Objective The UK prevalence of male obesity is among the highest in Europe. Excess weight is associated with ill-health, but while 5-10% weight loss can significantly improve future health, men are reluctant to engage in traditional weight management programmes. This study examines the potential of professional football clubs to engage overweight and obese men in weight loss. Football Fans in Training (FFIT) is a 12 week, gender-sensitised weight management and physical activity programme delivered to groups of men at Scottish Premier League (SPL) clubs. Design A mixed-method feasibility study including a pilot randomised trial and process evaluation involving focus groups with participants and coaches delivering FFIT. Setting Two SPL clubs: one large, city-based; one smaller, town-based. Participants 103 men, aged 35–65 years, body mass index (BMI) ≥ 27 kg/m2, randomly assigned to the intervention (receiving FFIT immediately, N=51) or comparison group (receiving FFIT 4 months later, N=52). Main outcome measures The primary outcomes were viability of the recruitment procedures and participant attrition. Process outcomes included acceptability of physical and questionnaire measurement to participants, and acceptability of FFIT to men and coaches. Secondary outcomes included indications of percentage weight loss at 12 weeks, and changes in independently-measured BMI, waist circumference, and self-reported physical activity, eating habits and psychological status post-programme. Results The recruitment target (N=60) was achieved in the large, but not smaller, club, suggesting additional measures may be needed to increase participation at smaller clubs. Attrition was low; 83.5% took part in 12-week measurements. Participants were comfortable with research procedures and very positive about FFIT. The football setting proved to be a particular draw; many indicated they would not have attended a similar programme elsewhere. Similarly positive feedback was received from coaches. The intervention group achieved a mean 4.6% weight loss (SD 2.8) while the comparison group recorded a mean 0.6% weight gain (SD 2.0); and BMI and waist circumference showed a similar pattern (all p<0.001). The intervention group also reported: significant increases in self-esteem and 12-Item Short Form Health Survey (SF-12) scores, physical activity, and consumption of breakfast, fruit and vegetables; and significant decreases in consumption of burgers, pies, crisps, biscuits and chocolate (these changes were significantly different from those reported by the comparison group, p=0.001 to 0.048). Conclusion Professional football clubs can encourage men (a traditionally hard-to-reach group) to engage in gender-sensitised weight management programmes and to make positive lifestyle changes. Follow-up assessments will determine if short-term improvements are maintained.


A physical mechanism of electron beam excitation of surface plasmon polaritons (SPPs) on the circular cylindrical structure and transformation into coherent radiation is proposed. Here SPPs on the circular cylindrical structures are excited by a cyclotron electron beam (CEB) rather than by the linearly moving electron beam (LEB). This change leads to an essential consequence due to the natural periodicity of in structure and CEB, and this dual natural periodicity makes the SPPs transformation possible and brings significant excellences. HEM hybrid modes and modes SPPs can be excited and propagate along a cyclotron trajectory together with the CEB to attract energy from CEB continuously to compensate the energy loss; the phase velocity of SPPs synchronizes the CEB; the process of the excitation and transformation is longer. Therefore, the transformed power density is enhanced and reaches up to . The cyclotron frequency of the electron beam is 1 THz, but the frequency regime of the SPPs and the radiation are much higher, up to hundreds of terahertz. The mechanism presented in this letter opens the way for developing the desired room temperature, powerful and coherent light radiation sources from the infrared to the ultraviolet frequency regime.


Objective: To examine the frequency of pain-related TMD in Saudi Arabians 20 to 40years old referred to a d specialist clinic in Makka. Materials and Methods: 325 referred patients (135 males, 190 females) filled in history questionnaires. Patients reporting pain-related TMD were clinically examined. The history and clinical examinations were performed according to an Arabic version of RDC/TMD Axis I and Axis II (Dworkin et al 1992). Results: All patients had a male-female ratio of 1:1.4. TMD pain patients were found to be 18% (n=58), out of which 46 were clinically examined. The 46 TMD pain patients had a mean age of 30 years (±7) with a male-female ratio of 1:6. All TMD pain patients had a diagnosis of myofascial pain and 66% had diagnoses of arthrogenous origin. The graded chronic pain was reported to be grade I in 45%, grade II in 53%. Axis II assessment of psychological status showed that 38% of the TMD pain patients yielded severe depression scores and 60% high nonspecific physical symptom scores. Conclusion: The present study showed a high frequency of TMD pain in this Saudi Arabian cohort and 18% of the patients met criteria for subdiagnoses of TMD. Depression and somatization according to SCL-90R had significantly higher scores in the pain group compared to the non-pain group. The high frequency of pain-related TMD found among the patients referred to specialized dental clinics should make health planners considering TMD/orofacial pain as specialty in dentistry in Saudi Arabia.


Assistive knee brace is a species of wearable lower extremity exoskeletons. Such assistive equipment can enhance people's strength and provide desired locomotion to have advantages over wheelchairs, which are commonly used for patients with mobility disorders. However, the integration between the assistive knee brace and the user is challenging as inaccurate alignments may adversely affect the biomechanics of the knee joint. The goal of this study is to evaluate the changes between normal walking and walking with an assistive knee brace in "off" mode. The assistive knee brace was developed by integrating a multifunctional actuator with a custom-made knee-ankle-foot orthosis in order to minimize excessive shifting and to improve alignment to the knee joint. Spatial and temporal gait parameters, joint kinematics and joint kinetics parameters were compared. In general, the observed results showed that most of the gait parameters were not affected when walking with the knee brace. The only significant differences were found in knee flexion and knee rotational motions. These results indicated that walking with the developed knee brace provided minimal hindrance to the user and assured that assistive torque can be applied to the knee joint.


Efficient and equitable water, wastewater and stormwater management for the megacities is becoming an increasingly complex task. When accelerating water scarcities and pollution in and around urban centres are superimposed on issues like continuing urbanization, lack of investment funds for constructing and maintaining water infrastructures, high public debts, inefficient resources allocation processes, inadequate management capacities, poor governance, inappropriate institutional frameworks and inadequate legal and regulatory regimes, water management in the megacities poses a daunting task in the future. This paper will focus on water management in its totality in megacities, including their technical, social, economic, legal, institutional and environmental dimensions through a series of case studies from different megacities of the world.


The Intertext series has been specifically designed to meet the needs of contemporary English Language Studies. Working with Texts: A Core Introduction to Language Analysis (second edition, 2001) is the foundation text, which is complemented by a range of 'satellite' titles. These provide students with hands-on practical experience of textual analysis through special topics, and can be used individually or in conjunction with Working with Texts. The Language of Comics: * highly illustrated with large number of real comic strips * provides a history of comics from the end of the nineteenth century to the present * explores the 'semiotics of comics', from the interaction between the verbal and the visual and how texts interrelate to the way speech and thought are reported in narrative and point of view * makes the case for comics as multi-modal texts and considers future developments in the genre * is user friendly and accessible, and provides a full glossary.


An investigation into the structures of the antigen-binding fragments (Fab) of mouse monoclonal immunoglobulins by X-ray crystallography, is presented. The family of immunoglobulins studied, Gloops 1-5, possess the ability to bind to both the peptide antigen and the parent protein: Hen Egg-white Lysozyme. The Gloop1 and Gloop4 Fabs were generated by proteolytic cleavage of the antibody, and crystallisation trials yielded crystals of uncomplexed Fabs of both species. Attempts to grow Fab:antigen complex crystals proved unsuccessful. Partial purification of the heterogeneous Gloop4 Fab was found to be essential for the success of the crystallisations. Data were collected on crystal forms of Gloop1, Gloop2 and Gloop4 on an area detector. The structures of three Gloop2 crystal forms were solved by the molecular replacement technique, using models consisting of Fab domain pairs. Two of the crystal forms were refined by molecular dynamics methods at maximum resolutions of 3.3A and 2.8A, and the third by rigid body methods alone at 3.5A resolution. Analysis of the Gloop2 structures between the crystal forms and with other Fabs indicated no atypical features in the domains. The elbow bend of the Gloop2 Fabs differed by up to 7°. The relative association of variable and constant domain pairs was also seen to vary between the Fabs. The changes in domain pairing caused significant differences in the relative disposition of the complementarity determining regions (CDRs), although there was no evidence for conformational change within individual CDRs. The Gloop2 combining site is dominated by a groove of approximate dimensions 12Ax9Ax7A, containing many aromatic side-chains and a pair of glutamic acid residues in analogous positions to a those found in a FabrHen egg-white Lysozyme complex.


We present an algorithm that arranges a multi-robot system into a regular hexagonal lattice. This configuration provides continuous coverage with the fewest number of robots required. It also has a bounded stretch over a fully-connected graph, producing an efficient multi-hop communications network. Our algorithm uses artificial forces to move each robot to local potential energy wells. A local error correction algorithm detects and corrects most local lattice errors. Both algorithms are fully distributed, requiring local network geometry information, but no global coordinates. We present analysis of the potential energy wells that form the lattice, a proof of the upper bound on the spanning ratio of a hexagonal packing, and the error detecting and correcting algorithm. Simulation results demonstrate the effectiveness of the approach for large populations of robots.


At the end of April 2020, in the EU27 there were more than 42 million applications for support for workers on short-time work or similar schemes, which corresponds to about one quarter of the overall EU workforce. With its proposed SURE programme to provide financial support to national short-time work and similar systems, the European Commission has recognized the importance of short-time work for avoiding unemployment and supporting employees' wages while at the same time allowing companies to adapt working hours to the drop in demand. Based on a comparison of the different short-time work schemes in Europe, this policy brief identifies some criteria for fair short-time work which enables workers not only to retain their job, but also to live a decent life.


