Magnetoencephalography (MEG) is a non-invasive neural imaging technique which passively measures the miniscule magnetic fields produced by neuronal activity without any risk to the subject. Its superior temporal resolution has led to its use in multimodal studies alongside neural imaging techniques, such as functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), which provide high spatial resolution. Multivariate analysis (MVA) is a well-established field of statistics and is currently applied to MEG data for the purposes of artefact identification using principal component analysis (PCA) and independent component analysis (ICA). This paper considers how the similarity measures of Frobenius norm, PCA similarity measure (SPCA) and Eros can directly analyse the multivariate data produced from MEG recordings. These techniques are applied to auditory stimuli to evaluate to what extent different stimuli can be distinguished by the corresponding neural activity. The results show that Frobenius norm finds dissimilarity between the neural response to distinct tones while Eros and SPCA show similarity between neural responses to certain pairs of tones. The results will be used to inform future studies where the measures identified in this study can be used as part of classification algorithms as well as provide a basic measure to map the similarities in the conditions to the similarity of the neural responses.


Insertion of bacterial insertion sequence IS911 can often be directed to sequences resembling its ends. We have investigated this type of transposition and shown that it can occur via cleavage of a single end and its targeted transfer next to another end. The single end transfer (SET) events generate branched DNA molecules that contain a nicked Holliday junction and can be considered as partial transposition products. Our results indicate that these can be processed by the Escherichia coli host independently of IS911‐encoded proteins. Such resolution depends on the presence of homologous DNA regions neighbouring the cross‐over point in the SET molecule. Processing is often accompanied by sequence conversion between donor and target sequences, suggesting that branch migration is involved. We show that resolution is greatly reduced in a recG host. Thus, the branched DNA‐specific helicase, RecG, involved in processing of potentially lethal DNA structures such as stalled replication forks, also intervenes in the resolution of partial IS911 transposition products.


This artists' text examines the relationship between photographic images and Massively Multiplayer Online (MMO) environments. We note that such scripted image worlds necessitate a fundamental reconsideration of the capacities of image, its formation, reproduction, storage and circulation. As an archaeologist would document an excavation, extending conventional methods through 3D visualization technology to work in new ways with the archaeological record, we chose to document a world built and razed digitally by a now dormant group of anonymous gamers called the Yung Cum Bois (YCBs). We turn to some definitions of griefer as a subcultural phenomenon within online culture to attempt to contextualize our involvement some more, thinking through the forms of image-gathering that grief play has generated, such as scripted object attacks where image-objects spawn and self-replicate, continually spurting out copies of themselves, lagging the region, slowing down frame rates, consuming land resources. Here we witness images blockading network logistics. This was active fieldwork. We got involved. We applied visualization technology learnt from archaeological computing research to the avatars, temporary structures and abandoned ruins of an online world, Second Life (SL). We patched together a kind of virtual photogrammetry, enabling the monumentalization of avatars, objects and scenarios, recompiling these into new configurations and uploading them freely to be reused, detourned and weaponized by our virtual friends. We situate this endeavour within a cobbled history of imaging technology, the networked self and its pathologies, riffling through our own image dump. Here.


Social services is a constitvent part of the social security system. Social services are provided in cases of social risk such as illness, disability, senility, widowhood, family, childcare, unemployment, lodging, social exclusion. The main objective of the social service system is to provide social assistance in various non-monetary forms and support payment for people who are not able to provide for themselves. Social support should be organized in such a way as to enhance the activity of people and their responsibility for themselves and their own families. In the theoretical part of this article, the authors analyse the organization of social services, the legal assumptions of social services organization and the type of organization. The main focus is on the administration of social services at the municipal level: management, planning, human resources, and control of social services. The social characteristics of theVilnius district and the analysis of institutions offering social services in Vilnius district are presented. The main aim of the article is to investigate problems in the administration of social services at the municipal level in Vilnius district as the basis of an experts survey. The workers of institutions providing social services in Vilnius municipality (22 respondents) participated in the investigation. The second part of the article evaluates of the efficiency and quality of social services for elderly people in the Varėna district municipality and care homes, areas for the improvement of services and the satisfaction of recipients. Social services are evaluated on three levels: organizational (municipality), service institutions (the elderly care home) and the recipients of services (care home residents) using Servqual the evaluation criteria of A. Parasuraman, L. Berry, V. Zeithaml and Ch. Gronroos' Perceived Service Quality model the article presents. A statistical analysis of social services evaluates the correspondence of the services to social care eligibility standards and makes suggestions for improvement in the provision of services.


This Article seeks to surface and understand more than what is already known about Jean Hortense Norris as a lawyer, jurist, and feminist legal realist—as well as a woman for whom sex very much became part of her professional persona and work. This article analyzes the lack of legal protections provided to Norris and troubling nature of her removal from the bench given the evidence presented and standards applied. Finally, this Article seeks to provide further context for Jean Norris's alleged misconduct charges to suggest that as a woman who dared to blur gender boundaries, embrace her professional power, and offer a unique vision of the "fairer sex," she was held to a different standard than her male peers and made to pay the price with her career. In these ways, this Article provides a more complete picture of Jean Norris beyond a shamed and disrobed judge. And it begins to move Judge Norris out of legal history's margins so that she may be remembered as more than mere mugshot in the American imagination.


This study examines lobbying activity during four California policymaking processes and through the four institutional venues available in that state: the legislative, executive, and judicial branches, and the ballot initiative. It shows that past advocacy activity explains future mobilization on the same policy issue. Groups that fail to reach their policy goals will be more likely to mobilize later if the policy process changes venue, compared with those that have achieved their policy preference. Thus, the availability of multiple venues provides a counterweight to the possible advantages received by certain group types in each venue. Furthermore, public interest groups are more likely to mobilize across venues and repeatedly within a venue, while business groups are less likely to do so.


A survey of fluvial landforms was conducted atWidden Brook, an unregulated sand-bed stream in the Hunter Valley, New South Wales (NSW), Australia, to investigate the physical factors associated with vegetation pattern in Riverine Oak Forest. Groundwater depth and chemistry (pH, dissolved oxygen and electrical conduc- tivity) were measured using piezometers and submersible data loggers on three fluvial landforms (i.e. toe of bank, top of bank and floodplain) along five transects. Floristic composition, canopy cover, bare ground and leaf litter were assessed within 45 quadrats on the three landforms along the five transects. Elevation above the bed and flood return period were determined by cross-sectional survey and flood frequency analysis, while flow duration was determined from the gauge record. Canonical correspondence analysis demonstrated that vegetation composition was associated with average watertable depth and flood variables to a similar extent. The relative importance of these factors would be expected to vary with flood- and drought-dominated climatic periods on a scale of several decades. Floristic composition was moderately associated with the canopy cover of the dominant woody species, Casuarina cunninghamiana (Miq.), but weakly correlated with bare ground and groundwater chemistry. Suites of species were associated with particular fluvial landforms and their corresponding flood and watertable conditions. The reach examined has characteristics similar to both the semi-arid and mesic riparian ecosystems of the USA. The coarse sediments, high flood variability, short flood duration and dominance by a pioneer tree that relies on groundwater are similar to riparian ecosystems in the western USA, while the relatively broad floodplain and the development of a forest canopy that is associated with the distribution of understorey plants are similar to the mesic riparian systems in the eastern USA.


As work regimes become global, social communication increasingly occurs across locations far apart. In the absence of a common national, ethnic, or organizational culture across continents, what makes communication possible among social worlds technologically integrated in real time? Taking India's global call centers as the focus of analysis, this article attempts to solve the riddle of communication by showing how transnational business practices rely on the transmutation of cultural communication into global communication through the processes of neutralization and mimesis. Neutralization refers to attempts at pruning unwanted cultural particulars, whereas mimesis refers to simulating desired cultural elements.


Three studies were conducted to investigate how men who have sex with men (MSM) use the Internet and particularly gay-themed websites (GTWs), and what are the effects that such use might have on aspects of their lives and communities, from sexual behaviour to gay identification and gay-related social action. The research took place in the capital cities of Greece and the United Kingdom, Athens and London respectively, two places with different levels of openness and acceptance of gay people. The first study included 20 Internet-based and face-to-face semi-structured interviews with 10 MSM living in Athens and 10 MSM living in London. The findings of thematic analysis showed that GTWs provide a parallel gay scene to the existing offline scene that, above all, facilitates the initiation of communication between MSM who then meet offline, mainly for sex. With its ease of access and the relative anonymity it provides, this online scene appeared to be very important to the sexual identity of MSM who feel unsafe or unable to disclose their sexuality offline. Challenges in terms of particularly its individualistic nature and the adoption of commodification and standardisation practices of gay men were flagged for the negative impact they might have on a sense of community and collectiveness. The second study was a survey completed online or offline by 173 MSM living in Athens and 188 MSM living in London. It aimed to investigate perceived and internalised homophobia of MSM of each city and found that those living in Athens reported higher levels of perceived homophobia, disclosed their sexuality less but had a higher global self-esteem compared to MSM living in London. In terms of the relationship between GTWs' use and self-esteem, findings showed that self-esteem was not related to greater dependence on the 'Gay Internet'. For MSM living in Athens, greater perceived homophobia of others related positively to greater use of GTWs, and communicational rather than informational facilities were preferred by those who appeared to feel less comfortable with their sexuality. The final study, a survey completed through the Internet by 151 MSM living in Athens and 225 MSM living in London, examined different patterns of use of the online gay scene, its evaluation and its contribution to explaining the participants' Internet-initiated sexual behaviour, gay identification and willingness to undertake gay-related social action. Findings showed that the online compared to the offline gay scene appears to be more addictive and a space with less healthy intra-group behaviour that does not facilitate as much a sense of community. Then, there was some evidence that communicational use of GTWs, which is mainly linked to satisfying sexual needs, contributed to explaining gay collective identifications in the case of MSM living in Athens. Also, more positive perceptions and experiences of the online scene, especially in terms of social capital, were found to relate to gay identification and willingness to undertake gay-related social action. The assumptions of Klandermans's (1997) Expectancy Value Model for collective action were not supported as they were tested within the Athens survey only. The results are discussed in the light of the implications they may have for the way the Internet is seen to be changing stigmatised people's individual and collective identities and actions, and in particular those of gay people and their communities.


