Outside of the immediate coastal environments, little is known of fire history in the North Coast Range of California. Fire scar specimens were collected from ponderosa pine (Pinus ponderosa C. Lawson), sugar pine (Pinus lambertiana Douglas), incense cedar (Calocedrus decurrens [Torr] Florin), and Douglas-fir (Pseudotsuga menziesii [Mirb.] Franco) for seven plots in mixed-conifer forests from the Mendocino National Forest, California, USA. Five plots were on high ridges immediately adjacent to the Sacramento Valley (DRY plots). The other two plots were on mesic north facing slopes interior in the range (MESIC plots), and were separated from the Sacramento Valley by at least one to several ridge systems. These two plots were selected because they supported populations of rare lady's slipper orchids (Cypripedium fasciculatum [Kellogg ex S. Watson] and C. montanum [Douglas ex Lindl.]). We found that DRY plots had unusually short fire return intervals (FRI) compared to other areas in northwestern California. The median FRI for these plots ranged from 4.5 yr to 6 yr in comparison with a tenth percentile of 11 yr, grand median of 24 yr, and ninetieth percentile of 66 yr for FRIs from other mixed conifer plots (n = 109) in the region. In northwestern California, most fire scars have been found primarily at ring boundary (68%) and secondarily in latewood (23%) with few in earlywood (9%). In contrast, in the DRY plots 35% (88) of the fire scars were in earlywood with only 15% (39) at the ring boundary. Fire occurrence was associated with drought conditions in the year of fire, and with wet conditions three years before the fire year. Before ∼1850, fires that scarred at least two trees on a site were quite frequent for the DRY plots while being less frequent and more variable on the MESIC plots. However, the MESIC orchid habitats burned with frequency and seasonality similar to mixed conifer forests in the Klamath Mountains of northern California. Fires were less frequent after ∼1850, with fires ceasing on most plots shortly after 1900. We suggest that these unusually low FRIs and high incidence of fire scars in earlywood were due to the adjacency of the DRY plots to the hot, relatively dry Sacramento Valley grasslands that were likely influenced by the burning practices of Native Americans.


The ability of power ultrasound, acidic electrolyzed water (AEW), and gamma irradiation to inactivate Escherichia coli O157:H7 inoculated onto alfalfa and broccoli seeds was examined. The treatment conditions under which the alfalfa and broccoli seeds treated with sterile deionized water (SW), AEW, ultrasound cleaning tank (UST), ultrasound probe (USP), and irradiation (IR) would retain a germination percentage of >85% were first determined for each disinfection hurdle. E. coli O157:H7 inactivation tests were then conducted with the experimental conditions determined in the germination tests to find out the maximum inactivation ability of each disinfection hurdle. AEW treatment at 55 oC for 10 min reduced E. coli O157:H7 population by 3.4 and 3.3 log CFU/g for the alfalfa and broccoli seeds, respectively. IR at 8 kGy resulted in a 5-log reduction with seed germination of >85% for both seed types, but a reduction in the length and thickness of the sprouts was observed. None of the ultrasound treatments achieved over a 2-log reduction in E. coli O157:H7 population without lowering the germination to below 85%. The results of this study demonstrated that AEW and ultrasound, when applied individually or in combination with thermal treatment at 55 oC, were not able to deliver a satisfactory inactivation of E. coli O157:H7. A combination of several hurdles must be used to achieve a complete elimination of E. coli O157:H7 cells on alfalfa and broccoli seeds.


The optimal allocation of decision rights in an organization reflects a trade-off between the costs of transferring relevant information within the hierarchy and the costs that occur when decision-making agents have different objectives than the principal. This paper is a first attempt to quantitatively analyze the allocation of decision rights within the workplace. I use detailed questions on decision-making from three separate data sets to measure the decentralization of decision rights within the hierarchy, to determine what establishment characteristics are related to the location of decision rights, and to examine what human resource practices are correlated with centralization. JEL Classifications: D21, D23, L23


Edge-intersection graphs of paths in grids are graphs that can be represented such that vertices are paths in a grid and edges between vertices of the graph exist whenever two grid paths share a grid edge. This type of graphs is motivated by applications in conflict resolution of paths in grid networks. In this paper, we continue the study of edge-intersection graphs of paths in a grid, which was initiated by Golumbic, Lipshteyn and Stern. We show that for any k, if the number of bends in each path is restricted to be at most k, then not all graphs can be represented. Then we study some graph classes that can be represented with k-bend paths, for small k. We show that every planar graph has a representation with 5-bend paths, every outerplanar graph has a representation with 3-bend paths, and every planar bipartite graph has a representation with 2-bend paths. We also study line graphs, graphs of bounded pathwidth, and graphs with -regular edge orientations.


Whereas in 1990 only a dozen freedom of information (FOI) laws existed, today there are over 85. But do they promise windows into government or merely ineffective window-dressing? The struggle against secrecy has become one of the most important issues of our time. This article examines the contingent nature of FOI by analyzing various window-dressing dilemmas in light of recent developments. It explores the challenges and promise of disclosure laws, drawing on the cases of Argentina, Brazil, Bulgaria, India, Mexico, and the U.S. The article stresses how presidential-legislative dynamics and media activism powerfully influence the degree of openness and transparency.


A dissertation submitted to the Faculty of Arts in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in the Department of African Languages and Culture at the University of Zululand, South Africa, 2014.


In this paper, we consider the $k$-center/median/means clustering with outliers problems (or the $(k, z)$-center/median/means problems) in the distributed setting. Most previous distributed algorithms have their communication costs linearly depending on $z$, the number of outliers. Recently Guha et al.[10] overcame this dependence issue by considering bi-criteria approximation algorithms that output solutions with $2z$ outliers. For the case where $z$ is large, the extra $z$ outliers discarded by the algorithms might be too large, considering that the data gathering process might be costly. In this paper, we improve the number of outliers to the best possible $(1+\epsilon)z$, while maintaining the $O(1)$-approximation ratio and independence of communication cost on $z$. The problems we consider include the $(k, z)$-center problem, and $(k, z)$-median/means problems in Euclidean metrics. Implementation of the our algorithm for $(k, z)$-center shows that it outperforms many previous algorithms, both in terms of the communication cost and quality of the output solution.


It is long known that to correctly reproduce a binaural signal through a pair of loudspeakers, this signal has to be pre-filtered to compensate for the crosstalk effect that will otherwise ruin the spatial clues contained on the binaural signal. In this work we make a brief review of the design technique for crosstalk cancellation (CTC) filters specially focused on its application in virtual reality installations and discuss still open dilemmas. CTC filters are designed based on the transfer paths between loudspeakers and listener ears and usually delivers channel separations of over 20 dB in a small region around the listeners head, the so-called sweet spot. If the listener moves away from the sweet spot, channel separation will deteriorate and the spatial cues from the binaural signal will be lost. A great deal of researchers tried to answer the question on how to increase the size of the sweep spot through a more skilled system setup, specially important for virtual reality applications where the users should be allowed to freely move and rotate their heads. For such applications dynamic CTC systems can be implemented with the aid of a head-tracking device to determine distance and orientation of the listener's head to the loudspeakers, allowing a constant update of the cancellation filters.


Congress' intent in enacting the Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act (EMTALA) was to prohibit hospital emergency rooms from refusing to treat patients because they were unable to pay or due to other discriminatory reasons. EMTALA requires emergency departments to screen all patients who present for treatment and to stabilize or transfer those identified to be suffering from emergency conditions.In practice, however, many of the EMTALA cases that have reached courts have been dismissed as being state law medical malpractice claims, not EMTALA. The confusion between EMTALA and medical malpractice resulted from an extremely vague statutory screening standard, requiring hospital emergency departments to render "an appropriate medical screening examination," without defining what such a screening entailed.As medical costs continue to escalate, and we grow more concerned about our ability to finance our medical care and to ensure access to the ever-growing numbers of uninsured, it becomes of paramount importance to utilize our healthcare dollars efficiently. A more tightly constructed EMTALA screening standard would do a better job of differentiating between EMTALA and medical malpractice, saving legal costs for claimants and hospitals and conserving judicial resources.This article will review the historic problem of "patient dumping," and how EMTALA was promulgated to cure the problem. It takes a detailed look at EMTALA's exceedingly vague screening standard, and how the courts have transformed it into a more defined standard.Nevertheless, the author points out how the currently accepted screening standard falls short. The author suggests a revised standard that will weed out negligence claims and restore EMTALA to its intended task - prohibiting hospital emergency rooms from refusing treatment for discriminatory reasons.


Counting the Stars is a captivating tale of forbidden love and bestselling author Helen Dunmore's tenth novel. In the heat of Rome's long summer, the poet Catullus and his older married lover, Clodia Metelli, meet in secret. Living at the heart of sophisticated, brittle and brutal Roman society at the time of Pompey, Crassus and Julius Caesar, Catullus is obsessed with Clodia, the Lesbia of his most passionate poems. He is jealous of her husband, of her maid, even of her pet sparrow. And Clodia? Catullus is 'her dear poet', but possibly not her only interest...Their Rome is a city of extremes. Tenants are packed into ramshackle apartment blocks while palatial villas house the magnificence of the families who control Rome. Armed street gangs clash in struggles for political power. Slaves are the eyes and ears of everything that goes on, while civilization and violence are equals, murder is the easy option and poison the weapon of choice. Catallus' relationship with Clodia is one of the most intense, passionate, tormented and candid in history. In love and in hate, their story exposes the beauty and terrors of Roman life in the late Republic. "She reels you in...Dunmore has a gift for turning every genre she touches to gold". (Telegraph). "Dunmore at her most innovative and daring ...a powerful and convincing study of fame and notoriety ...captivating and compelling". (Time Out). "Dunmore's strengths as a novelist have always included her skill in sensuous description and her ability to convey the promises and the dangers of erotic love. The Rome she has so vividly realised in Counting the Stars provides a new stage on which to display those strengths". (Sunday Times). Helen Dunmore is the author of twelve novels: Zennor in Darkness, which won the McKitterick Prize; Burning Bright; A Spell of Winter, which won the Orange Prize; Talking to the Dead; Your Blue-Eyed Boy; With Your Crooked Heart; The Siege, which was shortlisted for the 2001 Whitbread Novel of the Year Award and for the Orange Prize for Fiction 2002; Mourning Ruby; House of Orphans; Counting the Stars; The Betrayal, which was longlisted for the Man Booker Prize 2010, and The Greatcoat. She is also a poet, children's novelist and short-story writer.


