A crucial pre-requisite in genetically manipulating higher plants involves systems for culturing plant protoplasts and cells under static conditions with an adequate oxygen supply. This is especially the case for cells from cryopreservation, where respiratory perturbations are known to occur during early post-thaw recovery. Therefore, studies were undertaken to assess the potential, and actual, beneficial effects involving culture of cells at an interface between inert, oxygen-gassed perfluorocarbon (PFC) liquid overlaid with liquid or semi-solidified media supplemented with or without the non-ionic surfactant, Pluronic F-68. Assessments were also made to compare the efficacy of PFC supplementation with other physical (medium implanted with glass rods to increase the surface area available for gaseous exchange) and chemical (haemoglobin; Hb) options, both alone and in combination, for gaseous manipulation of plant protoplast cultures.

Investigations involving novel PFC-mediated oxygen delivery to cultured protoplasts were carried out on a broad range of plant species, which included Petunia hybrida (a herbaceous species) and Passiflora giberti (a woody species), as model systems, together with cassava (Manihot esculenta) a relatively recalcitrant species in tissue culture. Studies revealed enhanced protoplast initial plating efficiencies (IPEs) as measured by increased mitotic division, thereby demonstrating no short-term detrimental effects of exposure to PFC. Similarly, supplementation of culture media with Hb, at 1:50 (v/v), increased the mean IPEs of both Petunia and Passiflora protoplasts over that of untreated controls. Additionally, supplementation of aqueous medium with 0.01% (w/v) Pluronic® F-68 not only lowered interfacial tension, but further enhanced mitotic activity over that stimulated by both oxygenated PFC and Hb.

In the context of cryopreservation, media supplementation with Pluronic F-68, at 0.01-1.0% (w/v), significantly improved the post-thaw viability and growth of embryogenic suspension cells of the rice (Oryza sativa L.) cultivars Taipei 309 and Tarom, together with non-embryogenic cells of Lolium multiflorum and Moricandia arvensis. Moreover, a more pronounced synergistic effect in terms of viability and growth was observed for Taipei 309 cells when 0.01% (w/v) Pluronic® F-68 was evaluated in conjunction with oxygenated PFC. Plants regenerated from such cryopreserved cells were morphologically normal with expected chromosome complements (2n = 2x = 24), thus confirming the long-term biocompatibility of PFCs, with no adverse effect up on cellular totipotency.

These results indicate, for the first time, that both oxygenated PFC and Hb provide options for enhancing cellular oxygen supply to cultured eukaryotic cells in vitro. However, the recoverability and, hence, recyclability of PFCs make them a commercially more attractive option, despite the high initial investment cost. Overall, PFC-facilitated improvements in cell culture technology will have increasingly important biotechnological implications in the context of plant micropropagation, somatic hybridisation, transgenic plant production and commercial exploitation of these technologies.

NB. This ethesis has been created by scanning the typescript original and may contain inaccuracies. In case of difficulty, please refer to the original text.


To understand interactions between astatine atoms with gold clusters the AunAt and AunX clusters, n = 12 or 13, X = F, Cl, Br, and I, were calculated at the DFT level using basis sets with a quasi-relativistic pseudopotential and the D3 Grimme correction for the dispersion interactions. Among the studied clusters of various geometries, the interaction energy of At to the clusters is the smallest. Yet, consideration of the electron detachment from the X− anion and generation of a H2 molecule and OH− anion from water shows that the formation of the astatine gold clusters is favored.


This article argues that Byron's rehabilitation of the abject figure of the Oriental woman in his verse romances serves as a popular model of female heroism for Felicia Hemans. The orientalized Byronic heroines that appear in Hemans's poems challenge stereotypical representations of femininity through their unorthodox acts of self-assertion—often engaging in violence and even suicide as a means of avenging the loss of familial ties or emancipating themselves from their oppressive circumstances. Defiant heroines like Eudora in "The Bride of the Greek Isle," Maimuna in "The Indian City" and a whole host of other distraught yet resolute women who insist on reclaiming their dignity and humanity through acts of violence and self-destruction, all reflect the poet's persistent, even obsessive, meditations on the role of the Eastern woman in the formation of English national consciousness. As the feminized embodiment of Britain's "self-consolidating Other", Hemans's Byronic heroines serve not only as potent symbols of English ambivalence towards racial and cultural difference but also reveal the various inconsistencies of nineteenth-century British society by drawing attention to issues of nationalism and gender closer to home. Placed in the most trying emotional states, these heroines retaliate with impressive displays of agency and courage, and their actions allow Hemans not only to call into question the innate masculinity of acts of valor and sacrifice, but also to underscore the sorority of female suffering. More significantly, the poet's sympathetic portrayal of her Byronic heroines in the poems discussed --a depiction that links these heroines' psychological rebellion with the domestic affections-- enables her to promote the feminized idea of the British nation, and by implication, the British Empire, as a political commonwealth based on an ethic of care and tolerance.


The order Piroplasmida (Phylum: Apicomplexa) includes three main genera, Babesia, Theileria, and Cytauxzoon that are vector-borneprotozoan haemoparasites, some of which have clinical relevance both in humans and animals.

With exceptions, Babesia is typically differentiated from Theileria based largely on morphology, serology, and several life-cycle peculiarities, within the tick vectors and vertebrate hosts. Despite these differences, and their global socio-economic importance, piroplasms often present conflicting or uncertain molecular classifications, nomenclature, and intergenic relationships. For instance, based on the small ribosomal subunit RNA gene (18S rDNA), the taxon Piroplasmida includes at least nine mono- and para-phyletic clades, which are sometimes populated by relatively distant members of the same genus, or by closely related species of different genera1 .

As part of a study into the health and ecology of the platypus (Ornithorhynchus anatinus; Order: Monotremata), blood samples were collected for haematological and biochemical analysis, from wild-trapped individuals in Tasmania. Blood, together with ectoparasites removed from each individual, was also evaluated for piroplasm infections by blood film microscopy, and molecular analysis of the 18S rDNA. Moreover, phylogenetic analyses were performed on a subset of samples.

Pleomorphic organisms with occasional tetrads and intra-leukocytic forms, thought to be Theileria schizonts, were observed by microscopy, and were phenotypically consistent with Theileria ornithorhynchi, a piroplasm of the platypus named in previous studies2 . However, molecularly, the parasite-derived DNA belonged to two potentially novel piroplasm species, forming one monophyletic clade, clearly separated from other known marsupial-derived Theileria spp.3 . The high prevalence (100%), apparent lack of clinical signs, and distinct phylogenetic position of the parasite, likely reflect the unique ecology and evolutionary history of its ancient vector-host system.


The genes underlying rhg1 lie at a sometimes dominant sometimes co-dominant locus, necessary for resistance to all Hg types of the soybean (Glycine max (L.) Merr.) cyst nematode (Heterodera glycines). Genomic research identified; nucleotide changes within a candidate gene encoding a receptor like kinase (RLK) that were capable of altering root development and thereby part of the resistance to Hg types 0 (race 3); changes in a laccase that are capable of altering cyst development; and genes underlying changes in membrane biology. This set of three genes are subject to co-selection with a modifier locus on another linkage block. Root development is slowed in the resistant seedling and results in end of season yield loss when SCN is not present. However, in the presence of SCN resistant seedling roots grow just as vigorously as the now slower growing parasitized susceptible roots and therefore show little loss to SCN parasitism. In some genotypes but not others the RLK can act alone to confer resistance. Functional paralogs of the three gene cluster have been found on other linkage groups including A1, B1, G, and O and these can be functional in different sources of resistance like G. soja, PI 437654 and PI438489B. At rhg1 the allele differences change the structure, interacting partners and activity of the LRR protein and the laccase. The changes between the alleles result in about 30 other proteins (judged by 2 Dgels), 112 metabolites (by FTICRMS) and 8 metabolites (by GCMS) to increase in abundance in roots during SCN infection in the resistant NILs. Understanding the basis of root stunting by resistance alleles will be used to improve methods for developing new nematode resistant soybean cultivars that do not suffer from the yield suppression and low seed germination rates of existing cultivars.


Hepatocarcinogenesis is a multistep process driving the progressive transformation of normal liver cells into highly malignant derivatives. Unlimited proliferation and telomere maintenance have been recognized as prerequisites for the development of liver cancer. Moreover, recent studies identified illegitimate β-catenin signaling as relevant hit in a considerable subset of patients. To further investigate the currently not well-understood malignant evolution driven by telomerase and β-catenin, we monitored cytogenetic and phenotypic alterations in untransformed telomerase-immortalized human fetal hepatocytes following forced activation of β-catenin signaling. As expected, constitutive activation of β-catenin signaling significantly enhanced proliferation with decreasing serum dependence. Previously intact contact inhibition was almost completely eliminated. Interestingly, after several passages in cell culture, immortalized clones with dominant-positive β-catenin signaling acquired additional chromosomal aberrations, in particular translocations, anchorage-independent growth capabilities, and formed tumors in athymic nude mice. In further support for the driving role of β-catenin during hepatocarcinogenesis, improved colony growth in soft agar and accelerated tumor formation was also confirmed in Huh7 cells following stable expression of the constitutively active S33Y β-catenin mutant. Telomerase inhibition showed that short-term expansion of transformed clones was not telomerase dependent. Finally, cancer pathway profiling in derived tumors revealed upregulation of characteristic genes associated with invasion and angiogenesis. In conclusion, illegitimate activation of β-catenin signaling enhances the transformation from immortalization to malignant growth in human fetal hepatocytes. Our data functionally confirm a permissive role for β-catenin signaling in the initial phase of hepatocarcinogenesis. Mol Cancer Res; 9(9); 1222–31. ©2011 AACR.


