The Independent Evaluation Group is an independent unit within the World Bank Group; it reports directly to the Bank's Board of Executive Directors. IEG assesses what works, and what does not; how a borrower plans to run and maintain a project; and the lasting contribution of the Bank to a country's overall development. The goals of evaluation are to learn from experience, to provide an objective basis for assessing the results of the Bank's work, and to provide accountability in the achievement of its objectives. It also improves Bank work by identifying and disseminating the lessons learned from experience and by framing recommendations drawn from evaluation findings. IEG Working Papers are an informal series to disseminate the findings of work in progress to encourage the exchange of ideas about development effectiveness through evaluation. The findings, interpretations, and conclusions expressed here are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Board of Executive Directors of the World Bank or the governments they represent, or IEG management. The World Bank cannot guarantee the accuracy of the data included in this work. The boundaries, colors, denominations, and other information shown on any map in this work do not imply on the part of the World Bank any judgment of the legal status of any territory or the endorsement or acceptance of such boundaries.


Among the Bach unaccompanied suites for violoncello, the fourth suite in E-flat major is probably the least familiar to listeners and young cellists. It is also the least idiomatic for the cello, and the most difficult movement is the prelude. Musically speaking, it can be frustratingly abstract. For these reasons, it is not as popular as the other preludes and some students and teachers avoid its study. Taking into account Bach's famous and primary skill as an organist, the cello idiom can be enhanced by studying the organ idiom and using this knowledge to study this prelude. Watching organists perform the music of Bach and listening to more of Bach's organ works, especially the praeludia, toccatas, and fantasias can give cellists ideas for this fourth suite prelude. An organ performance of a transcription of this fourth suite prelude will be available online in the near future as a resource for cellists interested in this relationship between the cello and organ idioms where genres like the prelude are concerned. Discussing the timbres and technical issues of the organ can guide the cellist toward ideas of phrasing and articulation. Organ issues of registration, manual changes, and performance style can aid the performer, teacher, and student in large-scale analysis and phrasing, thus making this prelude more accessible and shedding a more positive musical light upon this movement to make it less intimidating and abstract.


When a sovereign state vouches for the anti-competitive behaviour of its producers, it is incumbent upon the courts to abstain from adjudicating and allow economic diplomacy to take its course. The recent decision of the US Supreme Court on a cartel case involving Chinese exporters of vitamin C appears to favour pro-active judicial enforcement of antitrust law, however. Comity among nations calls for giving due deference to the legitimate choices of others with respect to regulating competition in their own industries. But a state harmed by the anti-competitive conduct of foreign producers faces the difficult choice between protecting its own interest and avoiding intrusion into the conduct of another sovereign state. This paper explores this conundrum, which has implications on states with a development agenda that subordinates competition to industrial goals.  JEL classification: L52, F1


In 1952, Hodgkin and Huxley published an empirical set of equations describing changes in the neural membrane potential of the squid giant axon during the application of depolarizing or hyperpolarizing stimuli. As these equations were derived for an unmyelinated nerve fibre, there are reservations about their appli- cability to describe action potential propagation adequately in myelinated mammalian nerve fibres. This study proposes possible modifications of the Hodgkin-Huxley equations to describe action potentials generated in the Ranvier node of a human sensory nerve fibre, as applied specifically to the prediction of temporal character- istics of the human auditory system. Simulations of the effects of these modifications were performed in Matlab. Results suggest that the temporal characteristics of the human auditory system may be predicted better by using the modified set of equations. This finding is of value in creating more realistic neural models of the electrically stimulated human auditory system. Refractory periods were similar to those of general sensory nerve fibres of the same calibre. Relative refractory periods decreased with progressive retrograde nerve fibre degeneration. Chronaxie times decreased and rheobase current values increased when retrograde nerve fibre degeneration was simulated. Rheobase currents were also greater for straight array compared with contour array stimulation. Mean latencies decreased with progressive retrograde nerve fibre degeneration and agreed well with neural response telemetry. They also decreased with an increase in stimulus intensity.


Existing singing synthesis systems are usually monophonic and implemented using single processor systems. A polyphonic (multi-voice), formant-based synthesiser has been designed which addresses the needs of real-time performance. Singing synthesis, as opposed to speech synthesis, is highly dependent on the control of score parameters such as event onset times and fundamental frequency. The novel system described in this paper is designed to allow control of such parameters using the MIDI protocol and a graphical user interface. The hardware consists of a PC, ADSP-21060 SHARC processors and a Xilinx FPGA chip. This paper presents an introduction to the system, a description of the model used and the method of implementation on a parallel system. The results show processing requirements for polyphonic sound synthesis using the synthesis model.


Water and air. These primordial substances, which make possible all life on earth, are the subject of Hiroshi Sugimoto's Seascapes series. For over thirty years, Sugimoto has traveled the world photographing its seas, producing a body of work that is an extended meditation on the passage of time and the natural history of the earth. Sugimoto has called photography the "fossilization of time," and the Seascapes photographs simultaneously capture a discrete moment in time but also evoke a feeling of timelessness. This volume, the second in a series of books on Sugimoto's art, presents the complete series of over 200 Seascapes, some of which have never before been reproduced. All are identical in format, with the horizon line precisely bifurcating each image, though at times the sea and sky almost merge into one seamless unit. Each photograph captures a moment when the sea is placid, almost flat. Within this strict format, however, he has created a limitless array of portraits of his subjects. An essay by Munesuke Mita, Professor of Sociology at the University of Tokyo, examines contemporary art through a sociological lens, comparing the recent history of art with mathematical predictions of population growth. He connects Sugimoto's body of work to this unique analysis of the art world.


Functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) promises a non-intrusive way to measure real-time brain activity and build responsive brain-computer interfaces. A primary barrier to realizing this technology's potential has been that observed fNIRS signals vary significantly across human users. Building models that generalize well to never-before-seen users has been difficult; a large amount of subjectspecific data has been needed to train effective models. To help overcome this barrier, we introduce the largest open-access dataset of its kind, containing multivariate fNIRS recordings from 68 participants, each with labeled segments indicating four possible mental workload intensity levels. Labels were collected via a controlled setting in which subjects performed standard n-back tasks to induce desired working memory levels. We propose a benchmark analysis of this dataset with a standardized training and evaluation protocol, which allows future researchers to report comparable numbers and fairly assess generalization potential while avoiding any overlap or leakage between train and test data. Using this dataset and benchmark, we show how models trained using abundant fNIRS data from many other participants can effectively classify a new target subject's data, thus reducing calibration and setup time for new subjects. We further show how performance improves as the size of the available dataset grows, while also analyzing error rates across key subpopulations to audit equity concerns. We share our open-access Tufts fNIRS to Mental Workload (fNIRS2MW) dataset1 and open-source code2 as a step toward advancing brain computer interfaces.


Drug toxicity represents a worldwide issue, being an important cause of morbidity and mortality in children and adolescents. It is one of the most frequent causes of acute liver injury in children, sometimes with evolution to acute liver failure (ALF) or death. The liver damage produced by toxic causes represents 20-25% of all cases of ALF in children and teenagers. The most common drug used that has liver toxicity is acetaminophen, with easy access, being released without medical prescription. Fortunately, the antidote used in acetaminophen intoxication (acetylcysteine) makes mortality to remain low among these cases. Other drugs that cause toxic hepatitis are albendazole, valproic acid, anaesthetics and antituberculosis agents. In paediatrics, the early recognition of the possible cause that led to liver injury may be the key for the correct management and for a favourable outcome. If there is a toxic cause, the emergency referral to a specialized centre is vital in these patients.


Abstract. During the Observations and Modeling of the Green Ocean Amazon (GoAmazon2014/5) campaign, size-resolved cloud condensation nuclei (CCN) spectra were characterized at a research site (T3) 60 km downwind of the city of Manaus, Brazil, in central Amazonia for 1 year (12 March 2014 to 3 March 2015). Particle hygroscopicity (κCCN) and mixing state were derived from the size-resolved CCN spectra, and the hygroscopicity of the organic component of the aerosol (κorg) was then calculated from κCCN and concurrent chemical composition measurements. The annual average κCCN increased from 0.13 at 75 nm to 0.17 at 171 nm, and the increase was largely due to an increase in sulfate volume fraction. During both wet and dry seasons, κCCN, κorg, and particle composition under background conditions exhibited essentially no diel variations. The constant κorg of ∼ 0. 15 is consistent with the largely uniform and high O : C value (∼ 0. 8), indicating that the aerosols under background conditions are dominated by the aged regional aerosol particles consisting of highly oxygenated organic compounds. For air masses strongly influenced by urban pollution and/or local biomass burning, lower values of κorg and organic O : C atomic ratio were observed during night, due to accumulation of freshly emitted particles, dominated by primary organic aerosol (POA) with low hygroscopicity, within a shallow nocturnal boundary layer. The O : C, κorg, and κCCN increased from the early morning hours and peaked around noon, driven by the formation and aging of secondary organic aerosol (SOA) and dilution of POA emissions into a deeper boundary layer, while the development of the boundary layer, which leads to mixing with aged particles from the residual layer aloft, likely also contributed to the increases. The hygroscopicities associated with individual organic factors, derived from PMF (positive matrix factorization) analysis of AMS (aerosol mass spectrometry) spectra, were estimated through multivariable linear regression. For the SOA factors, the variation of the κ value with O : C agrees well with the linear relationship reported from earlier laboratory studies of SOA hygroscopicity. On the other hand, the variation in O : C of ambient aerosol organics is largely driven by the variation in the volume fractions of POA and SOA factors, which have very different O : C values. As POA factors have hygroscopicity values well below the linear relationship between SOA hygroscopicity and O : C, mixtures with different POA and SOA fractions exhibit a steeper slope for the increase in κorg with O : C, as observed during this and earlier field studies. This finding helps better understand and reconcile the differences in the relationships between κorg and O : C observed in laboratory and field studies, therefore providing a basis for improved parameterization in global models, especially in a tropical context.


