As handheld computers are becoming powerful, portable and wireless, they have recently received considerable attention in education because their multi-functionality and mobility can be used for supporting learning activities in various manner. In spite of the potential in education, handheld computers have several limitations. One of the critical limitations is the small screen size. In an attempt to find factors affecting text readability on the small screen of handheld computers, this study, first, reviewed basic reading process and reading model, previous studies examining potential factors affecting text readability on a small handheld screen. This study investigated the effect of screen orientation and margin on reading performance (reading speed and comprehension) and subjective impressions (ease of reading, mental workload and satisfaction) with a handheld computer. A 2x2 within-subject factorial design was conducted with 16 participants reading texts from a PDA (Compaq iPAQ 3850). The results of this study indicated that neither screen orientation nor margin had a significant influence on objective reading performance and subjective impression. It was found that there were no prevailing preference of screen orientation and margin in reading texts from a handheld computer screen. It was also found that participants had a favorable reading experience with the handheld computers. Based on results of experiments and post-experiment questionnaire, a set of recommendations was developed to improve reading from small screens of handheld computers.


Surgical education has traditionally relied on cadaveric dissection and supervised training in the operating theatre. However, both these forms of training have become inefficient due to issues such as scarcity of cadavers and competing priorities taking up surgeons time. Within this context, computer-based simulations such as virtual reality have gained popularity as supplemental modes of training. Virtual reality simulation offers repeated practice in a riskfree environment where standardised surgical training modules can be developed, along with systems to provide automated guidance and assessment. In this paper, we discuss the design and evaluation of such a training module, specifically aimed at training an advanced temporal bone procedure, namelycochlear implant surgery.


The main premise of the current effort is that the use of a drought index, such as Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI), may lead to a more appropriate understanding of drought duration, magnitude and spatial extent in semi-arid areas like Greece. The importance of the Index may be marked in its simplicity and its ability to identify the beginning and end of a drought event. Thus, it may point towards drought contingency planning and through it to drought alert mechanisms. In this context, Greece, as it very often faces the hazardous impacts of droughts, presents an almost ideal case for the SPI application. The present approach examines the SPI drought index application for all of Greece and it is evaluated accordingly by historical precipitation data. Different time series of data from 46 precipitation stations, covering the period 1947–2004, and for time scales of 1, 3, 6, 12 and 24 months, were used. The computation of the index was achieved by the appropriate usage of a pertinent software tool. Then, spatial representation of the SPI values was carried out with geo-statistical methods using the SURFER 9 software package. The results underline the potential that the SPI usage exhibits in a drought alert and forecasting effort as part of a drought contingency planning posture.


Abstract Four drill cores along a lateritic hill in Nkamouna-Kongo (southeast Cameroon) were studied using microprobe analysis, X-ray diffraction, scanning electron microscopy, transmission electron microscopy and infrared spectroscopy. The main objective of the study was to investigate the occurrence of clay silicates while evaluating the Ni-Co content of the laterite for potential mineral exploitation. The thick lateritic profiles (>40 m deep) developed on serpentinized ultramafic rocks have an Fe-rich clayey fraction, with goethite as the main mineralogical constituent and secondary quartz and relicts of magnetite-maghemite as accessory minerals. Silicate clays are less abundant and occur mainly towards the top of the profiles. At the summit of the interfluve, kaolinite and some gibbsite are associated with goethite. Along the slopes, at the bottom of profiles, the weathered bedrock shows the presence of smectite (Fe-beidellite) and kaolinite, probably due to slower water-flow conditions. Towards the top of the profile in the lower clay, ferruginous and upper clay horizons, only kaolinite remains with gibbsite, after the leaching of silica and soluble cations following repeated remobilization-recrystallization processes. At the summit, where the downward movement of water is rapid, no smectite was identified. As a whole, the mineralogical composition of the material varies in close relationship with the drainage, leading to a contrasted clay mineralogy marked by the presence of Fe-beidellite and kaolinite at the bottom, and that of kaolinite and gibbsite at the summit of the profiles.


Letter from W. A. Hays to Charles Moore, discussing a local drought. Hays is setting up a homestead outside of Howell County, Missouri. Milling has suffered due to low water levels from the drought. He finishes by speaking of wars in Europe and of the city of St. Louis, Missouri.


In recent years, attempts have been made to develop numerical models for unsteady flows in channels with sediment transport. The work presented in Reports KH-R-43A and KH-R-43B was conducted to analyze two essential ingredients of any numerical model: the relationship between the hydraulic variables (slope, depth, and velocity), and the predictor of sediment concentration.

Report KH-R-43A presents a detailed analysis of the two components and examines their role in numerical modeling. Six hydraulic relationships and 13 sediment concentration predictors are examined and compared. New relationships are then developed which appear to be more accurate than the existing techniques. Finally, the new relationships are utilized in a numerical unsteady flow, moveable bed model which uses a four-point implicit finite difference solution scheme.

The data base utilized in the first report is presented in Report KH-R-43B. The data base contains 7,027 records (5,263 laboratory records and 1,764 field records), in 77 data files. Not all records were used in the final analyses, but they have been included in an attempt to provide a historically complete set of alluvial channel observations.

The material presented in these reports is essentially the same as the thesis submitted by the author in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. A common list of references, with data sources separated from other references, has been included in both reports.


Metabolic encephalopathy is an acute disturbance in cellular metabolism in the brain evoked by conditions of hypoxia, hypoglycaemia, oxidative stress and/or inflammation. It usually develops acutely or subacutely and is reversible if the systemic disorder is treated. If left untreated, however, metabolic encephalopathy may result in secondary structural damage to the brain. Most encephalopathies are present with neuropsychiatric symptoms, one in particular being depression. However, mood disorders are often co‐morbid with cardiovascular, liver, kidney and endocrine disorders, while increasing evidence concurs that depression involves inflammatory and neurodegenerative processes. This would suggest that metabolic disturbances resembling encephalopathy may underscore the basic neuropathology of depression at a far deeper level than currently realized. Viewing depression as a form of encephalopathy, and exploiting knowledge gleaned from our understanding of the neurochemistry and treatment of metabolic encephalopathy, may assist in our understanding of the neurobiology of depression, but also in realizing new ideas in the pharmacotherapy of mood disorders. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.


Anterior knee pain syndrome (AKPS) represents a significant problem for patients and sports medicine clinicians. Many predisposing factors have been associated with AKPS. Considerable attention has been given to quadriceps strengthening. Specifically the vastus medialis oblique (VMO) muscle is targeted for selective strengthening. Because of the VMO's oblique attachment to the patella, researchers report that proper dynamic alignment of the patella is dependent on VMO control. Given the lack of scientific information and agreement concerning the rehabilitation of patients with AKPS, the clinician and patient often become frustrated with the lack of progress during rehabilitation. Therefore the purpose of this paper is to clarify the current literature concerning the role of the VMO.


In spite of the widespread use of generalized additive models (GAMs), there is no well established methodology for simultaneous inference and variable selection for the components of GAM. There is no doubt that both, inference on the marginal component functions and their selection, are essential in this additive statistical models. To this end, we establish simultaneous confidence corridors (SCCs) and a variable selection criteria through the spline-backfitted kernel smoothing techniques. To characterize the global features of each component, SCCs are constructed for testing their shapes. By extending the BIC to additive models with identity/trivial link, an asymptotically consistent BIC approach for variable selection is proposed. Our procedures are examined in simulations for its theoretical accuracy and performance, and used to forecast the default probability of listed Japanese companies.


This article deals with the notion of customization for the purpose of conference interpreter training. Two years ago a new MA level programme in Interpreting and Translation was created at the School of Languages and International Studies, University of Central Lancashire in Preston, UK. At the beginning of the third year of teaching on the programme, the author attempts to analyse the course design to find out if  the course can be tailored to meet an individual student's needs while at the same time ensuring that the students are taught all the key modules. All the modules that are directly relevant to practising interpreting skills are presented and carefully analysed. The author is also interested in the process of intercultural communication between students from the respective language streams on the course (so far, in alphabetical order, Arabic, Chinese, French, German and Polish) and the influence it could have on the students' co-operation within the course. Another important background question is related to the impact customisation in the course design could potentially have on the alumni's employability and in what way the programme actually prepares students for their future professional lives. Conclusions and evaluation form the last part of the article.


