The need to drastically reduce CO2 emissions will lead to the transformation of our current, carbon-based energy system to a more sustainable, renewable-based one. In this process, hydrogen will gain increasing importance as secondary energy vector. Energy storage requirements on the TWh scale (to bridge extended times of low wind and sun harvest) and global logistics of renewable energy equivalents will create additional driving forces toward a future hydrogen economy. However, the nature of hydrogen requires dedicated infrastructures, and this has prevented so far the introduction of elemental hydrogen into the energy sector to a large extent. Recent scientific and technological progress in handling hydrogen in chemically bound form as liquid organic hydrogen carrier (LOHC) supports the technological vision that a future hydrogen economy may work without handling large amounts of elemental hydrogen. LOHC systems are composed of pairs of hydrogen-lean and hydrogen-rich organic compounds that store hydrogen by repeated catalytic hydrogenation and dehydrogenation cycles. While hydrogen handling in the form of LOHCs allows for using the existing infrastructure for fuels, it also builds on the existing public confidence in dealing with liquid energy carriers. In contrast to hydrogen storage by hydrogenation of gases, such as CO2 or N2, hydrogen release from LOHC systems produces pure hydrogen after condensation of the high-boiling carrier compounds. This Account highlights the current state-of-the-art in hydrogen storage using LOHC systems. It first introduces fundamental aspects of a future hydrogen economy and derives therefrom requirements for suitable LOHC compounds. Molecular structures that have been successfully applied in the literature are presented, and their property profiles are discussed. Fundamental and applied aspects of the involved hydrogenation and dehydrogenation catalysis are discussed, characteristic differences for the catalytic conversion of pure hydrocarbon and nitrogen-containing LOHC compounds are derived from the literature, and attractive future research directions are highlighted. Finally, applications of the LOHC technology are presented. This part covers stationary energy storage (on-grid and off-grid), hydrogen logistics, and on-board hydrogen production for mobile applications. Technology readiness of these fields is very different. For stationary energy storage systems, the feasibility of the LOHC technology has been recently proven in commercial demonstrators, and cost aspects will decide on their further commercial success. For other highly attractive options, such as, hydrogen delivery to hydrogen filling stations or direct-LOHC-fuel cell applications, significant efforts in fundamental and applied research are still needed and, hopefully, encouraged by this Account.


Vascular cell adhesion molecule-1 (VCAM-1) has been shown to be highly expressed in atherosclerotic lesions. Although the soluble form of VCAM-1 (sVCAM-1) is detected in human sera, the relation between the degree of atherosclerosis and serum sVCAM-1 level has not been defined. In the present study, sVCAM-1 concentrations were measured in sera from 101 Japanese NIDDM patients. The mean ± SD serum sVCAM-1 concentration in 26 patients with symptomatic atherosclerotic vascular diseases (789 ± 187 ng/ml) was higher than that in 75 patients without the disease (664 ±175 ng/ml). Among the 101 NIDDM patients, 56 had atherosclerotic change of the carotid arteries, based on the evaluation by highresolution B-mode ultrasonography. Their sVCAM-1 level was 759 ± 201 ng/ml, higher than that in 45 patients without any detectable atherosclerosis of the carotid arteries (619 ± 130 ng/ml). In addition, there was a positive correlation between sVCAM-1 concentration and thickness of the intimal plus medial complex (IMT) of the carotid arteries in the NIDDM patients (r = 0.41, P < 0.0001). Multivariate regression analysis revealed significant predictors of mean IMT value to be sVCAM-1 concentration (F = 62.88, P = 0.0001) and age (F = 9.59, P = 0.0026). By contrast, sVCAM-1 concentration was not increased in nondiabetic patients with atherosclerotic change of the carotid arteries (668 ± 191 ng/ml; n = 36) compared with those without the atherosclerotic change (632 ± 177 ng/ml; n = 28), and there was no correlation between sVCAM-1 level and IMT of the carotid arteries in the nondiabetic subjects. These results indicate that circulating sVCAM-1 may be a marker of atherosclerotic lesions in NIDDM patients with symptomatic and asymptomatic atherosclerosis.


The discourses around games have tended to focus upon either their artefactual qualities or the phenomenological experience of play. In both cases, games are primarily to be understood singularly. An alternative approach, related to Foucault's archaeological methods, is to focus upon the manner in which games share player practices with earlier games. This technique can be applied to all eras of games, and is not merely restricted to videogames – indeed, a significant proportion of the player practices of videogames descend directly from the player practices of tabletop games, especially in terms of the progenitive role of tabletop role-playing games for contemporary digital entertainment. Such player practices can be broadly understood in terms of interface (how the player engages with the game), world (what the player imagines is happening), or the agency practices that connect the interface and the world. Three propositions concerning the relationships between fictional setting and designed rule systems within games are explored, the last of which stresses the idea that 'no-one plays alone' i.e. that all play entails continuity of its practices over and above variation of those practices. These propositions are used to demonstrate three aesthetic flaws that are peculiar to, or particularly relevant for, videogames. This in turn leads to a discussion of the ways that commercially successful games have always proceeded by leveraging the existing networks of practice. The result is an alternative perspective for game design, game scholarship, or game critique, one that foregrounds the role of player practices.


"Tracing the Past, Drawing the Future" examines a crucial turning point in the development of Chinese ink painting in the twentieth century, a change represented by the beautiful and innovative work of four artists, Wu Changshuo (1844-1927), Qi Baishi (1863-1957), Huang Binhong (1864-1955), and Pan Tianshou (1897-1971). With careers spanning over a century of radical change in China, these artists were instrumental in propelling the ancient tradition of Chinese ink painting into the modern era in the face of compelling Western influences. As a group, their work represents an alternative approach to questions of relevance and modernity. This lavish book illuminates the context in which these artists worked, describes their overall contribution to the history of Chinese art, and highlights their individual ideas and achievements. In his introductory essay, Xiaoneng Yang offers a brief historical background for the evolution of modern Chinese painting. Richard E. Vinograd analyzes the alternative modernism represented by these artists, each of whom worked in the brush-and-ink idiom, confronted the shift toward practices of the West, and gave new life through this confrontation to cherished traditions. The essays devoted to each artist are followed by individual entries discussing their works. Featuring more than one hundred works of both painting and calligraphy by the four artists, the book, which is published to accompany a traveling exhibition, also includes a glossary and detailed bibliography.


Criminalized Aboriginal women continue to be overrepresented in Canadian prisons. Research demonstrates they often have extensive experiences of victimization. This thesis explores how judges navigate these issues on sentencing, primarily by examining discourses about victimization in selected judgments. This author identified and reviewed 91 decisions sentencing Aboriginal women offenders, focusing those dealing with conditional sentences where possible. This author uses the feminist theory of the victimization-criminalization continuum to inform her thesis. Parliament attempted to respond to the overincarceration of Aboriginal peoples in 1996 with the enactment of amendments to the sentencing regime: s. 718.2(e) requires judges to consider alternatives to imprisonment for Aboriginal offenders where appropriate, and s. 742.1 offers one such alternative through the conditional sentence order. In R. v. Gladue, the Supreme Court of Canada directed how judges are to engage in the sentencing analysis for Aboriginal offenders. In 2012, the Court offered further clarification on this direction in R. v. Ipeelee. This is the context for this thesis. The histories of victimization of criminalized Aboriginal women being sentenced generally overlap with factors that comprise the Gladue analysis, and are interrelated. However, this author suggests that the focuses of the victimization-criminalization continuum and the Gladue analysis differ: the victimization-criminalization continuum most directly focuses on gendered vulnerabilities and reactions to victimization, whereas the Gladue analysis most directly focuses on reverberations of colonization (and how that should impact sentencing). This author uses various judgments to examine the overlap between these analyses, highlighting decisions that successfully integrate gendered understandings of victimization histories within the Gladue analysis, and those demonstrating more decontextualized reasoning. This author then discusses how judicial discourses about victimization intersect with discourses about rehabilitation and treatment. This author suggests associated problems that appear at this intersection – particularly where imprisonment is regarded as a place of healing (despite documented deleterious effects of incarceration). Finally, this author argues that recent incursions into the conditional sentencing regime through amendments to the Criminal Code that restrict its availability (first through the passage of Bill C9 and then Bill C-10) are problematic for criminalized Aboriginal women who may otherwise be sent to prison.


ABSTRACT Ovate pellets of kaolinite from .05 to 15 millimeters in length occur in conglomerates interbedded with pyroclastic materials and waterlaid sediments in the Eocene Calapooya formation at Hobart Butte, Oregon. Although Miocene hydrothermal solutions invaded these rocks, altered welded tuffs to clay, and deposited kaolin minerals together with realgar, stibnite, pyrite, quartz, and other minerals, a hydrothermal or a volcanic origin for the pellets is considered unlikely. The sizes and shapes of the pellets, the presence of pellets and lithic fragments within pellets, the lack of radial and concentric structures, the presence of charcoal, lignitic material, and diatoms in the matrix suggest fluvial deposition of clay flakes, broken from thin clay layers that had dried on Eocene flood pl ins. The arrangement of the long axes of the pellets parallel to the bedding and the molding of pellets against quartz, lithic fragments, and pellets support the interpretation of a sedimentary origin for the pellets and the clays containing them.