Batik industry wastewater is derived from the coloring and wax removal (pelorodan) processes. The treatment for batik wastewater can be made simple and cheap using phytotechnology principle. One of phytotechnology principles is by treating the wastewater using plants as phytotreatment agents which will absorb the pollutants in wastewater. The plants used in this study were Egeria densa and Salvinia molesta and the study used a laboratory-scale reactor in batch systems. The first performed step was acclimatization and then continued by Range Finding Test (RFT). The RFT result would give the value of pollutant's concentration to be used in the next step of the study, phytoremediation test. Phytoremediation test was conducted for 17 days. The studied parameters were Biochemical Oxygen Demand (BOD) and Chemical Oxygen Demand (COD). The result showed that the single reactor of Egeria densa reached the highest efficiency to reduce BOD and COD from thecoloring wastewater, with the efficiency of 93% for BOD and 95% for COD or equal to 94.4 mg BOD/ L and 392.2 mg COD/L. For wax removal wastewater, the lowest concentrations of BOD and COD were reached in reactor with single species of Salvinia molesta within 17 days which were 99% or equivalent to 1693.1 mg BOD/L and 4338.5 mg COD/L.


Background Burst abdomen represents one of the most frustrating and difficult postoperative complications encountered by surgeons who perform a significant volume of surgery. Burst abdomen occurs because of various preoperative, operative and postoperative factors, which can be prevented to some extent by being aware of them. The choice of incision for laparotomy depends on the area that needs to be exposed, the elective or emergency nature of the operation, and personal preference. Type of incision may, however, have an influence on the occurrence of postoperative wound complications, which is discussed in our study. There is little consensus in the literature as to whether a particular incision confers any advantage. Objective The purpose of this study was to provide an evidence-based consensus regarding the patients who underwent laparotomy for various intra-abdominal conditions included in our inclusion criteria and who developed burst abdomen in relation to the type of abdominal incision (vertical vs. transverse), as well as to know the rates of incidence, morbidity and mortality due to burst abdomen, and study other variables within the scope of postoperative complications. Other variables within the postoperative complications spectrum were also studied alongside the main one, burst abdomen. Patients and methods This is a prospective, randomized study (by card picking under supervision of the ward nurse) that compared the postoperative complications (mainly burst abdomen) after two main types of abdominal incisions, vertical and transverse, within a period of 12 months from October, 2015 to October, 2016. The study was conducted at the Emergency Unit, General Surgery Department, Kasr Al Ainy University Hospital, Faculty of Medicine, Cairo University. Sixty patients underwent open abdominal operations (exploration) after following distinctive inclusion and exclusion criteria. Thirty patients underwent vertical and thirty patients underwent transverse incisions. The main outcome measures were early complications such as burst abdomen, pulmonary complications and hospital stay. Results The transverse incision offers as good an access to most intra-abdominal structures as a vertical incision. The incidence of burst abdomen is higher in the vertical incision (midline) group, with 71.4% of the total patients suffering a burst abdomen. Respiratory complications occurred significantly in cases of burst abdomen (P<0.001). Hence, hospital stay was longer in cases of burst abdomen (P<0.001), which added to the economic burden. Conclusion Transverse incisions in abdominal surgery are based on better anatomical and physiological principles. It should be preferred, as the early postoperative period is associated with fewer complications (burst abdomen and pulmonary morbidity). A midline incision is still the incision of choice in conditions that require rapid intra-abdominal entry (such as trauma with suspected intra-abdominal haemorrhage).


The goal of section speed control is to increase speed limit compliance in the monitored road sections, decrease speed variance and improve traffic safety. General experience with section speed control on motorways is positive, with significant improvements in both speed and safety performance. The presented study focused on a unique application of section speed control in motorway work zones in the Czech Republic. Effectiveness was monitored (in terms of average speed, speeding and accident rates) in three sections and four time periods (normal operation, work zone, work zone with section speed control, normal operation), which allowed discerning individual effects of work zone and section speed control. In addition, a novel data source—floating car data—was used. Work zones were found to increase accident rates compared to normal operation and decrease with the introduction of section speed control. The effects on average speed, speed variance and speeding were positive, although smaller compared to the studies conducted in non-work zone conditions.


A new highly birefringent octagonal photonic crystal fiber (Hi-Bi OPCF) with a rectangular array of four elliptical airholes in the fiber core region is proposed and analyzed using the full-vector finite element method with anisotropic perfect match layer absorbing boundaries. Numerical results show that the phase birefringence of the photonic crystal fiber (PCF) reaches 3.43?10?2 at the wavelength of 1 550 nm. Moreover, two zero-dispersion wavelengths are achieved in the visible and near infrared wavelength regions for one polarization state but not in the other.


Learning Indonesian at school kindergarten (TK) should receive special attention and in accordance with the proportions. This was due, kindergarten age children are still in the stage or level of development, and still need some guidance. Like the pattern of thinking the child is still considered standard of thinking, which means in teaching must begin facts, product availability and can be seen and touched or held. Learning can be defined as a system and as a process through planning or designing, implementing and evaluating, with the purpose so that learners can achieve the learning objectives effectively and efficiently. Learning as a means of learning system that consists of several components that are organized, while learning as a process, means the circuit or the efforts of teachers in order to make students learn. This study aims to obtain a clear picture of the kindergarten learning Indonesian Muhammadiyah in Malang, including the following: 1) Describe the means of learning Indonesian at TK Muhammadiyah in Malang. 2) Describe the curriculum in kindergarten learning Indonesian Muhammadiyah in Malang. 3) Describe the technique or method of learning Indonesian at TK Muhammadiyah in Malang. The method of research used in writing this essay is a qualitative descriptive, where researcher memenggambarkan or description of Learning Indonesian on TK Muhammadiyah in Malang. The data will be analyzed in this study is the process of learning and teaching and learning outcomes of students in classes based on the documentation held teachers of Indonesian. Based on research results, it can be concluded that some learning media are used by teachers in teaching and learning Indonesian, among others: 1) Means Indonesian Language learning is in kindergarten. ABA can generally be categorized as good and efficient 2) Curriculum kindergarten. ABA Muhammadiyah in Malang City has been using the CBC (Competency-Based Curriculum), namely through: a) development program that includes an annual program, semester, module, weekly and daily, b) Evaluation of learning outcomes that include classroom assessment, basic skills test, final assessment, berchmarking and assessment program, and c) Development of the syllabus, namely through CBC syllabus development procedures and responsibilities of various parties in the development of the syllabus. Classroom-Based Assessment as a component of competency based curriculum has the following characteristics: a) Emphasis on student competency achievement, b)-oriented learning outcomes (learning outcomes) and individual differences of students, c) Using a variety of approaches and methods in the delivery and learning , d) the widespread use of learning resources (teachers, students, resource persons, and multi-media), e) Emphasis on process and
learning outcomes in an effort to achieve mastery or competence. 3) Methods, teacher interaction with students in the delivery of course material using a learning approach to social interaction and oriented to memorization. In the process of learning the teacher-student interaction, teachers use lecture method, discussion, question and answer the teacher explain the subject matter and students' response to the delivery of teacher. In a question and answer and discussion activities, interaction occurred between students with students, students with teachers.


The last six years (2007–2012) show a persistent change in early summer Arctic wind patterns relative to previous decades. The persistent pattern, which has been previously recognized as the Arctic Dipole (AD), is characterized by relatively low sea‐level pressure over the Siberian Arctic with high pressure over the Beaufort Sea, extending across northern North America and over Greenland. Pressure differences peak in June. In a search for a proximate cause for the newly persistent AD pattern, we note that the composite 700 hPa geopotential height field during June 2007–2012 exhibits a positive anomaly only on the North American side of the Arctic, thus creating the enhanced mean meridional flow across the Arctic. Coupled impacts of the new persistent pattern are increased sea ice loss in summer, long‐lived positive temperature anomalies and ice sheet loss in west Greenland, and a possible increase in Arctic‐subarctic weather linkages through higher‐amplitude upper‐level flow. The North American location of increased 700 hPa positive anomalies suggests that a regional atmospheric blocking mechanism is responsible for the presence of the AD pattern, consistent with observations of unprecedented high pressure anomalies over Greenland since 2007.


We explore the relationship between the spatial distributions of excess deaths and care home facilities during the COVID-19 outbreak in Italy. Using registry-based mortality data (January 1st- March 31st, 2015-2020) for Lombardy, one of the areas hit most severely, we estimate that municipalities with care homes present significantly higher excess death rates among the elderly (+41%). We find that this effect is not driven by the size of care homes and of the vulnerable population that they host. Rather, our results suggest that the excess deaths did not occur only within care homes and these facilities acted as one of the possible catalysts in the diffusion of COVID-19 in the whole elderly population of their surrounding territory.


The iron-containing ionic liquid (IL) 1-butyl-3-methylimidazolium tetrachloroferrate(III) [Bmim][FeCl4] has been used as a building block in the synthesis of transparent, ion-conducting, and paramagnetic ionogels. UV/Vis spectroscopy shows that the coordination around the Fe(III) ion does slightly change upon incorporation of the IL into PMMA. The thermal stability of the PMMA increases significantly with IL incorporation. In particular, the onset weight loss observed at ca. 265 °C for pure PMMA is completely suppressed. The ionic conductivity shows a strong temperature dependence and increases with increasing IL weight fractions. The magnetic properties are similar to those reported for the pure IL and are not affected by the incorporation into the PMMA matrix. The resulting ionogel is thus an interesting prototype for soft, flexible, and transparent materials combining the mechanical properties of the matrix with the functionality of the metal-containing IL, such as magnetism.