Wireless sensor networks (WSNs) are very useful in many application areas including battlefield surveillance, environment monitoring and target tracking, industrial processes and health monitoring and control. The classical WSNs are composed of large number of densely deployed sensors, where sensors are battery-powered devices with limited signal processing capabilities. In the crowdsourcing based WSNs, users who carry devices with built-in sensors are recruited as sensors. In both WSNs, the sensors send their observations regarding the target to a central node called the fusion center for final inference. With limited resources, such as limited communication bandwidth among the WSNs and limited sensor battery power, it is important to investigate algorithms which consider the trade-off between system performance and energy cost in the WSNs. The goal of this thesis is to study the sensor management problems in resource limited WSNs while performing target localization or tracking tasks. Most research on sensor management problems in classical WSNs assumes that the number of sensors to be selected is given a priori, which is often not true in practice. Moreover, sensor network design usually involves consideration of multiple conflicting objectives, such as maximization of the lifetime of the network or the inference performance, while minimizing the cost of resources such as energy, communication or deployment costs. Thus, in this thesis, we formulate the sensor management problem in a classical resource limited WSN as a multi-objective optimization problem (MOP), whose goal is to find a set of sensor selection strategies which reveal the trade-off between the target tracking performance and the number of selected sensors to perform the task. In this part of the thesis, we propose a novel mutual information upper bound (MIUB) based sensor selection scheme, which has low computational complexity, same as the Fisher information (FI) based sensor selection scheme, and gives estimation performance similar to the mutual information (MI) based sensor selection scheme. Without knowing the number of sensors to be selected a priori, the MOP gives a set of sensor selection strategies that reveal different trade-offs between two conflicting objectives: minimization of the number of selected sensors and minimization of the gap between the performance metric (MIUB and FI) when all the sensors transmit measurements and when only the selected sensors transmit their measurements based on the sensor selection strategy. Crowdsourcing has been applied to sensing applications recently where users carrying devices with built-in sensors are allowed or even encouraged to contribute toward the inference tasks. Crowdsourcing based WSNs provide cost effectiveness since a dedicated sensing infrastructure is no longer needed for different inference tasks, also, such architectures allow ubiquitous coverage. Most sensing applications and systems assume voluntary participation of users. However, users consume their resources while participating in a sensing task, and they may also have concerns regarding their privacy. At the same time, the limitation on communication bandwidth requires proper management of the participating users. Thus, there is a need to design optimal mechanisms which perform selection of the sensors in an efficient manner as well as providing appropriate incentives to the users to motivate their participation. In this thesis, optimal mechanisms are designed for sensor management problems in crowdsourcing based WSNs where the fusion center (FC) conducts auctions by soliciting bids from the selfish sensors, which reflect how much they value their energy cost. Furthermore, the rationality and truthfulness of the sensors are guaranteed in our model. Moreover, different considerations are included in the mechanism design approaches: 1) the sensors send analog bids to the FC, 2) the sensors are only allowed to send quantized bids to the FC because of communication limitations or some privacy issues, 3) the state of charge (SOC) of the sensors affects the energy consumption of the sensors in the mechanism, and, 4) the FC and the sensors communicate in a two-sided market. SENSOR MANAGEMENT FOR LOCALIZATION AND TRACKING IN WIRELESS SENSOR NETWORKS


This book suggests some quantitative and qualitative approaches for future research in African Studies that would allow a more comprehensive look at the quality and usefulness of the field. A major premise of the book is that research in the field of African Studies is in need of constructive change resulting from healthy debate over appropriate methodologies, the linkage of theory and practice, and the ways in which African Studies research can be usefully compared to other fields. In sum, the ten chapters in the book edge toward the suggestion that African Studies might merit the definition of the 'scientific study of Africa.' Contents: List of Figures and Tables; Preface; Introduction; QUANTITATIVE STUDIES; Attitudes Toward Krio and Its Use in Various Domains; A Time Series Cross-Sectional Study of the United States Foreign Assistance to Tropical Africa; An Analysis of Recent Conflicts in South Africa Using COPDAB; The Expansion Method Applied to African Economic Development Processes; Explaining and Predicting Causes of Military Coups d'Etat in Africa: A Meta-Analysis; An Analysis of Ethnic Voting in Nigeria's 1979 Presidential Election: The Utility of Univariate Statistics; QUALITATIVE STUDIES; Political Science and the Study of African Politics: A View from the Grassroots; Conducting Survey Research in an African Country: Suggestions for Other Researchers; The African Anthem, Nkosi Sikelel'i Afrika: A Methodological Exercise in Linguistic Presuppositions; Conclusion: Ethics and African Studies Research; Bibliography. Contributors: E. Morohundiya Sawyerr, Chris M. Kimaru, Walter W. Hill, Steven M. Banks, Ngozi Caleb Kamalu, Olufemi Vaughan, Emanuel N. Uwalaka, Mohamad Sulaiman Dumbuya.


Disaster and crisis situations are characterised by high dynamics and complexity with human lives and substantial environmental and economic consequences at stake. The advances in information technology have had a profound impact on disaster management by making unprecedented volumes of data available to the decision makers. This has resulted in new challenges related to the effective management of large volumes of data. In this paper, we discuss the application of data mining and machine learning techniques to support the decision-making processes for the disaster and crisis management. We discuss the challenges and benefits of the automated data analysis to different phases of crisis management. Based on the literature review, we observe a trend to move from narrow in scope, problem-specific applications of data mining and machine learning to solutions that address a wider spectrum of problems, such as situational awareness and real-time threat assessment using diverse streams of data.


Educational transitions in the UK are related to social background characteristics such as social class and, to a lesser extent, ethnicity and gender. This thesis presents a case study of admission to the University of Oxford to understand why, conditional on application, admissions patterns into selective higher eduction in Britain show an advantage for already privileged strata of society. Specifically, net of attainment, the professional middle class, white, male and state school applicants fare particularly well in securing offers for undergraduate study at Oxford. With the exception of the state school effect, the admissions privilege advantages already privileged strata of society. In the first empirical section, the analysis of purposefully generated survey data on 1,929 applicants for admission to the University of Oxford finds that quantifiable measures of merit fail to fully explain differential admissions patterns. The logistic regression models also uncover that while applicants from the private sector initially have similar gross chances of gaining an offer to their state school educated peers, they actually face a penalty in the selection process when taking into account their higher levels of prior academic attainment. Furthermore, the analysis shows that while measures of cultural capital, motivation, aspiration and learning style are meaningfully related to selection decisions, they do not explain the lower transition rates for ethnic minority applicants, those from non-professional class backgrounds, female applicants and private school applicants. The second step in the empirical investigations then aims to understand the generative mechanisms behind these findings from the perspective of the decision makers in the selection process. This section draws on interviews with 25 admissions tutors and the observation of eight admissions meetings. The analysis here finds that selectors view the admissions exercise as involving risks and uncertainties. Also, many participating tutors routinely considered schooling in their selection decisions and discounted the performance of applicants who had come from very high achieving schools but who were not top achievers within this peer group. The mechanism of homo-social reproduction in decisions involving uncertainty is then put forward as a possible explanation for the unequal transition patterns. Finally, the third empirical analysis section investigates links between degree performance in final university examinations and admissions relevant factors. This section includes the degree performance of Oxford students as well as those who subsequently embarked on their degree course at universities other than Oxford. The most striking finding is that among the Oxford graduates, female and private school students are less likely to achieve first class degrees than their male and state school educated peers. One interpretation of this finding is that the discounting that selectors apply in the admissions process for these applicants is not only justified but may not even go far enough. But it is also possible, in particular with regard to the female effect, that the Oxford study environment or the examination system, or both are more conducive to male achievements. This thesis contributes to sociological theory by showing that existing models of educational transition have paid insufficient attention to the role of gatekeepers and their individual preferences in generating aggregate selection patterns. Incorporating selectors as actors in transition models increases our understanding of unequal access to educational institutions and the challenges faced in striving towards equal opportunities in an education based meritocracy. The findings presented here have implications for other fields of sociological inquiry that need to account for the role of individual decision makers such as labour market research. The work presented here has implications for policy making regarding selection processes within the University of Oxford and British higher education more generally. It could also aid university systems such as Germany, that are moving towards selective admission, to think about the challenges of designing truly equitable selection processes.


Recent interest in negation has resulted in a variety of different annotation schemes for different application tasks, several vetted in shared task competitions. Current negation detection systems are trained and tested for a specific application task within a particular domain. The availability of a robust, general negation detection module that can be added to any text processing pipeline is still missing. In this work we propose a linguistically motivated trigger and scope approach for negation detection in general. The system, NEGATOR, introduces two baseline modules: the scope module to identify the syntactic scope for different negation triggers and a variety of trigger lists evaluated for that purpose, ranging from minimal to extensive. The scope module consists of a set of specialized transformation rules that determine the scope of a negation trigger using dependency graphs from parser output. NEGATOR is evaluated on different corpora from different genres with different annotation schemes to establish general usefulness and robustness. The NEGATOR system also participated in two shared task competitions which address specific issues related to negation. Both these tasks presented an opportunity to demonstrate that the NEGATOR system can be easily adapted and extended to meet specific task requirements. The parallel, comparative evaluations suggest that NEGATOR is indeed a robust baseline system that is domain and task independent.


In a context of liberalized financial systems, microfinance allows millions of households, usually excluded from classical financial services, to begin or reinforce their own activities and become microentrepreneurs. Yet, in spite of the success of numerous microfinance institutions (MFI), many difficulties remain which must be urgently resolved in view of their ambitious objectives. First, a large number of the rural households still lack access to financial services. Second, most of the existing MFI are not yet financially sustainable. Finally, while funds from governments and donors are rapidly increasing, financial institutions still need solid foundations to avoid management failures. These issues raise questions of the role of the state to promote MFI including (1) which state-owned institutions may be necessary? (2) which level and type of subsidization of the financial institutions can be accepted? (3) what can be the choice for the state between alternative investments in financial institutions or complementary services? (4) what are the necessary conditions for creating a favorable environment? This paper presents the evolution of views on the role of the state in the financial system including theoretical and empirical points of view from the interventionist period of the 1960s and 1970s to the current period of liberalization. Based on country case studies illustrating the divergent role of the state in the development of the rural financial system, the paper reviews the respective role of the state, the NGO and the private commercial banks in increasing their outreach and in adopting microfinance innovations. It also analyzes different issues regarding regulation of MFI.