ABSTRACT Objective: The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic creates secondary problems for the health care system, and understanding specific issues can guide the management of the pandemic and its future consequences. We aimed to characterize the problems and related risk factors experienced with outpatient compliance and dietary compliance of children with food allergies during the COVID-19 pandemic. Materials and Methods: A cross-sectional survey was conducted on the mothers of children with ongoing food allergies, eight months after Turkey's first confirmed case of COVID 19. Results: Of the 288 patients, 76.3% and 40.2% were non-adherent to their scheduled appointments and oral food challenge, respectively, during the pandemic. The group non-adherent to their scheduled visit was significantly older (p=0.005), had more frequent home food trials without the consent of their physicians (p<0.001), and had less usable epinephrine auto-injectors (EAI) available compared with the adherent group (p<0.001). Eighty-nine patients (30.9%) with home food trial experience had more essential food allergies (p<0.001) and experienced more allergic reactions (p=0.002), compared with patients who adhered to dietary elimination. Thirty parents (10.4%) eliminated some foods from their children's diet because of the suspected reactions. Conclusion: The COVID-19 pandemic, significantly reduces adherence with scheduled appointments and OFC, and increases home food trials and food eliminations without physician approval. Keywords: The COVID-19 pandemic, food allergy, compliance, telemedicine, oral food challenge


Value Proposition Analysis The proposition given to a product or service in terms of its worth given by a customer is researched and analysed to find the underlying factors contributing to the value. The study is undertaken to investigate the different factors that lays ground for increased 'Customer value' and 'Product Value'. The research objective is to find the "Value Proposition Analysis for Solid State Lighting: a Case Study AhmedAli Ahmed Electrical Contracting; Marketing the product in the Kingdom of Bahrain" Most businesses generate profits, when the customers give a certain value(s) to the service/product provided by the business entity. This could involve many attributes to consider. The project overlooks in to this value significantly to understand the attributes that collectively contributes to 'Valued Relation' between the customer and the business. This is achieved by making effective use of literature suggested by various authors and by employing research strategies to validate the literature through the findings. The research also looks in to the case study organisation to fully understand the capabilities of the company to market the product. Thus, this analysis will be specifically looking in to the value proposition given to Solid State Lighting by the current UK customers and by clients of AhamedAli Ahmed Electrical Contracting, Kingdom of Bahrain. However, this analysis must viewed critically, as the product comes at a premium price and the study will be much centred in the Kingdom of Bahrain and cannot be generalised for the other GCC countries or the Middle East. This study is focused to generate strategies in marketing Solid State Lighting in Bahrain taking A.A.E as the Case Study Organisation understanding the Value Proposition for Solid State Lighting.


The strengthening of health information systems is a priority for the World Health Organization (WHO) in the Eastern Mediterranean Region. Intensive work with countries since 2012 has resulted in a framework for health information systems (1) and 68 core indicators that focus on three main areas, which are: monitoring health determinants and risks; assessing health status, including morbidity and cause-specific mortality; and assessing health system response. Key Sustainable Development Goals' (SDG) indicators (2) have been recently incorporated in the regional core indicators list to provide countries with a unified approach for reporting on health-related indicators. This brings the current list of core indicators to 75. A recent assessment of the capacity of countries in the Region to report on the initial 68 core health indicators showed that most of the indicators within the area of health determinants and risks come from population-based surveys that should be conducted every 3–5 years (3). Furthermore, a majority of countries use international funds to conduct the population-based surveys, thereby limiting their ability to conduct surveys according to their needs (3).


The memory effect and redistribution of manganese (Mn) into subsequently regrown GaN-based epitaxial layers by metalorganic chemical vapor deposition were revealed. Low-temperature up-converted photoluminescence (UPL) and the secondary ion mass spectrometry were performed on GaN-based epitaxial samples with and without Mn doping to study the effect of residual Mn on optical property. UPL emission, which originated from residual Mn doping in regrown InGaN quantum wells (QWs) because of the memory effect of the reactor, could be eliminated in an air-exposed and H2-baking manner prior to the regrowth of the QWs. Considerable residual Mn background level and slow decay rate of Mn concentration tail were also observed in the regrown epitaxial layers, which could be attributed to the memory effect or surface segregation and diffusion from the Mn-doped underlying layer during regrowth in the Mn-free reactor.


In this paper, we discuss the clearance compensation effect in precision shearing. This effect is based on the hypothesis that unbalanced clearance is automatically compensated by the bending of a punch when shearing is performed using a long and thin punch. We also discuss the compensation mechanism through various experiments and an elastic-plastic finite element method. When the clearances on the right and left sides differ, the shearing and horizontal forces acting on both punch sides also differ slightly. These forces result in moments that bend the punch. The clearance compensation effect depends on the magnitude and direction of these moments. In other words, the effect is due to not only the horizontal force but also the shearing force. In most cases of double-sided shearing, the existence of the compensation effect was apparent. [doi:10.2320/matertrans.P-MRA2007884]


Newspaper photograph of the children and teachers of the Danevang School in 1908. There are two teachers, Cheatham Evans and Anna Laura McDonald and eighty four children in the photograph. Names are listed by row in the information below the photograph. According to accompanying information, this appeared in and El Camp newspaper.


Mid-sized companies--those with annual sales between $10 million and $250 million--produce a significant percentage of the nation's output; thus, any conditions impeding their performance should concern public policymakers. One such condition may be insufficient access to short-term credit at competitive prices. In order to evaluate the competitiveness of lending markets, analysts must be able to identify their geographic boundaries. ; This article, the second in a series on middle-market lending, investigates the boundaries and concentration levels of middle-lending markets in New England. It relies primarily on the results of a survey of mid-sized businesses conducted by the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston in 1992, supplemented by interviews with CEOs and senior commercial lending officers at several of the region's largest banks. The author concludes that the boundaries of New England's middle-lending markets have changed during the past 10 years, as large depositories capable of satisfying the credit needs of mid-sized firms have become more numerous and expanded geographically.


Low-temperature x-ray magnetic circular dichroism measurements on the endohedral single-molecule magnet DySc2N@C80 at the Dy M4,5 edges reveal a shrinking of the opening of the observed hysteresis with increasing x-ray flux. Time-dependent measurements show that the exposure of the molecules to x-rays resonant with the Dy M5 edge accelerates the relaxation of magnetization more than off-resonant x-rays. The results cannot be explained by a homogeneous temperature rise due to x-ray absorption. Moreover, the observed large demagnetization cross sections indicate that the resonant absorption of one x-ray photon induces the demagnetization of many molecules.


Abstract. This study investigates the capacity of a prognostic biosphere model to simulate global variability in atmospheric CO2 concentrations and vegetation carbon dynamics under current environmental conditions. Global data sets of atmospheric CO2 concentrations, above-ground biomass (AGB), and net primary productivity (NPP) in terrestrial vegetation were assimilated into the biosphere model using an inverse modeling method combined with an atmospheric transport model. In this process, the optimal physiological parameters of the biosphere model were estimated by minimizing the misfit between observed and modeled values, and parameters were generated to characterize various biome types. Results obtained using the model with the optimized parameters correspond to the observed seasonal variations in CO2 concentration and their annual amplitudes in both the Northern and Southern Hemispheres. In simulating the mean annual AGB and NPP, the model shows improvements in estimating the mean magnitudes and probability distributions for each biome, as compared with results obtained using prior simulation parameters. However, the model is less efficient in its simulation of AGB for forest type biomes. This misfit suggests that more accurate values of input parameters, specifically, grid mean AGB values and seasonal variabilities in physiological parameters, are required to improve the performance of the simulation model.


This study reports and describes fossil thecamoebians from early Cretaceous deposits of Cohasset A-52 well located on the Scotian Shelf. In this paper we illustrate and discuss fossil thecamoebians to provide additional data to the few published reports on this fossil group. The identified taxa are attributed to the genera Cucurbitella, Difflugia and Heleopera , showing a strong similarity with recent thecamoebians. Several other forms with an uncertain generic characterization are are described.


Coalition formation is a key problem in automated negotiation among self-interested agents. In order for coalition formation to be successful, a key question that must be answered is how the gains from cooperation are to be distributed. Various solution concepts have been proposed, but the computational questions around these solution concepts have received little attention.

We study a concise representation of characteristic functions which allows for the agents to be concerned with a number of independent issues that each coalition of agents can address. For example, there may be a set of tasks that the capacity-unconstrained agents could undertake, where accomplishing a task generates a certain amount of value (possibly depending on how well the task is accomplished). Given this representation, we show how to quickly compute the Shapley value--a seminal value division scheme that distributes the gains from cooperation fairly in a certain sense. We then show that in (distributed) marginal-contribution based value division schemes, which are known to be vulnerable to manipulation of the order in which the agents are added to the coalition, this manipulation is NP-complete. Thus, computational complexity serves as a barrier to manipulating the joining order. Finally, we show that given a value division, determining whether some subcoalition has an incentive to break away (in which case we say the division is not in the core) is NP-complete. So, computational complexity serves to increase the stability of the coalition.