Background: Specialist Registrars (SpRs) are expected to have an annual review (RITA). There are a number of models
to support this process. At Mersey Deanery an annual face-to-face RITA meeting takes place. This current process is
however a time-consuming and costly exercise.
Work done: A pilot study of the RITA process was conducted. Questionnaires relating to aspects of the RITA review
were distributed to SpRs attending RITA panels.
Results: 50 completed questionnaires were received. 94% of trainees had regular meetings with their Educational
Supervisor, 68% also having formal appraisal (median 30 minutes, range 10 to 60minutes). The meetings also of ered
the opportunity to set personal development plans with specii c targets to optimize the training and educational needs;
however only 46% reported having a current plan. Portfolios or log-books were held by 88% and 79% respectively.
Career advice had been received by 84%. The opportunity to meet with the RITA panel and receive personal feedback
with interactive discussion was reported as useful or very useful by 74% of the trainees.
Conclusions: Free-text responses of trainees suggest that the development of specii c career guidance of ered in
parallel to a more prescriptive RITA process would support the transition from trainee to consultant grade.


The epilithon of three soft-water lakes in the English Lake District (oligotrophic Wastwater, mesotrophic Coniston Water and eutrophic Esthwaite Water) and of Malham Tarn, a mesotrophic hard-water lake in the Yorkshire Dales, was sampled monthly from January 1997 until December 1998. Samples were analysed for chl-a content and algal community composition with special reference to the diatoms. At the oligotrophic Wastwater the maximum chl-a value occurred in early autumn, but at the other sites spring maxima were observed. The epilithon in all lakes was numerically dominated by diatoms. Achnanthes minutissima was particularly abundant at all the soft-water sites where it grew throughout the year. At Wastwater, Brachysira spp. were also characteristic of the epilithic algal community. The epilithon at Coniston Water contained larger cells of Fragilaria spp. (in 1997) and Gomphonema spp. (in 1998). At Esthwaite Water the community changed markedly between the monthly samples and seemed highly influenced by grazing. Here diatoms were a less important component of the epilithic biomass and filamentous Chlorophyceae were often dominant. The epilithic algal community at Malham Tarn was characterised by a spring bloom of Diatoma spp. and higher numbers of Cymbella spp., but in the summer filamentous green algae contributed most to the biovolume. Analysis of similarity (SIMI) between monthly samples of the epilithic algal communities within each lake over the two year period using the coefficient of variation of the SIMI values, demonstrated increased seasonal variability with increasing productivity.


Plea bargaining in the United States is in critical respects unregulated, and a key reason is the marginal role to which judges have been relegated. In the wake of Santobello v. New York (1971), lower courts crafted Due Process doctrines through which they supervised the fairness of some aspects of the plea bargaining process. Within a decade, however, U.S. Supreme Court decisions began to shut down any constitutional basis for judicial supervision of plea negotiations or agreements. Those decisions rested primarily on two claims: separation of powers and the practical costs of regulating plea bargaining in busy criminal justice systems. Both rationales proved enormously influential. Legislative rulemaking and state courts both largely followed the Court in excluding judges — and in effect, the law — from any meaningful role.This article challenges these longstanding rationales. Historical practice suggests that separation of powers doctrine does not require the prevailing, exceedingly broad conception of "exclusive" executive control over charging and other components of the plea process. This is especially true in the states, many of which had long traditions of private prosecutors and judicial oversight over certain prosecution decisions, as well as different constitutional structures. By contrast, English courts — based on both common law and legislation — retain some power to review such decisions. Moreover, assertions that legal constraints on plea bargaining would fatally impair the "efficiency" of adjudication is belied by evidence of very high guilty plea rates both in England, where bargaining is more regulated, and in U.S. courts before the Supreme Court closed off meaningful grounds for judicial review.


This paper discusses high performance clustering from a series of critical topics: architectural design, system software infrastructure, and programming environment. This is accomplished through an overview of a large scale, high performance SuperCluster (Roadrunner). This SuperCluster is based almost entirely on freely available, vendor-independent software: for example, its operating system (Linux), job scheduler (PBS), compilers (GNU/EGCS), and parallel programming libraries (MPI). The Globus toolkit, also available for this platform allows high performance distributed computing applications to use geographical distributed resources such as this SuperCluster. In addition to describing the design and analysis of the Roadrunner SuperCluster we provide experimental analyses from grand challenge applications and future directions for SuperClusters.


The focus of the present research is on children's commonsense reasoning in mechanics.
The important effect of pre-instructional ideas on children's learning is now widely
recognised and much effort has gone into investigating what these ideas are like in various
domain areas in science in the past few years. Early researches in this area have provided
us with a comprehensive catalog of phenomenological descriptions of various aspects of
children's reasoning about forces and motion. A related line of research has grown over
recent years, which attempts to probe into whether there are deeper explanations underlying
these misconceptions. If we take scientific theories and commonsense reasoning as two
ends of a dichotomy, then early researches in this field have predominantly started from the
scientific end, looking towards the intuitive end, trying to find out where the intuitive ideas
go astray. To look for deeper levels of analysis, some have since turned to looking from
the opposite end, trying to take children's ideas seriously, in their own right and not as a
distortion of the scientific view. This latter perspective is the one taken by the present
research and is believed to be appropriate if an understanding of the phenomenological
descriptions of children's intuitive ideas is to be attained.
The present research sets out to investigate the possible cognitive models used in the
spontaneous interpretation of and reasoning about motion by students with varying
amounts of Physics instruction. It is hoped that the resulting models will not only provide a
context for interpreting children's misconceptions, but also provide insight into the evolution
of naive cognitive models to more scientific ones.
The research consists of two tasks. The first is a classification task asking students to
categorize comic strip pictures about motion and to explain their underlying reasoning. The
second is a programming task, asking students to write expert systems about motion in the
language PROLOG. The second task is in fact one of self elicitation of knowledge by the
students themselves under the assistance of the researcher. The advantage of such an
exercise is that the representation is not only open for inspection by the students but is also
explorable. The results from both tasks will be analysed and synthesized in the thesis.


Hand-foot-mouth diseases (HFMD) caused by enterovirus 71 (EV71) and coxsackievirus 16 (CVA16) in children have now become a severe public health issue in the Asian-Pacific region. Recently we have successfully developed transgenic mice expressing human scavenger receptor class B member 2 (hSCARB2, a receptor of EV71 and CVA16) as an animal model for evaluating the pathogenesis of enterovirus infections. In this study, hSCARB2-transgenic mice were used to investigate the efficacy conferred by a previously described EV71 neutralizing antibody, N3. A single injection of N3 effectively inhibited the HFMD-like skin scurfs in mice pre-infected with clinical isolate of EV71 E59 (B4 genotype) or prevented severe limb paralysis and death in mice pre-inoculated with 5746 (C2 genotype). This protection was correlated with remarkable reduction of viral loads in the brain, spinal cord and limb muscles. Accumulated viral loads and the associated pro-inflammatory cytokines were all reduced. The protective efficacy of N3 was not observed in animals challenged with CVA16. This could be due to dissimilarity sequences of the neutralizing epitope found in CVA16. These results indicate N3 could be useful in treating severe EV71 infections and the hSCARB2-transgenic mouse could be used to evaluate the protective efficacy of potential anti-enterovirus agent candidates.


In this Article, the author examines ways that legal aid advocacy organizations in the U.S. can utilize international human rights doctrine and procedures to advance the interests of poor and marginalized Americans in domestic and foreign venues. This is a sympathetic account of some of the efforts undertaken by legal services lawyers in this burgeoning field of law. The first section briefly describes the history and structure of the quasi-public legal aid programs funded by the Legal Services Corporation (LSC). Section two details practical reasons why attorneys may want to look to international instruments or forums to achieve their clients' objectives and to satisfy the bureaucratic limitations imposed by the LSC. The third section provides synopses of actual cases in which legal aid attorneys have invoked international human rights law. These include cases filed in U.S. courts and international tribunals concerning protections for immigrants and language minorities, and the right to maternity leave and welfare payments. The last section offers observations on strategy and style, and forum and format, in utilizing unconventional arguments and modes of advocacy. The author recounts successes and challenges faced by practitioners who seek to combine the role of poverty lawyer with that of the international human rights advocate.


This study was aimed to examine the effectiveness of teaching the problem solving skills on emotional safety and coping styles among the adolescents. From 700,000female high school students in Tehran, 30 subjects were selected by a randomized clustered sampling from district 8 of education in Tehran and answered Emotional Safety Questionnaire - Short Form. For analysis of assumptions' information the multivariate analysis of covariance (MANCOVA) was used and the results showed that pretest scores for both control and experimental groups have statistically significant differences at a confidence level of 5% and therefore the problem solving skills has a significant impact on the emotionalsafety.


