Simon Dafydd Glyn Stephens ("Dai") brought both compassion and academic authority to the previously neglected discipline of adult auditory rehabilitation. As an international authority and outspoken advocate for people with impaired hearing, he spearheaded the development, nationally and internationally, of improved care for adults with hearing impairments. He was instrumental in establishing a new medical specialty, audiovestibular medicine, and contributed to the training of virtually every consultant physician in specialty in the UK.

Stephens was born in Caerfyrddin. Both his parents were teachers, and he developed the academic fascination and rigour that formed the cornerstone of his career. As a young child he spent much time in the company of a district nurse, travelling the countryside in her car. They spoke Welsh together, and from her and a Welsh couple to whom he became very close after the family moved to London, Stephens acquired the lifelong hallmark of his strong Welsh identity and passion for the Welsh language.

He attended Whitgift School in Croydon from 1952 to1959 and then entered Charing Cross Hospital Medical School, where he won the Huxley Prize. His interest in audiology was sparked when, after graduating with a first degree in physiology from London University, he spent a summer vacation as a research Fellow at the University of Iowa in 1962. There he met Professor Ronald Hinchcliffe, a co-founder of audiological medicine, who remained a firm friend and colleague until his death in 2011. On returning to Charing Cross …


The Superconducting Quantum Computing (SQC) is one of the most promising quantum computing techniques. The SQC requires precise control and acquisition to operate the superconducting qubits. The ultra-precision DC source is used to provide a DC bias for the qubit to work at its operation point. With the development of the multi-qubit processor, to use the commercial precise DC source device is impossible for its large volume occupation. We present our ultra-precision DC source which is designed for SQC experiments in this paper. The DC source contains 12 channels in 1U 19~inch crate. The performances of our DC source strongly beat the commercial devices. The output rang is -7~V to +7~V with 20~mA maximum output current. The Vpp of the output noise is 3~uV, and the standard deviation is 0.497~uV. The temperature coefficient is less than 1~ppm/$^{\circ}$C in 14~V range. The primary results show that the total drift of the output within 48h at an A/C room temperature environment is 40~uV which equal to 2.9~ppm/48h. We are still trying to optimize the channel density and long-term drift / stability.


The non-communicable disease burden in China is enormous, with tobacco use a leading risk factor for the major non-communicable diseases. The prevalence of tobacco use in men is one of the highest in the world, with more than 300 million smokers and 740 million non-smokers exposed to second-hand smoke. In the past decade public awareness of the health hazards of tobacco use and exposure to second-hand smoke has grown, social customs and habits have changed, aggressive tactics used by the tobacco industry have been revealed, and serious tobacco control policies have been actively promoted. In 2014, national legislators in China began actively considering national bans on smoking in public and work places and tobacco advertising. However, tobacco control in China has remained particularly diffi cult because of interference by the tobacco industry. Changes to the interministerial coordinating mechanism for implementation of the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control are now crucial. Progress towards a tobacco-free world will be dependent on more rapid action in China.


This paper introduces a motion-planning framework for a hybrid system with general continuous dynamics to satisfy a temporal logic specification consisting of cosafety and safety components in a partially unknown environment. The framework employs a multilayered synergistic planner to generate trajectories that satisfy the specification and adopt an iterative replanning strategy to deal with unknown obstacles. When the discovery of an obstacle renders the specification unsatisfiable, a division between the constraints in the specification is considered. The cosafety component of the specification is treated as a soft constraint, whose partial satisfaction is allowed, while the safety component is viewed as a hard constraint, whose violation is forbidden. To partially satisfy the cosafety component, inspirations are taken from indoor-robotic scenarios, and three types of (unexpressed) restrictions on the ordering of subtasks in the specification are considered. For each type, a partial satisfaction method is introduced, which guarantees the generation of trajectories that do not violate the safety constraints while attending to partially satisfying the cosafety requirements with respect to the chosen restriction type. The efficacy of the framework is illustrated through case studies on a hybrid car-like robot in an office environment.


While recent research has explored the phenomenon of drug parallel trade in regulated environments such as the European Union (EU), or the European Economic Area, little is known about the mechanisms that explain its origin or the role of the distribution chain in exporting and importing countries in determining its extent. By building on theoretical literature explaining the role of the distribution chain, this paper draws on an empirical specification of a gravity model to examine the determinants of inter-country flows of parallel-traded drugs. In this context, the paper deals with the effect of differences in the regulation of and competition in the distribution chain in the countries of origin and destination. The paper draws on proprietary data from the Intercontinental Medical Statistics database (for the Netherlands and other EU countries that export to the Netherlands) which identify the country of origin of parallel-imported medicines from 1997-2002 for a therapeutic group (statins) for which there is no generic competition. The study reveals that although parallel trade is a specific form of arbitrage, it is primarily a regulation-induced phenomenon. As a result, although the driving force for parallel trade is price differences across countries, the propagation mechanism lies in (a) the way drug prices are regulated across countries and (b) fragmentation and the underlying incentive structure in the wholesale distribution chain in countries where drug prices are regulated. The implications that flow from our study are that a more flexible and competitive and less fragmented (along national borders) distribution chain, particularly at wholesale level, might reduce the extent of and potential for parallel trade.


This book first arose out of a passage in Borges, out of the laughter that shattered, as I read the passage, all the familiar landmarks of my thought—our thought, the thought that bears the stamp of our age and our geography—breaking up all the ordered surfaces and all the planes with which we are accustomed to tame the wild profusion of existing things, and continuing long afterwards to disturb and threaten with collapse our age-old distinction between the Same and the Other. This passage quotes a "certain Chinese encyclopaedia" in which it is written that "animals are divided into: (a) belonging to the Emperor, (b) embalmed, (c) tame, (d) sucking pigs, (e) sirens, (f) fabulous, (g) stray dogs, (h) included in the present classification, (i) frenzied, (j) innumerable, (k) drawn with a very fine camelhair brush, (l) etcetera, (m) having just broken the water pitcher, (n) that from a long way off look like flies." In the wonderment of this taxonomy, the thing we apprehend in one great leap, the thing that, by means of the fable is demonstrated as the exotic charm of another system of thought, is the limitation of our own, the stark impossibility of thinking that.


This article discuss the concept of being in the perspective of existentialism and Islam. The closest similarity to the word "being" is to on (Ancient Greece), as the word of einai, to be (on, onta). For Parmenides, "being" (to on) is one, eternal and unchanging. Gabriel Marcel calls the way the human being with the term etre-au-monde, etre in carne, geist-in-welt.  Martin Heidegger uses a formula being in the world to characterize human life. Being in the world as a feature of human life, human beings are in the situation. Living in a world of concrete means that there are human relationships with the situation. Sartre said that the real one where there are two, namely: I'etre en soi and I'etre pour Soi. For Sartre, I'etre en soi is the idea that only a concrete phenomenon has ontological status; only something concrete is real. Unlike the being-in-itself, for Sartre the concept of being-for-itself is a state of being that comes with the awareness and self-control. The concept of being (wujud) by Suhrawardi is a mental concepts (mahfum) that do not have the type and diferensia. In the illumination philosophy of Suhrawardi, the idea of wujud can not be separated from nature and depiction of light. The philosophy of wujud by Mulla Sadrâ stands on three basic principles of fundamental importance. These three principles are as follows: wahdat al-wujud, tashkik al-wujud, and tashkik. While Mohammad Iqbal emphasis on metaphysics and anthropological philosophy. Iqbal gives greater emphasis on more concrete dimensions, namely khudi (ego).


From the Publisher:
An Introduction to CAD/CAM/CAE is a timely text with coverage of many modern topics, including: rapid prototyping, virtual engineering, NT-based solid modeling systems, and Web-related issues. This book provides balanced coverage of CAD/CAM (with slightly more emphasis on CAD topics) and bonus coverage of computer-aided engineering (CAE). This book's emphasis on the integration of three related disciplines-CAD, CAM, and CAE-makes it a great theoretical introduction to all subjects from geometric representation to the most sophisticated CAE subjects. Many illustrations and references ground the theory in practical examples. The book also features a unique illustration of the whole product development process through a practical case study that gives readers a clear idea how CAD, CAM, and CAE systems are integrated to accelerate the product development process. This book is carefully targeted toward today's students; topics are introduced in a concise, efficient manner, with mathematical terminology that is kept to a minimum. A background in programming, calculus, and matrix and vector algebra is helpful when using this text.


Seroprevalence of Hepatitis B surface antigen (HbsAg), anti-HCV IgG and anti-HIV IgG was determined in 100 people with Haemophilia (PWH), registered with Haemophilia Patient Welfare Society (HPWS), Lahore Zone, Pakistan. The study shows that none of the PWH were infected with HIV whereas a modest 4% were positive for HbsAg. However, there was a high level of anti-HCV seropositivity (56%) in our PWH, including many patients in younger age groups. When compared with figures from PWH in other regions of Asia like 23% in Western India, 33% in Sri Lanka and 15% of those in Iran, this figure is one of the highest. This rate is a reflection of the same rising trend in our population that is now exceeding 10%. The practice of unscreened blood/blood-products transfusions in the backdrop of high prevalence of HCV in our population is responsible for high figures seen in PWH. The need is to increase awareness level amongst the patients, health care worker and policy makers about these transfusion associated viral infections in a group of patients who already had a hereditary disorder of severe nature.