Tight import barriers cover many milk products, but import quotas or prohibitive tariffs have not covered imports of a variety of high-protein specialty products. These products without tariff rate quotas include various casein and milk protein concentrate products. In recent years, imports of milk protein products into the United States have received increasing attention from U.S. dairy interests. A simulation model is used to study the effects of imports of milk protein products on U.S. prices and production of milk protein, on government purchases of dairy products, and on the production, prices and incomes of U.S. milk producers.


Rainer Barbey and Heribert Tommek (eds), Literatur und Anarchie: Das Streben nach Herrschaftefreiheit in der europaischen Literatur vom 19. bis ins 21. Jahrhundert Heidelberg: Synchron Wissenschaftsverlag der Autoren, 2012, 235pp.; ISBN 978-3-939381-43-3This volume is a collection of twelve studies devoted to the relationship between anarchism and literature/ art. Taking a comparative and interdisciplinary approach, it covers several European countries and the period ranging from the second half of the nineteenth century to the present.The first two essays explore the role of anarchism in the German avant-garde at the beginning of the twentieth century. Walter Fahnders clarifies the links between the anarchist intellectuals Gustav Landauer and Erich Muhsam and the Bohemian scene. While Landauer made a clear distinction between anarchism and the anti-bourgeois Bohemian lifestyle, Muhsam revitalized the Bohemian concept by merging it with the Bakunian view of the lumpenproletariat as a potential subject of rebellion. Drawing on a close analysis of the German anarchist press and the writings of Proudhon, Kropotkin and Tolstoy, Hubert van den Berg contends that these anarchist thinkers rejected revolutionary aesthetic forms in favour of conventional idealist concepts of art and literature, emphasizing their political, social, ideological and educational functions. Consequendy, he takes issue with Andre Reszler over the latter s attempt in L'Esthetique anarchiste (1973) to deduce an anti-authoritarian aesthetic from classic anarchist writings, although he concedes that the work and life of a number of modernist artists reveals close affinities between the artistic and political avant-gardes.In one of the two contributions on wider philosophical issues, Martin Lohnig discusses the relationship between state and society in liberal theory, in Erich Miihsam's Die Befreiung der Gesellschaft vom Staat (1932) and in contemporary political thought. He dismisses Muhsam as a radical romantic and idealist and surprisingly accuses him of all people of not having defended the Weimar Republic against the communist and fascist threat. Achim Geisenhansluke analyses Walter Benjamins treatise Zur Kritik der Gewalt (1922). Placing it within the context of the philosophy of history and law, he problematises the tension between violence, law and justice, broaches Benjamins reception in deconstructionist writings and finally illustrates the 'anarchist subversion of the law', using Franz Kafka's story Der neue Advokat ( 1 920) as an example.With Rainer Barbey we return to a conventional literary approach. He studies Hermann Broch s cliche-ridden novel Esch oder die Anarchie (1903), which equates anarchism with violence and destruction, social disintegration, moral decline and mental degeneration. Employing Adornos concept of the authoritarian personality with its dialectics of submission and rebellion, Barbey interprets the protagonist's anarchist leanings as an emotional act of rebellion by a confused and alienated social outsider.Walter Koschmal traces the origins of Russian anarchism in the country's literature, giving special emphasis to Kropotkin's Russian Literature: Ideals and Realities (1915). He demonstrates how the avant-garde painters Kazimir Malevic and Wasilij Kandinsky advocate the use of innovative means of expression against traditionalists like Kropotkin who ignore the aesthetic dimension of literary texts and instead give priority to their utilitarian and didactic aspects. Kandinsky is also the topic of the arthistorical essay by Sebastian Karnatz, who points out structural analogies between political anarchism and Kandinsky s theory of art. He is particularly concerned with how Kandinsky, in the stage composition Der gelbe Klang (1909), translates his theory of a gesamtkunstwerk (total work of art) into practice. …


Feedback signals may be of different modality, latency, and accuracy. To learn and control motor tasks, the feedback available may be redundant, and it would not be necessary to rely on every accessible feedback loop. Which feedback loops should then be utilized? In this article, we propose that the latency is a critical factor to determine which signals will be influential at different learning stages. We use a computational framework to study the role of feedback modules with different latencies in optimal motor control. Instead of explicit gating between modules, the reinforcement learning algorithm learns to rely on the more useful module. We tested our paradigm for two different implementations, which confirmed our hypothesis. In the first, we examined how feedback latency affects the competitiveness of two identical modules. In the second, we examined an example of visuomotor sequence learning, where a plastic, faster somatosensory module interacts with a preacquired, slower visual module. We found that the overall performance depended on the latency of the faster module alone, whereas the relative latency determines the independence of the faster from the slower. In the second implementation, the somatosensory module with shorter latency overtook the slower visual module, and realized better overall performance. The visual module played different roles in early and late learning. First, it worked as a guide for the exploration of the somatosensory module. Then, when learning had converged, it contributed to robustness against system noise and external perturbations. Overall, these results demonstrate that our framework successfully learns to utilize the most useful available feedback for optimal control.


This paper presents a new distance for measuring shape dissimilarity between objects. Recent publications introduced the use of eigenvalues of the Laplace operator as compact shape descriptors. Here, we revisit the eigenvalues to define a proper distance, called Weighted Spectral Distance (WESD), for quantifying shape dissimilarity. The definition of WESD is derived through analyzing the heat trace. This analysis provides the proposed distance with an intuitive meaning and mathematically links it to the intrinsic geometry of objects. We analyze the resulting distance definition, present and prove its important theoretical properties. Some of these properties include: 1) WESD is defined over the entire sequence of eigenvalues yet it is guaranteed to converge, 2) it is a pseudometric, 3) it is accurately approximated with a finite number of eigenvalues, and 4) it can be mapped to the ([0,1)) interval. Last, experiments conducted on synthetic and real objects are presented. These experiments highlight the practical benefits of WESD for applications in vision and medical image analysis.


Replacing lithium ions with sodium ions as the charge carriers in rechargeable batteries can induce noticeable differences in the electrochemical storage mechanisms of electrode materials. Many material parameters, such as particle size, morphology, and the presence of defects, are known to further affect the storage mechanism. Here, we report an investigation of how the introduction of titanium vacancies into anatase TiO2 affects the sodium storage mechanism. From pair distribution function analysis, we observe that sodium ions are inserted into titanium vacancies at the early stage of the discharge process. This is supported by density functional theory calculations, which predict that sodium insertion is more favourable at vacancies than at interstitial sites. Our calculations also show that the intercalation voltage is sensitive to the anion coordination environment of the vacancy. Sodiation to higher concentrations induces a phase transition toward a disordered rhombohedral structure, similar to that observed in defect-free TiO2. Finally, we find that the X-ray diffraction pattern of the rhombohedral phase drastically changes depending on the composition and degree of disorder, providing further comprehension on the sodium storage mechanism of anatase.


This paper examines in a dynamic game-theoretic framework framework, the role of social institution of money and markets in facilitating exchange. It reveals how, depending on the level of transaction costs associated with a market setup (synonymously, trading posts) appropriate monetary trade emerges, which like a hub and spoke network (Starr and Stinchcombe, 1999) makes some markets non-functioning. However, despite the obvious advantages of a market setup in reducing search costs, pure random search for a complementary trading partner prevails in many economies, especially, in many developing economies. This paper models this feature of developing economies by introducing differences in transaction costs across agents and shows why sustainable equilibria might exist exhibiting random search for certain commodities even in the presence of established markets.


We recently reported experimental evidence for double enhancement of spontaneous emission due to increased photon density of states and small group velocity at photonic band-edge frequencies by observing angle-resolved emission and excitation spectra of photoluminescence [K. Kuroda et al., Opt. Express 17, 13168 (2009)]. The specimen we used was a one-dimensional photonic crystal composed of periodic multilayers of Ta2O5 and SiO2 with oxygen vacancies as light emitters. In the present study, we report on the lack of any excitation intensity dependence of the emission peak height and width, which excludes possibilities of nonlinear effects, the polarized emission spectra, and their comparison with theoretical calculations to further confirm our finding.


Bank profitability is a topical issue for a wide range of stakeholders including bank managers and investors, financial supervisors and economic policymakers as well as economists, analysts and journalists.While the general factors affecting the bank, profitability have been thoroughly investigated in the academic literature, differences in the significance of those factors among diverse bank business models and various degrees of banks systemic importance have been analysed less comprehensively. The paper sets out to determine the main factors and their level of impact on profitability of banks in Latvia. The analysis is enhanced by considering three different perspectives of the subdivision of the banking sector in terms of (i) bank business models or (ii) their systemic significance according to the assessment made by both the national supervisory authority and the Single Supervisory Mechanism.The research is based on the analysis of macroeconomic and bank's financial statement data; the conclusions are drawn based on the analysis of a fixed effects cross-section weights panel model. The research has shown that in Latvia bank profitability is affected mostly by factors such as economic environment, inflation, interest rates (spread), competition in the banking sector as well as individual bank overall effectiveness.The findings outline the differences between different bank business models and describe the unique banking market in Latvia from the perspective of bank business decisions, at the same time providing valuable insight on profitability aspects that could prove useful, among other parties, to the national supervisory authority and the European Central Bank in bank profitability analysis and assessment of systemically significant institutions.