Humans encounter mycobacterial species due to their ubiquity in different environmental niches. In many individuals, pathogenic mycobacterial species may breach our first-line barrier defenses of the innate immune system and modulate the activation of phagocytes to cause disease of the respiratory tract or the skin and soft tissues, sometimes resulting in disseminated infection. SUMMARY Humans encounter mycobacterial species due to their ubiquity in different environmental niches. In many individuals, pathogenic mycobacterial species may breach our first-line barrier defenses of the innate immune system and modulate the activation of phagocytes to cause disease of the respiratory tract or the skin and soft tissues, sometimes resulting in disseminated infection. Cutaneous mycobacterial infections may cause a wide range of clinical manifestations, which are divided into four main disease categories: (i) cutaneous manifestations of Mycobacterium tuberculosis infection, (ii) Buruli ulcer caused by Mycobacterium ulcerans and other related slowly growing mycobacteria, (iii) leprosy caused by Mycobacterium leprae and Mycobacterium lepromatosis, and (iv) cutaneous infections caused by rapidly growing mycobacteria. Clinically, cutaneous mycobacterial infections present with widely different clinical presentations, including cellulitis, nonhealing ulcers, subacute or chronic nodular lesions, abscesses, superficial lymphadenitis, verrucous lesions, and other types of findings. Mycobacterial infections of the skin and subcutaneous tissue are associated with important stigma, deformity, and disability. Geography-based environmental exposures influence the epidemiology of cutaneous mycobacterial infections. Cutaneous tuberculosis exhibits different clinical phenotypes acquired through different routes, including via extrinsic inoculation of the tuberculous bacilli and dissemination to the skin from other sites, or represents hypersensitivity reactions to M. tuberculosis infection. In many settings, leprosy remains an important cause of neurological impairment, deformity, limb loss, and stigma. Mycobacterium lepromatosis, a mycobacterial species related to M. leprae, is linked to diffuse lepromatous leprosy of Lucio and Latapí. Mycobacterium ulcerans produces a mycolactone toxin that leads to subcutaneous tissue destruction and immunosuppression, resulting in deep ulcerations that often produce substantial disfigurement and disability. Mycobacterium marinum, a close relative of M. ulcerans, is an important cause of cutaneous sporotrichoid nodular lymphangitic lesions. Among patients with advanced immunosuppression, Mycobacterium kansasii, the Mycobacterium avium-intracellulare complex, and Mycobacterium haemophilum may cause cutaneous or disseminated disease. Rapidly growing mycobacteria, including the Mycobacterium abscessus group, Mycobacterium chelonei, and Mycobacterium fortuitum, are increasingly recognized pathogens in cutaneous infections associated particularly with plastic surgery and cosmetic procedures. Skin biopsies of cutaneous lesions to identify acid-fast staining bacilli and cultures represent the cornerstone of diagnosis. Additionally, histopathological evaluation of skin biopsy specimens may be useful in identifying leprosy, Buruli ulcer, and cutaneous tuberculosis. Molecular assays are useful in some cases. The treatment for cutaneous mycobacterial infections depends on the specific pathogen and therefore requires a careful consideration of antimicrobial choices based on official treatment guidelines.


This paper presents experimental results for the fluid transport induced by tethered as well as freely swimming zooplankton organisms ( Daphnia ) in a density-stratified water column. Particle image velocimetry and planar laser induced fluorescence were used to measure the instantaneous velocity and density distributions and to estimate kinetic energy, dissipation rates, vertical mass fluxes, and apparent diffusion coefficients around individual organisms. For freely swimming organism we found dissipation rates of kinetic energy of 10 −6 W kg −1 and an apparent diffusion coefficient of 10 −5 m 2 s −1 . Both values are valid for a volume of influence of approximately 1 cm 3 , which is about two orders of magnitude larger than the size of the organism. In the case of tethered Daphnia all measures are significantly larger but – associated with the artificial situation – of less environmental significance. The results indicate that swimming-induced fluid and mass transport in the vicinity of zooplankton organisms is characterized by apparent diffusion coefficients comparable in magnitude to turbulent diffusivities typically found in stratified aquatic environments. Upscaling of these results using abundances of Daphnia in lakes further suggests that biologically-induced fluid transport by zooplankton might potentially be important for vertical mixing in stratified waters if background mixing is weak.


The law on bioethics passed by the French parliament in 2004 qualifies reproductive
cloning as a "crime against the human species", a clear indication of how threatened the
social world feels by certain aspects of genetic engineering. This article analyses the many
social issues involved in cloning. The field of bioethics constitutes a kind of open-air laboratory for anyone interested in studying norm formation processes in pluralist societies.
Among other things it brings to light the intertwining of axiological or value-focused controversies and economic logic. After specifying what cloning is, the article reviews the stages
through which the prospect of reproductive cloning as both reality and fantasy has become a
focus of public debate. It then examines the main arguments for and against reproductive
cloning, paying particular attention to arguments that refer to the danger cloning represents
for the social tie (a blow to the principles of filiation, the resurgence of eugenics, etc.).
Lastly, the article looks at the difficulties encountered when attempts are made to formulate
a prohibition at the national and international levels. The conclusion seeks to demonstrate
how certain biologists' discourse on cloning represents a strong invitation for greater dialogue between the life sciences and sociology.


Terrorism has become an integral part of everyday life in recent years and has dramatically affected the quality of life for individuals in society. Technology is the key to combating terrorism and protecting ordinary citizens, first responders and soldiers, among others, from danger. The area of intelligent or smart textiles is a rather new but rapidly emerging discipline with a high potential for payoff in the fight against terrorism. This publication shows the critical need to bring together the leading experts in the field to make an in-depth assessment of existing knowledge in the area of intelligent (smart) textiles for personal protection and safety, and to identify directions for future research. An important outcome or "deliverable" has been the "Research Roadmap" for the future in keeping with NATO's goals. The NATO provides a forum for young scientists and engineers to interact closely with the invited experts and participate in developing the Research Roadmap that is expected to advance this emerging discipline through collaborative research between NATO and Partner countries.


We present the results of bi-monthly VLBA observations at 7mm in 1998-1999 of 15 radio-bright AGNs. These include 5 BL Lac objects (3C~66A, OJ 287, 1803+784, 1823+568, and BL~Lac), 8 quasars (0420-014, 0528+134, 3C~273, 3C~279, PKS~1510-089, 3C~345, CTA~102, and 3C~454.3), and 2 radio galaxies (3C~111 and 3C~120). This is part of a mm-wave polarization monitoring program with the VLBA, JCMT, and (starting in February 1999) Steward Observatory, plus total flux density monitoring at BIMA and OVRO (mm array calibration data). Several of the sources (BL~Lac, 3C~279, PKS~1510-089, and 3C~120) are being monitored weekly or semi-weekly with RXTE.

The regular monitoring with high angular resolution allows us to identify components across different epochs with high confidence, and to determine with to high accuracy the extrapolated times of zero separation from the core. We will show the VLBA images and measurements of proper motions. For a number of sources the values of proper motions of components in the jets will be compared with the results of our previous program of VLBA monitoring of \gamma-ray bright blazars at high frequencies in 1994--1997.

This research is supported in part by the National Science Foundation through grant AST-9802941. The \gamma-ray blazar VLBA monitoring was supported in part by various NASA guest investigator grants (RXTE and CGRO).


Formulating the contribution of subgrid-scale (SGS) variability to microphysical processes in boundary layer and deep convective cloud parameterizations is a challenging task because of the complexity of microphysical processes and the lack of subgrid-scale information. In this study, a warm-rain microphysics parameterization that is based on a joint double-Gaussian distribution of vertical velocity, liquid water potential temperature, total water mixing ratio, and perturbation of rainwater mixing ratio is developed to simulate drizzling boundary layer clouds with a single column model (SCM). The probability distribution function (PDF) is assumed, but its parameters evolve according to equations that invoke higher-order turbulence closure. These parameters are determined from the first-, second-, and third-order moments and are then used to derive analytical expressions for autoconversion, collection, and evaporation rates. The analytical expressions show that correlation between rainwater and liquid water mixing ratios of the Gaussians enhances the collection rate whereas that between saturation deficit and rainwater mixing ratios of the Gaussians enhances the evaporation rate. Cases of drizzling shallow cumulus and stratocumulus are simulated with large-eddy simulation (LES) and SCM runs (SCM-CNTL and SCM-M): LES explicitly resolves SGS variability, SCM-CNTL parameterizes SGS variability with the PDF-based scheme, but SCM-M uses the grid-mean profiles to calculate the conversion rates of microphysical processes. SCM-CNTL can well reproduce the autoconversion, collection, and evaporation rates from LES. Comparisons between the two SCM experiments showed improvements in mean profiles of potential temperature, total water mixing ratio, liquid water, and cloud amount in the simulations considering SGS variability. A 3-week integration using the PDF-based microphysics scheme indicates that the scheme is stable for long-term simulations.


Among those who have recently lost a job, social networks in general and online ones in particular may be useful to cope with stress and find new employment. This study focuses on the psychological and practical consequences of Facebook use following job loss. By pairing longitudinal surveys of Facebook users with logs of their online behavior, we examine how communication with different kinds of ties predicts improvements in stress, social support, bridging social capital, and whether they find new jobs. Losing a job is associated with increases in stress, while talking with strong ties is generally associated with improvements in stress and social support. Weak ties do not provide these benefits. Bridging social capital comes from both strong and weak ties. Surprisingly, individuals who have lost a job feel greater stress after talking with strong ties. Contrary to the "strength of weak ties" hypothesis, communication with strong ties is more predictive of finding employment within three months.


Synthesizing visual content that meets users' needs often requires flexible and precise controllability of the pose, shape, expression, and layout of the generated objects. Existing approaches gain controllability of generative adversarial networks (GANs) via manually annotated training data or a prior 3D model, which often lack flexibility, precision, and generality. In this work, we study a powerful yet much less explored way of controlling GANs, that is, to "drag" any points of the image to precisely reach target points in a user-interactive manner, as shown in Fig.1. To achieve this, we propose DragGAN, which consists of two main components: 1) a feature-based motion supervision that drives the handle point to move towards the target position, and 2) a new point tracking approach that leverages the discriminative generator features to keep localizing the position of the handle points. Through DragGAN, anyone can deform an image with precise control over where pixels go, thus manipulating the pose, shape, expression, and layout of diverse categories such as animals, cars, humans, landscapes, etc. As these manipulations are performed on the learned generative image manifold of a GAN, they tend to produce realistic outputs even for challenging scenarios such as hallucinating occluded content and deforming shapes that consistently follow the object's rigidity. Both qualitative and quantitative comparisons demonstrate the advantage of DragGAN over prior approaches in the tasks of image manipulation and point tracking. We also showcase the manipulation of real images through GAN inversion.


AIM
Periodontal disease elevates systemic inflammatory markers strongly associated with coronary heart disease (CHD) risk. The aim of this randomized controlled trial was to investigate the effect of non-surgical periodontal therapy on systemic C-reactive protein (CRP), fibrinogen and white blood cells in CHD patients.