The structure of this dissertation is as follows. The first chapter presents a literature review on FDI with the aim to explore the motivations driving a firm to expand investments abroad, the reasons why FDI is preferred to other investment forms, and the main factors affecting location choices of foreign investors. Since our thesis focuses on location decisions of foreign firms in Vietnam, we spend more room on the discussion of the location theories such as the theory of comparative advantages, localization theory, institutional based view and information cost approach. Subsequently, we present a theoretical review on FDI determinants in transition economies and in Vietnam. We state that market size, labor costs and the riskiness of investment environments are key factors affecting FDI inflows to these countries. The final section provides the description of data source that is used for the empirical studies in Vietnam.

The second chapter studies the effect of institutional practices by local authorities on the entry rates of foreign firms in Vietnam over the period 2000-2005. The Vietnamese provincial competitiveness index in 2006 (PCI 2006) and its two sub-indices reflecting attitudes of local government toward state-owned enterprises and the capability of private enterprises to access to necessary information for their business are used as proxies for institutional implementations by provincial authorities. The empirical findings show that provinces with better institutional performance attract more foreign firms. The results support our argument that just as institutions at the national level affecting the overall volume of FDI inflows, informal institutions at the sub-national level influence FDI spatial distributions among provinces within the country. Formal legal changes initiated at the centre have varied impacts across provinces because the implementation of laws and regulations at local level depends on the informal institutions determined by attitudes (norms and cognitions) of local authorities.

The third chapter examines the effects of agglomeration economies on the location choices by foreign firms in Vietnam. By using a large dataset that provides detailed information about individual firms, we examine the location choices by 568 newly created foreign firms in 2005 in about 150 different 4-digit industries. The estimates of the negative binomial regression model and the conditional logit model strongly support our hypotheses that agglomeration benefits motivate foreign firms in the same industries and from the same countries of origin to locate near each other. Moreover, the empirical results show that provinces in Vietnam compete with each other to attract FDI, and the locations of Vietnamese firms have no effects on the location decisions by foreign firms in the same industry.

The last chapter investigates the survival probability of foreign entrants in Vietnam by looking at the life span of 187 foreign firms created in 2000 over the period 2000-2005. By applying the Cox proportional hazard model, we find that foreign firms with larger start-up size and growing current size are more likely to stay longer in the market. We also reveal that foreign firms entering the market with wholly-owned subsidiaries rather than making joint ventures with local partners can live longer. In addition, locating in industrial zones or export processing zones increases the survival probability of foreign firms due to tax priority and other incentives. However, by contrast to our prediction, agglomeration economies have no significant effect on firm survival. As expected, cultural distance is found to have a strong impact on the survival of foreign firms. Proximities in culture make it easier for foreign firms in cooperating with local partners, therefore increasing their success in foreign markets.


From inventory management in stores to automotive part tracking in assembly plants, barcodes are one of the most prevalent automatic identification and data capture technologies. This book provides a complete introduction to barcodes for mobile devices, presenting the most relevant and up-to-date information previously unavailable elsewhere or difficult to obtain. The focus throughout is on recent developments and two-dimensional (2D) barcodes, including the research and development steps towards colour barcodes for mobile devices, helping readers to develop their own barcodes. The authors also provide design details for their own novel colour 2D barcode: the Mobile MultiColour Composite (MMCC) barcode, plus coverage of RFID technology and one-dimensional barcodes. This book is ideal for professional developers of barcodes for mobile devices who need the latest technical details and information on how to develop barcodes. It is also a useful reference for graduate students researching the field of barcode technology and mobile computing.


Abstract Ankle sprain is one of the most common injuries treated in emergency departments (ED). In clinical practice, these injuries are expected to heal by themselves, often without any treatment other than short information about the RICE regime (rest, ice, compression and elevation). Still, remaining symptoms are reported to occur in 30% of the cases. The aim of this study was to evaluate the effect of early physiotherapy intervention after an acute ankle sprain. Sixty-five patients were recruited from the ED at a general hospital in Sweden (mean age = 35 years; 30 women), and allocated into an intervention group with early physiotherapy or a control group. Both groups were evaluated 6 weeks and 3 months after their injury. As primary outcome, the disease-specific Foot and Ankle Outcome Score (FAOS) was used. The patients also rated their physical activity ability and how satisfied they were with their ankle on a visual analogue scale (VAS). The intervention group made significant improvements compared with the control group at both evaluations measured with FAOS and the VAS questions. These findings indicate that early physiotherapy intervention has a positive effect on patient-focused foot and ankle function after an acute ankle sprain.


Mixing a passive scalar field by stirring can be measured in a variety of ways including tracer particle dispersion, via the flux-gradient relationship, or by suppression of scalar concentration variations in the presence of inhomogeneous sources and sinks. The mixing efficiency or efficacy of a particular flow is often expressed in terms of enhanced diffusivity and quantified as an effective diffusion coefficient. In this work we compare and contrast several notions of effective diffusivity. We thoroughly examine the fundamental case of a steady sinusoidal shear flow mixing a scalar sustained by a steady sinusoidal source-sink distribution to explore apparent quantitative inconsistencies among the measures. Ultimately the conflicts are attributed to the noncommutative asymptotic limits of large P$\acute{\text{e}}$clet number and large length-scale separation. We then propose another approach, a generalization of Batchelor's 1949 theory of diffusion in homogeneous turbulence, that helps unify the particle dispersion and concentration variance suppression measures.


Purpose: The research paper deals with the development of new scientific solutions regarding the identification of influence factors in the economic development models for developed and developing countries. The paper emphasizes the key significance of modelling within the framework of the study of economic growth at the level of world, national and regional economies (macro- and mesolevel). Design/methodology/approach: To achieve the objectives of this study the main components of economic development models were discussed. Findings: The transformation of the approaches of scholars to identify the influence factors within the historical change of the economic development models is noted. It was emphasized that the overwhelming majority of scholars use three factors of influence (land, labour, capital) and their derivatives in the "old", "new" and regional economic development models, which is insufficient in the current conditions of economic systems at the macro- and mesolevel. Practical implications: Two related economic development models for developed countries and developing countries are proposed for use; key influence factors within these models are identified. Originality/value: It is emphasized that capital, human resources, level of innovations and competitive advantages are important for ensuring the economic development of developed countries, and the level of corruption and the level of the shadow economy are added to the above-mentioned components for developing countries.


Labour commodification is a core process in building capitalist society. Nonetheless, it is given remarkably little attention in labour and social historiography, because assumptions about the process have obscured its historical character. Abandoning these assumptions, a close study of labour commodification in the boilermaking trades of late colonial New South Wales (Australia) illustrates the historical character of the process. In these trades, labour commodification was deeply contested at the most intimate level of class relations between workers and employers. This contest principally took the form of a struggle over the scheme of occupational classification used as the basis of pay rates. It was a highly protracted struggle, because workers developed strategies that kept the employers' efforts at bay for four decades. Employer efforts to intensify the commodity character of boilermakers' labour were largely ineffective, until they were given great assistance in the early twentieth century by the state arbitration system.


In the Southern Apennines, Plio-Quaternary post-orogenic extensional tectonic phases locally permitted normal tectono-gravitational reactivation of thrust ramps, accommodated by normal antithetic neo-formational structures. Reactivated ramps and neo-formational structures delimit wide rock masses, affected by pervasive fracture cleavage, known in the literature as «Gravity-Accommodated Structural Wedges» or «GASW» («SCATG» in Italian; IOVINE et alii, 1996; 1997; IOVINE & TANSI, 1998). GASW are characterised by typical morphological elements of deep-seated gravitational slope deformation (DRAMIS, 1984; DRAMIS et alii, 1985; SORRISO-VALVO, 1995), and show a lozenge shape in plan and a triangular shape in section (fig. 3). The Acri tectono-gravitational phenomenon, described in this paper, is located in Northern Calabria (Italy) in a very complex structural domain (figs. 1 and 2), characterised by the transition between two distinct regional faults systems-trending N-S and NW-SE (LANZAFAME & TORTORICI, 1981; VAN DIJK et alii, 2000; IOVINE & TANSI, 2002). In particular, the phenomenon developed on the eastern border of a crystalline-metamorphic horst (the Sila Massif), along thrust ramps arranged into a transpressive push-up, connected to a regional left-lateral strike-slip fault (the Petilia-Luzzi Fault) belonging to the NW-SE system. The Acri structure is typologically composite, being constituted by three distinct deformational elements («a», «b», and «c» in figs. 2 and 4): it represents the widest example of tectono-gravitational deformation in the Apennine chain. In particular, the element «a» is a GASW; the remaining elements («b»and «c») are ascribed to lateral spreading. The widespread presence of deep-seated and tectono-gravitational phenomena observed in the Apennine chain underline their fundamental role in the morpho-dynamic evolution of chain systems, during late phases of uplift and dissection. The proper recognition and interpretation of such phenomena is therefore essential for correct strategies of mitigation and reduction of slope-movement related risk.


This thesis addresses the apparent puzzle of the theology of judgement in the Fourth Gospel. Throughout John's Gospel, Jesus is presented as both judging and not judging while eschatological scenarios are presented and alluded to in which humanity will be judged at the last day and also in which will be no final judgement. This puzzling theology is particularly apparent in John 5 as has been noted many times in Johannine scholarship. In order to resolve this puzzle a hypothesis in initially proposed and the remainder of the study is devoted to affirming that the hypothesis does, in fact, provide a resolution.

