Realistic mathematical modeling of voice production has been recently boosted by applications to different fields like bioprosthetics, quality speech synthesis and pathological diagnosis. In this work, we revisit a two-mass model of the vocal folds that includes accurate fluid mechanics for the air passage through the folds and nonlinear properties of the tissue. We present the bifurcation diagram for such a system, focusing on the dynamical properties of two regimes of interest: the onset of oscillations and the normal phonation regime. We also show theoretical support to the nonlinear nature of the elastic properties of the folds tissue by comparing theoretical isofrequency curves with reported experimental data. Received: 2 March 2013,  Accepted: 5 June 2013;  Edited by: G. Mindlin;  DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.4279/PIP.050004 Cite as: M F Assaneo, M A Trevisan, Papers in Physics 5, 050004 (2013)


To date, most modular robotic systems lack flexibility when increasing the number of modules due to their hard building blocks and rigid connection mechanisms. In order to improve adaptation to environmental changes, softness at the module level might be beneficial. However, coping with softness requires a fundamental rethinking of the way modules are built. A major challenge is to develop a connection mechanism that does not limit the softness of the modules, does not require precise alignment and allows for easy detachment. In this paper, we propose a soft active connection mechanism based on electroadhesion. The mechanism uses electrostatic forces to connect modules. The method is easy to implement and can be integrated in a wide range of soft module types. Based on our experimental results, we conclude that the mechanism is suitable as a connection principle for lightweight modules when efficiency over a wide range of softness, tolerance to alignment and easy detachment are desired. The main contributions of this paper are (i) the qualitative comparison of different connector principles for soft modular robots, (ii) the integration of electroadhesion, featuring a novel electrode pattern design, into soft modules and (iii) the demonstration and characterization of the performance of functional soft module mockups including the connection mechanism.


BACKGROUND
Highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART) including HIV protease inhibitor ritonavir may be associated with the clinical complications including accelerated atherosclerosis and pulmonary artery hypertension. The objective of this study was to determine whether capsaicin, a major ingredient of hot pepper with antioxidative property, could effectively inhibit ritonavir-induced oxidative injury in porcine pulmonary arteries.

MATERIAL/METHODS
Fresh porcine pulmonary artery rings were treated with ritonavir (15 microM), capsaicin (50 microM) or both for 24 hours and, then, subjected to myograph analysis in response to vasoactive drugs including thromboxane A2 analog U-46619, bradykinin, and sodium nitroprusside (SNP).

RESULTS
In response to U-46619 (3x10(-8) M), ritonavir-treated porcine pulmonary artery rings reduced the contraction by 15% compared with control rings. In response to bradykinin (10(-6) M), ritonavir-treated rings showed a significant reduction of endothelium-dependent vasorelaxation by 32% compared with untreated control vessels (P<0.05, n=5, Student t-test). However, ritonavir treatment did not change endothelium-independent vasorelaxation in response to SNP (10(-6) M). Capsaicin-treated vessel rings did not show any significant changes in response to U-46619, bradykinin, and SNP compared with untreated control vessels. More importantly, capsaicin co-cultured with ritonavir significantly blocked ritonavir-induced inhibition of endothelium-dependent vasorelaxation and contraction compared with ritonavir alone treatment in porcine pulmonary artery rings (P<0.05, n=5, Student t-test).

CONCLUSIONS
Capsaicin effectively inhibits the detrimental effects of HIV protease inhibitor ritonavir on vasomotor functions of porcine pulmonary arteries. These findings may suggest that capsaicin could have clinical applications to prevent vascular and pulmonary complications of HAART drugs in HIV patients.


One recurring question concerning how legal commands should be formulated in a legal system involves whether commands should take the form of rules or standards. The policy option that is at the core of this question is whether the content of the law should be determined and announced in advance, in a rule, or left to an adjudicator, in a standard. This distinction is relevant in the transfer pricing area because the arm's length approach is a standard: its precise meaning can only be determined via adjudication. Thus, the arm's length standard is unworkable unless the legal system in which it operates is prepared to produce case law (or something functionally equivalent to case law) to give guidance to taxpayers on how they are expected to behave. The purpose of this article is two-fold. First, it attempts to provide an analysis of the dramatic problem faced by the arm's length standard when the legal system in which it works is unable to produce case law capable of showing taxpayers how they are expected to behave in the transfer pricing area (the Problem). The Problem is common to both developed and developing countries. On the one hand, developed countries face the Problem because a variety of reasons have made case law an infrequent element. Moreover, the limited case law available is not a public good: the holdings are too fact-specific to allow predicting the probable outcome of future court decisions. This scenario makes the meaning of the arm's length standard difficult to determine - especially when no comparables are available. On the other hand, developing countries also face the Problem but for an additional reason: their weak rule of law produces, inter alia, frequent violations of stare decisis making case law a negligible source for predicting court decisions. In sum, the meaning of the arm's length standard is largely uncertain in both the developed and developing worlds. This explains the worldwide arm´s length standard crisis. The second purpose of this article is to suggest a procedural method for inducing a legal system - be it from the developed or developing world - to produce a proxy of case law capable of determining precise meanings of the arm's length standard. The suggested procedure has been written in such a way as to facilitate its addition to article 9 of the OECD or UN Model Tax Conventions on Income and on Capital.


Abstract. Disturbances can have strong impacts on the dynamics and structure of tropical forests. They often lead to increased tree mortality and affect their behaviour as carbon sinks. In the future, the intensity of disturbances, such as extreme weather events, fires, floods, and biotic agents, will probably even increase, with more serious consequences for tropical forests than we have already observed. However, impacts of altering disturbances on rates of forest biomass loss through tree mortality (hereinafter: biomass mortality) have been little described yet. This complicates progress in quantifying the effects of climate change on forests globally. This study aims to analyse the consequences of elevated tree mortality on forest dynamics and to provide a methodology that can reduce uncertainties in estimating biomass mortality rates at local and country level. We achieved this by linking benefits of individual-based forest model-ling, statistical linear regression, and remote sensing. We applied an individual-based forest model to investigate the impact of varying disturbance regimes on the succession dynamic of a humid Terra Firma forest at the Paracou study site in French Guiana. By simulating increased tree mortality rates, we were able to investigate their influence on several forest attributes, namely biomass, leaf area index, forest height, gross primary production, net primary production, and biomass mortality. Based on simulations of leaf area index and forest height, we developed a linear multivariate regression model to project biomass mortality. Our findings demonstrate that severe disturbances altered the succession pattern of the forests in favour of fast-growing species, which changed gross primary production, but net primary production remained stable. We also observed a strong influence on biomass mortality rates as well as observed complex relationships between these rates and single forest attributes (leaf area index, forest height, and biomass). By combining leaf area index and forest height we obtained relationships that allow an estimation of the biomass mortality. Based on these findings, we mapped the biomass mortality for whole French Guiana. We found a nation-wide biomass mortality of 3 % per year (standard deviation = 1.4 % per year). The approach we describe here, provides a novel methodology for quantifying the spatial-temporal distribution of biomass loss, which has recently been identified as particularly critical for monitoring mortality hot spots. Quantifying biomass mortality rates may help reducing uncertainties in the terrestrial component of the global carbon cycle.


This paper presents a conjunctive 2-D surface and 3-D subsurface flow model, which deals with the interaction between surface and subsurface flows. The model uses the non-inertia approximation of the Saint-Venant equations for two-dimensional unsteady surface flow and a modified version of the Richards equation for three-dimensional unsteady unsaturated and saturated subsurface flows. The equations are written in the form of 2-D and 3-D heat diffusion equations respectively. In the model the surface and subsurface flow components are coupled interactively using the common boundary condition of infiltration through the ground surface. Overland flow is generally classified into Hortonian and saturation overland flows in watershed hydrology. The conjunctive model was, after verification with experimental data, applied to a hypothetical watershed to simulate examples of 2-D saturation overland flow and 3-D saturated and unsaturated subsurface flow. The model demonstrates that overland flow is initiated when rainwater supply exceeds infiltrability, not only in Hortonian but even in saturation overland flow. The model also simulates overland flow, infiltration, seepage, subsurface flow, and the interaction between subsurface and channel flows. The conjunctive model, as a general model to deal with the interaction between surface and subsurface flows, contributes as a tool for improved detailed simulation of 2-D surface and 3-D subsurface flows and their interaction.


Synopsis The known fossil insects of Carboniferous age from Scotland are reviewed. Of the seven recorded, one record is highly dubious and rejected, and another is herein identified as a crustacean. The remaining five insects belong to three orders: The extinct order Protodonata (giant dragonflies) is represented by the holotype of Truemania multiplicata (Bolton 1922). The extinct order Palaeodictyoptera is represented by the holotypes of Lithomantis carbonarius Woodward 1876 and the nymph Idoptilus peachii (Woodward 1887b) comb. nov. The order Blattodea (cockroaches) is represented by the lost holotype of 'Lithomylacris' kirkbyi Woodward 1887a and a nearly complete cockroach, herein identified as Archimylacris? sp. The localities and ages are reviewed and the five insect specimens came from the Coal Measures (Westphalian) of Ayrshire and Fife.


