for seven of eight habitats. The mean for each habitat class was well predicted by a multiple regression equation, with altitude, solar gain and snowpack persistence, but not substratum, as independent variables. Upper and lower altitutinal limits of bryophyte species occurrence were determined. The documented presence of Katahdin alpine bryophytes in four other mountain areas in northeastern United States and adjacent Québec, Canada, showed fewer of them in western areas (the high Adirondack Mountains, New York and Mt. Mansfield, Vermont), a possible outcome of increasing oceanic conditions eastward.


Most organizations have a firewall, antivirus software, and intrusion detection systems, all of which are intended to keep attackers out. So why is computer security a bigger problem today than ever before? The answer is simple--bad software lies at the heart of all computer security problems. Traditional solutions simply treat the symptoms, not the problem, and usually do so in a reactive way. This book teaches you how to take a proactive approach to computer security. Building Secure Software cuts to the heart of computer security to help you get security right the first time. If you are serious about computer security, you need to read this book, which includes essential lessons for both security professionals who have come to realize that software is the problem, and software developers who intend to make their code behave. Written for anyone involved in software development and usefrom managers to codersthis book is your first step toward building more secure software. Building Secure Software provides expert perspectives and techniques to help you ensure the security of essential software. If you consider threats and vulnerabilities early in the devel-opment cycle you can build security into your system. With this book you will learn how to determine an acceptable level of risk, develop security tests, and plug security holes before software is even shipped. Inside you'll find the ten guiding principles for software security, as well as detailed coverage of: Software risk management for security Selecting technologies to make your code more secure Security implications of open source and proprietary software How to audit software The dreaded buffer overflow Access control and password authentication Random number generation Applying cryptography Trust management and input Client-side security Dealing with firewalls Only by building secure software can you defend yourself against security breaches and gain the confidence that comes with knowing you won't have to play the "penetrate and patch" game anymore. Get it right the first time. Let these expert authors show you how to properly design your system; save time, money, and credibility; and preserve your customers' trust.


The Old English poem Exodus narrates the flight of Moses and the Israelites from Egyptian captivity, joining the story at the moment the tenth plague strikes the Egyptians and concluding with the Hebrews celebrating the destruction of Pharaoh and his army by the Red Sea. Despite what is at times a highly allusive style, and some omissions from the Biblical narrative, the poem recounts the order of events much as they are presented in chapters 12–15 of the book of Exodus, apart from one point when the poet digresses to tell the story of Noah and the Flood (ll. 362–76) and of Abraham's sacrifice of Isaac (ll. 380–46). Their histories are told as the Israelite tribes are about to enter the Red Sea and in the context of a genealogical recollection of their national ancestry (ll. 353b–61), beginning with Noah and leaping the generations to Abraham (ll. 376–79). The suddenness of this departure from the Exodus narrative requires explanation, and critics have generally explained the "digression " in terms of the connection made in Christian theology between events of the patriarchs' lives and the history unfolding at the Red Sea. The Flood and the sacrifice of Isaac were both linked to the exodus in the theology of the early church as major Old Testament events typologically foreshadowing the salvation of the Christian faithful, a connection confirmed by the recollection of these events in the readings of the Easter liturgy, a festival also associated with the sacrament of Baptism.


Many processes in biology, from antibody production to tissue differentiation, share a common fundamental step — establishing a physical contact between distant genomic segments. How do remote segments find each other on a remarkably short timescale despite being strung out over millions of base pairs along the DNA? What is the mechanism of the high degree of orchestration of remote genomic interactions ? We address these questions in the context of adaptive immunity  – the system that enables the individual to respond to a great variety of pathogens through a diverse repertoire of antibodies. The antibodies are generated by the genes that are themselves assembled from gene segments through a precisely orchestrated process of somatic recombination.  Experimental data from live-cell imaging in B-lymphocytes reveal the signatures of anomalous diffusion that help us identify the dominant mechanism of genomic motion.  Comparison of experimental and simulated data, along with insights from polymer physics, suggest that an interphase chromosome behaves as a network of cross-linked chains characteristic of a gel phase, yet it is poised near the sol phase, a solution of independent chains. Chromosome organization near the phase boundary provides the genome with a tradeoff between stability and responsiveness and orchestrates the timing of genomic interactions.