The hypothesis which is proposed at the beginning of this thesis is that John 5 presents a unified theology of judgement which is bicameral in that it consists of two eschatological compartments – one for Christian believers and one for the rest of humanity. The eschatology which John 5 presents for Christian believers is one in which they have been exempted from any end-time judgement process, but have already obtained the salvific benefit of eternal life which they shall continue to enjoy in a heavenly realm following bodily death. In parallel, John 5 presents a more traditional eschatology of a judgement tribunal for the rest of humanity at the eschaton where Christ, as God's appointed judge, will sit in judgement of those who have rejected him and those who have not had the opportunity to accept him. The salvific benefits of such a bicameral eschatology are directed entirely in favour of Christian believers. In addition, the hypothesis proposes that the Christology of the Fourth Gospel has developed specifically to empower the Johannine Christ to act as the bringer of life to Christian believers and as the deliverer of Judgement to the non-Christian portion of humanity.

This thesis seeks to substantiate the validity of the hypothesis by firstly establishing three prerequisites for its applicability to the text of John 5. Firstly, it is necessary to establish that the Christology and eschatology which the hypothesis addresses are indeed to be found in the Gospel and in John 5 in particular. Secondly, it is necessary to search through Johannine scholarship to establish how the problem has been addressed before and whether any proposed solutions can successfully stand as obstacles to the application of the hypothesis. Thirdly, the hypothesis requires that John 5 is a unified text with no redactional insertions by secondary editors. All three of these prerequisites are addressed and a case is made for proceeding with the application of the hypothesis.


This book reconciles the existence of technical trading with the Efficient Market Hypothesis. By analyzing a well-known agent-based model, the Santa Fe Institute Artificial Stock Market (SFI-ASM), it finds that when selective forces are weak, financial evolution cannot guarantee that only the fittest trading rules will survive.Its main contribution lies in the application of standard results from population genetics which have widely been neglected in the agent-based community. This has led to various misinterpretations of previous simulation results. The book is able to finally establish the emergence of technical trading for faster learning speeds in the SFI-ASM beyond a doubt. In emphasizing the importance of genetic drift as an important evolutionary factor and analyzing its effects on various mutation operators, this book provides agent-based modelers with several tools to design better evolutionary algorithms.


The classic approach to reinforcement learning is limited in that it only predicts the expected return. The specialized literature has long tried to remedy this problem by studying risk-sensitive models, but the distributional approach will not emerge until 2017. Since the seminal article M. G. Bellemare, Dabney, and Munos 2017 and the state-of-the-art performance of the C51 algorithm in the ATARI 2600 suite of benchmark tasks (M. G. Bellemare, Naddaf, et al. 2013), research has focused on understanding the behaviour of distributional algorithms. In this paper we place Bellemare's original results in distributional dynamic programming in parallel with the classic results.


Interest in insectivoran grade mammals has been reawakened by taxonomic changes that place tenrecs and golden moles in a new order and separate hedgehogs from moles, shrews and solenodons. This survey of their placentation shows there is great variation even within families. As an example three subfamilies of tenrec have been examined. The interhemal region is cellular hemomonochorial in Echinops and Microgale but endotheliochorial in Micropotamogale. Golden moles, which are placed in the same order, have hemodichorial placentation. Many insectivores have complex arrangements for histotrophic nutrition involving columnar trophoblast cells. These range from areolae in moles through complexly folded hemophagous regions in tenrecs to the trophoblastic annulus in shrews. Of these placental characters, few offer support to current phylogenies. However, the case for placing hedgehogs and gymnures in a separate order (Erinaceomorpha) is bolstered by the presence of interstitial implantation, amniogenesis by cavitation, a hemochorial barrier and a prominent spongy zone; these features do not occur in shrews, moles or solenodons (Soricomorpha). Three insectivoran grade mammals deserve close attention as they have been selected for genome sequencing. One of these, the European hedgehog (Erinaceus europaeus), has not been studied with current methodology and renewed investigation of this or the closely related genus Atelerix should be a priority.


Grain amaranth (Amaranthus spp.) is a C4 dicotyledonous pseudocereal crop that was widely cultivated in pre-Columbian America. It was successfully introduced in many regions with contrasting environmental conditions. The introduction of grain amaranth in eastern Canada would represent an opportunity for diversification. A study was conducted to evaluate management practices for grain amaranth grown in this region. Three field experiments replicated in three environments were conducted to evaluate the following factors: (i) seeding date (mid-May, early-June, and mid-June) and cultivar (K432, K593, and Plainsman); (ii) row spacing (38, 58, and 76 cm) and seeding rate (1, 2, and 4 kg ha -1 ), and (iii) N fertilization rate (0, 50, 100, 150, and 200 kg N ha -1 ) and cultivar (D136 and Plainsman). Seeding date affected grain yield in only one out of three environments, with the earlier date resulting in the highest yields. Cultivars differed in yield in only one of three environments, with Plainsman resulting in highest yields. Later seeding dates resulted in higher seed moisture at harvest in all environments. Seeding rate and row spacing did not affect grain yield, but row spacing affected grain moisture at harvest, with narrower rows resulting in grains with lower moisture content. Nitrogen fertilization increased yield and lodging in only one environment. Seed moisture and plant height were positively related to N fertilization in all environments. Cultivar D136 yielded more than Plainsman in 2005 and less in 2006. Therefore, grain amaranth production in eastern Canada seems possible, management practices having limited impact on grain yield, which averaged 923 kg ha -1 across all experiments and environments.


Initially described by Soehendra and Reynders-Frederix1 in 1980, plastic stents have been widely used for endoscopic relief of malignant biliary obstruction. The relative ease of placement and removal of plastic stents, as well as their low cost, have made them an attractive option for the past 35 years. It has been apparent for decades, however, that self-expandable metal stents (SEMS) provide much more durable biliary drainage than plastic stents. Accumulating evidence now suggests that it may no longer be justifiable to use plastic stents when it is clear that metal stents are associated with superior outcomes, fewer adverse events (AEs) and fewer repeated interventions.2 These advantages, along with reductions in length of hospital stay, appear to fully offset the high initial cost of selecting an SEMS over a plastic stent for palliation of malignant distal biliary obstruction—even in patients whose projected life expectancy is limited.3 ,4 In patients with borderline resectable pancreatic cancer who are undergoing neoadjuvant therapy, SEMS have also …


Ephesus was one of the most important harbour cities of the Roman Empire. This dissertation deals with the environmental changes of Ephesus and the Ephesia, i.e., the area surrounding the city (the so-called chora), with particular focus on (i) the detection of Holocene coastline changes along the Kucuk Menderes graben, (ii) the investigation of Ephesus' different harbours and settlement sites, and (iii) the reconstruction of the landscape evolution in the Ephesia especially under the aspect of human-environment interactions since Neolithic times. To achieve these goals, drill cores were retrieved from geo-bio-archives and analysed with sedimentological, geochemical, micro- and macrofaunistic, micromorphological, palynological and parasitological methods. Geophysical measurements and archaeobotanical investigations support these studies. The chronology is based on 14C age estimates, archaeological evidence (e.g., diagnostic ceramics) and historical accounts.
The results prove that the postglacial sea-level rise had created a marine embayment, which reached c. 20 km inland during the middle of the 6th millennium BC. When the speed of this transgression decelerated considerably, the Kucuk Menderes river started to prograde its delta. Two phases of delta advance can be distinguished: a slow progradation with low sedimentation rates between the 5th and the 1st millennia BC (up to 1 mm/y), and a much faster advance since then (c. 4–30 mm/y). The most likely reason for this considerable increase is human activities (mainly deforestation).
Settling in the Ephesia started during the Neolithic period. Two settlement sites in the floodplains of the Arvalya and Derbent valleys south of the Kucuk Menderes graben, Arvalya Hoyuk and Cucurici Hoyuk, date to the 7th millennium BC. These settlement mounds are located c. 1.5–2 km south of the former coastline.
With the continued westward progradation of the deltas of the Kucuk Menderes and its tributaries, the settlements and their harbours had to be shifted as well. The location of the so-called Sacred harbour near the Artemision, the famous Temple of Artemis, could be identified as a natural beach in a small embayment near the foot of Ayasoluk hill. It was in use from c. 1500 BC to max. 400 BC. With the ongoing siltation of the Sacred harbour, the Koressos harbour c. 1.5 km to the west came in use until this embayment was silted up as well. Thus, the city and its harbour were re-located further to the west in 289/288 BC by Lysimachos. This harbour was the predecessor of the hexagonal Roman–Byzantine harbour basin; it was intensively used from the 1st century BC to the 6th/7th centuries AD. While this site was most likely still accessible until the 13th century AD, the progressive siltation required the establishment of yet another harbour (Late Roman to Byzantine), located about 3.5 km to the west of the city and presumably in use until around AD 1000. Two more harbour sites can be detected even further to the west.
The harbours of Ephesus reveal the typical stratigraphy of a port in the Mediterranean: pre-harbour deposits at the base (i), overlain by harbour layers which were accumulated in a protected artificial basin and are characterised by increased sedimentation rates as well as a change in the microfossil assemblage (ii), and harbour abandonment layers on top (iii). In the Roman harbour and the harbour canal there are several indicators for dredging activities.
The following conclusions can be drawn regarding the vegetation changes. The presence of Cerealia-type pollen indicates agricultural activities as early as in the 7th millennium BC although by then the hills and hillslopes were still forested, i.e. covered by a natural vegetation community with an arboreal dominance of Quercus robur/cerris-type trees. Increased human activities are confirmed in the Roman harbour archive with eggs of intestinal parasites and roundworms, fruit tree pollen and heavy metal pollution; an intensive use is evident from the 1st century BC onwards. While high amounts of pine wood were used in Ephesus, low values of Pinus in the pollen profile seem to confirm deforestation activities in the vicinity of the city. Decreased human impact is reflected in the pollen record after the 6th/7th centuries AD with the decline of the city.
The swamps of Belevi in the hinterland of Ephesus are not only an excellent archive for the vegetation changes discussed above. They also archived an event layer: the Santorini ash of c. 1630 BC. It is the first find of this tephra in the environs of Ephesus.