This edited volume presents the proceedings of the AMAA 2015 conference, Berlin, Germany. The topical focus of the 2015 conference lies on smart systems for green and automated driving. The automobile of the future has to respond to two major trends, the electrification of the drivetrain, and the automation of the transportation system. These trends will not only lead to greener and safer driving but re-define the concept of the car completely, particularly if they interact with each other in a synergetic way as for autonomous parking and charging, self-driving shuttles or mobile robots. Key functionalities like environment perception are enabled by electronic components and systems, sensors and actuators, communication nodes, cognitive systems and smart systems integration. The book will be a valuable read for research experts and professionals in the automotive industry but the book may also be beneficial for graduate students


Our understanding of nearly all aspects of plant growth and development have benefited from the application of genetic analyses. Early anatomical and physiological studies provided evidence for processes that allow the plant to respond to internal and external stimuli, but genetics has provided the tools to revolutionize our understanding of the underlying mechanisms. The development of new tools in molecular genetics, the adoption of plant model organisms and the creation of databases for comparative gene analyses, have all contributed to the rapid progress in our understanding of plant developmental biology in recent years.

Keywords:

Arabidopsis thaliana;
dominance;
epistasis;
genetic screen;
mutation;
positional cloning


Translocation is modeled with the Rubinstein-Duke rules for hopping reptons along a one-dimensional lattice (tube). Identification of some coupled states guarantees a semi-periodicity of the process. The chain is driven through the pore by a bias potential promoting the transition of stored length in one direction. Accounting exactly for all allowed states the translocation time of polymers up to the 10-links length is determined. The crossover from reptation to faster dynamics through gradually allowing hernia creation and annihilation is found. Some computational details are presented.


This paper explains a didactic program of blending provocative teaching method with experiential learning at third year of the Bachelor of Journalism and Bachelor of Communication and Media Studies University of Wollongong, Australia. There are pedagogical imperatives today for developing the professional 'self ' in respect to citizenship, journalistic values and practice. The challenge is to acknowledge ethics and principles of human rights, while simultaneously embracing the transforming online, open-source Internet technologies. This can be achieved through a learning combination that exposes students to 'provocative' counter news, often whistleblower generated, while setting experiential learning assignments to engage volunteer journalism sites and their aligned aspirational values. The approach first acknowledges Chomsky's propaganda model of news then it presents participants with a judicious and provocative news-flow with verifiable, current and yet alternative stories otherwise misrepresented or omitted in mainstream news. Participants are then asked to write and publish news of their own, through the Wikimedia Foundation project, Wikinews. In association with regular 'editor' volunteers, Wikinews develops news-writing, increases appreciation of editorial processes and encourages respect for accuracy and due-diligence. Exposure to 'provocative news-flow' alerts participants to propaganda and assists in identifying actionable news stories. In combination, these processes connect the emerging journalist to a sense of belonging to a professional 'newsroom'. A network of volunteer practitioners, including their student colleagues and their tutor as 'chief of staff ', may also develop a sustainable pool of future Wikinews contributors and accredited editors.


This paper describes a Turkish style reinforced concrete minaret, its finite element model, modal testing, finite element model updating and earthquake behaviour, before and after model updating. The minaret of a mosque located in Trabzon, Turkey is selected as an application. A three‐dimensional (3D) model of the minaret and its modal analysis is performed to obtain analytical frequencies and mode shapes using ANSYS finite element program. The ambient vibration tests are conducted on the minaret under natural excitations such as wind effects and human movement. The output‐only modal parameter identification is carried out by Enhanced Frequency Domain Decomposition and Stochastic Subspace Identification methods in Operational Modal Analysis software and in doing so, dynamic characteristics (natural frequencies, mode shapes and damping ratios) are determined. A 3D finite element model of the minaret is updated to minimize the differences between analytical and experimental modal properties by changing some uncertain modelling parameters such as material properties and boundary conditions. The earthquake behaviour of the minaret is investigated using 1992 Erzincan earthquake before and after finite element model updating. Maximum differences in the natural frequencies are reduced from 21% to 8%, and good agreement is found between analytical and experimental natural frequencies. In addition to this, it is realized that finite element model updating is effective on the earthquake behaviour of the minaret. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.


We present a novel formal interpretation of dynamical hierarchies based on information theory, in which each level is a near-state-determined system, and levels are related to one another in a partial ordering. This reformulation moves away from previous definitions, which have considered unique hierarchies of structures or objects arranged in aggregates. Instead, we consider hierarchies of dynamical systems: these are more suited to describing living systems, which are not mere aggregates, but organizations. Transformations from lower to higher levels in a hierarchy are redescriptions that lose information. There are two criteria for partial ordering. One is a state-dependence criterion enforcing predictability within a level. The second is a distinctness criterion enforcing the idea that the higher-level description must do more than just throw information away. We hope this will be a useful tool for empirical studies of both computational and physical dynamical hierarchies.


Perceptual image hash has been widely investigated in an attempt to solve the problems of image content authentication and content-based image retrieval. In this paper, we combine statistical analysis methods and visual perception theory to develop a real perceptual image hash method for content authentication. To achieve real perceptual robustness and perceptual sensitivity, the proposed method uses Watson's visual model to extract visually sensitive features that play an important role in the process of humans perceiving image content. We then generate robust perceptual hash code by combining image-block-based features and key-point-based features. The proposed method achieves a tradeoff between perceptual robustness to tolerate content-preserving manipulations and a wide range of geometric distortions and perceptual sensitivity to detect malicious tampering. Furthermore, it has the functionality to detect compromised image regions. Compared with state-of-the-art schemes, the proposed method obtains a better comprehensive performance in content-based image tampering detection and localization.


There are many benefits to investing in hedge funds, particularly when using a diversified multi-strategy approach. Over recent years, multi-strategy funds of hedge funds have flourished and are now the favorite investment vehicle of institutional investors exploring the world of alternative investments. More recently, funds of hedge funds that specialize within an investment style have also emerged. The authors study the impact of diversification on naively constructed (randomly chosen and equally weighted) hedge fund portfolios. They provide insight into style diversification benefits as well as the inter-temporal evolution of diversification effects on hedge funds.


One of the most significant determinants in our perceived status in our society is our job (Blau & Duncan, 1967; Crewe and Zola, 1983; Jahoda, 1982; McCarthy, 1988; Nam, Powers, & Glick, 1964). However, a recent Harris poll (Prodigy, 1994) found that two-thirds of American adults with disabilities have no job, and nearly 80% of those presently unemployed would like to work. Reasons often cited for their lack of employment are that employers do not (a) structure jobs so that persons with a disability can be accommodated (Myers, 1992), (b) have confidence in the ability of the person with a disability, or consider the person with the disability capable of working full-time (Lou Harris and Associates, 1994). Furthermore, three often adults with disabilities have encountered job discrimination, and approximately 20% indicate that they have encountered physical barriers in the workplace that have interfered with effective job performance. In order to combat problems like those identified above, the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 (ADA) was enacted. For the first time, discrimination against persons with disabilities in both the governmental and private business sector was prohibited by law. In addition, ADA shifted the responsibility of initiating the accommodation process to the employee. Though no study has empirically evaluated the importance of on-the-job accommodations for persons who are hard of hearing, accommodation practices were found to be a significant factor in employment success for persons who were deaf (Gibler, 1995; Moore, 1995; Mowry & Anderson, 1993). Also, the majority of anecdotal literature (Boone, 1988; Foster, 1987; Moore, 1995) indicates that certain workplace situations that involve groups or are noisy are difficult for persons who are deaf or hard of hearing. Specific situations have been identified as difficult due to a breakdown in communication capabilities, e.g., receiving instructions, meetings, and training/inservices. Therefore, the provision of accommodations to facilitate communication may be essential to an employee's career maintenance or advancement. Purpose of the Study In order to (a) determine if the problems identified in the anecdotal literature were a factor in the workplace and (b) to develop an empirical basis for the development of training materials on workplace accommodations, a five-year project was developed. This report is based on the initial phase of that project. It presents the results of two surveys administered to (a) workers who are deaf or hard of hearing and (b) employers of persons who are deaf or hard of hearing. The purpose of the two surveys was to assess the type and adequacy of workplace accommodations. At the time of both the consumer and employer surveys, the provision of appropriate accommodations, based on the ADA timetable, required businesses with 25 or more employees to provide "reasonable accommodations" to both employees and customers who have disabilities. Method Two surveys were developed to examine current practices in workplace accommodations for persons who are deaf or hard of hearing. Both survey questionnaires used forced-choice and open-ended questions. Open-ended questions were coded based on variables identified through literature review. All data was coded and checked for validity. The data was then analyzed using SPSS\PC+ software. Due to the nonparametric nature of the data, frequency and where appropriate, chi square statistical analyses were performed. Consumer Survey Participants in the first survey were members of Self Help for the Hard of Hearing People, Inc. (SHHH). SHHH was selected because it is a self-help organization and presumably, its members have greater access to information about accommodations and coping with hearing loss. The forced-choice items provided frequency data for size and type of company, difficult workplace situations, general type of accommodations used, and incidence for denial of accommodations requests. …


The amount of 3D objects has grown over the last decades, but we can expect that it will grow much further in the future. 3D objects are also becoming more and more accessible to non-expert users. The growing amount of available 3D data is welcome for everyone working with this type of data, as the creation and acquisition of many 3D objects is still costly. However, the vast majority of available 3D objects are only present as pure polygon meshes. We arguably can not assume to get meta-data and additional semantics delivered together with 3D objects stemming from non-expert or 3D scans of real objects from automatic systems. For this reason content-based retrieval and classification techniques for 3D objects has been developed.