Mechanically gated ion channels were believed to underlie the perception of sound, but the identity of the channels has been elusive (see Ashmore). Corey et al. report that a member of the transient receptor potential (TRP) channel family TRPA1 is likely to be the long-sought mechanosensitive channel in vertebrates. Analysis of the mRNAs expressed from TRP channel encoding genes showed that TRPA1 was enriched in the mouse inner ear, and reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) analysis demonstrated that expression of TRPA1 occurred just prior to the onset of mechanical sensitivity of hair cells. Antibody labeling revealed that TRPA1 was present in the stereocilia tips, which is the proper location for the mechanosensitive channel. Knockdown of expression of the zebrafish homolog drtrpa1 inhibited function of the lateral line hair cells and the inner ear hair cells. Knockdown of expression of mouse Trpa1 in isolated hair cells also inhibited transduction currents. Thus, TRP channels have now been implicated in many forms of sensory perception: sight, touch, pain, osomosensing, and heat sensing, and now hearing. J. Ashmore, Channel at the hair's end. Nature 432, 685-686 (2004). [Online Journal] D. P. Corey, J. García-Añoveros, J. R. Holt, K. Y. Kwan, S.-Y. Lin, M. A. Vollrath, A. Amalfitano, E. L.-M. Cheung, B. H. Derfler, A. Duggan, G. S. G. Géléoc, P. A. Gray, M. P. Hoffman, H. L. Rehm, D. Tamasauskas, D.-S. Zhang, TRPA1 is a candidate for the mechanosensitive transduction channel of vertebrate hair cells. Nature 432, 723-730 (2004). [Online Journal]


The purpose of this study is to develop resin composite materials composed of polycaprolactone (PCL) acrylates and hydroxyapatite (HA) nanoparticles for ultraviolet digital light projection (DLP) three-dimensional (3D) printing technique.,Two PCL-based triacrylates, namely, glycerol-3 caprolactone-triacrylate (Gly-3CL-TA) and glycerol-6 caprolactone-triacrylate (Gly-6CL-TA) were synthesized from ring-opening polymerization of e-caprolacton monomer in the presence of glycerol and then acrylation was performed using acryloyl chloride. 3D printing resins made of Gly-3CL-TA or Gly-6CL-TA, 5% HA and 3% of photoinitiator 2,4,6-Trimethylbenzoyl-diphenyl-phosphineoxide were then formulated. The surface topography, surface element composition, flexural strength, flexural modulus, cytotoxicity and degradation of the PCL-based scaffolds were then characterized.,Resin composite composed of Gly-3CL-TA or Gly-6CL-TA and 5% (w/w) of HA can be printed by 405 nm DLP 3D printers. The former has lower viscosity and thus can form a more uniform layer-by-layer structure, while the latter exhibited a higher flexural strength and modulus after being printed. Both composite materials are non-cytotoxic and degradable.,This study provides a direction of the formulation of environment-friendly resin composite for DLP 3D printing. Both resin composites have huge potential in tissue engineering applications.


For more than 100 years, the United States has used a variety of policy tools to encourage and ensure ubiquitous, affordable basic communications service. Universal and accessible communications services have been the foundation upon which our economy, personal communications, and civic participation depend. The laws and rules used to achieve universal service, however, have evolved with new technologies and markets and now, as the network is in the midst of several new technology transitions, the question of how to achieve and measure universal service arises again.This article examines the basic question of what the "basic service" is in today's world. For decades basic voice service provider offer the traditional copper network has been treated as the basic universal service. Voice service certainly continues to be critical to business, personal, and emergency communications, but the time has now come to also acknowledge that broadband Internet access service is itself a basic service. The days of treating broadband access as a luxury are gone, and our policies should reflect that. With that in mind, this article considers a variety of metrics by which policymakers should evaluate broadband and voice services, to determine whether new services being offered are a true step forward for everyone in the technology transitions.Additionally, this article reviews potential tools that policymakers could use to achieve universal, affordable broadband and voice service. In the past, Congress and the FCC have used tools like carrier of last resort policies, Universal Service Fund programs, and voluntary efforts by companies to increase network build-out and access. At this early stage policymakers should seriously consider all available options to determine what approaches work best for new technologies.The development of new voice and broadband access services hold great potential, but they will only live up to that potential if the United States can fulfill its promise to ensure everyone has a meaningful chance to the use the networks we have all contributed to. There are still many details to work out, but policymakers should not delay in updating universal service policies to continue to serve the public throughout and after technology transitions.


Water distribution systems (WDSs) are vital to human survival and the economic prosperity of communities across the globe. The deteriorating infrastructure issues combined with rising number of main breaks is pushing water utilities to keep up with the growing supply reliability challenges. Given the complexity associated with quantifying supply reliability, both of conceptual and computational nature, several surrogate measures which are referred to as resilience metrics were developed and used in the past. This paper presents a comparative evaluation of five such resilience metrics using the minimum cut set reliability approach supported by pressure-driven demand analyses of WDSs. Estimated reliability measures of WDS design solutions obtained using resilience metrics as co-objectives along with cost form the basis for the comparative evaluation presented in this paper. Three benchmark WDSs of different configurations and sizes are used in this study. The results suggest that the network resilience index performed best in the low cost range for smaller networks while the newly proposed probabilistic resilience index performed best in the low to moderate cost range for all networks. The identification of most competent resilience metric will support optimal design and rehabilitation decision making for water distribution systems in a computationally efficient manner. doi: 10.2166/aqua.2018.010 ://iwaponline.com/aqua/article-pdf/67/6/517/493625/jws0670517.pdf Abdulrahman A. Bin Mahmoud Kalyan R. Piratla (corresponding author) Glenn Department of Civil Engineering, Clemson University, Clemson, SC 29634, USA E-mail: firstname.lastname@example.com Abdulrahman A. Bin Mahmoud Civil Engineering Department, King Saud University, Riyadh 11451, Saudi Arabia


To the Editor,

Rapidly progressing immunoglobulin A (IgA) nephropathy usually presents with a histological pattern of focal or diffuse necrotizing crescentic glomerulonephritis. Antineutrophil cytoplasmic antibody (ANCA) and its specific antibody to antigen proteinase-3 (anti-PR3) are markers of pauci-immune crescentic nephritis, Wegener granulomatosis, and microscopic polyangiitis (PAN). The coexistence of ANCA positivity and IgA nephropathy has rarely been reported.

A 35-year-old man presented with arthralgia in the large joints, a palpable purpuric rash on both legs, swelling of the left knee (Fig. 1), difficulty swallowing, and epigastric discomfort for 2 weeks. His medical history was unremarkable. He was a nonsmoker and never used alcohol or illicit drugs. Three months earlier, he was evaluated for microscopic hematuria and was told that he had urinary stone disease. He was married and had two sons. He was afebrile and his blood pressure was 110/70 mmHg, pulse was regular at 80 beats per minute, and respiratory rate 18 breaths per minute. On physical examination, there was no erythema or thrush in the oral cavity. The abdomen was soft, and there was no organomegaly. There was tenderness in the epigastric region with voluntary guarding without rebound tenderness. He had palpable purpura on both legs and synovitis in the left knee joint without erythema.

Figure 1.

The patient's swollen left knee (A) and vasculitic lesions on the lower limb (B).

The laboratory evaluation revealed the following: glucose (random) 125 mg/dL, creatinine 0.6 mg/dL, urea 20 mg/dL, Na 138 mEq/L, K 4.2 mEq/L, lactate dehydrogenase 230 U/L, total bilirubin 0.5 mg/dL, alkaline phosphatase 48 U/L, gamma glutamyl transferase 9 mg/dL, alanine transaminase 24 U/L, aspartate transaminase 25 U/L, high-sensitive C-reactive protein 110 mg/L, erythrocyte sedimentation rate 64 mm/hr, white blood cell 5.81 × 103/μL, eosinophils 0.120%, hemoglobin 11.6 g/dL, platelets 187 × 103/μL, international normalized ratio 1.11, activated partial thromboplastin time 27.7, rheumatoid factor 23.2 IU/mL, complement component 3 1.38 g/L, complement component 4 0.225 g/L, and hepatitis serology negative for hepatitis B virus and hepatitis C virus. Immunologic markers were antinuclear antibody 1:80 (granular pattern), anti-dsDNA negative, and both IgG type cANCA and anti-PR3 positive. The Schirmer test was normal. Urinalysis showed microscopic hematuria, pyuria, and proteinuria. A 24-hour urine collection showed protein excretion of 3.135 g/day. Esophagogastroduodenoscopy revealed diffuse white plaques that were compatible with candidiasis. Anti-human immunodeficiency virus antibody was negative. Gastric mucosa biopsies showed gastritis with atrophy and intestinal metaplasia. Lymphoid aggregates were present but Helicobacter pylori was negative. We thought that the abdominal pain was due to microscopic PAN or Henoch-Schonlein purpura, and performed abdominal magnetic resonance angiography, which was normal. A punch biopsy of the skin of the leg with palpable purpura showed leukocytoclastic vasculitis without IgA deposition.

Paranasal and chest computed tomography did not reveal any pathological changes. Renal ultrasound showed normal-sized kidneys bilaterally, with normal echogenicity. A renal biopsy was compatible with IgA nephropathy (Fig. 2). There was no crescent formation or amyloid deposits.

Figure 2.

Light (A: HE B: PAS, ×200) and immunofluorescence (C) microscopy of the renal biopsy, and light microscopic images (D: H&E, ×400) of the skin biopsy. (A) and (B) show mesangial cellular proliferation (arrows), ...

The patient was administered oral prednisone 32 mg a day for presumptive vasculitis and fluconazole for esophageal candidiasis. After the ANCA antibody was found to be positive, we administered 1 g cyclophosphamide along with 500 mg steroid pulses for 3 days. With this treatment, the palpable purpuric lesions disappeared and the 24-hour urinary protein excretion fell to 0.5 g. After the steroid pulses, 1 mg/kg prednisone was given daily and the dosage was planned to be reduced by 25% at 2-week intervals. We planned to give the patient 1 g cyclophosphamide every month for 6 months. The patient responded well to this regimen without any systemic toxicity. The palpable purpura disappeared and proteinuria decreased to 0.5 g/day by 3 weeks after presentation. However, anti-PR3 was still positive.