This article begins by scrutinizing divergent critical views of Gordimer's subject position and authorial agency, which locate her variously on a spectrum ranging from liberal- humanist autonomy to historical-materialist determinism. It then considers how Gordimer's nonfiction articulates a parallel ambivalence about the reach of the writer's imagination (and its dependence on "the potential of his own experience"), particularly regarding the ethics and feasibility of creating racially "other" characters. Its main part reads July's People (1981), in relation to other Gordimer novels, as a similarly self-reflexive engagement with subjectivity and alterity: the otherness of the imagined future (a "potential experience") facilitates fresh socio-political perspectives, even as the novel expresses philosophical scepticism about such imaginative extrapolation and its textual representation. The article concludes with a new reading of the novel's "open" ending as a projection of this epistemological conflict.


Globally, mental disorders are the largest cause of disability among those aged 10-24 years (1), with approximately half of all mental disorders emerging during adolescence, broadly the period between the ages of 12 and 18 (2-5). Suicide is one of the leading causes of death among young people (6) and in Ireland peak rates of hospital-treated self-harm are among 20-24 year old males and 15-19 year old females (7). Connecting for Life, Irelandâ?Ts National Strategy to Reduce Suicide 2015-2020, has identified young people aged 15-24 as a priority group at whom to target approaches to reduce suicidal behaviour and improve mental health (Goal 3, page 29) (8). Youth suicide prevention programmes are often based in a school setting. However, high-quality evidence has been limited, in both an Irish and international setting, to identify the true impact of suicide prevention interventions (9). In particular, no randomised controlled trials of school-based prevention programmes examining changes in suicidal behaviour had been conducted anywhere in Europe prior to the Saving and Empowering Young Lives in Europe (SEYLE) study. In this report we present the research findings of the SEYLE study, a mental health-promoting programme for adolescents in European schools (10). The study participants, 11,110 adolescents aged between 14 and 17 years old, were recruited from randomly selected mainstream second-level schools in ten European countries. The study was a randomised controlled trial (RCT) that aimed to identify an effective method of promoting adolescent mental health and decreasing suicidal thoughts and behaviours. A second aim was to gather information on the lifestyles and mental health of adolescents in order to identify risk and protective factors associated with suicidal behaviour. In this report we present both overall findings of the multi-centre trial and detailed findings on the mental health and lifestyles of Irish youth using data from the Irish study centre. In addition, this report details a range of risk and protective factors associated with mental ill-health and suicidal behaviour in Irish adolescents. The SEYLE trial identified one school-based intervention, Youth Aware of Mental Health (YAM), that was associated with a significantly lower number of subsequent suicide attempts and suicidal ideation compared to the control intervention (10). YAM is a brief, universal mental health awareness programme that was delivered in the classroom over a four-week period and includes role-play sessions, interactive lectures and workshops. The programme aimed to improve the mental health literacy and coping skills of young people, to raise awareness of risk and protective factors associated with suicide, and to enhance young peopleâ?Ts knowledge about mental health issues such as depression and anxiety.


UC is an intelligent natural language interface that allows naive users to learn about the UNIX operating system. UC was undertaken because the task was thought to be both a fertile domain for Artificial Intelligence research and a useful application of AI work in planning, reasoning, natural language processing and knowledge representation. The current implementation of UC comprises the following components: A language analyzer, called ALANA, that produces a representation of the content contained in an utterance; an inference component called a concretion mechanism that further refines this content; a goal analyzer, PAGAN, that hypothesizes the plans and goals under which the user is operating; an agent, called UCEgo, that decides on UC''s goals and proposes plans for them; a domain planner, called UCPlanner, that computes a plan to address the user''s request; an expression mechanism, UCExpress, that determines the content to be communicated to the user, and a language production mechanism, UCGen, that expresses UC''s response in English. UC also builds a model of the user that represents UC''s assessment of the user''s knowledge state with respect to UNIX. Another mechanism, UCTeacher, allows a user to add knowledge of both English vocabulary and facts about UNIX to UC''s knowledge base. This is done by interacting with the user in natural language. All these aspects of UC make use of knowledge represented in a knowledge representation system called KODIAK. KODIAK is a relation-oriented system that is intended to have wide representational range and a clear semantics, while maintaining a cognitive ap peal. All of UC''s knowledge, ranging from its most general concepts to the content of a particular utterance, is represented in KODIAK.


In 1990, 37 states spent almost $50 million on highway pavement crack sealing, according to researchers at the Strategic Highway Research Program (SHRP). In the near future, a robotic combination of video and range data may slash that figure substantially. This pavement crack-filling robot (currently under field trial) is only one of 50 products recently produced through SHRP. More will be introduced by 1993. After almost five years, SHRP is approaching the end of its road. The program was born in 1987 under the Surface Transportation and Urban Relocation and Assistance Act. Monies from state and federal highway funds (a set aside of 0.25%) funds the program, which is administered by the National Research Council (NRC) through a three-party agreement among the American Association of State Highway officials (AASHTO), the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) and the NRC. All three groups have committed to overseeing those activities that extend beyond 1993 and to ensuring that the products are implemented. The National Academy of Sciences will create and run the SHRP Monitoring and Research Transfer Committee. In addition to implementing SHRP products, the FHWA will manage contracts for the $41 million Long Term Pavement Performance (LTPP) program. AASHTO has appointed a task force to consider ways to speed the development of standards based on the completed products.


Complex computer models are used to predict how ecological systems respond to changing environmental conditions or management actions. Communicating these complex models to non-scientists is challenging, but necessary, because decision-makers and other end users need to understand, accept, and use the models and their predictions. Despite the importance of communicating effectively with end users, there is little guidance available as to how this may be achieved. Here, we review the challenges typically encountered by modellers attempting to communicate complex models and their outputs to managers and other non-scientist end users. We discuss the implications of failing to communicate effectively in each case. We then suggest a general approach for communicating with non-scientist end users. We detail the specific elements to be communicated using the example of individual-based models, which are widely used in ecology. We demonstrate that despite their complexity, individual-based models have characteristics that can facilitate communication with non-scientists. The approach we propose is based on our experiences and methods used in other fields, but which until now have not been synthesised or made broadly available to ecologists. Our aim is to facilitate the process of communicating with end users of complex models and encourage more modellers to engage in it by providing a structured approach to the communication process. We argue that developing measures of the effectiveness of communication with end users will help increase the impact of complex models in ecology. Crown Copyright © 2016 Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).


Transcription factors act during cortical development as master regulatory genes that specify cortical arealization and cellular identities. Although numerous transcription factors have been identified as being crucial for cortical development, little is known about their downstream targets and how they mediate the emergence of specific neuronal connections via selective axon guidance. The EMX transcription factors are essential for early patterning of the cerebral cortex, but whether EMX1 mediates interhemispheric connectivity by controlling corpus callosum formation remains unclear. Here, we demonstrate that in mice on the C57Bl/6 background EMX1 plays an essential role in the midline crossing of an axonal subpopulation of the corpus callosum derived from the anterior cingulate cortex. In the absence of EMX1, cingulate axons display reduced expression of the axon guidance receptor NRP1 and form aberrant axonal bundles within the rostral corpus callosum. EMX1 also functions as a transcriptional activator of Nrp1 expression in vitro, and overexpression of this protein in Emx1 knockout mice rescues the midline-crossing phenotype. These findings reveal a novel role for the EMX1 transcription factor in establishing cortical connectivity by regulating the interhemispheric wiring of a subpopulation of neurons within the mouse anterior cingulate cortex. Summary: EMX1, known to be involved in early cortical patterning, also has a role in interhemisphere axon guidance by promoting expression of the guidance receptor NRP1.


Abstract This article examines the intersections of community activism and wilderness in the sprawling suburban and industrial landscapes of Houston, Texas, in the United States. The Houston metropolitan region's rapid urban development, laissez-faire land use planning, and world-class petrochemical industries provide a critical context to explore the material and conceptual relations of wilderness. Building upon recent debates regarding the production of nature, the article argues that wilderness is and always has been integrated into our everyday suburban landscapes. The empirical data discussed reveals the practices and processes (re)producing wilderness materially and conceptually within the contemporary relations of urban life. It challenges us to envision wilderness as internal to society and society as internal to wilderness. The results suggest that wilderness, instead of being external and in need of protection, is internal to the human experience and therefore internal to our urban landscapes. Key Words: wilderness, urban development, production of nature, community activism, Houston, TX


Objectives: Despite extensive research on turnover among nursing personnel very little is known about the impact of physical workload and health on leaving. The aim of this study was to find predictors for leaving nursing care with special reference to physical working conditions and musculoskeletal problems. Methods: This study is based on longitudinal data from a survey of nursing personnel who were employed at various county hospitals in Sweden from 1992–95. A self administrated follow up questionnaire was used to identify their present position in the labour market. The response rate was 73% (n = 1095). Results: The results showed that nursing personnel reporting musculoskeletal problems of the neck/shoulder or knees and those who had limited use of transfer devices were more likely to leave nursing care. Conclusions: The study highlights the importance of taking musculoskeletal problems and use of transfer devices into consideration in order to retain nursing personnel.