Many systems are based on the completely unsupervised case. However, previous work has shown that there are strong possibilities of highly increasing the performance of these tasks by using any type of previous knowledge. In this thesis I use procedural models as previous knowledge. Procedural models describe the construction process of a 3D object instead of explicitly describing the components of the surface. These models can include parameters into the construction process to generate variations of the resulting 3D object. Procedural representations are present in many domains, as these implicit representations are vastly superior to any explicit representation in terms of content generation, flexibility and reusability. Therefore, using a procedural representation always has the potential of outclassing other approaches in many aspects. The usage of procedural models in 3D object retrieval and classification is not highly researched as this powerful representation can be arbitrary complex to create and handle. In the 3D object domain, procedural models are mostly used for highly regularized structures like buildings and trees.

However, Procedural models can deeply improve 3D object retrieval and classification, as this representation is able to offer a persistent and reusable full description of a type of object. This description can be used for queries and class definitions without any additional data. Furthermore, the initial classification can be improved further by using a procedural model: A procedural model allows to completely parameterize an unknown object and further identify characteristics of different class members. The only drawback is that the manual design and creation of specialized procedural models itself is very costly. In this thesis I concentrate on the generalization and automation of procedural models for the application in 3D object retrieval and 3D object classification.

For the generalization and automation of procedural models I propose to offer different levels of interaction for a user to fulfill the possible needs of control and automation. This thesis presents new approaches for different levels of automation: the automatic generation of procedural models from a single exemplary 3D object. The semi-automatic creation of a procedural model with a sketch-based modeling tool. And the manual definition a procedural model with restricted variation space. The second important step is the insertion of parameters into the procedural model, to define the variations of the resulting 3D object. For this step I also propose several possibilities for the optimal level of control and automation: An automatic parameter detection technique. A semi-automatic deformation based insertion. And an interface for manually inserting parameters by choosing one of the offered insertion principles. It is also possible to manually insert parameters into the procedures if the user needs the full control on the lowest level.

To enable the usage of procedural models directly for 3D object retrieval and classification techniques I propose descriptor-based and deep learning based approaches. Descriptors measure the difference of 3D objects. By using descriptors as comparison algorithm, we can define the distance between procedural models and other objects and order these by similarity. The procedural models are sampled and compared to retrieve an optimal object retrieval list. We can also directly use procedural models as data basis for a retraining of a convolutional neural network. By deep learning a set of procedural models we can directly classify new unknown objects without any further large learning database. Additionally, I propose a new multi-layered parameter estimation approach using three different comparison measures to parameterize an unknown object. Hence, an unknown object is not only classified with a procedural model but the approach is also able to gather new information about the characteristics of the object by using the procedural model for the parameterization of the unknown object.

As a result, the combination of procedural models with the tasks of 3D object retrieval and classification lead to a meta concept of a holistically seamless system of defining, generating, comparing, identifying, retrieving, recombining, editing and reusing 3D objects.


As the potential for a trade war with China escalates, and the rhetoric about NAFTA continues to heat up, we thought we'd step back and talk a bit about the perception underlying current political concern regarding trade: trade deficits. President Trump's comments early in March stated that the U.S. has a deficit with almost every county—something that just isn't true. But this perception that trade deficits mean that, according to President Trump, "we lost, over the last number of years, $800 billion a year," raises questions about what a trade deficit is and how it's measured.


Background: The latissimus dorsi muscle flap is one of the most commonly used surgical options for breast reconstruction. The donor area scar on the back, although sometimes hidden beneath the bra strap, is often extensive and enlarged or hypertrophic. The aim of this study is to describe the dissection and rotation of the latissimus dorsi muscle using 2 reduced vertical incisions. Methods: Twelve female patients underwent unilateral breast reconstruction with latissimus dorsi muscle flap. Ten patients had Poland's syndrome, and their breast reconstruc tion was performed with a tissue expander at the first instance, with subsequent latissimus dorsi muscle flap rotation to cover the silicone prosthesis. Two patients experienced volume decrease, irregularities, and breast retractions after adenomastectomy; their prosthesis were also covered by a latissimus dorsi muscle flap. The surgical procedure consisted of a 5-cm longitudinal incision on the lateral border of the latissimus dorsi muscle and another on the inframammary fold. Dissection, section, and rotation of the muscle were performed through skin retraction. Results: The final extension of the scar at follow-up averaged 6.2 cm. The mean surgical time for flap rotation and synthesis of the donor area was 80 minutes. No postoperative complications were observed in any of the cases. Conclusions: The reduced incision for dissection of the latissimus dorsi flap for breast reconstruction proved to be feasible and safe; this method provides aesthetic advantages without increasing cost or surgical time.


Progressive damage to mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) during life is thought to contribute to aging processes. However, this idea has been difficult to reconcile with the small fraction of mtDNA so far found to be altered. Here, examination of mtDNA revealed high copy point mutations at specific positions in the control region for replication of human fibroblast mtDNA from normal old, but not young, individuals. Furthermore, in longitudinal studies, one or more mutations appeared in an individual only at an advanced age. Some mutations appeared in more than one individual. Most strikingly, a T414G transversion was found, in a generally high proportion (up to 50 percent) of mtDNA molecules, in 8 of 14 individuals above 65 years of age (57 percent) but was absent in 13 younger individuals.


Research on discriminating behavior against ethnic minorities in everyday situations is still a rather under-researched field, since most prior research on ethnic discrimination focuses on housing markets, job markets, criminal justice, institutions or discourses. This article contributes toward filling the research-gap on everyday discrimination by bringing together prior research from sociology and social-psychology, including threat and competition theories from integration research, social identity theory, particularism-universalism theory and experimental findings on fairness norms. It conceptually advances the field by combining them into an integrated interdisciplinary approach that can examine discriminating behavior in everyday situations. This approach studies the dynamics of ingroup-outgroup relationships, fairness norms and threat in regard to negative behavior toward others (e.g., a neighbor). In particular, it focusses on the dynamics under which negative behavior is more likely toward an ethnic outgroup-person than an ingroup-person (i.e., discriminating behavior). To scrutinize the expectations derived within this framework, a factorial survey experiment was designed, implemented and analyzed (by means of multilevel mixed-effects linear regressions and average marginal effects). The survey experiment presents a hypothetical scenario between two neighbors in order to measure the effects and dynamics of ingroup-outgroup relationships, fairness norms and threat on behavior. While no significant outgroup-effect can be found in the general analysis of the main effects, more in-depth analyses show an interplay of situational cues: Outgroup-discriminating behavior becomes significantly more likely when the "actor" has low general fairness norms and/or when threat-level in a situation is low. These results foreground the importance of interdisciplinary in-depth analyses of dynamics for understanding the conditions under which discriminating behavior takes place in everyday situations—and for deriving measures that can reduce discrimination.


Volatile organic compounds (VOCs) have been identified as the most crucial precursors of tropospheric photochemical O3 formation and secondary organic aerosols. In this study, field measurement was conducted to develop VOCs emission factors and source profiles of the wood furniture coating industry in China. An activity-based database was established, involving coat consumption-based, coating area-based, furniture production-based, and output value-based VOCs emission factors. Combining the results of field tests and literature surveys, emission factors were calculated by enterprise scale, coating type, spraying technology, and emission control device. The uncertainties were quantified by using Monte Carlo simulations. VOCs emission factors were estimated: 0.22 (0.10–0.34, 95% CI) kg kg–1 for coat consumption-based; 21.97 (10.10–29.38) g m–2 for coating area–based; 0.69 (0.34–1.00) kg piece–1 for furniture production-based; and 6.95 (3.42–10.21) kg 10–4 yuan for output value–based calculation, respectively. Aromatics and oxygenated VOCs (OVOCs) were predominant species of solvent borne paint emission, with the proportion of 71.1% and 22.9% of totals, respectively. VOCs emissions from the wood furniture coating industry were estimated at 179.76 × 103 (88.58 × 103–260.52 × 103, 95% CI) t in 2016. Due to the huge production output and intensive distribution of enterprises, VOCs emissions mainly concentrated in Guangdong, Zhejiang, Shandong, Fujian, Jiangxi, and Sichuan province, with the combined contribution of 43.8% of the national totals.