The co-occurrence of IgA nephropathy with ANCA positivity has rarely been reported. Bantis et al. [1] retrospectively evaluated 393 patients with IgA nephropathy and found eight ANCA-positive patients (0.2%), of whom only three were anti-PR3 positive. All of these patients had rapidly progressive glomerulonephritis with crescent formation in kidney biopsies. The anti-PR3-positive patients had pulmonary infiltrates or hemoptysis, proteinuria (in the nephrotic range in one and in the subnephrotic range in the other two patients), fever, and arthralgias. O'Donoghue et al. [2] screened 100 patients with IgA nephropathy and found two with ANCA positivity (2%). Both patients were anti-myeloperoxidase positive and had no crescent formation in the kidney. Haas et al. [3] reported six patients with IgA nephropathy and ANCA positivity (five of them were anti-PR3 positive). All five anti-PR3 positive patients had impaired renal function, proteinuria (in the nephrotic range in two patients), hematuria, and hypertension. All of the patients had crescentic glomeruli in kidney biopsies, as well as systemic manifestations of vasculitic involvement.

Most of the anti-PR3-positive cases had severe kidney disease along with pulmonary or other manifestations of systemic vasculitis. However, our patient had only palpable purpura, subnephrotic proteinuria, and microscopic hematuria. He had no pulmonary involvement, creatinine elevation, crescent formation in the glomeruli, or hypertension. Our patient had IgG type ANCA. A punch biopsy of the skin revealed leukocytoclastic vasculitis without IgA deposition. In light of these clues, we diagnosed our patient with IgA nephropathy and ANCA associated vasculitis.

Generally, IgA nephropathy is considered a benign disease. In 30% of cases, renal function declines progressively, but slowly [4]. In most cases, the treatment is supportive. In a minority of cases, IgA nephropathy presents as rapidly progressive glomerulonephritis and these patients benefit from therapy that is analogous to the treatment administered in ANCA-associated vasculitis (steroids and cyclophosphamide) [5]. Patients with IgA nephropathy associated with ANCA antibodies should be treated in the same manner. Despite a lack of severe systemic manifestations of vasculitic disease, we administered one dose of cyclophosphamide to our patient along with pulse steroids and then oral corticosteroids.

In conclusion, we presented a rare case of vasculitic IgA nephropathy associated with anti-PR3 and ANCA positivity. Unlike other reported cases, our patient presented with mild renal and systemic involvement and showed a favorable response to cytotoxic treatment and corticosteroids.


This collection of Chinese stories begins with the great legends of how Earth and Heaven came into being, and of how the archer Yi rid the Emperor Yao of the menace of the ten suns. There are folk-tales too, about ghosts and rain-makers, poor students and magicians, and the man who was nearly made into fishpaste. Throughout all these stories the author has kept the subtle oriental flavour of the originals and brings to life all the magic and mystery of China.


The article presents a case study whereby the service performance of a single-choice information technology service provider in the parastatal industry of South Africa is measured against multi-choice private service providers without any provisional agreements. The outcome of the case study reveals that single-choice service provision options with provisional agreements have a limited chance of success if they are not supported by strong service user inputs. In fact, provisional strategies that disallow sound competition among service providers are bound to impact negatively on user preferences as well as information technology skills development opportunities that are required to improve service provision generally and long-term survival in particular.


Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to identify and analyze knowledge integration in manufacturing technology development projects required to build competitive advantages.

Design/methodology/approach

A longitudinal case study has been conducted at a Swedish manufacturing company by following a manufacturing technology development project in real time during a two-year period.

Findings

The results show that three different knowledge integration processes exist when developing unique manufacturing technology: processes for capturing, for joint learning, and for absorb learning. The findings of the current research suggest that the three knowledge integration processes are highly interrelated with each knowledge integration process affecting the other two.

Research limitations/implications

The major limitation of the research is primarily associated with the single case, which limits generalizability outside the context that was studied.

Practical implications

The findings are particularly relevant to manufacturing engineers working with the development of new manufacturing technologies. By using relevant knowledge integration processes and capabilities required to integrate the knowledge in manufacturing technology development projects, companies can improve design and organize the development of manufacturing technology.

Originality/value

Previous research has merely noted that knowledge integration is required in the development of unique manufacturing technology, but without explaining how and in what way. This paper's contribution is the identification and analysis of three knowledge integration processes that contribute to the building of competitive advantages by developing unique manufacturing technology and new knowledge.


Impulsivity is a personality trait exhibited by healthy individuals, but excessive impulsivity is associated with some mental disorders. Lesion and functional neuroimaging studies indicate that the ventromedial prefrontal region (VMPFC), including the orbitofrontal cortex (OFC), anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) and medial prefrontal cortex, and the amygdala may modulate impulsivity and aggression. However, no morphometric study has examined the association between VMPFC and impulsivity. We hypothesized that healthy subjects with high impulsivity would have smaller volumes in these brain regions compared with those with low impulsivity. Sixty‐two healthy subjects were studied (age 35.4 ± 12.1 years) using a 1.5‐T MRI system. The Barratt impulsiveness scale (BIS) was used to assess impulsivity. Images were processed using an optimized voxel‐based morphometry (VBM) protocol. We calculated the correlations between BIS scale scores and the gray matter (GM) and white matter (WM) volumes of VMPFC and amygdala. GM volumes of the left and right OFC were inversely correlated with the BIS total score (P = 0.04 and 0.02, respectively). Left ACC GM volumes had a tendency to be inversely correlated with the BIS total score (P = 0.05). Right OFC GM volumes were inversely correlated with BIS nonplanning impulsivity, and left OFC GM volumes were inversely correlated with motor impulsivity. There were no significant WM volume correlations with impulsivity. The results of this morphometry study indicate that small OFC volume relate to high impulsivity and extend the prior finding that the VMPFC is involved in the circuit modulating impulsivity. Hum Brain Mapp 2009. © 2008 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.


The variation in well performance observed between various shale gas plays, and indeed within individual basins and on individual pads, has gone some way to dispelling myths regarding the perceived homogeneity of "shale gas" targets. With increased quantities of data and more determined analysis, we show that understanding the micro- and mesoscale heterogeneity can be advanced through interdisciplinary studies that incorporate traditional and advanced geophysical data and methods with geological understanding and engineering measurements. This understanding is critical in optimizing well placement, the spacing and length of horizontal wells, and hydraulic fracturing effort to maximize recovery. Specifically, we illustrate that in the Muskwa Formation and the Otter Park, Klua, and Evie members of the Horn River Formation, reservoir quality can be predicted using lambda-rho and mu-rho data extracted from AVO inversion studies. From log data, we show that the most prospective reservoir intervals are characterized by decreasing lambda, increasing mu and/or a lambda:mu ratio less than one.


In this paper, we use sixteen financial indices from the World Bank's Financial Development and Structure database, to classify the OECD countries, according to their financial system structure, in five relatively homogenous clusters for the 1996-2005 period. We also examine the changes in their financial systems for the 1986-2005 period. Our analysis is based on the 'agglomerative method', a form of hierarchical clustering that uses Ward's methodology, to identify relatively homogenous groups of countries. The findings are surprising, yet reasonable. After two decades of deregulation, liberalization and globalization, the financial systems of the OECD countries not only differ in ways challenging the perceived wisdom that classifies them along the bank-based vs. capital-market-based norms, but additionally do not seem to converge to the second norm as is widely believed. These results warn against oversimplifications regarding financial system structure and the uncritical acceptance of policy recommendations based on them.


Knowledge of soil chemistry is useful in assessing the sensitivity of forested areas to natural and anthropogenic disturbances, but characterizing large areas is expensive because of the large sample numbers required and the cost of soil chemical analyses. We collected and chemically analyzed soil samples from 72 sites within a 214-ha watershed in the Catskill Mountains of New York to evaluate factors that influence soil chemistry and whether terrain features could be used to predict soil chemical properties. Using geographic information system (GIS) techniques, we determined five terrain attributes at each sampling location: (i) slope, (ii) aspect, (iii) elevation, (iv) topographic index, and (v) flow accumulation. These attributes were ineffective in predicting the chemical properties of organic and mineral soil samples; together they explained only 4 to 25% of the variance in pH w , effective cation-exchange capacity (CEC e ), exchangeable bases, exchangeable acidity, total C, total N, and C/N ratio. Regressions among soil properties were much better; total C and pH w together explained 33 to 66% of the variation in exchangeable bases and CEC e , Total C was positively correlated with N (r = 0.91 and 0.96 in Oa horizons and mineral soil, respectively), exchangeable bases (r = 0.65, 0.76), and CEC e (r = 0.54, 0.44), indicating the importance of organic matter to the chemistry of these acidic soils. The fraction of CEC e occupied by H explained 44% of the variation in pH w . Soil chemical properties at this site vary on spatial scales finer than typical GIS analyses, resulting in relationships with poor predictive power. Thus, interrelationships among soil properties are more reliable for prediction.


Recent experiments in the Joint European Torus (JET) have provided evidence of sawtooth stabilization by fast ions arising from deuterium neutral beam injection (NBI). A possible theoretical basis for the interpretation of the observed sawtooth period behaviour is investigated and predictions are compared with experimental results, using a sawtooth period model developed to predict the sawtooth period in the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER). Unlike the case of ion cyclotron resonance heating, a detailed comparison between theory and experiment for NBI has not yet been made. In the model employed in this paper, a beam ion contribution to the internal kink potential energy has been incorporated, using a simple analytical expression valid in the limit of isotropic fast particles. This analytical expression has been found to compare well with detailed calculations performed with a hybrid kinetic/MHD code NOVA-K, using fast particle distribution functions computed with a plasma analysis code TRANSP. The beam ion contribution has been implemented in a transport code PRETOR and a few representative JET discharges have been analysed and modelled. The beam ion term is found to be sufficiently stabilizing to produce simulated sawtooth periods in agreement with the experimental results. Sawtooth periods computed without taking this term into account are much shorter than the measured periods. The model indicates that sawteeth are triggered in these JET discharges by excitation of the internal kink in the semi-collisional ion-kinetic regime: this was found by previous authors to be the sawtooth trigger most likely to be relevant to ITER. The role of beam ions in determining the sawtooth period in JET is thus found to be similar to the predicted role of α-particles in ITER.