Transaction avoidance rules are widely considered to be an important tool for the regulation of related party transactions in insolvency. Existing 'best practice' guidance on the design of insolvency laws assumes that such avoidance rules are best operationalised within collective insolvency procedures. But in many jurisdictions the commencement of collective insolvency proceedings is value destructive; so much so that creditors may prefer to see firms fail outside such proceedings, even if this means foregoing opportunities to use the avoidance tools available within them. This suggests that avoidance tools may be most powerful when available outside insolvency proceedings as well as within them. Many jurisdictions do have some such form of avoidance action, often described as the 'actio Pauliana outside bankruptcy', on their statute books. But these forms of action have been neglected in the literature on the control of related party transactions in insolvency, and, perhaps as a consequence, have not benefited from international initiatives to improve the operation of domestic insolvency rules in cross-border cases in the same way that transaction avoidance actions brought in connection with collective insolvency proceedings have benefited. The chapter begins by evaluating the case for approaching transaction avoidance within insolvency proceedings, before turning to consider aspects of the design of the 'actio Pauliana outside bankruptcy', including measures to improve its efficacy in cross-border cases.


In this collection I have explored the paradox of perfection. The collection is an epic tribute to my prior self and discovers how the unperfect can be transformed to something, perceived, perfect. I flirt with my past obsessions in finding mathematically measured legs, exact tailored arms and perfectly fitted stockings. In a fun, poetic and melancholy way I invite the viewer on a highly visual voyage to my childhood where the obsession of finding costume perfection "Vemoden" the act of control becomes visual through statuesque frozen looks, where the previous unperfect becomes perfection.


We have recently shown that live attenuated virus vaccines produced on chicken-derived cells contain low levels of particle-associated reverse transcriptase (RT). In both virus and corresponding control harvests produced on chicken embryo fibroblasts, these activities were present at significantly higher concentrations than in the vaccines. In order to identify the putative retrovirus sequence responsible for this activity, a novel method for the selective PCR amplification of particle-associated retrovirus RNA that uses DNA primers complementary to the primer binding sites of the known exogenous retroviruses in combination with an anchor primer was applied. A product of the endogenous avian retrovirus family EAV-0, termed EAV-0(B1), was reproducibly generated with a tRNA(Trp)-derived primer from the RT peak fraction of a sucrose density gradient run with a harvest of a live attenuated measles vaccine. In contrast, no products were detected with primers derived from tRNA(Pro), tRNA(Lys)1,2 or tRNA(Lys)3. In the same fraction, genomic RNA of EAV-0(B1) was demonstrated by long PCR. Analysis of several sucrose density gradients from different harvests of various manufacturers demonstrated accumulation of, and colocalization with, RT activity for the EAV-0(B1) RNA but not for a chicken cellular mRNA. Synthesis of cDNA from EAV-0(B1) RNA was shown by endogenous RT reaction. Furthermore, complexes of naturally primed EAV-0(B1) RNA with RT were demonstrated. Taken together, these data strongly suggest that EAV-0 is able to produce virus-like particles with an active RT.


We use a Spatial Durbin Model to examine the relationship between civil society aid projects and measures of civil society including membership and participation in community groups and satisfaction with democracy in Nigeria and Uganda. We then study the effect of civil society aid programs on corruption, a proxy for elite capture. The spatial model allows us to estimate the effects of project spillovers that may indirectly impact non project areas. We find that civil society aid projects are associated with a decrease in the creation of community groups and attendance at community meetings in Nigeria. In Uganda, we find that civil society aid projects have a negative effect on the membership of community groups in neighboring areas. We also find that civil society projects have a positive effect on satisfaction with democracy, but they reduce satisfaction in neighbouring areas in both Nigeria and Uganda. Our corruption measures reveal that corruption has a positive direct correlation with civil society aid projects in Uganda. A number of robustness measures are used to account for selection.


An effective way to tailor the physicochemical properties of graphene film is developed by combining colloidal suspensions of reduced graphene oxide (rG‐O) nanosheets and exfoliated layered titanate nanosheets for the fabrication of freestanding hybrid films comprised of stacked and overlapped nanosheets. A flow‐directed filtration of such mixed colloidal suspensions yields freestanding hybrid films comprised of strongly‐coupled rG‐O and titanate nanosheets with tunable chemical composition. This is the first example of highly flexible hybrid films composed of graphene and metal oxide nanosheets. The intimate incorporation of layered titanate nanosheets into the graphene film gives rise not only to an increase of mechanical strength but also to increased surface roughness, chemical stability, and hydrophilicity; thus, the physicochemical properties of the graphene film can be tuned by hybridization with inorganic nanosheets. These freestanding hybrid films of rG‐O‐layered titanate show unprecedentedly high antibacterial property, resulting in the complete sterilization of Escherichia coli O157:H7 (≈100%) in the very short time of 15 min. The antibacterial activity of the hybrid film is far superior to that of the pure graphene film, underscoring the beneficial effect of the layered metal oxide nanosheets in improving the functionality of the graphene film.


1. Nitric oxide (NO) is a potent endogenous vasodilator and plays a role in the control of resting vascular tone. Patients with cirrhosis have a hyperdynamic circulation with reduced blood pressure and decreased peripheral resistance, and it is possible that increased production of NO due to induction of NO synthase may be involved in maintaining this vasodilatation. We have examined this possibility by studying the effects of local infusions of NG-monomethyl-L-arginine (an inhibitor of NO synthase) in the forearm arteriolar bed and the superficial dorsal hand veins of patients with alcoholic cirrhosis. 2. Drugs were either infused locally into the brachial artery and forearm blood flow was measured by venous occlusion plethysmography, or into a vein on the back of the hand and vein diameter was measured using a linear displacement technique. 3. Basal forearm blood flow was increased and vascular resistance was decreased in the patients with alcoholic cirrhosis compared with healthy control subjects. Noradrenaline and NG-monomethyl-L-arginine caused dose-dependent falls in forearm blood flow in both healthy control subjects and patients with cirrhosis. There was no significant difference in the responses to either noradrenaline or NG-monomethyl-L-arginine between the two groups. 4. In the superficial hand veins there was no change in vein size in response to NG-monomethyl-L-arginine infused alone, and venoconstriction to local infusion of noradrenaline was unaffected by co-infusion with NG-monomethyl-L-arginine. 5. Our results confirm that patients with alcoholic cirrhosis are vasodilated compared with healthy control subjects.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)


Short stick exercises have been attracting attention from the viewpoint of preventing falls and improving the health of elderly people and are generally performed under the guidance of instructors and nursing staff at nursing homes. However, in situations such as the COVID-19 pandemic, where people should refrain from unnecessary outings, it is advisable that individuals perform short stick exercises at home and record their exercise implementation status. In this paper, we propose an inertial measurement unit (IMU)-sensor-based short stick exercise tracking method that can automatically record the types and amounts of exercises performed using a short stick equipped with an IMU sensor. The proposed method extracts time-domain and frequency-domain features from linear acceleration and quaternion time-series data obtained from the IMU sensor and classifies the type of exercise using an inference model based on machine learning algorithms. To evaluate the proposed method, we collected sensor data from 21 young subjects (in their 20s) and 14 elderly subjects (79-95 years old), where the participants performed three sets (10 times per set) of eight basic types of short stick exercises (five types for elderly people). As a result of evaluating the proposed method using this data set, we confirmed that when LightGBM was used as the learning algorithm, it achieved F values of 90.0 and 86.6% for recognizing the type of exercise for young and elderly people, respectively. © 2022 M Y U Scientific Publishing Division. All rights reserved.


Scholars and activists mobilize increasingly the term degrowth when producing knowledge critical of the ideology and costs of growth-based development. Degrowth signals a radical political and economic reorganization leading to reduced resource and energy use. The degrowth hypothesis posits that such a trajectory of social transformation is necessary, desirable, and possible; the conditions of its realization require additional study. Research on degrowth has reinvigorated the limits to growth debate with critical examination of the historical, cultural, social, and political forces that have made economic growth a dominant objective. Here we review studies of economic stability in the absence of growth and of societies that have managed well without growth. We reflect on forms of technology and democracy com-patible with degrowth and discuss plausible openings for a degrowth transition. This dynamic and productive research agenda asks inconvenient questions that sustainability sciences can no longer afford to ignore.


This paper presents several distributed algorithms that cause a token to continually circulate through all the nodes of a mobile ad hoc network. An important application of such algorithms is to ensure total order of message, delivery in a group communication service. Some of the proposed algorithms are aware of, and adapt to changes in the ad hoc network topology. When using a token circulation algorithm, a round is said to complete when every node has been visited at least once. Criteria for comparing the algorithms include the average time, required to complete a round, number of bytes sent per round, and number of nodes visited per round. Comparison between the proposed algorithms is performed using simulation results obtained from a detailed simulation model (with ns-2 simulator). We also give a rigorous worst-case analysis of the proposed LR algorithm, which gives the best overall performance in the simulation.


"Igniting the Tinderbox" is intended as a nonfiction book and teacher's guide for middle school students to supplement the texts in the social studies curriculum. The book is a snapshot of Afghanistan between 1989 and 1996 as seen through the eyes of a middle school-aged Afghan boy, his mother, sister and a friend. As the characters live and remember historical events, students learn how world politics and the Afghan culture have impacted Afghanistan then and now. In seeing the world through their eyes, the students also learn about the music, art, traditions and other aspects of the culture that is Afghanistan. The teacher's guide provides background for each chapter, as well as suggested resources for further study, discussion questions and activities. All these help the students get into the characters' minds and understand Afghanistan better, as well as relate the Afghan culture and events to their own lives. Online resources include videos, which use Adobe flash, with the exception of one using Apple Quick Time (.mov). Linked photographs are jpegs and easily viewed online. When the students conclude the unit, I want them to have learned about another culture by understanding not just the "what" but the "why." They can extrapolate from the materials a better understanding of how decisions made today will affect generations to come and how one's worldview is influenced by the past, traditions and culture.