Recently, graphical representations of aerosol mass spectrometer (AMS) spectra and elemental composition have been developed to explain the oxidative and aging processes of secondary organic aerosol (SOA). It has been shown previously that oxygenated organic aerosol (OOA) components from ambient and laboratory data fall within a triangular region in the f_(44) vs. f_(43) space, where f_(44) and f_(43) are the ratios of the organic signal at m/z 44 and 43 to the total organic signal in AMS spectra, respectively; we refer to this graphical representation as the "triangle plot." Alternatively, the Van Krevelen diagram has been used to describe the evolution of functional groups in SOA. In this study we investigate the variability of SOA formed in chamber experiments from twelve different precursors in both "triangle plot" and Van Krevelen domains. Spectral and elemental data from the high-resolution Aerodyne aerosol mass spectrometer are compared to offline species identification analysis and FTIR filter analysis to better understand the changes in functional and elemental composition inherent in SOA formation and aging. We find that SOA formed under high- and low-NO_x conditions occupy similar areas in the "triangle plot" and Van Krevelen diagram and that SOA generated from already oxidized precursors allows for the exploration of areas higher on the "triangle plot" not easily accessible with non-oxidized precursors. As SOA ages, it migrates toward the top of the triangle along a path largely dependent on the precursor identity, which suggests increasing organic acid content and decreasing mass spectral variability. The most oxidized SOA come from the photooxidation of methoxyphenol precursors which yielded SOA O/C ratios near unity. α-pinene ozonolysis and naphthalene photooxidation SOA systems have had the highest degree of mass closure in previous chemical characterization studies and also show the best agreement between AMS elemental composition measurements and elemental composition of identified species within the uncertainty of the AMS elemental analysis. In general, compared to their respective unsaturated SOA precursors, the elemental composition of chamber SOA follows a slope shallower than −1 on the Van Krevelen diagram, which is indicative of oxidation of the precursor without substantial losss of hydrogen, likely due to the unsaturated nature of the precursors. From the spectra of SOA studied here, we are able to reproduce the triangular region originally constructed with ambient OOA compents with chamber aerosol showing that SOA becomes more chemically similar as it ages. Ambient data in the middle of the triangle represent the ensemble average of many different SOA precursors, ages, and oxidative processes.


This paper is intended as a contribution to the advancement of scholarship in the field of statistics education, which directly links with the scholarship of teaching and learning. It is apparent from the literature, that statistics education research, as an interdisciplinary field, does not rely on a single tradition of research methodology. There are different research backgrounds, different research methods are used, studies have different foci and different outcome variables are studied. What constitutes research in statistics education is therefore still a fundamental issue, with a consequent call for more research in this field. The present study attempts to identify the major themes of statistics education research in order to provide an overview of its current thematic nature. Twenty-four doctoral dissertations as well as 138 articles in three specialist statistics education journals, published between 2005 and 2009, were analyzed regarding their key themes and topics. The frequency of occurrence of the key themes is summarized. We found that the teaching and learning of statistics was the most popular theme or topic. In particular, there is a growing network of researchers interested in studying the development of students' statistical reasoning. Only 15% of the literature was dedicated to studies on the use of information communications technology (ICT), with the relevant studies reflecting the popularity of JAVA Applets and simulation tools. A smaller portion of the literature was devoted to course design and non-cognitive factors. This study provides a framework for understanding current developments in statistics education research and suggests structure to the field, making it easier for future researchers to become acquainted with the discipline. In this way a contribution is made in furthering scholarship in statistics education.


Decreasing the widths and thicknesses of thin metal stripes can effectively increase the propagation distance of long-range surface plasmon polaritons, but at the cost of significant reduction on the overall mode confinement, which fundamentally limits the packing density in nanophotonic integration. By utilizing the coupling between the dielectric waveguide and plasmonic modes, we propose a silicon-based 3-D hybrid long-range plasmonic waveguide that not only supports long-range propagation, but also has compact modal size. Our simulation result shows that a propagation distance of 696 μm with an ultrasmall modal area of 0.0013 μm2 can be simultaneously achieved at 1.55 μ m.


Leaves of Melicope ptelefolia Champ ex Benth were examined for phytochemicals.
Using various chromatography techniques such as normal column chromatography, gel
filtration on sephadex LH-20 and radial chromatography seven compounds were isolated
namely, kokusaginine (94), p-sitosterol (llo), p-0-geranylcoumaric acid (102), 3-
geranyl-2,4,6-trihydroxyacetophenone (1 1 I), the tentatively assigned compound
benzopyranone (1 12), 4',5-dihydroxy-3,3',7-trimethoxyflavone (1 13) and scoparone
(86). 3-Geranyl-2,4,6-trihydroxyacetophenonew as identified as a new natural product,
which was previously reported as a synthetic compound.
Nitric oxide (NO) inhibitory assay using RAW 246.7 murine monocytic macrophage
and soybean lipoxygenase inhibitory assay were carried out in the primary screening of the crude methanolic extract, the hexane, dichloromethane and ethyl acetate fractions.
Both the hexane and dichloromethane fractions were shown strongly to inhibit nitric
oxide production with an ICso of 27.8 1 pglml and 34.13 pg/ml respectively. Meanwhile,
inhibition of soybean lipoxygenase activity was shown only by the dichloromethane
fraction at ICso 48.0 1 pg/ml
Further anti-inflammatory investigation on the isolated compounds showed that
kokusaginine significantly inhibited NO production with an ICso of 12.09 pglml (46.69
pM), while 3-geranyl-2,4,6-trihydroxyacetophenone inhibited formation of (9Z, 11E)-
(1 39-1 3-hydroxyoctadeca-9,ll -dienoate with an ICsO of 7.35 pglml(24.17 pM).
3-Geranyl-2,4,6-trihydroxyacetophenone was further evaluated towards inhibition of
cysteinyl leukotriene (CysLTs) production. The result showed that this compound
significantly inhibited the production of CysLTs with an ICso of 12.13 pM. This was
slightly lower than the ICso of nordihydroguaretic acid (8.13 pM) which was used as the
reference drug.


From the moment the U.S. Supreme Court first confronted the difficult constitutional questions at the heart of the Voting Rights Act, its posture has been one of deference. This posture has continued to this day. In contrast, the Court has interpreted the language of the Act dynamically, often in total disregard to the text of the law or the intent of Congress. But as this Article explains, the Roberts Court appears poised to unsettle this longstanding narrative. The Act is in serious constitutional danger. One way to explain this move on the part of the Court is by invoking the post-racial storyline that has surfaced since the election of President Obama and which informs this Symposium. This is the argument that we now live in a post-racial world, a society where race no longer matters. The argument is disarmingly simple: In a world where President Obama can become president, the Voting Rights Act is no longer needed to protect minority voters from racial discrimination. This argument can be similarly applied to the Civil Rights Act and most other statutes of that era. To be sure, that is a debatable proposition, and reasonable people can disagree. Whether one agrees or not with this argument, the real question is one of epistemic authority; that is, which institution should decide whether we now live in a world where the Voting Rights Act is no longer needed? Is this a question better left to our policy-making bodies, or is this a question that we should leave to five Justices on the U.S. Supreme Court? To ask this question is to answer it. If the Supreme Court can decide this question, there is essentially little it cannot do. If striking down the Voting Rights Act on constitutional grounds is not considered judicially activist, this Article concludes, the term has ceased to have any useful meaning.


The East Asian countries are seriously discussing the consolidation of ASEAN+1 FTAs to develop so-called ASEAN++ FTA or RCEP. The detailed analysis of services chapters in the existing ASEAN+1 FTAs gives insights to services trade liberalization in this new trade agreement. In order for ASEAN and its FTA partners to gain substantial new commitments that are genuinely "plus" to the existing trade pacts, both WTO GATS and ASEAN+1 FTAs, ASEAN++ countries should aim at an ambitious level of liberalization much higher than the AFAS package 5. Also, the detailed analysis suggests a policy option of narrowing the types of services trade limitations, i.e., focusing on three types of limitations and hence improving transparency. Furthermore, we advocate for the needs of prioritizing production-related services sectors in the negotiation. Beyond ASEAN++ FTA, we briefly explain the critical roles of domestic regulatory reform.


Fetal bovine serum (FBS) is a ubiquitously used essential supplement in cell culture media. However, there are serious scientific and ethical concerns about the use of FBS regarding its harvest and production. During the last three decades, FBS could be substituted by other supplements or by the use of defined chemical components in serum-free cell culture. A number of serum-free medium formulations have been described for mammalian and insect cell lines as well as for primary cultures. However, the switch to serum-free media still demands a time-consuming literature survey and a manufacturer search for appropriate medium formulations, respectively. Here we present the second collection of commercially available serum-free media in an updated, freely accessible interactive online database. Searches for serum-free media and continuous cell lines already adapted to serum-free culture can be performed according to various criteria. These include the degree of chemical definition, e.g. serum-free (SF), animal-derived component free (ADCF) or chemically defined (CD), and the type of medium, e.g. basal media, medium supplements, or full replacement media. In order to specify the cell lines that are adapted to serum-free media, search terms like species, organ, tissue, cell type and disease can be used. All commercially available serum-free media and adapted cell lines currently available from major distributors (e.g. ATCC, ECACC and DMSZ) are included in the database. Despite an extensive search for serum-free media and adapted cell lines, detailed information from certain companies and suppliers is still lacking and is specifically highlighted. It is intended to create a platform for the interactive exchange of information and experience by experts in the field in order to continuously improve and extend the serum-free online database. The database is accessible at http://www.goodcellculture.com/


Scholarship in the Hebrew Scriptures is more bountiful and diverse than ever before, a situation that presents a formidable challenge to the student trying to understand the critical issues in Hebrew Bible study. This book deals with each section of the canon and explains the standard questions, with special attention to points of scholarly agreement and contention. Written by an international group of preeminent scholars, this collection is intended for readers with a diversity of interests and is specifically designed for those making their first acquaintance with the complex character of the Hebrew Bible or Old Testament.