Maps are the manifestation of an intellectual construct of physical and metaphysical environments. They are rich cultural objects presenting and transmitting information about time and place of production. A map is not neutral - it is an interactive, constructed representation of space as perceived and presented by its maker and then interpreted by the viewer. Maps thus reveal methodological relationships between artistic and scientific approaches, aesthetics and functionality and form and content in the context of visual culture. And given their subjective nature, maps reproduce the views or perspectives of their makers. Cartographic Traditions in East Asian Maps is focused on a group of maps from the MacLean Collection, one of the world's largest private collections of maps. The maps presented here are in a wide range of medium and formats including screens, wall maps, sheet maps, pocket maps, case maps and map plates. They are eighteenth and nineteenth-century maps from the late Qing dynasty in China, the Joseon dynasty in Korea and the Edo and Meiji periods in Japan illustrating late traditions in the region's history. Each of the three chapters examines one of the three principal regions of East Asia and begins with overall regional maps, then local city maps of Beijing, Edo, Yokohama and Kyoto, respectively, or the eight provinces of Korea. This book provides some of the particular practices and relationships between text and image in East Asian map making that are unique in world cartography. Often particular map making characteristics are not recognized as unique within their own cultural contexts, and so it is only through the process of comparing and contrasting that these qualities emerge. This survey of selected maps proves extremely useful in revealing certain similarities and distinctive differences in the representations of space, both real and imagined, in early modern cartographic traditions of China, Korea and Japan. In addition, as this was a period that Western nations were applying pressure on Asia to open for trade, religion and diplomacy, the introduction of Western cartographic methodologies during the early modern period of East Asia, along with some of the resulting changes, is also discussed. Published in association with MacLean Collection.


The integration of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) in the academic context caused a change in the way teaching and learning is carried out. It also broadened the usually formal educational contexts and the way these are accessed (Trujillo y Cáceres, 2010). Nonetheless, gaps can still be found concerning the inequality in the access to ICT resources and tools and, therefore, in the universal access to knowledge and education. This paper studies the use and integration of ICT through students' perceptions from the educational centers of the municipality of San Juan Girón (Santander, Colombia). The population is composed of 208 participants with ages ranging between 12 and 18, 59% female and 41% male. Statistically significant results were obtained concerning the use of school-owned resources and teaching methodologies.


The wool of sheep is suitable to test the mineral supply; however, a number of factors could affect the results. The growth rate and length of staple can be very different according to season, physiological state and individual variation. These factors are likely to affect the quantity of minerals accumulated into the wool. Therefore, the purpose of this research was to examine whether there is a difference between the mineral content of wool nearly reached the full staple length and the freshly grown wool using the same feeding regime.10 Tsigai pregnant sheep have been selected randomly from the same farm. Wool samples were obtained from the withers, side and quarter with bended scissors. Samples were mineralized using nitric acid and hydrogen peroxide using ultrasonic cleaning unit. P, Ca, Mg, Na, S, Cu,Se and Zn content were determined by ICP-OES. Statistical analyses were carried out by SAS (SAS Institute Inc., Cary, NC) GLM procedure.Differences between means were tested by Tukey test. Significantly lower Ca, Na, P, Zn values were found in case of intensively grown wool. Sampling location did not affect the mineral content. Herd mineral supply was adequate. Our results suggest that intensively grown wool samples have to be used for mineral analyses.


One of the major issues related to electroencephalography (EEG) is to localize where in the brain signals are generated, this is so called inverse problem of source localization. The quality of the source localization depends on the accuracy of the geometry and the electrical conductivity model used to solve the problem. Among the head tissues, the skull conductivity is the one that influences most the accuracy of the source localization,due to its low value. Moreover, the human skull is a bony tissue consisting of compact and spongy bone layers, whose thickness vary across the skull. As the skull tissue composition has strong inter-individual variability both in terms of geometry and of individual conductivity, conductivity estimation techniques are required in order to determine the unknown skull conductivity.
The aim of this thesis is to reduce the uncertainty on the skull conductivity both in spherical and realistic head geometries in order to increase the quality of the inverse source localization problem. Therefore, conductivity estimation is first performed on a 3-layered spherical head model. Existence, uniqueness and stability of the conductivity in the intermediate skull layer are discussed, together with a constructive recovery scheme. Then a simulation study is performed comparing two realistic head models, a bulk model where the skull is modelled as a single compartment and a detailed one accounting for the compact and spongy bone layers, in order to determine the importance of the internal skull structure for conductivity estimation in EEG.


With the heavy top and compressible flow as guiding examples, this paper discusses the Hamiltonian structure of systems on duals of semidirect product Lie algebras by reduction from Lagrangian to Eulerian coordinates. Special emphasis is placed on the left-right duality which brings out the dual role of the spat-ial and body (i .e. Eulerian and convective) descriptions. For example, the heavy top in spatial coordinates has a Lie-Poisson structure on the dual of a semidirect product Lie algebra in which the moment of inertia is a dynamic variable. For compressible fluids in the convective picture, the metric tensor similarly becomes a dynamic variable. Relationships to the existing literature are given.


"The Employed Inventor in the United States" treats a problem peculiar to most industrial states, where the independent inventor has to a large extent been replaced by the corporation or institution employee. The employed inventor is hired to use his talents in the interests of that one corporation or institution which provides research facilities for his use either in working on projects of his own choosing and at his own pace or in adhering to specific assignments and schedules imposed by the employer. Some of the main questions in this field are: What rights does the employed inventor have over his work? What are the rewards of his work? What legal and practical problems does his status raise for his employer? These and other questions are discussed in this book, the first general survey of the legal and practical relations between employer and inventor-employee in the United States.After an introduction by Neumeyer dealing statistically with the extent and disposition of R&D in the United States and the source of funds, Stedman has written a chapter on legal relations between employer and employee in regard to patents, copyright, and trade secrets, surveying the common law of invention. The remainder of the book, by Neumeyer, presents a spectrum of 20 detailed case studies treating employee-invention policy in industry (9 companies), government (4 agencies), and universities (7 institutions). There is also a chapter on collective bargaining agreements containing patent clauses with respect to employee inventions as concluded by certain companies, especially in the aircraft industry.This is an exploding field, one of the biggest in the industrial and business worlds. "The Employed Inventor in the United States" addresses the growing public interest in R&D policy and administration as well as the large professional population employed in such activity. The authors expect this field to become more important still, as cooperation between U.S. corporations and institutions and their foreign counterparts increases and as competition in engineering innovations for new products and processes grows in national and international markets.


One way to increase the performance of a processing unit is to exploit implicit parallelism. Exploiting this parallelism requires a processor to dynamically select instructions in a serial instruction stream which can be executed in parallel. As operations are computed concurrently, an execution speedup will occur. This thesis studies how effectively implicit parallelism could be exploited in the Scalable Pro cessor Architecture (SPARC)[9], a reduced instruction set architecture developed by Sun Microsystems. First an analysis of SPARC instruction traces will determine the optimal speedup that would be realized by a processor with infinite resources. Next, an analytical model of a parallelizing processor will be developed and used to predict the effects of limited resources on optimal speedup. Lastly, a SPARC simulator will be employed to determine the actual speedup of resource limited configurations, and the results will be correlated with the analytical model.


Seroepidemiological study of  Brucella ovis  in sheep from Sergipe State was carried out to determine the seropositivity and infection distribution in rural properties and possible factors associated with infection. A total of 54 sheep properties were studied and 932 blood serum samples from animals older than six months were collected in the three regions of Sergipe State. All sera samples were examined by agar gel immunodiffusion (AGID). According to the serological tests, 46.30% (25/54) of the properties had serologic evidence of infection by  B. ovis , with 4.40% of positive animals (41/932). Presence of sheep handler (OR=2.31) and properties with an area bigger than 50 ha (OR=1.98) were observed as factors associated with  B. ovis  infection, whereas the use of stall (OR=0.37) worked as a protective factor (OR=0.40). Thus, the presence of antibodies against  B. ovis  in Sergipe State was confirmed, and it highlights the importance of complementary studies to determine the specific health measures in herds to prevent this disease.


Craniofacial form is defined by a number of factors. A major contributor is the jaw musculature especially of the masseter muscle, as differences in transcription and translation of various genes have been documented from this tissue. Up to this point however, no reliable biological predictors of form have been identified.
The aims of this study were therefore, to describe the transcriptome of the masseter muscle using microarray technology and to establish and correlate the expression levels of potential candidate and known "informative" genes in masseter muscle with selected clinical, radiographic and dental features of subjects with a variety of craniofacial morphologies.
A total of 29 patients (18 deformity and 11 control) were selected from the orthodontic/orthognathic clinics at the Eastman Dental and Whipps Cross Hospitals, London, and Riyadh Military Hospital, Saudi Arabia.
Microarray results indicated five "novel" genes not previously reported in relation to the masseter muscles of subjects with variable craniofacial morphologies. Two genes (KIAA1671 and DGCR6) were down-regulated in long face patients, one (SERGEF) was down-regulated in Class III patients and one (LOC730245) was up-regulated in Class II long faces and in all Class III subjects, compared to controls. Another gene (NDRG2) was down-regulated in Class II compared to Class III individuals. Subsequent quantitative Reverse Transcriptase PCR results strongly confirmed that the "novel" gene SERGEF was down-regulated in relation to the clinical, dental and radiographic features of subjects with Class III appearance. SERGEF gene had a positive relationship to the number of dental occlusal contacts and ANB angle. The "informative" gene MHC7 was strongly related to both vertical and horizontal facial deformities.
These data suggest that the expression profiles of a number of genes can be analysed and used to make assessments as to their role in the primary aetiology and successful or unsuccessful treatment of patients with specific craniofacial morphologies.