Skarns are residue of relatively low‐temperature magma‐induced decarbonation in the crust largely associated with silicic plutons. Mafic magmatic intrusions are also capable of releasing excess CO2 due to carbonate assimilation. However, the effect of mafic to silicic melt evolution on the decarbonation processes, in addition to temperature controls on carbonate‐intrusive magmatic systems, particularly at continental arcs, remains unclear. In this study, experiments performed in a piston cylinder apparatus at midcrustal depth (0.5 GPa) at supersolidus temperatures (900–1200°C) document calcite interaction with andesite and dacite melts at equilibrium under closed‐system conditions at calcite saturation in a 1:1 melt‐calcite ratio by weight. With increasing silica content in the starting melt, at similar melt fractions and identical pressure, assimilation decreases drastically (≤65% andesite‐calcite to ≤18% dacite‐calcite). In conjunction, the CaO/SiO2 ratio in melts resulting from calcite assimilation in andesitic starting material is >1, but ≤0.3 in those formed from dacite‐calcite interaction. With increasing silica‐content in the starting melt skarn mineralogy, particularly wollastonite, increases in modal abundance while diopsidic clinopyroxene decreases slightly. More CO2 is released with andesite‐calcite reaction (≤2.9 × 1011 g/y) than with more skarn‐like dacite‐calcite interaction (≤8.1 × 1010 g/y, at one volcano assuming respective calcite‐free‐superliquidus conditions and a magma flux of 1012 g/y). Our experimental results thus suggest that calcite assimilation in more mafic magmas may have first degassed a significant amount of crustal carbon before the melt evolves to more silicic compositions, producing skarn. Crustal decarbonation in long‐lived magmatic systems may hence deliver significant albeit diminishing amounts of carbon to the atmosphere and contribute to long‐term climate change.


Electronic learning has changed the conventional pattern of studying in the universities for some decades back, especially in developing countries. Its innovative nature of instructional delivery tends to provide blended learning with the inculcation of multimedia in teaching pedagogy. The existence of virtual education in many e-learning systems had undermined students' responsibility at tertiary level to plan, control and reflect the learning process. In this paper, an e-learning system was developed with guidance and adaptation support. The functional scope of the developed system is 'learner-led' which allows lecturers and students whom are geographically dispersed to leverage on time and space in higher education. Learning experiences are being delivered through web pages hosted on web server and accessible to students synchronously through internet enabled device with web browser for self-paced study.


In a cooperative broadcast scenario, a group of nodes in a network aims to reconstruct a common message. In this paper, we present a new algorithm for distributed consensus-based estimation in such scenarios. Possible applications comprise mobile communication systems and sensor networks. Starting with a least squares estimation problem, the algorithm is developed using techniques from optimization theory. The required communication effort for parallel implementation in a resource-constrained network is estimated and compared to existing approaches. We show that the proposed algorithm requires fewer iterations and a reduced communication overhead per iteration while keeping the estimation accuracy. A modification of the algorithm based on an approximation is presented, which reduces the communication effort even further. All results are corroborated by computer simulations considering different system parameters.


Intramedullary nails are widely used to manage subtrochanteric fractures, and they have good results. There are some documented cases of fixation failure, use a short nail to treat atypical subtrochanteric fractures. The less biomechanically sound fixation achieved by short nail will predispose to cause delayed union and implant breakage. There have been few reports in the literature of implant failure, use a long nail to treat the atypical subtrochanteric fracture. But we experienced two cases of implant failure caused by non-union: treatment with 95-degree condylar blade plate with autologous cancellous bone graft. We report two cases of failed fixation of the bisphosphonateassociated atypical subtrochanteric fractures treatment with long cephalomedullary nails and discuss the causes of the underlying failure mechanism


Sugar cane bagasse was treated by immersion in one of these solutions: A) NaOH 2% volume/weigth; B) wood ash solution 30% volume/weight and C) water alone. Treated bagasse made up 60% of dry matter ration, and the remaining 40% constituted of concentrate (corn, full fat soybean and cotton meal). Six fistulated steers in a change-over design 3x3 were used, for evaluation of fiber degradability in the rumen, through the "in situ" nylon bag technique. Dry matter degradability at 48h incubation time was: A = 75.1%; B = 34.2% and C = 24.2%; NDF degradability of NaOH treated bagasse (A) was higher than in B or C treatments; degradability of B was higher than in C at 72h and 96h of incubation time. NDF degradability at 48 hour incubation time showed the following results: A = 74.0%; B = 41.6% and C = 35.7%. In conclusion, alkaline (NaOH and wood ash) treated sugar cane bagasse improves ruminal degradability, and NaOH is better than wood ash.