Stem cells play a critical role in tissue regeneration and repair, maintenance and turnover and the control of haematopoiesis in the various tissues. These cells have an incredible ability to differentiate into specific cell types like osteoblasts, chondrocytes or myocytes and to develop bone, cartilage or muscle tissues. Now it is believed that the cells do not differentiate by themselves but rather the secretion of the bioactive (trophic) factors which are responsible for the functional outcome of the tissue. Stem cells reside in complicated and dynamic three-dimensional (3D) microenvironments in vivo known as stem cell niches. The niches are composed of extracellular matrix (ECM), soluble and tethered proteins and supporting cells, which have a profound influence on the functionality of the cells, including differentiation and trophic factor release. In this chapter, we review and emphasize the influence of stem cell microenvironment on the secretion of trophic factors and their perspective application for bone regeneration.


The maritime sector is undergoing constant change, as is particularly apparent in the shift in competition that has unfolded in recent years. Whereas in the past shipowners and ports used to compete with one another, the competitive struggle is now increasingly unfolding at the level of logistics chains. Today, market players are selected not so much for their stand-alone competitiveness, but on the basis of whether or not they belong to a successful maritime logistics chain. This explains why certain market players are continuously trying to gain greater control over these chains, including through vertical and horizontal alliances, mergers and acquisitions. This contribution considers in greater detail these concerted efforts to increase market power through extensive integration. First, we deal with the competitive shifts that have occurred in the port and maritime arena. Subsequently, we look at the strategic behaviour exhibited by the main market players (shipowners, terminal operating companies, port authorities, logistics service providers, etc) and analyse their objectives. Finally, we assess the consequences of the strategies pursued in the context of the anticipated future scenarios.


In-silico protein-ligand binding prediction is an ongoing area of research in computational chemistry and machine learning based drug discovery, as an accurate predictive model could greatly reduce the time and resources necessary for the detection and prioritization of possible drug candidates. Proteochemometric modeling (PCM) attempts to make an accurate model of the protein-ligand interaction space by combining explicit protein and ligand descriptors. This requires the creation of information-rich, uniform and computer interpretable representations of proteins and ligands. Previous work in PCM modeling relies on pre-defined, handcrafted feature extraction methods, and many methods use protein descriptors that require alignment or are otherwise specific to a particular group of related proteins. However, recent advances in representation learning have shown that unsupervised machine learning can be used to generate embeddings which outperform complex, human-engineered representations. We apply this reasoning to propose a novel proteochemometric modeling methodology which, for the first time, uses embeddings generated via unsupervised representation learning for both the protein and ligand descriptors. We evaluate performance on various splits of a benchmark dataset, including a challenging split that tests the model's ability to generalize to proteins for which bioactivity data is greatly limited, and we find that our method consistently outperforms state-of-the-art methods.


Abstract. We investigate the representation of convective transport of atmospheric compounds by boundary layer clouds. We focus on three key parameterizations that, when combined, express this transport: the area fraction of transporting clouds, the upward velocity in the cloud cores and the chemical concentrations at cloud base. The first two parameterizations combined represent the kinematic mass flux by clouds. To investigate the key parameterizations under a wide range of conditions, we use large-eddy simulation model data for 10 meteorological situations, characterized by either shallow cumulus or stratocumulus clouds. The parameterizations have not been previously tested with such large data sets. In the analysis, we show that the parameterization of the area fraction of clouds currently used in mixed-layer models is affected by boundary layer dynamics. Therefore, we (i) simplify the independent variable used for this parameterization, Q1, by considering the variability in moisture rather than in the saturation deficit and update the parameters in the parameterization to account for this simplification. We (ii) next demonstrate that the independent variable has to be evaluated locally to capture cloud presence. Furthermore, we (iii) show that the area fraction of transporting clouds is not represented by the parameterization for the total cloud area fraction, as is currently assumed in literature. To capture cloud transport, a novel active cloud area fraction parameterization is proposed. Subsequently, the scaling of the upward velocity in cloud cores by the Deardorff convective velocity scale and the parameterization for the concentration of atmospheric reactants at cloud base from literature are verified and improved by analysing six shallow cumulus cases. For the latter, we additionally discuss how the parameterization is affected by wind conditions. This study contributes to a more accurate estimation of convective transport, which occurs at sub-grid scales.


Purpose

– The purpose of this paper is to examine how frequency of change (FC) in organizations and impact of change (IC) influence the employee behaviors, i.e. exit, voice, loyalty, and neglect (EVLN) through psychological contract fulfillment (PCF) as a mediator. The moderating role of successful past changes (SPC) is also assessed with direct and indirect relations of FC, and IC alongside employees' behaviors.

Design/methodology/approach

– Hypotheses were tested among a sample of 398 financial services-oriented non-managerial-level employees in Pakistan. Bootstrapped moderated mediation analyses (using PROCESS macro) were conducted to test the main and moderated mediation effects. The authors ran series of confirmatory factor analyses to validate the distinctiveness of variables and their items in this study.

Findings

– The results largely supported the hypotheses. Findings showed that FC is negatively related to loyalty but positively related to exit, voice, and neglect behaviors via contract fulfillment. IC is also found to have negatively related to loyalty but positively related to exit, voice, and neglect via PCF. SPC was found to moderate the relation between FC, IC, and contract fulfillment, as well as the indirect relationship with exit, voice, and neglect through contract fulfillment and negatively between FC, IC, and loyalty through contract fulfillment. The authors found direct interaction effects of FC via SPC in relation to exit and loyalty and also found direct interaction effects of IC via SPC to exit, voice, and loyalty.

Research limitations/implications

– The use of cross-sectional research design does not allow conclusions with respect to causality. The most important implication of the study is that employee behaviors following organizational change can best be understood via a psychological contract framework. A future suggestion is to include more organizations based on longitudinal research design with focus on both employee and employer perspective.

Practical implications

– This study highlights the importance of employees' behavioral responses and their sensemaking of PCF in a post-organizational change period.

Originality/value

– This study empirically investigated the effects of FC, and IC on fulfillment of psychological contract and behavioral responses of employees using a sample of non-managerial employees, and provides new insights into employee behaviors following organizational changes.


Why do they hate us? An entire cottage industry has arisen to answer this question. But what no one has really figured out is, who exactly are they? Is it al-Qaeda? Islamic nationalists? The whole Muslim world? "How to Win a Cosmic War" lays out, for the first time, a comprehensive definition of the movement behind and surrounding al-Qaeda and the like, a global ideology properly termed Jihadism. Contrasting twenty-first-century religious extremism across Christianity, Judaism and Islam with its historical antecedents, Aslan demonstrates that while modern Jihadis may have legitimate social grievances - the suffering of the Palestinians, American support for Arab dictators, the presence of foreign troops in Muslim lands, to name a few - they have no real goals or actual agenda. So, what do the Jihadists want? Aslan's answer is: nothing. The Jihadists have no earthly agenda; they are fighting a metaphysical conflict, a theological war. And ever since 9/11, we have unfortunately been fighting the same cosmic war, the war they want: the so-called 'War on Terror'. How do we win a Cosmic War? By refusing to fight in one. And in this stunning new work, Aslan reveals surprising conclusions about how we can deal with this predicament.


The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority ("FINRA") recently issued a report on robo-advisors entitled "Report on Digital Investment Advice." The report addresses the various features of robo-advisors and highlights investor protection concerns and regulatory issues that may arise from their use by investment professionals and individual investors. The report implicitly raises the question of whether robo-advisors meet the fiduciary standard of care applicable to broker-dealers and investment advisers. The report suggests that, on a stand-alone basis, robo-advisors do not meet a fiduciary standard when they advise individual investors. The report supports the view that human judgment by a trained financial professional is a necessary element of the fiduciary standard. This paper analyzes the findings and implications of the FINRA report in light of the fiduciary standard of care and poses questions that need to be answered by regulators concerning the fiduciary standard to which robo-advisors — as well as investment advisers and broker-dealers — will be held in the future.


In this paper, we investigate Nash-regret minimization in congestion games, a class of games with benign theoretical structure and broad real-world applications. We first propose a centralized algorithm based on the optimism in the face of uncertainty principle for congestion games with (semi-)bandit feedback, and obtain finite-sample guarantees. Then we propose a decentralized algorithm via a novel combination of the Frank-Wolfe method and G-optimal design. By exploiting the structure of the congestion game, we show the sample complexity of both algorithms depends only polynomially on the number of players and the number of facilities, but not the size of the action set, which can be exponentially large in terms of the number of facilities. We further define a new problem class, Markov congestion games, which allows us to model the non-stationarity in congestion games. We propose a centralized algorithm for Markov congestion games, whose sample complexity again has only polynomial dependence on all relevant problem parameters, but not the size of the action set.