Here we describe 31 fossil teeth, deposited in the palaeontological collections of the Museo di Storia Naturale di Milano (MSNM), that come from the inland portion of the Mahajanga Basin, NW Madagascar, namely from the Sakahara Formation (classically known as Isalo IIIb subunit), which is dated to the Bathonian stage of the Middle Jurassic. Based on detailed morphological characters, the eight morphotypes recognized herein are tentatively referred to four sauropod taxa: Archaeodontosaurus descouensi, 'Bothriospondylus madagascariensis', Lapparentosaurus madagascariensis and an indeterminate specialized eusauropod, which may represent a new species and provides the first evidence of a Bathonian diplodocoid in Madagascar. The identification of the teeth is corroborated by comparative examination of morphometric data. We provide evidence that Titanosauriformes were present in the Bathonian, on the basis of seven specimens referable to this clade. We also discuss in detail some dental characters that support the existence of a clear niche partitioning between the abovementioned taxa that co‐existed in the Malagasy Middle Jurassic terrestrial ecosystem. We hypothesize, for the first time, a direct correlation between the pattern drawn on the tooth crown by the enamel wrinkles and the feeding ecology of sauropod dinosaurs. The enamel wrinkles probably played a structural function: coarse wrinkles were associated with a diet composed mainly of hard foodstuff, whereas fainter wrinkles, which appeared in more derived morphologies, were associated with a diet composed of softer foodstuff.


Purpose: The objectives of this study are to describe mode of delivery decision making among HIV positive women, understand patient knowledge and attitudes regarding elective cesarean section (ECS) for prevention of mother-to-child transmission of HIV (PMTCT), and in turn quantify the use of ECS for PMTCT at an urban Kenyan maternity hospital. Methods: This is a descriptive cross-sectional study involving the survey of postpartum HIV-infected women delivering at Pumwani Maternity Hospital (PMH) in Nairobi, Kenya. Each participant was interviewed using a standardized questionnaire. Results: 250 women participated in this study over the course of three months. The rate of delivery by ECS for PMTCT was 4.0% (10/250), though 13.6% (34/250) planned this mode of delivery. Planning ECS was positively correlated with higher education levels (OR: 1.46; 95% CI: 1.09-1.94, p=0.028) and markers of higher socio-economic status including having a private toilet (OR: 2.89; 95% CI: 1.43-3.84, p=0.002) and living in a home with greater than one room (OR: 2.89; 95% CI: 1.07-7.80, p=0.033). The strongest correlates of ECS planning included having a surgical history (OR=5.86, 95% CI: 2.9211.77, p<0.001), attending clinic at PMH (OR=7.85, 95% CI: 4.63-13.30, p<0.001), and knowledge of ECS (OR=24.50, 95% CI: 8.10-93.35, p<0.001). Patient education regarding ECS for PMTCT was limited, and 64% (160/250) of participants had never heard of this PMTCT intervention. Most often cited concerns regarding cesarean section included increased recovery time (66.3%), minor complications (55.4%), and risk of death (48.7%). Post-counseling, 48.0% (120/250) of participants would choose elective cesarean section if offered, while 67.6% (169/250) would opt for this mode of delivery if the cost of ECS was the same as vaginal delivery. Correlates of ECS acceptability included high socioeconomic status (e.g. secondary education OR=1.64, 95% CI: 1.252.15, p<0.001; ability to pay for delivery OR=1.40, 95% CI: 1.12-1.76, p=0.003), surgical history (OR=2.79, 95% CI: 1.21-6.43, p=0.011), and attendance at PMH antenatal clinic (OR=3.03, 95% CI: 1.54-5.98 p=0.001). Conclusions: Patient knowledge and uptake of ECS for PMTCT is limited at PMH. Although women are aware of the dangers of ECS, post-counseling acceptability of ECS, especially if the burden of cost is removed, is high.


Roquefortine C is one of the most ubiquitous indoline alkaloids of fungal origin. It has been isolated from over 30 different species of Penicillium fungi and has garnered attention in recent years for its role as a biosynthetic precursor to the triazaspirocyclic natural products glandicoline B, meleagrin, and oxaline. The triazaspirocyclic motif, which encompasses three nitrogen atoms attached to one quaternary carbon forming a spirocyclic scaffold, is a unique chemical moiety that has been shown to impart a wide array of biological activity, from anti-bacterial activity and antiproliferative activity against cancer cell lines to anti-biofouling against marine organisms. Despite the promise of these compounds in the pharmaceutical and materials industries, few syntheses of triazaspirocycles exist in the literature. The biosynthesis of roquefortine C-derived triazaspirocycles, however, provides inspiration for the synthesis of these compounds, namely through a nitrone-promoted transannular rearrangement. This type of internal rearrangement has never been carried out synthetically and would provide an efficient stereoselective synthesis of triazaspirocycles. This work encompasses efforts towards elucidating the biosynthetic pathway of roquefortine C-derived triazaspirocycles as well as synthetic efforts towards the construction of triazaspirocycles. Chapter 1 will discuss a large-scale fermentation procedure for the production of roquefortine C from Penicillium crustosum. Chapters 2 and 3 explore (through enzymatic and synthetic means, respectively) the formation of the key indoline nitrone moiety required for the proposed transannular rearrangement. Finally, chapter 4 will discuss synthetic efforts towards the synthesis of triazaspirocycles. This work has considerably enhanced our understanding of the roquefortine C biosynthetic pathway and the unique chemistry of this natural product, and our efforts towards the synthesis of triazaspirocycles will facilitate the use of these compounds in numerous applications. Degree Type Dissertation Degree Name Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) Graduate Group Chemistry First Advisor Madeleine M. Joullie


We are headed for our first wartime Presidential transition in forty years. The good news is that this has prompted uncommon attention to the process of transition. The bad news is that transitions are difficult in the best of circumstances; forewarned does not always equal prepared. The United States handles transitions well on a strategic level. Strategic continuity is found in the Constitution. Transition is also part of the rhythm of government. The intelligence community, for example, has a sound tradition of briefing candidates and Presidents-elect. However, there is tactical vulnerability. An outgoing administration may hesitate to initiate all but the essential acts of force or to make policy commitments. Alternatively, an administration on its last legs runs the risk that policy initiatives will be short-lived, or that relevant actors will wait the administration out. An incoming administration may not have developed its policy framework or crisis templates; campaign rhetoric may not have adjusted to ground truth and the nuance of governance.There is procedural vulnerability as well. When a new administration comes into the White House there is little in the way of guidance. In many cases, safes are literally empty. Phone lists do not exist; sometimes, phones do not either. Most importantly, personnel may not be in place. This is evident with respect to officials subject to Senate confirmation. It is also true at intermediate levels of government where facts are gathered, intelligence analyzed, and policy choices framed. The Standing Committee on Law and National Security asked how might an incoming administration get a running start in the areas of national security law and Presidential process? In the following pages I offer some suggestions that might help the next team get a running start and mitigate transitional risks.


The adaptive instruction provided by Intelligent Tutoring Systems (ITSs) tailors direction, support, and feedback to enhance/maintain the learning needs (e.g., lack of knowledge or skill) of each individual. Today, ITSs are generally developed to support desktop training applications, with the most common domains involving cognitive problem solving tasks (e.g., mathematics and physics). In recent years, implementations of game-based tutors authored using the Generalized Intelligent Framework for Tutoring (GIFT), an open-source tutoring architecture, provided tailored training experiences for military tasks through desktop applications (e.g., games including Virtual Battlespace and Virtual Medic). However, these game-based desktop tutors have also been limited to adaptive instruction for cognitive tasks (e.g., problem solving and decision-making). The military requires adaptive instruction to extend beyond the desktop to be compatible with the physical nature of many tasks performed by soldiers, sailors, and airmen. This article examines how commercial sensor technologies might be adapted to work with GIFT and support tailored computer-guided instruction in the psychomotor domain for a military medical training task, specifically hemorrhage control. Toward this goal, we evaluated the usability and system features of commercial smart glasses and pressure-sensing technologies. Smart glasses were selected as the focus of this study over handheld mobile devices in order to promote a hands-free experience during the training of hemorrhage-control tasks on a mannequin. Pressure sensors were selected to provide direct measures of effectiveness during the application of tourniquets and pressure bandages. Each set of technologies (smart glasses and pressure sensors) was evaluated not with respect to each other, but with respect to their capabilities to support adaptive instruction in the wild at the learner's point-of-need and criteria based on established usability heuristics. Instruction in the wild is training provided in an environment outside the classroom and areas where tracking and sensing infrastructure are available (e.g., deployed areas of operation). We examined a wide range of features and capabilities, and evaluated their compatibility with the hemorrhage-control task, to answer the following question: what system design features (e.g., usability and interaction) are needed to support adaptive instruction for this individual psychomotor task at the point-of-need in locations where no formal training infrastructure is available?


An amplifier design for efficient amplification of linearly polarized fundamental mode lasers is presented. The concept was verified by amplifying single-frequency input powers from 1 W to 20 W into output power ranges of 35 W up to 65 W. Beam quality measurements with a mode-analyzer cavity showed only minor beam quality degradation due to the amplification process.