More than one million people participated in the 1994 genocide against the Rwandan Tutsi. How did Rwanda, whose criminal justice infrastructure was decimated by the genocide, attempt to bring the perpetrators to justice? In this article, we provide the first analysis of the outcomes of the gacaca courts, a traditional community-based justice system that was greatly modified to address crimes of genocide. After briefly reviewing the creation of the National Service of Gacaca Jurisdictions, we explain the court process. Then, we present an overview of the outcomes of the courts with a focus on the specific sanctions given to those found guilty. This article provides the first systematic analysis of these sanctions, contributing both an empirical overview and new insights into how Rwanda attempted to bring justice to the many citizens who took part in the genocidal violence. We conclude by briefly highlighting some successes and failures of the gacaca system and its broader lessons for justice in other contexts.


West's Respiratory Physiology: The Essentials is the gold standard text for learning respiratory physiology quickly and easily. This highly readable, must-have text serves as an introduction to students and a review for licensing and other exams. The Tenth Edition features the addition of Dr. Andrew M. Luks as co-author along with new clinical vignettes, additional multiple-choice review questions, and updated information on key topics in respiratory physiology, such as blood flow and metabolism, gas transport by the blood, and the physiology of high altitude. New! Clinical vignettes with questions emphasize how the physiology described can be applied to clinical situations and reinforce reasoning and critical thinking. More than 100 multiple-choice questions with full explanations provide self-testing of key concepts for comprehension and exam preparation. Clinical boxes and Key Concepts summaries provide bullet-point reviews. Appendices of important equations and answers to all questions are easily referenced. Online resources include animations that expand on and clarify challenging topics, an interactive question bank , and lectures by Dr. West.


Within the concentration range of 1-20 microM, orthovanadate (Na3VO4) demonstrated a time and dose-dependent inhibition of autocrine growth of the human carcinoma cell lines A549 (lung), HTB44 (kidney) and DU145 (prostate), as compared to appropriate controls (without Na3VO4). The investigation was conducted by two methods: staining with N-hexa-methylpararosaniline (crystal violet=CV) or bromide3-(4,5-dimethyltio-azo-2)-2,5-diphenyl-tetrazole (MTT). In 5, 10 and 20 microM of Na3VO4 in serum-free medium, the mean values of these two tests for A549 were approximately 40%, 45% or 65% as compared to the appropriate controls. HTB44 had the greatest opportunity (statistically insignificant) at lower vanadium concentrations (up to 10 microM), whereas at 20 microM growth inhibition of these cells was approximately 50% of the controls. DU145 showed approximately 33%, 65% and 98% growth inhibition for 5, 10 and 20 microM of Na3VO4, respectively Additionally, hypothetical curves obtained by a MANOVA test based on the CV results after 72 h incubation with Na3VO4 in serum-free medium, and an example of a time-dependent effect of Na3VO4 on A549 cells, were also presented. Sodium orthovanadate was also examined for its cytotoxic capabilities, especially its ability to induce tumor cell apoptosis; the results were compared with the effect of paclitaxel. The target cells were dyed by differential staining (HOECHST33258 and propidium iodide) after 3 h and 24 h (DU145) or 3 h and 72 h (A549) of incubation with the vanadium compound. Contrary to the two cancer cell lines (viable, apoptotic or necrotic in experimental conditions), the renal HTB44 cells were insensitive up to 15 microM Na3VO4 concentrations. After 3 h incubation with Na3VO4, both lung (A549) and prostate (DU145) cancer cells showed a slight but significant reduction in the percentage of viable cells, and an increased amount of apoptotic cells. In contrast to the lung cells, DU145 prostate cells after 24 h were more sensitive to paclitaxel than to sodium orthovanadate. In the case of lung cells, the time of incubation was prolonged (to 72 h) to allow for a study of the effect of orthovanadate in greater detail. After 72 h of incubation with Na3VO4 or paclitaxel, A549 showed a similar level of viable cells (25-32% of total cultured cells); however, the percentage of apoptotic cells was higher in the case of A549 cells--ca 36% for both drugs, but the concentration of Na3VO4 was significantly greater than paclitaxel levels.


The Mega Ampère Spherical Tokamak (MAST) programme is strongly focused on addressing key physics issues in preparation for operation of ITER as well as providing solutions for DEMO design choices. In this regard, MAST has provided key results in understanding and optimizing H-mode confinement, operating with smaller edge localized modes (ELMs), predicting and handling plasma exhaust and tailoring auxiliary current drive. In all cases, the high-resolution diagnostic capability on MAST is complemented by sophisticated numerical modelling to facilitate a deeper understanding. Mitigation of ELMs with resonant magnetic perturbations (RMPs) with toroidal mode number nRMP = 2, 3, 4, 6 has been demonstrated: at high and low collisionality; for the first ELM following the transition to high confinement operation; during the current ramp-up; and with rotating nRMP = 3 RMPs. nRMP = 4, 6 fields cause less rotation braking whilst the power to access H-mode is less with nRMP = 4 than nRMP = 3, 6. Refuelling with gas or pellets gives plasmas with mitigated ELMs and reduced peak heat flux at the same time as achieving good confinement. A synergy exists between pellet fuelling and RMPs, since mitigated ELMs remove fewer particles. Inter-ELM instabilities observed with Doppler backscattering are consistent with gyrokinetic simulations of micro-tearing modes in the pedestal. Meanwhile, ELM precursors have been strikingly observed with beam emission spectroscopy (BES) measurements. A scan in beta at the L–H transition shows that pedestal height scales strongly with core pressure. Gyro-Bohm normalized turbulent ion heat flux (as estimated from the BES data) is observed to decrease with increasing tilt of the turbulent eddies. Fast ion redistribution by energetic particle modes depends on density, and access to a quiescent domain with 'classical' fast ion transport is found above a critical density. Highly efficient electron Bernstein wave current drive (1 A W−1) has been achieved in solenoid-free start-up. A new proton detector has characterized escaping fusion products. Langmuir probes and a high-speed camera suggest filaments play a role in particle transport in the private flux region whilst coherence imaging has measured scrape-off layer (SOL) flows. BOUT++ simulations show that fluxes due to filaments are strongly dependent on resistivity and magnetic geometry of the SOL, with higher radial fluxes at higher resistivity. Finally, MAST Upgrade is due to begin operation in 2016 to support ITER preparation and importantly to operate with a Super-X divertor to test extended leg concepts for particle and power exhaust.


This Profile discusses the portrayal of women through Kwaito music and their frequent pornographic objectification in the popular township music genre. It considers the apparent shift away of Kwaito from its roots in the moment of popular expectation of the liberated South Africa and its desire to be an expression of the voices of the townships, both democratic, indigenous and controversial. The Profile draws on research to enquire into opinions of fans on the representation of women and asks whether the musicians have strayed from the track which has brought them into the limelight, popular support and success. While not representative of the whole genre, the Profile reviews a sample of lyrics and asks if there is another direction where popular music might go, particularly, whether gender equality and women's sexual exploitation will continue to exist in tension and contradiction. It is argued that popular music as an example of township music culture that embraces the ideas of post-apartheid freedom and that speaks to the democracy, and of non-racism and gender equality, may have been overtaken by a more compelling commercial pull: that as long as it sells on the streets, anything goes. It is argued that gendered cultural values hold importance both in how women are represented by men and women in a male-dominated music industry and in a culture that must increasingly be aware of the crisis posed to women of uncritical acceptance of cultural messages that accept gender violence and abuse as a necessary ingredient for success.


Reverse breakup fees are payments from a buyer to a seller if an acquisition does not close for specified reasons. The use of reverse breakup fees in private equity transactions has become a common practice and the subject of considerable commentary. Little attention, however, has been given to these clauses in strategic deals to allocate the antitrust risk between merging parties. To be sure, reverse breakup fees remain fairly uncommon relative to other risk shifting devices such as "best efforts" clauses and divestiture requirements. Nevertheless, reverse breakup fees in strategic deals appear to be growing in popularity to reassure sellers of the buyers' ability to obtain regulatory approval and encourage them to proceed with an otherwise risky transaction. In this article, we compare the application of reverse breakup fees in strategic deals with private equity buyouts and consider their use among other contractual risk-shifting provisions. We also identify significant patterns and trends in these provisions based on a survey of strategic merger agreements containing reverse breakup fees.


The prevalence of obesity and Type 2 diabetes is increasing world-wide being most evident in non-industrialised populations, and in deprived communities and minority ethnic groups, residing in the "affluent west". In the UK, the South Asian population, and in particular the Bangladeshi community, are up to six times more likely than the general population to have Type 2 diabetes. In Tower Hamlets East London, the prevalence is higher than both the London and England average; with over half of the cases being Bangladeshi. There is strong evidence that it is the interaction between an altered lifestyle, associated with economic development and urbanisation, which has triggered this massive increase in the prevalence of Type 2 diabetes. Genetic causes, and poor foetal and infant nutrition, are also seen as contributory factors.

Central to this thesis was the preposition that obesity and Type 2 diabetes are largely preventable and amenable to a wide range of public health prevention strategies. Too often a reductionist medical approach has been taken with the focus on individual behavioural change and few links to the culture of food and eating, or to the broader social, political, or economic context in which people live.

This trans-cultural study utilised qualitative approaches over three phases: paired interviews, in-depth semi-structured interviews and multiple pass dietary recall; drawing upon current social science and public health nutrition paradigms to investigate the contextual factors influencing food choices and physical activity, as perceived by the community itself and key informants, as well as the trend in eating patterns between two generations of British Bangladeshis.