Abstract. Urban growth phenomenon as a spatio-temporal continuous process is subject to spatial uncertainty. This inherent uncertainty cannot be fully addressed by the conventional methods based on the Boolean algebra. Fuzzy logic can be employed to overcome this limitation. Fuzzy logic preserves the continuity of dynamic urban growth spatially by choosing fuzzy membership functions, fuzzy rules and the fuzzification-defuzzification process. Fuzzy membership functions and fuzzy rule sets as the heart of fuzzy logic are rather subjective and dependent on the expert. However, due to lack of a definite method for determining the membership function parameters, certain optimization is needed to tune the parameters and improve the performance of the model. This paper integrates genetic algorithms and fuzzy logic as a genetic fuzzy system (GFS) for modeling dynamic urban growth. The proposed approach is applied for modeling urban growth in Tehran Metropolitan Area in Iran. Historical land use/cover data of Tehran Metropolitan Area extracted from the 1988 and 1999 Landsat ETM + images are employed in order to simulate the urban growth. The extracted land use classes of the year 1988 include urban areas, street, vegetation areas, slope and elevation used as urban growth physical driving forces. Relative Operating Characteristic (ROC) curve as an fitness function has been used to evaluate the performance of the GFS algorithm. The optimum membership function parameter is applied for generating a suitability map for the urban growth. Comparing the suitability map and real land use map of 1999 gives the threshold value for the best suitability map which can simulate the land use map of 1999. The simulation outcomes in terms of kappa of 89.13% and overall map accuracy of 95.58% demonstrated the efficiency and reliability of the proposed model.


Community-based Conservation seeks to strike a balance between nature conservation and economic growth by establishing spatial and institutional settings that maintain and even regain biodiversity while simultaneously allowing for sustainable land use. The implementation of community-based conservation blueprints on communal, often agronomically marginal lands, is in many southern and eastern African countries encouraged by the national government. Despite vast academic literature on community-based conservation, it remains unclear how this re-shaping of resource governance has driven territorialisation in rural areas. To address this gap, this article compares the implementation of community-based conservation in Northern Kenya and Northern Namibia. By doing so, we intend to shed light on the question 'why does community-based conservation result in different forms of territorialisation negotiated between state agencies, non-governmental organisations and rural communities? We demonstrate how historical preconditions, contemporary project design, and the commodification of natural resources shape territorialisation in both cases in different ways. In Kenya, concerns for securitisation have been driving community-based conservation, while in Namibia it primarily aimed to benefit the previously disadvantaged rural residents. Furthermore, in both regions community-based conservation programmes serve as vehicles to articulate political claims, either to reify traditional authorities, to create ethnically homogenous territories or to define boundaries of resource use.


A new triangular-shape designed tool as a cathode in microelectromechanical etching process is a precision nanoscale production of a reclamation system of Indium tin oxide (ITO) thin-films defects removal from optoelectronic flat panel displays' color filter surface is demonstrated in the current study. Through the ultra-precise removal of the thin-film nanostructure, the optoelectronic semiconductor industry can effectively reclaim defective products, reducing production costs. In the current experiment, a large size triangular shape cathode is accompanied by a small gap-width between the cathode and the workpiece takes less time for the same amount of ITO removal. A higher feed rate of displays' color filter or a small end radius of the cathode combined with enough electric power produces fast machining. Pulsed direct current can improve the effect of dregs discharge and is advantageous in association with a fast workpiece feed rate. However, it raises the current rating. A large flow rate of the electrolyte corresponds to a higher removal rate for the ITO nanostructure. The electrochemical etching just needs a short time to make the ITO remove removal easy and clean.


