Cloud-based applications require a high degree of automation regarding their IT resource management, for example, to handle scalability or resource failures. This automation is enabled by cloud providers offering management interfaces accessed by applications without human interaction. The properties of clouds, especially pay-per-use billing and low availability of individual resources, demand such a timely system management. We call the automated steps to perform one of these management tasks a "management flow". Because the emerging behavior of the overall system is comprised of many such management flows and is often hard to predict, we propose defining abstract management flows, describing common steps handling the management tasks. These abstract management flows may then be refined for each individual use case. We cover abstract management flows describing how to make an application elastic, resilient regarding IT resource failure, and how to move application components between different runtime environments. The requirements of these management flows for handled applications are expressed using architectural patterns that have to be implemented by the applications. These dependencies result in abstract management flows being interrelated with architectural patterns in a uniform pattern catalog. We propose a method by use of a catalog to guide application managers during the refinement of abstract management flows at the design stage of an application. Following this method, runtime-specific management functionality and management interfaces are used to obtain automated management flows for a developed application.


Competency has been the bedrock of each and every successful sector. This paper attempts to explore the package of success factors of effective competency mapping in a few representatives Captive Power Plants (CPP) of Odisha. The paper outlines data reduction using exploratory factor analysis (EFA) from an archetypal sample of 420 respondents drawn from four public and private power units of Odisha. Investigation reveals competency mapping process is an effective apparatus including six success factors that lend it credence: result orientation, transparency, updated practice, management support, employee participation and strategic orientation. These factors assign different weightage in terms of perception and significance towards mapping of competencies and embellishing knowledge. A convenient non probability sampling method has been espoused in this study. Future research on this study may attempt to replicate this research with intercession and temperance function to explore the interrelationship of effective competency mapping factors and employee performance. A wider organization network may be used to see whether the success factors have some degree of impact. The study assumes significance as Odisha state in India has been a constantly growing economy in case of power manufacturing and distributing area. The identified success factors do serve power sector organization positively and are observed to be beneficial in terms of employee involvement, establishing transparent communication channels to deliver consistent growth, developing leaders for future, aligning individual performance in sync with organization vision and mission. Power manufacturing and supply industries play a significant role in economic growth supporting the vision of Government of India's initiative "Power for all". "Power" is the most essential constituent of infrastructure impacting economic growth and welfare. Power manufacturing units are facing challenges in human knowledge development and its forward linkage with business sustainability. The paper explores the success factors contributing towards having an effective competency mapping of CPP in Odisha. The present study is among the few work studied in the past regarding exploring the success factors behind effective competency mapping. The findings add significantly to the scanty information in this area in Odisha context.


ABSTRACT Our daily lives are influenced by three different daily timers: the solar clock, our endogenous circadian clock and the societal clock. The way an individual's endogenous clock synchronises to the solar clock, through either advances or delays relative to sunrise and sunset, results in a phenomenon known as diurnal preference or chronotype. South Africa uses just one time zone, but in the most easterly regions of the country, the sun rises and sets up to an hour earlier than in the most westerly regions throughout the year. It was hypothesised first that South Africans living in the east of the country may have a greater preference for mornings (more morning chronotypes) than those living in the west; and second, that this difference would not be due to genetic differences in the populations, particularly a genetic polymorphism previously shown to influence chronotype. Here, we describe and compare the distribution of chorotype and PERIOD3 variable number tandem repeat (VNTR) polymorphism frequency in eastern (n = 129) and western (n = 175) sample populations. Using the Horne–Östberg Morningness, Eveningness Questionnaire we found that there was a significantly higher proportion of morning-types in the eastern population (56.6%) than in the western population (39.4%), and there were higher proportions of neither-types and evening-types in the western population (51.4% and 9.1%, respectively) than in the eastern population (37.2% and 6.2%, respectively) (p = 0.009). There were no significant differences in distribution of the PER3 genotype (p = 0.895) and allele (p = 0.636) frequencies. Although previous studies have shown associations between chronotype and PER3 VNTR genotypes, no significant associations were observed in either the eastern (p = 0.695) or the western (p = 0.630) populations. These findings indicate that, in South African populations, longitude influences chronotype independently of PER3 genotype. The impacts of the differences in chronotype whilst maintaining the same societal temporal organisation in the eastern and western regions were not assessed.


Beginning in the late 1940's, American literature discovered a four-letter word, and the word was "beat." Beat as in poverty and beatitude, ecstasy and exile. Beat was Jack Kerouac touring the American road in prose as fast and reckless as a V-8 Chevy. It was the junk-sick surrealism of William Burroughs; the wild, Whitmanesque poetry of Allen Ginsberg; and the lumberjack Zen of Gary Snyder. "The Portable Beat Reader" collects the most significant writing of these and fellow members (and spiritual descendants) of the Beat Generation, including Neal Cassady, Gregory Corso, Diane di Prima, Bob Dylan, Leroi Jones, and Michael McClure. In poetry, fiction, essays, song lyrics, letters, and memoirs, it captures the triumphant rudeness, energy, and exhilaration of a movement that swept through American letters with hurricane force.


Polyurethanes (PUs) have been synthesised successfully from renewable resources namely as rapeseed and sunflower oil using 4,4'-methylen-bis-(phenylisocyanate) (MDI) as the cross-linking agent. The mechanical property of these materials was observed in the Dynamic Mechanical Thermal Analysis (DMTA) test. A high tan delta peak is essential for a good damping material. These PUs can be strongly influenced on the addition of small (2.5-10) percentages of titanium dioxide, TiO2, e.g. the damping was improved on adding TiO2. Upon UV-induced aging, two important changes occur as observed in mechanical damping, such as a decrease in the height of the tan delta peak and a shift of the temperature of the tan delta peak to higher values with increased irradiation time. The loss tan delta peaks for the rapeseed-based PU loaded with 2.5, 5, 7.5, 10% of TiO2 were 0.58, 0.6, 0.68, and 0.71 respectively as compared with neat RSPU at only 0.43. These data show that the damping ability is enhanced through the introduction of TiO2 into the polymer. By doping with TiO2, the mechanical or physical properties of these PUs can be altered systematically, such as to get progressive increases in its stiffness and damping property.


Clusters are defined as geographically concentrated agglomerations of specialized firms in a particular domain. The cluster concept in its broader meaning of industrial agglomeration has been the focus of longstanding debates in the social sciences. This working paper traces the evolution of the literature on industrial concentration, reviewing the major contributions and puzzles at the core of cluster theory with a specific focus on clustering in developing economies. Traditionally, studies on clusters have overemphasized the dynamics arising in specific cluster locations as opposed to the impact of external factors. Indeed, researchers have explained clusters as self-contained entities and reduced their success to local exceptionality. In contrast, emerging literature has shown that clusters are integrated in broader structures beyond their location and are rather building blocks of today's global economy. The working paper goes on to present two historical cases from the global south to explain how clusters work as major tools for international business. Particularly in the developing world, multinationals have used clusters as platforms for channeling foreign investment, knowledge and imported inputs. The study concludes by stressing the importance of using historical evidence and data to look at clusters as agglomerations of actors and companies operating not just at the local level but across broader global networks. In doing so the historical perspective provides explanations lacking in the existing cluster scholarship to understand clusters as organizational structures underpinning the process of globalization.


Fluid simulation is widely used in the visual effects industry. The high level of detail required to produce realistic visual effects requires significant computation. Usually, expensive computer clusters are used in order to reduce the time required. However, generalpurpose Graphics Processing Unit (GPU) computing has potential as a relatively inexpensive way to reduce these simulation times. In recent years, GPUs have been used to achieve enormous speedups via their massively parallel architectures. Within the field of fluid simulation, the Lattice Boltzmann Method (LBM) stands out as a candidate for GPU execution because its grid-based structure is a natural fit for GPU parallelism. This thesis describes the design and implementation of a GPU-based free-surface LBM fluid simulation. Broadly, our approach is to ensure that the steps that perform most of the work in the LBM (the stream and collide steps) make efficient use of GPU resources. We achieve this by removing complexity from the core stream and collide steps and handling interactions with obstacles and tracking of the fluid interface in separate GPU kernels. To determine the efficiency of our design, we perform separate, detailed analyses of the performance of the kernels associated with the stream and collide steps of the LBM. We demonstrate that these kernels make efficient use of GPU resources and achieve speedups of 29.6× and 223.7×, respectively. Our analysis of the overall performance of all kernels shows that significant time is spent performing obstacle adjustment and interface movement as a result of limitations associated with GPU memory accesses. Lastly, we compare our GPU LBM implementation with a single-core CPU LBM implementation. Our results show speedups of up to 81.6× with no significant differences in output from the simulations on both platforms. We conclude that order of magnitude speedups are possible using GPUs to perform free-surface LBM fluid simulations, and that GPUs can, therefore, significantly reduce the cost of performing high-detail fluid simulations for visual effects.


Enveloping, or the mapping of skeletal controls to the deformations of a surface, is key to driving realistic animated characters. Despite its widespread use, enveloping still relies on slow or inaccurate deformation methods. We propose a method that is both fast, accurate and example-based. Our technique introduces a rotational regression model that captures common skinning deformations such as muscle bulging, twisting, and challenging areas such as the shoulders. Our improved treatment of rotational quantities is made practical by model reduction that ensures real-time solution of least-squares problems, independent of the mesh size. Our method is significantly more accurate than linear blend skinning and almost as fast, suggesting its use as a replacement for linear blend skinning when examples are available.