Replacing combustion vehicles with electric vehicles is a major step towards reducing CO 2 emissions. With regard to this shift, in particular commercial or governmental vehicle fleets are believed to be early adopters. However, the electrification of vehicle fleets is a complex task since it can have a huge impact on companies' day-to-day-business. This article presents a lightweight simulation framework to support the planning process and to study important effects of vehicle fleet electrification. Our discrete event-based approach allows to investigate economical and environmental aspects, such as the impact on operating costs, the required electric energy, or the amount of CO 2 emissions. Based on a given trip schedule (consisting of start time, distance, and duration), the framework allows deriving all necessary information, among others to dimension both the vehicle fleet and the charging infrastructure. We show the usefulness and the capability of our model by presenting results for a mid-sized company's vehicle fleet comprising 100 vehicles.


This volume provides a timely and expert analysis of Japan's Asia policy as the country continues to address the future through trying to cope with the burden of a chequered past. Dr Mendl locates his expostion of Japan's policy towards both North-East and South-East Asia in a full historical and cultural context and importantly takes due account of the underlying and potent factor of national identity in shaping international outlook. He begins his study with a discussion of the enigma of Japanese policy expressed in debate over whether or not that policy expresses a calculated grand design. A corresponding enigma emerges in Dr Mendl's exposition of Japan's policy towards a part of the world with which it shares a geographical location and a measure of identity but one which, he maintains, cannot be separated from its engagement at the global level. In exploring the theme of how Japan is confronted by the problem of reconcling its relations with Asia with pursuing a global role in unchartered post-Cold War waters, Dr.Mendl makes a lucid and scholarly contribution to the debate about Japan's place in a world which it has helped to shape through its economic performance and example.


Ten key games that shaped Liverpool football club. Much of the acres of football news coverage these days has little to do with what actually occurs on the pitch. Jonathan Wilson has established himself as one of the sport's pre-eminent writers, focussing on the tactics (with the award-winning INVERTING THE PYRAMID) and how events on the pitch have shaped football history (THE ANATOMY OF ENGLAND). His new book is a compellingly forensic analysis of ten key Liverpool matches that have shaped the club's fortunes for more than a century - from the long-lost triumphs of manager Tom Watson, who arrived in 1896, to the 1977 European Cup triumph over Borussia Monchengladbach, to the astonishing Champions League Final comeback against AC Milan, 'The Miracle of Istanbul', in 2005. Legendary players and managers of the stature of Bill Shankly, Bob Paisley and Kenny Dalglish populate these pages, which highlight the genius and the flaws of individuals by examining them in practice. Certain games lie on the fault-lines of history. Perhaps they mark the end of one era or the beginning of another. Perhaps they encapsulate a summation of a manager's reign. Or perhaps they mark a crossroads, moments at which football looked one way, and then went the other. But this is not a virtual history of Liverpool FC. Jonathan Wilson's prime purpose is not to speculate on what might have been. Rather it will try to determine why what was, was. No game is won or lost, after all, in a single moment but by a million little things. THE ANATOMY OF LIVERPOOL tells the story of a great club through a detailed examination of ten key matches looking, as a football history must, first and foremost at the football.


This dissertation is about the initial period of Brouwer's role in the foundational debate in mathematics, which took place during the first decades of the twentieth century. His intuitionistic and constructivistic attitude was a reaction to logicism (Russell, Couturat) and to Hilbert's formalism. Brouwer's own dissertation (1907) is a first introduction to his intuitionism, which was the third movement in the foundational debate. This intuitionism reached maturity from 1918 onwards, but one of my aims is to show that there are demonstrable traces of this new development of mathematics as early as 1907 and even before, viz. in his personal notes, which are composed of his numerous ideas in the field of mathematics and philosophy. To mention some important ones:
1. Mathematics is entirely independent of language. Mathematics is created by the individual mind (Brouwer certainly is a solipsist) and the role of language is limited to that of communication a mathematical content to others and is also useful for one's own memory.
2. The ur-intuition of the 'move of time', that is, the experience that two events are not coinciding, is the most fundamental basis of all mathematics. A separate space intuition (Kant) is not needed.
3. A strict constructivism. Only that what is constructed by the individual mind counts as a mathematical object.
4. Logic only describes the structure of the language of mathemqatics. Hence logic comes after mathematics, instead of being its basis.
5. An axiomatic foundation is rejected by Brouwer. Axioms only serve the purpose of describing concisely the properties of a mathematical construction.
These five items have far-reaching consequences for Brouwer's mathematical building. To mention the most relevant ones:
- The only possible cardinalities for sets are: finite, denumerably infinite, denumerably infinite unfinished and the continuum.
- The continuum is not composed of points (Aristotle already said so), but is given to us in its entirety in the ur-intuition. It can be turned into an everywhere dense measurable continuum by constructing a rational scale on it.
- Cantor's second number class does not exist as a finished totality for Brouwer, since there is no conceivable closure for the elements of this class.
- The continuum problem is a trivial one: Every well-defined subset of the continuum is finite, denumerably infinite, or has the cardinality of the continuum.
Finally, in my dissertation the sixth chapter is devoted to Brouwer's view on the application of mathematics to the human evironment and on his outlook on man and on human society in general (chapter 2 of Brouwer's dissertation). His opinion about humanity turns out to be a pessimistic one: All man's effort, when applying mathematics to the surrounding world, is aimed at a domination over his environment and over his fellow men.


In considering whether identity is freedom-limiting or freedom-enhancing, it is important to focus on the interplay between one's identity as an American and one's identity as a member of a particular racial or ethnic subgroup of Americans. Our collective identity as Americans is based on shared values of individual freedom, political democracy, and a commitment to the rule of law. These ideals transcend racial and ethnic differences. (1) They do not, however, eliminate the cultural differences between Americans, nor should they. Unfortunately, however, some commentators on both the political right and the political left have suggested that one's identity as an American and one's ethnic or racial identity are contradictory or incompatible, and that in order to celebrate one, it is necessary to suppress the other. (2) There are some commentators on the political right, for example, who wish to ignore and even eliminate most racial and ethnic differences. These commentators incorrectly believe that the suppression of racial and ethnic pride is necessary for effective assimilation. (3) These critics misinterpret the desire to preserve cultural traditions, celebrate the achievements of other group members, or honor a group's distinctive past as a rejection of our shared American culture. They thus find it difficult to understand why, for example, some immigrant parents want their children to learn their native language as well as English; why some Latinos feel special pride in Alberto Gonzales's service as Attorney General of the United States; or why some African-Americans have lobbied for the placement of a National Museum of Black History on the National Mall. Many of these conservative commentators fear that an emphasis on differences in the cultural arena is a slippery slope that will inevitably lead to different--and ultimately unequal--treatment in the legal arena. To preserve the idea of equal treatment under the law and the anti-discrimination principle embodied in the text of the Fourteenth Amendment, these conservatives argue that we should ignore race and ethnicity altogether and reject multiculturalism in any form. (4) If realized, this desire to suppress identity would limit freedom in at least four ways. First, it would limit the freedom of individuals to celebrate their culture and history in the ways they see fit. Second, it would limit the freedom of minority groups to honor members of their community and to highlight successful models of assimilation into the American mainstream. Third, it would limit academic and intellectual freedom to study various racial or ethnic cultures. Fourth, it would limit the freedom to engage in democratic politics, which is inherently and necessarily a collection of factions or identity group interests. (5) But, while the suppression of ethnic identity is freedom-limiting in these and other respects, the exaltation of ethnic identity over all else (6) poses an even greater danger to the American polity and to freedom generally. First, an overemphasis on racial and ethnic identity does, as some conservatives fear, undermine our national identity as Americans. When schools fail to inculcate American values, giving short shrift to the history of the American Revolution, the American Civil War, and the American Civil Rights Movement, while emphasizing the history of Africa, Latin America, or Asia, they are severing the ties that bind Americans together in the name of diversity. This is simply wrong. Second, an overemphasis on racial or ethnic identity encourages segregation in schools, the workforce, the political sphere, and elsewhere. It encourages school districts to herd Latino students into failed bilingual education programs that reinforce the retention of foreign customs and language at the expense of learning English. (7) It encourages employers to relegate Latinos and African-Americans to ethnic enclaves, requiring them to work primarily on minority issues. …


The honey possum is a tiny (~2.5-16g) unique mammal species that feeds exclusively on plant nectar and pollen. Given their dependence on floristic diversity for year-round food sources, the honey possum is hypothesised to be especially vulnerable to habitat destruction caused by Phytophthora cinnamomi. Honey possum habitat preferences were determined via radio tracking around P. cinnamomi affected Banksia heathland at Cape Riche, Albany. Honey possums were shown to be capable of moving relatively large distances (>100m an hour) and although radio tracking indicated they utilised both P. cinnamomi affected and unaffected areas, honey possums showed a preference for locations with attributes consistent with unaffected vegetation (i.e. tall and dense). Honey possum food plants were determined from identification of pollen collected from the noses of captured individuals. Although these data indicated that honey possums can utilise a range of flowering plants, they demonstrated particular affinity for Banksia plumosa subsp. plumosa, which is utilised for year-round nectar and pollen as well as refuge. Banksia p. plumosa is common throughout sites not affected by P. cinnamomi, but the plants are susceptible to the dieback and are largely absent in P. cinnamomi affected areas. Despite their ability to move reasonable distances in search of food, further spread of P. cinnamomi could result in food resources being so dispersed that they will be insufficient to support honey possum populations in similar heathlands.