Background The Vibrio parahaemolyticus type III secreted effector VopS contains a fic domain that covalently modifies Rho GTPase threonine with AMP to inhibit downstream signaling events in host cells. The VopS fic domain includes a conserved sequence motif (HPFx[D/E]GN[G/K]R) that contributes to AMPylation. Fic domains are found in a variety of species, including bacteria, a few archaea, and metazoan eukaryotes. Methodology/Principal Findings We show that the AMPylation activity extends to a eukaryotic fic domain in Drosophila melanogaster CG9523, and use sequence and structure based computational methods to identify related domains in doc toxins and the type III effector AvrB. The conserved sequence motif that contributes to AMPylation unites fic with doc. Although AvrB lacks this motif, its structure reveals a similar topology to the fic and doc folds. AvrB binds to a peptide fragment of its host virulence target in a similar manner as fic binds peptide substrate. AvrB also orients a phosphate group from a bound ADP ligand near the peptide-binding site and in a similar position as a bound fic phosphate. Conclusions/Significance The demonstrated eukaryotic fic domain AMPylation activity suggests that the VopS effector has exploited a novel host posttranslational modification. Fic domain-related structures give insight to the AMPylation active site and to the VopS fic domain interaction with its host GTPase target. These results suggest that fic, doc, and AvrB stem from a common ancestor that has evolved to AMPylate protein substrates.


The heterogenization of photocatalytic molecules typically enhances stability at the expense of activity. Therefore, a new approach to stabilizing molecular catalysts without compromising their original catalytic features is highly desired. In this study, we found that Zr-based metal–organic polyhedra (MOP) stabilized the photocatalytic compound ReTC [ReI(CO)3(BPYDC)(Cl), BPYDC = 2,2′-bipyridine-5,5′-dicarboxylate] without degrading its catalytic activity. ReTC was chemically bound to discrete cages of the MOP and was found to maintain its maximum CO2-to-CO conversion activity (660 h−1 turnover frequency (TOF)) for at least 24 h under visible light irradiation. The free molecular form of the same compound (H2ReTC) initially showed an activity of 131 h−1 TOF, which was lost within 2 h. The cumulative turnover number of ReTC-MOP after a 24 h reaction was 12 847, which was 42.0 times the value of 306 for molecular ReTC. The high catalytic activity and stability of ReTC-MOP are attributed to the fact that this MOP material provides an extremely small framework for chemical binding of ReTC, such that the catalyst has a high degree of motional freedom and enhanced light absorption while being protected in the reaction solution.


We argue that when a social convergence mechanism exists and is strong enough, one should expect the emergence of a well-defined 'field', i.e. a slowly evolving, local quantity around which individual attributes fluctuate in a finite range. This condensation phenomenon is well illustrated by the Deffuant–Weisbuch opinion model for which we provide a natural extension to allow for spatial heterogeneities. We show analytically and numerically that the resulting dynamics of the emergent field is a noisy diffusion equation that has a slow dynamics. This random diffusion equation reproduces the long-ranged, logarithmic decrease of the correlation of spatial voting patterns empirically found in Borghesi and Bouchaud (2010 Eur. Phys. J. B 75 395) and Borghesi et al (2012 PLoS One 7 e36289). Interestingly enough, we find that when the social cohesion mechanism becomes too weak, cultural cohesion breaks down completely, in the sense that the distribution of intentions/opinions becomes infinitely broad. No emerging field exists in this case. All these analytical findings are confirmed by numerical simulations of an agent-based model.


Constrained reinforcement learning (RL) is an area of RL whose objective is to find an optimal policy that maximizes expected cumulative return while satisfying a given constraint. Most of the previous constrained RL works consider expected cumulative sum cost as the constraint. However, optimization with this constraint cannot guarantee a target probability of outage event that the cumulative sum cost exceeds a given threshold. This paper proposes a framework, named Quantile Constrained RL (QCRL), to constrain the quantile of the distribution of the cumulative sum cost that is a necessary and sufficient condition to satisfy the outage constraint. This is the first work that tackles the issue of applying the policy gradient theorem to the quantile and provides theoretical results for approximating the gradient of the quantile. Based on the derived theoretical results and the technique of the Lagrange multiplier, we construct a constrained RL algorithm named Quantile Constrained Policy Optimization (QCPO). We use distributional RL with the Large Deviation Principle (LDP) to estimate quantiles and tail probability of the cumulative sum cost for the implementation of QCPO. The implemented algorithm satisfies the outage probability constraint after the training period.


In this dissertation, I argue that there is a pressing need in post-apartheid KwaZulu-Natal to re-assess the eighteenthand nineteenth-century histories of the region from the perspectives of people whose ancestry was dispossessed and/or displaced in the wars that took place in that period, particularly those that elevated Shaka to dominance. I suggest that because of their retrospective manipulation by the vested interests of power politics, historical processes over the past two centuries, and in the last century in particular, have invested the figure of King Shaka and 'Zulu' ethnic identities with unitary meanings that have made them close to inescapable for most people who are considered 'Zulu'. I argue that there is, therefore, a need to recuperate the histories of the clans which were defeated by the Zulu and welded into the Zulu 'nation'. Following British-Jamaican novelist Caryl Phillips' strategy, I begin to conduct this recuperation through a process of subverting history by writing back into historical records people and events that have been written and spoken out of them. I argue that literary texts, izibongo ('personal' praises) and izithakazelo (clan praises) in this case, offer a useful starting point in recovering the suppressed or marginalised histories of some of the once-significant clans in the region. In the three chapters of this dissertation, I examine the izibongo of three late eighteenth-/early nineteenth-century amakhosi (kings) in the present KwaZulu-Natal region, Shaka kaSenzangakhona of the Zulu clan, Phungashe kaNgwane of the Buthelezi and Zwide kaLanga of the Ndwandwe. In the first chapter, I read Shaka's izibongo as an instance of empire-building discourse in which I trace the belittling representations granted Phungashe and Zwide. In the second and third chapters, I set Phungashe's and Zwide's izibongo, respectively, as well as the histories carried in and alluded to by these texts, and the clans' izithakazelo, alongside Shaka's and examine the extent to which the two amakhosi's izibongo talk back to Shaka's imperialism. I also follow the later histories of the two amakhosi's clans to determine which individuals became prominent in the Zulu kingdom under Shaka and after, as well as point to the revisions of the past that are being conducted in the present by people of the two clans. The versions of the izibongo I study and the hypotheses of history I present are drawn from sources that include the James Stuart Archive, A.T. Bryant, and oral historical accounts from several people I interviewed. Given the present imperatives in South Africa of bringing justice to the various peoples who were dispossessed under colonial and apartheid domination, I argue that recuperating the histories of the clans that were conquered by the Zulu under Shaka's leadership problematises questions of justice in KwaZulu-Natal: if it is legitimate to claim reparation for colonialism and apartheid, then the Zulu kingdom should be viewed under the same spotlight because of the similar suffering it visited on many inhabitants of the region. In that way, we can transcend divisive colonial, apartheid and Zulu nationalist histories that continue to have strong, often negative, effects on the crossing of identity boundaries constructed under those systems of domination.


Over the last two decades, technology has evolved fast causing mass evolution in every aspect of life, among which health care domain and human-machine interaction. However, the benefits of the technology progress were limited for its elderly users, since the traditional human-machine interfaces were always a barrier between them and any new devices. Compared to those interfaces, multimodal interfaces offer a more natural way of interaction with the machines, coping with some inherent difficulties of elderly people. The paper presents a system dedicated to assist people with special needs, such as elderly people or people recovering from specific diseases, to perform rehabilitation exercises by using a multimodal interface. The system presents to the user a set of required exercises prescribed by the doctor or by the caregiver, and tracks the user exercise evolution, informs the user about his/her performances and mistakes, changes exercise levels depending on the users' physical condition and results. Furthermore, the system gives advice to its user to optimize the results of the exercise. To be easily accessible by elderly people, the interface is a key-factor of the system. The supervision of exercises is achieved by means of a Kinect camera, successive images of user's exercises being analyzed automatically. The feed-back to the user is given either by messages displayed on the screen or through voice output. The user is represented on the screen by an avatar, which is mirroring the user's movements during the exercise. The user can interact with the system by giving simple voice commands or by using the touch facilities of the screen. In this way, it allows the user to interact with the system without interrupting his exercise and in the most natural possible way. The interface can be adapted to user preferences by configuring the type and color of fonts, the arrangement of icons on the screen and the aspect of the display. After repeated interactions with the system, the icons corresponding to the most used commands given, either by touch or by voice, will become bigger on the screen or better placed. We claim that our proposed approach will help the elderly to perform their rehabilitation exercise in their preferred medium with a grade of independence and to improve the efficiency of the exercise and well-being.


A lensless Vanderlugt optical correlator using two phase-only spatial light modulators (SLMs) is proposed. The SLMs are used for displaying input and filter patterns respectively. The SLMs are also used as programmable lenses in order to realize the lensless construction. This lensless system is simple and its alignment adjustment is easy. The performance of the SLMs as programmable lenses is also described.