Young stars accrete mass from circumstellar disks and, in many cases, the accretion coincides with a phase of massive outflows, which can be highly collimated. Those jets emit predominantly in the optical and IR wavelength range. However, in several cases, X-ray and UV observations reveal a weak but highly energetic component in those jets. X-rays are observed both from stationary regions close to the star and from knots in the jet several hundred AU from the star. In this article, we show semianalytically that a fast stellar wind that is recollimated by the pressure from a slower, more massive disk wind can have the right properties to power stationary X-ray emission. The size of the shocked regions is compatible with observational constraints. Our calculations support a wind–wind interaction scenario for the high-energy emission near the base of young stellar object jets. For the specific case of DG Tau, a stellar wind with a mass-loss rate of 5 × 10−10 M☉ yr−1 and a wind speed of 800 km s−1 reproduces the observed X-ray spectrum. We conclude that a stellar wind recollimation shock is a viable scenario to power stationary X-ray emission close to the jet launching point.


Pseudomonas extremaustralis is a versatile Antarctic bacterium, able to grow under microaerobic and anaerobic conditions and is related to several non-pathogenic Pseudomonads. Here we report on the role of the global anaerobic regulator Anr, in the early steps of P. extremaustralis biofilm development. We found that the anr mutant was reduced in its ability to attach, to form aggregates and to display twitching motility but presented higher swimming motility than the wild type. In addition, microscopy revealed that the wild type biofilm contained more biomass and was thicker, but were less rough than that of the anr mutant. In silico analysis of the P. extremaustralis genome for Anr-like binding sites led to the identification of two biofilm-related genes as potential targets of this regulator. When measured using Quantitative Real Time PCR, we found that the anr mutant expressed lower levels of pilG, which encodes a component of Type IV pili and has been previously implicated in cellular adhesion. Levels of morA, involved in signal transduction and flagella development, were also lower in the mutant. Our data suggest that under low oxygen conditions, such as those encountered in biofilms, Anr differentially regulates aggregation and motility thus affecting the first stages of biofilm formation.


At the request of Mr. Hicks I made several analyses of Cambrian rocks, principally with the view of determining the amount of phosphoric acid in each; but incidentally, in one or two cases, an analysis, more or less complete, has been made of the specimen of rock itself. No. I. is a darkish grey flaggy rock, with an impression of Paradoxides Davidis on one side. Portions of the slab immediately under the fossil have a somewhat nodular appearance. The entire fragment is bulged out by an interior lenticular thickening, which consists largely of calcic carbonate, whereas the layer in immediate proximity to the fossil does not effervesce much with cold acid. Hence this small fragment consists of two very different kinds of rock. Small crystals of pyrites may be observed. The specific gravity of the fragment is 2·84. The following analysis represents chiefly the composition of that portion which adjoins the fossil impression and which does not effervesce strongly in cold acid; it is not, however, altogether without some of the interior and more calcareous portion. It is worthy of remark that there is a curious reddish brown extractive matter which pervaded this analysis, and that a very similar substance also pervaded the analysis of the lobster-shell, hereafter to be noticed. No. II. Specimen in contact with trap. A dull black slaty rock, joints lined with ferric hydrate, no pyrites visible. The impression upon it of a Trilobite is distinct; but there are no indications along the costæ of the


Multiagent learning (MAL) is the study of agents learning while in the presence of other agents who are also learning. As a field, MAL is built upon work done in both artificial intelligence and game theory. Game theory has mostly focused on proving that certain theoretical properties hold for a wide class of learning situations while ignoring computational issues, whereas artificial intelligence has mainly focused on designing practical multiagent learning algorithms for small classes of games. This thesis is concerned with finding a balance between the game-theory and artificial-intelligence approaches. We introduce a new learning algorithm, FRAME, which provably converges to the set of Nash equilibria in self-play, while consulting experts which can greatly improve the convergence rate to the set of equilibria. Even if the experts are not well suited to the learning problem, or are hostile, then FRAME will still provably converge. Our second contribution takes this idea further by allowing agents to consult multiple experts, and dynamically adapting so that the best expert for the given game is consulted. The result is a flexible algorithm capable of dealing with new and unknown games. Experimental results validate our approach.


[1] The substantial lowering of tropical snowlines at the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM), circa 21 kya, is examined using a modified version of the single-cell tropical climate model of Betts and Ridgway [1989]. These authors concluded that it was difficult to reconcile the large depression of snowlines at the LGM with the small reduction in mean tropical sea-surface temperature (SST) of the Climate: Long-Range Investigation, Mapping, and Prediction (CLIMAP) reconstruction. Here, climatic implications of the snowline depression are compared, not with CLIMAP, but with temperature proxies (δ18O and Sr/Ca ratios in corals, noble gas concentrations in aquifers, alkenone and Mg/Ca ratios in deep-sea sediments and recent faunal reconstructions) whose LGM values have been interpreted as implying lower surface temperatures in the tropics. It proves difficult, in the framework of this model, to reconcile the coldest of the indicated paleotemperatures with the observed snowline depression, which by itself is found to be consistent with an SST reduction of ∼3 K. A cooling of this magnitude corresponds most closely to recent warm-pool LGM sea-surface temperature estimates based on Mg/Ca paleothermometry. Discordance among the various proxy reconstructions may result, at least in part, from regional variations in surface temperature change at the LGM.


ne of protein resources which is not used maximally in Indonesia is wheat pollard. Wheat pollard is a by-product from wheat millings that contains (protein) higher than wheat flour (17.68% compared to 12-13%). Protein concentrate was extracted by alkali and hydrolysed enzymatically.. Alkali method at pH 10 yielded protein value 62.75% and flour yield 17.17%. On the other hand enzymatic hydrolysis method at minute-75 yielded protein value 68.38% and flour yield 48.17%. Amino acid increased after it was made into protein concentrate, for example lysin at the beginning was 8.00 g/100 g sample become 13.00 g/100 g sample (by alkali method) and 19.11 g /100 g sample (by enzymatic hydrolysis method). The highest physicochemical properties derived from enzymatic hydrolysis method were solubility protein (NSI : 95.73%, PDI : 75.21%), water adsorption 57.79%, fat adsorption 80.67%, foam capacity 47.74%, foam stability 84.61%, emulsification capacity 73.59% and strong gelation at 10%. The total result show that enzymatic hydrolysis method is better than extracted alkali method in protein value, yield, amino acid value, and physicochemical properties.


During the most recent three decades, restorative justice has emerged as a new paradigm to address the problem of prosecution, in particular, of crimes committed in contexts of massive human rights violations. The center of the new perspective is the rights of victims and the question of more adequate mechanisms and practices than the traditional ones to recompose the social relations broken by the conflict and attend to individual rights in alternative ways to those proposed from the retribution paradigm. of criminal law. The research that supports this article was based on the identification of two challenges arising from interviews with various actors, both from groups of victims and with officials from the Special Peace Jurisdiction. On the one hand, the challenge of the dogmatic construction of restorative justice and, on the other, to identify the keys to its pedagogy and desirable social appropriation. In this way, we undertook the assembly of the theoretical currents that inform exits to conflicts from the restorative approach, with the most conspicuous problems derived from the punitive paradigm shift, as well as the possible alternatives that the victims consider fit to a framework of acceptability reasonable and consistent with their claims for justice. Finally, the article focuses its proposal on the collective construction of relational goods as a plausible alternative to consider in the developments and in the attention to justice claims in transitional contexts.
DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.21017/Rev.Repub.2020.v28.a79


This is an empirical study of 1,326 randomly-selected federal district court cases from a five-year period from 2005 to 2010. It is designed to measure the effect of the 2009 decision of Ashcroft v. Iqbal on federal district courts' rulings on motions to dismiss complaints for failure to state a claim under Rule 12(b)(6). The present piece expands upon my earlier study, The Tao of Pleading: Do Twombly and Iqbal Matter Empirically? 59 AM. U. L. REV. 553 (2010). Statistical analysis of the expanded database indicates a continuing, and in some ways strengthened, tendency of courts under Iqbal to grant 12(b)(6) motions, compared to courts under the previous standard set by Conley v. Gibson. The updated results indicate that the relative risk of a 12(b)(6) motion being granted without leave to amend, compared to denied, was expected to be 1.75 times more under Iqbal than under Conley, holding all other variables constant, and this increase is statistically significant. Further, the odds of the case being entirely dismissed upon the grant of a 12(b)(6) motion without leave to amend were 1.71 times greater under Iqbal than under Conley. Finally, the updated study continues to indicate that constitutional civil rights cases in particular were dismissed at a higher rate post-Iqbal than pre-Twombly. In March 2011 the Federal Judicial Center released an extensive empirical study of the possible effect of Iqbal on 12(b)(6) motions. If read quickly and uncritically, the FJC's overall conclusion, unlike mine, appears to be that Iqbal's impact has been negligible, in particular when considering grants of 12(b)(6) motions without leave to amend. Here, I also explore the FJC Study, and venture that it minimizes Iqbal's impact in a variety of ways. Most critically, the FJC's database omits pro se cases, which are disproportionately civil rights cases, and which my previous study found were more likely to be the subject of a successful 12(b)(6) motion under Iqbal than under Conley. In addition, the FJC's database omits all cases in which the 12(b)(6) motion was granted on the basis of sovereign or qualified immunity; in other words, the FJC excluded the cases that were most like Iqbal itself. Finally, the FJC's database (for studying the rulings on 12(b)(6) motions) is limited to a six-month period pre-Twombly (January to June 2006) and a six-month period post-Iqbal (January to June 2010), whereas my database contains cases running continuously for a five-year period from May 22, 2005 to May 18, 2010. After attempting to limit my database to more closely parallel the FJC's, my findings are broadly consistent with theirs: both the FJC and I found that 34% of 12(b)(6) motions were denied in 2006. In the first six months of 2010, the FJC found that the rate of denial of 12(b)(6) motions had fallen to 25%; I found that the rate of denial had fallen to 27%. Concomitantly, of course, that means that both studies found that the rate of granting 12(b)(6) motions, at least in part, increased significantly from 2006 to 2010. And both studies found that the increase in grants was primarily attributable to grants with leave to amend. When I include all cases decided under Conley and Iqbal in my database, including those with pro se plaintiffs, my results show a much greater impact of Iqbal than do the FJC's: 46% of the 12(b)(6) motions were granted in full under Conley, and 61% of the motions were granted in full under Iqbal. As an aside, the comparison of my delimited results with the FJC's tends to disprove the oft-stated hypothesis that orders granting 12(b)(6) motions are more likely to be "published" in computerized databases such as Westlaw than orders denying 12(b)(6) motions.