MATERIALS AND METHODS
Angiographically proven CHD patients with periodontitis (n = 317) were randomized to intervention (n = 212) or control group (n = 105). Primary outcome was reduction in serum CRP levels; secondary outcomes were reductions in fibrinogen and white blood cells. Periodontal treatment included scaling, root planing and oral hygiene instructions. Periodontal and systemic parameters were assessed at baseline and at 2-month follow-up. Intent-to-treat (ITT) analysis was performed.

RESULTS
Study was completed by 246 subjects (intervention group = 161; control group = 85). Significant improvements in periodontal and systemic parameters were observed in intervention group. The number of subjects with CRP > 3mg/L in intervention group decreased by 38% and in control group increased by 4%. ITT analysis gave a significant (χ(2) =4.381, p = 0.036) absolute risk reduction of 12.5%.

CONCLUSION
In CHD patients with periodontitis, non-surgical mechanical periodontal therapy significantly reduced systemic levels of C-reactive protein, fibrinogen and white blood cells.


Objective: Cerebral small vessel disease (SVD) is associated with increased mortality, disability and cognitive decline, depression in stroke survivors. This study examined the association between SVD burden, defined by a combination of SVD markers, and health-related quality of life (HRQoL) in acute ischemic stroke. Methods: Patients admitted with acute ischemic stroke of any etiology were prospectively screened between January 2010 to December 2014 and enrolled in the study if they met study entry criteria. HRQoL was evaluated with the 12-item Stroke Specific Quality of Life (SSQoL) at 3 months after the onset of acute ischemic stroke. SVD was ascertained by the presence of any of the SVD markers including lacune, white matter hyperintensities (WMH), cerebral microbleeds (CMB) and enlarged perivascular spaces (EPVS) in the basal ganglia or their combinations on brain magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). The presence of each individual marker scored 1 point and was summed up to generate an ordinal "SVD score" (0–4) capturing total SVD burden. Linear regression was used to determine the associations between SVD burden and HRQoL. Results: Of the743 acute ischemic stroke patients that formed he study sample (mean age: 66.3 ± 10.6 years; 41.7% women), 49.3%, 22.5%, 16.0%, 9.2% and 3.1% had SVD scores of 0, 1, 2, 3 and 4, respectively. After adjusting for demographic, clinical and imaging variables, the SVD score was independently associated with lower overall score of SSQoL (B = −1.39, SE = 0.56, p = 0.01), and its domains of mobility (B = −0.41, SE = 0.10, p < 0.001) and vision (B = −0.12, SE = 0.06, p = 0.03). Acute infract volume (B = −1.44, SE = 0.54, p = 0.01), functional independence (B = 5.69, SE = 0.34, p < 0.001) and anxious (B = −1.13, SE = 0.23, p < 0.001) and depressive symptoms (B = −3.41, SE = 0.22, p < 0.001) were also the significant predictors of the overall score of SSQoL. Conclusion: The brain's SVD burden predicts lower HRQoL, predominantly in domains of mobility and vision at 3 months after acute ischemic stroke. The evaluation of SVD burden could facilitate developing individual treatment strategies.


In a retrospective study, histopathology and immunohistochemistry (IHC) were performed on formalin-fixed paraffin embedded (FFPE) archival tissues from chickens obtained during outbreaks of highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) H5N1 that occurred in Nigeria in 2006 and 2007. Ten samples as representative of 10 outbreaks were selected, and following the detection of HPAI viral antigen in different chicken tissues using IHC, RNA was extracted from each sample and molecular analysis was performed using real-time reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (rRT-PCR) targeting matrix protein. Seven rRT-PCR positive samples were then subjected to conventional and rRT-PCR assays for the amplification of hemagglutinin (HA) gene. Four of them were further characterized by sequence analysis of a short HA2-part of the H5 gene. Along the 154 nucleotides sequenced, differences at 4 positions were detected in one sample. One of these mutations led to an amino acid exchange at position 544 (Ala>Thr) whereas the others were silent. The study suggests the potential application for retrospective IHC and PCR analysis of FFPE tissues from chickens involved in the AI outbreaks for pathologic studies and providing short fragment sequences which may help in the characterization of viral strains and tracing the outbreaks. This is important as archived poultry tissues can be re-examined for possibility of earlier introduction of the virus. Keywords: Avian influenza; FFPE; H5N1; Nigeria; Immunohistochemistry; real-time RT-PCR


SUMMARY: Using data collected during the DYBAGA and ECO cruises, remote sensing chlorophyll-a estimations and the averaged upwelling index of the previous fortnight (Iw'), we studied the variability of the sea surface CO2 fugacity (fCO2) over the Galician continental shelf during three seasonal cycles. Sea surface salinity (SSS) distribution controlled fCO2 mainly in spring, while sea surface temperature (SST) did so during periods of intense cooling in November and warming in June. The uptake of carbon by photosynthetic activity, which was more intense during spring and autumn, masked the surface increase in the dissolved inorganic carbon concentration during upwelling events, especially during spring. A significant low correlation between fCO2 and Iw' was found during spring and summer when upwelling events were observed, whereas no relationship was observed during the downwelling period. High fCO2 exceeding atmospheric values was only found during the summer stratification breakdown. Although sea-air CO2 fluxes showed a marked inter-annual variability, surface waters off the Galician coast were net sinks for atmospheric CO2 in every seasonal cycle, showing a lower CO2 uptake (~65%) compared to previously published values. Marked inter-annual changes in the sea-air CO2 fluxes seem to be influenced by fresh water inputs on the continental shelf under different meteorological scenarios.


AIMS
To understand GP trainees' experience of out-of-hours (OOH) training in England; whether it is achieving educational aims, and to highlight potential improvements. Additionally to explore factors that influence the decision to work in OOH care.

METHODS
An online survey was sent to 1091 GP trainees in England. Odds ratios were calculated for factors correlating with intention to work in OOH, or confidence and effectiveness in OOH work. Free text responses were coded and organised thematically.

RESULTS
Trainees' experience of OOH care influences the decision to work there once qualified. Although this experience has positively influenced over three-quarters of trainees, it can be improved. Training is not achieving competencies in managing psychiatric emergencies and personal safety. Half of trainees received formal teaching in OOH skills; 3% receiving assessments in telephone triage. Only a quarter of trainees had worked with their usual GP trainer. Influential features of training included trainer enthusiasm and continuity, familiarity with the workplace, and confidence in OOH skills. Financial and lifestyle considerations were also important.

CONCLUSION
OOH training in England has an impact on the future workforce and could be improved. The planned transition to a 4-year GP training structure offers an opportunity to address this.


Novel view synthesis is a long-standing problem in machine learning and computer vision. Significant progress has recently been made in developing neural scene representations and rendering techniques that synthesize photorealistic images from arbitrary views. These representations, however, are extremely slow to train and often also slow to render. Inspired by neural variants of image-based rendering, we develop a new neural rendering approach with the goal of quickly learning a high-quality representation which can also be rendered in real-time. Our approach, MetaNLR++, accomplishes this by using a unique combination of a neural shape representation and 2D CNN-based image feature extraction, aggregation, and re-projection. To push representation convergence times down to minutes, we leverage meta learning to learn neural shape and image feature priors which accelerate training. The optimized shape and image features can then be extracted using traditional graphics techniques and rendered in real time. We show that MetaNLR++ achieves similar or better novel view synthesis results in a fraction of the time that competing methods require.


The Internet of Things (IoT) became one of the defining paradigms of today's world, element of revolutionary, quantitative and qualitative transformation of our cognition and interaction with the environment in which we are living and working day by day. In recent years, many solutions to interconnect intelligent objects in systems with various scales and objectives have been developed. We are already talking about smart cities, smart homes, digital health, various industrial processes or environment polution monitoring etc. This paper presents a review and an analysis of the existing offer of IoT platforms, as well as evolution trends in their field. Several relevant IoT solutions have been studied, selected on the basis of reports and reviews published in specialized literature or on web sites of some specialized consulting companies or publications. Comparative evaluation criteria for IoT hardware and software platforms have been identified and selected. Also, some trends and perspectives on the short and medium term evolution of IoT platforms have been analyzed and are presented, both in the context of the developments of specific technologies and under the pressure of the requirements of the IoT ecosystems communities.


Digital living is the name of the game in the Information Superhighway. The emergence of 'virtual communities'evokes a thorough redefinition of social relationships and human bonding (Gemeinschaft). These communities generate interactions which produce and sustain social capital. Cyber communities are under the reality of anonymity , 'timeless time', 'spaceless flows' and asynchronous interaction. Since they merge cultures and peoples into a single 'wired society', there is an infinite manner of transforming social configurations. The augmentation and dissipation of social capital hinges on the length of the individual's connection to the Web. Unlike physical interface, cyber networks foster the creation of trust with a lesser social cost. Nevertheless, virtual communities can only "complement and supplement" rather supplant traditional physical communities. The presence of a physical community remains a sine qua non of the accumulation of social capital in the internet.


IMPORTANCE
There are genetic influences on memory ability as we age, but no specific genes have been identified.

OBJECTIVE
To use a cognitive endophenotype, exceptional episodic memory (EEM) performance, derived from nondemented offspring from the Long Life Family Study (LLFS) to identify genetic variants that may be responsible for the high cognitive performance of LLFS participants and further replicate these variants using an additional 4006 nondemented individuals from 4 independent elderly cohorts.

DESIGN, SETTING, AND PARTICIPANTS
A total of 467 LLFS participants from 18 families with 2 or more offspring that exhibited exceptional memory performance were used for genome-wide linkage analysis. Adjusted multivariate linear analyses in the 40-megabase region encompassing the linkage peak were conducted using 4 independent replication data sets that included 4006 nondemented elderly individuals. Results of the individual replication cohorts were combined by meta-analysis.

MAIN OUTCOME MEASURE
Episodic memory scores computed as the mean of the 2 standardized measures of Logical Memory IA and IIA.