In the second millennium b.c., Babylonian scribes assembled a vast collection of astrological omens, believed to be signs from the gods concerning the kingdom's political, military, and agricultural fortunes. The importance of these omens was such that from the eighth or seventh until the first century, the scribes observed the heavens nightly and recorded the dates and locations of ominous phenomena of the moon and planets in relation to stars and constellations. The observations were arranged in monthly reports along with notable events and prices of agricultural commodities, the object being to find correlations between phenomena in the heavens and conditions on earth. These collections of omens and observations form the first empirical science of antiquity and were the basis of the first mathematical science, astronomy. For it was discovered that planetary phenomena, although irregular and sometimes concealed by bad weather, recur in limited periods within cycles in which they are repeated on nearly the same dates and in nearly the same locations.N. M. Swerdlow's book is a study of the collection and observation of ominous celestial phenomena and of how intervals of time, locations by zodiacal sign, and cycles in which the phenomena recur were used to reduce them to purely arithmetical computation, thereby surmounting the greatest obstacle to observation, bad weather. The work marks a striking advance in our understanding of both the origin of scientific astronomy and the astrological divination through which the kingdoms of ancient Mesopotamia were governed.Originally published in 1998.The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These paperback editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.


The present study sought to examine the short-term effect of Fe2O4Zn nanoparticle on histological and enzymatic changes of liver in male Wistar laboratory rats. 24 male Wistar laboratory rats were divided into three groups. The control group included rats which received 0.5 ml of physiological saline. The second and third groups received 0.5 ml of Fe2O4Zn Nano fluid at concentration levels of 100 and 200 ppm for 7 consecutive days. The rats were phlebotomized on days 2, 7, and 14 following the treatment. Serum concentration levels of liver enzymes were measured. The livers were removed from the bodies on day 14. Serum glutamic oxaloacetic transaminase (SGOT), serume glutamic-pyruvic transaminase (SGPT), and alkaline phosphatase (ALP) levels saw a significant increase in both treatment groups compared to the control group on days 2, 7, and 14. Lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) levels, however, showed a reduction in the treatment groups compared to the control group which was not statistically significant. The histopathological analysis of liver tissues in treatment groups pointed to intrahepatocellular lipid accumulation, mild portal inflammation, hepatocyte inflammation, hyperemia, centrilobular, intravascular and portal red blood cell (RBC) aggregation, and centrilobular necrosis. Results from the second treatment group were more drastic than the first treatment group. Results demonstrate the histopathological effects of Fe2O4Zn on liver tissues and enzyme levels in the treatment groups compared to the control group


The civil law tradition considers specific performance the primary remedy for non-performance of obligations, as opposed to awarding damages and termination of contract. In recent years, creditors have rarely sought specific performance due to its costly and complex enforcement. This article focuses on whether specific performance is still efficient in legal practice. Since the fulfillment of monetary obligations is always possible in specie, the article deals with the fulfillment of non-monetary obligations and the enforcement of the court order of specific performance. Moreover, this article focuses on the general rules of specific performance in contract law and also analyses the possibility of demanding the fulfillment of obligations arising from a lease agreement—as lease agreements are distinguished by their continuing performance of obligations being a crucial part of successful commercial practice.


With the shorter time-to-market and the rising cost in SoC development, the demand for post-silicon programmability has been increasing. Recently, programmable accelerators have attracted more attention as an enabling solution for post-silicon engineering change. However, programmable accelerators suffers from 5~10X less energy efficiency than fixed-function accelerators mainly due to their extensive use of memories. This paper proposes a highly energy-efficient accelerator which enables post-silicon engineering change by a control patching mechanism. Then, we propose a patch compilation method from a given pair of an original design and a modified design. Experimental results demonstrate that the proposed accelerators offer high energy efficiency competitive to fixed-function accelerators and can achieve about 5X higher efficiency than the existing programmable accelerators.


The control of multi-legged animal walking is a neuromechanical process where the nervous system produces neural signals to activate the muscles for driving the skeletons (e.g., legs and joints). To model and achieve this process on an artificial multi-legged machine is a difficult and challenging problem. This is because the process needs to model the interaction among the redundant nervous system (i.e., multiple neurons and synapses) and the redundant musculoskeletal systems (i.e., dozens of muscles and joints). Moreover, the two (i.e., neural and musculoskeletal) intrinsic redundancies lead to the kinematic redundancy where determining the joint angles that result in the particular positions at the endpoints of the legs is a tough task. The neurophysiologist Nikolai Bernstein pointed out, these three redundancies cause the difficulties of modeling and achieving a neuromechanical process on an artificial system with many degrees of freedom (DOFs). The modeled neuromechanical process needs in real time 1) to coordinate very many DOFs of jointed legs and muscle-like mechanisms, 2) to generate the proper leg stiffness (i.e., compliance), and 3) to determine joint angles that give rise to particular positions at the endpoints of the legs.

To show a way forward to model these three sub-processes, here we develop and implement neuromechanical controller coupled with sensorimotor learning on the hexapod robot AMOS with 19 DOFs. The controller consists of the modular neural network (MNN) for coordinating 18 joints and several virtual agonist-antagonist muscle mechanisms (VAAMs) for variable compliant joint motions. In addition, sensorimotor learning, including forward models and dual-rate learning processes, is introduced for predicting foot force feedback and for online adjusting the VAAMs' stiffness parameters. The control and learning mechanisms enable the hexapod robot AMOS to achieve adaptive compliant walking that adapts to different gaits (e.g., tripod gaits) and rough surfaces (e.g., gravel). As a result, AMOS can not only well classify rough surfaces, but also perform more energy-efficient walking on them, compared to other small legged robots. In addition, the developed method shows that the tight combination of neural control with tunable muscle-like functions, guided by sensory feedback and coupled with sensorimotor learning, is a way forward to better understand and solve adaptive coordination problems in multi-legged locomotion.

In this thesis, the presented work has seven key contributions: 1) it develops a simplified muscle model for the muscle-like functions that underlie variable compliant joint motions; 2) it presents the underlying muscle-like functions (e.g., brakes) of the VAAMs that are comparable to those of biological muscles; 3) it utilizes a proximo-distal gradient of neural control and muscle functions to enhance the stability of legged robot locomotion under adaptive compliance control; 4) it achieves variable compliant joint motions relying only on force sensing at the end effectors of the legs. Thus, the implementation reduces sensing and design efforts of legged robots; 5) it exploits the compliant joint signals generated by the VAAMs to well classify surfaces without using multiple sensing; 6) it utilizes sensorimotor learning to self-adjust the stiffness parameters of the VAAMs that adapts to insect-like gaits (e.g., tripod gaits) and surfaces (e.g., gravel), thereby leading to more energy-efficient hexapedal walking; 7) it provides a way forward to model stable and adaptive compliant insect-like walking, by implementing a bio-inspired neural network and several virtual agonist-antagonist mechanisms (VAAMs) on the hexapod robot AMOS with 19 DOFs (i.e., probing Bernstein's `degrees of freedom' problem).


Our improved understanding of cell mechano-sensing has been enabled by developments in biomaterials platforms and in vitro culture systems. These emerging systems model key aspects of the cellular niche in a controlled fashion, enabling one to ask and answer questions that could not be addressed in vivo due to the complex interactions of these multiple discrete signals. These emerging materials include key features of the native microenvironment, including complex mechanical properties, degradable domains, and native-scale feature sizes. In this thesis work, we designed a 2D methacrylated hyaluronic acid hydrogel (MeHA) system to recapitulate the multiple adhesive interactions normally present in the developing mesenchymal progenitor cell niche, including an RGD adhesive motif (from fibronectin) and the HAVDI adhesive motif (from NCadherin). This system allowed for the decoupled presentation of cell-ECM interactions and cell-cell interactions while simultaneously modulating other variables present in the microenvironment, such as changes in substrate stiffness. Using this system, we elucidated a new signaling pathway through which HAVDI ligation altered MSC mechanosensing of ECM stiffness, which culminated in downstream differences in cellular proliferation and differentiation. Our findings suggest that HAVDI presentation may be harnessed towards novel biomaterial design to direct cellular behavior and allow for tuning of response to substrate stiffness in regenerative medicine applications. Building from this platform, we further investigated nuclear morphology of MSCs on these 2D MeHA substrates and in native tissue, and showed that nuclear morphology and mechanotransduction were markedly different on planar substrates compared to within the native tissue niche. These findings suggested that dimensionality and the manner by which nuclear pre-stress is established in 3D regulates strain transmission to the nucleus. To better recapitulate these interactions, we cultured cells in 3D MMP-degradable HA hydrogels, and showed that these remodelable systems more accurately recapitulated the in vivo cellular response in vitro. Moving forward, work with these defined synthetic 3D niches will play a critical role in understanding of complex processes governing stem cell development and differentiation, as well as disease pathologies that arise when these processes become disrupted. Degree Type Dissertation Degree Name Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) Graduate Group Bioengineering First Advisor Robert L. Mauck


The concept "social enterprise", despite being widespread, is still of difficult interpretation. What is certain is that social enterprises bring great benefits to different communities or groups of disadvantaged people by managing economic activities. This paper analyzes the situation of social enterprises in Ireland, being Ireland an example of a country in which social enterprises still do not have a nationally accepted and agreed definition. The first part of this work gives an up-to-date representation of the Irish social enterprise sector, while in the second part Camara Education is presented as a specific case of successful Irish social enterprise. The Camara Education model will be presented, together with the results obtained and the beneficial impact on society it generates.