Turkish manufacturing industry has been increasingly important with the adoption of free market economy. It has become the driving force of the Turkish economy in terms of employment, production and exports. In terms of capital ownership, in Turkish manufacturing industry; public, private and foreign capital type companies operate in different status. The aim of this study is to predict the sales income trends of the public, private and foreign capital types operating in different positions in terms of capital ownership in the Turkish manufacturing industry through the Grey and Markov model. The grey model for estimating the total sales revenue of the firms, and the new Markov approach based on the quadratic programming model for their trends have been proposed. These models were used to forecast the total sales of firms for the period 2004-2014 and to estimate the trends of 2017-2022 period. In the scope of the research, the sales revenues of Turkey's largest 500 industrial firms, operating in the manufacturing industry were analyzed. The analyzed dataset covers the period 1993-2014. As a result of the analyzes, it has been found that in the Turkish manufacturing industry, the weight of public capital is gradually decreasing and that the private capital has a high level of penetration.


Capping rules, which govern interactions of helical peptides with hydrophobic surfaces, were never established before due to lack of methods for the direct measurement of polypeptide structure on the interphase boundary. We employed proteomic techniques and peptide retention modeling in reversed-phase chromatography to generate a data set sufficient for amino acid population analysis at helix ends. We found that interactions of amphipathic helical peptides with a hydrophobic C18 phase are induced by a unique motif featuring hydrophobic residues in the N1 and N2 positions adjacent to the N-cap (Asn, Asp, Ser, Thr, Gly), followed by Glu, Gln, or Asp in position N3 to complete a capping box. A favorable N-capping arrangement prior to amphipathic helix may result in the highest hydrophobicity (retention on C18 columns) of Asp/Asn (or Glu/Gln) peptide analogues among all naturally occurring amino acids when placed in N-cap or N3 position, respectively. These results contradict all previously reported hydrophobicity scales and provide new insights into our understanding of the phenomenon of hydrophobic interactions.


For the physical construction of buildings delivering maximum value basically boils down to delivering what has been designed with no waste. An imperfect understanding of what actually constitutes value for the customer is therefore of no great consequence. The same cannot be said for the design process, where the specific value that is to be delivered is defined. It is therefore important that people involved in the design of building have proper grasp of what value is, both specifically on the project that they are working on and in general. Within LC workshop approaches are often employed to determine what constitutes value for the client. This can be useful on specific projects, but is not helpful for developing an intuitive understanding of value in general. Neither are the current definitions of value employed by the community. It has been our experience that they are too abstract to be sufficiently accessible for students and practitioners. In this paper we present a draft of a framework for understanding and describing the value of the end product of the construction process, the finished building, centred on the customer's business model and processes.


Aim To examine symptoms indicative of respiratory tract and gastrointestinal infections and determine risk factors for such symptoms in elite cross-country skiers. Methods Self-reported training and symptom data for 37 elite cross-country skiers from 2007 to 2015 were analysed using multilevel logistic regression equations with symptom incidence and duration as outcome variables, and sex, performance level, season, competition, air travel, altitude exposure and training characteristics as independent variables. Results Data for 7016 person-weeks were analysed, including 464 self-reported infection events and 110 959 h of training. Athletes reported median (range) 3 (1–7) respiratory tract and/or gastrointestinal events per year, with symptoms lasting 5 (1–24) days. During the winter, symptoms occurred more frequently (OR 2.09, p<0.001) and lasted longer (b=0.043, p<0.001) compared with summer. Competition and air travel increased the risk of symptoms, with ORs of 2.93 (95% CI 2.24 to 3.83) and 4.94 (95% CI 3.74 to 6.53), respectively (p<0.001). Athletes with higher training monotony had lower risk of symptoms (OR 0.87 (95% CI 0.73 to 0.99), p<0.05). Other training variables were not associated with symptoms. Athletes who had won an Olympic/World Championship medal reported shorter symptom duration compared with less successful athletes (b=−0.019, p<0.05) resulting in significantly fewer symptomatic days/year (14 (6–29) vs 22 (8–43) days/year). Conclusions Air travel and competition are major risk factors for acute respiratory tract and gastrointestinal symptoms in this population. Athletes who have large fluctuations in training load experience such symptoms more frequently. Shorter duration of symptoms appears to be associated with success in cross-country skiing.


This paper presents hybrid energy storage systems based on hydro-pneumatics and Supercapacitors with high potentials regarding life cycle and impacts on environment. These so called "Batteries with Oil-hydraulics and Pneumatics (BOP)" systems exploit the high performances of oil-hydraulics machines to store energy into compressed air. In the first system, the BOP-A, compression and expansion of a trapped volume gas take place in the storage vessel. A Maximum Efficient Point Tracking algorithm is used to optimise the efficiency of the oil-hydraulic machine. As the maximum efficiency conditions impose the level of the converted power, an intermittent time-modulated operation is applied to the pneumatic-to-electric conversion subsystem to obtain a variable mean power. A smoothly variable output power is achieved with the help of a supercapacitive auxiliary storage device used as a filter. The paper describes the concept of the system, the principle of the Maximum Efficiency Point Tracking (MEPT) algorithm and the strategy used to vary the output power. Practical results are reported, that have been recorded from a first prototype of BOP-A. In addition, the paper introduces the second and more promising system, the BOP-B, where compression and expansion of fresh air are done in liquid-piston work-chambers with integrated heat exchangers. This leads to an almost isothermal process and therefore to high efficiency and high energy density. Finally, some economical considerations are made, in the context of a stand alone photovoltaic home supply, through a comparative cost evaluation of the presented hydro-pneumatic systems and a lead acid batteries system. This evaluation confirms the cost effectiveness of the studied hybrid storage systems.


Problem. Sustaining healthy democracies requires citizens to successfully transition from civilian life into political leadership positions. Despite the need for this transition to take place, little is known about the transition. Globally, lawyers are the most represented professional group inpolitics, therefore, a study of their transition acts as a good starting point in understanding the process. This study used the Nicholson Transition Cycle (NTC) to explore the transition of 65 lawyers into Canadian politics. Method. An exploratory multiple case study approach was used to gather data from face-to-face interviews, phone interviews, public archives, email, and websites. Interviews were transcribed, coded, and categorized to fit under the NTC's four phases of transition: preparation, encounter, adjustment, and stabilization. Qualitative Data Analysis software assisted with the organization of the data. Confidentiality and anonymity were maintained by concealing the identity of participants by changing some geographic locations, omitting obvious identifiers, and occasionally changing gender. Results. Statements about motivation, early exposure or experience with politics, as well as early steps into political activity were classified under the preparation phase. Many participants reported having family members who worked in politics, and that experience prepared them for politics. Reported motivations for entering politics included career advancement, using politics as a stepping stone, and fulfilling a childhood dream. Participants who were unhappy with the status quo regarded politics as an ideal forum for creating change and improving social conditions. Participants reported that the knowledge and skills obtained in law helped them transition intopolitics. Early exposure to politics and politicians provided advanced insight about the work of politicians. Many participants were encouraged by others to run for political office because of their legal skills and social networking. Statements about getting through the initial days, weeks, and months of political office were grouped under the encounter phase. Stories about how participants coped with new and unfamiliar experiences in politics were included here. Some participants reported they coped with the transitory nature of employment in politics by maintaining a part-time law practice they could go back to if they lost an election. Developing mentors and relying on peers was regarded as crucial in understanding their new environment, processes, and procedures; in handling the media, and in communicating with the public. Participants provided numerous examples of how their litigation skills became useful such as when they engaged in heated debate and inwithstanding personal attacks during a Question Period. Female politicians indicated that they experienced special challenges due to gender discrimination. The experience of helping constituents, meeting fascinating people, and enjoying the privileges of public office were cited by participants as joyful new experiences during the encounter phase. Personal changes, role development, and relationship building were major areas participants reported working through and were labeled under the adjustment phase. Adjusting to the loss of income and personal privacy, and having to maintain a hectic schedule were part of this transition. Some reported a disruption of the family unit related to prolonged absence from the home. Divorces were reported and some noted that children experienced difficulties in home and school. Participants found that consensus, collaboration, and building bridges were vital in getting things done. Due to the volume of issues requiring attention, delegating to competent staff was imperative for survival. For Anglophone participants, learning French was regarded as a valuable skill in running an efficient constituency office, if they were not already bilingual. When respondents reported aspects of settling into political life, these were classified under the stabilization phase. Central in this process were reports of beginning to see social problems from broader societal perspectives and not just from legal or policy views. They reported learning how to work with others to identify the core cause of social problems. Some reported harnessing their knowledge of the political process and combining it with the law to advance democratic principles of freedom, equality, justice, and diversity. Some communicated with constituents by using social media and the internet as well as traditional forms of communication. Being re-elected on multiple occasions was seen by some as an indication that their work was being helpful to others. Others viewed being given a government portfolio as a sign of political competence. Conclusions and Recommendations. Overall, participants reported that the promise to make a positive change in society was a strong motivation to prepare for and transition into politics. Psychological preparation contained elements of political socialization, previous career skills, prior learning, and consistent exposure to politics and politicians. Participants reported confronting the newness of the job by developing coping mechanisms, learning the new rules of the game, and experiencing the joy of political life. Adjusting to the new requirements of the job meant changing personal habits, reaching out to build bridges, broadening their thinking, and leveraging administrative skills. Learning French presented distinct advantages. As participants matured into their political leadership roles, they transitioned from highly specialized knowledge in the law to civic leaders with social insights. This study shows the challenges of transitioning from civilian to political office in the lives of 65 lawyers. While these findings can't be generalized to all professions, they raise conclusions that call for more research and for action to create resources that help individuals willing to make the sacrifices to become political leaders. Concern to understand more about the transition process and develop ways of evaluating and mentoring civilians in this transition promises to make a major contribution to the long-term viability of democratic states.