The Constitution of Kenya: Contemporary Reading, provides an in-depth assessment of the interface between constitutionalism and Kenya's new Constitution. Focusing on the historical trajectory on the search for a new Constitution, Chapter One lays the groundwork upon which the fault line between constitutionalism and the issue areas are articulated in the other chapters in relation to the new Constitution. The superb chapters on the carefully selected issue areas, make this edited volume an essential reading. The book makes an important contribution to the evolving constitutionalism and policy clarification on Kenya's new Constitution. It is a welcome and timely intervention by legal scholars and practitioners on the new constitution and the challenges facing Kenya in its implementation. The book is an excellent teaching and reading manual for students in law, history, politics, diplomacy, and international relations as well as for the practitioners.


This thesis presents an overview of the emerging Flexible AC Transmission System
(FACTS) and Convertible Static Compensator (CSC) technologies. CSC, the flexible
multifunctional compensator is an innovation fi-om FACTS technology. These
technologies are fully utilized the existing transmission system assets, that improve
transmission nationality for economical and environmental reasons.
The CSC can occupy as shunt and/or series compensation devices providing various
modes. The CSC can operate in 11 different configurations depending on control
objectives, for voltage control at bus system as well as power flow control on two
existing transmission lines. The CSC can function as a Static Synchronous
Compensator (STATCOM), Static Synchronous Series Compensator (SSSC),
Unified Power Flow Controller (UPFC) and Interline Power Flow Controller (IPFC).
This research work focused on STATCOM and SSSC for CSC as shunt and series
controller, respectively. The basic operation of the controllers is explained, together
with the circuit configurations and general control strategies. The STATCOM and SSSC are based on a voltage-sourced converter (VSC) which consist of Gate Turn-
Off (GTO) Thyristor as the switching devices, are used in this research work to study
the performance of the controllers.
An 11-bus system as the test system is used throughout the study to verifL the
proposed models and its control strategies. The model of the controllers and its
control are then validated through PSCAD/EMTDC simulation. Steady-state analysis
is done to demonstrate the capability of the controllers designed for improving
voltage regulation and power flows in the transmission systems. The result obtained
from the simulations clearly showed that the designed STATCOM and SSSC
controllers are capable in regulating voltage and increased the transmitting power


Do large investors increase the vulnerability of a country to speculative attacks in the foreign exchange markets? To address this issue, we build a model of currency crises where a single large investor and a continuum of small investors independently decide whether to attack a currency based on their private information about fundamentals. Even abstracting from signaling, the presence of the large investor does make all other traders more aggressive in their selling. Relative to the case in which there is no large investors, small investors attach the currency when fundamentals are stronger. Yet, the difference can be small, or null, depending on the relative precision of private information of the small and large investors. Adding signaling makes the influence of the large trader on small traders behaviour much stronger.


Depictions of Lebanon in international politics have historically represented it as a 'weak state' whose domestic sovereignty is eroded by nonstate actors viewed as anomalies to extirpate. The War on Terror has been no exception. Since at least 2002 international efforts have aimed at reinforcing Lebanon's 'weak' domestic sovereignty against 'extremist elements'. These approaches adopt a classic understanding of sovereignty as the achievable, exclusive, and measurable control by a state over a bounded territory. Such an understanding is misleading and even obstructive of peace for Lebanon. The accepted view of Lebanon as a 'weak state' suffering from chronic conflict and the myth of its capital Beirut as cyclically destroyed and reconstructed actually normalise imaginative geographies that ultimately impact on international action. Through the concept of 'hybrid sovereignties', this article goes beyond traditional views of legitimate state power and irregular nonstate 'dissidence' as dwelling in distinct legitimacy categories. Engaging theoretically with epistemologies of hybridity, and relying empirically on official foreign policy statements, archive material, and interviews conducted in Beirut between 2005 and 2010, the article considers Lebanese sovereignty as resulting from complex hybridisations between state and nonstate actors. Firstly, I review scholarly approaches to sovereignty and engage with the notion of hybridity to set a basis for discussing Lebanon's sovereignty beyond the 'weak state' discourse. Secondly, I show that 'weak state' approaches to Lebanon fail to account for differential views of sovereignty and weakness from inside the Lebanese political system. Thirdly, I use the notion of hybrid sovereignties to interpret political violence during two moments of intrastate conflict: the early phases of the civil war in 1975–76, and the May 2008 clashes in Beirut. In both moments, distinctions between accepted binaries, such as state/nonstate, legitimate/illegitimate, security/insecurity, and domestic/foreign, blurred. Both state actors and nonstate militias performed sovereignty practices increasingly resembling each other, and coconstituting each other through Beirut's physical environment. Exposing Lebanon's hybrid sovereignties demystifies the self-fulfilling prophecy of the 'weak state' rhetoric and its deadly consequences for Lebanon.


Maeda Ai was a prominent literary critic and an influential public intellectual in late-twentieth-century Japan. Text and the City is the first book of his work to appear in English. A literary and cultural critic deeply engaged with European critical thought, Maeda was a brilliant, insightful theorist of modernity for whom the city was the embodiment of modern life. He conducted a far-reaching inquiry into changing conceptions of space, temporality, and visual practices as they gave shape to the city and its inhabitants. James A. Fujii has assembled a selection of Maeda's essays that question and explore the contours of Japanese modernity and resonate with the concerns of literary and cultural studies today.

Maeda remapped the study of modern Japanese literature and culture in the 1970s and 1980s, helping to generate widespread interest in studying mass culture on the one hand and marginalized sectors of modern Japanese society on the other. These essays reveal the broad range of Maeda's cultural criticism. Among the topics considered are Tokyo; utopias; prisons; visual media technologies including panoramas and film; the popular culture of the Edo, Meiji, and contemporary periods; maps; women's magazines; and women writers. Integrally related to these discussions are Maeda's readings of works of Japanese literature including Matsubara Iwagoro's In Darkest Tokyo, Nagai Kafu's The Fox, Higuchi Ichiyo's Growing Up, Kawabata Yasunari's The Crimson Gang of Asakusa, and Narushima Ryuhoku's short story "Useless Man." Illuminating the infinitely rich phenomena of modernity, these essays are full of innovative, unexpected connections between cultural productions and urban life, between the text and the city.


The law of the United States forces authors to choose between copyrights and privacy rights. Federal lawmakers have noticed and tried to remedy that problem. The Copyright Act makes express provisions for anonymous and pseudonymous works. The Copyright Office has tried to remedy that tension, too; copyright registration forms do not outwardly require authors to reveal their real world identities. Nonetheless, authors still face a choice between protecting their privacy and enjoying one of copyright's most powerful incentives: the prospect of transferring to another the exclusive right to use a copyrighted work. That power proves useful, to say the least, when it comes to making money off of copyrights. Run-of-the-mill authors can invoke it by licensing or assigning their unregistered copyrights or by registering their works themselves. But what about anonymous or pseudonymous authors? Despite a good faith effort to respect authorial privacy, current copyright registration practices fall short of ideal. Far from a trifling matter, this procedural hurdle threatens to prevent copyright law from satisfying its constitutional mandate. This paper maps the problematic conflict between copyright and privacy and points towards some possible solutions.


The Lar Igneous Suite (LIS), east of Iran, is part of post collisional alkaline magmatism related to Late Cretaceousmid Eocene Sistan suture zone. The suite consists of a wide variety of igneous rocks, from volcanic to intrusive and hypabissal rocks such as tuffs, trachyte, monzonite, syenites and lamprophyres. Syenitic rocks which mainly occur in a giant ring dike and stocks, are shoshonitic to potassic-ultrapotassic (K2O/Na2O > 2 wt.%; MgO > 3 wt.%; K2O > 3 wt.%) in composition and are also associated with Cu-Mo mineralization. In this study, chemical composition of biotites within the Lar syenites (LS) is determined by electron microprobe analysis. The results show that LS biotites are Ti-Mg-biotites (phlogopite) which contain relatively high Ti and Mg, and low Fe concentrations. The Mg/(Fe+ Mg) ratio in these biotites range between 0.56 and 0.73 that represent their transitionally chemical evolution. TiO2 content in these biotites is high and in the range of 3.0-5.4 wt.%. These chemical characteristics indicate that the LS biotites are primary and have been crystallized directly from magma. The investigations also demonstrate that the LS biotites have crystallized from a magma of orogenic nature. Temperature and pressure are the most significant factors controlling Mg and Ti content in the LS biotites, respectively. The results show that the LS biotites crystallized at temperatures (T) between 800 to 842 °C and pressures (P) between 0.99 to 1.44 kbar. These conditions are indicative of a crystallization depth of 3.26-4.74 km Keywords—Sistan suture zone, Lar Igneous Suite, Zahedan, syenite, biotite.