Thermal equation of state (EoS) of synthetic lawsonite [CaAl2Si2O7(OH)2·H2O] has been established using in– situ X–ray diffraction methods under high pressure and high temperature. Sodium chloride NaCl was used as the pressure standard in the experiments. The unit–cell volumes were measured up to 10 GPa and 973 K after the deviatric stress was released at high temperature. The P–V–T dataset was analyzed using a Birch–Murnaghan equation of state, yielding the room pressure volume V0 = 674.2(2) Å3 and the isothermal bulk modulus at room temperature K0 = 129(2) GPa (K′ set to 4). These values are comparable with the previous studies. When fitting the high temperature data, a second order temperature derivative of the bulk modulus was considered. Unlike Daneil et al. (1999) who reported a minimum value of bulk modulus at ~500 K, the bulk modulus decreases with increasing temperature at least up to 973 K. The dataset yields: V0 = 674.3(4) Å3, K0 = 128.7(15) GPa, (∂KT /∂T )P = −0.047(8) GPa K−1, (∂KT /∂T)P = 0.028(6) × 10−3 GPa K−1, α = 3.13(25) × 10−5 K−1, assuming K′ = 4. These data can be used to calculate the density and the stability of lawsonite under high pressure and high temperature conditions.


The Asset Manager Code of Professional Conduct (the Code) is intended to help investment managers provide services in a professional and fair manner, and to make full disclosure of key items. The body of standards specifies the general responsibilities of managers in six broad categories: (1) loyalty to clients, (2) investment process and actions, (3) trading, (4) risk management, compliance, and support, (5) performance reporting and valuation, and (6) disclosures. In addition, the document offers guidance for all of its proposed requirements. The second edition of the Code contains two particularly timely and meaningful enhancements. There are new sections addressing managers' responsibility for establishing and disclosing an organization's risk management process and information to guide managers as they adopt or claim compliance with all principles of the Code. View further details on how to adopt or claim compliance with the Code and submit the acknowledgement form to CFA Institute; visit our web sit...


On August 29, 2013, Dr. McCay Vernon, a pioneer in the education of the deaf who had an incredible impact on the field, passed away at age 84. A psychologist, Mac was indeed "present at the creation." He began his career at a time when little was known about the various etiologies of deafness, when it was assumed that deaf individuals were less intelligent than hearing individuals and that the use of any kind of sign language was detrimental to the development of speech, English, and academic achievement. He changed the thinking behind these assumptions, and many more. His seminal research on the variable impact of different causes of deafness on growth and functioning provided new insights. His work on cognition and deafness established that the cognitive abilities of deaf and hearing persons were equivalent, and his findings on the positive impact of manual communication, educational achievement, linguistic competence, oral skills, and psychological development helped advance the acceptance of manual communication in the classroom. His books They Grow in Silence, with Gene Mindel, and Psychology of Deafness, with Jean Andrews, remain landmark works.Mac was a psychology professor at Western Maryland College (now McDaniel College), Westminster, from 1969 to 1991. There, he attracted and mentored leaders in education, psychology, and genetics and deafness. He became editor of the American Annals of the Deaf in 1969 and led the journal to international prominence. He retired as editor of the Annals in 1989, but remained as a reviewer and member of the Editorial Board for the rest of his life. Upon his retirement, he moved to Saint Augustine, in the state where he had grown up, Florida, and remained active in the fields of psychology, mental health, education, medicine, and the law as they related to deafness.Jean first met Mac 40 years ago when she was a first-year master 's degree student and Mac was teaching the Psychology of Deafness class at Western Maryland. This began a long friendship and years ofproductive collaboration. In his class, Mac would have graduate students who were deaf tell their painful and lonely stories about growing up without sign language. While at Western Maryland, Mac published a second edition of his book, They Grow in Silence, as well as research on preschool education, the role of deaf teachers, deaf-blindness, and the effects of various etiologies on deafness; he was also making documentary films about deafness and serving as editor of the Annals. Mac's research on preparing and hiring deaf teachers is a model my colleagues and I have tried to replicate at other universities. As a young teacher of reading at the Maryland School for the Deaf, in Frederick, I would often stop by Mac's office in nearby Westminster to discuss what I was learning, and Mac suggested that I go to the University of Illinois to study linguistics and reading.After graduating from the University of Illinois, I joined the faculty at Eastern Kentucky University in teacher training. Mac invited me to coauthor the Psychology of Deafness textbook. Six years later, when I moved to Texas to teach at Lamar University, Mac served on doctoral committees for our students, providing many ideas for research as well as mentorship. Around 2000, Mac was instrumental in helping to set up the National Deaf Academy (NDA), in Mount Dora, FL, a facility for the treatment of deaf children and adults with mental health issues. In his earlier research on etiologies, Mac had found that biology (etiologies), home environment (lack of communication), and poor instructional methods can lead to later mental health problems in deaf individuals. …


This paper provides a review of bacterial transport experiments conducted by a multiinvestigator, multiinstitution, multidisciplinary team of researchers under the auspices of the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE). The experiments were conducted during the time period 1999–2001 at a field site near the town of Oyster, Virginia known as the South Oyster Site, and included four major experimental campaigns aimed at understanding and quantifying bacterial transport in the subsurface environment. Several key elements of the research are discussed here: (1) quantification of bacterial transport in physically, chemically, and biologically heterogeneous aquifers, (2) evaluation of the efficacy of conventional colloid filtration theory, (3) scale effects in bacterial transport, (4) development of new methods for microbial enumeration and screening for low adhesion strains, (5) application of novel hydrogeophysical techniques for aquifer characterization, and (6) experiences regarding management of a large field research effort. Lessons learned are summarized in each of these areas. The body of literature resulting from South Oyster Site research has been widely cited and continues to influence research into the controls exerted by aquifer heterogeneity on reactive transport (including microbial transport). It also served as a model (and provided valuable experience) for subsequent and ongoing highly‐instrumented field research efforts conducted by DOE‐sponsored investigators.


Digital elevation models (DEMs) provide us with a digital representation of the continuous land surface. DEMs often contain depressions that result in areas described as having no drainage, referred to as sinks or pits. These depressions disrupt the drainage surface, which preclude routing of flow over the surface. Sinks arise when a connected component of pixels occurring at the same elevation level is surrounded by pixels of higher elevation, or when two cells flow into each other resulting in a flow loop, or the inability for flow to exit a cell and be routed through the grid. Hydrologic parameters derived from DEMs, such as flow accumulation, flow direction, upslope contributing area and river network detection require sinks to be removed (Maune, 2001). Naturally occurring sinks in elevation data with a grid cell size of 100m2 or larger are rare in terrains modelled by fluvial erosion processes. They could occur more frequently in glaciated or karst topographies. Various algorithms have been proposed to detect and remove surface depressions, such as elevation-smoothing method (Mark 1984), depression-filling algorithms (Jenson and Domingue, 1988; Soille and Ansoult, 1990; Tarboton et al., 1991), breaching (Martz and Garbrecht, 1998) carving method (Soille et al., 2003) or hybrid method combining carving and depression filling (Soille, 2004). For a detailed review it is possible to refer to e.g. Reuter et al. (2008) or Wang and Liu (2006). Lindsay and Creed (2005) compared the performance of different algorithms on various slope classes and landforms using a very high resolution dataset. However there is few information on the influence of the various algorithms on the accuracy of the positioning of the extracted networks. The aim of this study was to assess the effects of three pit removal methods on the position of river networks extracted from the SRTM dataset.


Controversy regarding Human embryonic Stem Cell (hESC) research is evident in the medical and scientific community, legislative, judicial, and executive branches of the government, private companies, religious affiliations, special interest groups, and among the general American public. Stem cells are derived from adult stem cell resources, which are termed non-embyronic or from the cells of immature blastocytes termed embryonic stem cells. Non-embryonic cells do not have the ability to differentiate into other specialized tissues, whereas embryonic cells are capable of differentiating into almost any type of tissue. hESC research, which is the focus of this paper, includes the direct creation and therapeutic cloning of human embryos, known as somatic cell nuclear transfer (SCNT) during the blastocyte-stage of development, the use of surplus embryos from in vitro fertilization, and from tissue derived from extracted embryos through abortion. The purpose of hESC research is threefold: (1) to advance science and medicine, (2) prevent disease, and (3) cure certain diseases. hESC research is an ethical dilemma facing the United States of America. Opponents of hESC often cite the rights of the embryo and define the embryo at conception. Supporters of hESC research include the scientific and medical community, and private hESC research companies. The unique political system of the United States has allowed for a dichotomous policy to arise, where federal funding of hESC is prohibited, but private companies and individual states are able to legally forge a path in hESC research. The prohibition of federal funds has created an abyss between states who choose to fund hESC research and those who prohibit it. It has also set the stage for yet another private corporation to advance in hESC and place profit above the American public. The embryo is the only silent member of this debate.


The formulas of the quantum electrodynamics have been applied to calculate the spontaneous emission rate of excited atom in dielectric microcavity. The results exhibit damping oscillating patterns which depend sensitively on the scaling parameter and geometrical structure. Compared with the case that the emitting atom is immersed in dielectric, the spontaneous emission rate is depressed obviously and the center or the mean value of the oscillations is intimately related to the real refractive index of the local position where the atom is. In order to explain this phenomenon, we utilize the closed-orbit theory to deal with the classical trajectories of the emitted photon, and extract the corresponding frequencies of the oscillations by Fourier transform. It is found that the oscillations can be represented in terms of the closed-orbits of the photon motion constrained in dielectric microcavity, thus providing another perspective on the spontaneous emission of atom sandwiched by dielectric slabs.