Penrose has proposed an interesting cyclic cosmology in which two subsequent cosmologies are glued along conformal boundary together. The metric of the next cosmology is related to that of previous by conformal scaling factor, which approaches zero at the 3-D conformal boundary. The physical origin of this kind of distance scaling is difficult to understand. The prediction is the existence of concentric circles of cosmic size interpretable as kind of memories about previous cosmic cycles. In TGD framework zero energy ontology (ZEO) inspired theory of consciousness suggest an analogous sequence of cosmologies. Now the cycles would correspond to life cycles of cosmic size serving as a conscious entity having causal diamond (CD) as imbedding space correlate. The arrow of geometric time is defined as the time direction to which the temporal distance between the ends of CD increases in sequence of state function reductions leaving passive boundary of CD unaffected and having interpretation as weak measurements. The arrow of time changes "big" state function reductions changing the roles of the boundaries of CD and meaning the death and re-incarnation of self with opposite arrow of time. Penrose's gluing procedure would be replaced with "big" state function reduction in TGD framework. This proposal is discussed in some detail and the possibility that also now concentric low variance circles in CMB could carry memories about the previous life cycles of cosmos. This picture applies to all levels in the hierarchy of cosmologies (hierarchy of selves) giving rise to a kind of Russian doll cosmology.


Microseismic monitoring is increasingly being used to assess in real time the effectiveness of hydraulic fracture treatments. Operators are interested in three key questions. (1) Where are the microseismic events occurring (what is the size of the microseismic cloud)? (2) What is the failure mechanism (are fractures opening, closing, or shearing)? (3) Why is failure occurring in specific locations but not others (why are fractures not always symmetric with respect to the injection well and what is the geomechanical behavior of the reservoir)? In particular, the last question is difficult to answer from the recorded seismicity alone because the geomechanical behavior depends on the in-situ stress field, the local rock properties (lithologies), and any existing areas of weakness including faults, fractures and joints (Grob and Van der Baan, 2011). Geomechanical modeling can thus play a key role in better understanding both brittle and ductile deformation inside a reservoir because of hydraulic fracturing an...


Integrated Assessment studies have shown that meeting ambitious greenhouse gas mitigation targets will require substantial amounts of bioenergy as part of the future energy mix. In the course of the Agricultural Model Intercomparison and Improvement Project (AgMIP), five global agro-economic models were used to analyze a future scenario with global demand for ligno-cellulosic bioenergy rising to about 100 ExaJoule in 2050. From this exercise a tentative conclusion can be drawn that ambitious climate change mitigation need not drive up global food prices much, if the extra land required for bioenergy production is accessible or if the feedstock, for example, from forests, does not directly compete for agricultural land. Agricultural price effects across models by the year 2050 from high bioenergy demand in an ambitious mitigation scenario appear to be much smaller (+5% average across models) than from direct climate impacts on crop yields in a high-emission scenario (+25% average across models). However, potential future scarcities of water and nutrients, policy-induced restrictions on agricultural land expansion, as well as potential welfare losses have not been specifically looked at in this exercise.


Forests are one of the most important renewable natural resources and national assets of any country, which today is a valuable resource by various human and natural factors, including fire, threat, and destruction. Due to the fact that many fires occur in the forests of Kurdistan province every year, the purpose of this study was to identify the factors affecting the occurrence of forest fires in Kurdistan and risk zoning in order to achieve fire control and countermeasures. In this study, after determining the ecological and human parameters using the GIS and hierarchical analysis method, the effective factors of analysis and the weight of each were calculated. Then, a fuzzy map based on the coefficient of the importance of each floor of each layer was prepared for all parameters and after overlaying the maps by weighted linear combination method, the final fire risk zoning map was obtained. The fire risk zoning map was performed in five categories (very low risk, low risk, medium risk, high risk, and very high risk) and finally, the areas with very high risk were surveyed. The conclusion is that 6.9% of the total study area is in the very low-risk area, 18.5% in the low-risk area, 26% in the medium-risk area, 30% in the high-risk area, and 18.5% in the very high-risk area. has it. The results also show that there is a direct relationship between the variable of land-use change and the increase in forest firesd.


The development of cognitive representation is the main theme of the three classic theories on how children learn new concepts (Piaget, Bruner, Vygotsky). However, these theories do not agree on evaluation standards for training effectiveness. According to Piaget, it is only when stringent criteria for evaluating training effects are met, i.e. when the child can solve a wide range of transfer problems after training, and when the results of training are durable, that one can conclude that the child's representation has changed. Many American training studies deal with rather specific training effects with only minor transfer. Moreover, these studies do not investigate the duration of the effect, making it impossible to conclude that representation changes through training. The training method developed by Obuchova (1966) maintains the same criteria used by Piaget. Replications of training studies using Obuchova's method have shown that cognitive representation does change. The outcomes of training studies conducted by different theoretical schools clarify that one can only examine whether and to what extent cognitive representation is changed when stringent criteria are used to assess the effect of training.


The article investigates the investment and financial constraints for French, Hungarian and Slovenian farms using FADN panel data with different econometric estimation approaches. Farm gross investment is positively associated with real sales growth and cash flow implying the absence of soft budget constraint. Gross farm investment is positively associated with investment subsidies. Specific results by country are found depending on farm indebtedness. Investment subsidies can mitigate some capital market imperfections in short-term, while on long-term what is crucial is farm sale ability to successfully compete in the output market gaining sufficient cash flow for farm competitive survival and investment.


In this study, high-temperature acetylene gas was delivered to the reactive sites of matrix-supported transition metal catalysts by means of a chemical vapor deposition (CVD) apparatus, yielding carbon nanofibers (CNF) and nanotubes (CNT). A principle feature that delineated this pyrolysis-induced polymerization from prior studies lay in the method used to support the nanoscale transition metal catalysts. In particular, sodium chloride, a byproduct of the catalyst synthesis, was deliberately retained and exploited in subsequent manipulations for the reason that it performed remarkably well as a support medium. In comparison to typical silica and alumina-based support media, a non-porous sodium chloride medium clearly revealed major operational advantages in the matter of fabricating carbon species such as nanorods and nanotubes. In particular, pyrolysis could be conducted at temperatures spanning 500°C to 700°C without observing any agglomeration and subsequent sintering of the catalyst. The root cause of the high stability of these catalytic nanoparticles was not elucidated conclusively but it appeared to be related to the segregating effect of the support matrix, which could arise initially by the direct interaction between mobile chloride ions and the catalyst surface, and subsequently via encapsulation of each catalyst particle, by the growing polymeric species. The other noteworthy peculiarity of sodium chloride as a support material lay in its markedly different morphology, which could be characterized as microcrystalline and non-porous, with catalytic particles dispersed throughout the medium as opposed to remaining surface-pendent. While somewhat counter-intuitive, the zero-porosity of this matrix did not pose any apparent drawbacks in the matter of fabricating carbon nanofibers or nanotubes. In fact, the catalytic effectiveness of many transition metals particles was comparable or better than those of the prior art, whose effectiveness typically rests on utilizing a highly-porous and high-surface support medium with an interconnected morphology. High catalytic activity appeared to be promoted by the fact that the sodium chloride matrix became mobile and acetylene-permeable at elevated temperatures, the most important evidence originating from electron micrographs, which clearly indicated carbon-coated catalysts encased entirely in sodium chloride. In comparing several transition metal oxides, the most active catalyst was clearly nickel-based. The activity of the nickel catalyst did not appear to strongly depend on the ligand used in its fabrication but there was certainly a catalytic dependency on the size of the particle. Kinetic analyses of catalysts indicated that carbon-carbon bond formation was not reaction limited. Rather, the mass transfer of carbon units within the bulk or its chemisorption dynamics was in fact rate limiting, in agreement with literature studies on related systems. It followed to reason that the superior performance of nickel over other transition metal oxides was directly related to its stronger chemisorptivity of carbon species. Reaction rate versus flow rate measurements yielded a pseudo rate constant of zero for all catalyst types, implying that acetylene was saturating under the conditions of reaction. At prolonged reaction times, all catalysts lost their activity. While the possibility of catalyst poisoning could not be ruled out, other indications suggested that poor mass transfer of either the feedstock or the growing product were the likely cause. The morphology of carbon nanotubes were relatively typical whereas the morphology of nanofibers were subject to great variability, often ranging from straight rods to nanocoils to Y-junction or second order nanotubes on nanofiber structures. A hierarchy of the rules that governed the course of growth was not clearly established in this study but the major cause of this diversity appeared to be directly related to the shape, surface properties and the chemistry of the catalyst. Two other important parameters appeared to be the gas flow rate and the pyrolysis temperature. A final merit of employing the sodium chloride support technology was related to its preparative generality and practicality, particularly in view that it could enable the synthesis of metal catalysts and polymeric carbon species while precluding some common drawbacks such as toxicity, harsh experimental manipulations, and high cost. Even the quantitative recovery of catalyst could be facilitated by dissolution of the salt support in water, followed by filtration. It follows to reason that further development and fine-tuning of this novel and non-porous support technology can instigate a new class of support materials and can potentially open the door to the synthesis of carbon-based nanostructures with truly unusual physico-chemical traits.