RESULTS
Heritability estimates indicated a significant genetic component for EEM (h2 = 0.21; SE = 0.09). Genome-wide linkage analysis revealed that EEM was linked to the 6q24 region (maximum logarithm of odds score, 3.64). Association analysis in LLFS families identified single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) nominally associated with EEM in the 40-megabase window encompassing the linkage peak. Replication in one cohort identified a set of 26 SNPs associated with episodic memory (P ≤ .05). Meta-analysis of the 26 SNPs using the 4 independent replication cohorts found SNPs rs9321334 and rs6902875 to be nominally significantly associated with episodic memory (P = .009 and P = .013, respectively). With meta-analysis restricted to individuals lacking an APOE ε4 allele, SNP rs6902875 became statistically significant (meta-analysis, P = 6.7 × 10-5). Haplotype analysis incorporating the 2 SNPs flanking rs6902875 (rs9321334 and rs4897574) revealed that the A-A-C haplotype was significantly associated with episodic memory performance (P = 2.4 × 10-5). This genomic region harbors monooxygenase dopamine β-hydroxylase-like 1 gene (MOXD1), implicated in the biosynthesis of norepinephrine, which is prominently involved in cognitive functions.

CONCLUSIONS AND RELEVANCE
The results provide strong evidence for potential candidate genes related to EEM on 6q24. Identifying the genes will help in understanding the biological basis of memory performance and allow interventions for enhancement of cognitive function.


Fluorescence recovery after photobleaching (FRAP) is a fluorescence microscope technique to measure molecular diffusion and transport. FRAP is a valuable technique in cell biological research and evolved conjointly with microscope and fluorescent probes advancements. Although developed in the 1970s, the discovery and further development of fluorescent proteins revolutionised FRAP. After the discovery of green fluorescence protein and its application as a noninvasive and genetically coded protein-tag, in vivo studies of protein dynamics and interactions became possible. FRAP is based on irreversibly bleaching a pool of fluorescent probes and monitoring the recovery in fluorescence due to movement of surrounding intact probes into the bleached spot. Although measurements are straightforward, quantitative FRAP requires careful experimental design, solid controls, data collection, and analysis. Over the past years, several FRAP-related techniques have been tailored to suit particular cell biological questions, including inverse FRAP, fluorescence loss in photobleaching, and fluorescence localisation after photobleaching.

Key Concepts:

Fluorescence recovery after photobleaching (FRAP) is a method to qualitatively and quantitatively study biomolecule dynamics in living cells.

FRAP is based on irreversibly bleaching a pool of fluorescent probes with high intensity light and monitoring the recovery in fluorescence due to movement of surrounding intact probes into the bleached spot.

FRAP experiments are often conducted on confocal microscopes. To derive quantitative results from such experiments, several parameters and controls need to be considered and utilised in the analysis.

There are several FRAP-related methods that have been developed for specific applications and biological questions.

FRAP is a versatile and popular method in modern biomedical research. Its application is broad and is increasingly applied in pharmacological, therapeutic and diagnostic areas.

Keywords:

FRAP;
photobleaching;
fluorescence;
diffusion;
protein dynamics;
protein interaction;
microscopy;
confocal microscopy;
fluorescent protein;
GFP


associated with the injection of a large mass of 13 C-depleted carbon into the ocean-atmosphere system. The mass of injected carbon, the extent of deep sea dissolution, and the amount of warming during ETM2 appear to be approximately half of those documented for the Paleocene-Eocene thermal maximum (PETM, � 55.5 Ma), but the pattern of lysocline migration during ETM2 has not yet been documented sufficiently to decipher potential differences in carbon sources and sequestration mechanisms. We present high-resolution carbonate dissolution and bulk stable isotope records across ETM2 and the successive H2 event (� 53.6 Ma) on a common age model for four sites along the Walvis Ridge depth transect (1500 to 3600 m paleowater depth) to assess lysocline evolution. The onset of ETM2 is characterized by multiple, depth-dependent transitions of carbonate dissolution (up to � 96% of the total flux), associated with rapid depletions in bulk carbonate carbon (up to � 1–1.5%) and oxygen (up to � 0.7–1.5%) isotope values. H2 shows a � 0.7% negative carbon isotope excursion, with a coeval decrease in d 18 Oo f� 0.5% and � 80% of carbonate dissolution. During ETM2, the lysocline recovered within � 30 ka. We attribute this rapid recovery to terrestrial CaCO3 neutralization through enhanced chemical weathering of carbonates in soils and rocks. According to theory, carbonate dissolution was lower after recovery than prior to ETM2, indicating carbonate ion oversaturation and a deeper position of the lysocline. Spectral analysis indicates that the changes in carbonate dissolution and d 13 C values were precession paced, implying that weathering feedbacks and short-term perturbations in the carbon cycle were important in determining early Eocene background and hyperthermal ocean [CO3� ] conditions.


Emile Durkheim said that when all of the members of a tribe or clan come together, they can sanctify the sacred and experience a spiritual "effervescence." Friedrich Hayek suggested that certain genes and instincts still dispose us toward the ethos and mentality of the hunter-gatherer band and that modern forms of political collectivism have, in part, been atavistic reassertions of such tendencies. Picking up on Hayek, Daniel Klein has suggested a combination of yearnings: (1) a yearning for coordinated sentiment (like Smithian sympathy) and (2) a yearning that the sentiment encompasses "the people," that is, some focal and seemingly definitive set of "we." This article reports on an experiment designed to explore the demand for encompassment by having subjects sing together. In each trial, one person in the room was designated not to sing unless every one of the others in the room had made a payment sufficient so as to have that person sing. Our evidence of a demand for encompassment is threefold: Subjects chose to sacrifice money to achieve encompassment 47.4% of the time, with 59.6% of the subjects doing so in at least one trial. An exit questionnaire showed that subjects' chief reason for making such a sacrifice was a belief that the singing would be more enjoyable if it encompassed the whole group. Furthermore, the subjects reported significantly higher enjoyment when they had experienced encompassment. We are well aware of the significant differences between the situation of the experiment and the situation of actual political life. We nonetheless discuss the experiment as a parable for a penchant toward political collectivism, a parable that helps to clarify the role of encompassment in the sentimental facets of Hayek's ideas about the psychology of political collectivism.


Slovenia is a small European country with a total of 547 HIV-infected individuals cumulatively reported by the end of 2011. However, the estimated incidence rate of HIV infections increased from 7.0 per million in 2003 to 26.8 per million in 2011. In this study, we assessed the prevalence of transmitted drug resistance (TDR) in the past 6 years (2005-2010) and analyzed the time trend of the proportion of men having sex with men (MSM) and HIV-1 subtype B among newly diagnosed individuals in a 15-year period (1996-2010) in Slovenia. Among 150 patients included in the study, representing 63% of HIV-1 newly diagnosed patients in 2005-2010, TDR was found in seven patients (4.7%). The prevalence of TDR to nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitors, nonnucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitors, and protease inhibitors was 2% (3/150), 2% (3/150), and 0.7% (1/150), respectively. The majority of patients were infected with subtype B (134/150, 89%), while subtype A was detected in 6.0% (9/150), subtype D in 1.3% (2/150), and subtype G and CRF02_AG in 0.7% (one patient each). Three of 150 sequences could not be typed. Infection with subtype B was found to be significantly associated with male gender, Slovenia being reported as the country of the patient's nationality and origin of the virus, CDC class A, mode of transmission with homosexual/bisexual contact, sex with an anonymous person, and a higher CD4(+) count. Among patients carrying the subtype B virus, an MSM transmission route was reported in 87% of patients. Although the prevalence of TDR in Slovenia is still below the European average, active surveillance should be continued, especially among MSM, the most vulnerable population for HIV-1 infection in this part of Europe.


The extraocular muscles in mammals, the effector organs of the oculomotor system, are fundamentally different from skeletal muscle. All extraocular muscles consist of two different layers, an orbital and a global layer. There are two basic categories of the muscle fibers: twitch or singly-innervated muscle fiber (SIF) and non-twitch or multiply-innervated muscle fiber (MIF). Previous studies in monkey revealed that SIF and MIF motoneurons are anatomically separated and have different premotor inputs. SIF and MIF motoneurons were identified by tracer injection into the belly, or the distal myotendinous junction, of the eye muscles. There are two groups of MIF motoneurons in the oculomotor nucleus, the C- and S-group. The C-group motoneurons innervate the medial rectus (MR) and inferior rectus (IR), while S-group motoneurons innervate the superior rectus and inferior oblique muscles. The motoneurons of C-group are located around the periphery of the oculomotor nucleus. We investigated the location of MR and IR MIF motoneurons in C-group, and the dendritic spread of MR compared with IR MIF motoneurons. We found that the MR and IR MIF motoneurons are two different populations of neurons in C-group. They lie relatively separated. The MR MIF motoneurons are located more dorsomedially than IR MIF motoneurons. The pattern of dendritic spread of these two MIF motoneurons is also different. The dendrites of IR MIF motoneurons spread into the supraoculomotor area bilaterally, but do not approach the Edinger-Westphal nucleus, in contrast, the dendrites of MR MIF motoneurons extend into the supraoculomotor area and the Edinger-Westphal nucleus unilaterally. The function of Edinger-Westphal nucleus is associated with the "near response". In conclusion, the different location and different dendritic trees suggest that MR and IR MIF motoneurons have different functions. The IR MIF motoneurons may help to stabilize the eye position along with MIF motoneurons from other eye muscles, while the MR MIF motoneurons might also participate the vergence eye movements.