The Supreme Court's ruling in Matsushita Elec. Indus. Co. v. Zenith Radio Corp. marked the end of judicial hostility to Rule 56 motions and effectively legitimized the use of summary judgment in antitrust cases. The 5-4 decision dramatically altered the antitrust litigation landscape both procedurally and substantively. Procedurally, the decision underscored the trans-substantive nature of summary judgment, making clear that summary judgment is as appropriate in complex antitrust cases as in any other area of the law. Matsushita also made clear that the legal standards for summary judgment mirror the legal standards for directed verdict at trial. In addition, the decision instructs that to create a "genuine issue for trial" under Rule 56, the non-moving party must do more than create "metaphysical doubt." That is, the nonmovant must adduce sufficient evidence about which reasonable people could disagree; absent such a showing, "there is no 'genuine issue for trial.'" Perhaps even more important were the Court's rulings on substantive antitrust issues. Matsushita limits the range of inferences that can be drawn from ambiguous evidence of an antitrust conspiracy. Evidence that is as consistent with independent activity as with antitrust conspiracy fails as a matter of law to create a genuine issue for trial. If the factual context makes the claim implausible, the non-movant must come forward with especially persuasive evidence to avoid summary dismissal. The Court concluded that defendants had no rational motive to agree to sustain sales losses for over 20 years with no end in sight in order to drive Zenith from


Abstract Observations of modern sedimentation rates in nonmarine and shallow-marine clastic environments indicate that deposits formed in comparable settings in the ancient record could accumulate in a fraction of the time that would appear to be available according to conventional chronostratigraphic dating methods. Typically as little as 10% of elapsed time is represented by sediment, the remainder by breaks in sedimentation, many of which are inconspicuous. An examination of the chronostratigraphy and sedimentary history of the Mesaverde Group of the Book Cliffs, Utah, U.S.A., confirms this pattern. Shoreface, deltaic, and nonmarine successions are considered to be particularly fragmentary. Ravinement surfaces may each account for up to 105 years of missing time. In the sedimentary record of shallow-marine and nonmarine deposits stratigraphic continuity is not to be expected, and calculation of time-related issues, such as mass-balance transport rates and the trajectories of shoreline transgression and regression, must take this into account.


Over the last few years there has been a growing concern over the increasing concentration of micropollutants originating from a great variety of sources including pharmaceutical, chemical engineering and personal care product industries in rivers, lakes, soil and groundwater. As most of the micropollutants are polar and persistent compounds, they are only partially or not at all removed from wastewater and thus can enter the environment posing a great risk to the biota. It is hypothesized that wastewater is one of the most important point sources for micropollutants.

This book will give a comprehensive overview of modern analytical methods and will summarize novel single and hybrid methods to remove continuously emerging contaminants - micropollutants from the aqueous phase. New trends (e.g. sensor technology, nanotechnology and hybrid treatment technologies) will be described in detail. The book is very timely because the new techniques are still in the development phase and have to be realized not only in the laboratory but also on a larger scale. The content of the book is divided into chapters that present current descriptive and analytical methods that are available to detect and measure micropollutants together with detailed information on various chemical, biological and physicochemical methods that have evolved over the last few decades.

Treatment of Micropollutants in Water and Wastewater will also enable readers to make well informed choices through providing an understanding of why and how micropollutants must be removed from water sources, and what are the most appropriate and available techniques for providing a cost and technologically effective and sustainable solutions for reaching the goal of micropollutant-free water and wastewater.

The book will be suitable for water and wastewater professionals as well for students and researchers in civil engineering, environmental engineering and process engineering fields.

This title belongs to Integrated Environmental Technology Series .

ISBN: 9781843393160 (Print)

ISBN: 9781780401447 (eBook)


A spawning aggregation of the lanternfish Diaphus danae in the Coral Sea, that is fed on by spawning aggregations of yellowfin and bigeye tuna, has been sampled by mid-water trawling for the first time. Males and females in the aggregation occurred at a ratio of 23 to 1 and occupied two non-overlapping size classes (males 71.2–95.1-mm standard length (SL), females 99.0–121.4-mm SL). Hydrated oocytes with single oil droplets, which indicated imminent spawning, were in higher proportion in the first trawl (2134 hours to 2234 hours) than in the final trawl (0324 hours to 0424 hours) through the aggregation. Maximum estimated female D. danae fecundity (25 803) and gonadosomatic index (34.01) were higher than for any other lanternfish species recorded. Bigeye tuna (Thunnus obesus) individuals collected from aggregations were estimated to have 81–319 D. danae specimens in their stomachs. The annual Coral Sea D. danae aggregation is the only confirmed lanternfish spawning aggregation in Australian waters. The D. danae spawning aggregation provides a rich, transient foraging resource for spawning bigeye and yellowfin tuna in the Coral Sea, these being the only known tuna spawning aggregations in the Eastern Tuna and Billfish Fishery.


Binding of angiotensin II (ANG II) to the AT1 receptor (AT1R) in the proximal tubule stimulates Na+/H+ exchanger isoform 3 (NHE3) activity through multiple signaling pathways. However, the effects of ANG II/AT1R-induced inihibitory G protein (Gi) activation and subsequent decrease in cAMP accumulation on NHE3 regulation are not well established. We therefore tested the hypothesis that ANG II reduces cAMP/PKA-mediated phosphorylation of NHE3 on serine 552 and, in doing so, stimulates NHE3 activity. Under basal conditions, ANG II stimulated NHE3 activity but did not affect PKA-mediated NHE3 phosphorylation at serine 552 in opossum kidney (OKP) cells. However, in the presence of the cAMP-elevating agent forskolin (FSK), ANG II blocked FSK-induced NHE3 inhibition, reduced intracellular cAMP concentrations, lowered PKA activity, and prevented the FSK-mediated increase in NHE3 serine 552 phosphorylation. All effects of ANG II were blocked by pretreating OKP cells with the AT1R antagonist losartan, highlighting the contribution of the AT1R/Gi pathway in ANG II-mediated NHE3 upregulation under cAMP-elevating conditions. Accordingly, Gi inhibition by pertussis toxin treatment decreased NHE3 activity both in vitro and in vivo and, more importantly, prevented the stimulatory effect of ANG II on NHE3 activity in rat proximal tubules. Collectively, our results suggest that ANG II counteracts the effects of cAMP/PKA on NHE3 phosphorylation and inhibition by activating the AT1R/Gi pathway. Moreover, these findings support the notion that NHE3 dephosphorylation at serine 552 may represent a key event in the regulation of renal proximal tubule sodium handling by ANG II in the presence of natriuretic hormones that promote cAMP accumulation and transporter phosphorylation.


This is the first full biography of Hakim Warqenah Eshate, or Dr Charles Martin (1865-1952), who was Ethiopia's first western trained physician as well as a statesman, administrator, diplomat, author and a major progressive force in modern Ethiopian history. Yet he had overlapping identities as a world citizen, citizen of the British empire and Ethiopian nationalist, living in many different countries but never wholly belonging in any one. The child of Ethiopian aristocrats, he was found on the battlefield of Magdala by a British officer and raised and educated in India. First employed in the Indian civil service he subsequently served as a physician to three Ethiopian emperors. The key turning point in his life came with his marriage to an Ethiopian aristocrat, closely related to two Empresses, a marriage which greatly enhanced his influence at court. This is as much a family biography as his biography, and focuses especially on his work as an educator, governor of a model province and, finally, the climax of his career when, as Ethiopian ambassador to England, he was a key international figure in protesting the Italian invasion of Ethiopia and mobilizing world opinion against Italy and for Ethiopia. He became a spokesman for the African diaspora during the 1930s and an Ethiopian elder statesman in the 1940s, and his extended family (and many of those he mentored) had an impact on modern Ethiopian history. The biography is based on Charles Martin's unpublished diary and autobiography and archival research in Ethiopia and Europe. Peter Garretson was educated in Ethiopia (the Sandford School), London (Westminster School and SOAS) and the United States (Haverford College). He has taught at the University of Khartoum, Swarthmore and Florida State University, where he is now Associate Professor of History and Director of the Middle East Center.


The thesis is worked in the areas of the intersection of probability, combinatorics and analytical combinatoric. The research is motivated from the need of producing new methodologies and financial models in global market resulted from the lesson of 2007-2009 global financial market and a quantum tool called Feynman path integral method which has been applied to model path-dependent option pricing model by Hao and Utev. Path calculation method deal with models by analysing each possible individual asset price paths which broaden the methodology of modelling financial market and can solve some unusual or complex models which is difficult to model by using non path-dependent calculation method. My research has focused on developing combinatorial structure and path calculation methods and then apply them to model individual share price path and calculate option prices. The share price can be modelled as a path with a given share price changes and the expiry date. We have applied Flajolet symbolic method, generating functions and path calculation method to model a set of typical finite restricted share price paths with restriction not allowing k consecutive down steps and derived a calculation of option prices in the model. Besides, applying the Flajolet symbolic method, we constructed a relationship between individual share price and generating function, analysed the transformed share price paths via different operations on generating functions. In addition, we applied path calculation method to solve winning probability in the classical gambler ruin problem which contributes the same result as the solution solved by establishing the recurrence equation method. Furthermore, we have solved a different gambler's ruin problem using the path calculation method which cannot be solved by the recurrence equation method. Counting paths with combinatoric can be studied from two ways, one way is to label and the other is computation. Labelling is a part of representation of objects. We have developed a graphical theoretical construction of individual share price path via general binary trees and matroid. In addition, We have developed a method to solve some kinds of pattern avoiding path counting combinatorial problem by modifying certain probability methods. Two working papers including modelling of paths via matroids and counting via Markov-type technique is now being produced.


Data-driven digital technologies are often presented in policy agendas as contributing to the goal of sustainable development by providing information to reduce energy consumption and offering a green alternative to industries and behaviour with a higher environmental footprint. However, it is widely acknowledged in the context of environmental research that Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) in general, and data centres and cloud computing in particular, have a heavy footprint featuring a high consumption of non-renewable energy, waste production and carbon dioxide emissions. In spite of this, environmental issues have so far figured only sparsely in both policy initiatives supporting data-driven digital initiatives, as well as in recent ethics and governance scholarly literature discussing the data-driven revolution. We convened an interdisciplinary workshop to map out the current conceptual landscape on the environmental impacts of data-driven technologies, and to explore how ethical thinking can contribute to it. In this commentary, we discuss the main themes that emerged and our call for action.