Massive online open courses (MOOC) are one of the widely used groups of online education and have been thought of as a key factor in future education. In recent years, there has been an increasing interest in MOOC from education and information systems researchers. In this paper, the aim is to observe MOOC in their natural setting to examine a particular community of MOOC by drawing on the concepts of communities of practice as a theoretical lens. One of the most significant current discussions on MOOC is Coursera. Questions have been raised about the structure of an emergent type of community within MOOC. However, far too little attention has been paid to study community of practice in this type of online education. The authors conducted an online ethnographic study on a sample of discussion forums of Coursera. Discussions were qualitatively content analyzed in order to understand the structure of an emergent type of community within MOOC. Our findings suggest that cohesion in a MOOC community is brought about by the domain of doubts, questions, new knowledge, experiences and the community of learners who meet people around the world with similar interests; the practices of documents, information, ideas, stories, experiences and software sharing. The combination of forces for MOOC community are global, free and online education identity of community which provides great materials, top professors, mass participation and certificates from top universities; voting system for warrant; movement of new comers from peripheral to the core of community by contributing more in discussions.


Sub-Saharan Africa has seen wide-ranging economic and political change alongside civil and international wars. This volume focuses on the radical social uncertainties there, and how social actors perceive and cope with them in their everyday lives. It also suggests some ways to conceptualize both the actions and the environment of uncertainty.


This book is a comprehensive presentation of embedded Java security. It is compared with the security model of the Java 2 Standard Edition in order to view the impact of limited resources on security. No other book specifically addresses the topic of embedded Java security. Furthermore, the book provides hints and suggestions as ways for hardening security, and offers researchers and practitioners alike a broader and deeper understanding of the issues involved in embedded Java security, and as a larger view - mobile devices security. The author is a well-known authority and expert in mobile computing and embedded devices.


Several physical architectures allow for measurement-based quantum computing using sequential preparation of cluster states by means of probabilistic quantum gates. In such an approach, the order in which partial resources are combined to form the final cluster state turns out to be crucially important. We determine the influence of this classical decision process on the expected size of the final cluster. Extending earlier work, we consider different quantum gates operating at various probabilites of success. For finite resources, we employ a computer algebra system to obtain the provably optimal classical control strategy and derive symbolic results for the expected final size of the cluster. We identify two regimes: when the success probability of the elementary gates is high, the influence of the classical control strategy is found to be negligible. In that case, other figures of merit become more relevant. In contrast, for small probabilities of success, the choice of an appropriate strategy is crucial.


The results of an ongoing collaborative project between the New Jersey Institute of Technology (NJIT) and SEMATECH on the temperature-dependent emissivity of silicon-related materials and structures are presented in this study. These results have been acquired using a spectral emissometer. This emissometer consists of a Fourier Transform Infra-Red (FTIR) spectrometer designed specifically to facilitate simultaneous measurements of surface spectral emittance and temperature by using optical techniques over the near- and mid-IR spectral range and temperatures ranging from 300 K to 2000 K. This noncontact, real-time technique has been used to measure radiative properties as a function of temperature and wavelength for a wide range of silicon-related materials and structures. The first results of the temperature and wavelength dependent emissivity and hence refractive index of silicon nitride, in the literature, is presented in this study.


While in the past, increased use of inputs and expansion of agricultural land accounted for a good part of agricultural growth in Africa, improvements in productivity will need to be a major driver of growth in the future. Thus, agricultural innovations are needed to sustainably increase productivity, i.e. output per unit of all inputs, while maintaining environmental quality and resources. Such innovations require enhanced investments in research and development. This study identifies potentials in agriculture and food systems in Africa for enhanced food security. For maximum impact, the Special Initiative "One World – No Hunger" of BMZ needs to take note of the whole African landscape of actions in agriculture and food security. Therefor this study provides a detailed review of related ongoing and recent initiatives, in order to help identify in what ways investments under the "One World – No Hunger" Special Initiative from a broad strategic perspective might best connect and serve in coherent and complementary ways to increase food and nutrition security and sustainable agricultural productivity growth. Innovations in the agricultural sector are key to ensure food security and achieve the right to food. Investments in the agricultural sector are crucial not only to increase food production but also because the returns on investments in terms of poverty reduction effects are often highest in in this sector. Furthermore, food insecurity and violent conflicts are inextricably interlinked with food insecurity being both a driver and a consequence of violent conflicts and related refugee flows. African countries have recently made major commitments to invest in agriculture. The Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Programme (CAADP), that was initiated in 2003 and has been reinforced by the Malabo Declaration in 2014, is now the reference point and measure of commitment in Africa. With CAADP, African countries committed to spend 10% of their total public expenditures on agriculture to achieve an annual agricultural growth rate of 6%. Other African and international initiatives, including new partnerships between African governments, donors and the private sector like the New Alliance for Food Security and Nutrition or Feed the Future, have since been launched to support the CAADP process. Investment opportunities differ across Africa. In view of the above mentioned goals, it is suggested here that development investments by Germany target countries which reveal potentials indicated by 1. having a track record of political commitment to foster sustainable agricultural growth, as indicated by performance under CAADP, and 2. showing actual progress in sustainable agricultural productivity driven by related innovations, as indicated by comprehensive productivity measurement and innovation actions on the ground, and 3. prioritizing actions for hunger and malnutrition reduction and showing progress (for instance measured by the Global Hunger Index), but where agricultural and rural development and nutrition interventions are likely to make a significant difference, as indicated by public policy and room for civil society actions. The records and potentials of 42 African countries are identified accordingly, using comprehensive assessments of agronomic, economic and governance criteria that can be transparently tracked.


A new wavelet-based embedded image coding technique is proposed. For any desired L/sub /spl infin//-distortion bound, the bit stream can be truncated at a corresponding bit rate, so that the target upper bound on the absolute values of the pixels of the reconstruction error image is guaranteed. The algorithm outperforms embedded L/sub 2/-oriented wavelet coders in terms of maximum absolute error.


Motivated by recent experimental progress in the context of ultracold multicolor fermionic atoms in optical lattices, we have investigated the properties of the SU (N) Heisenberg chain with totally antisymmetric irreducible representations, the effective model of Mott phases with m < N particles per site. These models have been studied for arbitrary N and m with non-Abelian bosonization [I. Affleck, Nucl. Phys. B 265, 409 (1986); 305, 582 (1988)], leading to predictions about the nature of the ground state (gapped or critical) in most but not all cases. Using exact diagonalization and variational Monte Carlo based on Gutzwiller projected fermionic wave functions, we have been able to verify these predictions for a representative number of cases with N <= 10 and m <= N/2, and we have shown that the opening of a gap is associated to a spontaneous dimerization or trimerization depending on the value of m and N. We have also investigated the marginal cases where Abelian bosonization did not lead to any prediction. In these cases, variational Monte Carlo predicts that the ground state is critical with exponents consistent with conformal field theory.


This paper aims to develop a practical approach to modeling of fiber reinforced polymers (FRP) strengthened masonry panels. The main objective is to provide suitable relations for the material characterization of the masonry constituents so that the finite element applications of elasto-plastic theory achieves a close fit to the experimental load-displacement diagrams of the walls subjected to in-plane shear and compression. Two relations proposed for masonry columns confined with FRP are adjusted for the cohesion and the internal friction angle of both units and mortar. Relating the mechanical parameters to the uniaxial compression strength and the hydrostatic pressure acting over the wall surface, the effects of major and intermediate principal stresses and on the yielding and the shape of the deviatoric section are then reflected into the analyses. Performing nonlinear finite element analyses (NLFEA) for the three walls tested in two different studies, their stress-strain response and failure modes are eventually evaluated through the comparisons with the experimental behavior.


Abstract Nitrogen-16 is produced in the coolant of water-cooled reactors from the 16O(n,p)16N reaction, and its rate of generation increases with an increase in reactor power level. Therefore, measurement of gamma rays emitted by 16N in the primary coolant can be used to monitor the reactor power level. Measurements have been made with a locally fabricated argon-filled three-electrode ionization chamber. The (I, V) characteristics of the chamber filled with argon have been studied with 16N gamma rays at the Pakistan Research Reactor-1 (PARR-1). The ionization current was measured at 1-, 3-, 5-, 7-, and 10-MW power levels. The measured ionization current was found to increase linearly with the power level. The plateau region of the chamber was observed to start at an applied voltage of 400 V, and the chamber operating voltage was found to be 600 V at an argon gas pressure 1.38 MPa. An empirical relation between reactor power and ionization current was developed. The (1/I, 1/V) and (I, 1/V2) curves elucidate the initial and volume recombination losses, respectively. The volume recombination losses were found to be relatively smaller than the initial recombination losses. These losses were found to increase with increasing power level. However, the increase in the initial recombination losses was slightly greater than the volume recombination losses.