Operation of Scanning Thermal Microscopy (SThM) [1] in liquid environment probing thermal phenomena with nanoscale resolution could open unique opportunities for studies of biological materials, processes in the rechargeable energy storage and catalysis. Until recently such SThM operation would be deemed fully impossible, due to dominating heat dissipation from the heated probe into the surrounding liquid that thought to drastically deteriorate both the sensitivity of the probe and its spatial resolution. Nevertheless, Tovee and Kolosov [2] showed that such immersions SThM, or iSThM, is not only possible for the certain widely used type of the probe (Kelvin Nanotechnology, Scotland), but also opens the possibility to make nanoscale mapping of the heat transport with the near-field operation of SThM. Here we show that the presence of liquid provides highly stable thermal contact between the probe tip and the sample eliminating one of the major drawbacks of the ambient or vacuum SThM's – variability of such contact. iSThM can effectively observe the semiconductor devices and 2D materials with the resolution of few tens of nanometres, providing new tool for exploring thermal effects of chemical reactions and biological processes with nanoscale resolution. Using finite element modeling analysis we show that selecting suitable thermal conductivity of the liquid allows to to significantly enhance contrast of iSThM for the particular material. We also experimentally demonstrate that by applying of the ultrasonic vibration to the probe and by detecting a shear response of the probe it is possible to achieve near – non-contact iSThM paving the way for efficient zero-damage nanoscale thermal probing.


Benthic gross primary productivity (GPP), net primary production (NP), and respiration (R) were measured seasonally in each of 12 major benthic habitats in 3 southeast Australian estuaries, along with a suite of biological, physical, and chemical parameters to construct a benthic carbon budget and to elucidate controls over benthic metabolism. We also tested the performance of an artificial neural network (ANN) model in predicting benthic metabolism from the suite of measured parameters, and compared model performance to traditional stepwise regression methods. Carbon budgets indicated that macrophyte communities made the greatest contribution to whole system benthic metabolism (51 to 79% of gross productivity and 38 to 74% of respiration), and net benthic metabolism of the 3 estuaries ranged from −25 to ~90 g C m−2 yr−1. Metabolism in non-macrophyte communities was tightly coupled to light, temperature, organic matter supply, and benthic algal biomass, and metabolism in macrophyte communities was coupled predominantly to temperature and light. ANN outperformed stepwise regression for all benthic metabolic parameters in both macrophyte and non-macrophyte habitats. Root mean square errors of ANN were up to 3-fold lower than stepwise regression models, indicating the potential use of ANN in modeling ecosystem-scale metabolism. We used ANN models to predict systemwide changes in benthic net production associated with an increase in temperature of 1 to 2°C. Model results indicate that system-wide net production increased with temperature, indicating that carbon burial in, and/or export from estuaries may increase as a result of increasing water temperature associated with climate change.


The dynamics of the intrinsically unstable premixed flames propagating in channels is studied by means of numerical modelling in this work. Critical conditions of extinction and the influence of the thermal-diffusive effect on the dynamics of flame propagating in planar channels with cold sidewalls under gravity is investigated. For the horizontally propagating flames, the appearance of inversion influences the effect of thermal-diffusion on the asymmetry of flame fronts. For upwards propagating flames, the convex shape of the flame imposed by the mode of ignition combined with buoyancy can suppress
the thermal-diffusive effects; in contrast, the buoyancy alone cannot damp the thermal diffusive effects even for quite large Froud numbers in regard to the appearance of inversion. The variation of Lewis number has no essential effect on the planar flame shape formation when flame propagates downward. Lowering Lewis number can significantly decrease the critical conditions of extinction. However, if Lewis number is smaller than some limit, its further effect on the critical extinction conditions is unsignificant.
In the two-step consecutive reaction, the effects of the ratio of Damkohler numbers, heat release rates, activation energy and Lewis number on the separation and fragmentation of flames are considered. The inversion is more pronounced in combustion with separated flame fronts than for single-step reactions. However, the inversion is obvious only when the two flame fronts are close enough to each other. Thus, the details of combusiiition chemistry may have a strong effect on the stability of the flame front. The thermal diffusive effect of the first flame is, in certain way, dominant and has influence on the
second flame. The presence of the first reaction suppresses the thermal-diffusive effect of the second reaction in regard to the appearance of inversion.
The propagation of flames at a variety of Reynolds number ranging from 70 to 1000 are explored. For longer channels or a flat initial flame front, the inversion of the flame is apparent for Reynolds number higher than 200. For large &, the computational grids should be very fine because of the small thickness of preheat zone. The Generalized Curvilinear
Coordinate Gridding method is introduced and an elliptic grid generator based on the variational approach is employed to construct the solution-adaptive grids. However, we found out that the global structure of the algorithm required by the adaptive grid approach might be not as efficient as simplified non-adaptive grids for prospective use of massively parallel computers.


The discovery of new materials and the manipulation of their exotic properties for device fabrication is crucial for advancing technology. Nanoscience and the creation of nanomaterials have taken materials science and electronics to new heights for the benefit of mankind. Advanced Materials and Nanosystems: Theory and Experiment cover several topics of nanoscience research. The compiled chapters aim to update students, teachers, and scientists by highlighting modern developments in materials science theory and experiments. The significant role of new materials in future technology is also demonstrated. The book serves as a reference for curriculum development in technical institutions and research programs in the field of physics, chemistry, and applied areas of science like materials science, chemical engineering, and electronics.

Key features:

This part covers 12 topics in these areas:

1. Carbon and boron nitride nanostructures for hydrogen storage applications

2. Nanomaterials for retinal implants

3. Materials for rechargeable battery electrodes

4. Cost-effective catalysts for ammonia production

5. The role of nanocomposites in environmental remediation

6. Optical analysis of organic and inorganic components

7. Metal-oxide nanoparticles

8. Mechanical analysis of orthopedic implants

9. Advanced materials and nanosystems for catalysis, sensing, and wastewater treatment

10. Topological Nanostructures

11. Hollow nanostructures


Background: Qatar Hamad Medical Corporation Ambulance Service (HMCAS) major incident response guide is intended to address techniques in field operations that must be utilized in the event of a major incident. This guide standardizes operations during major incidents, regardless of what caused the incident, number of patients, severity of the injuries or the complexity of the incident. Methods: This plan was tested and implemented across the ambulance service and Hamad International Airport (HIA) in collaboration with other agencies such as police, civil defense and HIA safety department through a full-day training program. Different training methods such as workshops, lectures and simulated exercises was conducted using different scenarios. Results: This system was implemented for five real major incidents during 2014–2015 in Qatar. The average time for all units to be on scene was 20 minutes. The total units needed by this system were 33 units, approximately according to the predetermined attendance sheet (PDA). These units include all on-scene structure of command according to the HMCAS major incident response guide. The average time to transport the victims from the scene to the hospitals was 10 minutes or less. Three communication channels were established during the whole process. Conclusion: The designed system is suitable for up to 100 patients in pre-hospital emergency care in case of a major incident. The system would need to be tested and evaluated regularly to ensure compliancy and understanding from all staff in HMCAS to ensure that they are ready at all times in the event of a major incident.


During their lifetime, multihop wireless mesh networks (WMNs) experience frequent link failures caused by channel interference, dynamic obstacles, and/or applications' bandwidth demands. These failures cause severe performance degradation in WMNs or require expensive manual network management for their real-time recovery. This paper presents an autonomous network reconfiguration system (ARS) that enables a multiradio WMN to autonomously recover from local link failures to preserve network performance. By using channel and radio diversities in WMNs, ARS generates necessary changes in local radio and channel assignments in order to recover from failures. Next, based on the thus-generated configuration changes, the system cooperatively reconfigures network settings among local mesh routers. ARS has been implemented and evaluated extensively on our IEEE 802.11-based WMN test-bed as well as through ns2-based simulation. Our evaluation results show that ARS outperforms existing failure-recovery schemes in improving channel-efficiency by more than 90% and in the ability of meeting the applications' bandwidth demands by an average of 200%.


As novel forms of crowdsourcing emerge on the market, we emphasize that the important aspect of location-dependency is more complex than assumed and, thus, suggest a typology along two dimensions of locality: the first dimension refers to whether or not the crowdsourcees interact while being collocated or dispersed, the second dimension refers to the locality of the crowdsourcees in relation to the crowdsourcer's locality (local vs. remote crowd). The resulting four types of crowdsourcing are underpinned by real-world examples. Potential advantages and challenges of the four types are discussed, particularly with respect to motivation and value. The suggested categorization shall provide the necessary basis for future research, as a systematic approach is essential to enable, yield and foster sustainability in a novel interdisciplinary research field like location-based crowdsourcing.