lIgObjective:l/ig The objective of this review is to summarise the published research available on the biomechanics of the elbow joint during the performance of different tennis strokes and the implications in sports medicine. Data sources:l/Ig Academic Search Elite, PubMed, INFOTRAC and SportDiscus were use to search for related sources using a combination of terms such as: elbow, biomechanics, tennis, torques, kinetics, kinematics, forces, serve, backhand, forehand, tennis elbow, valgus overload, and tennis injuries from 1966-2004. Reference sections of key sources were also searched. Study selection:l/Ig Ninety-six resources were selected based on how relevant and important they were in relation to the stated objective. Data extraction:l/Ig The results presented in this review are the interpretation and summary of the author. No meta-analysis procedures were used in the presentation of the results. Data synthesis:l/Ig The elbow joint complex undergoes a forceful extension and pronation during the tennis serve but these torques are small compared to the varus torque exerted as the results of the external rotation motion of the upper arm and the internal rotation torque transmitted through the humerus onto the elbow. A similar mechanism occurs during the forehand stroke making the medial aspect of the elbow joint susceptible to injuries. During the backhand stroke, the elbow joint extends and it seems to supinate, but little is known about the kinetics (force and torques) of the one and two-handed backhand. Racquet impact data (hand forces, accelerations, and goniometric) seem to support the hypothesis that tennis elbow is caused by the initial shock wave that creates an eccentric overload of the forearm muscles.
lbrglIgConclusions:l/Ig The kinematics of the elbow during the tennis serve are well established but there exists a need for more kinetic and kinematics studies on all tennis strokes, especially on the backhand and forehand strokes. Future research needs to investigate how the effects of the different techniques, such as grip type, stance type, forehand and backhand type and poor techniques (leading elbow, off-centre hits, and hitting off the back foot) affect the elbow mechanics. Once kinetic models are developed, research should focus on the creation of computer simulations to provide information on technique modification in an effort to reduce the large mechanical loads placed at the elbow.


Only a very small proportion of investment proposals attract venture capital. This is because entrepreneurs and venture capitalists (VCs) have differing opinions of when a venture is ready for external investment or considered "investor ready." These differing opinions result, primarily, from the emotionally committed entrepreneur who fails to see the venture from an investor's point of view. The result is a large number of unfunded and disappointed entrepreneurs and frustrated VCs. This article investigates these differences in opinion, and finds that, though entrepreneurs are aware of the fundamental investment criteria used by a VC, they are comparatively overconfident in their assessment of the overall investor readiness of their venture. Investor readiness is determined by examining the technology, market, and management readiness—and gut feel—of a new venture. In response to the findings, the article discusses numerous solutions to increase an entrepreneur's chance of receiving financing from a VC.


ABSTRACT This article summarizes the results of a longer study of address forms in Ancient Greek, based on 11,891 address tokens from a variety of sources. It argues that the Greek evidence appears to contradict two tendencies, found in address forms in other languages, which have been claimed as possible sociolinguistic universals: the tendency toward T/V distinctions, and the principle that "What is new is polite." It is suggested that these alleged universals should perhaps be re-examined in light of the Greek evidence, and that ancient languages in general have more to contribute to sociolinguistics than is sometimes realized. (Address, Ancient Greek, T/V distinctions)


Keith Mayerson told Publishers Weekly in 2011 that the 1996 release of his graphic novel adaptation Horror Hospital Unplugged was "too arty for comics, too comics for art, and too gay for everyone." The publisher hoped that by reissuing Horror Hospital Unplugged in 2011, the comics landscape had become more welcoming to a book like this...but what kind of a book is Horror Hospital Unplugged? Dennis Cooper, born 1953, is a prose author of numerous books and poems focusing on disaffected youth, music, and death. He frequently collaborates with visual artists on various projects. In this case, he collaborated with Keith Mayerson, a painter and cartoonist, born in 1966, who casts pop culture figures into his own personal narratives. The 240-page graphic novel is based on a 16-page short story by Cooper titled "Introducing Horror Hospital," which appears in his 1992 collection Wrong. Among Cooper's work, the short story is surprisingly tame and straightforward. It follows Trevor Machine, a lead vocalist of a crappy but sincere punk band. Guys come to his shows and try to sleep with him. He does drugs and interviews. He thinks about death. Finally, a friend dies. Everything that's in the short story is also in the graphic novel adaptation, but the adaptation extrapolates upon, explodes, and complicates the source text. The graphic novel adds narrative elements, including an exploration of Machine's sexual confusion and a plethora of pop culture references: a visit from the ghost of River Phoenix becomes central to the book. Phoenix tells Trevor that he'll die of a drug overdose and that death isn't so bad—it's actually "kind of laid back." He tells Trevor that, in these last weeks before death, he should "go burn brightly and fuck with the world." While "Introducing Horror Hospital" lacks the violence of much of Cooper's work, the graphic novel adaptation assaults the reader with Mayerson's drawings. The execution of this book feels like an act of anger or frustration or pain. Mayerson attacks these pages with his pen. Grotesque nib drawings splay across the page. Characters' faces twist from panel to panel, morphing into Tex Avery wolves as drawn by André Masson. Other pages suggest Antonin Artaud drawing a MAD Magazine spread of celebrity caricatures. Some pages are dense with gags and notes and maze-like arrangements while other panels feel like they were thrown onto the page. "Did he draw this on uppers?" is a fair question. The book seems to ask you to flip the pages as fiercely as they were drawn...you have to hurtle through this book to make it cohere. It perfectly suits the energetic and dreamy content of the story. Throughout, more specific visual references abound. In one sequence, a big mustached blob attacks Trevor and hits his head on a Frogger arcade machine. The design of the blob man recalls the inflated adults in Pink Floyd's animated The Wall (1979). Trevor's punk friend pulls him into the club bathroom, and the interior of the lavatory looks like a Ralph Steadman page. Trevor's nose bleeds, and that cues Mayerson to move into a realm of "boy love" manga, where a bloody nose signifies sexual


Using 5.33 x lo6 single muons collected in 1.46 x lo4 live hours by MACRO during the period 19911994, we have searched for a correlation between variations in the underground muon rate, N,, and seasonal temperature variations in the atmosphere. These correlations are found to be present with high statistical significance. Analysis of the relatively complete December 1992-December 1994 subset of the data yields a value for the temperature coefficient, a~ = (T/N,) (aN,/aT) = 0.83 f 0.13. Analysis of the total data set gives consistent results. We have compared this result with the hypothesis that the muons observed in MACRO come from pion decays alone. Although our result is consistent with the 'pion only' hypothesis, a discussion of the sensitivity of our data sample to the kaon component of the cascades leading to observed muons underground will also be presented. @ 1997 Elsevier Science B.V.


Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is a significant public health concern and can have long-term emotional, social and financial consequences for individuals and society. Lifetime prevalence in the general population is estimated at 8% and rates of exposure to Post-Traumatic Events (PTE) indicate approximately 50 to 65% have been exposed to at least one PTE in their lives. This indicates that approximately 15 to 25% of people exposed may also have a diagnosis of PTSD at some time in their life. It is therefore paramount that sufferers receive effective treatment. A case of successful treatment using Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT) combined with more conventional psychological treatment for a woman, DS, suffering from acute PTSD with travel anxiety post a motor vehicle accident is presented. The client's progress was evaluated at baseline and post treatment. After six sessions, over an eight week period, improvements were noted on all identified goals and on all assessment tools such that at post treatment DS no longer met the criteria for PTSD. The case highlights the utility of single case designs to evaluate the clinical decisions made in selection of treatment of PTSD. Theoretical implications of this study are discussed and an evaluation of using EFT in this case is provided.


When I captured these animals I was a passenger on
board the ship Invercargill, Captain John Muir, then on a
voyage from London to Port Chalmers, N.Z.
Nothing unusual was noticed in the appearance of
the sea, which was calm, until the afternoon, when the water
was filled with brilliant blue stars, floating past the ship in
great numbers. With a small canvas bag I succeeded in
fishing up several of the blue stars, which were a species of
Sapphirina, and two or three other animals, non-luminous,
one of which was a Salpa democratica. I kept them in a glass
of sea water till the 29th, when an unfortunate accident killed
them, and having only a small magnifying glass, I was prevented
from making a full examination of all. I preserved
the sketches I was able to make, and through the kindness of
Mr. Morton, of the Royal Society's Museum, I lately received
from Mr. Haswell, of Sydney, information as to the
species and construction of the animals depicted.
The two small crustaceans correspond so closely with the
descriptions and drawings of the male and female of Sapphirina
gemma, as given by J. D. Dana ("Crustacea," Part II.,
pp. 1252-3; Atlas, Plate 88, figs. 1 and 2), that I am very confident
that they are individuals of that species.
I have not been able to find any detailed account of the
Salpae in the Society's Library, but in the Proceedings of
the Boston Society of Natural History, Vol. XI., p. 17, is a
detailed description, with woodcuts, of Salpa Cabotti, by
Alexr. Agassiz. This is found south of Cape Cod, and very
closely resembles the one I caught, and the description and
investigation into the connection of the chain forms are highly
interesting. Includes illustrations.