A recent article (Kohn, 2006) rekindled interest in a paper begun years earlier but never completed. Stimulated by Mile Kohn's observations concerning the misuse or even abuse of research in the educational community the author looks back over a lengthy career in academe and laments that the discipline of education is still on the outside looking in. ********** Although science has been defined and redefined over the centuries, at its core it is a human enterprise which has as its basic goal the formulation, understanding, and utilization of an accurate conceptual model of the universe. Education is a human enterprise, and education, too, has been defined and redefined. But the comparisons end. If education is a science, or if there is a science of education, its basic purpose has thus far eluded searchers. Questions as to the nature of education's ultimate goal or goals abound in the journals and media of today and may be traced as far back as Aristotle, and perhaps even to the dawn of civilization. Unfortunately, the background noise accompanying the quest for educational truth is so loud that for all practical purposes the search itself is doomed, for as few can profess to be scientists or to have done science, almost all have experienced education at one time or another. Thus, everyone (including the author!) lays claim to an experiential expertise of sorts and has his or her pet theory as to what education is or ought to be. In the spring of 1969, the author was completing a university-coordinated internship as a Supervisor of Science in a small agricultural community in a moderately large northcentral state and living in a two-room apartment on the northern end of a local motel. As a participant in a National Science Foundation-sponsored Institute for Science Supervisors, and as a young man looking for the next step in his professional life, he needed to make a decision--return home to a waiting job as a high school chemistry teacher, look for a position as a supervisor of science, or stay at the university and enter the doctoral program. He chose the third alternative and, as a research fellow housed in the R & D Center at a major research university, soon committed to the quest for a theory of education based upon what has been shown to be true as opposed to what someone hopes or believes to be true. Two sources, Thomas Kuhn's The Structure of Scientific Revolutions and a chapter by Arthur Foshay in Harry Passow's Curriculum Crossroads, guided his early thinking. Kuhn's Theory Kuhn (1964), who wrote of the process by which science advances, was of the opinion that during periods of what he termed normal science all persons working in any given field were possessed of the same paradigm--concepts, ideas, and opinions that pertained to the day-to-day workings of that field of study. He characterized the work of the scientist as puzzle-solving and noted that each individual operates under the same paradigm and under the conviction that any problem is solvable--the answer will come if only the investigator is clever and skillful enough to do what no one has done before. Kuhn observed that progress during times of normal science is rapid because researchers choose to concentrate on problems that will fail to be solved only through their own shortcomings. Troubles arise with the discovery of results which do not fit the existing paradigm. Such results, if persistent, may lead to an uneasy situation until the issue is resolved or a new paradigm is formulated. If the new paradigm is incompatible with the one in place, a Kuhnian revolution occurs--the old paradigm is discarded and a new period of normal science is begun. Normal science is therefore, not random in its choice of direction but proceeds along predictable lines; and research, as Kuhn observes, "... is directed to the articulation of those phenomena and theories that the paradigm already supplies." In other words, investigators, freed from the need to search for the paradigm itself, can devote their energies to the filling of gaps in--or the logical extensions of--the existing order of things. …


At the end of World War II, the federal government bestowed one of the richest rewards ever given a mass mobilized army in the form of the Servicemen's Readjustment Act of 1944, better known as the OJ. Bill of Rights. The OJ. Bill offered veterans generous loans, education benefits, and unemployment insurance to help them readjust to civilian life. The bill is widely lauded as one of the most important federal acts of the twentieth century. Further 0.1. Bills followed for veterans of the Cold War including those who served in Korea and Vietnam. Despite their continued impact on the lives of veterans and on society, the later bills have received very little public or academic attention. No major study examines the later OJ. Bills beyond the World War II generation. This dissertation helps fill that void by examining the political origins of the Vietnam era OJ. Bills of 1966, 1972, and 1974. Specifically, this dissertation explores the debates over veterans' education benefits at the federal level during the Vietnam era. After the passage of the 1966 OJ. bill, many Vietnam era veterans complained that their benefits fell short of those offered the World War II generation. As a result, the Vietnam era 0.1. Bills often get dismissed as a part ofa wider pattern of government neglect of the Vietnam veteran. This study provides a context for understanding why the benefits did not, at first, reach the same generous heights as the previous OJ. Bills and challenges the standard narrative that the government abandoned the Vietnam veteran. The government, particularly the Senate, did make considerable efforts to improve the Vietnam veteran's benefits. Although a succession ofpresidents and congressmen limited the government's generosity because of their ideological or economic convictions, numerous increases in the level of funding followed the 1966 bill, making iv veterans' benefits far more comparable to those offered World War II veterans. Following the increases, Vietnam era veterans claimed their education benefits in far greater numbers than their World War II predecessors. Because so many Vietnam veterans decided to return to school, this study shows that the G.I. Bill needs to be a central part of their homecoming story.


Abstract The draught phenomena affecting the traditional agricultural areas in south of Romania has been increasing in intensity over the time, leading to the desertification of several thousands of hectares in the south part of the country. In this study we have computed the vegetation fraction cover for the South-West and South - East regions of Romania, based on the minimum and maximum NDVI extracted from MODIS satellite images. The time frame to refer to is 2000 - 2017, perennially, with special significance given the numerous and prolonged draught intervals these areas have been facing and the social economic evolution, from small farms to large agricultural holdings. The resulted vegetation fraction cover (fc) is correlated to the SPI values in order to determine a pattern to be used in anticipating deviations from the seasonal vegetation productivity. As a conclusion, the study presents a fair balance, indicating the most sensitive areas in soil vegetation cover, due to the SPI change.


An idealized general circulation model (GCM) with an analytically described Newtonian cooling term is employed to study the occurrence rate of sudden stratospheric warmings (SSWs) over a wide range of parameters. In particular, the sensitivity of the SSW occurrence rates to orographic forcing and both relaxation temperature and damping rate is evaluated. The stronger the orographic forcing and the weaker the radiative forcing (in both temperature and damping rate), the higher the SSW frequency. The separate effects of the damping rates at low and high latitudes are somewhat more complex. Generally, lower damping rates result in higher SSW frequency. However, if the low‐ and high‐latitude damping rates are not the same, SSW frequency tends to be most sensitive to a fractional change in the lower of the two damping rates. In addition, the effect of the damping rates on the stratospheric residual circulation is investigated. It is found that higher high‐latitude damping rate results in deeper but narrower circulation, whereas higher low‐latitude damping rates cause strengthening of the stream function in the tropical midstratosphere to upper stratosphere. Finally, the relation between easily measured and compared climatological fields and the SSW occurrence rate is determined. The average stratospheric polar zonal mean zonal wind shows a strong anticorrelation with the SSW frequency. In the troposphere, there is a high correlation between the meridional temperature gradient and SSW frequency, suggesting that the strength of synoptic activity in the troposphere may be an important influence on SSW occurrence.


Purpose: To determine the differential gene expression between oral squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC) with and without metastasis to cervical lymph nodes and to assess prediction of nodal metastasis by using molecular features. Experimental Design: We used Affymetrix U133 2.0 plus arrays to compare the tumor genome-wide gene expression of 73 node-positive OSCCs with 40 node-negative OSCCs (≥18 months). Multivariate linear regression was used to estimate the association between gene expression and nodal metastasis. Stepwise logistic regression and receiver operating characteristics (ROC) analysis were used to generate predictive models and to compare these with models by using tumor size alone. Results: We identified five genes differentially expressed between node-positive and node-negative OSCCs after adjusting for tumor size and human papillomavirus status: REEP1, RNF145, CTONG2002744, MYO5A, and FBXO32. Stepwise regression identified a four-gene model (MYO5A, RFN145, FBXO32, and CTONG2002744) as the most predictive of nodal metastasis. A leave-one-out ROC analysis revealed that our model had a higher area under the curve (AUC) for identifying occult nodal metastasis compared with that of a model by tumor size alone (respective AUC: 0.85 and 0.61; P = 0.011). A model combining tumor size and gene expression did not further improve the prediction of occult metastasis. Independent validation using 31 metastatic and 13 nonmetastatic cases revealed a significant underexpression of CTONG2002744 (P = 0.0004). Conclusions: These results suggest that our gene expression markers of OSCC metastasis hold promise for improving current clinical practice. Confirmation by others and functional studies of CTONG2002744 is warranted. Clin Cancer Res; 17(8); 2466–73. ©2011 AACR.


Sixteen experienced marathoners ran on treadmills for 3 h at approximately 70% maximal oxygen consumption (Vo(2 max)) on two occasions while receiving 1 l/h carbohydrate (CHO) or placebo (Pla) beverages. Blood and vastus lateralis muscle biopsy samples were collected before and after exercise. Plasma was analyzed for IL-6, IL-10, IL-1 receptor agonist (IL-1ra), IL-8, cortisol, glucose, and insulin. Muscle was analyzed for glycogen content and relative gene expression of 13 cytokines by using real-time quantitative RT-PCR. Plasma glucose and insulin were higher, and cortisol, IL-6, IL-10, and IL-1ra, but not IL-8, were significantly lower postexercise in CHO vs. Pla. Change in muscle glycogen content did not differ between CHO and Pla (P = 0.246). Muscle cytokine mRNA content was detected preexercise for seven cytokines in this order (highest to lowest): IL-15, TNF-alpha, IL-8, IL-1beta, IL-12p35, IL-6, and IFN-gamma. After subjects ran for 3 h, gene expression above prerun levels was measured for five of these cytokines: IL-1beta, IL-6, and IL-8 (large increases), and IL-10 and TNF-alpha (small increases). The increase in mRNA (fold difference from preexercise) was attenuated in CHO (15.9-fold) compared with Pla (35.2-fold) for IL-6 (P = 0.071) and IL-8 (CHO, 7.8-fold; Pla, 23.3-fold; P = 0.063). CHO compared with Pla beverage ingestion attenuates the increase in plasma IL-6, IL-10, and IL-1ra and gene expression for IL-6 and IL-8 in athletes running 3 h at 70% Vo(2 max) despite no differences in muscle glycogen content.