The problems of the formation, evolution and regulation of the insurance market of Ukraine are researched in the article. The conceptual framework of the Ukrainian insurance market functioning and regulation are theoretically reasoned. The necessity of the synthesis of the market, government and institutional regulation for providing an effective insurance market functioning is explained. The problems of the Ukrainian insurance market evolution and regulation are pointed out and the suggestions for their solving are formulated


High rates of highly persistent mental health problems can have significantly damaging effects on young adults' lives, and young adults are less likely to seek treatment for such problems. This article describes a unique Canadian knowledge translation project called Mobilizing Minds: Pathways to Young Adult Mental Health , which aimed to impact not only the mental health literacy of young adults, but to engage young adults in the entire research process from inception to dissemination of results. Knowledge translation is a process that involves producing and assessing the quality of the knowledge to be translated and tailoring the knowledge to be user friendly for particular segments of the population. The article gives particular attention to the ways in which the Mobilizing Minds project was influenced by youth engagement. We discuss three aspects: 1) structures, processes and communication; 2) project products ; and 3) challenges and responses. Lessons learned specific to intergenerational collaboration will be of interest to youth as consumers of mental health information and services, mental health practitioners, researchers, and decision-makers seeking to improve mental health at a systemic level. Keywords: knowledge translation, young adult, mental health, participatory research, youth engagement, youth-adult partnerships


BACKGROUND
The incidence, risk factors, and outcome of contrast-induced acute kidney injury (CI-AKI) in 730 patients with acute coronary syndrome (ACS) undergoing emergency percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI), whose contrast volume was below maximum allowable contrast dose (MACD) was prospectively investigated.

METHODS AND RESULTS
MACD was defined as (5ml×body weight [kg]/baseline creatinine [mg/dl]). CI-AKI was defined as a greater than 25% increase in creatinine from the baseline or an absolute increase of ≥0.5mg/dl within 48h after the procedure. CI-AKI occurred in 212 (29%) patients. Patients with CI-AKI had a higher risk for in-hospital mortality (9.4% vs. 1.5%, P<0.001) and a longer stay in the coronary care unit (median, 4.0 vs. 3.0 days, P<0.001) compared with those without CI-AKI. In a multivariate logistic analysis including 20 clinical variables, elevated glucose levels as variables categorized into quartiles were independently (P<0.001) associated with the development of CI-AKI. In addition, this relationship was seen in both the subgroup of patients with known diabetes and that of those without known diabetes.

CONCLUSIONS
CI-AKI might occur commonly and could be be associated with a more complicated clinical course in ACS patients undergoing emergency PCI whose contrast volume does not exceed MACD. Elevated pre-procedural glucose might be a powerful and independent risk factor for the development of CI-AKI in this population.


This paper looks at the evolution of incomes at the top of the distribution in Canada. Master files of the Canadian Census are used to study the composition of top income earners between 1981 and 2011. Our main finding is that, as in the United States, executives and individuals working in the financial and business services sectors are the two most important groups driving the growth in top incomes in Canada. A finding more specific to Canada is that the oil and gas sector has also played an important role in income growth at the top, especially in more recent years. Another arguably Canadian-specific finding is that holders of medical degrees have lost ground compared to other top income earners. Finally, despite the IT revolution, scientists, engineers and even computer scientists do not account for much of the growth in top incomes in Canada.


Ancient Athens was a remarkably peaceful and well-ordered society by both ancient and contemporary standards. Scholars typically attribute Athens' success to internalized norms and purely informal enforcement mechanisms. This article argues that the formal Athenian court system played a vital role in maintaining order by enforcing informal norms. This peculiar approach to norm enforcement compensated for apparent weaknesses in the state system of coercion. It mitigated the effects of under-enforcement in a private prosecution system by encouraging litigants to uncover and punish their opponents' past violations. Court enforcement of extra-statutory norms also permitted the Athenians to enforce a variety of social norms while maintaining the fictions of voluntary devotion to military and public service and of limited state interference in private conduct.


The species richness‐elevation relationship (SRE) is predominantly hump‐shaped along terrestrial gradients, but has been less explored in aquatic environments. Chironomids were used to evaluate the generality of the SRE in mountain lakes, and the role of methodological and biological factors in determining its shape. The shape of 39 chironomid SREs distributed worldwide was identified by consensus between statistical and visual methods. A 'coefficient of methodological integrity' (Cin) was developed to combine information on sampling effort and homogeneity, and elevational extent in order to quantify the adherence of each dataset to methodological standards known to influence the SRE. Differences in the shape of the SRE between biogeographical regions, biomes and climatic regions were tested using Fisher's exact tests. A formal meta‐analysis was conducted to quantify the overall strength of the SRE, and its association with geographical extent, sampling technique, biogeography, biomes and climate. The SRE presented multiple forms, with considerable variation between identification methods. The most satisfactory datasets (i.e. lowest Cin values), showed predominance of non‐linear (low‐plateau and hump‐shaped) patterns. The Cin explained ~21% of pattern variation. Neither biogeography, nor biomes or climatic regions accounted for differences in the shape of the SRE. The global predominance of non‐linear SRE suggests that chironomid richness generally remains high in lakes at mid‐elevations, decreasing sharply towards high elevations. As previously known for terrestrial environments, identification of SRE shape is influenced by analytical method. Whenever possible, tailoring the sampling design to increase methodological integrity will reduce uncertainty in the identification of SRE shape in mountain lakes.


The Water Future and Solutions Initiative (WFaS) develops consistent, multi-model global water scenaros with the aim to analyze the water-food-energy-climate- environment nexus and identify future hotspots of water insecurity and related impacts on food and energy security. WFaS coordinates its work with on-going scenario development in the fifth assessment review of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), which has developed climate scenarios based on the Representative Concentration pathways (RCPs) and alternative futures of societal developments described in the Shared Socio-economic Pathways (SSPs). In its 'fast-track' scenario assessment WFaS applies available multi-model ensembles of RCP climate scenarios and population, urbanization, and economic development quantifications of the SSPs. Here we interpret SSP narratives to indicate direct or indirect consequences for key water dimensions. Criical scenario assumptions are assessed for different conditions in terms of a country or regions ability to cope with water-related risks and its exposure to complex hydrologcal conditions. For this purpose a classification of hydro-economic challenges across countries has been developed. Scenario assumptions were developed for defined categories of hyro-economic development challenges and relevant features of SSPs. In this way we systematically assess qualitatively key scenario drivers required for global water models We then provide quantifications of assumptions for technological and structural changes for the industry and domestic sector. For the quantification of global scenarios of future water demand, we applied an ensemble of three global water models (H08, PCR-GLOBWB, WaterGAP). Ensemble results of global industrial water withdrawal highlight a steep increase in almost all SSP scenarios. Global amounts across the three models show a wide spread with the highest amounts reaching almost 2000 km^3 yr^-1 by 2050, more than doubled compared to the present industrial water use intensity (850 km^3 yr^-1). Increases in world population result in global domestic water withdrawals by 2050 reaching 700-1500 km^3 yr^-1 depending on scenario and water model. This is an increase of up to 250% compared to the present domestic water use intensity (400-450 km^3 yr^-1). We finally suggest improvements for future water use modelling.


This Article discusses an exam technique that uses realistic hypothetical corporations to test on course material. These fact scenarios are more enjoyable for the students to complete than traditional exams. In addition, the technique helps the Author achieve important pedagogical goals. Students are given a document package composed of corporate articles of incorporation, bylaws, SEC filings, a Standard & Poors Company report, financial statements, and a trust indenture, for example. They have a few weeks before the end of the term to digest the material. They understand that in order to answer the take-home exam questions completely they will have to master the documents. This Article discusses the pros and cons of this testing method.


The current study explored whether language proficiency mediates the perception of task difficulty and whether intended task complexity differences are reflected in the language production (i.e., fluency, accuracy, and complexity) of learners of different proficiency levels in English. 37 participants (20 advanced and 17 pre-intermediate learners of English) took part in the experiment, all of them undergraduate students at a Spanish university, aged between 18 and 25. They were provided with two tasks of hypothetically differing cognitive complexity levels manipulated along ± few elements and ± spatial reasoning dimensions. Two kinds of instruments were used to measure participants' perceptions of task difficulty: self-reported difficulty ratings and time estimation of task completion. Complexity, accuracy, and fluency measures were used to analyze participants' speech production on the two tasks. As far as the perception of complexity is concerned, no significant differences between the high and low proficiency groups were found. Regarding performance measures, in the high proficiency group the complex task triggered greater lexical and structural complexity and accuracy, to the detriment of fluency. In the low proficiency group, on the complex task, fluency was boosted while the other areas remained intact irrespective of cognitive task complexity. These results are discussed in terms of Robinson's Cognition Hypothesis and Skehan's Trade-off Hypothesis.


KwaZulu-Natal has the highest prevalence of HIV in South Africa. The prevalence of dual infection in a normal-risk population in this region is unknown. Dual HIV infection has important implications for diagnosis, treatment response and vaccine development. This cross-sectional study aimed to establish and optimize methods for subtyping and detection of dual infection in KZN. Samples were from chronically-infected patients on ARV treatment within the ARV Rollout Programme, from sites throughout KZN. Subtyping of the samples was performed using HMA. Four samples had indeterminate results by HMA and were then cloned and sequenced. Phylogenetic analysis showed that one of the four samples was a dual infection. This study showed 1/46(2%) samples to be dually infected which suggests that the prevalence of dual infection is low in the sample population. The low prevalence of dual infection reported could be due to the low-risk profile of the sample population. It was concluded that the low prevalence of dual infection is unlikely to have a considerable impact on HIV management.