Abstract In some situations, closed loop control by the pilot can result in the combined pilot-aircraft system becoming marginally stable or even unstable. This can happen whether the pilot is controlling attitude or flight path. In this paper, an investigation into helicopter stability under flight-path constraint below the minimum-power speed is reported. The work provides a theoretical basis for flight path handling qualities criteria particularly for flight on the, so-called, back-side of the power curve. The research uses the theory of weakly coupled systems by partitioning the helicopter longitudinal dynamics to investigate three interacting subsystems – classically the surge mode, the phugoid mode and the heave mode. Under certain conditions, strong control of flight path or vertical speed is shown to drive the aircraft-pilot system unstable and a conflict is shown to exist between feedback gain values to guarantee stability of both the surge and the flight path motions. This conflict constitutes a potential source of adverse rotorcraft-pilot couplings. The problems are exacerbated in cases when the use of collective control is restricted. The phenomenon is explored in both ground based simulation and flight test to provide a verification of the theory.


Aquatic mammals had to adapt to visual environments that are very diVerent from those encountered by terrestrial mammals. Herein, we review the current knowledge on the colour-vision capabilities of aquatic mammals and discuss the puzzles that emerge from those studies. The common pattern in terrestrial mammals is dichromatic colour vision based on two spectral types of cone photoreceptors in the retina (commonly green and blue cones). Behavioural studies in a few pinnipeds and one dolphin species suggest a similar type of dichromatic colour vision in marine mammals. In contrast, recent immunocytochemical, physiological, and molecular genetic studies of the cone visual pigments in a larger sample of species show that whales and seals generally lack the blue cones and presumably are green cone monochromats. This challenges the behavioural Ž ndings, because cone monochromacy usually is tantamount to colour blindness. Furthermore, a loss of the blue cones seems a rather inadequate adaptation to the bluedominated underwater light Ž eld in the open ocean. Other aquatic and amphibiousmammals (sirenians, otters, hippopotamuses and polar bear) appear to show the more common pattern of cone dichromacy. The present review summarizes available data on the various aquatic mammalian taxa, assesses the reliability of these data, and discusses the potential adaptive pressures involved in blue cone loss. It is suggested that blue cones were lost in an early, 'coastal' period of cetacean and pinniped evolution; many coastal waters preferentially absorb blue light and constitute a long-wavelengthdominated environment. Residual colour vision in these cone monochromats could be achieved in mesopic lighting conditions by exploiting the signal diVerences between the remaining green cones and the rods.


Regular physical activity and exercise bring about recognized health benefits and most Western countries have developed health recommendations, targeted information and programs to promote these behaviors. In spite of this, a large amount of the Western populations do not reach recommended levels of physical activity and exercise [1]. Because people in general are most likely aware of these benefits, one way to understand the modest uptake would be to study motivational aspects of these behaviors. This short communication paper is a summary of a PhD thesis entitled: "You don't have to love it - Exploring the mechanisms of exercise motivation using self-determination theory in a digital context.


In this article we consider the configuration of the South African library and information services (LIS) sector, and analyse the extent to which its structuring facilitates or hinders optimum service to the children and youth of South Africa. The background to our investigation is the crisis in public schooling and the plight of South African youth who suffer disproportionate rates of poverty and unemployment. In our investigation we examine the planning and practice in two new libraries – one a community library, and one a joint-use library for learners and local residents – in an effort to establish the extent to which libraries may partner with schools to take advantage of new thinking that recommends a whole system approach, encapsulated in the metaphor of LIS as an ecosystem. We conclude that this new approach might generate models of service delivery that transcend boundaries that traditionally delineate and confine sub-sectors in the LIS sector.


At the risk of serving and betraying two masters, the intellectual and practical work of the translator is best characterized as an ethical problem: to navigate our anxieties of otherness by making difference accessible while also protecting the 'other' from appropriation. This article locates these concerns within the context of international motion picture news production, during which the need to make far-off people, events, and cultural practices accessible to audiences at home suggests a similar translation process. Using Paul Ricoeur's notion of 'linguistic hospitality' as its point of entry, it maintains that as cultural translations engaged in the description and explanation of frames of reference different to those of the spectator, newsreels took their audiences on an intercultural journey of discovery, bridging both the physical and the metaphorical gulf that separated them from the images projected on their cinema screens and the experience of life elsewhere. By placing this discussion within the concrete practice of British Pathé News, this article advances a powerful example of not only the complex intercultural negotiations that exist at the heart of newsreel production as a form of cultural translation but also the ways in which these negotiations echo across our relationship to otherness more generally.