The construct of individualism–collectivism (IND-COL) has become the definitive standard in cross-cultural psychology, management, and related fields. It is also among the most controversial, in particular, with regard to the ambiguity of its dimensionality: Some view IND and COL as the opposites of a single continuum, whereas others argue that the two are independent constructs. We explored the issue through seven different tests using original individual-level data from 50 studies and meta-analytic data from 149 empirical publications yielding a total of 295 sample-level observations that were collected using six established instruments for assessing IND and COL as separate constructs. Results indicated that the dimensionality of IND-COL may depend on (a) the specific instrument used to collect the data, (b) the sample characteristics and the cultural region from which the data were collected, and (c) the level of analysis. We also review inconsistencies, deficiencies, and challenges of conceptualizing IND-COL and provide guidelines for developing and selecting instruments for measuring the construct, and for reporting and meta-analyzing results from this line of research.


When studying flocking/swarming behaviors in animals one is interested in quantifying and comparing the dynamics of the clustering induced by the coalescence and disbanding of animals in different groups. In a similar vein, studying the dynamics of social networks leads to the problem of characterizing groups/communities as they form and disperse throughout time.
Motivated by this, we study the problem of obtaining persistent homology based summaries of time-dependent data. Given a finite dynamic graph (DG), we first construct a zigzag persistence module arising from linearizing the dynamic transitive graph naturally induced from the input DG. Based on standard results, we then obtain a persistence diagram or barcode from this zigzag persistence module. We prove that these barcodes are stable under perturbations in the input DG under a suitable distance between DGs that we identify.
More precisely, our stability theorem can be interpreted as providing a lower bound for the distance between DGs. Since it relies on barcodes, and their bottleneck distance, this lower bound can be computed in polynomial time from the DG inputs.
Since DGs can be given rise by applying the Rips functor (with a fixed threshold) to dynamic metric spaces, we are also able to derive related stable invariants for these richer class of dynamic objects.
Along the way, we propose a summarization of dynamic graphs that captures their time-dependent clustering features which we call formigrams. These set-valued functions generalize the notion of dendrogram, a prevalent tool for hierarchical clustering. In order to elucidate the relationship between our distance between two DGs and the bottleneck distance between their associated barcodes, we exploit recent advances in the stability of zigzag persistence due to Botnan and Lesnick, and to Bjerkevik.


Piezoelectric actuators have proven to be useful in suppressing disturbances and shape control of flexible structures. Large space structures such as solar arrays are susceptible to large amplitude vibrations while in orbit. Moreover, Shape control of many high precision structures such as large membrane mirrors and space antenna is of great importance. Since most of these structures need to be ultra-light-weight, only a limited number of actuators can be used. Consequently, in order to obtain the most efficient control system, the locations of the piezoelectric elements as well as the feedback gain should be optimized. These optimization problems are generally non-convex. In addition, the models for these systems typically have a large number of degrees of freedom. Researchers have used numerous optimization criteria and optimization techniques to find the optimal actuator locations in structural shape and vibration control. Due to the non-convex nature of the problem, evolutionary optimization techniques are extensively used. However, One drawback of these methods is that they do not use the gradient information and so convergence can be very slow. Classical gradient-based techniques, on the other hand, have the advantage of accurate computation; however, they may be computationally expensive, particularly since multiple initial conditions are typically needed to ensure that a global optimum is found. Consequently, a fast, yet global optimization method applicable to systems with a large number of degrees of freedom is needed. In this study, the feedback control is chosen to be an optimal linear quadratic regulator. The optimal actuator location problem is reformulated as a convex optimization problem. A subgradient-based optimization scheme which leads to the global solution of the problem is introduced to optimize the actuator locations. The optimization algorithm is applied to optimize the placement of piezoelectric actuators in vibration control of flexible structures. This method is compared with a genetic algorithm, and is observed to be faster in finding the global optimum. v Moreover, by expanding the desired shape into the structure's modes of vibration, a methodology for shape control of structures is presented. Applying this method, locations of piezoelectric actuators on flexible structures are optimized. Very few experimental studies exist on shape and vibration control of structures. To the best knowledge of the author, optimal actuator placement in shape control has not been experimentally studied in the past. In this work, vibration control of a cantilever beam is investigated for various actuator locations and the effect of optimal actuator placement is studied on suppressing disturbances to the beam. Also using the proposed shape control method, the effect of optimal actuator placement is studied on the same beam. The final shape of the beam and input voltages of actuators are compared for various actuator placements.


In seven field experiments with wheat and oats sown in autumn, insecticides were applied to control aphids and thereby diminish the spread of aphid-transmitted barley yellow dwarf luteovirus (BYDV). Disease progress was followed over time by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) on leaf samples using antiserum specific to BYDV serotype PAV. Two foliar applications of either of two newer generation synthetic pyrethroid insecticides, alpha-cypermethrin or beta-cyfluthrin, sprayed before flag leaf emergence and at rates as low as 12.5 g a.i./ha, decreased spread of BYDV by up to 75% and increased grain yields by up to 41%. These pyrethroids were more effective in decreasing BYDV spread than foliar applications of pirimicarb (150 g a.i./ha) or dimethoate (320 g a.i./ha), two applications of which decreased BYDV spread by up to 45% and increased grain yield by up to 14%. Seed treatment with imidacloprid (70 g a.i./ha) delayed BYDV spread in wheat and oats for up to 6 weeks after plant emergence. When imidacloprid seed dressing was followed by two foliar sprays of alpha-cypermethrin, BYDV incidence was decreased by up to 88%, and grain yield was increased by up to 76%. The predominant colonizing aphid species was Rhopalosiphum padi. Dressing seed with imidacloprid and/or foliar applications of the synthetic pyrethroids markedly decreased the numbers of aphids. Numbers colonizing plants were mostly lower than 10 per tiller on nontreated plots, suggesting the grain yield increases resulting from insecticide application were due to control of BYDV rather than to decreased aphid feeding damage. To minimize BYDV-induced grain yield losses in autumn-sown cereals, protection by insecticides should be provided from soon after plant emergence until the twelfth week of plant growth.


Effects of free‐tropospheric thermodynamic properties and large‐scale subsidence on the nocturnal growth of marine stratocumulus clouds are investigated through large‐eddy simulation based on Flight 5 of the Physics of Stratocumulus Top research campaign. It was characterized by a weak inversion and moist troposphere. Sensitivity simulations are performed using variations in the subsidence and free‐tropospheric temperature and humidity. The results confirm that the cloud‐top entrainment instability parameter κ alone cannot unambiguously control the behaviors of marine stratocumulus due to the opposite response of liquid water path (LWP) to changes in the humidity and temperature jumps with the same variation in κ, thereby both jumps should be considered separately. However, sometimes it could be considered as a joint factor of the humidity and temperature jumps controlling LWP even though cloud‐top entrainment instability does not occur or κ < 0. An obvious role of subsidence is to push the inversion layer down nearly identically and at the same rate under different ambient conditions. Enhanced subsidence, as expected, diminishes the entrainment rate, cloud‐top height, cloud thickness, and LWP. However, it has a small influence on the inversion thickness and the dynamic instability across the inversion. An LWP budget analysis shows that the direct effect of subsidence is a small reduction in the LWP, but the indirect effect of subsidence is large due to contributions from other physical processes. Therefore, subsidence is an important physical process controlling the LWP budget, even though its direct contribution is significantly smaller than the largest contributions from both radiation and entrainment.


We explore what may be learned from managerial practices of an established medium-sized enterprise ("MSE") in surviving and thriving during a recession. Drawing on a Strategy-as- Practice ("SAP") view of managerial action, an improvised strategic process was observed in four acquisitions undertaken by the MSE when its closely-knit management reacted to operational pressure by improvising ideas for potential acquisitions. This process, which we call "collective sensing", occurred within unscheduled "get-togethers" in the workplace, when participants enacted a range of roles in a routine of sensing potential acquisitions. We explain collective sensing by viewing it as a consistent pattern of actions among top managers who used get-togethers as a creative platform for identifying a stream of potential acquisitions, including potentially valuable opportunities that have been overlooked in the market. Several contributions are proposed for developing and using collective sensing in SMEs as a practical managerial process that can produce high-potential acquisitions.


In this paper I investigate whether there is a systematic difference between conventional banks and participation banks in terms of their response to monetary policy shocks. For this purpose I look at the quarterly loan growth of commercial banks and participation banks in Turkish banking sector and see whether the lending channel of monetary policy differs depending on bank type. At the same time, I control for some bank specific variables, namely the log of real assets, the ratio of liquid assets to total assets and the ratio of equity to total assets. I find that participation banks show larger reaction to monetary policy. In terms of bank specific variables, banks with higher liquidity ratio tend to have higher loan growth, whereas banks with larger asset size have smaller loan growth.


New structural, metamorphic, finite strain and kinematic vorticity data for granitic gneiss and metavolcano-sedimentary rocks of the Tanumah area in the Arabian shield in Saudi Arabia reveal a history of deformation reflecting different tectonic regimes. Kinematic analysis shows their relationship to the nappe contacts between the granitic gneiss and metavolcano-sedimentary rocks and explains the nature of the subhorizontal foliation typical for the Tanumah area. The vorticity analysis of porphyroclasts was determined in high temperature mylonites. The kinematic vorticity number for the mylonitic granitic and metavolcano-sedimentary samples in the Tanumah area range from 0.60 to 0.90, and together with the strain data suggest deviations from simple shear. The data indicate oblate strain symmetry (flattening) in the Tanumah area and the strain magnitudes do not increase towards the tectonic contacts. It is suggested that the accumulation of finite strain was not associated with any significant volume change. The penetrative subhorizontal foliation is subparallel to the tectonic contacts with the overlying nappes and foliation was formed during nappe thrusting and intrusion of granite rocks under semi-brittle to ductile deformation in the Tanumah area. It can be concluded that the accumulation of ductile strain during thrusting was not by simple shear and involved a component of vertical shortening, which caused the subhorizontal foliation in Tanumah area and adjacent units.