The theme of abandonment and the image of the abandoned woman have been staples of the poetic canon since the dawn of literature. As Lawrence Lipking states regarding the tradition launched by Ovid's Heroides, "to be a heroine ... means being abandoned." (1) Ovid's series of plaintive epistles, almost all in the voices of women of legend addressing their absent lovers, presents the "other" side of an age-old story. In the dominant literary models which generally tell their tales from the masculine perspective, the woman who is left behind essentially ceases to exist. When the man sails away to epic conquest or spurs his steed on toward chivalric adventure or simply loses interest once his desire has been assuaged, for him that is the end of the episode. For the woman, however, that is where a new story begins. Hers is the tale of the ugly aftermath, the often unseen consequences of love. Naturally, then, love's ending is a different story altogether when the woman is given voice, and especially when there is a woman author-figure behind it. The abandoned woman who speaks, who opts not to suffer in silence, can be unnerving, because while she suffers, she is also unrestrained--"those who are banished are also let loose" (Lipking xvii). Expressing herself through lament, while at the same time unable to control her lover or her own late, she subverts the basic Aristotelian principle that poetry requires action and closure (Lipking 3) and must not be allowed to languish unresolved. This woman, who has nothing left to lose and who is therefore not bound by such rules, dares to (or cannot help but) speak truths glossed over or left in the margins of conventional literary models, and even of social and historical perceptions that privilege the experience of the man and that do not necessarily offer neat resolutions. The one positive, however, is that through expression she can turn her suffering into a sustained creative impulse that is both an antidote to the heartache and a claim to power and self-determination. Writing is also permanence (2)--pain inscribed in poetry takes on a lasting form, standing as a monument to the woman's suffering and to her art and her selfhood. One could argue that for such feminine voices, expression is action, defying masculine discourse and shattering conventional limits. For both the late-medieval writer Christine de Pizan and her Renaissance counterpart Louise Labe, the figure of the abandoned woman suffering the pain of loss and unanswered desire is central as subject matter and as a foundation for the poet-personae behind their works. (3) In their poems, the feminine protagonists work in gender parallel with poet-figures who are self-consciously constructed as feminine, and the boundaries between them are provocatively blurred. Interestingly, Mireille Huchon has recently put forth the theory that Labe was but a persona created by a group of male poets in Lyon, whom Huchon credits as the true authors of the texts written under Labe's name. (4) While that theory has yet to be universally accepted, it adds an intriguing wrinkle to the construct of the author figure, specifically presented as feminine, who functions in parallel with her feminine protagonist-speaker. If Labe was the creation of a group of men inspired by Labe's medieval predecessor, the constructed nature of the poet-protagonist couple of which she is part is all the more pronounced because all the more artificial. That, in turn, speaks volumes about the extent to which abandonment is presumed, in literature at least, to be a quintessentially feminine experience. Whether she is imaginary or backed up by a historically real woman, the fact remains that Louise Labe's poet-persona resonates strikingly with that of Christine. For both, it is not only the feminine lyric voice, but the poet-figure herself who speaks from the margins, confronting tradition to expose issues that are typically downplayed or ignored, boldly challenging literary and even social norms. …


Bacillus velezensis W1, isolated from two-spotted spider mites that had died naturally, is a patented strain with strong capability to cause mortality of the phytophagous mite Tetranychus urticae. The whole genome of W1 was completely sequenced with a combination of an Illumina Miseq platform (400-bp paired-end) with 2 × 250 bases and a Pacific Biosciences (PaBio) RS II Single Molecule Real Time (SMRT) sequencing platform using a 20 kb SMRTbell template library. Here, we report the complete genome sequence of B. velezensis W1, including one circular chromosome of 4,237,431 bp encoding 4,352 genes with GC content of 45.84%, providing insights into the genomic basis of its acaricidal activity and facilitating its application in red spider mite biocontrol.


Are implicit biases something we can rightly be held responsible for, and if so, how? A variety of social and cognitive psychological studies have documented the existence of wide-ranging implicit biases for over 30 years. These implicit biases can best be described as negative mental attitudes that operate immediately and unconsciously in response to specific stimuli. The first chapter of this thesis surveys the psychological literature, as well as presents findings of real-world experiments into racial biases. I then present the dominant model of implicit attitudes as mere associations, followed by evidence that at least some implicit attitudes take on a propositional form and involve making inferences based on evidence. I then reject adopting either of these two rigid models in favor of a dispositional approach that treats implicit biases as on the same spectrum of, but adjacent to, beliefs. I then evaluate the moral wrongdoing associated with holding explicitly prejudicial beliefs, appealing first to Kantian notions of respecting individuals as agents, then appealing to Strawson's argument that we are responsible for expressions of our will. Our status as human agents involves participating in complex and sustained interactions with others, which necessarily implies that we take part in the social practice of holding each other responsible for the quality of their will. The reactive attitudes we display in our everyday interactions indicate which features and circumstances are most important when investigating this practice. After applying this approach to implicit attitudes, I then pose the objection that their unconscious and unendorsed nature disqualifies implicit attitudes as proper expressions of our will. I develop this objection using Scanlon's account of moral responsibility, which requires the capacity to self-govern in light of principles that are generally agreed upon as good reasons for guiding interactions with one another. Finally, I critique Real Self theories that seek to arbitrarily privilege one part of ourselves in favor of the Whole Self, which privileges those features that are most integrated into our overall character.


Abstract Pyroxenes have the capacity to incorporate both hydrogen and fluorine in their structures, and accurate measurement of these volatile elements can be used to constrain geophysical and petrologic processes in planetary bodies. For example, pyroxenes may be used to constrain the volatile contents of melts from which they crystallized. However, the experimental determination of H and F in pyroxenes is difficult, particularly at the relatively low levels present in natural samples. Here we evaluate methods for determining both H and F in orthopyroxene. We measured trace concentrations of H (~40-400 ppm H2O) and F (<1-17 ppm) in a suite of nine orthopyroxenes from varying geological environments, using secondary ion mass spectrometry (SIMS). The SIMS data for H (measured as 16O1H, referenced to 30Si and 18O) are cross calibrated against Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectra, in turn calibrated against either manometry (Bell et al. 1995) or the frequency-dependent molar absorption coefficient derived by Libowitzky and Rossman (1997). Despite the fact that our samples exhibit a wide range of IR band structures, with varying percentages of absorbance split among low (2600-3350 cm-1) and high (3350-3700 cm-1) wavenumber bands, the SIMS data are fit with the same precision and virtually the same regression slope regardless of which IR calibration is used. We also confirm previous suggestions that the matrix effect for SIMS analyses between orthopyroxene and olivine is small (≤20%). Anomalously high yields of 16O1H in some analyses can be attributed to the presence of amphibole lamellae, and these analyses must be filtered out with different criteria than for olivine due to differences in the geometrical relationship of host to inclusion. For F, our derived values are highly dependent on analytical uncertainties related to the use of silicate glasses as standards. Regardless of the accuracy of our calibration, we see systematic differences in F concentrations in orthopyroxenes and olivines depending on their geological context. Samples derived from crustal environments and from Colorado Plateau minette diatremes have very low F (≤3 ppm), while higher contents can be found in megacrysts from South African kimberlites (up to 17 ppm in orthopyroxene and 47 ppm in olivine) and in xenocrysts from the Rio Grande Rift (Kilbourne Hole, 7-9 ppm in orthopyroxene).


Apr25 Mike Sign-language interpreting: A high-risk occupation Sign-language interpreters face a high risk of ergonomic injury, such as carpal tunnel syndrome—possibly even greater than assembly-line and other manual-labor workers—and the risk is heightened in high-stress settings. These are some of the findings of research led by Matthew Marshall, an associate professor of industrial and systems engineering in RIT's Kate Gleason College of Engineering. Particularly with the large population of deaf and hard-of-hearing people—and, thus, interpreters—here at RIT and NTID, this is important research. Dr. Marshall's study also looked into steps taken to minimize ergonomic injuries by lessening occurrences of interpreters placed in stressful situations. RIT's Department of Access Services has made strides in recent years in reducing the injury rate among interpreters, he adds. Dr. Marshall's findings, released in the March 2008 edition of the journal Ergonomics, have received coverage by UPI and other news outlets. Hear more about this fascinating story—including the role of cognitive stress in ergonomic-related injuries—along with campus news and News & Events highlights, all on this week's Dateline: RIT – The Podcast. On a separate topic . . . For those going to tonight's Red Wings game, I'll be there, along with "Ritchie the Tiger," as part of an RIT contingent distributing information about this spring's Imagine RIT Innovation and Creativity Festival. See you at the ballpark! Have a great weekend!


Estimating from the steady declining rate of engineering students in Malaysia, the country is predicted to be short of 236,000 engineers and technical personnel to achieve its 2020 Mission. Hence, it has built the first technical MARA Junior Science College that introduced engineering to lower secondary students. However, there is yet a study on whether or not it helps the students to increase their interests in engineering. Therefore, in this paper, a survey has been conducted to first and foremost investigate the technical students' interests in engineering as well as finding out the reasoning from those who are not interested in engineering. After that, a half day engineering program is introduced with a measurement on the interest in engineering before and after the intervention is held. Finally, the survey studies which field of engineering the students are most interested in. The results show that, before the program is introduced, only 8.47% of the technical students have shown high interests in engineering field with only 7.5% female students are interested in engineering compared to 18.42% for male students. After the program is introduced, as high as 33.05% students rated their interest in engineering field as 'most interested', with 39.47% in male students and 30% in female students. It proves that an engineering event is crucial in increasing students' interests in engineering. It also concludes that EE is the most favourite field of engineering with percentage score of 38.98%, while EP being the least.