This current research study sought to explore male participants' subjective experiences of their masculinity, body image and psychological well-being using Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA). The purpose of this study was to employ an idiographic exploration of the participants' experiences of masculinity, body image and how these influence their psychological well-being. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with eight male participants. Participants were aged between 23-60 years old, fluent in English, White and Indian, heterosexual and homosexual. Five major themes emerged from the data: Masculinity as a Threat to the Self, The Suffering Man, Negotiating Masculine Ideology, Negotiating Interpersonal Masculinity and Changing the Body. The themes were complex, multifactorial and interpersonal in nature. Particularly interesting was the prevalence of the experience of coping with emotional distress with the participants sharing difficulty expressing emotions and vulnerability. This highlights how the men experience their body image, masculinity and psychological well-being as being intrinsically linked. Findings may provide insights into working with men in the field of Counselling Psychology and help to better recognise issues pertaining to masculinity and body image and how these may present amongst men when seeking help.


In the recent financial crisis, macroeconomic stimuli produced mixed results across developed economies. In contrast, China's stimulus boosted real GDP growth from an annualized 6.2% in the first quarter of 2009 trough to 11.9% in the first quarter of 2010. Amidst this phenomenal response, land auction and house prices in major cities soared. We argue that the speed and efficacy of China's stimulus derives from state control over its banking system and corporate sector. Beijing ordered state-owned banks to lend, and they lent. Beijing ordered centrally-controlled state-owned enterprises (SOEs) to invest, and they invested. However, our data show that much of this investment was highly leveraged purchases of real estate. Residential land auction prices in eight major cities rose about 100% in 2009, controlling for quality variation. Moreover, higher price rises occur these SOEs are more active buyers. We argue that these centrally-controlled SOEs overbid substantially, fueling a real estate bubble; and that China's seemingly highly effective macroeconomic stimulus package may well have induced costly resource misallocation.


The work described in this thesis is concerned with cluster-species and related systems, many of which are electron deficient. The term 'electron deficient' is used to describe a polynuclear species in which there are too few valence electrons to allocate a localised 2-centre 2-eleotron bond to every pair of atoms which are within normal covalent bonding distance. The bonding in these systems may be rationalised instead in terms of the relationship between the total number of skeletal electrons provided by the skeletal cluster units, and the total number of skeletal atoms. The aim of this work is to suggest new ways in which bond enthalpy contributions can be allocated to individual 2-centre links in cluster systems. In order to obtain energy terms (E) which reflect changes in bond length, (d), relationships of the form E α d(^-k)(where k=constant; 2<k≤5) are proposed. Such empirical correlations are shown to be appropriate for simple main group systems and are applied in turn to boron hydrides, borane anions, transition metal carbonyls and to complexes containing multiple metal-metal bonds. Similar relationships are used to suggest possible bond orders in some systems. Finally, the extent to which skeletal electron counting methods may be used to rationalise the bonding in boranes, carboranes, transition metal complexes and small clusters, metal π-hydrocarbon complexes and small cyclic hydrocarbons is discussed.


ABSTRACT The discovery of two distinct, near-complete specimens belonging to the Cretaceous ant genus Haidomyrmex Dlussky prompts a detailed description and discussion of a remarkable mandibular morphology. The specimens, preserved in 98 million-year-old amber from northern Myanmar, are described here as Haidomyrmex scimitarus, n. sp., and Haidomyrmex zigrasi, n. sp., with diagnostic differences provided between them as well as with H. cerberus Dlussky (also in Burmese amber). Relationships and comparisons of H. scimitarus, H. zigrasi, H. cerberus, and the recently described Haidomyrmodes mammuthus Perrichot from Cretaceous French amber are also discussed. Haidomyrmex was probably arboreal, cursorial, and a specialized trap-jaw predator, utilizing its enormous mandibles and cranial morphology in concert to capture prey. Mandibles appear to have moved in a plane oblique to the dorsoventral and horizontal axes of the body, unlike the lateral-plane movement of modern ants. The additions of these new fossils provide insight into some of the earliest yet surprisingly specialized ants that roamed the Earth.