1. Probability Models in Electrical and Computer Engineering. Mathematical models as tools in analysis and design. Deterministic models. Probability models. Statistical regularity. Properties of relative frequency. The axiomatic approach to a theory of probability. Building a probability model. A detailed example: a packet voice transmission system. Other examples. Communication over unreliable channels. Processing of random signals. Resource sharing systems. Reliability of systems. Overview of book. Summary. Problems. 2. Basic Concepts of Probability Theory. Specifying random experiments. The sample space. Events. Set operations. The axioms of probability. Discrete sample spaces. Continuous sample spaces. Computing probabilities using counting methods. Sampling with replacement and with ordering. Sampling without replacement and with ordering. Permutations of n distinct objects. Sampling without replacement and without ordering. Sampling with replacement and without ordering. Conditional probability. Bayes' Rule. Independence of events. Sequential experiments. Sequences of independent experiments. The binomial probability law. The multinomial probability law. The geometric probability law. Sequences of dependent experiments. A computer method for synthesizing randomness: random number generators. Summary. Problems. 3. Random Variables. The notion of a random variable. The cumulative distribution function. The three types of random variables. The probability density function. Conditional cdf's and pdf's. Some important random variables. Discrete random variables. Continuous random variables. Functions of a random variable. The expected value of random variables. The expected value of X. The expected value of Y = g(X). Variance of X. The Markov and Chebyshev inequalities. Testing the fit of a distribution to data. Transform methods. The characteristic function. The probability generating function. The laplace transform of the pdf. Basic reliability calculations. The failure rate function. Reliability of systems. Computer methods for generating random variables. The transformation method. The rejection method. Generation of functions of a random variable. Generating mixtures of random variables. Entropy. The entropy of a random variable. Entropy as a measure of information. The method of a maximum entropy. Summary. Problems. 4. Multiple Random Variables. Vector random variables. Events and probabilities. Independence. Pairs of random variables. Pairs of discrete random variables. The joint cdf of X and Y. The joint pdf of two jointly continuous random variables. Random variables that differ in type. Independence of two random variables. Conditional probability and conditional expectation. Conditional probability. Conditional expectation. Multiple random variables. Joint distributions. Independence. Functions of several random variables. One function of several random variables. Transformation of random vectors. pdf of linear transformations. pdf of general transformations. Expected value of functions of random variables. The correlation and covariance of two random variables. Joint characteristic function. Jointly Gaussian random variables. n jointly Gaussian random variables. Linear transformation of Gaussian random variables. Joint characteristic function of Gaussian random variables. Mean square estimation. Linear prediction. Generating correlated vector random variables. Generating vectors of random variables with specified covariances. Generating vectors of jointly Gaussian random variables. Summary. Problems. 5. Sums of Random Variables and Long-Term Averages. Sums of random variables. Mean and variance of sums of random variables. pdf of sums of independent random variables. Sum of a random number of random variables. The sample mean and the laws of large numbers. The central limit theorem. Gaussian approximation for binomial probabilities. Proof of the central limit theorem. Confidence intervals. Case 1: Xj's Gaussian unknown mean and known variance. Case 2: Xj's Gaussian mean and variance unknown. Case 3: Xj's Non-Gaussian mean and variance unknown. Convergence of sequences of random variables. Long-term arrival rates and associated averages. Long-term time averages. A computer method for evaluating the distribution of a random variable using the discrete Fourier transform. Discrete random variables. Continuous random variables. Summary. Problems. Appendix: subroutine FFT(A,M,N). 6. Random Processes. Definition of a random process. Specifying of a random process. Joint distributions of time samples. The mean, autocorrelation, and autocovariance functions. Gaussian random processes. Multiple random processes. Examples of discrete-time random processes. iid random processes. Sum processes the binomial counting and random walk processes. Examples of continuous-time random processes. Poisson process. Random telegraph signal and other processes derived from the Poisson Process. Wiener process and Brownian motion. Stationary random processes. Wide-sense stationary random processes. Wide-sense stationary Gaussian random processes. Cylostationary random processes. Continuity, derivative, and integrals of random processes. Mean square continuity. Mean square derivatives. Mean square integrals. Response of a linear system to random input. Time averages of random processes and ergodic theorems. Fourier series and Karhunen-Loeve expansion. Karhunen-Loeve expansion. Summary. Problems. 7. Analysis and Processing of Random Signals. Power spectral density. Continuous-time random processes. Discrete-time random processes. Power spectral density as a time average. Response of linear systems to random signals. Continuous-time systems. Discrete-time systems. Amplitude modulation by random signals. Optimum linear systems. The orthogonality condition. Prediction. Estimation using the entire realization of the observed process. Estimation using causal filters. The Kalman filter. Estimating the power spectral density. Variance of periodogram estimate. Smoothing of periodogram estimate. Summary. Problems. 8. Markov Chains. Markov processes. Discrete-time Markov chains. The n-step transition probabilities. The state probabilities. Steady state probabilities. Continuous-time Markov chains. State occupancy times. Transition rates and time-dependent state probabilities. Steady state probabilities and global balance equations. Classes of states, recurrence properties, and limiting probabilities. Classes of states. Recurrence properties. Limiting probabilities. Limiting probabilities for continuous-time Markov chains. Time-reversed Markov chains. Time-reversible Markov chains. Time-reversible continuous-time Markov chains. Summary. Problems. 9. Introduction to Queueing Theory. The elements of a queueing system. Little's formula. The M/M/I queue. Distribution of number in the system. Delay distribution in M/M/I system and arriving customer's distribution. The M/M/I system with finite capacity. Multi-server systems: M/M/c, M/M/c/c, and M/M/infinity. Distribution of number in the M/M/c system. Waiting time distribution for M/M/c. The M/M/c/c queueing system. The M/M/infinity queueing system. Finite-source queueing systems. Arriving customer's distribution. M/G/I queueing systems. The residual service time. Mean delay in M/G/I systems. Mean delay in M/G/I systems with priority service discipline. M/G/I analysis using embedded Markov chains. The embedded Markov chains. The number of customers in an M/G/I system. Delay and waiting time distribution in an M/G/I system. Burke's theorem: Departures from M/M/c systems Proof of Burke's theorem using time reversibility. Networks of queues: Jackson's theorem. Open networks of queues. Proof of Jackson's theorem. Closed networks of queues. Mean value analysis. Proof of the arrival theorem. Summary. Problems. Appendix A. Mathematical Tables. Appendix B. Tables of Fourier Transformation. Appendix C. Computer Programs for Generating Random Variables. Answers to Selected Problems. Index.


Commodity applications can pose a serious threat to users' confidential information when they do not have sufficient security features or are configured improperly. This problem is difficult due to the unavailability of these applications' source code, which renders the techniques such as compiler-level security enhancement hard to apply. Existing solutions rely on either system-call level control, which is often too coarse-grained, or instruction-level dataflow tracking, which is too expensive to operate online. In this paper, we present a new solution called Leapfrog which retrofits binary executables with mandatory dataflow control. Our technique enables a "patched" application to perform fine-grained dataflow control at a performance penalty which in many cases can be neglected. This is achieved through a novel technique that tracks sensitive data flows only at a small set of program locations: each location uses the program's internal state and pre-computed conditions to predict the path the data flows will go through and the next location they will reach. As a result, the sensitive data can be followed until they are to be sent out to the Internet, where they are controlled according to security policies. Such dataflow tracking and control is supported by an offline analysis which identifies the execution paths for processing sensitive data and the conditions for the data to propagate along these paths. We further mitigate the coverage concern of this analysis through enforcing a security policy that disallows highly sensitive data to be processed by unknown execution paths without disrupting a program's operations. Leapfrog works on multithreaded applications and can attach code to an application without functionally altering its executable files. Our evaluations show that our technique effectively protects sensitive information in misconfigured applications and those with security flaws, and also incurs a small runtime overhead.


Abstract In this article we suggest a new multivariate autoregressive process for modeling time-dependent extreme value distributed observations. The idea behind the approach is to transform the original observations to latent variables that are univariate normally distributed. Then the vector autoregressive DCC model is fitted to the multivariate latent process. The distributional properties of the suggested model are extensively studied. The process parameters are estimated by applying a two-stage estimation procedure. We derive a prediction interval for future values of the suggested process. The results are applied in an empirically study by modeling the behavior of extreme daily stock prices.