Multiple drivers were revealed to be influencing food and activity choices with the community being significantly affected by urbanisation, being immersed in an obesogenic environment, the degree of acculturation into the British society and changes to the patriarchal structure of their community. The policy framework at the time of this research reflected an epistemological dilemma of a social issue continuing to be addressed with a largely clinical solution and the perception of a Government which despite outward appearances to the contrary, remained committed to the personalisation of the health agenda. The most recent change to the Coalition Government has seen this paradigm continuing, jarring sharply with the lived realities of the community and the overwhelming evidence that the obesity and diabetes epidemics cannot be dealt with by promoting behavioural change and individualised treatment alone.

The long lasting theory in Public Health that the social dimensions of health need to be addressed in conjunction with biological determinants has been confirmed with a complex web of interactions weaving together to influence the choices being made, highlighting the interconnectedness of diet and culture, and the relationship to a culture in transition. The vast array of factors have substantial implications for further development of food and public health policy for this community relating to the prevention diet related non-communicable diseases, as well as for professional practice.


The pressure oscillation within combustion chambers of aeroengines and industrial gas turbines is a major technical challenge to the development of high-performance and low-emission propulsion systems. In this paper, an approach integrating computational fluid dynamics and one-dimensional linear stability analysis is developed to predict the modes of oscillation in a combustor and their frequencies and growth rates. Linear acoustic theory was used to describe the acoustic waves propagating upstream and downstream of the combustion zone, which enables the computational fluid dynamics calculation to be efficiently concentrated on the combustion zone. A combustion oscillation was found to occur with its predicted frequency in agreement with experimental measurements. Furthermore, results from the computational fluid dynamics calculation provide the flame transfer function to describe unsteady heat release rate. Departures from ideal one-dimensional flows are described by shape factors. Combined with this information, low-order models can work out the possible oscillation modes and their initial growth rates. The approach developed here can be used in more general situations for the analysis of combustion oscillations. Copyright © 2012 by the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Inc. All rights reserved.


The authors demonstrate using both simulation and experiment, a drop code unit for metro ring optical networks with service differentiation capability. This is achieved by means of a spectral amplitude coding technique whereby the code weight in a particular channel is varied to provide different signal quality levels. Transmission of three channels with different weights operating at 10 Gbps per channel was simulated over a 68 km unamplified and 185 km amplified links of dispersion compensated fibre. Services are perfectly dropped at bit error rates from 10−9 to 10−3, leaving the through service free from accumulated noise. The authors also present a 2.5 Gbps per channel proof-of-concept experiment over 40 km of single-mode fibre (SMF).


OBJECTIVE
To study the genetic contribution of major histocompatibility complex class I polypeptide-related sequence A (MICA), important in natural killer (NK) cell function, in patients with systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE).

METHODS
Japanese patients with SLE (n=716), those with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) (n=327), and healthy control subjects (n=351) were genotyped for the Val129 Met polymorphism (rs1051792) and transmembrane (TM) alanine-encoding GCT repeats, termed A4, A5, A5.1, A6, and A9, in the MICA gene. Recombinant human MICA-GST fusion proteins were tested on the NK cell line NK92MI for the expression of NK group 2, member D (NKG2-D), NK cell-mediated cytotoxicity, and interferon-γ (IFNγ) production.

RESULTS
The MICA 129Met allele, TMA9 allele, and 129Met/Met genotype were positively associated with SLE (corrected P [Pcorr]=0.01 and odds ratio [OR] 1.3, Pcorr=0.003 and OR 1.6, and Pcorr=0.02 and OR 1.8, respectively), while the MICA 129Val allele was negatively associated with SLE (Pcorr=0.01, OR 0.8). The MICA 129Met;A9 haplotype was also associated with SLE (Pcorr=0.0006, OR 1.8), and there was an additive genetic effect between the MICA 129Met;A9 haplotype and HLA-DRB1*15:01. When NK92MI cells were incubated in vitro with recombinant human disease-associated 129Met;A9 (the combination of polymorphisms at 129Met and TMA9), expression of NKG2-D on NK92MI cells and cytotoxicity of the NK cells were inhibited, but production of IFNγ from NK92MI cells was enhanced.

CONCLUSION
The MICA polymorphism is genetically associated with SLE, and MICA appears to contribute to the pathogenesis of SLE by modulating NK cell function.


Hydrogen absorption cell measurement is an efficient technique for remote sensing for the density and temperature distributions of the planetary hydrogen coronas. The temperature distribution gives scientists crucial information to estimate quantitatively the escape rate of hydrogen atoms from the present planetary atmosphere. In addition, the absorption cell technique has some advantages over others from the point of view of geometrical size, weight, simplicity, and durability. Thus, the technique could be suitable for future missions with small size satellites. An absorption cell photometer was mounted on the first Japanese Mars mission, NOZOMI, but no data could be obtained because NOZOMI's orbit insertion was unsuccessful. The parameter optimization (i.e., filament shape, applied power, gas pressure, and so on) for the absorption cells installed in NOZOMI was insufficient due to the limited development time. Since the absorption performance is strongly dependent on these parameters, further optimization and study would be required for future space missions. We have developed new cells and evaluated dependences of the performances of them on 1) filament shape, 2) filament temperature, 3) hydrogen gas pressure, and 4) path length in the cell. In this presentation, we will present the current status of the optimization.


BACKGROUND
In our previous report, 3 of 10 patients with spinal cord injury who were injected with autologous mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) showed motor improvement in the upper extremities and in activities of daily living.

OBJECTIVE
To report on the results of a phase III clinical trial of autologous MSCs therapy.

METHODS
Patients were selected based on the following criteria: chronic American Spinal Injury Association B status patients who had more than 12 months of cervical injury, and no neurological changes during the recent 3 months of vigorous rehabilitation. We injected 1.6 × 10 autologous MSCs into the intramedullary area at the injured level and 3.2 × 10 autologous MSCs into the subdural space. Outcome data were collected over 6 months regarding neurological examination, magnetic resonance imaging with diffusion tensor imaging, and electrophysiological analyses.

RESULTS
Among the 16 patients, only 2 showed improvement in neurological status (unilateral right C8 segment from grade 1 to grade 3 in 1 patient and bilateral C6 from grade 3 to grade 4 and unilateral right C8 from grade 0 to grade 1 in 1 patient). Both patients with neurological improvement showed the appearance of continuity in the spinal cord tract by diffusion tensor imaging. There were no adverse effects associated with MSCs injection.

CONCLUSION
Single MSCs application to intramedullary and intradural space is safe, but has a very weak therapeutic effect compared with multiple MSCs injection. Further clinical trials to enhance the effect of MSCs injection are necessary.


By exploring micro-optical design principles and technology, we have developed an artificial apposition compound eye. The overall thickness of the imaging system is only 320 m, the diagonal field of view is 21°, and the f-number is 2.6. The monolithic device consists of an UV-replicated microlens array upon a thin silica substrate with a pinhole array in a metal layer on the back side. The pitch of the pinholes differs from that of the lens array to provide individual viewing angle for each channel. Theoretical limitations of resolution and sensitivity are discussed as well as fabrication issues and compared with experimental results. A method to generate nontransparent walls between optical channels to prevent cross talk is proposed. © 2004 Optical Society of America OCIS codes: 110.0110, 350.3950, 150.0150.


In the past decade, several rapidly evolving transients have been discovered whose timescales and luminosities are not easily explained by traditional supernovae (SNe) models. The sample size of these objects has remained small due, at least in part, to the challenges of detecting short timescale transients with traditional survey cadences. Here we present the results from a search within the Pan-STARRS1 Medium Deep Survey (PS1-MDS) for rapidly evolving and luminous transients. We identify 10 new transients with a time above half-maximum (t1/2) of less than 12 days and −16.5 > M > −20 mag. This increases the number of known events in this region of SN phase space by roughly a factor of three. The median redshift of the PS1-MDS sample is z = 0.275 and they all exploded in star-forming galaxies. In general, the transients possess faster rise than decline timescale and blue colors at maximum light (gP1 − rP1 ≲ −0.2). Best-fit blackbodies reveal photospheric temperatures/radii that expand/cool with time and explosion spectra taken near maximum light are dominated by a blue continuum, consistent with a hot, optically thick, ejecta. We find it difficult to reconcile the short timescale, high peak luminosity (L > 1043 erg s−1), and lack of UV line blanketing observed in many of these transients with an explosion powered mainly by the radioactive decay of 56Ni. Rather, we find that many are consistent with either (1) cooling envelope emission from the explosion of a star with a low-mass extended envelope that ejected very little (<0.03 M☉) radioactive material, or (2) a shock breakout within a dense, optically thick, wind surrounding the progenitor star. After calculating the detection efficiency for objects with rapid timescales in the PS1-MDS we find a volumetric rate of 4800–8000 events yr−1 Gpc−3 (4%–7% of the core-collapse SN rate at z = 0.2).


This study addresses an open question about science bloggers' self-perceived roles as science communicators. Previous research has investigated the roles science journalists see themselves engaging in, but such research has failed to capture the experiences of science bloggers as a broad and diverse group that is yet often very different in their practices from professional journalists. In this study, a survey of over 600 science bloggers reveals that on the broadest level, science bloggers see themselves engaging most often as explainers of science and public intellectuals. Perceived communication role depends predominantly on occupation, science communication training, blog affiliation and gender.