The focus of this study is a single manuscript in a Tai Nuea village near Mueang Sing in northwestern Laos, copied in 1935 and entitled Pukthanusati (Pali buddhānussati) 'the Recollection of the Buddha.' It is written in the Tai Nuea language and Lik Tho Ngok or 'Bean Sprout' script, and is in the form of a jātaka or narrative story of a former lifetime of the Buddha, the most popular genre for recitation. The thesis examines the lay manuscript culture of which it is a part and the language and orthography of its contents, and then provide a phonemic transcription and annotated English translation of the text together a complete glossary of terms and images of the manuscript.
 The detailed study of this one manuscript is used as an entry point for a broader investigation of Lik manuscript culture as found in Mueang Sing today, including the distinct roles of the Lik and Tham orthographies, scribal vocation, manuscript production, uses and functions, and the contents of the texts. The Pukthanusati text is then the basis for examination of phonological aspects of language use in the recitation of Lik manuscript literature and the historical context of the dialect's phonemes as well as Burmese and Indic forms occurring as loanwords. The Lik Tho Ngok orthography is also placed in context through an overview of its historical development, including possible prototypes and phonological influences, the twentieth century reforms of some traditional orthographies and the question of orthographic depth. The Lik Tho Ngok orthography as found in the manuscript studied is then described in detail, with tables and accompanying notes illustrating the inventories of consonant and vowel glyphs, consonant clusters, ligatures and special orthographic forms, use of subscripts and superscripts, numerals, punctuation, and the Tai Nuea spelling system. The phonemic transcription and annotated English translation of the text illustrate the rhyming structure and other features of specialised language use in Lik manuscript culture.
 The Tai Nuea and a number of closely related Tai groups have generally been overlooked in the field of Buddhist Studies. The study of this manuscript culture therefore contributes to our understanding of local practices on the northern periphery of Theravāda Buddhist influence in mainland Southeast Asia in addition to responding to an urgent need to examine and document this endangered scribal tradition and it specialised use of language and orthography.


^^riT^HE International Court of Justice shall be the principal 1 judicial organ of the United Nations." Article 92 of the United Nations Charter thus rounds out the grand design of what the Court itself has described as the "organized international community." This is the structure or framework for world order, which, however nascent and rudimentary, is an indispensable feature of the modern age. It was to the principal judicial organ of the United Nations that Ethiopia and Liberia submitted the protracted and un resolved dispute with South Africa concerning the interpreta tion and application of the Mandate for South West Africa, the very existence of which was denied by South Africa. A summary of the history and background of the dispute is an essential prelude to the following discussion, which concerns: (1) Why the litigation was instituted. (2) What the Court did ?1962. (3) What the Court did?1966. (4) Some lessons to be learned. The Territory of South West Africa, a German colony prior to the First World War, was entrusted to South Africa in 1920 as a Mandate under the League of Nations Covenant. The Mandate System, of which South West Africa is the one vestigial remnant, comprised certain colonies and territories which, as a consequence of the war, had ceased to be under the sovereignty of the de feated states. These colonies and territories, in the words of Article 22 of the League Covenant, were "inhabited by peoples not yet able to stand by themselves under the strenuous conditions of the modern world." The restoration of the colonial status quo ante or the immediate grant of independence were considered by the victors to be unacceptable solutions. Although the powers had publicly voiced opposition to territorial annexation as a proper end of victory, secret arrangements had in fact been made by Great Britain, France and Japan prior to the armistice. These arrangements provided, among other things, that three British Dominions were to have the right to annex, respectively, German


Around the world, SCADA (supervisory control and data acquisition) systems and other real-time process control networks run mission-critical infrastructure--everything from the power grid to water treatment, chemical manufacturing to transportation. These networks are at increasing risk due to the move from proprietary systems to more standard platforms and protocols and the interconnection to other networks. Because there has been limited attention paid to security, these systems are seen as largely unsecured and very vulnerable to attack.

This book addresses currently undocumented security issues affecting SCADA systems and overall critical infrastructure protection. The respective co-authors are among the leading experts in the world capable of addressing these related-but-independent concerns of SCADA security. Headline-making threats and countermeasures like malware, sidejacking, biometric applications, emergency communications, security awareness llanning, personnel & workplace preparedness and bomb threat planning will be addressed in detail in this one of a kind book-of-books dealing with the threats to critical infrastructure protection. They collectivly have over a century of expertise in their respective fields of infrastructure protection. Included among the contributing authors are Paul Henry, VP of Technology Evangelism, Secure Computing, Chet Hosmer, CEO and Chief Scientist at Wetstone Technologies, Phil Drake, Telecommunications Director, The Charlotte Observer, Patrice Bourgeois, Tenable Network Security, Sean Lowther, President, Stealth Awareness and Jim Windle, Bomb Squad Commander, CMPD.

* Internationally known experts provide a detailed discussion of the complexities of SCADA security and its impact on critical infrastructure
* Highly technical chapters on the latest vulnerabilities to SCADA and critical infrastructure and countermeasures
* Bonus chapters on security awareness training, bomb threat planning, emergency communications, employee safety and much more
* Companion Website featuring video interviews with subject matter experts offer a "sit-down" with the leaders in the field


Micro uidic devices are powerful bioapplication tools for cellular experiments in particular, as they can regulate physical and chemical parameters such as the ow rate, shear stress, oxygen, and molecular concentrations in a culture medium to mimic physiological and pathological microenvironments in vitro. However, as cell cultures take place in enclosed spaces, culture samples have to be removed repeatedly to monitor cell-derived metabolites and proteins in order to maintain the cellular microenvironment. We report a simple method for obtaining surface enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) spectra through self-assembly of a nanoparticle monolayer on polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS), which is commonly used in highly biocompatible micro uidic devices. Silica nanoparticles were stabilized as a hexagonal close packed structure on an O2 plasma-processed PDMS membrane, and was coated with silver using vapor deposition to create an SERS plate. When this SERS plate was installed in a micro uidic device, the nanoparticles did not peel off even after long-term uid immersion. The SERS spectra exhibited stable SERS generation and an enhancement factor of more than 1.5 × 106 of the Raman signals from rhodamine 6G compared to the signals without nanoparticles. The SERS spectra of lactate and ATP were obtained, and Raman shifts due to the different masses of 12Cand 13C-lactate were observed, suggesting that the proposed method can be applied to determine the cellular metabolic ux in micro uidic devices. We also obtained cell membrane-derived SERS spectra by culturing murine mammary carcinoma 4T1 cells directly on the nanoparticle membrane. PDMS has high biocompatibility and is often used for fabricating micro uidic devices. Through tight binding of the nanoparticles to the O2 plasma-treated PDMS, the chemical reaction products or the metabolites from cells can be measured for a long duration, while maintaining the microenvironment. We anticipate that this technology can be utilized as a useful tool for analyzing cellular metabolic functions and imaging cellular distributions without staining in various pathological models created in micro uidic devices.


The modeling of multivariate time series in an agnostic manner, without assumptions about underlying theoretical structure is traditionally conducted using Vector Auto-Regressions. They are well suited for linear and state-independent evolution. A more general methodology of Multivariate Recurrent Neural Networks allows to capture non-linear and state-dependent dynamics. This paper takes a range of small- to large-scale Long Short-Term Memory MRNNs and pits them against VARs in an application to US data on GDP growth, inflation, commodity prices, Fed Funds rate and bank reserves. Even in a small-sample regime, MRNN outperforms VAR in forecasting: its out-of-sample predictions are about 20% more accurate. MRNN also fares better in interpretability by means of impulse response functions: for instance, a temporary shock to the Fed Funds rate variable generates system dynamics that are more plausible according to conventional economic theory.


Many nonhematologic tumors produce growth factors that may influence cellular proliferation either by autocrine or by paracrine mechanisms. In the current study, human tumor cell lines were investigated for the constitutive production of macrophage colony-stimulating factor (M-CSF). Culture supernatants obtained from cell lines were analyzed using a radioimmunoassay and a radioreceptor assay specific for M-CSF. Among the various cell types analyzed, all the ovarian cell lines and a majority of the breast cancer cell lines secreted significant amount of an M-CSF-like factor. Treatment of mouse bone marrow cultures with culture supernatants from ovarian cancer cells stimulated the production of macrophage colonies. Analysis of total cellular RNA obtained from the ovarian cell lines by Northern blot showed multiple sizes of M-CSF transcripts with an abundance of a 4.2-kb message. The relative amount of M-CSF transcripts correlated with the level of immunoreactive material seen in the culture supernatants.


Soybean cultivars resistant to Pseudomonas syringae pathovar glycinea (Psg), the causal agent of bacterial blight, exhibit a hypersensitive (necrosis) reaction (HR) to infection. Psg strains carrying the avrB gene elicit the HR in soybean cultivars carrying the resistance gene Rpg1. Psg expressing avrB at a high level and capable of eliciting the HR in the absence of de novo bacterial RNA synthesis have been obtained in in vitro culture. Nutritional signals and regions within the Psg hrp gene cluster, an approximately 20-kilobase genomic region also necessary for pathogenicity, control avrB transcription.


The principle of independence underpins the financial attractiveness and utility of documentary credits, since it makes the assurance of payment by banks concrete. Fraud is however a well-known exception upon which the principle of independence can be set aside. It is argued in this article that English law suffers from four uncertainties as to the fraud exception and it is evaluated how such uncertainties can be remedied. It is mainly advocated that English courts should consider the issue of allocating the risk of fraud, as commercially expected by parties, as a factor in fashioning rules and equitable concerns for the fraud exception. Regrettably, the commercial reality of the distinction between complex (chain of banks) and simple documentary credits, as a core factor in determining liability, is overlooked by English courts. In contrary, there is a tendency by courts to overdramatise the role of contractual analysis. Finally, it is argued that the decision of the Privy Council in Alternative Power cannot be an authority to accept any kind of fraud that is not related to the presented documents (non-documentary fraud) as an exception to the principle of independence.