Abstract We report here on the chemical analysis by portable x-ray fluorescence (PXRF) and laser ablation-inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry (LA-ICP-MS) of 438 obsidian flakes recovered from Sepik coastal sites spanning the last two millennia of prehistory. Our results demonstrate the continuous involvement of local people in exchange networks moving obsidian from both the Admiralty Islands and West New Britain to this coast, possibly as far back as the mid-Holocene. Suspected early assemblages contain significantly higher frequencies of obsidian from the more distant sources on New Britain. Assemblages dated to after ~2000 calBP contain obsidian predominately from the nearer Admiralty sources. Site by site differences in the relative frequencies of obsidian from different Admiralty sub-sources suggest that prehistoric patterns of interaction on the coast were complex, and cannot be accounted for by simple patterns of 'down the line' connections. Keywords: Papua New Guinea, Sepik coast, Obsidian, LA-ICP-MS, portable XRF Prehistory on the Sepik coast The Sepik coast, by which we mean the coastline and small offshore islands between the urban centers of Jayapura and Madang (Terrell 2001: 213, in press) is today the home of upwards of 60 languages belonging to 24 distinct language families. Even so, this coast is the setting for wide-reaching exchange relationships among communities structured by inheritable trans-generational friendships (sometimes also called trade or exchange 'partnerships') that cross linguistic and cultural boundaries (Terrell, et al. 1997: 549-557; Welsch and Terrell 1998)--relationships contrary to the commonsense idea that great linguistic diversity must be a sign of great isolation between people and places (Terrell 2001: 213, 2010). From a prehistorian's perspective, it is of interest to understand the long-term history of social networks on the coast, and whether the kinds of intensive connections that exist today, crossing ethnic and linguistic boundaries, may also have existed in the past. On current evidence, New Guinea and its major offshore islands have been settled for approximately 40,000 years, and there is some evidence to suggest that people may have been living on the north coast near modern day Vanimo as early as 35,000 years ago (Terrell 2002: 10-11). However, the Sepik coast for the most part probably did not support any sizable populations until around 6000-7000 years ago, when Holocene sea levels had stabilized sufficiently for productive lagoons to form. Prior to this, the coastline rose steeply from the sea to the Torricelli Mountains, providing little productivity for humans to exploit (Pope and Terrell 2007: 10; Terrell 2004: 603-605). During 1993 and 1994, Terrell and Rob Welsch undertook a program of combined ethnographic and archaeological survey work along the Sepik coast between the modern towns of Leitre and Wewak in the context of the Field Museum of Natural History Alfred B. Lewis Project (Fig. 1), and later returned to conduct excavations at archaeological sites in the vicinity of modern day Aitape on the New Guinea mainland (NGRP 16, 22, and 23) and on nearby Tumleo Island (NGRP 46) (Terrell and Schechter no date; Terrell and Welsch 1990, 1997). Their team's surface collections and excavations have revealed extensive evidence for continuous settlement along the Sepik coast dating back at least two millennia, although aceramic inland contexts near modern-day Kobom associated with the mid-Holocene shoreline are suspected to be far older, as are find spots on Ali Island, where a single sherd of Lapita style (~3500-2200/1600 BP) was recovered (Terrell and Welsch 1997: 558-559). We report here on chemical compositional analysis by Laser Ablation-Inductively Coupled Plasma-Mass Spectrometry (LA-ICP-MS) and portable X-ray Fluorescence (PXRF) of 438 pieces of obsidian recovered from the Sepik coast. …


A 6 mon (6 hr/day, 5 days/week) inhalation toxicity study was conducted with cyanogen gas using male rhesus monkeys (Macacca mulatta) and male albino rats (Charles River Strain) as experimental animals. Fifteen monkeys and 90 rats were divided into three groups of 5 monkeys and 30 rats. One group, the Controls, was not exposed to the test material; the other two groups were exposed to either 11 ppm or 25 ppm cyanogen. At the outset of exposures, there was a doubling of the rate of responding on a variable interval 2.9 min schedule of reinforcement in monkeys exposed to 25 ppm cyanogen, and increases were also seen in the monkeys receiving 11 ppm exposures; the increases were transitory as the rate returned to control levels before exposures were terminated. At the end of the 6 mon exposure, there were no effects in hematologic or clinical chemistry parameters attributable to the inhalation exposure to cyanogen. The electrocardiograms, and gross pathologic and histopathologic examinations of test animals were normal when compared with the Control animals. Total lung moisture content was significantly lower in monkeys exposed to either 11 ppm or 25 ppm cyanogen than in Control animals. Body weights were significantly lower in rats exposed to 25 ppm than in Controls. The results suggest that subchronic 25 ppm cyanogen exposures are marginally toxic, but the evidence on 11 ppm does not support a similar conclusion.


Over the past decade the popularity of black writers including E. Lynn Harris and Terry McMillan has been hailed as an indication that an active African American reading public has come into being. Yet this is not a new trend; there is a vibrant history of African American literacy, literary associations, and book clubs. Forgotten Readers reveals that neglected past, looking at the reading practices of free blacks in the antebellum north and among African Americans following the Civil War. It places the black upper and middle classes within American literary history, illustrating how they used reading and literary conversation as a means to assert their civic identities and intervene in the political and literary cultures of the United States from which they were otherwise excluded.

Forgotten Readers expands our definition of literacy and urges us to think of literature as broadly as it was conceived of in the nineteenth century. Elizabeth McHenry delves into archival sources, including the records of past literary societies and the unpublished writings of their members. She examines particular literary associations, including the Saturday Nighters of Washington, D.C., whose members included Jean Toomer and Georgia Douglas Johnson. She shows how black literary societies developed, their relationship to the black press, and the ways that African American women's clubs—which flourished during the 1890s—encouraged literary activity. In an epilogue, McHenry connects this rich tradition of African American interest in books, reading, and literary conversation to contemporary literary phenomena such as Oprah Winfrey's book club.


The academic, career and personal needs of students of Ambrose Alli University, Ekpoma-Nigeria were surveyed. A total of 920 undergraduates participated in this study. The results of the study revealed that irrespective of students' residential status, gender, age and relationship status, the students ranked time-management as the most pressing counseling need. This was followed in this order: drug concerns, family problems, career needs, relationship problems, finance, sexual harassment, academic ability, personality types, anxiety/depression, differential treatment and serf-evaluation. The results further indicated among others that female students were more in need of financial counseling than their male counterparts. Single students had more assertive/communication needs than their married colleagues. In addition, the study also revealed that students residing on the campus had more counseling needs on how to foster and sustain a stable relationship than those not residing on the campus. In view of these, counseling interventions for implementation that are geared towards helping students meet with their needs were further provided. ********** Over the years, the importance of periodically assessing the identifiable needs of students before undertaking, designing and delivering effective counseling services and programs is well established (Bishop, Bauer & Becker, 1998; Gallagher, 1992; Morrill, Oetting, & Hurst, 1974, as cited in Gallagher, Golin & Kelleher, 1992). Despite the availability of counseling centers in few universities in Nigeria, majority of their students do not avail themselves of the services of these counseling centers. Even where the counseling centers exist, most of these centers provide services for students without even attempting to assess the needs of the students targeted for these services (Aluede, Uadia, Aluede & Igbineweka, 2002; Tawari, 1986). The needs of university students vary from academic, social to psychological. These needs are dynamic in nature; as they may shift with changes in age, experience, socioeconomic status, gender, ethnicity and social trends (Papalia, Olds, & Feldman, 1998). Hence, the need for an accurate and a regular assessment of college student needs (Gallagher, Golin, & Kelleher, 1992). An accurate and perpetual assessment of these changing needs is crucial to the development of effective student service programs. Therefore, needs assessment is particularly important in the light of the increasing diversity of students, their changing personal and career needs, and the heightened accountability demands that confront student services (Friedlander, 1978, cited in Barrow, Cox, Sepich & Spivak, 1989). Gallagher, Christofidis, Gill, and Graham-Weaver (1996) and Roark, (1993) found that there is an increase in the severity of student concerns. Research has also identified an increase in the unique needs of students in the following areas: drug abuse, alcohol use, eating, weight problems, sexual assault and harassment, violence and AIDS (Bertocci, Hirsch, Sommer, & Williams, 1992). Although, questions about the efficacy of needs assessment studies in predicting the actual use of counseling centers by students has been raised, Gallagher et al., (1992) found that these studies continue to be the most efficient way of identifying student concerns. Therefore, the needs of the students have to be identified prior to designing or modifying counseling data from different sources, including students, faculty and administrators. Moreover, counseling center data are very important in identifying the actual services provided by the staff, problem areas, and differences between actual and stated priorities (Bishop, 1991). Areas students seek help include: overcoming their procrastination; public speaking anxiety; improvement in their study skills; career uncertainty; self-confidence problems; lack of motivation; fear of failure; depression; lack of purpose in life; anxiety and nervousness (Gallagher, 1992). …


Software reliability has become more important than ever in recent years, as a wide spectrum of software solutions are being used on various platforms. To this end, runtime monitoring is one of the most promising and feasible solutions for enhancing software reliability. In particular, runtime monitoring of parametric properties (parametric monitoring) has been receiving growing attention for its suitability in object-oriented systems. Despite many parametric monitoring approaches that have been proposed recently, they are still not widely used in real applications, implying that parametric monitoring is not sufficiently practical yet. In this dissertation, three perspectives for better practicality of parametric monitoring are proposed: expressiveness, efficiency, and scalability. A number of techniques on all three perspectives are developed and integrated to the JavaMOP framework, which is a formalism-independent, extensible runtime monitoring framework for parametric properties. One limitation in expressing parametric properties is that the first event must alway initiate all parameters. This limitation is removed in the proposed work to improve expressiveness of parametric monitoring. Further, a new logical formalism, PTCaRet, is introduced for describing properties of the call stack. As for efficiency, the 'enable set optimization', the 'indexing cache', and the 'monitor garbage collection' are proposed for optimizing creation of monitors, access to monitors, and termination of monitors, respectively. In addition, several scalable parametric monitoring techniques are introduced. These techniques, for the first time, allow a large number of simultaneous parametric specifications to be monitored efficiently. The optimization techniques presented in this dissertation were implemented into the JavaMOP framework, yielding JavaMOP 3.0, the latest and most efficient version of JavaMOP. Thorough evaluations show that these techniques can improve runtime performance of JavaMOP by 3 times on average, and up to 63 times in some cases; as for memory usage, by 3 times on average. While Tracematches and the previous version of JavaMOP crashed on several cases due to out of memory errors, the newer version of JavaMOP did not crash on any case during the evaluations. Considering that the previous version of JavaMOP was one of the most efficient parametric monitoring frameworks in terms of runtime performance, the results presented in the dissertation can be argued significant.