Organisational control systems are a central phenomenon, yet despite their significance, top-down command-and-control approaches often dominate research. This surmise creates no problem in hierarchical organisations where everyone knows their work duties and what is expected of them. However, it becomes troublesome in knowledge work, where the sets of tasks carried out by any two members of the organisation differ significantly. The article offers conceptual insights elucidating control systems based on the notion of accountability; which help to raise awareness and mobilise efforts beyond the boundaries of long-established hierarchical control. Implications for the theory and practice of organisational control are discussed.


The aim of the current study was to correlate the effects of body weight, height, and body mass index (BMI) on thyroid volume of healthy undergraduate Saudi males by using ultrasound. After retaining an acceptance from the local ethics committee, a total of 100 (mean age was 21.8 ± 1.3 y; ages range from 18 to 22 y) participants were recruited between September 2016 and January 2018 in this prospective cohort study. Ultrasonographic measurements of the gland were performed using a HI vision Avius ultrasound unit (Hitachi), equipped with a high frequency direct contact 10 MHz linear array ultrasound probe. The calculated mean of thyroid volume was 7.5 ± 2.4 ml (right lobe volume was 3.9 ± 1.6 ml while that for left lobe was 3.6 ± 1.2 ml). Extremely statistically significant correlation (P<0.0001) was found between gland volume (ml) and participants' weight (kg), height (cm), and BMI (kg/m2). In conclusion, the estimated thyroid volume was decreased significantly as participants' weight and BMI increase. In contrast, the volume increases significantly as height increases. Also, a local reference of thyroid volume among healthy undergraduate Saudi males was conducted.


Along with the automation of daily activities and improvement in the availability of food in our society, comes the increasing incidence of persons having chronic lifestyle diseases. One of the most prevalent of these is hypertension. It is also important to emphasize that this 'silent killer' is becoming more popular among younger populations nowadays. Fortunately, organizations have come up with ways to tackle this problem, including a wide variety of pharmacologic management that would help lower and maintain blood pressure. One of which is the use of α-adrenergic blockers.


Mandibular lesions are classified as odontogenic and nonodontogenic based on the cell of origin. Odontogenic lesions are frequently encountered at head and neck imaging. However, several nonodontogenic pathologies may also involve mandible and present further diagnostic dilemma. Awareness of the imaging features of nonodontogenic lesions is crucial in order to guide clinicians in proper patient management. Computed tomography (CT) may provide key information to narrow diagnostic considerations. Nonodontogenic mandibular lesions may have lytic, sclerotic, ground-glass, or mixed lytic and sclerotic appearances on CT. In this article, our aim is to present various nonodontogenic lesions of the mandible by categorizing them according to their attenuations on CT.


Building a sketch of an n-by-n empirical kernel matrix is a common approach to accelerate the computation of many kernel methods. In this paper, we propose a unified framework of constructing sketching methods in kernel ridge regression (KRR), which views the sketching matrix S as an accumulation of m rescaled sub-sampling matrices with independent columns. Our framework incorporates two commonly used sketching methods, sub-sampling sketches (known as the Nystr\"om method) and sub-Gaussian sketches, as special cases with m=1 and m=infinity respectively. Under the new framework, we provide a unified error analysis of sketching approximation and show that our accumulation scheme improves the low accuracy of sub-sampling sketches when certain incoherence characteristic is high, and accelerates the more accurate but computationally heavier sub-Gaussian sketches. By optimally choosing the number m of accumulations, we show that a best trade-off between computational efficiency and statistical accuracy can be achieved. In practice, the sketching method can be as efficiently implemented as the sub-sampling sketches, as only minor extra matrix additions are needed. Our empirical evaluations also demonstrate that the proposed method may attain the accuracy close to sub-Gaussian sketches, while is as efficient as sub-sampling-based sketches.


Representation of surface roughness effects on aeolian sediment transport is a key source of uncertainty in wind erosion models. Drag partitioning schemes are used to account for roughness by scaling the soil entrainment threshold by the ratio of shear stress on roughness elements to that on the vegetated land surface. This approach does not explicitly account for the effects of roughness configuration, which may be important for sediment flux. Here we investigate the significance of roughness configuration for aeolian sediment transport, the ability of drag partitioning approaches to represent roughness configuration effects, and the implications for model accuracy. We use wind tunnel measurements of surface shear stress distributions to calculate sediment flux for a suite of roughness configurations, roughness densities, and wind velocities. Roughness configuration has a significant effect on sediment flux, influencing estimates by more than 1 order of magnitude. Measured and modeled drag partitioning approaches overestimate the predicted flux by 2 to 3 orders of magnitude. The drag partition is sensitive to roughness configuration, but current models cannot effectively represent this sensitivity. The effectiveness of drag partitioning approaches is also affected by estimates of the aerodynamic roughness height used to calculate wind shear velocity. Unless the roughness height is consistent with the drag partition, resulting fluxes can show physically implausible patterns. These results should make us question current assessments of the magnitude of vegetated dryland dust emissions. Representing roughness effects on surface shear stress distributions will reduce uncertainty in quantifying wind erosion, enabling better assessment of its impacts and management solutions.


Background: General anesthesia administration involves laryngoscopy and endotracheal intubation which are associated with the pressor response and can lead to tachycardia, hypertension, and arrhythmias, which can be deleterious in compromised patients and hence, this response needs to be suppressed. Aims: The aim of the study is to compare the effectiveness of intravenous (i.v) fentanyl and nalbuphine on the suppression of hemodynamic response in patients undergoing surgery under general anesthesia. Setting and Design: This prospective comparative study was conducted in the department of anesthesiology of a tertiary care center, and patients posted for elective surgery under general anesthesia were included. Methods: A total of 100 patients of either sex in the age group of 20–50 years, belonging to the American Society of Anesthesiologists physical status classes I and II undergoing surgery under general anesthesia, were divided into two groups: Group N (n = 50) – who received injection nalbuphine 0.2 mg/kg diluted in 10 mL normal saline i.v and Group F (n = 50) – who received injection fentanyl 2 μg/kg diluted in 10 mL of normal saline i.v over 1 min, 5 min prior to intubation. Technique of anesthesia was standardized for all the patients in the study. Heart rate (HR), blood pressure (systolic, diastolic, and mean arterial pressure [SBP, DBP, and MAP]), and oxygen saturation were recorded at baseline, induction, and at 1, 3, 5, and 10 min after intubation. Statistical Analysis: Descriptive statistics were done using mean with standard deviation for quantitative variables, and categorical variables were presented in frequencies along with respective percentages. The statistical comparisons for quantitative variables were done using Student's t-test and for categorical variables, Chi-square was used according to the data. All statistical analyses were performed using SPSS software (Version 22, SPSS Inc., Chicago, IL, USA). All analyses were two tailed, and results were discussed on 5% level of significance, i.e., P < 0.05 was considered statistically significant. Results: The demographic characteristics were comparable in both groups. HR was statistically insignificant between the two groups at all intervals. Comparing SBP, DBP, and MAP between the two groups, there was a significant increase in nalbuphine group than fentanyl group postintubation and was statistically significant at all intervals of time. Maximum rise in SBP, DBP, and MAP was 5.49%, 6.03%, and 5.80% for fentanyl group and 12.88%, 9.37%, and 10.86% for nalbuphine group, respectively. Comparison of oxygen saturation in two groups was statistically insignificant. Conclusion: Fentanyl is better than nalbuphine in blunting the pressor response of laryngoscopy and endotracheal intubation.


We study stage-wise conservative linear stochastic bandits: an instance of bandit optimization, which accounts for (unknown) safety constraints that appear in applications such as online advertising and medical trials. At each stage, the learner must choose actions that not only maximize cumulative reward across the entire time horizon but further satisfy a linear baseline constraint that takes the form of a lower bound on the instantaneous reward. For this problem, we present two novel algorithms, stage-wise conservative linear Thompson Sampling (SCLTS) and stage-wise conservative linear UCB (SCLUCB), that respect the baseline constraints and enjoy probabilistic regret bounds of order O(\sqrt{T} \log^{3/2}T) and O(\sqrt{T} \log T), respectively. Notably, the proposed algorithms can be adjusted with only minor modifications to tackle different problem variations, such as constraints with bandit-feedback, or an unknown sequence of baseline actions. We discuss these and other improvements over the state-of-the-art. For instance, compared to existing solutions, we show that SCLTS plays the (non-optimal) baseline action at most O(\log{T}) times (compared to O(\sqrt{T})). Finally, we make connections to another studied form of safety constraints that takes the form of an upper bound on the instantaneous reward. While this incurs additional complexity to the learning process as the optimal action is not guaranteed to belong to the safe set at each round, we show that SCLUCB can properly adjust in this setting via a simple modification.