Personal health management are a modern health technology with the ability to engage patients more fully in their healthcare. Personal health management including hospitals and ambulatory care settings, insurers and health plans.Each patient is promised the full control of her medical records and can hare her health data with an including healthcare providers, family members or friends. The main theme of the PHR is to empower patient to control to their own medical decisions. The PHR is a tool that you can use to collect, track and share past and current information about your health of someone in your care. A PHR is information about your health compiled and maintained by you. The difference is in how you use your PHR to prove the quality of your health care. Take an active role in monitoring your health and healthcare by creating your own PHR.


Lake Urmia water level has fluctuated during many years. We investigated water level data (annual maximum, minimum and average series in the period of 1966–2012) to evaluate changes based on long-term and seasonal patterns over time, data characteristics and temporal change analysis. Our tools for the mentioned analyses included seasonal trend decomposition using loess (STL); normality and independence; change point and trend analysis. The results of STL revealed a sustained decline occurring after the last 1990s and loess trend line confirmed it. The analyses of data characteristics showed that the observed data do not fulfil the assumptions of being independent and identically normal-distributed. Therefore, the non-parametric Pettitt's test was applied to identify an abrupt change point in the data series, followed by trend analysis using the non-parametric Mann-Kendall test. Results showed that there is a significant decreasing trend in water lake level and the beginning of change point is in 1996.


Purpose Delayed intensification (DI) is an integral part of treatment of childhood acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL), but it is associated with relevant toxicity. Therefore, standard-risk patients of trial AIEOP-BFM ALL 2000 (Combination Chemotherapy Based on Risk of Relapse in Treating Young Patients With ALL) were investigated with the specific aim to reduce treatment intensity. Patients and Methods Between July 2000 and July 2006, 1,164 patients (1 to 17 years of age) with standard-risk ALL (defined as the absence of high-risk cytogenetics and undetectable minimal residual disease on days 33 and 78) were randomly assigned to either experimental reduced-intensity DI (protocol III; P-III) or standard DI (protocol II; P-II). Cumulative drug doses of P-III were reduced by 30% for dexamethasone and 50% for vincristine, doxorubicin, and cyclophosphamide, which shortened the treatment duration from 49 to 29 days. The study aimed at noninferiority of reduced-intensity P-III; analyses were performed according to treatment given. Results For P-III and P-II, respectively, the 8-year rate of disease-free survival (± SE) was 89.2 ± 1.3% and 92.3 ± 1.2% ( P = .04); cumulative incidence of relapse, 8.7 ± 1.2% and 6.4 ± 1.1% ( P = .09); and overall survival, 96.1 ± 0.8% and 98.0 ± 0.6% ( P = .06). Patients with ETV6-RUNX1-positive ALL and patients 1 to 6 years of age performed equally well in both arms. The incidence of death during remission was comparable, which indicates equivalent toxicity. The 8-year cumulative incidence rate of secondary malignancies was 1.3 ± 0.5% and 0.6 ± 0.4% for P-III and P-II, respectively ( P = .37). Conclusion Although the criteria used for the standard-risk definition in this trial identified patients with exceptionally good prognosis, reduction of chemotherapy was not successful mainly because of an increased rate of relapse. The data suggest that treatment reduction is feasible in specific subgroups, which underlines the biologic heterogeneity of this cohort selected according to treatment response.


In 1974, H. Ruderman posed the following question: If (2 − 2)|(3 − 3), then does it follow that (2 − 2)|(x − x) for every integer x? This problem is still open. However, in 2011, M. R. Murty and V. K. Murty showed that there are only finitely many (m,n) for which the hypothesis holds. In this thesis, we examine two generalizations of this problem. The first is replacing 2 and 3 with arbitrary integers a and b. The second is to replace 2 and 3 with arbitrary algebraic integers from an imaginary quadratic field. In both of these cases we have shown that there are only finitely many (m,n) for which the hypothesis holds. To get the second result we also generalized a result by Bugeaud, Corvaja and Zannier from the integers to imaginary quadratic fields. In the last half of the thesis we use the abc conjecture and some related conjectures to study some exponential Diophantine equations. We study the Pillai conjecture and the Erdos-Woods conjecture and show that they are implied by the abc conjecture and that when we use an effective version, very clean bounds for the conjectures are implied.


Author offers and develops the theory of a new simple cheap efficient electric (electron) generator. This generator can convert pressure or kinetic energy of any non-conductive flow (gas, liquid) into direct current (DC). The generator can convert the mechanical energy of any engine into high voltage DC. One can covert the wind and water energy into electricity without turbine. One can convert the rest energy of an internal combustion engine or turbojet engine in electricity and increase its efficiency. ------------------------------------------------- Key words: Jet Electric Generator, Electron generator, AB generator, Wind electric generator, Water electric generator, DC generator, High voltage generator.


Strangles is a common condition in equine practice with high morbidity. Management of outbreaks is complicated by the development of asymptomatic carriers with the causative organism (Streptococcus equi var equi) being retained within the guttural pouch 1,2 . This Bright Veterinary Idea looks at the use of a reverse thermodynamic gel to manage chronic shedding in equine strangles.


This research attempts to span the gap between the AI in medicine (AIM) and consistency-based diagnosis (CBD) communities by applying CBD to physiology. The highly-regulated nature of physiological systems challenges standard CBD algorithms, which are not tailored for complex dynamic systems. To combat this problem, we separate static from dynamic analysis, so that CBD is performed over the steady-state constraints at only a selected set of time slices. Regulatory models help link static inter-slice diagnoses into a complete dynamic account of the physiological progression. This provides a simpler approach to CBD in dynamic systems that (a) preserves information-reuse capabilities, (b) extends information-theoretic probing, and (c) adds a new capability to CBD: the detection of dynamic faults (i.e., those that do not necessarily persist throughout diagnosis).


The hydrodynamic forces acting on a ship that travels in restricted water vary greatly with water depth and the geometry of the ship hull. This will affect the ship maneuverability in terms of various flow effects like for instance squat, when the ship is sucked down towards the seabed due to a pressure drop on the hull at forward speed. It is, thus, important to gain detailed knowledge on these aspects of marine engineering. The problem is in the present work addressed through a numerical investigation of turbulent transverse flow on two-dimensional ship sections in shallow water. The numerical code is validated against traditional flow problems in the literature. Namely, the Backward-facing step (BFS) and the Smoothly-contoured ramp (SCR). 2D and 3D laminar flows and 2D low Reynolds number turbulent flows are calculated, and the results are found to be in good agreement with the previous numerical and experimental comparison data. The turbulence model used in the calculations is the one-equation Spalart-Allmaras model. The overall goal of achieving more efficient and accurate numerical schemes will always be in focus of code development. Adaptive mesh refinement (AMR) is then a very helpful tool to save both time for grid generation prior to the calculations in question and the CPU hours needed to solve the governing equations. The latter is even more evident in a parallel environment. These aspects are included in the present investigation as part of the process to adapt and investigate a CFD tool suitable to handle turbulent flows on a ship hull in shallow water. Several physical and numerical parameters are included in the present study and the Plackett-Burman screening design is utilized to efficiently analyze the results. With the latter method, a simple function for calculating the drag force on a two-dimensional ship section as function of the given parameters has been obtained.


INTRODUCTION
Bonding of composite resin to dentin mandates a wet substrate whereas, enamel should be dry. This may not be easily achievable in intracoronal preparations where enamel and dentin are closely placed to each other. Therefore, Dentin Bonding Agents (DBA) are recommended for enamel and dentinal bonding, where enamel is also left moist. A research question was raised if the "enamel-only" preparations will also benefit from wet enamel bonding and contemporary DBA.

AIM
The aim of this study was to compare the shear bond strengths of composite resin, bonded to dry and wet enamel using fifth generation DBA (etch and rinse system) containing various solvents such as ethanol/water, acetone and ethanol.

MATERIALS AND METHODS
The crowns of 120 maxillary premolars were split into buccal and lingual halves. They were randomly allocated into four groups of DBA: Group 1-water/ethanol based, Group 2-acetone based, Group 3-ethanol based, Group 4-universal bonding agent (control group). The buccal halves and lingual halves were bonded using the wet bonding and dry bonding technique respectively. After application of the DBAs and composite resin build up, shear bond strength testing was done.

RESULTS
Group 1 (ethanol/water based ESPE 3M, Adper Single Bond) showed highest bond strength of (23.15 MPa) in dry enamel. Group 2 (acetone based Denstply, Prime and Bond NT, showed equal bond strength in wet and dry enamel condition (18.87 MPa and 18.02 MPa respectively).

CONCLUSION
Dry enamel bonding and ethanol/water based etch and rinse DBA can be recommended for "enamel-only" tooth preparations.


In this paper, we consider semi-supervised classification on evolutionary data, where the distribution of the data and the underlying concept that we aim to learn change over time due to short-term noises and long-term drifting, making a single aggregated classifier inapplicable for long-term classification. The drift is smooth if we take a localized view over the time dimension, which enables us to impose temporal smoothness assumption for the learning algorithm. We first discuss how to carry out such assumption using temporal regularizers defined in a structural way with respect to the Hilbert space, and then derive the online algorithm that efficiently finds the closed-form solution to the classification functions. Experimental results on real-world evolutionary mailing list data demonstrate that our algorithm outperforms classical semi-supervised learning algorithms in both algorithmic stability and classification accuracy.