The kinetics of the sorption of a number of solutes by the
plastics of intravenous delivery systems were investigated.
Models based on diffusion theory and compartmental analysis
were developed and examined for .their ability to describe
the uptake of a number of solutes from aqueous solutions
stored in contact with the plastics. In deriving diffusion
equations it has been assumed, firstly, that diffusion of
solute in the plastic matrix is the rate-limiting step in
the sorption process (matrix-controlled sorption) and,
secondly, that both the plastic matrix and an interfacial
resistance barrier contribute to the diffusional resistance
encountered by the solute molecule (intermediate diffusion
kinetics). The situation in which diffusion across the
interfacial resistance barrier is the rate-limiting step
was also considered.
The ability of the diffusion and compartment models to
describe and predict the sorption of the nonelectrolytes,
nitroglycerin and diazepam, was examined. The diffusion
model seemed to be the more satisfactory model in respect
of both description and prediction of the drug uptake. The
compartment model appeared to describe the drug uptake at
earlier times, but was not able to describe the loss as
equilibrium was approached; nor could that model be
employed as a predictive method. The complete time-course,
including equilibrium, of the sorption of nitroglycerin and
diazepam was well-described by the (matrix-control) diffusion model. The diffusion model was also found to
predict accurately the rate and extent of nitroglycerin and
diazepam loss from solutions stored in plastic infusion
bags of different sizes and containing various volumes of
solution.
The sorption of several weak electrolytes, specifically pnitrophenol,
p-toluidine, warfarin sodium and
trifluoperazine dihydrochloride, during storage of
solutions of various pH in plastic infusion bags was also
studied. The rate and extent of sorption varied with pH in
a manner suggesting preferential uptake of the unionised
species. It was assumed that only the unionised species
was sorbed by the plastic matrix and the diffusion model
was modified accordingly. The uptake of p-nitrophenol and
p-toluidine was adequately described by the matrix-control
diffusion model, confirming quantitatively the relationship
between solute uptake and fraction unionised. However, the
uptake of warfarin sodium and trifluoperazine
dihydrochloride was significantly better described by the
intermediate diffusion model. It appeared that the rate of
uptake of the unionised form of these solutes was
diminished due to the influence of interfacial or aqueous
diffusional barriers. Solute lipophilicity, degree of
ionisation and diffusion coefficient appeared to be
important factors determining the relative contribution of
the interfacial barrier and the plastic matrix to the
overall diffusional resistance. Several approximations of the diffusion equations were
considered. These approximations suggested that the rate
and extent of solute uptake by the plastics of delivery
systems at early times can be described by a single
parameter. In general these approximations yielded
parameter estimates consistent with those obtained by
nonlinear regression using the full equations. A method of
discriminating between matrix-controlled and intermediate
sorption kinetics, based on these approximations, is also
presented.
The kinetics of solute loss from solution to plastic
tubings during the course of an infusion was also
investigated. The kinetics of loss could be interpreted in
terms of diffusion-controlled sorption of the unionised
solute by the plastic. Equations are presented to describe
the availability of diazepam, and possibly other solutes,
during infusion.
The interaction of chlormethiazole edisylate with the
plastic infusion systems displayed some unique
characteristics, and these were further examined. It was
found that, in some circumstances, chlormethiazole
edisylate was not only sorbed by the plastic, but also
permeated to the external environment. Furthermore,
plasticisation of the polyvinyl chloride by chlormethiazole
edisylate was observed. Some initial attempts at correlating the physicochemical
characteristics of a range of solutes with their plastic
sorption behaviour are also presented.


Aims: The seed oil composition of Baphia massaiensis seeds was determined using H NMR and GC-MS techniques. The seed oil was also screened for antimicrobial activity. Study Design: The study was designed to determine Baphia massaiensis seed oil fatty acid composition and antimicrobial activity. Place and Duration of Study: Department of Chemistry, University of Botswana, between June 2012 and July 2014. Methodology: The Baphia massaiensis seed cotyledons powder (29.2 g) were extracted by Soxhlet extraction using n-hexane/ 1-propanol. The seed oil (3.12 g) was esterified to FAMEs using dry methanol. The percentage composition of fatty acids methyl esters (FAMEs) in the seed oil of B. massaiensis was determined using H NMR and GC-MS techniques. The antimicrobial screening was carried out using agar well diffusion method. Results: The H NMR method showed the oil composition to be 20% ω-3 fatty acids, 11% monounsaturated, 60% di-unsaturated and 9% saturated fatty acids. Based on GC-MC analysis, Short Research Article Keroletswe et al.; JOCAMR, 2(3): 1-7, 2017; Article no.JOCAMR.32553 2 saturated fatty acids composition was 12.2% and unsaturated fatty acids were 87.8% of the total FAMEs. The major constituents of B. massaiensis seed oil FAMEs were linoleic acid (C18:2; 49.0%) and linolenic acid (C18:3; 36.7%) methyl esters. The FAMEs were active against E. coli, S. aureus and B. subtilis with 10-16 mm inhibition zones. Conclusion: Linoleic acid (49.0%) and linolenic (36.7%) methyl esters were the major components of Baphia massaiensis FAMEs.


BOOKS RECEIVED A BOOK OF SHORT STORIES. Sherman. New York: Henry Cloth. 353 pp, \Vith a critical and theoretical discussi<in of twenty-five pages, the introduction, thirteen short stories are offered in this book of short stories, selected and edited by Professor Sherman of the University of Illinois. He has chosen from five American and five Eriglish authors.e-Irving, Hawthorne, Poe, Dickens. Frank Stockton, Thomas Hardy, Stephenson. Barrie, O. Henry, and Kipling. The introduetio Kd ' to the point, not wordy, and the notes apparently cover every point that. the instructor should ex ect.


The role of social capital in promoting health is now widely debated within international public health. In relation to HIV, the results of previous observational and cross-sectional studies have been mixed. In some settings it has been suggested that high levels of social capital and community cohesion might be protective and facilitate more effective collective responses to the epidemic. In others, group membership has been a risk factor for HIV infection. There have been few attempts to strengthen social capital, particularly in developing countries, and examine its effect on vulnerability to HIV. Employing data from an intervention study, we examined associations between social capital and HIV risk among 1063 14 to 35-year-old male and female residents of 750 poor households from 8 villages in rural Limpopo province, South Africa. We assessed cognitive social capital (CSC) and structural social capital (SSC) separately, and examined associations with numerous aspects of HIV-related psychoesocial attributes, risk behavior, prevalence and incidence. Among males, after adjusting for potential confounders, residing in households with greater levels of CSC was linked to lower HIV prevalence and higher levels of condom use. Among females, similar patterns of relationships with CSC were observed. However, while greater SSC was associated with protective psychosocial attributes and risk behavior, it was also associated with higher rates of HIV infection. This work underscores the complex and nuanced relationship between social capital and HIV risk in a rural African context. We suggest that not all social capital is protective or health promotive, and that getting the balance right is critical to informing HIV prevention efforts. 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.


The type specimen of Australopithecus sediba (MH1) is a late juvenile, prompting some commentators to suggest that had it lived to adulthood its morphology would have changed sufficiently so as to render hypotheses regarding its phylogenetic relations suspect. Considering the potentially critical position of this species with regard to the origins of the genus Homo, a deeper understanding of this change is especially vital. As an empirical response to this critique, a developmental simulation of the MH1 cranium was carried out using geometric morphometric techniques to extrapolate adult morphology using extant male and female chimpanzees, gorillas and humans by modelling remaining development. Multivariate comparisons of the simulated adult A. sediba crania with other early hominin taxa indicate that subsequent cranial development primarily reflects development of secondary sexual characteristics and would not likely be substantial enough to alter suggested morphological affinities of A. sediba. This study also illustrates the importance of separating developmental vectors by sex when estimating ontogenetic change. Results of the ontogenetic projections concur with those from mandible morphology, and jointly affirm the taxonomic validity of A. sediba.


The seasonal and interannual variability in surface energy exchange and evapotranspiration (E) of two temperate semi-arid grasslands in southeastern Arizona, USA, were investigated using multi-year (2004–2007) eddy covariance measurements. The study sites, a post-fire site (AG) and an unburned site (KG), received 43–87% of the annual precipitation (P) during the North American Monsoon season (July–September), with the lowest values in the drought years of 2004 and 2005. Irrespective of the differences in temperature, surface albedo, vegetation cover and soil characteristics both sites responded similarly to changes in environmental conditions. The seasonal and interannual variations in the partitioning of net radiation to turbulent fluxes were mainly controlled by P through the changes in soil water content ( ) and vegetation growth. Drastic changes in albedo, vegetation growth and energy fluxes occurred following the onset of the monsoon season in July. During the dry or cool periods of autumn, winter and spring, the sensible heat flux was the largest component of the energy balance, whereas latent heat flux dominated during the warm and wet periods of summer. The dry-foliage Priestley–Taylor coefficient ( ̨) declined when in the 0–15 cm soil layer dropped below 0.08 m3 m−3 at AG, and 0.09 m3 m−3 at KG, respectively. The July–September average of dry-foliage surface conductance,  ̨ and E, reached their lowest values in 2004 at AG and in 2005 at KG. During July–September, monthly E was linearly correlated to the monthly mean and the broadband normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI), whereas during May–June the relationship between NDVI and E was not significant. Annual E varied from 264 to 322 mm at AG and from 196 to 284 mm at KG with the lowest value during the severe drought year at the site. July–September E had positive correlation with total P, the mean NDVI and the number of growing eriod season days during that p


In various surveys, presence of measurement errors has led to misleading results in estimation of various population parameters. This study indicates the effects of measurement errors on estimates of population total and population variance when samples are drawn using systematic sampling technique from a stratified population. A finite population was generated through simulation. The population was then stratified into four strata followed by generation of ten samples in each of them using systematic sampling technique. In each stratum a sample was picked at random. The findings of this work indicated that systematic errors affected the accuracy of the estimates by overestimating both the population total and the population variance. Random errors only added variability to the data but their effect on the estimates of the population total and population variance was not that profound.


We study methods for simultaneous analysis of many noisy experiments in the presence of rich covariate information. The goal of the analyst is to optimally estimate the true effect underlying each experiment. Both the noisy experimental results and the auxiliary covariates are useful for this purpose, but neither data source on its own captures all the information available to the analyst. In this paper, we propose a flexible plug-in empirical Bayes estimator that synthesizes both sources of information and may leverage any black-box predictive model. We show that our approach is within a constant factor of minimax for a simple data-generating model. Furthermore, we establish robust convergence guarantees for our method that hold under considerable generality, and exhibit promising empirical performance on both real and simulated data.