Public-private partnerships have long been highly valued in Western welfare states, and the valuation of such cooperation has become even stronger in light of last year's economic turbulence, particularly with voluntary non-profit organizations (VNPOs). At the same time, the voluntary sector is changing. The broad popular movements have generally declined in favour of more individual interests as the basis for forming VNPOs, and those organisations still involved in the provision of social services are becoming more and more similar to public service, due to requirements placed on them by the public sector. This is believed to have consequences for the value of such cooperation. If voluntary organisations in public services – or other private organisations for the matter – are becoming copies of public services, there is not much value to be gained from such cooperation, except for some financial gain.In this article, we argue that this conclusion is based on a rather narrow perception of public-voluntary cooperation. Research and debate on such cooperation are mainly preoccupied by what we call supplementary relations, in which voluntary organizations are assessed according to whether they can deliver cheaper or better services than the public sector. Based on an example of public-voluntary cooperation in preventive social work among young adults in Norway, the article show that public-voluntary collaboration can be truly valuable when it is based on a complimentary relation, in which parties collaborate because they command different resources equally important to the task at hand.


ABSTRACTThis study elucidates the characteristics of persistent organic pollutants (POPs), including polychlorinated dibenzo-p-dioxins and dibenzofurans (PCDD/Fs), polychlorinated biphenyl (PCBs), polybrominated dibenzo-p-dioxins and polybrominated dibenzofurans (PBDD/Fs) and polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs), that are emitted from a generator (non-road diesel engine) that is fueled with a blend of waste cooking oil biodiesels (WCO-biodiesels). Experimental results reveal that the mass concentrations of PCDD/Fs, PCBs, PBDD/Fs and PBDEs from the diesel generator that is fueled with petroleum diesel (D100) under loads of 1.5 kW and 3.0 kW were 583–875 pg Nm–3, 580–810 pg Nm–3, 982–1408 pg Nm–3, and 134–216 ng Nm–3, respectively, while the toxicity concentrations of PCDD/Fs, PCBs, and PBDD/Fs were 33.2–58.6, 2.72–3.11, and 1.54–2.30 pg WHO2005-TEQ Nm–3, respectively. W20 and W40 emitted 15–65% and 23–85% less of these POPs by mass (and 25–47% and 46–91% by toxicity), respectively. Among the tested fuel blends, the W40 exhibited the greatest emission factor reductions of mass and toxicity of these four POPs, despite of the load. Therefore, WCO-biodiesels can feasibly be used as an alternative generator fuel, favoring the recycling/reuse of waste oils and mitigating hazards to human health and environment.


Abstract:We are all dependent, none more so than the rich and powerful, who could not maintain their status without an army of servants, in spite of their contempt of the 'dependency culture' of the poor. Chronic illness is a common source of dependency. It forces people to rely on the state - and, if they are lucky, a network of good-hearted friends. The formal social contract is often underpinned by this much more personal one of support from friends. But the nature of gratitude towards giving friends is complex - Melanie Klein is much better known for her early writing on envy than her later view of gratitude 'as an expression of love and thus of the life instinct, and as the antithesis of envy'. There is no political literature on gratitude. Political discourse more usually depends on creating resentment. But recognition of the blessing of gratitude can change your life - your relation to friends, and to those working in state social and medical services. It makes it possible to accept gifts - and one's dependence on others.


The widespread development of groundwater is the only affordable and sustainable way of
improving access to clean water and meeting the Millennium Development Goals for water
supply by 2015. Current approaches to rural water supply, in particular demand driven
approaches and decentralisation of service delivery have many benefits to the overall efficacy
and sustainability of water supplies, however, problems arise when projects do not take into
consideration the nature of the groundwater resources. Different approaches and technologies
are required depending on the hydrogeological environment. Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) can
be divided into four hydrogeological provinces: (1) The crystalline basement occupies 40% of
the land area of SSA and supports 235 million rural inhabitants. (2) Volcanic rocks occupy
6% of the land area of SSA, and sustain a rural population of 45 million, many of whom live
in the drought stricken areas of the Horn of Africa; (3) Consolidated sedimentary rocks
occupy 32% of the land area of SSA and sustain a rural population of 110 million: (4)
Unconsolidated sediments occupy 22% of the land area of SSA and sustain a rural population
of 60 million. Hydrogeological expertise can have significant benefit to rural water supplies
by increasing capacity throughout projects by effectively transferring knowledge; by
providing authoritative benchmarking, by focused research and by providing accessible
advice to planners and policy makers.


This article brings forward the question of which acoustic features are the most adequate for identifying beats computationally in acoustic music pieces. We consider many different features computed on consecutive short portions of acoustic signal, among which those currently promoted in the literature on beat induction from acoustic signals and several original features, unmentioned in this literature. Evaluation of feature sets regarding their ability to provide reliable cues to the localization of beats is based on a machine learning methodology with a large corpus of beat-annotated music pieces, in audio format, covering distinctive music categories.

Confirming common knowledge, energy is shown to be a very relevant cue to beat induction (especially the temporal variation of energy in various frequency bands, with the special relevance of frequency bands below 500 Hz and above 5 kHz). Some of the new features proposed in this paper are shown to outperform features currently promoted in the literature on beat induction from acoustic signals.We finally hypothesize that modeling beat induction may involve many different, complementary acoustic features and that the process of selecting relevant features should partly depend on acoustic properties of the very signal under consideration.


A recent result shows that inner speech can, with proper care, be decoded to the same high-level of accuracy as articulated speech. This relies, however, on neural data obtained while subjects perform elicited tasks, such as covert reading and repeating, whereas a neural speech prosthetic will require the decoding of inner speech that is self-generated. Prior work has, moreover, emphasised differences between these two kinds of inner speech, raising the question of how well a decoder optimised for one will generalise to the other. In this study, we trained phoneme-level decoders on an atypically large, elicited inner speech dataset, previously acquired using 7T fMRI in a single subject. We then acquired a second self-generated inner speech dataset in the same subject. Although the decoders were trained exclusively on neural recordings obtained during elicited inner speech, they predicted unseen phonemes accurately in both elicited and selfgenerated test conditions, illustrating the viability of zero-shot task transfer. This has significant practical importance for the development of a neural speech prosthetic, as labelled data is far easier to acquire at scale for elicited than for self-generated inner speech. Indeed, elicited tasks may be the only option for acquiring labelled data in critical patient populations who cannot control their vocal articulators.


Motivation is a very complex topic. Various fields of study have defined motivation differently. Education is one of those fields. Motivation is one of the important topics in education that is essential for improvement of studentsachievement. Motivation in education depends on different variables such as age, culture, gender, learning environments and so on. This study is concerned with one of the learning environments namely online learning. The primary task of instructors in online learning is to motivate their students. This paper offers literature review on motivation of adult learners enrolled in online courses. This paper also provides insights on the essential theories and perspectives of motivation as well as brief information about ARCS model developed by Keller. The study poses some important questions that intend to challenge teaching skills of its readers.


In the built environments of the West, the totalizing success of mass-produced building materials and assemblies has led to a homogenization of interior space. This condition is exemplified by the pervasive use of drywall and acoustic ceiling tiles that have, since their widespread implementation in the 1950s, become ubiquitously unavoidable materials. These materials and assemblies constitute a type of contemporary vernacular that has resulted in spaces that are variable and yet indistinguishable from one another.
Implicated in the widespread use of standardized materials, assemblies and details raise questions of control, authorship and agency in architectural practice. Positioning these wall and ceiling assemblies in relation to their modernist origins and investigating their current implementation, this thesis aims to highlight the significance of drywall and drop ceilings using a series of installations that draw attention to the use and implications of this disregarded set of materials.


Online enterprise communities often have clear informational goals, for example, for experts to answer novices' factual questions. However, emotional support is also critical for developing online social relationships. But what is the optimal balance between informational and emotional communication for such communities? To address this, we develop and validate a model to assess the relative prevalence of emotional versus factual communication. We next test hypotheses about how this prevalence relates to community member satisfaction in enterprise communities. Overall, factual, not emotional, posts predict perceived member satisfaction. This relationship also depends on community subtype. Although prior work argues that Communities of Practice (CoPs) rely on frequent emotional communication, instead we found CoPs showed less satisfaction when members focused on emotional concerns. We discuss implications for both community tool design and the practices of community leaders.


Answering to the formidable challenge of climate change calls for a quick transition to a future economy with a drastic reduction in GHG emissions. And this in turn requires the development and massive deployment of new low-carbon energy technologies as soon as possible. Although many of these technologies have been identified, the critical issue is how to make them happen at the global level, possibly by integrating this effort into a global climate regime. This paper discusses the preferred approaches to foster low-carbon energy technologies from a regulatory point of view. Specific promotion policies for energy efficiency and conservation, renewable energy, carbon capture and sequestration, and nuclear power are examined, but the focus is on the regulatory instruments that will be needed for the deployment of enhancements to electricity grids and the associated control systems so that they are able to integrate intelligent demand response, distributed generation and storage in an efficient, reliable & environmentally responsible manner. The paper also comments on the interactions between technology and climate change policies and provides recommendations for policy makers.