The idea that an organization's members are the real source of its competitive advantage has long been acknowledged. The significance of human capital as a determinant of firm performance is gaining recognition in the strategic management literature, and the need for relating employee talent to a firm's competitive advantage is continuing to develop in the human resource management arena hence the drive to establish superior human capital to generate competitive advantage Many firms have explicitly embraced competitive strategies to gain and maintain a lead in their industries. In all the competitive strategies firms have engaged in, human capital has been the driver of competition. This study endeavoured to empirically test the effects of human capital and especially in innovation and operational efficiency in according food and beverage firms the requisite competitive advantage in the very dynamic industry. the study sought to answer the following research question: What are the effects of human capital (in innovative adaptation and dynamic operational efficiency) on firms' ability to attain sustainable competitive advantage within the F & B companies in Kenya? This research entailed a descriptive study design. This study sought to do that among the F & B firms in Kenya. The study was concerned with describing the characteristics of a unique group of food and beverage firms and their competitiveness. From the study, 87 percent of respondents indicated concurrence on usefulness of human resources for SCA. Kenyan firms in the food and beverage industry therefore highly regard human capital as a major contributor to sustainable competitive advantage. The study established that internal processes largely rely on how capabilities are harnessed for competitive advantage.


Spectral line broadening and radiative electron-ion recombination processes may make significant contributions to the total spectral background level when inductively coupled plasma excitation sources are observed with spectrometers having low stray light levels. These background contributions are more easily identified in inductively coupled plasma discharges because of their stable background level and by the fact that net analyte line intensities are affected to such a small degree by changes in the concentration of concomitants. The wings of collisionally broadened lines may produce significant background changes at wavelengths removed 10 nm from the parent line center. For some elements such as Mg, linear Stark-broadened lines produced spectral background at unexpectedly large displacements from the line center. The radiative Al ion-electron recombination continuum produces a greater than tenfold increase in the background from ∼210 down to 193 nm at Al solution concentration of 2500 μg/ml. Thus, a solution containing only 250 μg/ml of Al will cause an ∼100% increase in the background level below 210 nm over that measured when deionized water is nebulized into the plasma.


This article is a first part of the series devoted to the analysis of the new hybrid visual language of moving images that emerged during the period 1993–1998. Today this language dominates our visual culture. It can be seen in commercials, music videos, motion graphics, TV graphics, and other types of short non-narrative films and moving image sequences being produced around the world by the media professionals including companies, individual designers and artists, and students. This article analyzes a particular software application which played the key role in the emergence of this language: After Effects. Introduced in 1993, After Effects was the first software designed to do animation, compositing, and special effects on the personal computer. Its broad effect on moving image production can be compared to the effects of Photoshop and Illustrator on photography, illustration, and graphic design. This analysis is used to support the author's theory that the logic of the new visual language is that of remixability. Normally remixing involves combining content – for example, different music tracks. In this case what gets remixed is not only the content of different media or simply their aesthetics, but their fundamental techniques, working methods, languages, and assumptions. United within the common software environment, cinematography, animation, computer animation, special effects, graphic design, and typography have come to form a new metamedium. A work produced in this new metamedium can use all techniques that were previously unique to these different media, or any subset of these techniques.


Moderator (Ronald Wakabayashi): To begin, may I ask you both to share some of your thoughts on the issue of race in general and how your recent work touches on the matter of alliances? West: Let me begin by briefly saying that I'm delighted to be here. And I'd like to thank brother Leonard Robinette [Chairman and Executive Director, WLCAC] and those at the Getty Center and Arco for having the vision and determination to bring us together, building on the rich legacy of Ted Watkins [Founder, WLCAC], who in so many ways was an exemplary organic intellectual, as both a progressive activist and institution builder. First, there is a real sense in which my own understanding of race builds very much on the kind of deep class concerns that brother Ted Watkins had, one that encompasses an understanding that it is very difficult to talk about race without talking about that larger economic, political, and cultural context, while always keeping one's eye on the internal dynamics of business elites, bank elites, cultural elites, and how they shape the very framework in which we not only confront one another, but perceive one another. And that's so crucial to me. The second point is that a Black-Brown alliance must always be understood within something bigger than itself. Jorge and I have had a longstanding relationship. We have been friends, taught at Princeton together, but we are not here just to chit chat and have a Black-Brown, touchy-feely kind of thing. We are talking about ways in which larger ideals and principles, radically democratic ones, sit at the center of what ought to hold any desirable Black-Brown alliance together. I can imagine a whole host of Black-Brown alliances on which I would bring serious critique to bear, precisely because they would not be focusing on the various ways in which the working poor and very poor within our Black and Brown communities are actually being empowered. There are a number of Black and Brown alliances one can conceive of that are themselves in alliance with business and bank elites of a conservative sort, that are disempowering or setting up impediments to the empowerment of the masses, the vast majority of Brown and Black brothers and sisters. So in this regard Black-Brown dialogue is just an instance of what it means to take seriously a radically democratic project for the masses that keeps track of working people, the working poor, and the very poor, and at the same time tries to enrich the quality of our public life, which is a precondition for keeping that radical democratic tradition alive. Klor de Alva: I have been working on questions of race and ethnicity for a long time in a wide variety of settings. However, the questions surrounding the relationships between Blacks and Browns had not been a central feature because most of my work had focused on interactions between indigenous peoples and Europeans and between Latinos and so-called Anglos. Over time, I became progressively more engaged with relationships between Blacks and Browns, Asians and Blacks, and Asians and Latinos. Yet in the course of my professional career there have been very few opportunities where those particular interests were nourished. After all, most people adhere to the dominant view that sees race and ethnicity as something essential. That is, they see race and ethnicity as something primordial, unchanging, fundamentally fixed and determinative. And that has been a very important assumption that has driven conversations about race and ethnicity in the United States and has made it very difficult to carry on a conversation like the one we are having now. There are many conversations taking place between Browns and Blacks today. Most of them are based on mutual suspicion, fear, and stereotypes that we cannot repeat in public. There are many nasty ones I have been witness to, and accusatory and distrustful ones filled with anger and hate. My hope is that today we will be terribly frank and open so that we can use this opportunity as a springboard for many other, better conversations, among yourselves, among the people you all interact with, and in all the other settings where I hope Cornel and I will also have the chance to carry our discussions forward. …


AIM
To examine the clinical characteristics of a subgroup of patients with hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) and compare them to those with known risk factors.

METHODS
We used the HCC database of 306 patients seen at our institution from January 1, 1995 to December 31, 2001. Of the 306 patients, 63 (20%, group 1) had no known risk factors (hepatitis C virus, hepatitis B virus, alcohol, hemochromatosis or cirrhosis from any cause) and 243 (group 2) had one or more risk factors.

RESULTS
The median age was similar in both groups, but there were disproportionate numbers of younger (< 30 years old), older (> 80 years) patients, women (33% vs 18%), and Caucasians (81% vs 52%) in group 1 as compared to group 2. There were fewer Asians (2% vs 11%) and African Americans (13% vs 27%) in group 1. Abdominal pain (70% vs 37%) was more common while gastrointestinal bleeding (0% vs 11%) and ascites (4% vs 17%) were less common in group 1 compared to group 2. Group 1 had larger tumor burden (median size 9.4 cm vs 5.7 cm) at the time of presentation, but there were no differences in the site (right, left or bilateral lesions), or number of tumors between the two groups.

CONCLUSION
HCC patients without identifiable risk factors have different characteristics and clinical presentation compared to those with known risk factors. Absence of cirrhosis and larger tumor burden may explain the differences in the presenting symptoms.


Contraception is an important topic for women, men and healthcare professionals. Several methods of contraception are available. It is important for the pharmacist to have a solid understanding of the subject in order to give appropriate advice. When used correctly, modern contraceptives are highly effective in preventing pregnancy. Most women can safely use hormonal contraceptives. This article focuses on the use of hormonal contraception in women who may not necessarily be young or healthy, provides answers to practical questions that are not frequently asked, and addresses a few common misperceptions about hormonal contraception.


This paper examines the importance of directed motion towards reefs by late stage larval reef fish for determining recruitment rates to substrate-associated adult populations. The significance of reliance on different sensory faculties for orientation, and of different larval swimming and sensory capabilities, is explored with mathematical models. A 4-way classification is examined, separating weak and strong swimming larvae, and larvae relying on current-dependent and -independent cues for orientation. The relative importance of factors determining supply rates varies among these 4 cases, but, in general, purely hydrodynamically based considerations of incidental recruitment, or passive entrainment in re-circulatory features around reefs, appear less important than considerations of larval swimming, and the interaction of swimming with these physical transport processes. The extent of sensory capabilities of larvae proves to be a critical parameter, and the rate of larval supply depends sensitively upon it, for species relying on both current-dependent and -independent cues. The consequences of these findings are discussed, with particular reference to the potential for active behaviour to influence settlement patterns of different species.


This study followed the introduction of the Arthritis Source website into the existing teaching practices of Arthritis Foundation Helpline volunteers. The goal was to examine what factors may affect a particular group of educators adopt a potentially valuable Internet tool into an existing instructional environment. Defining the possible uses of the website in reference to the volunteers' actual job duties helped provide a clearer understanding of how the volunteers might use this new technology. The researchers used qualitative techniques to focus on three volunteers who experienced different physical, environmental and cognitive means that impacted their use of the new tool. Each volunteer experienced varying levels of motivation in areas of learning, satisfaction and responses to outside influences. Each volunteer also had varying amounts of opportunity prompts in which to interact or refer the website. Consequently, Helpline volunteers experienced different rates of adopting the information-intensive website into their traditional work system.