The issue of the influence of norms on behaviour is as old as sociology itself. Institutional theorists, such as Selznick (1957), theorized this influence in terms of « precarious values ». This paper uses this classical view to bring in structure between norms and behaviour. To do this, we explore the selection effect (Snijders, 2001,2005) of a conflict of norms (a controversy) on the evolution of the advice network among lay judges at the Commercial Court of Paris and on their decisions. We use a jurisprudential case about unfair competition (material and « moral » damages), a case that we submitted to all the judges of this court. The controversy among them is about the extent to which they should be « punitive » in awarding damages, especially « moral » damages. We examine the criteria and norms that they refer to in their discretionary decision making in this case. Statistical analyses using Siena combine longitudinal advice network data collected among them with their normative dispositions. We show that, in spite of declaring themselves to be punitive, the majority of judges align themselves on judges with a law degree coming from the banking industry, who tend to be non punitive. We measure and model the selection effect of this norm on the evolution of the network, teasing out a « preferential attachment » effect in which bankers with a law degree become ever more central over time in these networks. This allows them to exercise a strong influence on the court's judicial decision making. We argue that this approach of conformity and alignments in controversies provides new insights into the relationship between norms, structure and behaviour.


We have successfully demonstrated that a microflow reactor is extremely useful in controlling reactions involving an unstable o-benzoquinone. As a model reaction, Michael addition reaction between o-benzoquinone generated from electrochemical oxidation of catechol and benzenethiols was employed. This reaction system enables selective oxidation of catechol avoiding the oxidation of benzenethiol, although these oxidation potentials are close to each other. The examination of several reaction conditions indicated that the key features of the method are an effective o-benzoquinone generation and its rapid use for the following reaction without decomposition in a microflow system. In addition, cyclic voltammetry measurements elucidated that catechol concentration and selection of anode material were crucial factors for effective o-quinone generation.


Which Side of the Moon? The far- and nearsides of the Moon are geologically different. Using high-precision crustal thickness maps derived from NASA's Gravity Recovery and Interior Laboratory (GRAIL) mission, Miljković et al. (p. 724) show that the distribution of lunar impact basins is also highly asymmetrical. Numerical simulations of impact basin formation coupled with three-dimensional simulations of the Moon's asymmetric thermal evolution suggest that lateral variations in temperature within the Moon's crust have a large effect on the final size of an impact basin. Numerical simulations imply that lunar impact basins are not representative of the earliest inner solar system impact flux. Maps of crustal thickness derived from NASA's Gravity Recovery and Interior Laboratory (GRAIL) mission revealed more large impact basins on the nearside hemisphere of the Moon than on its farside. The enrichment in heat-producing elements and prolonged volcanic activity on the lunar nearside hemisphere indicate that the temperature of the nearside crust and upper mantle was hotter than that of the farside at the time of basin formation. Using the iSALE-2D hydrocode to model impact basin formation, we found that impacts on the hotter nearside would have formed basins with up to twice the diameter of similar impacts on the cooler farside hemisphere. The size distribution of lunar impact basins is thus not representative of the earliest inner solar system impact bombardment.


ABSTRACT During the July Crisis, the United Kingdom was put under strong pressure from Russia and the latter's ally, France, to declare it would fight alongside them. Britain had made the entente cordiale with France in 1904 and a Convention with Russia in 1907. The British Ambassador to St. Petersburg, George Buchanan, was the key figure in diplomatic communication between Britain and Russia at this time and his performance has drawn diverse comments over the decades. Some analysts believe he genuinely sought to restrain Russia from war, but was undermined by his own government, who too easily accepted St. Petersburg must mobilise its army. But others feel Buchanan's reports of Russian mobilisation were ill-informed and unhelpful to the government in London. This article examines Buchanan's performance, arguing that he attempted to preserve peace for a time and does not deserve some of the criticisms levelled at him. Nonetheless, the preservation of the Triple Entente was a priority for him and, after about 28 July, once it became clear that European war could not be avoided, he became tardy in reporting Russia's war preparations, appearing more interested in defending his hosts' behaviour than in providing an accurate analysis of events.