A standard method to obtain stochastic models for symbolic time series is to train state-emitting hidden Markov models (SE-HMMs) with the Baum-Welch algorithm. Based on observable operator models (OOMs), in the last few months a number of novel learning algorithms for similar purposes have been developed: (1,2) two versions of an "efficiency sharpening" (ES) algorithm, which iteratively improves the statistical efficiency of a sequence of OOM estimators, (3) a constrained gradient descent ML estimator for transition-emitting HMMs (TE-HMMs). We give an overview on these algorithms and compare them with SE-HMM/EM learning on synthetic and real-life data.


In recent years, library have been engaged in an evolutionary process, focusing on services to the public and the transformation of their spaces into third places. They are increasingly focusing their strategies on the development of partnerships and ways to increase membership.
This transformation also involves programming around digital cultures, which makes it possible to attract, retain and above all crossroads new audiences around unifying projects.
In this mutation, the role of the librarians also changes towards more animation and socialization, of trainers, of accompaniers on the borderline of confidants. The general observation quite often shows that this relationship between users of the library creates quite intimate relationships that lead to a loving relationship.

This study is based on a request from the FESSEUL Association to organise an event on 14 February 2019 at the library of the French Institute in Dakar.
Upon receipt of the request, librarians and users gave meaning to the debate since they all received, at one time or another, a declaration of love from one or more users or even are victims of harassment.
During the event, we gathered testimonies that prove that more and more couples are forming in libraries and this can be explained by the fact that librarians and users spend most of their time together, rubbing shoulders and enjoying each other.
One component of this article will focus on the testimonies of library professionals who are constantly harassed by users. This raises several questions. Indeed, how to be open and firm while playing a role of mediator close to your public in the library.

This study will also ask other questions:

1. How are library personal-relationships born and how long do they last?
2. When the feelings are not shared, what approaches can be used to promote good working conditions ?
3. If one of them does not consent to this love, especially the librarian, how should he protect himself while maintaining a good relationship with the user?

In short, the article will share the love in the library as it is experienced and felt by West Africans.


[1] The Southern Hemisphere Additional Ozonesondes (SHADOZ) project has collected more than 3000 ozone profiles from 14 tropical and subtropical sites using balloon-borne electrochemical concentration cell (ECC) ozonesondes flown with standard radiosondes. Published analysis of ozonesonde precision from SHADOZ profiles measured in 1998–2000 revealed that variations in ozonesonde technique might cause small station-to-station biases in the total ozone measurement. We present further evaluation of imprecisions and accuracy based on 1998–2004 SHADOZ data, results from laboratory simulations of ozonesonde flights, and a revised back-scattered ultraviolet algorithm, the TOMS version 8, 2004 release. The laboratory studies used standard ECC ozonesondes in a flight simulation chamber to evaluate techniques used at SHADOZ stations. Ozone deviations from a standard ozone instrument in the chamber tests resemble those of SHADOZ station data relative to a SHADOZ-defined climatological reference. Certain systematic variations in SHADOZ ozone profiles are accounted for by differences in solution composition, data processing, and instrument manufacturer. When SHADOZ total ozone column amounts are compared to the new TOMS algorithm, discrepancies between sonde and satellite decline 1–2 percentage points on average, compared to version 7 TOMS.


Phylogeography and population structure of the ant Formica exsecta was studied across Eurasia by using mtDNA sequences and microsatellite genotypes. The phylogeny based on 1.5 kb mtDNA fragment including the cytochrome b and part of the ND6 gene showed significant division (1.63% of nucleotide divergence) between a haplotype from Tibet and all other haplotypes. Similar to findings in diverse array of species associated with forest in Eurasia, the mtDNA phylogeny revealed no evidence for vicariant events due to separation in different forest refugia over glacial periods. The haplotype network includes several small clades (with 2-4 haplotypes in each) with geographically limited distribution, but one geographical region may have received haplotypes from two or more of such clades. This pattern could indicate mixing of different gene pools during postglacial colonization of Europe from different forest refugia or from an ancestral source with some spatial genetic differentiation. The genealogy and the haplotype frequencies suggest postglacial colonization of Siberia from a single refugial source of limited size. Maternal and biparental DNA markers indicated a moderate but significant level of population differentiation (mtDNA Phi(ST) = 0.42, microsatellite F-ST = 0.13) across Eurasia. However, no correlation between genetic differentiation estimated for mtDNA and microsatellites was found among the populations. Considerable reduction in microsatellite genetic diversity was found in the small population of F. exsecta in England, giving some basis to classify this population as near threatened.


Abstract: Most nations have experienced an internal armed conflict since 1960. The past decade has witnessed an explosion of research into the causes and consequences of civil wars, belatedly bringing the topic into the economics mainstream. This article critically reviews this interdisciplinary literature and charts productive paths forward. Formal theory has focused on a central puzzle: why do civil wars occur at all when, given the high costs of war, groups have every incentive to reach an agreement that avoids fighting? Explanations have focused on information asymmetries and the inability to sign binding contracts in the absence of the rule of law. Economic theory has made less progress, however, on the thornier (but equally important) problems of why armed groups form and cohere, and why individuals decide to fight. Likewise, the actual behavior of armed organizations and their leaders is poorly understood. On the empirical side, a vast cross-country econometric literature has aimed to identify the causes of civil war. While most work is plagued by econometric identification problems, low per capita incomes, slow economic growth and geographic conditions favoring insurgency are the factors most robustly linked to civil war. We argue that micro-level analysis and data are needed to truly decipher war's causes, and understand the recruitment, organization, and conduct of armed groups. Recent advances in this area are highlighted. Finally, turning to the economic legacies of war, we frame the literature in terms of neoclassical economic growth theory. Emerging stylized facts include the ability of some economies to experience rapid macroeconomic recoveries, while certain human capital impacts appear more persistent. Yet econometric identification has not been adequately addressed, and there is little consensus on the most effective policies to avert conflicts or promote postwar recovery. The evidence is weakest where it is arguably most important: in understanding civil wars' effects on institutions, technology, and social norms.


Purpose To explore which microperimetry sensitivity index (pointwise sensitivity, mean sensitivity, and volume sensitivity) is suitable as a microperimetry outcome measure in patients with X-linked RPGR-associated retinitis pigmentosa (RP). Methods Microperimetry data from patients with RPGR-associated RP were collected and analyzed retrospectively. Fourteen participants completed triplicate microperimetry testing, across 2 consecutive days for the repeatability analyses. Longitudinal data was obtained from 13 participants who completed microperimetry testing at two separate visits. Results The test–retest coefficients of repeatability (CoR) for pointwise sensitivity were ±9.5 dB and ±9.3 dB, in the right and left eyes, respectively. The mean sensitivity CoR for the right and left eyes was ±0.7 dB and ±1.3 dB. Volume sensitivity CoR was ±144.5 dB*deg2 and ±324.2 dB*deg2 for the right and left eyes, respectively. The mean sensitivities were positively skewed toward zero in those with a high number of nonseeing points (arbitrarily assigned to −1.0 dB) and just seen points (0.0 dB). Volume sensitivities were unaffected by the averaging effects of skewed data. Conclusions Clinical trials should report population-specific test–retest variability to determine a clinically significant change. Pointwise sensitivity indices should be used with caution as outcome measures in clinical trials owing to high levels of test–retest variability. Global indices seem to be less prone to variability. Volume sensitivity indices seem to be superior for use in RPGR-associated RP clinical trials compared with mean sensitivity because they are unaffected by the averaging effects of highly skewed data. Translational Relevance Careful selection of sensitivity indices (VA) is required when using microperimetry as a clinical trial outcome measure.


CERES, with the help of ARPA-E funding, has rethought biofuels from the ground up. Their forward thinking approach to overcoming the traditional barriers for biofuels has resulted in creating high biomass feedstocks for switchgrass, sorghum, and miscanthus varietals. These new breeds grow taller and thicker on traditionally low rent farmland that doesn't compete with corn or other food crops.


Background: Many efforts are made to find new and more effective treatments for psoriasis. Intralesional 5-Fluorouracil (5-FU) +epinephrine is a cheap option which can be administered with long intervals. The effectiveness of Pulse Dye Laser (PDL) on psoriasis has been already assessed. We decided to evaluate the effectiveness of 5-FU+epinephrine and compare it to betamethasone and PDL. Methods: A group of 22 patients with chronic stable plaque psoriasis were included. Three plaques on each patient were treated with 5FU+epinephrine, PDL and betamethasone, respectively. Psoriasis Severity Index (PSI) scoring was applied to assess each plaque before treatment and in weeks 2, 4, 6, 12, and 24. Photos of each plaque were taken before treatment and at each treatment and follow-up session. They were finally compared and scored by a dermatologist. Results: Decline in mean Psoriasis Severity Index (PSI) in week 6 (2 weeks after treatment) and in week 24 (the last follow-up session) was statistically significant as compared to baseline in all groups. (P<0.001) The highest decline in mean PSI score was in the 5-FU+epinephrine group while the lowest belonged to the PDL group (80% vs. 27%).The mean period of remission in the 5-FU+epinephrine group was significantly longer in comparison to the two other groups. (P<0.001) In photographic evaluation, the best response was observed in the 5FU+epinephrine group. Conclusion: 5-FU+epinephrine is a cheap option which can provide a rapid response and long remission .With respect to limited effectiveness, short remission and high cost; PDL dose not seem to be a preferred choice in the treatment of psoriasis. (Iran J Dermatol 2009;12:36-41)


Progressive image transmission (PIT) provides multiple image resolutions that favors a time-critical or a low-band channel environment. In this paper, a PIT based watermarking for multi-resolution image authentication is proposed. The image content with progressive characteristic is taken as the authentication code. The authentication code is then embedded according to multi-resolution image encoding. The experimental results show the validity of the proposed scheme. Malicious operations are detected progressively from multi-resolution images. The significant tampering can be detected firstly and slight tampering is detected in the later authentication stages. Furthermore, the tampered locations can be located correctly.