Abstract We present two information leakage attacks that outperform previous work on membership inference against generative models. The first attack allows membership inference without assumptions on the type of the generative model. Contrary to previous evaluation metrics for generative models, like Kernel Density Estimation, it only considers samples of the model which are close to training data records. The second attack specifically targets Variational Autoencoders, achieving high membership inference accuracy. Furthermore, previous work mostly considers membership inference adversaries who perform single record membership inference. We argue for considering regulatory actors who perform set membership inference to identify the use of specific datasets for training. The attacks are evaluated on two generative model architectures, Generative Adversarial Networks (GANs) and Variational Autoen-coders (VAEs), trained on standard image datasets. Our results show that the two attacks yield success rates superior to previous work on most data sets while at the same time having only very mild assumptions. We envision the two attacks in combination with the membership inference attack type formalization as especially useful. For example, to enforce data privacy standards and automatically assessing model quality in machine learning as a service setups. In practice, our work motivates the use of GANs since they prove less vulnerable against information leakage attacks while producing detailed samples.


"Valuing Roles" gives you practical advice on how to determine employee worth, as well as how to structure and implement approaches that recognize it. This book highlights the benefits and risks of the different approaches your organization can use, putting job evaluation into perspective and demonstrating how it links to other people, pay-related processes, systems and policies, ensuring a transparent framework for talent management. Written by two highly experienced practitioners, Michael Armstrong and Ann Cummins, this book thoroughly examines the 'why' and 'how' behind the concept, giving you: advice and techniques to help you to measure the relative value of people; a practical methodology for ensuring fair and equitable outcomes at all levels in your organization; and, highly topical coverage of critical issues including equal pay and market pricing. Valuing Roles uses the latest research on this hugely important topic, including an analysis of a 2007 job evaluation survey carried out by e-reward. The theory is supported by a wide range of international case studies, as well as checklists, templates and flowcharts to help you determine the relative worth of jobs or individuals in your organization.


Background Exercise-based training is proposed to aid injury prevention through enhanced neuromuscular-control and muscle strength. Objective To assess the effects of exercise-based interventions on injury incidence in team sports. Design Systematic review. Setting 5 electronic databases were searched (12/01/13) returning 275 unique articles. Participants 23 randomised controlled trials (RCTs) involving 21,479 participants were included. Interventions Multifaceted exercise programmes were tested against controls (normal practice) in 12 studies, 7 studies used a balance board, 3 studies targeted hamstring strength and 1 study examined eccentric training of the Achilles and patellar tendons. Main outcome measurements RCTs reporting overall or lower-limb injury incidence were included. Methodological quality of each trial was assessed using a tool developed by the Cochrane Bone, Joint and Muscle Trauma group (Goldman and Jones 2010). Meta-analysis was performed on homogenous studies using RevMan 5.1 software. Risk ratios (RR) and 95% confidence intervals (95% CI) were calculated using the Mantel-Haenszel method in a random effects model. Results Pooled-analysis of multifaceted exercise programmes demonstrated a reduction in overall (RR=0.65, 95% CI=0.44–0.96, P=.03), knee (RR=0.79, 95% CI=0.63–0.99, P=.04), ACL (RR=0.51, 95% CI=0.28–0.93, P=.03) and ankle injury risk (RR=0.72, 95% CI=0.58–0.90, P=.003). Balance board interventions were shown to reduce hamstring (RR=0.22, 95% CI=0.05–1.02, P=.05) and ankle injury (RR=0.64, 95% CI=0.49–0.83, P=.001). Hamstring muscle training had no significant effect (RR=0.46, 95% CI=0.19–1.11, P=.09). Eccentric training of the Achilles and patellar tendons demonstrated an increased injury risk (RR=2.5, 95% CI=1.35- 4.61, P=.003). Conclusions Exercise-based interventions can reduce injury risk in team sports. Strategies are required to translate this evidence into practice.


Humans have occupied Sahul for at least 65,000 years; until 9,000 years ago Australia and New Guinea were one continent. Apart from the Austronesian arrival around New Guinea's coasts 3,200 bp, there is no evidence of linguistic immigration into Australia or New Guinea. It is therefore surprising that they form two distinct phonological realms rather than sharing some similarities across this relatively recent human boundary. I survey the principal characteristics of both Australia and New Guinea, then make this more concrete by focussing on languages of Southern New Guinea, close to Australia. Although modern languages from this region differ strikingly from Australian languages in their region, reconstruction of their ancestral sound-systems by the comparative method suggests this has not always been the case, suggesting earlier similarities spanning the Torres Strait have gradually been erased as these languages converged in their phonological systems with other Papuan languages to their north.


Abstract Climate change and species invasions represent key threats to global biodiversity. Subarctic freshwaters are sentinels for understanding both stressors because the effects of climate change are disproportionately strong at high latitudes and invasion of temperate species is prevalent. Here, we summarize the environmental effects of climate change and illustrate the ecological responses of freshwater fishes to these effects, spanning individual, population, community and ecosystem levels. Climate change is modifying hydrological cycles across atmospheric, terrestrial and aquatic components of subarctic ecosystems, causing increases in ambient water temperature and nutrient availability. These changes affect the individual behavior, habitat use, growth and metabolism, alter population spawning and recruitment dynamics, leading to changes in species abundance and distribution, modify food web structure, trophic interactions and energy flow within communities and change the sources, quantity and quality of energy and nutrients in ecosystems. Increases in temperature and its variability in aquatic environments underpin many ecological responses; however, altered hydrological regimes, increasing nutrient inputs and shortened ice cover are also important drivers of climate change effects and likely contribute to context‐dependent responses. Species invasions are a complex aspect of the ecology of climate change because the phenomena of invasion are both an effect and a driver of the ecological consequences of climate change. Using subarctic freshwaters as an example, we illustrate how climate change can alter three distinct aspects of species invasions: (1) the vulnerability of ecosystems to be invaded, (2) the potential for species to spread and invade new habitats, and (3) the subsequent ecological effects of invaders. We identify three fundamental knowledge gaps focused on the need to determine (1) how environmental and landscape characteristics influence the ecological impact of climate change, (2) the separate and combined effects of climate and non‐native invading species and (3) the underlying ecological processes or mechanisms responsible for changes in patterns of biodiversity.


Purpose: In academic plastic surgery, there is a paucity of data examining the relationship between program rank, faculty training history, and production of academic program graduates. The purpose of this study is to determine objective faculty characteristics that are associated with a high program reputation. Methods: Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education-accredited integrated Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery (PRS) programs were ranked using Doximity and divided into Top-quartile programs and Other programs. Accredited medical schools were ranked using U.S. News and World Report. Individual faculty profiles were reviewed on program websites for information on prior training. Results: Seventy-nine programs with 712 faculty were identified and objectively analyzed. Compared to Other PRS programs, Top-quartile programs had a higher proportion of faculty that trained at Top-quartile residency programs (P < 0.0001) and Top-quartile medical schools (P < 0.0001). Top-quartile programs also had the highest proportion of faculty that trained at the same institution for fellowship (P = 0.0001), residency (P = 0.03), medical school (P = 0.4), or any prior training (medical school, residency, or fellowship) (P = 0.002). Top-quartile programs were associated with the largest total faculty size (P < 0.0001) and the largest number of graduates entering the field of academic plastic surgery (P < 0.0001). Conclusions: Program reputation is associated with PRS faculty selection and production. Top-ranked programs are more likely to have faculty that previously trained at the same institution or at top-ranked programs. Top-ranked programs are more likely to graduate residents that will become academic plastic surgeons.


SUMMARY

Motivated by a recent resurgence in earthquake predictability research, we present a method for testing alarm-based earthquake predictions. The testing method is based on the Molchan diagram—a plot of miss rate and fraction of space–time occupied by alarm—and is applicable to a wide class of predictions, including probabilistic earthquake forecasts varying in space, time, and magnitude. A single alarm can be simply tested using the cumulative binomial distribution. Here we consider the more interesting case of a function from which a continuum of well-ordered alarms can be derived. For such an 'alarm function' we construct a cumulative performance measure, the area skill score, based on the normalized area above a trajectory on the Molchan diagram. A score of unity indicates perfect skill, a score of zero indicates perfect non-skill, and the expected score for a random alarm function is 1/2. The area skill score quantifies the performance of an arbitrary alarm function relative to a reference model. To illustrate the testing method, we consider the 10-yr experiment by J. Rundle and others to predict M≥ 5 earthquakes in California. We test forecasts from three models: relative intensity (RI), a simple spatial clustering model constructed using only smoothed historical seismicity; pattern informatics (PI), a model that aims to capture seismicity dynamics by pattern recognition; and the U. S. Geological Survey National Seismic Hazard Map (NSHM), a model that comprises smoothed historical seismicity, zones of 'background' seismicity, and explicit fault information. Results show that neither PI nor NSHM provide significant performance gain relative to the RI reference model. We suggest that our testing method can be used to evaluate future experiments in the Collaboratory for the Study of Earthquake Predictability and to iteratively improve reference models for earthquake prediction hypothesis testing.