As late as 1987, two-thirds of the Americans who responded to a national survey believed that English was the official language of the United States. In fact, the Constitution is silent on the issue. Since Senator S. I. Hayakawa first proposed an English Language Amendment in Congress in 1981, Official English has been considered in forty-seven states and adopted by seventeen; the amendment is pending in the 102d Congress. Supporters argue that English has always been our common language--a means of resolving conflicts in a nation of diverse racial, ethnic, and religious groups, and an essential tool of social mobility and cultural integration. Opponents charge that the amendment is unnecessary and that it threatens civil rights, educational opportunities, and free speech, wrapping racist biases in a cloak of patriotism. Language Loyalties: A Source Book on the Official English Controversy provides a balanced, comprehensive guide to this complex and often confusing debate. It is an essential handbook and reference for advocates, educators, policymakers, jurists, scholars, and citizens who seek to join this debate fully informed. Addressing the issues involved in developing America's first planned national language policy, James Crawford has expertly collected and introduced more than eighty-five source documents and articles.


This thesis studied the interaction between diet-induced obesity and the 24h variations in behavior and physiology paced by the circadian system. Mice and rats were fed with a free choice high-fat high-sugar diet (fcHFHS). In mice, fcHFHS diet changed day-night eating patterns and PER2 clock-protein expression in the Lateral Habenula (LHb), a food-reward related area. In rats, no feeding patterns or clock-gene changes in LHb were found, however, Per2 gene expression was disrupted in the Nucleus Accumbens, which is indirectly connected to LHb. When blocking pharmacologically the glutamatergic functioning of the LHb, food intake was altered in both chow and fcHFHS-fed rats in a time-dependent manner. Finally, we tested the influence of Npas2 clock-gene on the disruption of rhythmic behavior produced by the fcHFHS-diet using Npas2 mutant and WT mice. Both genotypes, however, displayed similar altered eating patterns caused by the fcHFHS diet. Our findings indicate a relationship between nutrient type and an abnormal clock-gene expression in food reward-related areas, and an important role for the LHb in feeding behavior.


We examine how changes in macroeconomic conditions (the global financial crisis) relate to investment and financial decision making for each of the different size categories of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). We use a large dataset of 764,963 observations in Japan for the time period from 2006 to 2014 to understand the heterogeneity of SMEs in financing and investment decision making, such in size, industry, and region. Our findings are of particular importance for regulators because we show that SMEs are dynamic in nature where they change their financial behavior in response to any macroeconomic shock. In addition, we report differences among the different size subsample at the sales growth and state/industry GDP growth levels. Hence, this requires designing a unique set of regulations for each group accordingly to effectively enhance the growth potential for each group and for SMEs as a whole. These findings have implications for lenders, especially banks, which should treat each size group within SMEs differently while lending or assessing creditworthiness.


This article examines the American legal criminal doctrine that is commonly applied in cases of a particular sub-type of femicide: assaultive femicide, women who are battered to death. The most relevant criminal doctrine applicable to these circumstances is the felony-murder rule, applied in most U.S. jurisdictions. As will be shown, the doctrine's most problematic modification relates to one of its sub-doctrines, the principle of merger, which was stretched and extended to include lesser non-homicidal offenses such as assault. This gross doctrinal extension has in fact created a criminal anomaly whereby blameworthy murderers of women are exonerated and technically exempted from murder convictions. Given that most U.S. jurisdictions apply the felony-murder doctrine in some form, the article will analyze and scrutinize the felonymurder doctrine with regard to its particular applicability to circumstances of assaultive femicide. In addition, the article will propose statutory amendments to Sections 210.2(b) and 210.6 of the U.S. Model Penal Code. The proposed statutory amendments to the U.S. Model Penal Code are applicable, mutatis mutandis, to most American jurisdictions and may constitute a prototype for future legislative state reforms.


A lack of English proficiency and failure to use standard phraseology played a role in the world's largest aviation disaster which occurred in Tenerife in 1977 (Tenerife Information Center 2009). As a result, the crucial role of effective communication between pilots and air-traffic controllers (ATCs) came under scrutiny (Cushing 1997), with the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) implementing English language proficiency standards and compulsory language testing of pilots and ATCs (Tiewtrakul and Fletcher 2010). Consequently, the use of so-called "Aviation English" (AE) was enforced which consists of a range of operationally-relevant language functions and dialogue management as well as formulaic standard phraseology (Shawcross 2008). The study reported on in this paper has two aims: (i) to investigate pilots' and ATCs' perceptions of the role of language in air-traffic communication, and (ii) to investigate the use of AE in authentic pilot-ATC communication in South African airspace. In order to address the first aim, an online questionnaire was designed to investigate issues surrounding the role of language in air-traffic communication. A total of 197 pilots and 66 ATCs completed the questionnaire. To address the second aim, approximately 10 hours' worth of recordings were obtained of on-site air-traffic communication at two airport towers in Gauteng. These were then transcribed and carefully analysed within the framework of Van Es's (2004) SHELL model and with the aid of a taxonomy compiled on the basis of two previous studies by Cardosi, Brett and Han (1997) and Van Es (2004). The results of the questionnaire indicated that the majority of the respondents support ICAO's English language proficiency standards and testing. Although the respondents believe that language-related communication problems can cause serious and sometimes fatal incidents, they are confident that the problems are resolved quickly and successfully, thereby avoiding potentially hazardous situations. The results of the analysis of the voice recordings correlated with the results of the questionnaire. Only a small number of transmissions were identified with read-back errors as well as a small number of transmissions containing deviations from AE and standard phraseology. When miscommunications did occur, pilots and ATCs resolved these problems quickly and effectively using AE as well as plain English to successfully negotiate understanding. After discussing in more detail the results of the analyses of the two data sets, a conclusion is provided with some suggestions for further, specifically linguistic, investigations into AE and pilot-ATC communication in South Africa. A brief illustration is also given of the potential value of research, such as that reported here, for benchmarking speech systems for unmanned aircraft (cf. Burger, Barnard and Jones 2011).


With the advancement of statistical methodology inextricably linked to the use of computers, new methodological ideas must be translated into usable code and then numerically evaluated relative to competing procedures. In response to this, Statistical Computing in C++ and R concentrates on the writing of code rather than the development and study of numerical algorithms per se. The book discusses code development in C++ and R and the use of these symbiotic languages in unison. It emphasizes that each offers distinct features that, when used in tandem, can take code writing beyond what can be obtained from either language alone. The text begins with some basics of object-oriented languages, followed by a "boot-camp" on the use of C++ and R. The authors then discuss code development for the solution of specific computational problems that are relevant to statistics including optimization, numerical linear algebra, and random number generation. Later chapters introduce abstract data structures (ADTs) and parallel computing concepts. The appendices cover R and UNIX Shell programming. Features Includes numerous student exercises ranging from elementary to challenging Integrates both C++ and R for the solution of statistical computing problems Uses C++ code in R and R functions in C++ programs Provides downloadable programs, available from the authors website The translation of a mathematical problem into its computational analog (or analogs) is a skill that must be learned, like any other, by actively solving relevant problems. The text reveals the basic principles of algorithmic thinking essential to the modern statistician as well as the fundamental skill of communicating with a computer through the use of the computer languages C++ and R. The book lays the foundation for original code development in a research environment.


Secreted by the adipose tissue, adiponectin is an adipokine with unique anti-diabetic, anti-obesity and anti- atherosclerosis properties. Adiponectin has been proposed as a drug target for treating obesity-related diseases and many existing drugs have been found to regulate circulating adiponectin levels in humans. The initial goal of this study was to characterize the binding of potential ligands to adiponectin. However, the binding site of dimethyl sulfoxide (DMSO) was incidentally discovered by solution NMR. As the widely used solvent for many ligand binding assays, DMSO binding at the atomic level has never been reported. Our results indicate the necessity of characterizing the binding of DMSO prior to perfoming ligand binding assays.


This paper discusses the motivation behind common knowledge. Common knowledge has been argued to be necessary for joint action in general and for language use as a particular kind of joint action. However, this term has been broadly interpreted. Two major issues must be addressed: (1) What mental state corresponds to common knowledge, i.e., is knowledge, belief or supposition the appropriate mental attitude? (2) What inference process allows agents to achieve common knowledge? Most generally, common knowledge is used to describe the knowledge that is evidenced in reflexive reasoning. The term has also been used to refer to facts or objects which are mutually salient. One of the main problems for a theory of common knowledge is whether knowledge is the appropriate mental attitude. It seems as though probabilistic beliefs might approximate the cognitive phenomenon of common knowledge more closely than knowledge. The main problem with a usable notion of common knowledge is that inference must play a critical role in what becomes common knowledge. I discuss the nature of conversational inference. It has a number of properties that distinguish it from other inferential systems, such as being apparently abductive and probabilistic, but a precise characterization of it is an unsolved problem. I suggest that in cases where ensuring common knowledge really matters, participants in dialogue accomplish this is by exploiting opportunities for redundancy in conversation. Comments University of Pennsylvania Department of Computer and Information Science Technical Report No. MSCIS-91-14. This technical report is available at ScholarlyCommons: http://repository.upenn.edu/cis_reports/484 Common Knowledge: A Survey MS-CIS-91-14 LINC LAB 195


"The Dharma Bums" appeared just one year after the author's explosive "On The Road" had put the Beat Generation on the literary map and Kerouac on the best-seller list. The same expansiveness, humour and contagious zest for life that sparked the earlier novels sparks this one too, but through a more cohesive story. The books follow two young men engaged in a passionate search for dharma or truth. Their major adventure is the pursuit of the Zen way, which takes them climbing into the high sierras to seek the lesson of solitude.