Abstract. The maximum subarray problem is used to identify the subarray of a two-dimensional array, where the sum of elements is maximized. In terms of image processing, the solution has been used to find the brightest region within an image. Two parallel algorithms of the maximum subarray problem solve this problem in O(n) and O(log n) time. A field programmable gate array implementation has verified theoretical maximum performance; however, extensive customization is required, restricting general application. A more convenient platform for this work is a graphics processor unit since it offers a flexible trade-off between hardware customization and performance. Implementation of the maximum subarray algorithm on a graphics processor unit is discussed in this article for rectangular solutions and convex extensions are explored.


Producer organizations (POs) provide benefits to smallholders by alleviating market access challenges. However, whether all farmers benefit from a PO is still a question. Limited evidence is available on whether POs are inclusive of poor farmers. Even if the poor join, do they participate in decision-making? We conducted interviews with 595 smallholder dairy farmers in Kenya. We distinguish three groups; members of a bargaining PO, members of a processing PO and non-members. We show that membership is related to the structural characteristics of the organization: processing POs favor membership of farmers that are wealthier, more educated and more innovative. As to participation in the decision-making process: older, male and specialized farmers have a higher chance of being involved than poor farmers. Factors distinguishing farmer participation in decision-making between bargaining and processing POs are highlighted. We find that a bargaining PO is more inclusive of all groups of farmers, while women and poor farmers are excluded from decision-making in a processing PO. Our findings contribute to policymaking on inclusive development.


BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE: Breast cancer is the most common and the most influential type of cancer in women, which causes deep excitement and severe emotional problems. Considering the increase in survival rates, patients with breast cancer continue to live longer with this disease and its complications and stresses, compared with patients with other types of cancer, which may affect the psychological well-being of this group of patients. This study was conducted to determine the psychological well-being of women with breast cancer and its relationship with emotional intelligence. METHODS: This cross-sectional study was conducted among 90 women with breast cancer who referred for treatment or counseling to one of the hospitals of Shahid Rajaee in Babolsar, Ayatollah Rohani in Babol and the Cancer Counseling and Screening Center in Babol, using convenience sampling. In addition to demographic questions, Bradberry & Greaves's Emotional Intelligence Questionnaire (possible range = 0 – 140) and Ryff's Psychological Wellbeing Scale (possible range = 0–108) were completed. FINDINGS: The mean age of the participants was 45.98±9.74 with an age range of 24 – 70 years. The mean score of psychological well-being was 75.01±12.10 and the mean score of emotional intelligence was 77.14±19.53 and psychological well-being had a significant relationship with emotional intelligence (r = 0.45, p <0.001). The results showed that emotional intelligence explains and predicts 20% of psychological well-being changes (β = 0.48). Among the demographic characteristics, only the relationship between education and psychological well-being was significant (r = 0.18, p = 0.070). CONCLUSION: The results of the study showed that emotional intelligence of women with breast cancer predicts a part of their psychological well-being.


The three dimensional magnetic field surrounding an 861 turn coil as well as that surrounding and within a single phase 1.5 kvA shell type transformer were calculated using the three dimensional finite element magnetic vector potential (m.v.p.) formulation described in a companion paper. Plots of equal magnetic vector potential contours which display vividly the three dimensional nature of the fields are given. Experimental verification of calculated flux densities and device inductance, given here for the first time, demonstrated the validity and accuracy of the given approach. Excellent agreement between the experimental and calculated values was achieved. Potential applications of this method to more complex problems, where conventional two dimensional methods are inadequate, are discussed in light of the given results.


Vibration signals acquired from bearing have been found to demonstrate complicated nonlinear characteristics in literature. Fractal geometry theory has provided effective tools such as fractal dimension for characterizing the vibration signals in bearing faults detection. However, most of the natural signals are not critical self-similar fractals; the assumption of a constant fractal dimension at all scales may not be true. Motivated by this fact, this work explores the application of the multi-scale fractal dimensions (MFDs) based on morphological cover (MC) technique for bearing fault diagnosis. Vibration signals from bearing with seven different states under four operations conditions are collected to validate the presented MFDs based on MC technique. Experimental results reveal that the vibration signals acquired from bearing are not critical self-similar fractals. The MFDs can provide more discriminative information about the signals than the single global fractal dimension. Furthermore, three classifiers are employed to evaluate and compare the classification performance of the MFDs with other feature extraction methods. Experimental results demonstrate the MFDs to be a desirable approach to improve the performance of bearing fault diagnosis.


2015  May  12 Accepted  Abstract Tuberculosis is a common health problem. Abdominal tuberculosis constitutes about 2% of all tubercular cases and it's the sixth most common extrapulmonary tuberculosis. The aim of this study was to evaluate the clinical presentation, diagnosis and effective treatment of abdominal tuberculosis. This is a retrospective study including 11 patients (4males and 7 females), with clinical features of abdominal tuberculosis. They were divided according to the clinical presentation into two groups. The first group included patients presented as acute abdominal pain mainly due to bowel obstruction or as peritonitis and were prepared and treated by explorative laparotomy and definitive diagnosis of abdominal TB was made by tissue biopsy. The second group included patients with chronic symptoms. The results observed in this study were that abdominal pain was the commonest symptom followed by abdominal distention, anorexia, weight loss and fever. Tender right lower abdominal quadrant was found in 7 patients(63.6%) and right iliac fossa mass was found in 3 patients (27.3%). Explorative laparotomy was needed for 5 patients (45.5%) who presented as acute abdomen. Strictures were found in 3 patients (27.3%), adhesion in one patient (9.1%) and peritonitis caused by perforation in the terminal ileum was recorded in one patient. Ascitic fluid analysis for AFB stain and culture confirm the diagnosis of abdominal tuberculosis in patients who presented with chronic symptoms of tuberculosis. All patients showed good response to ATT therapy. No mortality or recurrence was recorded during ATT treatment or during follow up period. We concluded that abdominal tuberculosis is difficult to diagnose due to vague and non specific symptoms and signs such as abdominal pain, anorexia, weight loss and fever. High index of suspicion and clinical awareness is needed for definite diagnosis which depends on PCR or histopathology or AFB stain.


We explore some mathematical features of the loss landscape of overparameterized neural networks. A priori one might imagine that the loss function looks like a typical function from $\mathbb{R}^n$ to $\mathbb{R}$ - in particular, nonconvex, with discrete global minima. In this paper, we prove that in at least one important way, the loss function of an overparameterized neural network does not look like a typical function. If a neural net has $n$ parameters and is trained on $d$ data points, with $n>d$, we show that the locus $M$ of global minima of $L$ is usually not discrete, but rather an $n-d$ dimensional submanifold of $\mathbb{R}^n$. In practice, neural nets commonly have orders of magnitude more parameters than data points, so this observation implies that $M$ is typically a very high-dimensional subset of $\mathbb{R}^n$.


Structural risk minimisation (SRM) is a general complexity regularization method which automatically selects the model complexity that approximately minimises the misclassification error probability of the empirical risk minimiser. It does so by adding a complexity penalty term e(m,k) to the empirical risk of the candidate hypotheses and then for any fixed sample size m it minimises the sum with respect to the model complexity variable k. When learning multicategory classification there are M subsamples m i , corresponding to the M pattern classes with a priori probabilities p i , 1 ≤ i ≤ M. Using the usual representation for a multi-category classifier as M individual boolean classifiers, the penalty becomes Si=1Mpie(mi,ki)Mi=1pi(miki). If the m i are given then the standard SRM trivially applies here by minimizing the penalised empirical risk with respect to k i , 1...,M. However, in situations where the total sample size Si=1MmiMi=1mi needs to be minimal one needs to also minimize the penalised empirical risk with respect to the variables m i , i = 1...,M. The obvious problem is that the empirical risk can only be defined after the subsamples (and hence their sizes) are given (known). Utilising an on-line stochastic gradient descent approach, this paper overcomes this difficulty and introduces a sample-querying algorithm which extends the standard SRM principle. It minimises the penalised empirical risk not only with respect to the k i , as the standard SRM does, but also with respect to the m i , i = 1...,M. The challenge here is in defining a stochastic empirical criterion which when minimised yields a sequence of subsample-size vectors which asymptotically achieve the Bayes' optimal error convergence rate.


We explored associations between the common protozoan parasite Toxoplasma gondii and brain cancers in human populations. We predicted that T. gondii could increase the risk of brain cancer because it is a long-lived parasite that encysts in the brain, where it provokes inflammation and inhibits apoptosis. We used a medical geography approach based on the national incidence of brain cancers and seroprevalence of T. gondii. We corrected reports of incidence for national gross domestic product because wealth probably increases the ability to detect cancer. We also included gender, cell phone use and latitude as variables in our initial models. Prevalence of T. gondii explained 19 per cent of the residual variance in brain cancer incidence after controlling for the positive effects of gross domestic product and latitude among nations. Infection with T. gondii was associated with a 1.8-fold increase in the risk of brain cancers across the range of T. gondii prevalence in our dataset (4–67%). These results, though correlational, suggest that T. gondii should be investigated further as a possible oncogenic pathogen of humans.


Abstract The aim of the work is to develop the fabrication technology of a small curved tungsten (W) macro-brush–type geometry using a vacuum brazing technique. Taking the design concept of the ITER divertor dome, the present mock-up has scaled down more than ten times in size. A feasibility study of the curved brazing was done, and design and fabrication of the special fixture for the curved profile brazing were carried out. The vacuum brazing technique was used to develop the joining of tungsten tiles in the curved profile of a CuCrZr block (heat sink) using silver-free brazing alloy (NiCuMn-37) with a specially designed custom-made fixture (Type 304 stainless steel). Nondestructive testing, particularly the ultrasonic immersion technique, was incorporated to inspect the quality of the brazed joint in the mock-up. The hardness value (HV) measured on the copper alloy was found to degrade from 143 to 46 HV (before and after brazing). The results of the experimental activity and methodology adopted to fabricate the small-sized trial W mock-up are presented and discussed in the paper.