Vibrationally induced configurational change and nonlinear current-voltage (I-V) characteristics are investigated within the scanning tunneling microscope (STM) junction, including hydroxyl dimers on a Cu(110) surface. H-bonded hydroxyl dimers composed of OH and/or OD have a unique inclined geometry that can be switched back and forth by vibrational excitations via the inelastic electron tunneling process of the STM. The relative occupation change between the high-and low-conductance states as a function of bias voltage critically depends on the isotopic compositions, and thus the I-V characteristics can be modified to exhibit negative differential resistance by H/D substitution. The experimental results of the occupation change and I-V curves are nicely reproduced using a recently proposed analytical model combined with comprehensive density functional calculations for the input parameters (vibrational modes and their emission rates by tunneling electrons, conductance, and relative occupation change of high-and low-conductance states), and they underlines the different roles played by the free and shared O-H(D) stretch modes of the hydroxyl dimers on a Cu(110) surface.


Photoshop: Top 100 Simplified Tips & Tricks provides adventurous Photoshop users with a visual reference on how to use the bells and whistles found in the latest version of Photoshop. Broken out in 10 chapters, with 10 tasks per chapter, Photoshop: Top 100 Simplified Tips & Tricks covers 100 cool and useful tips and tricks that can be performed in the newest release of Photoshop. Full-color screen shots and numbered, step-by-step instructions show you how to take their Photoshop skills to new heights. Order the latest edition today and make your pictures pop.


Someoneis housing career can be described as climbing up a ladder. You start at the bottom when you rent a room and end with buying your dream house. In between you take the steps of renting a dwelling and buying several dwellings. In The Netherlands, the housing career ladder worked until the late nineties. Since the nineties housing prices of owner-occupied dwellings increased much more than the incomes. Thus making it more diificult for households to buy a dwelling. This created missing steps in the housing career ladder, which resulted in stopping people from moving up the ladder. To enable people to walk up the ladder again, several ideas were presented for creating extra steps in the ladder by the government and housing associations. One of the most famous constructions is that housing associations give a discount on the selling price of their dwellings and share the profit with the owner when the dwelling is sold again. In most cases the dwellings are sold back to the housing associations and then sold again to somebody else. This enables households with lower incomes to buy a dwelling. Besides providing owner-occupied dwellings for households with lower incomes, housing associations also hope that the livability of the neighbourhoods were these houses are situated is going the be improved. Which is also good to increase the added value on the dwelling for the buyer; dwellings in better neighbourhoods are sold for a higher price. The question is if this construction is actually used as an extra step in the housing career ladder. Thus is it used by households at the beginning of the housing career ladder who have lower incomes? And when they sell the dwelling are they moving up the ladder, thus buying a more expensive dwelling? And does the livability of the neighbourhood actually improve? This paper will answer these questions. First, several of these selling constructions will be discussed. After that it will be examined if the households actually use this construction to climb up the housing career ladder. For this part, a large recurring survey among households who use one type of this construction will be used. Then it will be examined if the livability of neighbourhoods increased since the constructions are introduced. To examine this, a large livability survey among households living in these neighbourhoods is used. The paper ends with some concluding remarks.


Abstract Sensitivity and uncertainty analysis is becoming increasingly widespread in many fields of engineering and sciences, encompassing practically all of the experimental data-processing activities and many computational modeling and process simulation activities. There are many methods, based either on deterministic or statistical concepts, for performing sensitivity and uncertainty analysis. However, a precise, unified terminology across all methods does not seem to exist, yet often, identical words (e.g., "sensitivity") may not necessarily describe identical quantities, particularly when stemming from conceptually distinct (statistical versus deterministic) methods. Furthermore, the relative strengths and weaknesses of the various methods do not seem to have been reviewed comparatively in the literature published thus far. This paper is the first part of a comparative review, written in two parts, that focuses on the salient features of the statistical and deterministic methods currently used for local and global sensitivity and uncertainty analysis of both large-scale computational models and indirect experimental measurements. Deterministic methods are analyzed in Part I, while statistical methods are highlighted in Part II. Part I of this review commences by highlighting the deterministic methods for computing local sensitivities, namely, the so-called Brute-Force Method (based on recalculations), the Direct Method (including the Decoupled Direct Method), the Green's Function Method, the Forward Sensitivity Analysis Procedure (FSAP), and the Adjoint Sensitivity Analysis Procedure (ASAP). Except for the Brute-Force Method, it is emphasized that local sensitivities can be computed exactly and exhaustively only by using deterministic methods. Furthermore, it is noted that the Direct Method and the FSAP require at least as many model evaluations as there are parameters, while the ASAP requires a single model evaluation of an appropriate adjoint model whose source term is related to the response under investigation. If this adjoint model is developed simultaneously with the original model, then the adjoint model requires relatively modest additional resources to develop and implement. If, however, the adjoint model is constructed a posteriori, considerable skills may be required for its successful development and implementation. Nevertheless, the ASAP is the most efficient method to use for computing local sensitivities of large-scale systems, where the number of parameters, and parameter variations, exceeds the number of responses of interest. The Global ASAP (GASAP) is also highlighted as it appears to be the only deterministic method published thus far for performing genuinely global analysis of nonlinear systems. The GASAP uses both the forward and the adjoint sensitivity systems to explore, exhaustively and efficiently, the entire phase-space of system parameters and dependent variables in order to obtain complete information about the important global features of the physical system, namely, the critical points of the response and the bifurcation branches and/or turning points of the system's state variables.


We discuss an emerging program of research on a particular aspect of mathematics learning, students' learning through their own mathematical activity as they engage in particular mathematical tasks. Prior research in mathematics education has characterized learning trajectories of students by specifying a series of conceptual steps through which students pass in the context of particular instructional approaches or learning environments. Generally missing from the literature is research that examines the process by which students progress from one of these conceptual steps to a subsequent one. We provide a conceptualization of a program of research designed to elucidate students' learning processes and describe an emerging methodology for this work. We present data and analysis from an initial teaching experiment that illustrates the methodology and demonstrates the learning that can be fostered using the approach, the data that can be generated, and the analyses that can be done. The approach involves the use of a carefully designed sequence of mathematical tasks intended to promote particular activity that is expected to result in a new concept. Through analysis of students' activity in the context of the task sequence, accounts of students' learning processes are developed. Ultimately a large set of such accounts would allow for a cross-account analysis aimed at articulating mechanisms of learning.


Rice is one of the major crops in Malaysia. It has been a staple food of the
Malaysian community for many decades. Continued growth of Malaysian
population put additional pressure on local rice production to meet the
demand of the consumption. Rice grain filling is a critical factor that directly
affects the local rice production. This preliminary study was carried out to
identify genes that are putatively involved in the grain filling of rice by using
cDNA subtraction. Four subtracted cDNA libraries were constructed from
three different pools of RNA (samples A, B and C) during the reproductive
and ripening phase of rice. A total of 2366 clones were obtained from these
four subtracted cDNA libraries and 384 clones were sequenced. In sample A
(panicle initiation), most of the sequenced cDNA were putatively involved in
cell wall structure and metabolism (38 %) e.g. pollen allergen (subtraction 1).
The number of putative genes involved in metabolism (9 %) and storage
protein (3 %) was low in this library (subtraction 1). The genes that were
differentially expressed in heading to milk stage (sample B) were mainly involved in metabolism (28 %, subtraction 3). Most of the genes that were
differentially expressed in sample C (milk stage to maturation) were putative
storage proteins (61 %) e.g. glutelins and prolamins, and the genes that were
putatively involved in metabolism (10 %) decreased compared to subtraction
3. This reflected that metabolic activities in panicles significantly reduced and
most of the activities in grain were involved in reserving food towards the end
of the grain filling. To understand the grain filling process during rice growth
stages, ADP-glucose pyrophosphorylase which is the rate-limiting enzyme in
starch biosynthesis was studied. The cDNA for the 3' region of ADP-glucose
pyrophosphorylase small subunit (Adp3'-2) (which showed 97 % identity to
ADP-glucose pyrophosphorylase small subunit from japonica cultivar) was
isolated. It was preferentially expressed in milk and dough stage of grain
development. Southern analysis showed that Adp3'-2 may be a single copy
gene in the rice genome. In addition, bZIP protein which has a regulatory role
in several plant developmental processes including seed storage has also
been cloned. The cDNA for the 3' region of bZIP protein was also isolated.
No signal was detected in Northern analysis attributed to its low expression in
panicle, and the Southern analysis also suggested that 3' Reb-2 may be a
single copy gene in the rice genome


A three-dimnensional vision system for on-line operation that aids a collision avoidance system for an industrial robot is developed. Because of the real-time requirement, the process that locates and describes the obstacles must be fast. To satisfy the safety requirement, the obstacle model should always contain the physical obstacle entirely. This condition leads to the bounding box description of the obstacle, which is simple for the computer to process. The image processing is performed by a Machine Intelligence Corporation VS-100 machine vision system. The control and object perception is performed by the developed software on a host Digital Equipment Corporation VAX 11/780 Computer. The resultant system outputs a file of the locations and bounding descriptions for each object found. When the system is properly calibrated, the bounding descriptions always completely envelop the obstacle. The response time is data-dependent. When using two cameras and processed on UNIX time sharing mode, the average response time will be less than 2 s if eight or fewer objects are present. When using all three cameras, the average response time will be less than 4 s if eight or fewer objects are present.