Background There is evidence that antiretroviral therapy (ART) increases cardiovascular risk (CVR). There is controversy over the effect of abacavir (ABC) on CVR. The use of abacavir has been associated with a higher incidence of myocardial infarction in several cohort studies, but data from clinical trials are not conclusive. Purpose To determinate the effect of exposure to ABC and exposure time (ET) to ABC in CVR of a HIV-infected cohort on ART from the northwest of Spain. Materials and Methods Cross-sectional study including HIV patients on ART who were treated at our hospital between March-May 2012. We recorded demographics, ART history and CVR risk factors. CVR was estimated using the Framingham function calibrated for Spanish population (REGICOR). CVR categories were: low (<5%); intermediate (5–9%); high (10–14%); very-high (>15%). Three ABC exposure groups were defined: a) no abacavir exposure (No ABC); b) exposure to abacavir but not to indinavir (ABC); c) exposure to abacavir and indinavir (ABC + IND). Results 89 HIV patients were included in the study (83.1% males, mean age 47.4 ± 7.8 years). Smoking prevalence was 51.7%, hypertension 39.3%, dyslipidaemia 24.7%, low HDL cholesterol 67.4%, diabetes 4.5%. Mean global CVR was 4.01%±2.50. Proportion of patients with low CVR was 70.8%; intermediate 25.8%; high 2.2%; very high 1.1%. According to ABC exposure: mean CVR was 4.02 ± 2.62 (No ABC); 3.77 ± 2.28 (ABC); 4.30 ± 2.0 (ABC+IND). No significant differences were found when we compared mean risks of each group. We did not find differences in CVR according to ET to ABC. Conclusions Apparently, ABC exposure does not increase CVR in our HIV-infected population. More prospective controlled studies are needed to evaluate any association between ABC and increased CVR. No conflict of interest.


Introduction Injury from motorcycle is a considerable cause of disability and death in the world and especially in low and middle-income countries; it is one of the most serious public health problems. In Cameroon, motorcycle is commonly used for transportation particularly among students. The aim of this paper is to study the risk-factors of the motorcycle-related accidents and injuries among secondary school students' in the Tiko municipality, Cameroon. Methods A cross sectional study was conducted in January 2012 on 391 students age 16-24 from public and private schools in the Tiko Municipality. Logistic regression was used to estimate the association between risk factors and injuries. A closed-ended and few open-ended questionnaire was used to collect data. Results The study showed that over 70% of students used motorcycles always or often. Few had undergone any formal training for driving a motorcycle. The vast majority reported not wearing protective gear while driving or riding a motorcycle. Usage of protective gear was particularly low among girls. Over 16% reported using a motorbike always or occasionally under the influence of alcohol or drugs. Over 58% of respondents reported having an accident and over 35% were injured when driving or riding a motorcycle. Those who lived at the Tiko-Douala road have three times higher probability to sustain accidents and injuries than students residing elsewhere (OR 3.19 (1.20-8.46). Conclusion It is deeply alarming that every second respondent in the study reported having been in an accident and every third motorcycle user was somehow injured. We therefore call for an immediate attention and a deeper investigation into the highlighted situation, particularly at Tiko-Douala road.


Purpose: Project-Based Learning (PBL) is considered to be an active learning methodology which can be used to develop both technical and transversal competences in engineering programs. This methodology demands a great deal of work effort from the students and also from the teachers and it requires a meticulous plan and a well-managed project as well. These activities go far beyond the normal activities in traditional lectures, enabling to outpace the difficulties that spur along the way that may be both complex and demotivating. This methodology has been implemented in the Integrated Master Degree on Industrial Engineering and Management (IEM), at one public university in Portugal, since the 2004/2005 academic year. The aim of this paper is to identify and discuss the main difficulties of the implementation of PBL, mainly from the teachers' perspectives. Additionally, some effective strategies will be recommended to overcome such difficulties. Design/methodology/approach: The perceptions of the teachers were collected through a survey based on six main themes. The participants in the study include eight teachers from the five courses of the first semester of the first year of the IEM program involved in the 2012/2013 and 2013/2014 editions. Findings:  Integration of courses in the project; student assessment; growing number of students in each team and the need of physical spaces for them; and compartmentalized knowledge has emerged as the main difficulties. To overcome these difficulties some key strategies were recommended. Originality/value: A new perspective based on course teachers' views and experiences will deepen the understanding of the problems and provide inputs for the development of strategies that may improve the effectiveness of PBL and introduce changes for its successful implementation. These strategies are intended to be transferable to other contexts, as most of the problems and constraints are common to other active learning approaches.


Much has been written about the diagnostic characteristics that distinguish autism spectrum disorders (ASD) from other disorders of childhood for toddlers and elementary school age children. There is a paucity of description of the characteristics and needs of youth and young adults with ASD. This paper presents a description of the characteristics of ASD in adolescence and young adulthood and presents three case studies to illuminate the issues confronting individuals with ASD, their families and support providers.


This paper presents a combination of strategies for conversion rate (CVR) prediction deployed at the Yahoo! demand side platform (DSP) Brightroll, targeting at modeling extremely high dimensional, sparse data with limited human intervention. We propose a novel probabilistic generative model by tightly integrating components of natural language processing, dynamic transfer learning and scalable prediction, named Dynamic Transfer Learning with Reinforced W ord M odeling (a.k.a. Trans-RWM ) to predict user conversion rates. Our model is based on assumptions that: on a higher level, information can be transferable between related campaigns; on a lower level, users who searched similar contents or browsed similar pages would have a higher probability of sharing similar latent purchase interests. Novelties of this framework include (i) A novel natural language modeling specifically tailored for semantic inputs of CVR prediction; (ii) A Bayesian transfer learning model to dynamically transfer the knowledge from source to the future target ; (iii) An automatic new updating rule with adaptive regularization using Stochastic Gradient Monte Carlo to support the efficient updating of Trans-RWM in high-dimensional and sparse data. We demonstrate that on Brightroll our framework can effectively discriminate extremely rare events in terms of their conversion propensity.


Background and Objectives: Emission of volatile organic compounds and unpleasant smell are the important characteristics of the rendering plant, causing disturbance for the workers and nearby residents. In order to prevent the spread of air pollutants and to provide favorable environment, application of treatment technologies is essential. Materials and Methods: In this study, in order to select suitable collector and ventilation system for rendering plant, air sampling was performed via NIOSH sampling methods (1501, 1300, 1600, and 2002). Totally, 24 air samples were collected from the ambient air, air pollution source, and worker's breathing zone using two sorbent, activated charcoal and silica gel and were analyzed using GC-MS. Then, the local ventilation system was designed based on the qualification and quantitation analysis of air samples. The stairmand high efficiency cyclone and thermal oxidizer were designed for dust control and gas cleaning respectively. Results: In total, 41 chemical pollutants in exhaust air from rendering plant were identified; these compounds included hydrocarbons, aldehydes, ketones, alcohols, ethers, halogenated compounds, sulfur compounds, nitrogen compounds, and acids. The results of ventilation system designing showed that the system with airflow of 5725 m3/h and a cyclone with the diameter of 1 m and the height of 4 m could remove 50% of particles with 9.45-micron diameter. Gaseous pollutants were removed using thermal oxidation via the consumption of 96 m3/h fuel gas flow. The chamber volume was 6.67 m3. The daily fuel costs were estimated 310000 RLS. Conclusion: Application of local exhaust ventilation system and integrated collectors for control of air pollutants in rendering plant can remove large amounts of particulate and gaseous pollutants. Control of these pollutants can cause loss of smell nuisance and environmental pollution and improving the health and welfare of workers and neighboring residents of such industries.


Aeolian transport is an important characteristic of many arid and semiarid regions worldwide that affects dust emission and ecosystem processes. The purpose of this paper is to evaluate a recent model of aeolian transport in the presence of vegetation. This approach differs from previous models by accounting for how vegetation affects the distribution of shear velocity on the surface rather than merely calculating the average effect of vegetation on surface shear velocity or simply using empirical relationships. Vegetation, soil, and meteorological data at 65 field sites with measurements of horizontal aeolian flux were collected from the Western United States. Measured fluxes were tested against modeled values to evaluate model performance, to obtain a set of optimum model parameters, and to estimate the uncertainty in these parameters. The same field data were used to model horizontal aeolian flux using three other schemes. Our results show that the model can predict horizontal aeolian flux with an approximate relative error of 2.1 and that further empirical corrections can reduce the approximate relative error to 1.0. The level of error is within what would be expected given uncertainties in threshold shear velocity and wind speed at our sites. The model outperforms the alternative schemes both in terms of approximate relative error and the number of sites at which threshold shear velocity was exceeded. These results lend support to an understanding of the physics of aeolian transport in which (1) vegetation's impact on transport is dependent upon the distribution of vegetation rather than merely its average lateral cover and (2) vegetation impacts surface shear stress locally by depressing it in the immediate lee of plants rather than by changing the bulk surface's threshold shear velocity. Our results also suggest that threshold shear velocity is exceeded more than might be estimated by single measurements of threshold shear stress and roughness length commonly associated with vegetated surfaces, highlighting the variation of threshold shear velocity with space and time in real landscapes.


The study was carried out to determine the extent to which antimicrobial drugs may be translocated into milk and the associated risk of exposure by consumers. A total of 394 milk samples were collected in the study sites in dry and wet seasons, and from different categories of milk market agents, including producers (farmers), processors, wholesalers (assemblers) and retailers. The milk samples were screened for antimicrobial drug residues using the Charm Aim-96 an- timicrobial inhibition assay screening kit. Overall, 35.5% (140/394) of the milk samples collected were contaminated with one or more of the antimicrobial drugs screened. This translates into an average risk of exposure every third time a con- sumer drinks locally produced milk. There was no significant difference in contamination levels between season and area of sampling. Among market agents, contamination levels ranged from 16.6% (9/54) for wholesalers or milk assemblers to 54.2% (13/24) for milk processors. There were no significant differences in prevalence proportions of drug residues in milk from different types of traders between and within locations.