Abstract Wilson's disease is an inherited autosomal recessive disorder of copper balance leading to accumulation of copper mainly in liver and brain result from absent or reduced function of copper-transporting P-type ATPase. Copper is an essential trace element but in Wilson's disease it accumulate to the point of toxicity. D-penicillamine is a classic drug for treatment of Wilson's disease. Its major effect is to promote the urinary copper excretion. The use of D-penicillamine in the therapy of Wilson's disease is known to be complicated by the development of various glomerular diseases. In this report we describe the development of nephrotic syndrome after 2 years treatment with D-penicillamine in a 31-year-old male undergoing treatment for Wilson's disease, with a prompt regression at the discontinuation of the drug. We present this case to draw attention to the rare complication as nephrotic syndrome in patients with Wilson's disease under D-penicillamine treatment and possible underlying causes. It is strongly necessary the therapy and clinical condition of patients with Wilson's disease to be monitoring regularly - we recommended monthly.


It is known that a highly dynamic communication among subcellular organelles (e.g., cytosol, endoplasmic reticulum (ER), mitochondria, and nucleus) dictate cellular behaviors. But little information exists on how the inter-organelle crosstalk impacts cancer cells due to the lack of approaches that manipulate inter-organelle communication in cancer cells. We unexpectedly found that a negatively charged, enzyme cleavable peptide enables the trafficking of histone protein (H2B), a nuclear protein, to the mitochondria in cancer cells. The peptide, denoted as MitoFlag, interacts with the nuclear location sequence (NLS) of H2B to block it entering nucleus. A protease on the mitochondria cleaves the Flag from the complex of MitoFlag and H2B to form assemblies that retain H2B on the mitochondria and facilitate the H2B entering mitochondria. Molecular validation of MitoFlag shows that adding NLS, replacing aspartic acid residues by glutamic acid residues, or changing L-aspartic acid to D-aspartic residue abolishes the trafficking of H2B into mitochondria of HeLa cells. As the first example of enzyme-instructed self-assembly (EISA) of a synthetic peptide for trafficking endogenous proteins, this work provides insights for understanding and manipulating inter-organelle communication in cells.


Fairness has emerged as an important consideration in algorithmic decision-making. Unfairness occurs when an agent with higher merit obtains a worse outcome than an agent with lower merit. Our central point is that a primary cause of unfairness is uncertainty. A principal or algorithm making decisions never has access to the agents' true merit, and instead uses proxy features that only imperfectly predict merit (e.g., GPA, star ratings, recommendation letters). None of these ever fully capture an agent's merit; yet existing approaches have mostly been defining fairness notions directly based on observed features and outcomes. Our primary point is that it is more principled to acknowledge and model the uncertainty explicitly. The role of observed features is to give rise to a posterior distribution of the agents' merits. We use this viewpoint to define a notion of approximate fairness in ranking. We call an algorithm $\phi$-fair (for $\phi \in [0,1]$) if it has the following property for all agents $x$ and all $k$: if agent $x$ is among the top $k$ agents with respect to merit with probability at least $\rho$ (according to the posterior merit distribution), then the algorithm places the agent among the top $k$ agents in its ranking with probability at least $\phi \rho$. We show how to compute rankings that optimally trade off approximate fairness against utility to the principal. In addition to the theoretical characterization, we present an empirical analysis of the potential impact of the approach in simulation studies. For real-world validation, we applied the approach in the context of a paper recommendation system that we built and fielded at the KDD 2020 conference.


Abstract : This thesis assesses the feasibility, suitability, efficacy, and military potential of utilizing the Enhanced Position Location Reporting System (EPLRS) from airborne communications nodes with emergent commercialbased wireless technologies. Such integration would offer highly mobile maneuver units with over-the-horizon (OTH) tactical data connectivity. Specifically, this work examines tactical data requirements intrinsic to military operations with current OTH tactical data solutions. It also explores current EPLRS architectures and use and then compares the functional capabilities and limitations of EPLRS with those of IEEE 802.11x and 802.16 standards and prevalent developing meshed network routing protocols. Finally, this thesis evaluates fielded and emergent technologies to see if they are suitable to build and to sustain (collectively or independently) interconnected, ubiquitous, and routable tactical data networks by capitalizing on the advantages of EPLRS and by exploiting the inherent advantages of airborne assets in overcoming line-of-sight (LOS) limitations.


The presence of micro-organisms in air is taken for granted, but understanding the identities, distribution and abundance of airborne micro-organisms remains in its infancy. Indoor exposure to micro-organisms has been related to range of adverse health outcomes. The indoor levels of particulate matter and bioaerosols were monitored in thirty houses across Lahore, Pakistan. Two DustTrak aerosol monitors (model 8520, TSI Inc.) were run simultaneously in the kitchens and living rooms of the selected sites to measure fine particulate matter. At the same time, agar coated petri plates were exposed face upwards for twenty minutes to sample the micro-organisms present in surrounding air of both micro-environments. A total of 7 bacterial species and 11 fungal species were identified including "Staphylococcus spp.", "Bacillus spp.", "Micrococcus spp." and "Serratia spp." while the predominant fungal species were "Alternaria alternata" and "Aspergillus spp." The concentrations (cfu m^(-3)) for bacteria ranged from 472 to 9829 in the kitchens and from 275 to 14469 in the living rooms. Likewise, the fungal cfu m^(-3) ranged between 236 and 1887 in the kitchen and from 315 to 1887 in the living room. A seasonal variation in bioaerosols was evident in the kitchens while being not so pronounced in the living rooms. A linear regression model showed a direct association of temperature with bacteria and fine particulate matter but not with fungi. Ventilation was also observed to have a significant impact upon PM levels. Out of 30 households sixteen had the presence of at least one individual with allergenic reactions. These findings highlight the enhanced risk of exposure to fine particulate matter as well as bioaerosols in the urban residential built environment in Pakistan.


Why are socially beneficial reforms not implemented? One simple answer to this question (which has received little attention in the literature) is that this may be caused by generalised uncertainty about the effectiveness of reforms. If agents are unsure about whether a proposed reform will work, it will be less likely to be adopted. Despite the numerous benefits economists assign to structural reforms, the empirical literature has thus far failed to establish a positive and significant effect of reforms on economic performance. We collect data from 43 econometric studies (for more than 300 coefficients on the effects of reform on growth) and show that approximately one third of these coefficients is positive and significant, another third is negative and significant, and the final third is not statistically significant different from zero. In trying to understand this remarkable variation, we find that the measurement of reform and controlling for institutions and initial conditions are main factors in decreasing the probability of reporting a significant and positive effect of reform on growth.


A bit more than fifty years ago the Israeli government put Adolph Eichmann on trial in Jerusalem. The way was opened for this trial by the International Military Tribunal convened in Nuremberg, Germany, in late 1945. However, what the prosecutors in Jerusalem did dramatically departed from the Nuremberg trial template. The Israeli legal team assembled a sprawling case designed not simply to convict the defendant but to tell the vast story of the entirety of the Holocaust whether it involved Eichmann or not. Where Nuremberg relied on documentary proof about the actions of indicted individuals and organizations, Israel chose, instead, to present a parade of victimwitnesses. This shift to the in-court narration of the victims' stories had a dramatic impact on the template for atrocity prosecutions, resulting in cases that are longer, slower and more vulnerable to a variety ofjustice system breakdowns. Such breakdowns have marred the trials of John Demjanjuk and Imre Finta as well as the proceedings of the ICTY and cast a shadow over the use of trials to call the perpetrators of mass atrocity to justice.


The main purpose of metabolic engineering is the modification of biological systems towards specific goals using genetic manipulations. For this purpose, models are built that describe the stationary and dynamic behaviour of biochemical reaction networks inside a biological cell. Based on these models, simulations are carried out with the intention to understand the cell's behaviour. The modeling process leads to the generation of large amounts of data, both during the modeling itself and after the simulation of the created models. The manual interpretation is almost impossible; consequently, appropriate techniques for supporting the analysis and visualization of these data are needed. The purpose of this thesis is to investigate visualization and data mining techniques to support the metabolic modeling process. The work presented in this thesis is divided into several tracks: • Visualization of metabolic networks and the associated simulation data. Novel visualization techniques will be presented, which allow the visual exploration of metabolic network dynamics, beyond static snapshots of the simulated data plots. Node-link representations of the metabolic network are animated using the time series of metabolite concentrations and reaction rates. In this way, bottlenecks and active parts of metabolic networks can be distinguished. Additionally, 3D visualization techniques for metabolic networks are explored for cross-free drawing of the networks in 3D visualization space. Steerable drawing of metabolic networks is also investigated. In contrast to other approaches for drawing metabolic networks, user guided drawing of the networks allows the creation of high quality drawings by including user feedback in the drawing process. • Comparison of XML/SBML files. SBML (Systems Biology Markup Language) has become ubiquitous in metabolic modeling, serving the storage and exchange of models in XML format. Generally, the modeling process is an iterative task where the next generation model is a further development of the current model, resulting in a family of models stored in SBML format. The SBML format, however, includes a great deal of information, from the structure of the biochemical network to parameters of the model or measured data. Consequently, the CustX-Diff algorithm for a customizable comparison of XML files will be introduced. By customizing the comparison process through the specification of XPath expressions, an adaptable change detection process is enabled. Thus, the comparison process can be focused on specific parts of a XML/SBML document, e.g. on the structure of a metabolic network. • Visual exploration of time-varying sensitivity matrices. Sensitivity analysis is a special method used in simulation to analyze the sensitivity of a model with respect to its parameters. The results of sensitivity analysis of a metabolic network are large time-varying matrices, which need to be properly visualized. However, the visualization of time-varying high-dimensional data is a challenging problem. For this purpose, an extensible framework is proposed, consisting of existing and novel visualization methods, which allow the visual exploration of time-varying sensitivity matrices. Tabular visualization techniques, such as the reorderable matrix, are developed further, and algorithms for their reordering are discussed. Existing and novel techniques for exploring proximity data, both in matrix form and projected using multi-dimensional scaling (MDS), are also discussed. Information visualization paradigms such as focus+context based distortion and overview+details are proposed to enhance such techniques. • Cluster ensembles for analyzing time-varying sensitivity matrices. A novel relationship-based cluster ensemble, which relies on the accumulation of the evolving pairwise similarities of objects (i.e. parameters) will be proposed, as a robust and efficient method for clustering time-varying high-dimensional data. The time-dependent similarities, obtained from the fuzzy partitions created during the fuzzy clustering process, are aggregated, and the final clustering result is derived from this aggregation.