On December 26, 2004, a massive tsunami triggered by an underwater earthquake pummeled the coasts of Thailand, Indonesia, Sri Lanka, and other countries along the Indian Ocean. With casualties as far away as Africa, the aftermath was overwhelming: ships could be spotted miles inland; cars floated in the ocean; legions of the unidentified dead-an estimated 225,000-were buried in mass graves; relief organizations struggled to reach rural areas and provide adequate aid for survivors. Shortly after this disaster, researchers from around the world traveled to the region's most devastated areas, observing and documenting the tsunami's impact. The Indian Ocean Tsunami: The Global Response to a Natural Disaster offers the first analysis of the response and recovery effort. Editors Pradyumna P. Karan and S. Subbiah, employing an interdisciplinary approach, have assembled an international team of top geographers, geologists, anthropologists, and political scientists to study the environmental, economic, and political effects of the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami. The volume includes chapters that address the tsunami's geo-environmental impact on coastal ecosystems and groundwater systems. Other chapters offer sociocultural perspectives on religious power relations in South India and suggest ways to improve government agencies' response systems for natural disasters. A clear and definitive analysis of the second deadliest natural disaster on record, The Indian Ocean Tsunami will be of interest to environmentalists and political scientists alike, as well as to planners and administrators of disaster-preparedness programs.


In a global context of widespread fears over Islamic radicalisation and militancy, poor Muslim youth, especially those socialised in religious seminaries, have attracted overwhelmingly negative attention. In northern Nigeria, male Qur'anic students have garnered a reputation of resorting to violence in order to claim their share of highly unequally distributed resources. Drawing on material from long-term ethnographic and participatory fieldwork among Qur'anic students and their communities, this book offers an alternative perspective on youth, faith, and poverty. Mobilising insights from scholarship on education, poverty research and childhood and youth studies, Hannah Hoechner describes how religious discourses can moderate feelings of inadequacy triggered by experiences of exclusion, and how Qur'anic school enrolment offers a way forward in constrained circumstances, even though it likely reproduces poverty in the long run. A pioneering study of religious school students conducted through participatory methods, this book presents vital insights into the concerns of this much-vilified group.


This study examines the ways in which state policies recognize, accommodate and legitimize immigrant cultures, and analyzes the extent to which state accommodation leads to acceptance and tolerance toward immigrants. The study brings together social psychological and institutionalist perspectives, and argues that state recognition and accommodation of immigrant cultures normalize new practices and traditions by making them a part of the country's cultural landscape. This state-led process blurs group lines, and reduces the likelihood of prejudice against immigrants. In contrast, when a state ignores or actively excludes an immigrant culture, it frames those associated with it as outsiders or lesser-citizens, and makes tolerance toward them less likely. To test that hypothesis, the study focuses on the Muslim immigrants in Western Europe, since their case involves a salient (real or perceived) cultural distance to the host societies. The study employs a mixed-methods research. It first examines the Belgian, British and German cases, and traces the process from state accommodation to tolerance with a special focus on the legitimization of cultural elements by state recognition. Then, it conducts a systematic analysis that covers nineteen countries in Western Europe. Individual-level data for the analysis come from the fourth wave of the European Values Study. On the country-level, the study builds what it calls the Accommodation of Islam (AOI) index to measure the extent to which Western European countries accommodate Islam in a variety of realms. Then, it specifies a multilevel regression model that controls for all major alternative explanations. On the individual level, the findings reveal multiple dimensions of religiosity that have divergent influences on anti-Muslim prejudice. On the country level, they indicate that the individuals in countries that do not accommodate Islam are more likely to be prejudiced against Muslims.


Writers and readers of literature are, among other things, biological en tities that evolve under particular political (geographical/historical) conditions. A comparative study of certain texts by Martin Heidegger (1889–1976) can help us establish a fruitful interpretation of this threefold link between literary art, biology and politics. However, careful analysis reveals that Heidegger remains too rooted in an old-world, nationalistic and anthropocentric paradigm. We will attempt to rethink Heidegger's assumptions on the grounds that literature, a cultural practice, enables us to delineate our natural environment. By reformulating Heidegger's line of thought, we can more precisely address the plural structure of our biotic and political-literary experiences.


The National Clinical Database (NCD) of Japan started its registration in 2011 and over 9 000 000 cases from more than 5000 facilities were registered over a 6‐year period. This is the report of NCD based upon gastrointestinal surgery information in excess of 3 200 000 cases from 2011 to 2016 adding data of complications. About 70% of all gastrointestinal surgeries were carried out at certified institutions, and the percentage of surgeries done at certified institutions was particularly high for the esophagus (92.4% in 2016), liver (88.4%), pancreas (89.8%), and spleen (86.8%). The percentage of anesthesiologist participation was more than 90% for almost all organs, except 85.7% for the rectum and anus. Approximately, more than two‐thirds of the surgeries were carried out with the participation of a board‐certified surgeon. Although patients have been getting older, mortalities have not been increasing. There were differences in the incidence of complications according to organ site and procedure. Remarkably, mortality rates of low anterior resection were very low, and those of hepatectomy and acute diffuse peritonitis surgery have been gradually decreasing. Although the complication rates were gradually increasing for esophagectomy or pancreaticoduodenectomy, the mortality rates for these procedures were decreasing. Nationwide, this database is expected to ensure the quality of the board‐certification system and surgical outcomes in gastroenterological surgery.


Increased nitrogen use efficiency, NUE, in crop plant production is the main challenge for agriculture in this century. Any success in this objective achievement requires to take into account not only phosphorus and potassium but also secondary nutrients, such as magnesium and sulfur, at least. In order to check this hypothesis a series of annual field experiments were conducted in 2005, 2006, 2007 and 2006, testing in the four course rotation response of following crops: maize  spring barley  winter oil-seed rape  winter wheat to increasing level of nitrogen nutritional balance imposed by set of treatments comprised potassium and magnesium. The obtained results clearly indicated on maize as the most productive crop, irrespective of the imposed fertilizing system. The highest yields of the tested crops were harvested on plots fertilized with NPK and Kieserite, provide that potassium was applied as Korn-Kali. Effects of the imposed systems of fertilizer N balancing have been assessed by means of two NUE indices, such as: (i) partial factor productivity of fertilizer nitrogen (PFPN) and agronomic net efficiency of fertilizer nitrogen (AEN). Both indices were useful in making a reliable evaluation of tested treatments, but the AEN was more conspicuous as a NUE index. The most pronounced effect of the applied nutrients on yield development was through improvement of kernel/grain number per plant. This fact indirectly stresses on the importance of the period extending from the stage of ear growth to the stage of kernel/grain growth as decisive for final grain yield establishment. The net balance of plant available potassium and phosphorus showed that their net surplus with respect to yield response was negative, in turn indicating on magnesium as a nutrient required to reach nutritional balance of N, P, K in high-yielding crops.


Fiber-reinforced synthetic polymers (FRP) are the building materials that may permit both the improvement of long-term building performance and the simplification of the construction process. Thanks to their high specific strength, low thermal conductivity, good environmental resistance, and their ability to be formed into complex shapes, FRP materials are well-suited to fulfilling many building functions. By integrating traditionally separate building systems and layers into single function-integrated components and industrially fabricating those components, the amount of on-site labor can be greatly reduced and overall quality can be improved. In order to profit from the advantageous qualities of FRP, however, it is essential to address the unique weaknesses and disadvantages of the material. Most notably, the problems of poor fire safety and high material costs must be overcome. In response to these challenges, a new multiple-story building system employing FRP materials is proposed. Within this system, fire safety is ensured through the use of an internal liquid cooling system, which circulates a cooling medium through the load-bearing FRP elements to maintain their temperature within a safe operating range. This system is made cost-effective through the integration of the building's heating and cooling system. By controlling the temperature of the circulating liquid, the building's structural elements can serve as heating or cooling emitters (radiators). Further, the addition of the liquid within the cells of the FRP elements helps maintain a more constant interior climate through the "thermal flywheel" effect, which improves energy efficiency and comfort. Experimental investigations were performed to explore the fire safety aspects of the proposed system. An existing FRP cellular bridge deck material was adapted to incorporate an internal liquid cooling system. After several preliminary investigations, large-scale experiments involving structural and fire loading were conducted on both liquid-cooled and non-liquid cooled specimens. The experiments demonstrated the efficacy of the system in protecting load-bearing FRP elements from the weakening effects of high temperatures, especially those that are stressed in compression. Structural fire endurance times were improved from less than one hour to more than two hours (EC1 Part 1.2) through the implementation of the liquid cooling system. Alongside the experimental program, a series of mathematical models were developed. Numerical thermochemical and thermomechanical models simulate the response of loaded liquid-cooled FRP panels in fire, while analytical models predict the post-fire mechanical behavior of fire-damaged sections. All models provide predictions that are within 10% of experimentally measured values.