This paper considers generalized linear models using rule-based features, also referred to as rule ensembles, for regression and probabilistic classification. Rules facilitate model interpretation while also capturing nonlinear dependences and interactions. Our problem formulation accordingly trades off rule set complexity and prediction accuracy. Column generation is used to optimize over an exponentially large space of rules without pre-generating a large subset of candidates or greedily boosting rules one by one. The column generation subproblem is solved using either integer programming or a heuristic optimizing the same objective. In experiments involving logistic and linear regression, the proposed methods obtain better accuracy-complexity trade-offs than existing rule ensemble algorithms. At one end of the trade-off, the methods are competitive with less interpretable benchmark models.


An Analysis of the Risk from UAS Missions in the National Airspace Armand Awad Chair of the Supervisory Committee: Professor Emeritus Juris Vagners Department of Aeronautics & Astronautics As Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS) are integrated into the national airspace, we must be careful to ensure that the hazard rate to human bystanders is sufficiently small. The first source of risk to bystanders involves midair collisions between UAS and other aircraft. The second source of risk concerns risks due to ground impact, both the bystander hazard rate due to aircraft impacting the ground as well as the dependence of crash rate on location. Here, we present first-order models adapted from the literature which estimate the risk due to these various scenarios. Model verification is then achieved through extensive analysis of historic civil aviation accidents. From this, we gain two major insights. First of all, we show that UAS already achieve manned levels of safety with respect to midair collisions. This is because general aviation aircraft routinely operate in conditions where see-and-avoid is used but is not effective. Secondly, we find that the risk due to ground collision of UAS is sufficiently small to allow operations over the majority of the United States. The models presented here are powerful tools that can be used by a general audience to objectively assess the risks associated with various missions in the national airspace.


Abstract One of the most serious bottlenecks in the scientific workflows of biodiversity sciences is the need to integrate data from different sources, software applications, and services for analysis, visualisation and publication. For more than a quarter of a century the TDWG Biodiversity Information Standards organisation has a central role in defining and promoting data standards and protocols supporting interoperability between disparate and locally distributed systems.Although often not sufficiently recognized, TDWG standards are the foundation of many popular Biodiversity Informatics applications and infrastructures ranging from small desktop software solutions to large scale international data networks. However, individual scientists and groups of collaborating scientist have difficulties in fully exploiting the potential of standards that are often notoriously complex, lack non-technical documentations, and use different representations and underlying technologies. In the last few years, a series of initiatives such as Scratchpads, the EDIT Platform for Cybertaxonomy, and biowikifarm have started to implement and set up virtual work platforms for biodiversity sciences which shield their users from the complexity of the underlying standards. Apart from being practical work-horses for numerous working processes related to biodiversity sciences, they can be seen as information brokers mediating information between multiple data standards and protocols.The ViBRANT project will further strengthen the flexibility and power of virtual biodiversity working platforms by building software interfaces between them, thus facilitating essential information flows needed for comprehensive data exchange, data indexing, web-publication, and versioning. This work will make an important contribution to the shaping of an international, interoperable, and user-oriented biodiversity information infrastructure.


The Pamir is the western continuation of Tibet and the site of some of the highest mountains on Earth, yet comparatively little is known about its crustal and tectonic evolution and erosional history. Both Tibet and the Pamir are characterized by similar terranes and sutures that can be correlated along strike, although the details of such correlations remain controversial. The erosional history of the Pamir with respect to Tibet is significantly different as well: Most of Tibet has been characterized by internal drainage and low erosion rates since the early Cenozoic; in contrast, the Pamir is externally drained and topographically more rugged, and it has a strongly asymmetric drainage pattern. Here, we report 700 new U-Pb and Lu-Hf isotope determinations and >300 40Ar/39Ar ages from detrital minerals derived from rivers in China draining the northeastern Pamir and >1000 apatite fission-track (AFT) ages from 12 rivers in Tajikistan and China draining the northeastern, central, and southern Pamir. U-Pb ages from rivers draining the northeastern Pamir are Mesozoic to Proterozoic and show affinity with the Songpan-Ganzi terrane of northern Tibet, whereas rivers draining the central and southern Pamir are mainly Mesozoic and show some affinity with the Qiangtang terrane of central Tibet. The eHf values are juvenile, between 15 and −5, for the northeastern Pamir and juvenile to moderately evolved, between 10 and −40, for the central and southern Pamir. Detrital mica 40Ar/39Ar ages for the northeastern Pamir (eastern drainages) are generally older than ages from the central and southern Pamir (western drainages), indicating younger or lower-magnitude exhumation of the northeastern Pamir compared to the central and southern Pamir. AFT data show strong Miocene–Pliocene signals at the orogen scale, indicating rapid erosion at the regional scale. Despite localized exhumation of the Mustagh-Ata and Kongur-Shan domes, average erosion rates for the northeastern Pamir are up to one order of magnitude lower than erosion rates recorded by the central and southern Pamir. Deeper exhumation of the central and southern Pamir is associated with tectonic exhumation of central Pamir domes. Deeper exhumation coincides with western and asymmetric drainages and with higher precipitation today, suggesting an orographic effect on exhumation. A younging-southward trend of cooling ages may reflect tectonic processes. Overall, cooling ages derived from the Pamir are younger than ages recorded in Tibet, indicating younger and higher magnitudes of erosion in the Pamir.


PT. Masscom Graphy is a company which operate in printing and
publishing. The main product is Suara Merdeka newspaper which become the
mainstay of the Central Java community. Since 2003, the company has obtained
ISO 9001: 2000 as guarantee that the company has implemented a good quality
management according to quality standards guidance in order to maintain
consumer's confidence. In the production activity, the company always endeavor
to produce a good product and reduce high product defects (misdruk) by setting a
standards with 6% misdruk tolerance from total production. However, in the
reality, misdruk levels fluctuate and sometimes exceeds the specified tolerance
standards.
This study aims to determine the damage level of the company's products
and quality control of the company's by using statistical assistance tools. Thus,
the company can take precautionary and improvement measures to reduce the
misdruk level and improve product quality. Analizing the quality control of
product of the company can be done by using statistical assistance tools, its
consist of check sheet, histograms, p-charts, pareto charts, and cause-effect
diagram. P-charts is used to monitor whether the defective product is still in
statistical control or not. Pareto charts is used to identify the dominant types of
defects and to determine the improvement priority. The cause-effect diagram is
used to find the factors that cause a damage in the production process. In order to
facilitate better understanding for the further analysis, Check sheet and
histograms were used in data presentation.
P-charts analysis results show that the process is in a uncontrollable state
or still in deviate state. This can be seen from the control graph, where the
graphic points on the graph fluctuate very high and irregular, and its are out from
control limit. Based on pareto diagram, the improvement priority which need to
be done are damage in the form of blurred color (28.31%), deviation from the
register (19.79%) and the fittness of papers cut (19.50%). The cause-effect
diagram analysis shows that misdruk factor arise from human/ workers factors,
production machinery, work methods, materials/ raw materials and work
environment.


Little is known about the genetic diversity of Salmonella enterica serovar Typhi (S. Typhi) circulating in Latin America. It has been observed that typhoid fever is still endemic in this part of the world; however, a lack of standardized blood culture surveillance across Latin American makes estimating the true disease burden problematic. The Colombian National Health Service established a surveillance system for tracking bacterial pathogens, including S. Typhi, in 2006. Here, we characterized 77 representative Colombian S. Typhi isolates collected between 1997 and 2018 using pulse field gel electrophoresis (PFGE; the accepted genotyping method in Latin America) and whole genome sequencing (WGS). We found that the main S. Typhi clades circulating in Colombia were clades 2.5 and 3.5. Notably, the sequenced S. Typhi isolates from Colombia were closely related in a global phylogeny. Consequently, these data suggest that these are endemic clades circulating in Colombia. We found that AMR in S. Typhi in Colombia was uncommon, with a small subset of organisms exhibiting mutations associated with reduced susceptibility to fluoroquinolones. This is the first time that S. Typhi isolated from Colombia have been characterized by WGS, and after comparing these data with those generated using PFGE, we conclude that PFGE is unsuitable for tracking S. Typhi clones and mapping transmission. The genetic diversity of pathogens such as S. Typhi is limited in Latin America and should be targeted for future surveillance studies incorporating WGS.


Drought is one of the consequences of a reduction of rainfall over a long period of time. Often a number of meteorological elements as high temperatures, strong winds and low relative humidity occurs in conjunction with the drought. These facts make drought very strongly expressed. The present paper aims to analyze the intensity and the seasonal differences of meteorological drought in Northeastern Bulgaria and to characterize the drought impact on the main crops cultivated in the study area. The tendencies of the seasonal and the annual air temperatures and precipitation are investigated. Drought periods are revealed on the base of precipitation anomalies and the drought indices as Standartized Precipitation Index (SPI) and De Martonne Index. The driest years for the period 1961 – 2011 have been established. The production of the main crops in the study area is analyzed on the background of climate change. The information from climate models is used in order to describe future climate and to make the recommendations for crop cultivation in relation to climate impact.