In the past five years, each of the BRIC countries has revised its merger control policies and practice, changing the conditions for competing in these markets. In this article, we review the turnover (sales) and asset threshold levels in the BRIC countries vs. the EU and the US that impose a filing and review with the antitrust authorities of the proposed M&A transaction. While a common belief is that merger control thresholds are becoming more similar, our review indicates that thresholds remain very different among the BRIC countries as well as the EU and the US. This is the case for both "small" transactions that can be made without review, as well as the "large" transactions that may expect a review. Further, countries differ substantially in their requirement to review "foreign-to-foreign" transactions (those taking place completely outside the geographic boundaries of a regulatory regime) and whether the turnover and assets of the transacting firms are taken to assess the need for a review, or the turnover and assets of the group to which they belong. Tables provide the actual turnover and asset thresholds in the BRIC countries as well as the EU and the US.


Goodwin argues that organ and tissue transplant regimes typically operate in isolated legal regimes. Further complicating the challenge in parsing out the trade in body parts is that it is wedged between two legal processes, altruistic organ donation and legalized tissue implantation. In this essay, the author argues against tissue and organ (T&O) default rules like presumed consent and offers a departure from the conventional scholarship addressing T&O supply and demand. The author makes three distinct normative evaluations. First, the author proposes compensating relatives for providing human tissue and bone for transplantation and medical research. The author then highlights the neglected distinction between organs and tissues. Second, the author proposes using incentives to promote living organ donation. The author argues that ex ante compensation models will generally result in better outcomes for donors because of better information-sharing and the costs and burdens associated with participation in organ procurement will be better understood. By contrast, the author argues that default compulsory or compulsory-like consent rules are far more problematic. The author demonstrates why associating incentives with living donations might help to resolve the organ supply problem in the United States and emphasizes incentives for cadaveric donations. Finally, Goodwin considers how we might begin to create frameworks that move the discussion of incentives for human biological materials beyond hypothetical treatments in the literature to actually testing them at the state level. To this end, the author stresses the importance of considering federalism to address localized concerns regarding compensation regimes.


CONTEXT
The highest incidence of uterine cervical cancer in India is reported in Chennai. The prevalence and oncopotency are to be considered for the development of vaccines and therapeutic agents.

AIMS
The aim of the present study is to analyze the prevalence and oncopotency of high risk type HPV16 and 18 in cervical lesions.

SETTINGS AND DESIGN
This study is designed with 130 study subjects for analysis of selected types of HPV 6/11 and 16/18, in four groups, in a course of three years. The Bethesda system of classification is followed for grouping the samples, using histopathologic examination in biopsies.

MATERIALS AND METHODS
The biopsy samples were collected in 10% buffered formalin and were embedded in paraffin within 24 hours, for long-term preservation. The presence of HPV types were tested by PCR using type-specific primers for HPV16 and HPV18 in the DNA isolated from the subject's biopsies. The stages of cervical lesions were identified by histopathology using the Hematoxylin Eosin stain.

STATISTICAL ANALYSIS USED
The data were subjected to statistical analysis, using the SPSS and INSTAT software packages for their associations and risk estimation, respectively. The Graph Pad Prism 2 x 2 contingency table was used for risk estimation and the Kruskel Wallis test was used for analysis of the associations.

RESULTS
In the study population, the data indicated a high prevalence of HPV 16. However, during the course of study (1999 - 2003), four (66.6%) dysplasia cases with HPV 18, three (21.4%) dysplasia cases with HPV 16, and none with low-risk HPV6/11, turned into invasive cancer, within one year.

CONCLUSIONS
The observation of the study implied that HPV16 had a high prevalence in uterine cervical cancer compared with HPV18 cases. However, the development of invasive cancer from precancerous lesions was more for HPV18 infected cases than for HPV16 during the study period, which indicated the higher oncopotency of HPV type 18.


Recent case law concerning intermediation activity in digital markets shows that one of the key concerns of competition authorities is the use by online platforms of a type of agreement generally traced to the category of Most Favoured Nation clause (MFN), typically included in B2B long-term contracts, where the supplier undertakes to guarantee the best price conditions to the intermediary concerned as compared with any other dealer. The competitive assessment of such clauses (also known as parity clauses) is controversial in both traditional and digital markets. At first sight, they appear to offer potential benefits to consumers, at least in terms of price transparency and reduction of transaction costs; however, they also give rise to competition concerns, as they may serve to acquire or strengthen monopoly pricing. Their recurrence in the digital environment has revitalized an ongoing debate on the likely effects of these clauses on competition.

The article first analyzes the business models adopted by intermediaries in e-commerce and the concerns that have arisen under competition law, with particular regard to the increasing use of some forms of MFN clauses. The analysis is conducted in the light of several cases in the field of online hotel booking brought before national competition authorities (NCAs) for alleged violation of competition rules. The article then questions the theories of harm and the main critical issues deriving from such case law, highlighting the difficulties hidden in the adoption of a generalized approach in the competitive assessment of the clauses at issue.


A novel analytical methodology is presented aimed at the objective evaluation of dyskinetic movements which occur in Parkinson's disease. The methodology is based on the comparison between the harmonic contents of voluntary and non-voluntary movements, highlighting their correlation in terms of frequency and phase mismatches. Interestingly, we demonstrated that there is a time delay between these two kinds of movements. The dyskinesia was measured by means of lowcost and easy-to-use wearable electronics based on inertial sensor units.


In a wireless sensor network, with numerous sensor nodes, a huge volume of data is produced. For the massive data generated by sensor networks to be understood by the machine, semantic web technologies such as ontology need to be applied. On the other hand, since the end users intend to access the high level physical entities' information monitored by the sensor network, the applicability of sensor networks can be enhanced through proposing a strategy to extract the data based on entities instead of extracting the raw sensor data. Hence, this paper firstly presents a method for semantic and temporal modeling of physical entities monitored by a sensor network. Secondly, an appropriate strategy will be offered to collect and aggregate data on physical entities through software agents. The outcome of modeling and simulation through the proposed method is suggested desirable performance as compared to the previously presented strategies.DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5755/j01.itc.47.2.16073


Most mammals scent-mark and a variety of hypotheses have been put forward to explain this behaviour. Differences in the main function of scent-marking between species are likely to be related to differences in social systems. Here, we investigate the functions of scent-marking in a cooperatively breeding carnivore. In the banded mongoose (Mungos mungo), individuals of both sexes commonly breed in their natal group and reproductive skew within groups is low. Using experimental scent-mark presentations, we tested predictions of the intrasexual competition, self-advertisement to potential mates and dominance assertion hypotheses. Both males and females responded more intensely to scent marks of same-sexed than of opposite-sexed individuals. Dominant individuals counter-marked more than subordinate ones and males showed higher counter-marking rates than females, but only marginally so. During oestrus, responses to scent marks were increased by both sexes. Our findings strongly indicate that scent-marking in the banded mongoose primarily serves a purpose in intrasexual competition both between and within groups. Unlike in other social herpestids and some solitary rodents, we found little evidence for self-advertisement. We suggest that the peculiar social system of the banded mongoose results in self-advertisement losing importance in this species, shifting the main function of scent-marking to intrasexual competition.


A squeeze-out is a mechanism used by a majority shareholder in a corporation to force out those in the minority. This article begins with a discussion of whether a squeeze-out should be allowed under the fundamental corporate law principle of majority rule. In spite of concerns for minority shareholders, it is reasonable to seek legislation to minimize the negative aspects of squeeze-outs rather than to simply deny the mechanism altogether. To reduce the risk of the majority's exploiting minority shareholders through squeeze-outs, any squeeze-out legislation should be carefully designed, thereby guaranteeing fair compensation for minority shareholders. For comparative research, this article reviews squeeze-out devices available in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Germany and classifies the devices into three categories: (1) tender offer squeeze-outs, as in compulsory acquisitions in the U.K.; (2) cash-out merger squeeze-outs, as in the long-form mergers in the U.S.; and (3) supermajority type squeeze-outs, as stipulated in the German Stock Law. Alternatively, a squeeze-out may be characterized in one of two conditions by either: (1) controlling shareholder or incumbent management (control-maintained type); or (2) outside investors (control-transferred type). This article attempts to demonstrate the way each condition affects the risk of the majority shareholder's exploiting the minority shareholders. For example, tender offer squeeze-outs, whether combined with control-maintained or control-transferred situations, are likely to provide fair compensation. However, cash-out merger squeeze-outs and supermajority type squeeze-outs, when combined with control-maintained situations, might fail to provide sufficient protection in the process of forcing out the minority. The Korean government announced its plan to introduce cash-out merger squeeze-outs and supermajority type squeeze-outs in its KCC Reform Bill of 2008. This article supports the decision by the Korean government to move in the direction of creating more flexible squeeze-out mechanisms. The government, however, should take into consideration some of the unique features of Korean business practice. The government should also account for the fact that Korea's corporate governance system is still based on a developing economy. Specifically, many Korean companies have dominant or controlling shareholders, and the level of general protection for minority shareholders is still limited in Korea. If the Korean government, as suggested in the Reform Bill of 2008, was to adopt cash-out mergers and supermajority type squeeze-outs, it needs to be cognizant of the risk of expropriation of minority shareholders and appropriately address the risk in its legislation.


OBJECTIVE
The purpose of this study was to determine the utility of a brief screening tool for panic disorder in the primary care setting.

METHODS
A total of 1476 primary care outpatients in three primary care medical clinics on the West Coast of the United States were studied. Patients completed a brief self-report measure, the five-item Autonomic Nervous System Questionnaire (ANS), while in the waiting room. The presence of DSM-IV panic disorder was subsequently determined in groups of "screen-positive" and "screen-negative" subjects using the Composite International Diagnostic Interview. A subset of patients (N = 511) also completed the 21-item Beck Anxiety Inventory. Indices of diagnostic utility were calculated using receiving operating characteristic analyses to guide the selection of optimal cutoff levels.