Abstract. Transport and reactivity of carbon in the critical zone are highly controlled by reactions of dissolved organic matter (DOM) with subsurface soils, including adsorption, transformation and exchange. These reactions are dependent on frequent wet–dry cycles common to the unsaturated zone, particularly in semi-arid regions. To test for an effect of wet–dry cycles on DOM interaction and stabilization in subsoils, samples were collected from subsurface (Bw) horizons of an Entisol and an Alfisol from the Catalina-Jemez Critical Zone Observatory and sequentially reacted (four batch steps) with DOM extracted from the corresponding soil litter layers. Between each reaction step, soils either were allowed to air dry ( wet–dry treatment) before introduction of the following DOM solution or were maintained under constant wetness ( continually wet treatment). Microbial degradation was the dominant mechanism of DOM loss from solution for the Entisol subsoil, which had higher initial organic C content, whereas sorptive retention predominated in the lower C Alfisol subsoil. For a given soil, bulk dissolved organic C losses from solution were similar across treatments. However, a combination of Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) and near-edge X-ray absorption fine structure (NEXAFS) spectroscopic analyses revealed that wet–dry treatments enhanced the interactions between carboxyl functional groups and soil particle surfaces. Scanning transmission X-ray microscopy (STXM) data suggested that cation bridging by Ca2+ was the primary mechanism for carboxyl association with soil surfaces. STXM data also showed that spatial fractionation of adsorbed OM on soil organo-mineral surfaces was diminished relative to what might be inferred from previously published observations pertaining to DOM fractionation on reaction with specimen mineral phases. This study provides direct evidence of the role of wet–dry cycles in affecting sorption reactions of DOM to a complex soil matrix. In the soil environment, where wet–dry cycles occur at different frequencies from site to site and along the soil profile, different interactions between DOM and soil surfaces are expected and need to be considered for the overall assessment of carbon dynamics.


No•ice in this bibliography does not preclude a later review; •rBR following an entry indicates a review already in preparation. See also Canadiana, a monthly list of Canadian publications prepared by the National Library, Ottawa; International Perspectives, published bi-monthly by the Department of External Affairs; Journal of the Parliaments of the Commonwealth, issued quarterly by the General Council of the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association; and, in the University of Toronto Quarterly, 'Letters in Canada,' published in the July issue. Sections of the bibliography omitted from this issue for reasons of space will be included in later issues.


Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) processing is one of the key procedures in popular Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) communication systems. Structured pipeline architectures, low power consumption, high speed and reduced chip area are the main concerns in this VLSI implementation. In this paper, the efficient implementation of FFT/IFFT processor for OFDM applications is presented. The processor can be used in various OFDM-based communication systems, such as worldwide interoperability for Microwave access (Wi-Max), Digital Audio Broadcasting (DAB), Digital Video Broadcasting-Terrestrial (DVBT). We adopt single-path delay feedback architecture. To eliminate the Read Only Memories (ROM's) used to store the twiddle factors, this proposed architecture applies a reconfigurable complex multiplier to achieve a ROM-less FFT/IFFT processor and to reduce the truncation error we adopt the fixed width modified booth multiplier. The three Processing Elements (PE's), Delay-Line (DL) buffers are used for computing IFFT. Thus we consume the low power, lower hardware cost, and high efficiency and reduced chip size.


Despite increasingly stringent clinical practice guidelines for glycaemic control, the implementation of recommendations has been disappointing, with over 60% of patients not reaching recommended glycaemic goals. As a result, current management of glycaemia falls significantly short of accepted treatment goals. The Global Partnership for Effective Diabetes Management has identified a number of major barriers that can prevent individuals from achieving their glycaemic targets. This article proposes 10 key practical recommendations to aid healthcare providers in overcoming these barriers and to enable a greater proportion of patients to achieve glycaemic goals. These include advice on targeting the underlying pathophysiology of type 2 diabetes, treating early and effectively with combination therapies, adopting a holistic, multidisciplinary approach and improving patient understanding of type 2 diabetes. Implementation of these recommendations should reduce the risk of diabetes-related complications, improve patient quality of life and impact more effectively on the increasing healthcare cost related to diabetes.


Abstract : The explosive shock created by the underwater explosion of a mine or torpedo in close proximity to a surface ship can severely threaten the combat capability and survivability of the ship. MEL-S-901D specifics the shock test procedures and acceptance criteria for all shipboard systems that must resist high impact mechanical shock. While the U.S. Navy's Medium-weight Shock Machine with its standard equipment mounting fixture can subject a combat systems component to more severe shock excitations than experienced in actual ship shock trials, it cannot simulate the lower frequency excitations typically transmitted through a ship's superstructure during shock trials that expose equipment to catastrophic resonant vibration. This study is an experimental investigation into the dynamic response of the recently built Two Degree-of-Freedom (2DOF) tuned Deck Simulator (TDS) for the Medium-weight Shock Machine (MWSM) to evaluate its potential role in the pre-acceptance shock qualification of new shipboard combat systems equipment. Upon completion of final characterization testing, the 2DOF-TDS could be integrated into the medium-weight shock qualification procedures of MIL-S-901D. This improvement could significantly enhance the capacity of a warship to absorb damage and still maintain its mission integrity


Surveys of mandatory parent education in the USA
(M J Geasler and K R Blaisure, 'A review of divorce education programme materials' (1998) 47 Family Relations 167–175; M J Geasler and K R Blaisure, '1998 Nationwide survey of court-connected divorce education programmes' (1999) 37 Family and Conciliation Courts Review 36–63; S L Pollet and M Lombreglia, 'A nationwide survey of mandatory parent education' (2008) 46(2) Family Court Review 375–394) have demonstrated the positive impact of well-designed, evidence-based programmes on children and families. Divorce education programmes for parents are now required in many jurisdictions in 46 states in the USA (Pollet and Lombreglia, above) and in several English-speaking countries around the world (K Blaisure, Divorce intervention and prevention: Comparison of policy initiatives in England/Wales and the US (The Foreign and Commonwealth Office, 2003)). Although programmes are provided in many places, very few of them have a strong, positive, evidence base that would encourage their application in locations where either no programme exists or existing programmes have not been demonstrated to be effective.


Background Negative symptoms observed in patients with psychotic disorders undermine quality of life and functioning. Antipsychotic medications have a limited impact. Psychological and psychosocial interventions, with medication, are recommended. However, evidence for the effectiveness of specific non-biological interventions warrants detailed examination. Aims To conduct a meta-analytic and systematic review of the literature on the effectiveness of non-biological treatments for negative symptoms in psychotic disorders. Method We searched for randomised controlled studies of psychological and psychosocial interventions in psychotic disorders that reported outcome on negative symptoms. Standardised mean differences (SMDs) in values of negative symptoms at the end of treatment were calculated across study domains as the main outcome measure. Results A total of 95 studies met our criteria and 72 had complete quantitative data. Compared with treatment as usual cognitive–behavioural therapy (pooled SMD −0.34, 95% CI −0.55 to −0.12), skills-based training (pooled SMD −0.44, 95% CI −0.77 to −0.10), exercise (pooled SMD −0.36, 95% CI −0.71 to −0.01), and music treatments (pooled SMD −0.58, 95% CI −0.82 to −0.33) provide significant benefit. Integrated treatment models are effective for early psychosis (SMD −0.38, 95% CI −0.53 to −0.22) as long as the patients remain in treatment. Overall quality of evidence was moderate with a high level of heterogeneity. Conclusions Specific psychological and psychosocial interventions have utility in ameliorating negative symptoms in psychosis and should be included in the treatment of negative symptoms. However, more effective treatments for negative symptoms need to be developed.


We investigate the small-particle phonon-polariton response of several microstructures that are made of silicon carbide (SiC). Phonon polaritons can be excited in a wavelength region between 10 and 12 µm. Simple structures such as elliptical cylinders support phonon polaritons at two wavelengths, which depend on the axis ratio of the particle. In particles with a more irregular shape such as rectangular or triangular cylinders, up to five phonon polaritons can be excited. Through comparison of the strength of phonon-polariton excitation with the similar effect of the plasmon-polariton excitation in metallic nanoparticles, it is found that the excitation of phonon polaritons is more efficient. This behavior is attributed to the lower imaginary part of the dielectric constant of SiC.


This article is a partial report about quantitative research on the role of the Negative Existential Position in Authoritarian Personality formation (reported on elsewhere) and acculturation features among immigrants with authoritarian backgrounds in a democratic milieu (Germany). Data were collected among respondents of different backgrounds: immigrants in Germany from Turkey, the former Soviet Union and Western countries, and native Germans as a quasi-control group (N=1318), with each subsample encompassing at least 200 respondents. Various statistical analyses were performed in order to validate the empirical outcomes (from correlation analysis to structural equation modelling). The hypothesis that a Negative Existential Position is more articulated among individuals who were exposed to an authoritarian socialization was confirmed. The hypothesis that a Negative Existential Position serves as a predictor for the so called Acculturation Dysfunction was confirmed as well. The conceptual analogy between Existential Positions and Styles of Acculturation was examined and the hypothesis that four possible styles of acculturation (Berry et al., 1987, Berry & Kim, 1988; Berry et al., 1989) are correlated with correspondent Existential Position found support.


Over the last couple of years, research related to fossil free and emission free construction sites has developed rapidly in Norway, with an ambition to contribute towards global, national and regional emission reduction targets. Major public players are already demanding fossil free construction sites through public procurement, whilst requirements for emission free construction sites are on the way. Even though the Norwegian construction industry is a forerunner, there is a lack of knowledge or common understanding among different stakeholders on the definition, scope and strategies needed for fossil free and emission free construction sites. The aim of this paper is to present the main challenges and opportunities from the construction phase of two Norwegian zero emission construction sites, namely Campus Evenstad in Hedmark and Lia nursery school in Oslo. Construction activities considered include transportation and installation of building materials, construction machinery, temporary works, energy use, waste management and person transport. This paper presents and discusses the lessons learnt from the design, ambition levels, inputs from stakeholders, emission reduction solutions of these two construction sites, and evaluates methods considered to address conceptual and practical issues. In conclusion, this paper suggests lessons learnt for reducing GHG emissions from Norwegian zero emission construction sites.