Winners of randomly assigned initial public offering (IPO) lottery shares are significantly more likely to hold these shares than lottery losers 1, 6, and even 24 months after the random allocation. This finding persists in samples of highly active investors, suggesting along with additional evidence that this "endowment effect" is not driven by inertia alone. The effect decreases as experience in the IPO market increases, but remains even for very experienced investors. These results provide field evidence derived from the behavior of 1.5 million Indian stock investors consistent with the laboratory literature that documents endowment effects for risky gambles.


Janette Dillon. Shakespeare and the Staging of English History. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012. Pp. 150. $75.00. In Shakespeare and the Staging of English History, Janette Dillon aims to reconstruct stage pictures on early modern stages for selected scenes from Shakespeare's history plays. The book begins with a discussion of the opening stage direction of 1 Henry VI, reasoning how an important stage property, the coffin, is borne and adorned, in what order each attendant enters, what position on the stage each character occupies, and what kind of atmosphere as a whole is created onstage. By focusing primarily on the logic of spatial allotment of both stage properties and characters, Dillon's approach to Shakespeare's history plays reflects the perspective of a professor of drama, who envisions the plays in detailed stage performances. One of the most intriguing features of the book is Dillon's claim that it centers on "the nature and meaning of performance on early modern stages" (5). Our knowledge about the actual productions of Shakespeare plays in the Renaissance is very limited because unlike written texts that may survive over time, stage productions are ephemeral without modern filming devices. Dillon mentions the existence of evidence such as "inventories of costumes and props and occasional eyewitness testimony" (1), and this circumstantial evidence has inspired her discussion. However, the main parts of her reinterpretations are still based on clues from stage directions and lines from characters within the plays. Dillon makes an apology on the very first page of the introduction by informing us that "words like 'probably' will figure frequently" (1). This apology may be considered a self-evident drawback by some critics. I have in mind the word "conjectured" that E. K. Chambers uses in his criticism of Edmond Malone's description of the sign of the Globe, and Chambers's skeptical comment, "I do not know where he got this information." (1) However, just like all defenses of poetry since Aristotle, which shield the imaginary and the fictitious, Dillon's apology can be considered justifiable. She explains, at least, how she has inferred her probable stage pictures. Since even the authorship of the plays attributed to Shakespeare has long been a subject of contention, conjectures about original Shakespearean staging practices are naturally difficult and debatable. A basic premise of the book is that space onstage parallels social relationships, not just for early modern actors but also for early modern audiences. Dillon writes that "early modern actors and audiences had a strong shared sense of 'right' and 'wrong' about position and movement in social space and were inured to the idea that spatial and kinetic practice encoded certain aspects of social relationship" (7). She adds a note here that on spatial codes in the early modern period, we can refer to her earlier study The Language of Space in Court Performance, 1400-1625 (Cambridge University Press, 2010). Nevertheless, since the premise is critical to the whole book, it requires more elaboration than this note and the two brief examples she gives subsequently--the everyday practice of children kneeling to their fathers and women sitting on the left of men (7). Actually, not only the stage but also the whole theater, with its differently priced seating and spaces (groundlings did not have seats), was encoded with meanings of social relationship. Even though Dillon pays very little attention to the immediate spatial context of the stage, from critics such as Andrew Gurr, a major academic advisor to the reconstruction of the Globe in London, we learn about the spatial arrangement of the theater in the form of a circle around the stage. Gurr brings attention to the significance of this circular notion of theatrical space at the beginning of Playgoing in Shakespeare's London, where he points out that "Shakespearean playgoers were members of a crowd surrounding the speakers," and there were even some seats behind the stage indicating the occupants' "social eminence. …


Cities depend on multiple heterogeneous, interconnected infrastructures to provide safe water to consumers. Given this complexity, efficient numerical techniques are needed to support optimal control and management of a water distribution network (WDN). This paper introduces a holistic analysis framework to support water utilities on the decision making process for an efficient supply management. The proposal is based on graph spectral techniques that take advantage of eigenvalues and eigenvectors properties of matrices that are associated with graphs. Instances of these matrices are the adjacency matrix and the Laplacian, among others. The interest for this application is to work on a graph that specifically represents a WDN. This is a complex network that is made by nodes corresponding to water sources and consumption points and links corresponding to pipes and valves. The aim is to face new challenges on urban water supply, ranging from computing approximations for network performance assessment to setting device positioning for efficient and automatic WDN division into district metered areas. It is consequently created a novel tool-set of graph spectral techniques adapted to improve main water management tasks and to simplify the identification of water losses through the definition of an optimal network partitioning. Two WDNs are used to analyze the proposed methodology. Firstly, the well-known network of C-Town is investigated for benchmarking of the proposed graph spectral framework. This allows for comparing the obtained results with others coming from previously proposed approaches in literature. The second case-study corresponds to an operational network. It shows the usefulness and optimality of the proposal to effectively manage a WDN.


Severe recession in 2010–12 drove the need for sovereign debt reduction in Greece, despite a massive cut in government spending. The 2012 restructuring cut privately-held debt by about 50 percent, but much debt was exempt (IMF, euro area governments, ECB), and new borrowing was needed to recapitalize banks. In December an official sector package of lower interest rates, buybacks, and remittance of ECB profits on Greek bonds boosted total relief by about one third. Nonetheless, even under favorable conditions the ratio of debt to GDP is unlikely to be much below 120 percent by 2020, limiting market access for a country that has restructured with deep haircuts. Although Greek borrowing needs are now covered for several years, more relief from the official sector thus seems likely to be needed in the future.


Looking Inside the Perpetual-Motion Machine: Job and Worker Flows in OECD Countries * There is an increasing interest in the process of job creation and destruction as well of hirings and separations. Many studies suggest that idiosyncratic firm-level characteristics shape both job and worker flows in a similar way in all countries. Others argue that cross-country differences in terms of gross job flows are minor. However, these statements are usually based on the comparison of national estimates, typically collected on the basis of different definitions and collection protocols. By contrast, in this paper, we use cross-country comparable data on both job and worker flows to examine key determinants of these flows and of their cross-country differences. We find that idiosyncratic firm (industry, firm age and size) and worker (age, gender, education) characteristics play an important role for both gross job and worker flows in all countries. Nevertheless, in contrast with part of the literature, we find that, even controlling for these factors, cross-country differences concerning both gross job and worker flows appear large and of a similar magnitude. Both job and worker flows in countries such as the United States and the United Kingdom exceed those in certain continental European countries by a factor of two. Moreover, the variation of worker flows across different dimensions is well explained by the variation of job flows, suggesting that, to a certain extent, the two flows can be used as substitutes in cross-country analysis. Consistently, churning flows, that is flows originating by firms churning workers and employees quitting and being replaced, display much less cross-country variation. JEL Classification: J23, J24, J63


Cross-modal similarity retrieval is a problem about designing a retrieval system that supports querying across content modalities, e.g., using an image to retrieve for texts. This paper presents a compact coding solution for efficient cross-modal retrieval, with a focus on the quantization approach which has already shown the superior performance over the hashing solutions in single-modal similarity retrieval. We propose a collective deep quantization (CDQ) approach, which is the first attempt to introduce quantization in end-to-end deep architecture for cross-modal retrieval. The major contribution lies in jointly learning deep representations and the quantizers for both modalities using carefully-crafted hybrid networks and well-specified loss functions. In addition, our approach simultaneously learns the common quantizer codebook for both modalities through which the cross-modal correlation can be substantially enhanced. CDQ enables efficient and effective cross-modal retrieval using inner product distance computed based on the common codebook with fast distance table lookup. Extensive experiments show that CDQ yields state of the art cross-modal retrieval results on standard benchmarks.


Local pH environment has been considered to be a potential biomarker for tumor diagnosis because solid tumors contain highly acidic environments. A pH-sensing nanoprobe based on surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) using nanostars under near-infrared excitation has been developed for potential biomedical applications. To theoretically investigate the effect of protonation state on SERS spectra of p-mercaptobenzoic acid (pMBA), we used the density functional theory (DFT) with the B3LYP functional to calculate Raman vibrational spectra of pMBA-Au/Ag complex in both protonated and deprotonated states. Vibrational spectral bands were assigned with DFT calculation and used to investigate SERS spectral changes observed from experiment when varying pH value between five and nine. The SERS peak position of pMBA at ~1580 cm−1 was identified to be a novel pH-sensing index, which has small but noticeable downshift with pH increase. This phenomenon is confirmed and well-explained with theoretical simulation. The study demonstrates that SERS is a sensitive tool to monitor minor structural changes due to local pH environment, and DFT calculations can be used to investigate Raman spectra changes associated with minor differences in molecular structure. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.