The unique Business-Engineering-Technology (BET) minor at Auburn University trains business and engineering students in teamwork and entrepreneurship. All eleven graduates of the first BET class (2003) and nineteen graduates from the second BET class (2004) were surveyed to assess their entrepreneurial skills, knowledge and abilities. Their responses were compared against the Auburn University norm for graduating seniors. The norm was developed using 254 responses from business and engineering students who were cohorts of the BET students. In this lock-step program, students design and develop three different products and matching businesses to exploit their products. Over the two years, they prepare three written project reports and presentations which include product details, a business plan, one prototype and financial analyses. The written reports and presentations are graded. The assessment described in the paper does not use these student deliverables. We are considering the use of an assessment that would incorporate these student deliverables as well. The comparison between BET and non-BET graduating seniors in Tables 1 and 2 shows that BET students consider themselves more knowledgeable and skilled in entrepreneurship and teamwork than their peers graduating from the two colleges. However, when compared to their peers, students going through the BET program are no more predisposed to entrepreneurship upon graduation than their peers graduating at the same time from the colleges of engineering and business at Auburn University. It appears from this study that knowledge, skills, and abilities do not translate into a desire for entrepreneurship in graduating seniors who may average twenty-two years of age at graduation. This phenomenon and an explanation for it will be investigated in future studies. Based on the first three offerings of this program, the program will see some revisions, which are included at the end of this paper. Introduction A relatively new minor for business and engineering students called the Business-Engineering-Technology Program (BET) at Auburn University trains students in cross-functional teamwork and entrepreneurial skills. The motto of the program is Launching New Products through Teamwork. The unique two-year, lock-step program (sixteen semester credits) for business and engineering students in their junior and senior years is offered through the


IMPORTANCE
Data on outcomes following surgical management of intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma (ICC) are limited. The incidence of ICC is increasing and it has a poor prognosis. No consensus has been reached regarding the optimal treatment modalities.

OBJECTIVE
To systematically review and synthesize the available evidence regarding treatment and prognosis in patients with ICC.

DATA SOURCES
The PubMed database was searched for relevant articles published between January 1, 2000, and April 1, 2013.

STUDY SELECTION
Only studies assessing predictors of survival or recurrence in patients undergoing curative-intent surgical treatment of ICC were included. Small series, studies reporting on mixed types of cholangiocarcinoma, or exclusively on hepatolithiasis-associated cholangiocarcinoma, and those published in a language other than English, French, German, Italian, or Greek, were excluded. Fifty-seven of 960 articles were therefore analyzed.

DATA EXTRACTION AND SYNTHESIS
Data on preoperative, intraoperative, and postoperative variables were extracted by 3 independent reviewers. Multiple studies reporting on the same population were excluded. Data were pooled using a random-effects model.

MAIN OUTCOMES AND MEASURES
We hypothesized that preoperative variables and tumor characteristics affect patient survival. The outcomes of the study were overall survival and recurrence-free survival. The hypothesis was formulated before data collection.

RESULTS
Fifty-seven studies (4756 patients) were included in the review. Median patient age ranged from 49 to 67 years, and 57% were male. Most patients had a solitary (69%), large (median size, 4.5-8.0 cm) tumor of the mass-forming type (86%). Approximately one-third of the patients had lymph node metastasis (34%) or vascular (38%), perineural (29%), or biliary invasion (29%). Most underwent a major hepatectomy (82%), often accompanied by lymphadenectomy (67%) and sometimes by extrahepatic bile duct resection (23%). Median and 5-year overall survival (OS) generally were approximately 28 months (range, 9-53 months) and 30% (range, 5%-56%), respectively; factors predicting shorter OS included large tumor size, multiple tumors, lymph node metastasis, and vascular invasion. Adjuvant chemotherapy or radiotherapy did not appear to be beneficial. Seven studies (2132 patients) provided data for the meta-analysis. Factors associated with shorter OS included older age (pooled hazard ratio, 1.10; 95% CI, 1.03-1.17), larger tumor size (1.09; 1.02-1.16), presence of multiple tumors (1.70; 1.43-2.02), lymph node metastasis (2.09; 1.80-2.43), vascular invasion (1.87; 1.44-2.42), and poor tumor differentiation (1.41; 1.17-1.71).

CONCLUSIONS AND RELEVANCE
The prognosis of ICC is dictated mainly by tumor factors. Future research could focus on the usefulness of adjuvant treatment as well as other multidisciplinary treatment modalities.


The law discriminates among a corporation's secrets. In the eyes of the law, commercial secrets of corporations are legitimate secrets that deserve legal protection and nondisclosure, but personal secrets of executives are not as deserving of legal protection and nondisclosure. This divergent treatment of secrets has resulted in a legal landscape of perplexing, paradoxical paths for corporations and executives concerning executive disclosures — a precarious landscape that has left corporations and investors dangerously susceptible to revelations of private facts that shock market valuation and institutional stability.This Article explores this divergent treatment of secrets in the context of public corporations and the private individuals who manage them, and offers a new way of thinking about corporate and personal secrets. This Article conceives the concept of Executive Trade Secrets as a pragmatic theoretical framework for unlocking this paradox of secrets and addressing the challenges surrounding executive disclosures. This Article is the first to use trade secrets law to address the interdisciplinary legal issues surrounding executive disclosures. It re-conceptualizes private matters of executives as legally protectable trade secrets by unfolding the hidden symmetry between commercial secrets and personal secrets. It reveals Executive Trade Secrets as faithful to the first principles of the laws of trade secrets, privacy, securities, and corporations, and explains how such fidelity protects the privacy interests of executives and the corporate interests of shareholders. This Article, ultimately, constructs a way to think anew about executive disclosures and the larger issues at the modern nexus of secrecy, privacy, and commerce.


This reconsideration of Matthew's soteriology argues that Matthew understands salvation in continuity. It employs a sequential treatment of the Gospel, which enables it to avoid the danger which characterises many previous studies of limiting the discussion of salvation in Matthew to certain texts, where the theme of salvation is more direct and explicit.

To this end, the study is divided into seven chapters. Chapter 1 discusses the need for a reconsideration of Matthew's soteriology, and Chapters 2 and 3 furnish, respectively, a brief literature survey and the method of approach. Chapters 4–6 examine Matthew's depiction of Jesus' saving roles as teacher and judge, healer and helper, and the significance for Matthew of Jesus' death and resurrection––especially in Matthew 1–7, 8–25 and 26–28 respectively, but also within the Gospel as a whole. On the basis of the findings from Chapters 4–6, Chapter 7 shows that Matthew understands salvation in continuity.

The study argues that Matthew does not understand salvation as something achieved only by Jesus' death, and nor does he limit salvation to Jesus, because Jesus' saving does not replace or abrogate the repertoire of salvation in the past such as the Torah and the temple. Instead, for Matthew, Jesus' saving is the fulfilment of God's saving plans and promises for his people and the continuation of God's saving in the past. For Matthew, Jesus' vicarious death is soteriologically comparable with the vicarious suffering of the righteous in the past, though much wider in its reach, and like theirs does not call the temple and the Torah into question. Matthew's understanding of salvation in continuity is also to be seen as his response to the historical and theological questions of post-70 C.E. Judaism.


In the early days of the Internet, many political communication theorists held the utopian belief that political actors would use online tools to communicate directly with members of the public, and thereby bolster political engagement and enrich democracy. Unfortunately, studies over the past two decades found that political websites were not usually used to interact directly with the public, but instead were used to simply disseminate information in a one-way information-sharing model. However, the emergence of social media sites presents political actors with the opportunity to interact with the public far more easily than websites had previously allowed. Given the widespread adoption and high usage rates of social media sites, these online resources could potentially open up a space for public discussion about politics and allow political actors to interact directly with members of the public. Literature indicates that this type of shared space is conducive to the kind of civic mindset that leads to higher rates of political engagement. Research on political uses of social media tends to focus on the use of social media engagement. Research on political uses of social media tends to focus on the use of social media within elections, such as the 2008 U.S presidential election, and on the use of social media by national governments. I have chosen instead to examine how a group of municipal councilors in Toronto, Ontario uses social media. These politicians have the greatest need to interact directly with individuals throughout their term of service because municipal councilors are expected to know the members of their ward far more intimately than federal, or even provincial, politicians. My study focuses on the use of Facebook because literature indicates that it is the most political
social media platform and that it presents politicians with the greatest opportunity to foster political engagement online. Through analysis of the Facebook pages of Toronto city councilors this study examines the degree to which councilors use Facebook to engage their followers, whether certain citizens are consistently engaged in ongoing political discussions, and whether small communities of politically engaged citizens develop around the Facebook profiles of councilors.


Are the methods of synthetic biology capable of recreating authentic living members of an extinct species? An analogy with the restoration of destroyed natural landscapes suggests not. The restored version of a natural landscape will typically lack much of the aesthetic value of the original landscape because of the different historical processes that created it – processes that involved human intentions and actions, rather than natural forces acting over millennia. By the same token, it would appear that synthetically recreated versions of extinct natural organisms will also be less aesthetically valuable than the originals; that they will be, in some strong sense, 'inauthentic', because of their peculiar history and mode of origin. I call this the 'genesis argument' against de-extinction. In this article I critically evaluate the genesis argument. I highlight an important disanalogy between living organisms and natural landscapes: viz., it is of the essence of the former, but not of the latter, to regularly reproduce and die. The process of iterated natural reproduction that sustains the continued existence of a species through time obviously does not undermine the authenticity of the species. I argue that the authenticity of a species will likewise be left intact by the kind of artificial copying of genes and traits that a de-extinction project entails. I conclude on this basis that the genesis argument is unsound.


In this study, we have investigated the effect of the buffer layers on the electronic and optical properties of an exciton (X) and a biexciton (XX) in a type-II CdTe/CdSe quantum dot nanocrystal. In an experimental study, it has been reported that when a CdTe/CdSe quantum dot nanocrystal is coated by a ZnTe material as a buffer layer, the photoluminescence quantum yield is growing from 4 to 20%. We have confirmed theoretically this improvement and extended the calculations to an XX structure. In the calculations, two different semiconductor materials, CdS and ZnTe, have been considered for the buffer layer. We have theoretically shown that the buffer layer causes an increase in the radiative oscillator strength of both X and XX. When the ZnTe is used as the buffer layer, the oscillator strength becomes stronger when compared to CdSe buffer material because of higher conduction band offset between CdSe and ZnTe.