RESULTS
The two-question version of the ANS had excellent sensitivity (range = 0.94-1.00 across the three clinic sites) and negative predictive value (0.94-1.00) but low specificity (0.25-0.59) and positive predictive value (range 0.18-0.40). The three- and five-question versions of the ANS had only modestly improved specificity, and this was achieved at the cost of reduced sensitivity and increased respondent burden to complete the questionnaire. The 21-item Beck Anxiety Inventory had maximal clinical utility at a cutoff level of > or =20, but sensitivity was lower than desirable for a screening instrument (0.67).

CONCLUSIONS
The two-question version of the ANS shows promise as a screening instrument for panic disorder in the primary care setting.


In 2015 the United Nations Development Programme issued a document entitled Guidelines for Pharmaceutical Patent Examination: Examining Pharmaceutical Patents from a Public Health Perspective (the "Guidelines"). The heart of the Guidelines is a category-by-category examination of eight types of "secondary" pharmaceutical patent claims: Markush claims; selection patents; polymorphs; enantiomers; salts; ethers and esters; compositions; doses; combinations; prodrugs; metabolites; and new medical uses. The Guidelines advise patent offices to apply heightened patentability requirements to these claims in a manner that would effectively deny patent protection to important pharmaceutical innovations currently afforded patent protection. In particular, the Guidelines postulate that many forms of pharmaceutical innovation are inherently routine, and absent some sort of exceptional circumstance should be treated as obvious/non-inventive, and hence unpatentable. In my experience, however, the Guidelines' assumption that many types of pharmaceutical inventions are inherently obvious and undeserving of patent protection is incorrect, and based on an oversimplified view of how these inventions come about. This article provides an evidence-based response to the Guidelines that refutes, or at least qualifies, some of the significant conclusions and recommendations set forth by its author.


Introduction Variation in an individual's response to environmental factors is likely to influence susceptibility to complex human diseases. The genetic basis of such variation is poorly understood. Here, we identify natural genetic variants that underlie variation in the host innate immune response to infection and analyze the mechanisms by which such variants alter these responses. Identifying the genetic basis of variability in the host response to pathogens. A cohort of 534 individuals donated blood for (a) genotyping of common DNA variants and (b) isolation of immune DCs. DCs were stimulated with viral and bacterial components, and the variability in individuals' gene expression responses was mapped to specific DNA variants, which were then shown to affect binding of particular transcription factors. Methods We derived dendritic cells (DCs) from peripheral blood monocytes of healthy individuals (295 Caucasians, 122 African Americans, 117 East Asians) and stimulated them with Escherichia coli lipopolysaccharide (LPS), influenza virus, or the cytokine interferon-β (IFN-β) to generate 1598 transcriptional profiles. We genotyped each of these individuals at sites of common genetic variation and identified the genetic variants that best explain variation in gene expression and gene induction between individuals. We then tested mechanistic predictions from these associations using synthetic promoter constructs and genome engineering. Results We identified 264 loci containing genetic variants associated with variation in absolute gene expression in human DCs, of which 121 loci were associated with variation in the induction of gene expression by one or more stimuli. Fine-mapping identified candidate causal single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) associated with expression variance, and deeper functional experiments localized three of these SNPs to the binding sites of stimulus-activated transcription factors. We also identified a cis variant in the transcription factor, IRF7, associated in trans with the induction of a module of antiviral genes in response to influenza infection. Of the identified genetic variants, 35 were also associated with autoimmune or infectious disease loci found by genome-wide association studies. Discussion The genetic variants we uncover and the molecular basis for their action provide mechanistic explanations and principles for how the innate immune response to pathogens and cytokines varies across individuals. Our results also link disease-associated variants to specific immune pathways in DCs, which provides greater insight into mechanisms underlying complex human phenotypes. Extending our approach to many immune cell types and pathways will provide a global map linking human genetic variants to specific immunological processes. Immune Variation It is difficult to determine the mechanistic consequences of context-dependent genetic variants, some of which may be related to disease (see the Perspective by Gregersen). Two studies now report on the effects of stimulating immunological monocytes and dendritic cells with proteins that can elicit a response to bacterial or viral infection and assess the functional links between genetic variants and profiles of gene expression. M. N. Lee et al. (10.1126/science.1246980) analyzed the expression of more than 400 genes, in dendritic cells from 534 healthy subjects, which revealed how expression quantitative trait loci (eQTLs) affect gene expression within the interferon-β and the Toll-like receptor 3 and 4 pathways. Fairfax et al. (10.1126/science.1246949) performed a genome-wide analysis to show that many eQTLs affected monocyte gene expression in a stimulus- or time-specific manner. Mapping of human host-pathogen gene-by-environment interactions identifies pathogen-specific loci. [Also see Perspective by Gregersen] Little is known about how human genetic variation affects the responses to environmental stimuli in the context of complex diseases. Experimental and computational approaches were applied to determine the effects of genetic variation on the induction of pathogen-responsive genes in human dendritic cells. We identified 121 common genetic variants associated in cis with variation in expression responses to Escherichia coli lipopolysaccharide, influenza, or interferon-β (IFN-β). We localized and validated causal variants to binding sites of pathogen-activated STAT (signal transducer and activator of transcription) and IRF (IFN-regulatory factor) transcription factors. We also identified a common variant in IRF7 that is associated in trans with type I IFN induction in response to influenza infection. Our results reveal common alleles that explain interindividual variation in pathogen sensing and provide functional annotation for genetic variants that alter susceptibility to inflammatory diseases.


Dynamic structural responses via time history analy sis are highly dependent to characteristics of selected records as the seismic excitation. Ground motion scaling is a well-known solution to reduce such a dependency and increase reliability to the dynamic results. The present work, formulate a twofold prob lem for optimal spectral matching and performing consequent sizing optimization based on such scaled ground motion via numerical step-by-step analyses. Particle swarm opt imization as a widely used metaheuristic is specialized and improved to solve this problem treating a number of examples. The scaling error is evaluated using both tradition al procedure and the developed method. In this regard, some issues are studied including the effect of structural period and shape of the design spectrum on the results. Contribution of the proposed enhancement on the standard particle swarm intelligence has improved its explor ative capability resulting in higher efficiency of the algorithm.


The Brong Ahafo region supplies most of Ghana's staple foods and is often described as the 'breadbasket' of Ghana. Despite the important role of this region in the provision of local food, farmers are shifting towards the cultivation of cashew nuts for export. The increasing production of cashew for export is driven by multiple factors across scale; including a historical legacy of export-led agriculture, increasing global demand for cashew nuts, and a number of local level socio-cultural factors. While farmers may benefit from cashew production, the conversion of land into production of cashew poses local level socio-cultural and economic challenges. In this paper, we adopt a critical perspective through the lens of political ecology to demonstrate how the transition towards the production of cashew is driving land accumulation, social differentiation, alongside a decline in access to land for local food provisioning. Through the use of a range of qualitative methods, including interviews, focus group discussions, observation and policy document analysis, this paper reports on in-depth data collected from cashew farmers and local agricultural actors in the Brong Ahafo region. Findings demonstrate that cashew production is transforming land tenure relations through individualisation, alongside the acquisition of communal land for cashew cultivation. In particular, the acquisition of land by local elites, and alongside the increasing conversion of family land into cashew production, is changing existing social and land tenure relations, with profound outcomes for migrant farmers and local food provisioning. We conclude there is an urgent need for agricultural policies to consider these impacts of export-led cashew production for land tenure and local food security.


ABSTRACT Informal best fit lines frequently appear in school curricula. Previous research collectively illustrates that the adjective informal does not translate to cognitive simplicity. Using existing literature, we create a hypothetical framework of cognitive processes associated with studying informal best fit lines. We refine the framework using data from a cycle of design-based research about building students' understanding of covariation. The refined framework includes student thinking processes for signifying observations as data, signifying data with scatterplots, perceiving aggregates in scatterplots, perceiving trends in aggregates, signifying trends with straight lines, and using straight lines as estimation tools. We explain how students' perceptions of aggregates can proceed from the inside-out as well as from the outside-in. We also demonstrate how the amounts of variation encountered at different points in time and the extent to which students perceive straight lines to be abbreviations of linear covariation are important considerations for teaching and research.


There is a widespread need for statistical methods that can analyze high-dimensional datasets with- out imposing restrictive or opaque modeling assumptions. This paper describes a domain-general data analysis method called CrossCat. CrossCat infers multiple non-overlapping views of the data, each consisting of a subset of the variables, and uses a separate nonparametric mixture to model each view. CrossCat is based on approximately Bayesian inference in a hierarchical, nonparamet- ric model for data tables. This model consists of a Dirichlet process mixture over the columns of a data table in which each mixture component is itself an independent Dirichlet process mixture over the rows; the inner mixture components are simple parametric models whose form depends on the types of data in the table. CrossCat combines strengths of mixture modeling and Bayesian net- work structure learning. Like mixture modeling, CrossCat can model a broad class of distributions by positing latent variables, and produces representations that can be efficiently conditioned and sampled from for prediction. Like Bayesian networks, CrossCat represents the dependencies and independencies between variables, and thus remains accurate when there are multiple statistical signals. Inference is done via a scalable Gibbs sampling scheme; this paper shows that it works well in practice. This paper also includes empirical results on heterogeneous tabular data of up to 10 million cells, such as hospital cost and quality measures, voting records, unemployment rates, gene expression measurements, and images of handwritten digits. CrossCat infers structure that is consistent with accepted findings and common-sense knowledge in multiple domains and yields predictive accuracy competitive with generative, discriminative, and model-free alternatives.