In the aftermath of the disruptions caused by hurricanes Katrina and Rita, natural gas prices rose to record-high levels. Because natural gas is an important energy source for the U.S. economy, there was widespread concern that these high prices might cause a significant slowing in the economy - especially among those manufacturing industries that heavily consume natural gas. The analysis presented in this article suggests that output is responsive to natural gas prices in some manufacturing sectors. Although perhaps significant, this result must be balanced against the finding that, when the analysis is extended to the macroeconomy (real gross domestic product growth), increases in crude oil prices significantly predict real gross domestic product growth, but natural gas prices do not.


Content Delivery Networks (CDNs) aim to improve network performance and protect against web attack traffic for their hosting websites. And the HTTP range request mechanism is majorly designed to reduce unnecessary network transmission. However, we find the specifications failed to consider the security risks introduced when CDNs meet range requests. In this study, we present a novel class of HTTP amplification attack, Range-based Amplification (RangeAmp) Attacks. It allows attackers to massively exhaust not only the outgoing bandwidth of the origin servers deployed behind CDNs but also the bandwidth of CDN surrogate nodes. We examined the RangeAmp attacks on 13 popular CDNs to evaluate the feasibility and real-world impacts. Our experiment results show that all these CDNs are affected by the RangeAmp attacks. We also disclosed all security issues to affected CDN vendors and already received positive feedback from 12 vendors.


Someparts of forest in southern Papua Indonesia is used as production forest.  Therefore, cutting is one of factors which has impact to population of trees.  Research was done to see recuperation of non-commercial species (Actinodaphne nitida, Blumeodendron sp.) in logged area.  Integral Projection Models (IPMs) were applied to analyze population dynamics of the 2 species.  Mortality, growth, fecundity, autocorrelation of growth were included in IPMs.  Data were collected from 3 permanent sample plots (3 ha) between 2005-2009 in PT. Tunas Sawaerma, Assiki, and Boven Digul.  Data showed a significance in autocorrelation of growth.  In this research, IPMs can be used to describe recuperation  of the tree species.  Population dynamics occur in which trees have the same survival probability among diameter size, while growth of trees and autocorrelations contribute to the change of population structure of trees.  Elastisity test of growth autocorrelation pointed out that A. nitida and Blumeodendron sp remain to grow faster over time and have a larger contribution to population growth than other species.  In addition, the more faster-growing individuals will have the more significant contributions for population growth rate of A. nitida and Blumeodendron sp.


It is tempting to think that visual long-term memory (VLTM) is composed of the visual features of objects we encounter. However, there is a long tradition in the memory literature of thinking of memories as inherently contextual. VLTM for objects may thus not only be based on visual features but also on non-visual features of the encoding context, such as the current task. We ran an fMRI study to examine this possibility and address two questions: (1) Are tasks previously performed on an object retrieved during subsequent object recognition? (2) How are such associations updated when we have to perform a new task on the object? In a first phase, observers were exposed to a sequence of objects, which were randomly assigned to one of two tasks: How easy would it be to draw the object? (artist task); How useful is the object? (function task). Some of these objects were presented again in a second phase with a different task: How natural is the object? (organic task). To address the first question above, we applied multivariate pattern analysis and found that, despite being irrelevant, the artist or function task initially performed on each object was automatically reactivated in the brain. Now, however, two tasks had been performed on the object, raising the question of which task(s) persisted in memory. We hypothesized that the reactivation of the first task during the organic task would trigger competition between these representations and result in the first task being weakened. Indeed, greater classifier evidence for the first task during the second phase was linked to an increased likelihood of later forgetting that this task had been performed on the object. These findings emphasize the contextual nature of visual memory and the role of competition-dependent learning in updating its contents. Meeting abstract presented at VSS 2015.


Electrical actuation of liquid droplets at the microscale offers promising applications in the fields of microfluidics and lab-on-a-chip devices. Much prior research has targeted the electrical actuation of electrically conducting liquid droplets; however, the actuation of dielectric droplets has remained relatively unexplored, despite the advantages associated with the use of a dielectric droplet. This paper presents modeling and experimental results on the electrical actuation of dielectric droplets between two flat plates. A first-order analytical model, based on the energy-minimization principle, is developed to estimate the electrical actuation force on a dielectric droplet as it moves between two flat plates. Two versions of this analytical model are benchmarked for their suitability and accuracy against a detailed numerical model. The actuation force prediction is then combined with available semi-analytical expressions for predicting the forces opposing droplet motion to develop a model that predicts transient droplet motion under electrical actuation. Electrical actuation of dielectric droplets is experimentally demonstrated by moving transformer oil droplets between two flat plates under the influence of an actuation voltage. Droplet velocities and their dependence on the plate spacing and the applied voltage are experimentally measured and showed reasonable agreement with predictions from the models developed.


Multiplex immunoassays range from small-scaled multiplex sandwich ELISAs in a planar or bead-based format to the more expanded antibody arrays employing direct sample labeling. The plethora of data generated from these arrays could be of great interest to understand a complex disorder such as endometriosis. Multiplex immunoassay analysis may provide information on disease pathology and may lead to improved, timely diagnosis. Until now, the use of multiplex immunoassays has been limited in endometriosis. With the constant development of multiplex technologies, future studies should focus on implementing these techniques, and combining them with multivariate statistical analysis. In this review, we provide an overview of multiplex immunoassay methods used in endometriosis studies and the data sets acquired by these methodologies. These data and future studies might provide novel insights for biomarker discovery and investigation of the pathogenesis in endometriosis.


The present-day Australian monsoon delivers substantial moisture to the northern regions of a predominantly arid continent. However, the pre-Quaternary history of the Australian monsoon is poorly constrained due to sparse and often poorly dated paleoclimate proxy evidence. Sedimentological and paleontological data suggest that warm, humid, and seasonal environments prevailed in central and north Australia during the Miocene, though it is unclear whether these were products of the Australian monsoon. We perform a series of sensitivity experiments using an atmospheric general circulation model, combined with an offl ine equilibrium vegetation model, to quantitatively constrain the areal extent of the Miocene monsoon. Our results suggest a weaker than modern monsoon climate during the Miocene. This result is insensitive to atmospheric CO 2 , although somewhat sensitive to vegetation interactions and the presumed distribution of inland water bodies. None of our Miocene experiments exhibit precipitation rates greater than modern over north Australia, in disagreement with paleoclimate record interpretations. Vegetation modeling indicates that inferred precipitation values from fossil fl ora and fauna could only support Miocene vegetation patterns if atmospheric CO 2 was twice the modern concentration. This suggests that elevated CO 2 was critical for sustaining Miocene vegetation.


Trypanosoma brucei is the parasite responsible of causing both human (sleeping sickness) and animal (nagana) African trypanosomiasis, diseases of medical and veterinary importance. The infection in cattle has a major impact on African economy, which limits the production of milk and meat. The life cycle of these parasites extracellular alternate between the salivary glands of the insect transmitter (tsetse fly) and the blood of the vertebrate (mammal), presenting different morphological stages: procyclic, epimastigote, metacyclic forms in the invertebrate, long-slender trypomastigotes and short-stumpy forms in the vertebrate. The TAs are extracellular microorganisms that multiply in the blood and the lymphatic system and are constantly exposed to the attack of the the immune system of the mammalian host. During the step prior to the entry into the host, the metacyclic parasites express a dense cover formed by the Variant Surface Glycoprotein (VSG), after entering to the vertebrate host they transform into a morphology that stays in the blood (bloodstream). The most important mechanism for the maintenance in the bloodstream is the switch of VSG through which the parasites change his coat regularly and liberate the VSG expressed at this time, which allows the evasion of the attack of the immune system of the vertebrate host (specifically humoral response). In addition to all these events, this pathogens have generated an activation of M1 dependent of IFN-γ; express proteins of resistance to factors of human serum, for example, SRA (serum resistance antigen) and TgsGP (T. b. gambiense-specific glycoprotein); GIP-VSG produce the activation of NF-κB and MAPK pathways and the production of pro-inflammatory molecules (TNF-α, IL-6, IL-12p40, and GM-CSF) that with IFN-γ activated macrophages type M1, promotes a series of pathologies as tissue damage and encephalitis that provoke destruction in the Central Nervous System (CNS); these are just some of the factors that support the development of the infection in mammals. The African trypanosomes (AT) have learned to survive the attack of the defense system of vertebrates, through many years of carrying out a host-parasite interaction extremely complex and dynamic. Throughout the life cycle, these parasites re-programed your metabolism in order to benefit from the nutrients available in the environment. This abilities has allowed these escape magicians advance effectively and successfully in the development of immune system evasion mechanisms, allowing manipulating cellular and humoral responses, which implies a spectacular equilibrium in the vector/parasite/host relationship that allows their survival in the mammal and leads to a happy term their cycle of transmission.