Plants belonging to the genus Taraxacum have been used in traditional healthcare to treat infectious diseases including food‐borne infections. This review aims to summarize the available information on Taraxacum spp., focusing on plant cultivation, ethnomedicinal uses, bioactive phytochemicals, and antimicrobial properties. Phytochemicals present in Taraxacum spp. include sesquiterpene lactones, such as taraxacin, mongolicumin B, and taraxinic acid derivatives; triterpenoids, such as taraxasterol, taraxerol, and officinatrione; and phenolic derivatives, such as hydroxycinnamic acids (chlorogenic, chicoric, and caffeoyltartaric acids), coumarins (aesculin and cichoriin), lignans (mongolicumin A), and taraxacosides. Aqueous and organic extracts of different plant parts exhibit promising in vitro antimicrobial activity relevant for controlling fungi and Gram‐positive and Gram‐negative bacteria. Therefore, this genus represents a potential source of bioactive phytochemicals with broad‐spectrum antimicrobial activity. However, so far, preclinical evidence for these activities has not been fully substantiated by clinical studies. Indeed, clinical evidence for the activity of Taraxacum bioactive compounds is still scant, at least for infectious diseases, and there is limited information on oral bioavailability, pharmacological activities, and safety of Taraxacum products in humans, though their traditional uses would suggest that these plants are safe.


This study explored expatriate teacher turnover in international schools. Two hundred and eighty-one international teachers completed a questionnaire identifying which variables influenced their decision to leave at the end of their first contract. Using both quantitative and qualitative data, this study revealed that three causal factors were viewed as influential by the respondents; administrative leadership, compensation and personal circumstances. Qualitative data revealed that proprietary schools also suffer from the perception of operational decisions being driven by a profit incentive.


Indians as Customers Indians have a long tradition as buyers and sellers with foreign countries, having traded for centuries with their neighbours in the Middle East and Southeast Asia. Since the fifteenth century, this trade also included Europe, though trade with the Romans has been documented as early as the first century. This has led Indians engaged in business to have a "trader" mentality, with both its positive and negative connotations. Positively, this makes them highly entrepreneurial, always looking for opportunities to do business. Perhaps negatively, especially from the supplier's perspective, this makes them inordinately price sensitive in their purchasing. In other words, Indians are tough negotiators and love bargaining. Any foreigner desiring to sell to an Indian firm should be prepared for this. Indian procurement officers like to be knowledgeable buyers and drive a hard bargain. For example, R. C. Bhargava, former purchase director of Suzuki India, used his knowledge of costs almost cold-bloodedly in purchase negotiations. Car tires have always been sold as proprietary products. Nowhere in the world was their price negotiated on a cost-plus basis. Yet, Bhargava stunned the tire industry in India by declaring: "You show me your cost structure and I will give you a remunerative margin." Indians use their knowledge of zero-based costing remarkably well in buying situations. Indians are not shy of using their relationships in business. For example, Shiv Shivram, a veteran buyer of forty years with Imperial Tobacco and Dunlop, is friendly with salespersons at all levels. When the general sales manager of a vendor comes to negotiate a contract, one of the vendor's salesmen he is friendly with will whisper the bottom price in Shivram's ear. Thus when Shivram negotiates, he knows the price below which he cannot go as it would hurt the seller. The strategy is to use long-standing relationships to get the best deal while giving a fair return, but not to squeeze the last dollar out of the seller. When major purchases, big-ticket items, or capital equipment are at stake, the negotiations can be frustrating to non-Indians. Westerners are often heard complaining that the discussions take forever and the specifications keep changing. Consider, for example, the current rush by foreign vendors to sell arms to India. Reflecting on the experience, Rear Admiral Rees Ward, head of the United Kingdom's defence manufacturers' trade association, said: "It is a rapidly growing market of a potential superpower ... however, the procurement processes often cause delays and cancellations and therefore overseas companies need to understand that they have to commit to the long haul if they are going to win contracts" (Sylvia Pfeifer & Amy Yee 2008: 9). After months of tough negotiations have brought a handshake agreement and the deal is ready to be signed the next morning, be prepared for a surprise. It is too soon to start celebrating. At the eleventh hour, after the lowest price has been negotiated, it will be length of credit that will determine who gets the order. There will be a new negotiation about the payment terms because Indian companies, usually strapped for cash, like long credit cycles. The negotiations are conducted by the professional managers in the company. However, with any significant purchase, the promoter or owner will be brought in to bless the deal at the final stage. The professional managers of family-owned companies are usually unwilling to stick their necks out and complete the transaction without involving the promoter. Doing so may leave the professional manager open to the accusation of having received a kickback from the supplier. Peter Smith, senior executive of General Electric, who for thirty years sold power plants to many Indian companies, remarked: "After the negotiations are over and the draft purchase order has been seen by the seller, the real decision maker arrives. …


We study wave propagation in a rotating slow-light structure with mode degeneracy. The rotation, in conjunction with the mode degeneracy, effectively induces superstructure that significantly modifies the structure's dispersion relation. It is shown that a rotation-dependent stop band is formed in the center of the slow-light waveguide transmission curve. A light signal of frequency within this stop band that is excited in a finite-length section of such a waveguide decays exponentially with the rotation speed and with the coupled resonator optical waveguide's total length or total number of degenerate microcavities. This effect can be used for optical gyroscopes with exponential-type sensitivity to rotation.


The authors are developing COAP and IPv6-based sensor networks for
environments where lightweight implementations, long battery
lifetimes, and minimal management burden are important. The memo shows
how different communication models supported by COAP affect
implementation complexity and energy consumption, far more so than
mere changes in message syntax. Our prototype implements a multicast-
based IPv6, UDP, COAP, and XML protocol stack in less than 50
assembler instructions. While this extremely minimal implementation is
suitable only for limited applications and makes a number of
assumptions, the general conclusions point to need for further work in
developing the COAP multicast and observation frameworks.


This study examines the organization of scientific computation in Britain over the period 1925-1955. At the beginning of the twentieth century most scientific computation was performed by individuals using logarithm tables and slide rules. By the late 1920s desk calculators and accounting machines had become common computing tools. This thesis looks at the adoption of mechanized computing methods by scientists and traces the centralization of computing effort which subsequently took place.

Chapter 1 identifies nine criteria which are used to analyse the individual computing centres discussed in the thesis, and form a basis for the study. Chapter 1 also looks at scientific computation at the beginning of the twentieth century and gives relevant background information for the remainder of the thesis.

The bulk of the thesis, chapters 2 to 6, describe the computing centres which emerged during 1925-1955. The description begins by looking at L.J. Comrie's work at the Nautical Almanac Office in the late 1920s and goes on to consider the Scientific Computing Service, the Cambridge Mathematical Laboratory, the Admiralty Cotnputing Service and the NPL Mathematics Division. The NPL Mathematics Division is of particular importance as it was set up, in 1945, to act as a national computing centre and represents the pinnacle of centralized computing in Britain.

Similar events in the United States and Europe are described in chapter 7 and are compared and contrasted with centralized computation in Britain. The Unesco International Computation Centre is also described in chapter 7 and some conclusions about the way in which computation in Britain was centralized are given.


Water quality in rural areas is affected adversely by build-up of traffic-generated organic compounds on road surfaces, leading to their presence in water runoff and sediments. Characterising these compounds is a first step in developing measures for the removal of such pollutants from water courses. In this study, liquid-liquid extraction of water samples from several rivers and surface run-off enabled quantification of major PAHs. Soxhlet extraction of sediment samples was followed by clean-up of samples using column chromatography. The PAHs were quantified by gas chromatography. In water and sediment samples, 6 PAHs were identified and quantified. In river water samples, individual PAH levels ranged between 0.1 µg/l and 137 µg/l, while in sediment samples levels ranged between 17.9 µg/kg and 9870 µg/kg. For surface run-off, levels ranged between 0.6 µg/l and 2 500 µg/l for water samples and between 112 µg/kg and 34 400 µg/kg for sediment samples. Total levels of PAHs in sediment samples were relatively high (111.6 to 61 764 µg/kg) compared to those in water from both river and surface run-off (29.2 to 3 064.8 µg/l), and PAH levels in surface runoff were much higher than in river waters, implicating tarred roads and parking lots as main point sources of PAHs. PAH ratios also indicate that the PAH content of runoff and sediment is more likely due to pyrogenic sources, i.e. vehicle emissions, although petrogenic sources (mainly oil spills) also play an important role. Toxic Equivalence Quotient (TEQ) values in river and runoff waters ranged from 0.10 to 4.03 µg/l and for sediments the TEQ ranged from 0.50 to 272.23 µg/kg. These results are of concern, as the calculated TEQ is likely to be an underestimate of the actual TEQ, since only 6 PAHs with relatively low toxicities were analysed. Long droughts and low rainfall, and washing of automobiles in and near the rivers are important factors which may have contributed to the observed levels of PAHs in both river water and sediments.