We examine the stability of laminar high-Reynolds-number flow through an asymmetric flexible-walled channel driven by a fixed upstream flux and subject to a (large) uniform external pressure. We construct a long-wavelength, spatially one-dimensional model using a flow profile assumption, modelling the flexible wall as a thin tensioned membrane subject to a large axial pre-stress. We numerically construct the non-uniform static shape of the flexible wall and consider its stability using both a global eigensolver and numerical simulation of the nonlinear governing equations. The system admits multiple static solutions, including a highly collapsed steady state where the membrane has a single constriction which increases with increasing external pressure. We demonstrate that the non-uniform static state is unstable to two distinct (infinite) families of normal modes which we characterise in the limit of large external pressure. In particular, there is a family of low-frequency oscillatory modes which each persist to low membrane tensions, where the most unstable mode has an oscillating membrane profile which is outwardly bulged at the centre of the domain with a narrow constriction at the downstream end. In addition, there is a family of high-frequency oscillatory modes which are each unstable beyond a critical value of the tension within a two-branch neutral curve. Unstable modes along the lower branch of the neutral curve are sustained by a leading-order balance between unsteady inertia and the restoring force of membrane tension along the channel. In addition, we elucidate the mechanism of energy transfer to sustain the self-excited oscillations: oscillations decrease the mean maximal constriction of the channel over a period, which reduces the overall dissipation of the mean flow and releases energy to sustain the instability. Fully nonlinear simulations indicate that as the Reynolds number increases these unstable normal modes can grow supercritically into sustained large-amplitude 'slamming' oscillations, where the membrane is periodically drawn very close to the opposite rigid wall before recovering.


The successful applications of nuclear technology in areas as diverse as research, healthcare, nondestructive examinations, agriculture and electrical power generation are all dependent on the expert human resources available to the country or region utilising this technology. The expertise needed to understand and safely employ nuclear energy includes skilled craftsmen, operators, technicians and technologists, engineers and scientists, managers and executives. Nuclear technology is complex, has unique safety and resource requirements, and represents a significant financial investment. To embark on a nuclear power programme and to successfully manage it, the governing bodies of the locality where the nuclear installation is to be located, as well as the country's government, must be active supporters of the related facilities. Furthermore, the country's government must put in place a regulatory system that is independent of the designers, owners and operators of the nuclear facilities, as well as systems that meet such international agreements as the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. The paper reviews Canadian and other international experience in providing the education and training needed for a country or region to successfully initiate and maintain the expert human resources complement in order to benefit from the peaceful uses of nuclear technology.


As the digitalisation of the economy progresses, one of the changes in business models affecting statistics including GDP and trade data is the adoption of cloud computing services in place of fixed investment in computer and communications hardware and the development of own-account software. This rapidly growing phenomenon involves the detachment of the physical location of data and computing processes from their creation, ownership and use, potentially introducing transactions across national borders. In this paper, we construct price indices for cloud services in the UK, showing significant price declines both before and after adjusting for quality in the past few years. We discuss the conceptualisation of a volume measure for cloud services. We discuss the implications of cloud use by businesses for the interpretation of measured business investment, GDP and productivity growth, noting in particular the limitations of measuring total factor productivity through growth accounting, and the importance of double deflation when there are significant changes in the price of intermediate goods such as cloud services. We discuss also the implications for the interpretation of international trade statistics. Finally, we set out the requirements for official statistical surveys to be able to track cloud computing in the future.


One of Egypt's best known geologists, Rushdi Said was, under President Gamal Abd al-Nasser, an important official and head of the national mining organization, which was responsible for surveying the Egyptian deserts for mineral deposits. This personal memoir throws fascinating light not only on the geological surveys and mining projects of the time but on Nasser's policy of industrialization - of which Said was an enthusiastic supporter - and the effect on that industrialization of President Sadat's Open Door Policy, which Said sees as a direct out-growth of the acute financial crisis brought on by the 1973 October War. Said is critical of Sadat's decision to prioritize tourism and the service industries at the expense of manufacturing industry, and relates how this, together with increasing corruption from the mid-1970s onward, forced him to resign. The culmination of the crisis came in 1981, when, just weeks before his assassination, Sadat ordered the arrest of Said and some 1,500 other public, religious, and political figures. As a man trusted and respected by Nasser, Said is in a privileged position to give an eyewitness account of many important aspects of Egypt's recent history, but his own history - his family, education, growing self-awareness as a Copt, and wider concerns about Copts in Egyptian society - is also revealing and insightful. A personal reflection on a life lived and a source of recent history, this book will be of interest to political and economic historians and to anyone interested in what it was like to live through Egypt's recent past.


Concern over changes in global climate has increased in recent years with improvement in understanding of atmospheric dynamics and growth in evidence of climate link to long‐term variability in hydrologic records. Climate impact studies rely on climate change information at fine spatial resolution. Towards this, the past decade has witnessed significant progress in development of downscaling models to cascade the climate information provided by General Circulation Models (GCMs) at coarse spatial resolution to the scale relevant for hydrologic studies. While a plethora of downscaling models have been applied successfully to mid‐latitude regions, a few studies are available on tropical regions where the atmosphere is known to have more complex behavior. In this paper, a support vector machine (SVM) approach is proposed for statistical downscaling to interpret climate change signals provided by GCMs over tropical regions of India. Climate variables affecting spatio‐temporal variation of precipitation at each meteorological sub‐division of India are identified. Following this, cluster analysis is applied on climate data to identify the wet and dry seasons in each year. The data pertaining to climate variables and precipitation of each meteorological sub‐division is then used to develop SVM based downscaling model for each season. Subsequently, the SVM based downscaling model is applied to future climate predictions from the second generation Coupled Global Climate Model (CGCM2) to assess the impact of climate change on hydrological inputs to the meteorological sub‐divisions. The results obtained from the SVM downscaling model are then analyzed to assess the impact of climate change on precipitation over India.


Spectrally resolved bioluminescence optical tomography is an approach to recover images of luciferase activity within a volume using multiwavelength emission data from internal bioluminescence sources. The underlying problem of uniqueness associated with nonspectrally resolved intensity-based bioluminescence tomography is highlighted. Reconstructed images of bioluminescence are presented by using as input both simulated and real multiwavelength data from a tissue-simulating phantom. The location of the internal bioluminescence is obtained with 1 mm accuracy. Further, the amplitude of the reconstructed source is proportional to the actual bioluminescence intensity.


One of the current challenges in mathematics education is how to link school mathematics to students' everyday activities to improve the quality of the students' educational experience. Drawing ideas from scholarship in ethnomathematics, this study describes some of the mathematical practices of kente weavers and concludes with discussion of classroom implications that have the potential to enhance mathematics teaching in Ghana using kente weaving. The study employed the techniques of Yin's (2003) case study and Wolcott's (2008) ethnographic approaches to qualitative data collection to unravel the mathematical practices of the kente weavers. A diverse and purposeful sample of 15 kente weavers [ 10 from Bonwire Ashanti region and 5 from Agotime Volta region] and 5 mathematics teachers in Bonwire (Ashanti) were selected to represent a range of weavers as these helped expose weaving patterns. The various stages and weaving patterns were observed to identify mathematical choices and reasoning these choices conveyed. It was followed by both informal and semi-structured interviews of the 15 kente weavers in the kente industry. A series of meetings were organized for the 5 mathematics teachers in Bonwire to discuss some potential classroom implications of the mathematical practices of the kente weavers. As I described the mathematical practices of the weavers, I placed more emphasis on three of the six items on Bishop's list for identifying of mathematical practices in cultures counting, measuring, and designing (Bishop, 1988) because the data provided relatively little insight on the other three items in the list locating, explaining, and playing. Evidence of mathematical practices of the weavers indicated ii that irrespective of the mathematical experience of the weavers, they all employed a certain level of informal mathematics ( counting, measuring, and designing) in the discharge of their duties as weavers. However, the level of mathematics employed in weaving a particular pattern depends on the complexity of the pattern.


Tree squirrels (Sciurus spp.) are highly successful immigrants to urban and suburban areas in North America and Europe, causing both economic and ecological damage. Control of such invasive populations is challenging but of increasing importance to local managers. We studied an invasive population of fox squirrels (S. niger) and applied an immunocontraceptive vaccine in an experimental study of demographic control. Here we integrate our data into a simple stage-structured population model to simulate population reduction under 2 treatment levels (60 and 80% of females, respectively) for vaccines lasting from 1 to 5 years. Contraception can be an effective means of reducing fox squirrel populations if the vaccine is effective for ≥2 years or if ≥71% of the females are treated. Over a 15-year period, fewer individuals require treatment at a treatment rate of 0.8 versus 0.6 due to a declining population size. This study illustrates how a simple population model may guide local resource managers in the design of control strategies for invasive species.


Karl Marx's comments on silk manufacture in "The Working Day" chapter of Capital, volume 1, demonstrate how "quality"—usually associated with "use value"—has been mobilized by capital to naturalize industrialized labor. Putting his insight into conversation with a recent multimedia poetic project, Jen Bervin's Silk Poems (2016–17), this essay examines the homology between, on the one hand, poetry's avowed task of fitting form to content and, on the other, the ideology of labor that fits specific bodies to certain materials and tasks.


We present our calculation of the Green's function for a static scalar and electric charge in a weakly-curved spacetime. We find that to leading order the scalar Green's function reduces to the Green's function for the Poisson equation in Euclidean space. We also calculate the next order correction in the scalar Green's function. We also present the recurrence relation for the Green's function of static electric charge. The calculations that we present here are needed to modernize the self-force expressions in a weakly-curved spacetime.