Background Much has been written about Black undergraduate men's out-of-class engagement and social experiences, identity development, participation in intercollegiate athletics, and college enrollment and completion rates. Too little is known about their academic readiness and first-year college adjustment. Purpose The purpose of this study was to understand Black male students' academic transition experiences in the first college year, with a particular emphasis on how they resolved academic challenges with which they were confronted. Setting This study was conducted at 42 colleges and universities in 20 states across the United States. Six institution types were included: private liberal arts colleges, public research universities, highly selective private research universities, public and private Historically Black Colleges and Universities, and comprehensive state universities. Participants The sample was comprised of 219 Black undergraduate men, mostly juniors and seniors, who maintained high cumulative grade point averages, were extraordinarily engaged in a range of student organizations, held multiple leadership roles on campus, cultivated meaningful relationships with faculty and administrators, participated in enriching educational experiences (e.g., study abroad programs), and earned numerous merit-based awards and honors for their college achievements. Research Design Qualitative research methods were used in this study. Specifically, phenomenology was used to understand what Black male students experienced in the first college year and how they experienced the transition phenomenon. Data Collection and Analysis Individual, face-to-face interviews were conducted with all 219 participants. Each interview was 2-3 hours. Moustakas' (1994) process for phenomenological data analysis and Harper's (2007) trajectory analysis technique were used to analyze data collected for this study. Findings Two thematic categories of findings are presented in this article. First are reflections from students who experienced turbulence in their transitions from high school to higher education. Being underprepared for the academic rigors of college, the surprising mismatch between academic effort and first-year grades, the racial composition dissimilarities between their high schools and college campuses, and feelings of cultural misfit were factors to which participants attributed their initial adjustment challenges. The second category includes insights from achievers who transitioned seamlessly to college. They attributed their successful starts to strong academic preparation, prior experiences in demographically comparable educational environments, participation in summer bridge and college transition programs, and academically profitable relationships they cultivated in student organizations. Recommendations This article ends with several suggestions for helping Black undergraduate men adjust more seamlessly and resolve surprising academic transition issues encountered in the first college year.


By merging banks with one another, the government hopes to improve the general
condition or quality of banks. However, after these mergers there are twenty banks
that have been liquidated, and only nineteen remain operation. The aim of this paper
is to construct a model in order to predict the failure of merged banks in Indonesia,
based on financial ratios.
The object of research consists of the financial ratios of either liquidated or
successful ones. The data are collected from a published financial reports of those
banks which have been audited and processed as financial ratios. These financial
ratios are analysed by way of logistic regression. The research hypothesis proposed
is that financial ratios can be turned into prediction models to establish the degree to
which mergers have failed in Indonesia.
The results show that the financial standard of performance of failed banks is
indeed inferior to that of successful ones The results from the statistical test also
indicate that the combination of RR and ROA financial ratios are the most significant
ones to pass the compatibility or "proper and fitness" test to predict the extent of
failure of mergers between banks in Indonesia. The outcome of research may be
exploited by society at large, observers of the banking world, and Bank Indonesia by
way of an early warning system concerning the failure of mergers between banks in
Indonesia.
Keywords: Financial ratios, banking performance analysis, merger


Battery modeling plays a crucial role in improving the performance of battery powered systems especially in electric vehicle (EV) applications. To date, many state-of-the-art battery models have been proposed by researchers to improve the performance of electric vehicles. In this paper, an electric circuit based approach for electric vehicle battery model capable of capturing dynamic capacity rate effects for runtime prediction, state of charge tracking and I-V performance is proposed. To compare the results, two well-known electrical circuit based battery models are accurately modeled in MATLAB Simulink and the accuracy and the simplicity of each model are then compared with the proposed model in this paper with the emphasis on rate capacity effects for state of charge tracking and runtime prediction. To extract the battery parameters and to verify the results of each battery model, experimental tests have also been conducted on four Li-ion LGHG2 3 Ah battery cells connected in series.


This paper will examine some commonly adopted approaches to the measurement of risk in finance and the various shortcomings implicit in the underpinnings of these approaches: early views on the nature of risk and uncertainty (Hume, Bernoulli, Knight, Keynes and Ramsey); the adoption of a mean variance decision choice criteria as a central foundation in financial economics and its accompanying limitations; the various approaches in financial econometrics to modelling volatility (ARCH, GARCH, stochastic volatility, realised volatility and attempts to capture 'tail risk'); the measurement of risk implicit in applications of option pricing models and implied volatility (in particular the VIX index); the Basel Agreements and convention of modelling risk in a value at risk (VaR) framework; and the attractions of conditional value at risk (CVaR) as an alternative metric. I shall conclude with a consideration of the shortcomings of these various approaches when faced with a system wide shock as recently experienced in the global financial crisis.


Selective laser melting (SLM) is a promising manufacturing method which enables the production of complex structured components from base metal powders. With the development of SLM, the possibility of fabricating functional heat transfer devices such as heat pipes and heat sinks using this technique has also gained significant interest in the recent years. In this paper, the possibilities of producing microstructured surfaces using SLM to promote nucleate pool boiling heat transfer were explored. The SLM facility (SLM 250 HL by SLM Solutions GmbH) at the Future of Manufacturing Laboratory 1 of Singapore Centre for 3D Printing (SC3DP) in Nanyang Technological University (NTU), Singapore was employed for the fabrication of the surfaces. The machine is comprised of a Gaussian distributed Yb:YAG laser with maximum power of 400 W and laser beam spot size of 80 μm which melts and fuses the AlSi10Mg base powder of distribution size 20 μm to 63 μm layer-by-layer to develop three-dimensional structures.In total, four 1 cm × 1 cm microstructured surfaces were produced; namely micro-cavity surface, micro-fin surface, micro-sized rectangular channel (MRC) surface and micro-sized square channel (MSC) surface. Saturated pool boiling experiments were conducted on these surfaces in a water-cooled thermosyphon with FC-72 as the coolant fluid under atmospheric condition. In comparison with a plain surface, the MRC and MSC surfaces exhibited marginal improvements in the average heat transfer coefficient whilst more significant enhancements of up to 51.2% were demonstrated with the micro-cavity and micro-fin surfaces. At low heat fluxes (< 7 W/cm2), minimal differences in heat transfer performances between the microstructured surfaces and plain surface were observed. For increased heat fluxes, incremental enhancements in the heat transfer coefficients were observed for the micro-cavity and micro-fin surfaces as compared to the plain surface. The highest enhancement in the heat transfer coefficient over the plain surface was determined to be 63.5% for the micro-fin surface at the heat flux of 17.9 W/cm2 and it was also observed that the heat transfer coefficient of micro-fin surface is consistently higher that of other microstructured surfaces for the range of heat fluxes tested. In addition, higher critical heat fluxes were also achieved with all microstructured surfaces as compared to the plain surface with the highest CHF of 46.2 W/cm2 for the micro-fin and MRC surface. Visual observations suggest that the enhancement in heat transfer from the microstructured surfaces is likely to be due to the increased bubble nucleation sites created from the extended surfaces and the artificial cavities. In summary, these results indicate the promising use of SLM to produce surface features that will enhance pool boiling heat transfer.Copyright © 2016 by ASME


Bislama is the national language of Vanuatu, the world's most linguistically diverse nation with at least 80 actively spoken Oceanic languages used by about 200,000 people. Bislama began as a plantation pidgin based on English in the nineteenth century, but it has since developed into a unique language with a grammar and vocabulary very different from English. It is one of very few national languages for which there is no readily available reference grammar. This book aims to fill this gap by providing an extensive account of the grammar of Bislama as it is used by ordinary Ni-Vanuatu. It does not, therefore, aim to describe any kind of artificial written norm but sets out to capture a range of different kinds of ways that Ni-Vanuatu will say things in various contexts, both written and spoken, formal and informal. The thrust of this volume is to show that Bislama has a grammar - an unfamiliar concept for those educated in Vanuatu. It also shows that Bislama is a language of considerable complexity, which will come as a surprise to many of its users, who have been taught to view their language as somehow "simple" and even "deficient."


Background . A shortage of clinician scientists globally, particularly in the developing world, including Africa and South Africa (SA), is well known and was recently highlighted in a consensus report by the  Academy of Science of South Africa. There is a need to find innovative ways to develop and advance  clinician scientists in SA. Objective . To provide opportunities for young clinicians to develop research skills through enrolling for a  PhD. Method . To address this need in SA, we developed an innovative programme over 2 years in   collaboration with the Carnegie Corporation of New York to support and train young specialist clinicians in research as the next generation of clinician scientists, through a full-time PhD programme. Results . Since initiation of the programme in March 2011, 16 such specialists have been enrolled at  intervals in the Fellowship programme, 5 have qualified with PhDs, while a further 3 are expected to  qualify shortly. Publications and presentations at congresses have been recorded as well as grant  applications. Discussion . Although the programme is seen as an important initial step in addressing the shortage of clinician scientists, its dependence on donor funding and the lack of a secure career path for clinicians  wishing to spend more of their career in research pose problems for the programme's sustainability. It is hoped that the positive outcomes of this experience will initiate further programmes of this kind at  academic institutions and attract the attention of funders and universities in order to sustain and enlarge this initiative.


A new formula for the lens index has been reported which is independent of the lens parameters. This proposed innovative nondestructive liquid-immersion technique is based on a coherent optical-processing configuration, and it is superior to the existing methods because the lens aperture, air equivalent factors for the glass cell and the liquids, lens aberrations, focusing errors, etc. are not of concern. The Fourier transform spectra of a grating as well as of a double slit have been employed to determine the lens index. The comparator and the x-y recorder have been separately used to calculate the distance between two successive diffraction orders in the back focal plane of the test lens. The present technique is quick to perform and easy to handle.