A computed tomographic (CT) with contrast enhancement is extensively used for assessment of a wide range of thoracic and abdominal circumstances. Thus, as the use of CT in the evaluation of unstable patients increases, the chance to see the CT features of imminent cardiogenic shock and cardiac arrest also increases during scanning. The patient was a 27 year old man who brought to the emergency department by paramedics unresponsive, After physical examination and obtaining ECG due to presence of hypotension ,with suspicion to traumatic injury, Thoracoabdominal CT was done for patient which show dense opacification of the right hepatic lobe, that resembling contrast extravasations from IVC and the hepatic vein, laparatmy was done for patient which were normal .Patient Has developed cardiac arrest and died at the end of surgery. Postmortem autopsy and toxicology revealed Tricyclic antidepressant intoxication as a cause of cardiac arrest and death. TCA poisoned Patients may have normal ECG findings on arrival. In spite of infrequent reports of cardiogenic shock that occurring during CT scan, knowledge of distinctive CT findings of these patients is very essential for precise analysis of images, in addition to informing clinical physician for malpractice avoidance and immediate initiation of resuscitation


The purpose of this study is to investigate the factors that constrain or enable process virtualization in a government‐to‐citizen engagement process. Past research has established that most e‐government projects, especially in developing countries, are regarded as total failure or partial failure. Citizens' unwillingness to use government electronic services and lack of awareness are among some of the reasons why these electronic services fail. Using the process virtualization theory (PVT) as theoretical lens, the authors investigated the various activities within the driver license acquisition process at the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Authority. The PVT helped in identifying factors which enable or inhibit the virtualization of the driver license acquisition process in Ghana. Based on a survey data of 317 participants, we report that process characteristics in the form of relationship requirements affect citizens' willingness toward the use of government virtualized processes. Situating the PVT within a developing country context, our findings reveal that some cultural and behavioral attributes such as socialization hinder the virtualization of some activities within the driver licensing process.


The challenge of linking intergenic mutations to target genes has limited molecular understanding of human diseases. Here, we show that H3K27ac HiChIP generates high-resolution contact maps of active enhancers and target genes in rare primary human T cell subtypes and coronary artery smooth muscle cells. Differentiation of naïve T cells to T helper 17 cells or regulatory T cells creates subtype-specific enhancer-promoter interactions, specifically at regions of shared DNA accessibility. These data provide a principled means of assigning molecular functions to autoimmune and cardiovascular disease risk variants, linking hundreds of noncoding variants to putative gene targets. Target genes identified with HiChIP are further supported by CRISPR interference and activation at linked enhancers, by the presence of expression quantitative trait loci, and by allele-specific enhancer loops in patient-derived primary cells. The majority of disease-associated enhancers contact genes beyond the nearest gene in the linear genome, leading to a four-fold increase of potential target genes for autoimmune and cardiovascular diseases.


Wikipedia is the biggest, free online encyclopaedia that can be expanded by any-one. For the users, who create content on a specific Wikipedia language edition, a social network exists. In this social network users are categorised into different roles. These are normal users, administrators and functional bots. Within the networks, a user can post reviews, suggestions or send simple messages to the "talk page" of another user. Each language in the Wikipedia domain has this type of social network.
In this thesis characteristics of the three different roles are analysed in order to learn how they function in one language network of Wikipedia and apply them to another Wikipedia network to identify bots. Timestamps from created posts are analysed to reveal noticeable characteristics referring to continuous messages, message rates and irregular behaviour of a user are discovered. Through this process we show that there exist differences between the roles for the mentioned characteristics.


Secularisation in Western Europe, 1848-1914. By Hugh McLeod. (New York: St Martin's Press. 2000. Pp. xii, 387. $65.00 clothbound; $19.95 paperback.) Finely nuanced yet bold in conclusion, this study shatters the widespread assumption in western Europe that secularization inevitably accompanies the emergence of modern industrial, urban society. Professor McLeod bases his comparative study not so much with reference to the United States, where organized religion remains conspicuously strong, as by concentrating on western Europe itself, in particular on France, on the German Empire as defined in 1871, and on England, excluding the religiously distinct fringes of the United Kingdom. Temporally he concentrates on the years during which secularization is supposed to have become ascendant, between the middle of the nineteenth century, when by McLeod's own account, "going to church on Sunday or to communion at Easter were things taken for granted by the majority of the population," and the outbreak of World War I, when such practices "were the exception rather than the rule" (p. 178). There has long been plenty of evidence that religious belief and practice remained and grew only stronger in the country where industrial revolution began, in England. As McLeod points out,"The period from the 1850s to the 1880s was one of exceptional prosperity in the history of the English churches, in which every social class and political faction was to some degree reached by one of the many religious denominations and levels of involvement were high" (p. 48). The political movements of liberalism, radicalism, and socialism that had strongly secularizing affinities in France and Germany continued to take religious forms in England. But before the reader can conclude that England must have followed its own Sonderweg in religion, McLeod points out the crosscurrents everywhere. Among Protestants in Germany, for example, the decline in religious practice began long before the onset of industrialization; on the other hand, the"[a]rtisans and shopkeepers, who in Germany were often regarded as the most devout section of the urban population in the second half of the nineteenth century, were in France regarded as the group most prone to militant anti-clericalism" (p. 132). The highlighting of national differences in a comparative study is not surprising. More remarkable is the common "key to the religious situation in later nineteenth-century Europe"that McLeod finds in pluralism. His argument in this regard, the central thesis of the book, merits quotation in full: "trends towards secularisation have to be seen in the context of intense religious competition, whether between rival branches of Christianity or between religious and secular views of the world. …


Numerical relativity codes that do not make assumptions on spatial symmetries most commonly adopt Cartesian coordinates. While these coordinates have many attractive features, spherical coordinates are much better suited to take advantage of approximate symmetries in a number of astrophysical objects, including single stars, black holes and accretion disks. While the appearance of coordinate singularities often spoils numerical relativity simulations in spherical coordinates, especially in the absence of any symmetry assumptions, it has recently been demonstrated that these problems can be avoided if the coordinate singularities are handled analytically. This is possible with the help of a reference-metric version of the Baumgarte-Shapiro-Shibata-Nakamura formulation together with a proper rescaling of tensorial quantities. In this paper we report on an implementation of this formalism in the Einstein Toolkit. We adapt the Einstein Toolkit infrastructure, originally designed for Cartesian coordinates, to handle spherical coordinates, by providing appropriate boundary conditions at both inner and outer boundaries. We perform numerical simulations for a disturbed Kerr black hole, extract the gravitational wave signal, and demonstrate that the noise in these signals is orders of magnitude smaller when computed on spherical grids rather than Cartesian grids. With the public release of our new Einstein Toolkit thorns, our methods for numerical relativity in spherical coordinates will become available to the entire numerical relativity community.


ABSTRACT
 Despite some national examinations of policy responses for young carers (YCs), this study provides a first comprehensive cross-national comparison of the different legislation, policy and service frameworks that exist to protect and support adolescent young carers (AYCs) in six European countries (Italy, Netherlands, Slovenia, Sweden, Switzerland and United Kingdom) and how these are enacted. Until now, research has focused on estimating numbers of AYCs and the impact of caring tasks. A preliminary examination of policy responses to YCs was followed by expert interviews. Case study analysis of 25 interviews and a cross-national synthesis were undertaken before incorporating feedback from former YCs. Different responses to YCs were found, ranging from protection and support in policy and legislation and a definition for YCs, to a total lack of recognition and support. Findings highlight the potential to extend existing legislation, policy and service frameworks to include AYCs, and the importance of recognising and raising awareness of YCs. Awareness should be raised at all levels of society for example with professionals in health, social and education sectors and the general public. A definition for YCs is needed, so AYCs can self-identify and AYCs should be recognised as an important target group for policy makers.


The absence of benchmarks for Web sites with dynamic content has been a major impediment to research in this area. We describe three benchmarks for evaluating the performance of Web sites with dynamic content. The benchmarks model three common types of dynamic content Web sites with widely varying application characteristics: an online bookstore, an auction site, and a bulletin board. For the online bookstore, we use the TPCW specification. For the auction site and the bulletin board, we provide our own specification, modeled after ebay.com and slahdot.org, respectively. For each benchmark we describe the design of the database and the interactions provided by the Web server. We have implemented these three benchmarks with a variety of methods for building dynamic-content applications, including PHP, Java servlets and EJB (Enterprise Java Beans). In all cases, we use commonly used open-source software. We also provide a client emulator that allows a dynamic content Web server to be driven with various workloads. Our implementations are available freely from our Web site for other researchers to use. These benchmarks can be used for research in dynamic Web and application server design. In this paper, we provide one example of such possible use, namely discovering the bottlenecks for applications in a particular server configuration. Other possible uses include studies of clustering and caching for dynamic content, comparison of different application implementation methods, and studying the effect of different workload characteristics on the performance of servers. With these benchmarks we hope to provide a common reference point for studies in these areas.


Significance The question of whether a person's position among siblings has a lasting impact on that person's life course has fascinated both the scientific community and the general public for >100 years. By combining large datasets from three national panels, we confirmed the effect that firstborns score higher on objectively measured intelligence and additionally found a similar effect on self-reported intellect. However, we found no birth-order effects on extraversion, emotional stability, agreeableness, conscientiousness, or imagination. This finding contradicts lay beliefs and prominent scientific theories alike and indicates that the development of personality is less determined by the role within the family of origin than previously thought. This study examined the long-standing question of whether a person's position among siblings has a lasting impact on that person's life course. Empirical research on the relation between birth order and intelligence has convincingly documented that performances on psychometric intelligence tests decline slightly from firstborns to later-borns. By contrast, the search for birth-order effects on personality has not yet resulted in conclusive findings. We used data from three large national panels from the United States (n = 5,240), Great Britain (n = 4,489), and Germany (n = 10,457) to resolve this open research question. This database allowed us to identify even very small effects of birth order on personality with sufficiently high statistical power and to investigate whether effects emerge across different samples. We furthermore used two different analytical strategies by comparing siblings with different birth-order positions (i) within the same family (within-family design) and (ii) between different families (between-family design). In our analyses, we confirmed the expected birth-order effect on intelligence. We also observed a significant decline of a 10th of a SD in self-reported intellect with increasing birth-order position, and this effect persisted after controlling for objectively measured intelligence. Most important, however, we consistently found no birth-order effects on extraversion, emotional stability, agreeableness, conscientiousness, or imagination. On the basis of the high statistical power and the consistent results across samples and analytical designs, we must conclude that birth order does not have a lasting effect on broad personality traits outside of the intellectual domain.