EVLib is a Java library for the management and simulation of a number of Electric Vehicle (EV) activities, at a charging station level, within a Smart Grid environment. EVLib aims to solve interoperability issues between a number of Artificial Intelligence (AI)-related techniques already applied in this field. Thus, it provides a simple, yet efficient interface for the management of all major EV-related activities such as the charging and dis-charging of batteries, as well as the battery swapping. Moreover, a large number of parameters, such as the number of chargers, the waiting queues, and the available energy can be easily configured. On top of this, the library supports the simultaneous operation of many EV activities through the efficient use of threads. Finally, the library's efficiency and scalability have been tested in realistic scenarios, while the correctness and safety of the code have been verified using state of the art tools.


This book is a list of citations covering the wealth of information written about the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC). The CCC was President Franklin D. Roosevelt's favorite and most respected New Deal program. It provided economic assistance and hope for the future to the many enlisted men and their families during the height of the Great Depression. These men developed state parks, built roads and bridges and restored the environment from the devastation caused by droughts and deforestation of the west. Through hard work, they found renewed pride in themselves and their country. Their efforts can be seen in former camp sites and parks across the nation. There continues to be a fascination with the CCC. It is often studied as a model program of youth service work, conservation, and adult education. This collection will be useful to all who study the New Deal era and especially to those who concentrate on the CCC. The bibliography is organized by material type, including Federal Government documents, magazine, and journal articles, ERIC documents, books (including theses and dissertations), videos and films. The magazine, journal articles, and ERIC documents are briefly annotated to further assist the researcher.


Stratospheric ozone column data was acquired during four recent aircraft-based validation missions for the Aura satellite flown in years 2004-2006. The data was retrieved by the spectrally-resolved actinic flux measurements of the charge-coupled-device scanning actinic flux spectroradiometer (CAFS) instrument carried on board the NASA WB-57 and DC-8 aircrafts. Each dataset contains information on temporal and spatial variability in the stratospheric ozone column. Analyses of the CAFS datasets provide guidance for assimilation of data from individual satellite orbits into the global maps of stratospheric ozone. Moreover, the 10-second samplings of the CAFS data supply information on spatial variability of stratospheric ozone column across the footprint of a satellite measurement. The CAFS data is available as a function of altitude and geo location of the aircraft. This paper describes the algorithm for the retrieval of an ozone column above the aircraft level, along with validation of the CAFS retrieved ozone product. A discussion of the retrieval uncertainty is provided with emphasis on the algorithm's assumptions and instrumental uncertainties. Sensitivity of the ozone retrieval to fundamental atmospheric parameters is discussed in detail, and the range of uncertainties is estimated under a variety of observational conditions. The characteristic model uncertainty of the CAFS partial ozone column retrieval is better than 3 %, whereas the CAFS measurement precision contributes less than 1 % to the retrieval uncertainty.


Analysis of energy and exergy has been performed for a double–pass thermoelectric (TE) solar air collector. The incident solar radiation heats up the absorber plate so that a temperature difference is created between the thermoelectric modules that generate a direct current. Only a small part of the absorbed solar radiation is converted to electricity, while the rest increases the temperature of the absorber plate. The ambient air flows through the heat sink located in the lower channel to gain heat. The heated air then flows to the upper channel where it receives additional heating from the absorber plate. At a temperature difference of 22.8°C, the unit achieved a power output of 2.13 W and the conversion efficiency of 6.17%. The exergy efficiency varies from a minimum of 7.4% to a maximum of 8.4%, respectively.


ABSTRACT Whether supervision of doctoral students is best pursued individually or collectively is a recurring but unresolved question in debates on higher education. The rarity of longitudinal data and the common usage of qualitative methods to analyse a limited number of cases have left the effectiveness of either model largely untested. To assist with overcoming these problems, this paper reports on a study of 145 individuals admitted to a specific doctoral programme between 1991 and 2014. It analyses the effects of either individual or collective supervision during the first year of the programme on the probability of thesis completion and the time to thesis completion. Group means, Cox regressions, Kaplan–Meir curves and Ordinary Least Square regressions are calculated on the basis of the number of months spent by each doctoral student in the programme without defending a thesis. Studied in these ways, it appears that collective supervision in the first year significantly increases the probability of thesis completion and decreases the time to thesis completion. Collective supervision may have this effect as it enhances peer learning, creates a wider academic learning context, allows doctoral students to gradually acquire the values and behaviours of a research practice community and reduces the risk of premature selection of permanent supervisors.


Abstract. Atmospheric trace gas inversions often attempt to attribute fluxes to a high-dimensional grid using observations. To make this problem computationally feasible, and to reduce the degree of under-determination, some form of dimension reduction is usually performed. Here, we present an objective method for reducing the spatial dimension of the parameter space in atmospheric trace gas inversions. In addition to solving for a set of unknowns that govern emissions of a trace gas, we set out a framework that considers the number of unknowns to itself be an unknown. We rely on the well-established reversible-jump Markov chain Monte Carlo algorithm to use the data to determine the dimension of the parameter space. This framework provides a single-step process that solves for both the resolution of the inversion grid, as well as the magnitude of fluxes from this grid. Therefore, the uncertainty that surrounds the choice of aggregation is accounted for in the posterior parameter distribution. The posterior distribution of this transdimensional Markov chain provides a naturally smoothed solution, formed from an ensemble of coarser partitions of the spatial domain. We describe the form of the reversible-jump algorithm and how it may be applied to trace gas inversions. We build the system into a hierarchical Bayesian framework in which other unknown factors, such as the magnitude of the model uncertainty, can also be explored. A pseudo-data example is used to show the usefulness of this approach when compared to a subjectively chosen partitioning of a spatial domain. An inversion using real data is also shown to illustrate the scales at which the data allow for methane emissions over north-west Europe to be resolved.


When learning ultrasound (US) imaging, trainees must learn how to recognize structures, interpret textures and shapes, and simultaneously register the 2D ultrasound images to their 3D anatomical mental models. Alleviating the cognitive load imposed by these tasks should free the cognitive resources and thereby improve the learning process. We argue that the amount of cognitive load that is required to mentally rotate the models to match the images to them is too large and therefore negatively impacts the learning process. We present a 3D visualization tool that allows the user to naturally move a 2D slice and navigate around a 3D anatomical model. The slice is displayed in-place to facilitate the registration of the 2D slice in its 3D context. Two duplicates are also shown externally to the model; the first is a simple rendered image showing the outlines of the structures and the second is a simulated ultrasound image. Haptic cues are also provided to the users to help them maneuver around the 3D model in the virtual space. With the additional display of annotations and information of the most important structures, the tool is expected to complement the available didactic material used in the training of ultrasound procedures.


The petrography and chemical composition of carbonate accretionary particles of Chicxulub impact origin are described from Cretaceous-Paleogene boundary deposits at Brazos River, Texas, and Bass River borehole, New Jersey. The particles consist of lapilli and lapilli fragments ranging in size from 0.05 to 0.3 cm; they are white in color, have an accretionary fabric at several scales, and are composed of micrometer-sized microspar of low-Mg calcite with an elevated sulfur content. The internal aggregate microfabric indicates that they formed by accretion of small solid particles, suggesting an origin from carbonate crystals generated within the vapor plume of the Chicxulub impact. Carbonate accretionary lapilli occur with altered glass spherules in Cretaceous-Paleogene boundary deposits at sites in Texas and northern Mexico and in the spherule layer in New Jersey, indicating that a large amount of particulate carbonate was present within the impact plume.


With much of the reservoir engineering development activities prior to 1986 being directed to new processes such as EOR, reservoir engineering of today has, like the other petroleum engineering disciplines, become part of an integrated effort to extract the maximum amount of oil from a reservoir. We will discuss some of the new developments in reservoir engineering which had a real impact on oil field operations in Shell and on the working practices of the individual reservoir engineer. Examples of recent advances in reservoir engineering are: (1) progress in the field of measuring residual oil saturations to water under representative conditions which will enable a more realistic assessment of trapped/bypassed oil in water floods such as those in large North Sea fields; (2) improved understanding of the production behaviour of horizontal wells based on analytical and numerical modelling which led to successful applications in Gabon and Oman; (3) advances in our understanding of production in naturally fractured reservoirs which provided the basis for a unique field experiment in the Natih Field in Oman; (4) understanding of the mechanism of fracturing in water injection wells, a process which has large cost-saving potential. The one factor largely responsible for the change in working practices of individual reservoir engineers is the availability of modern integrated IT technology. Moreover, working with uncertainty in a structured way has become routine in a reservoir engineer's work.


In this paper, we present the motivation, process, results and analysis of results that we have worked on as part of our participation in the 2015 MediaEval Retrieving Diverse Social Images Task. This year, we adapted a recently-published technique for result diversication (\Relational Learning-toRank" [13]), borrowed from the world of standard document retrieval. As compared to the original work, our version makes certain changes to the ranking and comparison algorithm, and explores a variety of feature combinations specic to an image retrieval context. The key idea behind our technique was a greedy iterative approach to ranking search results, which attempted to balance relevance with redundancy by comparing candidate results to those already selected by the algorithm. Our approach worked tolerably well on many queries, but there is clearly room for improvement.