Today it is not uncommon to find items in department stores that are hand-crafted in countries like Thailand and Costa Rica. These "traditional" crafts now make up an important part of a global market. They support local and sometimes national economies and help create and solidify cultural identity. But these crafts are not necessarily indigenous. Whereas Thailand markets crafts with a long history and cultural legacy, Costa Rica has created a local handicraft tradition where none was known to exist previously. In Global Markets and Local Crafts, Frederick F. Wherry compares the handicraft industries of Thailand and Costa Rica to show how local cultural industries break into global markets and, conversely, how global markets affect the ways in which artisans understand, adapt, and utilize their cultural traditions. Wherry develops a new framework for studying globalization by considering the phenomenon from the perspective of the supplier instead of the market. Drawing from interviews and extensive fieldwork shadowing artisans and exporters in their daily dealings, Wherry offers a rare account of globalization in motion-and what happens when market negotiations do not proceed as planned. Considering economic and political forces, flows of people and materials, and frames that define cultural and market situations as they play out in the artisan communities of these two countries, Wherry uncovers how authentic folk tradition is capitalized or created.


In his first book "Ecovillages", Jan Bang explained at the principles and practice of setting up a sustainable community, including difficult decisions about management, design and architecture, farming and food, water, sewage, energy sources and economics. "Growing Eco-Communities" looks at what comes next. Groups aren't fixed by those earlier decisions and directions: they grow and develop, and not always in expected directions. Jan Bang here provides a comprehensive overview of the different changes that groups can undergo and offers experienced advice on how to handle particular situations. As in "Ecovillages", the book is anchored by numerous case studies of real-life communities and how they've dealt with change. There are sections on The Pioneering Phase (including 'everybody does everything' and 'decisions over dinner'); through the Maturity and Stability Phase (including 'Procedures for new members and the rule of law' and 'I want my own room'); to Old Age (including 'the professionals take over', 'the next generation' and 'dynasty!'). Throughout, the author addresses practical issues of flexibility, self-sufficiency, neighbours, technology, spirituality and money, among others. This is a candid, inspiring and practical book which should be essential reading for anyone involved in a community or non-residential group, club or association.


Many catchment hydrologic and ecologic processes are impacted by the storage capacity of soil water, which is dictated by the profile thickness and water retention properties of soil. Soil water retention properties are primarily controlled by soil texture, which in turn varies spatially in response to microclimate‐induced differences in insolation, wetness and temperature. All of these variables can be strongly differentiated by slope aspect. In this study, we compare quantitative measures of soil water retention capacity for two opposing slopes in a semi‐arid catchment in southwest Idaho, USA. Undisturbed soil cores from north and south aspects were subjected to a progressive drainage experiment to estimate the soil water retention curve for each sample location. The relatively large sample size (35) supported statistical analysis of slope scale differences in soil water retention between opposing aspects. Soils on the north aspect retain as much as 25% more water at any given soil water pressure than samples from the south aspect slope. Soil porosity, soil organic matter and silt content were all greater on the north aspect, and each contributed to greater soil water retention. These results, along with the observation that soils on north aspect slopes tend to be deeper, indicate that north aspect slopes can store more water from the wet winter months into the dry summer in this region, an observation with potential implications on ecological function and landscape evolution. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.


An initial study has recently been presented of surrogate-assisted evolutionary algorithms used to design vertical-axis wind turbines wherein candidate prototypes are evaluated under fan-generated wind conditions after being physically instantiated by a 3D printer. Unlike other approaches, such as computational fluid dynamics simulations, no mathematical formulations were used and no model assumptions were made. This paper extends that work by exploring alternative surrogate modelling and evolutionary techniques. The accuracy of various modelling algorithms used to estimate the fitness of evaluated individuals from the initial experiments is compared. The effect of temporally windowing surrogate model training samples is explored. A surrogate-assisted approach based on an enhanced local search is introduced; and alternative coevolution collaboration schemes are examined.


Background: Preterm birth is the leading cause of neonatal and infant mortality and has become a major health concern due to the increasing rates of infant deaths in the United States (WHO, 2017). Studying maternal risk factors for preterm labor provides insight to this obscure condition and can assist in the identification of high risk women, as well as facilitate appropriate pregnancy planning. Purpose: Although research can be found on interpregnancy intervals and maternal age as independent risk factors for premature labor, gaps exist within the relation of these variables. This study was done to investigate whether there is a significant risk association between advanced maternal age (35 years and older) and short interpregnancy intervals on premature labor, that deems transferring out of a low risk birthing center to a more advanced hospitalized setting. Methodology: De-identified data regarding obstetric history, medical history, and pregnancy morbidity was abstracted from women who delivered at Baby + Co., a birthing center in Nashville, Tennessee, between the years of 2015 and 2018. The population set included 1001 women, 5 of which delivered preterm. Means and standard deviations for the two groups were calculated, and two sided t-tests and corresponding p-values were calculated. Result: There was no statistical significance regarding maternal age and preterm transfers (pvalue of 0.762). However, there was a positive correlation between short interpregnancy intervals and preterm birth (p-value .007). Discussion: Due to the low risk population included in this study, there is a need for additional research conducted within a higher risk population set to determine the significance and interaction between advanced maternal age and short interpregnancy intervals on preterm labor.


The paper describes the methodology of the automated creation of neural models of microwave structures. During the creation process, artificial neural networks are trained using the combination of the particle swarm optimization and the quasi-Newton method to avoid critical training problems of the conventional neural nets. In the paper, neural networks are used to approximate the behavior of a planar microwave filter (moment method, Zeland IE3D). In order to evaluate the efficiency of neural modeling, global optimizations are performed using numerical models and neural ones. Both approaches are compared from the viewpoint of CPU-time demands and the accuracy. Considering conclusions, methodological recommendations for including neural networks to the microwave design are formulated.


The state has owned most historical buildings since the establishment of the People's Republic of China (PRC). Residents within are entitled to the right to use the house in the form of a lease. After entering a free trade housing market in 1988, residents in historic neighbourhoods of Shanghai have been suffering uncertainty of their identities. Residents' role, responsibilities and obligations within urban transformation, has always been in suspense and strongly affected by multiple stakeholders' decisions. Based on an analysis of the relationship between the native residents and the historic Lilong communities they are living in, this paper examines stakeholders' heritage approaches in three typical transforming project, to explore residents' mobility and behaviour within varied urban transformation and socio-economic development. Through a literature review, fieldwork and a pilot study in Xintiandi, Tianzifang and Chunyangli districts, urban transformation in historic urban communities from within is found literally rare in China. This paper argues that residents could not clarify their role by living in urban heritage, neither obtaining house-ownership to define their position nor being treated as one component of urban heritage. Government in China has been indeed the character who mediates between all stakeholders and bears the most burden.


Title of Document: THE EFFECTS OF LOW-FAT DIET AND EXERCISE ON C-REACTIVE PROTEIN AND METABOLIC SYNDROME: FINDINGS FROM A RANDOMIZED CONTROLLED TRIAL Sarah Michelle Camhi, Doctor of Philosophy, 2008 Directed By: Professor Deborah R. Young, PhD Kinesiology Background: Low-fat diet (D) and exercise (E) are recommended for reducing cardiovascular disease risk. However, the independent and combined effects of D and E on C-reactive protein (CRP) and metabolic syndrome (MS) are unknown. Purpose: The purpose of this dissertation was to examine the changes in CRP and MS between control (C), D, E and diet plus exercise (D+E). Methods: Men (n=197) and postmenopausal women (n=180) with elevated lowdensity lipoprotein cholesterol and reduced high-density lipoprotein cholesterol, were randomized into a one-year trial with four groups: C, D, E or D+E (Stefanick et al., 1998). Weight loss was not an intervention focus. This secondary data analysis evaluated stored plasma samples for high-sensitivity CRP. MS prevalence was retrospectively found using the NCEP-ATP III definition. CRP change (∆CRP) was examined between intervention groups using ANCOVA. Differences between groups for MS at follow-up were retrospectively investigated using logistic regression. All analyses were stratified by gender and controlled for baseline values, body fat change and other appropriate covariates. Results: In women, ∆CRP was different between D+E vs. C (-0.7 ± 0.33 mg/L, p = 0.04) and D+E vs. E (-0.9 ± 0.32 mg/L, p = 0.004). Women also had a decrease in CRP within D+E (∆ log CRP 0.2 ± 0.035 mg/L; p = 0.0002). After the intervention, ∆CRP did not differ for men between or within treatment groups. MS at follow-up was not different between C, D, E or D+E in either men or women. In women with MS, ∆CRP was different between D+E vs. C (-1.3 ± 0.43 mg/L; p = 0.006), D+E vs. E (-1.1 ± 0.44 mg/L; p = 0.02), and D vs. C (-1.2 ± 0.43 mg/L; p = 0.009). In women with MS, CRP decreased from baseline within D+E (∆ log CRP 0.2 ± 0.039 mg/L; p=0.0008). At follow-up, there were no differences between or within groups for ∆CRP in men with MS, or men without MS and women without MS. Conclusion: D and D+E may be effective treatments for reducing CRP in women with MS. Further studies are needed to replicate results and clarify the influence of gender. THE EFFECTS OF LOW-FAT DIET AND EXERCISE ON C-REACTIVE PROTEIN AND METABOLIC SYNDROME: FINDINGS FROM A RANDOMIZED CONTROLLED TRIAL