None of us has health insurance, really. If you develop a long-term condition such as heart disease or cancer, and if you then lose your job or are divorced, you can lose your health insurance. You now have a preexisting condition, and insurance will be enormously expensive - if it's available at all. Free markets can solve this problem, and provide life-long, portable health security, while enhancing consumer choice and competition. "Health-status insurance" is the key. If you are diagnosed with a long-term, expensive condition, a health-status insurance policy will give you the resources to pay higher medical insurance premiums. Health-status insurance covers the risk of premium reclassification, just as medical insurance covers the risk of medical expenses. With health-status insurance, you can always obtain medical insurance, no matter how sick you get, with no change in out-of-pocket costs. With health-status insurance, medical insurers would be allowed to charge sick people more than healthy people, and to compete intensely for all customers. People would have complete freedom to change jobs, move, or change medical insurers. Rigorous competition would allow us to obtain better medical care at lower cost. Most regulations and policy proposals aimed at improving long-term insurance - including those advanced in Barack Obama's presidential campaign - limit competition and consumer choice by banning risk-based premiums, forcing insurers to take all comers, strengthening employer-based or other forced pooling mechanisms, or introducing national health insurance. The individual health insurance market is already moving in the direction of health-status insurance. To let health-status insurance emerge fully, we must remove the legal and regulatory pressure to provide employer-based group insurance over individual insurance and remove regulations limiting risk-based pricing and competition among health insurers.


3D continuous ZnO morphologies with characteristic feature sizes on the 10 nm length scale are attractive for electronic device manufacture. However, their synthesis remains a challenge because of the low crystallization temperature of ZnO. Here, we report a method for the robust and reliable synthesis of fully crystalline 3D mesoporous ZnO networks by means of atomic layer deposition (ALD) of ZnO into a self‐assembled block copolymer template. By carefully optimizing the processing conditions we are able to synthesize several‐micrometer‐thick layers of mesoporous ZnO networks with a strut width of 30 nm. Two 3D mesoporous morphologies are manufactured: a periodic gyroid structure and a random worm‐like morphology. Exploiting the ALD property to conformally coat complex surfaces of high aspect ratio, the channel network of a 3D continuous channel network of a self‐assembled block copolymer is replicated into ZnO. X‐ray photoemission spectroscopy and x‐ray diffraction measurements reveal that the chemical composition of the mesoporous structures is uniform and consists of wurtzite‐ZnO throughout the film. Scanning electron microscopy reveals an average pore dimension of 30 nm. The potential of this material for a hybrid photovoltaic application is demonstrated by the manufacture of a poly(3‐hexylthiophene)/ZnO solar cell.


ARTICLE INFO This paper presents an optimal design of Fuzzy Power System Stabilizer (FPSS) using Harmony Search Algorithm (HSA) in multi-machine power system. The PID controller is one of the appropriate techniques to damp low frequency oscillation in nonlinear systems. The proposed controller is based on their rule base and membership function information. In conventional techniques the information is obtained by trial and error which needs too much time. So, finding the optimum value of rule base or membership function is really important. Accordingly, HAS is proposed in this paper to find the optimum value of rule base by considering the power system constrains and factors. This newly developed control strategy mixed the advantage of HSA and Fuzzy controller with simple structure while is easy to implement. Hence, the proposed controller is tested over the New England 10-unit 39-bus standard power system and 9 buses IEEE power system, under various system configurations and loading conditions, to illustrate the performance of the proposed method. The effectiveness of proposed controller is compared with other techniques. Eigenvalue analysis and nonlinear simulation results show the effectiveness of the proposed controller.


Police officers (hereafter referred to as transpreters ) have a fundamental role and function as both 'interpreters' and 'translators' in the process of the administration of justice. This role and function hinges, oftentimes, on how the two agents, that is, the transpreters and the complainants, relate to each other. What is it that they represent? What do they stand to gain? What mechanisms are at play that they exploit to reach their various goals and desires? In discharging these roles and functions, transpreters in particular become actively engaged in the activities of listening to, visualising, then retelling and rewriting the complainants' isiXhosa oral narrative text into the English language. All these laborious and tedious activities are conducted to compile sworn statements that become essential in the leading of a criminal investigation, as well as in compiling the evidence that is ultimately used in court. In this context, the 'voices' that inform the 'styles' in and through which the original narratives are reconstructed (as translations) into police records remain critical as part of the legal discourse in the South African criminal justice system. These 'voices' and 'styles' signal the extent to which sworn statements are mediated and manipulated.


This paper develops a formalism for optimizing nozzle location/configuration with respect to combustion stability of high-frequency transverse modes in a can combustor. The stability of these acoustically non-compact flames was assessed using the Rayleigh Integral (RI). Several key control parameters influence RI – flame angle, swirling strength, nozzle location, as well as nozzle location with respect to the acoustic mode shape. In this study, we consider a N-around-1 configuration such as typically used in a multi-nozzle can system and study the overall stability of this system for different natural transverse modes. Typically, such nozzles are distributed in a uniformly circular manner for which we study the overall RI and for cases where RI > 0, we optimize the nozzle distribution that can reduce and minimize RI. For a fixed geometry such a circular configuration, the analysis shows how the flame's parameters must vary across the different nozzles, to result in a relatively stable system. Additionally, for a fixed set of flame parameters, the analysis also indicates the non-circular distribution of the N nozzles that minimizes RI. Overall, the analysis aims to provide insights on designing nozzle locations around the center nozzle for minimal amplification of a given transverse mode.


Given that FLT3 expression is highly restricted on lymphoid progenitors, it is possible that the established role of FLT3 in the regulation of B and T lymphopoiesis reflects its high expression and role in regulation of lymphoid‐primed multipotent progenitors (LMPPs) or common lymphoid progenitors (CLPs). We generated a Flt3 conditional knock‐out (Flt3fl/fl) mouse model to address the direct role of FLT3 in regulation of lymphoid‐restricted progenitors, subsequent to turning on Rag1 expression, as well as potentially ontogeny‐specific roles in B and T lymphopoiesis. Our studies establish a prominent and direct role of FLT3, independently of the established role of FLT3 in regulation of LMPPs and CLPs, in regulation of fetal as well as adult early B cell progenitors, and the early thymic progenitors (ETPs) in adult mice but not in the fetus. Our findings highlight the potential benefit of targeting poor prognosis acute B‐cell progenitor leukaemia and ETP leukaemia with recurrent FLT3 mutations using clinical FLT3 inhibitors.


Introduction: Assessment of loneliness, quality of sleep and affecting factors in elders. Materials and Method: A total of 428 elders were included in the research. The research data were collected using the loneliness scale (UCLA-LS) and Pittsburgh sleep quality index (PSQI). One-way analysis of variance, t test and Pearson analysis of correlation were used to evaluate the data. Results: The average loneliness score was 41.87±8.43. The average loneliness score of those living in the nursing home was higher than that of those living in the home environment. The relationship between the average loneliness score and age, educational background, childbearing, and the number of visitors were significant (p<0.05). The average sleep quality score was 6.21±3.33. Educational background, income status, childbearing, having a chronic disease, number of visitors, and duration of residence in the nursing home were found to affect the quality of sleep (p<0.05). A slightly positive relationship (r=0.298; p=0.001) was observed between the average loneliness score and the quality of sleep score. Conclusion: Loneliness and sleep problems are common among elders. In order to improve their quality of life and health status, health care providers should recognize and take necessary actions to alleviate these problems.


This research adopts a critical realist methodology to gain explanatory insight into the job retention challenges faced by employees recovering from mental health problems. Methods involved a literature review of qualitative job retention research, a comparative case study approach, and service user collaboration. Occupational, resilience and mental health recovery perspectives were the major orientating concepts.


The purpose of this research is to show the usefulness of cartographic materials in research, namely cadaster maps; in particular for studying landscape architecture, settlements planning, and localization of military objects on the territory. Primary attention in this paper is paid to Map of the Kingdom of Galicia and Lodomeria as a part of cadaster maps made in the First Military Survey in 1763–1787 by Officer Friedrich von Mieg. The maps are serviceable for studying military architecture because the author, Friedrich von Mieg, gave particular attention to locating military objects during the map's creation. The author of the research used this map to establish the position of bastion castles and their quantity in the territory of Galicia (the historical and geographic region in Eastern Europe). The nucleus of historical Galicia lies within the modern parts of Poland (Lesser Voivodeship, Subcarpathian Voivodeship, and Silesian Voivodeship) and western part of Ukraine (Lviv, Ternopil and Ivano-Frankivsk region). At the end, the researcher has defined 39 bastion castles on the territory understudying. Besides, the scholar has found 40 unspecified castles that need further investigation because it was hard to identify exactly their type using the map. These results will help the author undertake deeper research about the history and fate of these castles. The discovery gives a clear picture about the castles with bastion profile on the territory and, also, can help find the current location of strongholds and make recommendations about their rehabilitation.