To meet the growing rigid demand of urban housing, urban renewal has played a significant role, which significantly promotes the urban prosperity in China. However, at the same time, many problems occurred through large-scale urban renewal projects. To avoid unintended consequences that occurred in urban renewal, how these decisions were made can be one key focus. To better achieve the goal of sustainability, this research aims to deepen the understanding of urban renewal decision-making in China and contribute to recommend strategies to improve the system. Based on the participatory decision-making theory and the characteristics of urban renewal, a conceptual framework is built to achieve the aim of this research. According to the research framework, this research firstly conducted an empirical study of stakeholders' expectations in urban renewal projects. Eighteen factors are identified and compared among the main stakeholder groups. Secondly, this research explores the stakeholders and their participation in the decision-making of urban renewal in China. Stakeholder Analysis and Social Network Analysis are complemented as the research methodology. In the third step, transaction costs theory is adopted to improve the understanding of urban renewal decision-making process in China. Based on the results of the above three steps, the last step of this research systematically determines a set of strategies for improving urban renewal decision-making in China by adopting the Analytic Network Process. The findings of this research add new knowledge on the exploration of the decision-making of public projects and can be directly adopted by the authority in practice.


Cells within the human body are subjected to continuous, cyclic mechanical strain caused by various organ functions, movement, and growth. Cells are well known to have the ability to sense and respond to mechanical stimuli. This process is referred to as mechanotransduction. A better understanding of mechanotransduction is of great interest to clinicians and scientists alike to improve clinical diagnosis and understanding of medical pathology. However, the complexity involved in in vivo biological systems creates a need for better in vitro technologies, which can closely mimic the cells' microenvironment using induced mechanical strain. This technology gap motivates the development of cell stretching devices for better understanding of the cell response to mechanical stimuli. This review focuses on the engineering and biological considerations for the development of such cell stretching devices. The paper discusses different types of stretching concepts, major design consideration and biological aspects of cell stretching and provides a perspective for future development in this research area.


The European Science Foundation (ESF) and the French Foundation of the Maison des Sciences de l'Homme (FMSH) (within the Entre-Sciences programme) have agreed to jointly develop a new conference series in environmental sciences; an effort to actively foster exchanges between scientists working in the humanities and social sciences and their colleagues in the life and natural sciences.
This interdisciplinary conference present the new advances in the modelling of the Global Change that combines Geosciences and Economics, with a perspective view from history - given the novelty of their interrelations – and from political science – given the impact of the model outputs in the public sphere. The conference gather together speakers and attendees from Europe, United States and Asia.
The conference focuses on new advances in the construction of models of the global change, in Earth sciences and in Economics. Given the issues at stake with Global Warning in terms of impacts and risks, these multidisciplinary approaches are necessarily placed in a public policy perspective, a case apparently unique in the history of science. Chaired by Joel Guiot, climatologist at the European Centre for the Research and Teaching of the Geosciences of the Environment (CEREGE, Aix-en-Provence) and Sylvie Thoron, economist at the Aix-Marseille Research Group in Quantitative Economy (GREQAM, Marseille), the conference aims at generating intense discussions between scientists coming from various disciplinary horizons, by emphasizing the need for integrative approaches when thinking of our future in terms of sustainable development.


The EU is engaged in an ambitious, controversial, and high-stakes experiment to extend the reach of its climate change law. It is seeking to use its market power to stimulate climate action, and to substitute for climate inaction, elsewhere. This is most apparent in relation to the EU's decision to include aviation in its emissions trading scheme. While we are sympathetic to the EU's objectives, and do not take issue with its unilateral means, we argue that the EU is not giving adequate weight to the principle of Common but Differentiated Responsibilities and Respective Capabilities (CBDRRC). While the status, meaning, and implications of this principle are contested and unclear, it requires that developed countries should take the lead in addressing the causes and effects of climate change. We argue that the concept of CBDRRC retains relevance in the context of unilateral climate action, and that the EU's Aviation Directive should be interpreted, applied, and where necessary adjusted in the light of it. We put forward two concrete proposals to achieve this end.