The primary objective of this article is to provide a map of Imam Samudra's thinking behind Bali bombing I as written in his book Aku Melawan Teroris to those who are not able to read the book in its original Indonesian language with an assumption that counterideological effort cannot be executed effectively without understanding the ideas held by terrorism perpetrators. To add value, the article also offers a comparative study between Samudra's thinking and Al Qaeda's ideology. It then points out and provides brief alternative viewpoints to Samudra's thinking. The article ends with some policy recommendations pertaining to counterideological work.


Convolutional neural networks (CNN) can be manipulated to perform specific behaviors when encountering a particular trigger pattern without affecting the performance on normal samples, which is referred to as backdoor attack. The back-door attack is usually achieved by injecting a small proportion of poisoned samples into the training set, through which the victim trains a model embedded with the designated backdoor. In this work, we demonstrate that backdoor neurons are exposed by their pre-activation distributions, where populations from benign data and poisoned data show significantly different moments. This property is shown to be attack-invariant and allows us to efficiently locate backdoor neurons. On this basis, we make several proper assumptions on the neuron activation distributions, and propose two backdoor neuron detection strategies based on (1) the differential entropy of the neurons, and (2) the Kullback-Leibler divergence between the benign sample distribution and a poisoned statistics based hypothetical distribution. Experimental results show that our proposed defense strategies are both efficient and effective against various backdoor attacks. Source code is available here.


Abstract. For a systematic mapping of the Martian surface, the Mars Express orbiter is equipped with a multi-line scanner: Since the beginning of 2004 the High Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC) regularly acquires long image strips. By now more than 4,000 strips covering nearly the whole planet are available. Due to the nine channels, each with different viewing direction, and partly with different optical filters, each strip provides 3D and color information and allows the generation of digital terrain models (DTMs) and orthophotos. To map larger regions, neighboring HRSC strips can be combined to build DTM and orthophoto mosaics. The global mapping scheme Mars Chart 30 is used to define the extent of these mosaics. In order to avoid unreasonably large data volumes, each MC-30 tile is divided into two parts, combining about 90 strips each. To ensure a seamless fit of these strips, several radiometric and geometric corrections are applied in the photogrammetric process. A simultaneous bundle adjustment of all strips as a block is carried out to estimate their precise exterior orientation. Because size, position, resolution and image quality of the strips in these blocks are heterogeneous, also the quality and distribution of the tie points vary. In absence of ground control points, heights of a global terrain model are used as reference information, and for this task a regular distribution of these tie points is preferable. Besides, their total number should be limited because of computational reasons. In this paper, we present an algorithm, which optimizes the distribution of tie points under these constraints. A large number of tie points used as input is reduced without affecting the geometric stability of the block by preserving connections between strips. This stability is achieved by using a regular grid in object space and discarding, for each grid cell, points which are redundant for the block adjustment. The set of tie points, filtered by the algorithm, shows a more homogenous distribution and is considerably smaller. Used for the block adjustment, it yields results of equal quality, with significantly shorter computation time. In this work, we present experiments with MC-30 half-tile blocks, which confirm our idea for reaching a stable and faster bundle adjustment. The described method is used for the systematic processing of HRSC data.


The ion densities have been measured from year 1995-1998, using RPA payload of SROSSC2 satellite to study the effect of solar flares on ion density. Solar flare data has been obtained from National Geophysical Data Center (NGDC) Boulder, Colorado (USA). Study indicates considerable decrease in total ion density during flare time compared to normal time. This decrease varies from 1.2 to 2.8 times. Out of four ion species – O + , O2 + , H + and He + as measured by SROSS – C2, O + ion density is most affected by the effects of the flare. There is considerable decrease in O + ion density while O2 + , H + and He + density show negligible change during flare time compared to normal time. Furthermore relation between change in ion density (ΔN) as a response to change in ion temperature (ΔT) during flare time and normal days has been estimated. A comparison with O+ density obtained from IRI – 2012 during the flare time underestimates the density value.


The excitation process of short optical pulses in waveguides by use of prism couplers is studied with a fully dynamic model. A good coupling efficiency is obtained even for short pulses. Fast nonlinear behavior such as power limiting and optical switching is predicted with a response time much shorter than the buildup time of the waveguide coupler. This new result is due to the group-velocity matching between the guided and the pump fields.


Musical genres are categorical labels created by humans to characterize pieces of music. A musical genre is characterized by the common characteristics shared by its members. These characteristics typically are related to the instrumentation, rhythmic structure, and harmonic content of the music. Genre hierarchies are commonly used to structure the large collections of music available on the Web. Currently musical genre annotation is performed manually. Automatic musical genre classification can assist or replace the human user in this process and would be a valuable addition to music information retrieval systems. In addition, automatic musical genre classification provides a framework for developing and evaluating features for any type of content-based analysis of musical signals. In this paper, the automatic classification of audio signals into an hierarchy of musical genres is explored. More specifically, three feature sets for representing timbral texture, rhythmic content and pitch content are proposed. The performance and relative importance of the proposed features is investigated by training statistical pattern recognition classifiers using real-world audio collections. Both whole file and real-time frame-based classification schemes are described. Using the proposed feature sets, classification of 61% for ten musical genres is achieved. This result is comparable to results reported for human musical genre classification.


Abstract. The bacterial and archaeal community composition and the possible carbon assimilation processes and energy sources of microbial communities in oligotrophic, deep, crystalline bedrock fractures is yet to be resolved. In this study, intrinsic microbial communities from groundwater of six fracture zones from 180 to 2300 m depths in Outokumpu bedrock were characterized using high-throughput amplicon sequencing and metagenomic prediction. Comamonadaceae-, Anaerobrancaceae- and Pseudomonadaceae-related operational taxonomic units (OTUs) form the core community in deep crystalline bedrock fractures in Outokumpu. Archaeal communities were mainly composed of Methanobacteriaceae-affiliating OTUs. The predicted bacterial metagenomes showed that pathways involved in fatty acid and amino sugar metabolism were common. In addition, relative abundance of genes coding the enzymes of autotrophic carbon fixation pathways in predicted metagenomes was low. This indicates that heterotrophic carbon assimilation is more important for microbial communities of the fracture zones. Network analysis based on co-occurrence of OTUs revealed possible "keystone" genera of the microbial communities belonging to Burkholderiales and Clostridiales. Bacterial communities in fractures resemble those found in oligotrophic, hydrogen-enriched environments. Serpentinization reactions of ophiolitic rocks in Outokumpu assemblage may provide a source of energy and organic carbon compounds for the microbial communities in the fractures. Sulfate reducers and methanogens form a minority of the total microbial communities, but OTUs forming these minor groups are similar to those found in other deep Precambrian terrestrial bedrock environments.


In this paper, I provide a specific channel through which financial development helps economic growth: by reducing the incidence of crises and making them less severe. To support this, I examine the various links among financial markets development, financial crisis, and GDP growth rate. My empirical estimates, using cross-country data from 1980 to 2007, show a statistically significant and economically relevant effect among these variables: countries with better local financial markets can largely decrease the frequency of occurrence of financial crisis, and that efficient banking systems can alleviate the adverse impact of banking crisis on output lost for the long-run, while better stock market can do it for the short-run.


In this work we contribute a distribution shift benchmark for a computer vision task; monocular depth estimation. Our differentiation is the decomposition of the wider distribution shift of uncontrolled testing on in-the-wild data, to three distinct distribution shifts. Specifically, we generate data via synthesis and analyze them to produce covariate (color input), prior (depth output) and concept (their relationship) distribution shifts. We also synthesize combinations and show how each one is indeed a different challenge to address, as stacking them produces increased performance drops and cannot be addressed horizontally using standard approaches.


Aim To review the incidence of renal involvement and the natural course of Henoch Schönlein Purpura (HSP) over a 5 year period at a tertiary paediatric hospital. Method Patients were followed-up over a 1 year period, with frequency of visits dependent on proteinuria. At each visit a minimum of blood pressure and urinalysis was performed. Using a standardised data collection pathway all clinical data was collected prospectively. The primary outcome measured was the need for a consultant referral either during or after completing a year of follow-up. Results 165 patients were identified presenting over 69 months, giving an incidence of 14.5 HSP cases per 100 000 children per year attending our hospital. The mean age at presentation was 7.2 years, with those requiring a renal referral significantly older (9.8± 3.5 vs 6.9±4.0 years; p≤0.01). Non-Caucasian patients were significantly more likely to be referred for renal review (21% vs 6%; p≤0.01). Purpuric rash was a presenting feature in 100% of patients, arthralgaia (45%) and joint swelling (19%) being the next most common presenting features. No patients initially presented with nephrotic or nephritic syndrome. At presentation 14% of patients were hypertensive, no patients had hypertension persisting beyond day 7 of follow-up. 12 (7%) patients from the cohort required referral to a paediatric nephrologist, 3 with raised urine albumin creatinine ratio were referred within 3 months, and the other 9 had persistent proteinuria or haematuria at the end of 12 months. Urine samples performed on day 7 had a negative predictive value of a normal urinalysis indicating a normal outcome of 98%. Conclusion Older patients and those of non Caucasian ethnicity are at a higher risk of nephritis. Significant nephritis is an infrequent complication of HSP and transient hypertension is common. The follow-up of patients with HSP should be stratified according to urinalysis, blood pressure and renal function.