In recent years, the fabrication of novel ultrathin film systems featuring multi-functionalities has been extensively studied due to their potential applications in photonics, sensors and solar cells. In a general sense, the primary goal of the present thesis was to develop dye-sensitized ultrathin film-modified electrodes based on the layer-by-layer methodology for future light energy conversion applications. In this work, we show that stable and uniform ultrathin multilayer films were successfully assembled by the electrostatic adsorption of alternating monolayer of poly-L-lysine (pLys) and poly-L-glutamic acid onto modified gold electrodes. The multilayer films become electroactive when ferri/ferrocyanide ions are loaded into the film and behave as photoactive when sensitized by Cadmium selenide (CdSe) quantum dots. Photocurrent responses originating from the CdSe sensitized ultrathin multilayer film are observed and were dependent on the applied potential, the thickness of the film and the presence of quenchers in the organic phase. From the obtained photocurrent and the kinetic analysis, two different regimes were observed for the potential distribution in the film: (i) the strong potential dependence regime observed in case of thin films where the system reacts as a modified electrode and (ii) the weak potential dependence regime observed in case of thick films where the potential drop occurs mainly in the first 5 layers and the system behave as supported Two Immiscible Electrolyte Solutions (ITIES). Thereafter, three-dimensional assembly of nanoparticles and pLys was found to be an efficient way to increase the photocurrent efficiency of the system. Large photocathodic and photoanodic currents were recorded in the case of CdSe and CdSe/CdS sensitized films, respectively. The kinetic analysis of photoinduced processes and coupled reactions revealed that the multilayer films behave as one electronic unit, i.e. homogeneous nanoporous semiconducting photoelectrodes. When sensitizing the multilayer film by porphyrin molecules instead of CdSe quantum dots, mainly cathodic photocurrent is observed and is dependent on the applied potential and the thickness of the film. Depending its thickness, the films vary from that of a modified electrode to that of a supported liquid film. Under illumination, the maximum photocurrent responses were reached only after five bilayers and the photocurrent efficiency was weaker than in case of CdSe nanoparticles. Furthermore, another way to increase the photocurrent efficiency is by increasing the specific surface area of the substrate. Reticulated Vitreous Carbon (RVC) foam with properties of high porosity was used as the substrate and the photocurrent efficiency is increased by an order of magnitude in comparison with a planar electrode. The photostability of CdSe nanoparticles is studied in different solvent and under different environment. In presence of light and oxygen, the photo-oxidation of CdSe particles occurs. When the particles are synthesized in water and present lattice defects, a luminescence photo-enhancement is observed due to the photo-oxidation. On the other hand, the photo-oxidation of organic soluble CdSe particles with high quantum yield and with no structure defects is translated by a photobleaching. Consequently, in both cases, the size of particles is decreased and a large absorption and emission blue shift is observed. The size decreases and the blue-shift can be precisely controlled by controlling the irradiation time by a pulsed nano-laser. The presence of ZnS shell around the particles can decrease the photo-oxidation processes. Moreover, adding a sacrificial holes acceptor (n-butylamine) is shown to be an efficient way to prevent the photo-oxidation of the particles even in presence of oxygen. The photophysical properties of cadmium telluride (CdTe) and gold particles are studied at liquid|liquid interfaces. First, time-resolved fluorescence of CdTe nanoparticles adsorbed at the liquid/liquid interface were probed by Time Correlated Single Photon Counting (TCSPC), which was compared with CdTe nanoparticles originally synthesized in aqueous solution and those transferred from the aqueous to organic solvents by using tetraoctylammonium bromide (TOAB) as a phase transfer reagent. Finally, the formation of metal-like liquid films using gold nanoparticles at liquid|liquid interfaces was successfully obtained. The optical properties of the meltal-like liquid film are studied by Surface Plasmon Resonance (SPR) technique at liquid|liquid interface. General experiments and simulations were carried out in order to determine the best parameters to optimize the SPR technique at liquid|liquid interface.


Hyperviscosity, due to alterations of blood cells and plasma components, can induce microvascular damage. Nitric oxide (NO) is released by endothelium and plays a crucial role in flow-mediated vasodilation. An impaired availability of NO, due to polymorphisms of endothelial NO synthase (eNOS), may influence erythrocyte deformability thus increasing blood viscosity. We investigated haemorheological variables in patients with idiopathic sudden sensorineural hearing loss (ISSHL), retinal vein occlusion (RVO) and systemic sclerosis (SSc), as possible models of microvascular damage, and their relationship with eNOS gene T-786C, G894T and 4a/4b polymorphisms. Whole blood viscosity and plasma viscosity were assessed with a rotational viscosimeter and erythrocyte deformability index (DI) with Myrenne filtrometer. eNOS polymorphisms were analyzed in ISSHL and SSc patients. At multivariate analysis alterations of some haemorheological variables resulted significantly associated with ISSHL, RVO and SSc. A significantly higher prevalence of eNOS -786C and 894T was found in both ISSHL and SSc patients than in controls; at multivariate analysis these two polymorphisms significantly affected DI in both groups of patients. These results suggest that hyperviscosity, either determined by genetic susceptibility or not, can be involved in the pathophysiology of these clinical disorders and can be the target of new therapeutic strategies.


In agrarian developing countries the natural environment is a key determinant of both poverty and nutritional status. Climate, terrain, and soil characteristics drive the agricultural system, determining in large part cropping patterns, choice of crops, yield rates, and overall productivity levels. The human resources crucial to agricultural productivity are also influenced by the natural environment. The Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) is placing priority on developing a concept of ecoregional zones based on the premise that agroecological conditions largely determine the production potential and the size of population that an area can support in the developing world. Understanding the ecoregional dimensions of poverty and malnutrition potentially could be a major step forward in alleviating poverty sustainably by the year 2020 because it may help to target scarce resources more effectively. There are clearly discernible links between the natural environment, agricultural productivity, health, and nutritional status. Use of an ecoregional dimension to explore the incidence of malnutrition exploits these linkages. Analysis at the ecoregional level suggests that targeting of scarce resources to address the problems of poverty and malnutrition could potentially be improved by 2020 by taking into consideration these linkages between ecoregional characteristics and poverty.


Some aspects of the current status and promotional strategies of rabbit production in Nigeria were appraised in this study. This was because such data are lacking and rabbit production offers a great potential towards attainment of food security in terms of animal protein intake. Data were obtained principally from field survey, questionnaires administration, personal observations and experiences of authors, structured personal interviews of identified rabbit farmers, personal interview and observational data from agricultural extension agents, personal interview and visitation to markets and retail outlets for rabbit, proxy information from distant collaborators, recorded data from Government establishments and published data. AII the information collected was synthesized to provide an informative blend on major aspects of rabbit production. From the data collected, it was found that rabbit production in Nigeria is largely a traditional, non-commercially oriented, family-consumption targeted, and smallholder type operation comprising an average of 2-7 does and 3 bucks. About 3.4-5.2% of the Nigerian population may be keeping rabbits with women and children being mostly involved. Rabbit keeping is both intensive and semiintensive, though sorne scattered free range backyard rearing was recorded. Unlike the rural rabbit keepers, space is limiting for most urban rabbit keepers. Diets of rabbits in Nigeria are primarily forages, grasses and legumes, kitchen wastes while commercial feeds are rarely fed. Bucks and does are under-utilized, with does producing about 20 weaned rabbit per year and are usually offered for sale after four parlties. Nigerian rabbits do not suffer any peculiar disease, however skin disease (mange) and coccidia infection are very common. There are high peri- and post-natal mortalities, and it was estimated that overall mortality between birth and marketing was between 30-40%, being highest in the young enes. The performance and reproductive productivity of rabbits in Nigeria are strongly correlated with the leve! of management. There exists a latent and growing market for rabbit meat in Nigeria especially as an alternative livestock species. We propase promotional strategies for sustainable rabbit production.


Abstract. The Italian Tsunami Effects Database (ITED), consists of an ensemble of records reporting tsunami effects observed at several Observation Points (OP) along the Italian coasts from historical times. ITED was compiled starting from the Euro Mediterranean Tsunami Catalogue (EMTC) and it focuses on the propagation effects observed along the Italian coasts, providing information on how each locality was interested by tsunami effects over time. The effects reported in ITED are related to tsunamis occurred within the Italian territory and contained in the EMTC; these events were excerpt, analyzed and updated according to recent studies published in literature. The database can be accessed through a web GIS application, that displays the location of the OPs indicating for each of them the description of tsunami effects found in literature and the corresponding bibliographic references as well as the metrics related to the observed event. Based on those descriptions, the estimate value of the tsunami intensity has been assigned to each OP, according to both the Sieberg-Ambraseys and the Papadopoulos-Imamura scales. All the ITED data, including quantitative data such as runup, inundation, withdrawal, can be retrieved by accessing online the database through the WebApp that was expressly designed and built for this purpose. ITED contains 300 observations of tsunami effects at 225 OPs referred to 186 Italian main localities, hereafter called Place Name (PN) related to 72 Italian tsunamis. The database provides also the tsunami-history for each PN, allowing the end user to have a complete picture of how the PN is prone to tsunami effects.The realization of ITED was also the occasion to update Italian tsunamis contained in the EMTC, leading to the release of a new version of the EMTC catalogue, named EMTC2.0. ITED was specifically built to meet the needs of the tsunami hazard community, thus providing useful information that can improve the knowledge on how much the national territory is exposed to tsunami risk.


Defined Contribution (DC) plans are rapidly becoming the primary retirement investment vehicle for a majority of employees across the US and other markets around the globe. Asset allocation for DC plans has to strike a balance between growth and protection assets over the savings lifecycle while protecting the long-term purchasing power of the nest egg. Due to the long duration of retirement investing and various risks associated with it, implementing the right asset allocation has become critical and challenging for DC plans.The unique Risk Focused methodology presented in this paper aims to address the shortcomings of conventional Target Date Funds experienced during the 2008 financial crisis. The proposed approach addresses the cumulative impact of shortfall, sequence of returns, longevity, and market risks in determining asset allocation at different time horizons. This is accomplished by combining the term structure of risk, return, and covariance of asset classes with an explicit risk budget. The Risk Focused glide path potentially delivers comparable retirement wealth outcomes with enhanced downside protection, lower journey volatility, and attempts to facilitate a smoother journey on the road to retirement. Hence, the caption of the paper, "Road to Retirement – Bumpy or Smooth, Depends on your Route".