An acute asthmatic episode can occur following exercise and is termed exercise induced asthma (EIA). The purpose of this thesis was to investigate the prevalence, diagnosis, and treatment of EIA in elite British athletes. The addition of objective pulmonary function assessment to the criteria an athlete must submit to use inhaled 02-agonists at Olympic Games may result in a change in the prevalence of asthma within elite athletes. The purpose of study 1 was to compare the prevalence of asthma at the 2000 and 2004 Olympic Games in the Great British Olympic team (Team GB). The asthma prevalence of Team GB reported in 2000 (21.2%) was similar to the asthma prevalence reported in 2004 (20.7%). 13 out of 62 (21.0%) athletes, from 2004 Team GB with a previous diagnosis of asthma failed to present evidence of EIA. The overall asthma prevalence of Team GB remained unchanged between 2000 and 2004. Mid-expiratory airflow measurements may improve the diagnosis of EIA in elite athletes. Study 2 investigated the response of Forced Expiratory Flow at 50% vital capacity (FEFso) following eucapnic voluntary hyperpnoea (EVH) and exercise challenge, in elite athletes, as an adjunct to Forced Expiratory Volume in one second (FEVI). 66 male and 50 female athletes were tested for EIA. Sixty athletes demonstrated a fall in FEVI >10% leading to the diagnosis of EIA. Using the FEF50 criteria (1FEF50 >-26%) led to 21 (35%) asthmatic athletes receiving false negative diagnosis. The addition of FEF50 failed to enhance the diagnosis of EIA in elite athletes. It is unclear, between exercise and EVH challenges as to which one provides the greatest sensitivity and most suitable method of EIA diagnosis in elite athletes. Study 3 investigated the response of elite winter athletes to EVH and two exercise challenges (laboratory-based [LB] and sport-specific [SS]). 14 athletes from the British Short-track Speed Skating and Biathlon teams volunteered for the study. Ten athletes presented with a positive response to EVH (71%); of these, only 3 (21%) had a positive response to the SS challenge. No athletes had a positive test to the LB challenge. Our results suggest that the EVH challenge is more sensitive, compared with either LB or SS exercise challenge, to diagnose EIA in elite winter athletes. A limited number of studies exist examining the optimal pharmacotherapy for elite athletes with EIA. The purpose of study 4 was to examine the effects of fluticasone propionate and salmeterol in the control of EIA in athletes. Eight athletes were prescribed 200mcg fluticasone propionate (FLU), 50mcg Salmeterol (SAL), 250mcg fluticasone propionate and salmeterol in combination (FXS) or placebo (PLA), in a randomised double blind design. No significant (p=0.07) differences were observed in the FEV1 change (zFEV1) following EVH challenge between the 4 treatments. Baseline eNO for both FXS (20.3+_8.2ppb) and FLU (19.7+_9.2 ppb) were significantly (p=0.02) lower than SAL (39.3+_26.7ppb) or PLA (46.3+_26.8ppb). Four athletes were prescribed FLU, 2 athletes were prescribed FXS and 2 athletes were prescribed SAL. The results of this study demonstrate the heterogeneity of response in elite athletes with EIA to the three medication regimes employed. Therefore, suggesting differences in the pathogenesis of EIA in this population. This thesis is the first to investigate EIA within elite British athletes. The prevalence of asthma within elite athletes is greater than that of the British general population. Optimal EIA diagnostic methods should include EVH challenges using FEV1 as the criterion measurement. Treatment for athletes with EIA should be taken on an individual basis due to the heterogeneity of response to medications that attenuate EIA in elite athletes.


In March 2000, European leaders met in Lisbon, Portugal, to consider the state of the European economy. While there had been economic growth in Europe in the 1990s, it had been consistently lower than that of the European Union's ("EU" or "Union") main competitors, with unemployment levels remaining stubbornly high. Determined to blaze a new course in Europe, Heads of State and Government announced that "the Union has [today] set itself a new strategic goal for the next decade: to become the most competitive and dynamic knowledge-based economy in the world, capable of sustainable growth with more and better jobs and greater social cohesion." These conclusions on economic reform contained a range of policies to stimulate key sectors of the European economy. Delivering this major goal would mean that the EU needed to equip itself with efficient, transparent, and above all, integrated European financial markets. To achieve this, European leaders called for the implementation of the European Commission's 1999 Financial Services Action Plan by 2005. This target was as ambitious as it was essential, recognizing the fundamental strategic importance of integrated European financial markets for the whole European economy. The economic benefits of improving companies' access to investment capital and encouraging investors in such an integrated market were seen as central to its achievement. Attention has focused on the importance of achieving higher levels of harmonization of regulations in securities markets. Although turnover on European stock exchanges reached record levels at the end of the 1990s, capital markets remained regulated by essentially outmoded EU legislation, some of which dates back two decades. This is one of the main reasons why levels of capitalization of European stock exchanges have remained considerably below those of the U.S. markets. And despite the 1992 deadline for completion of the EU's internal market and the fact that many Member States had modernized their market regulations in the 1990s, little had changed at the European level to create a true level playing field. Against this background, and in order to achieve the ambitious goal set at the Lisbon summit, in July 2000, the Council of Economic and Finance Ministers established a high level group of independent figures, the Committee of Wise Men, chaired by Baron Alexandre Lamfalussy, to develop fresh thinking on the reform of the regulatory process for securities. The European Institutions in the course of 2001 endorsed their proposals, and their application is now being extended from securities to all financial services sectors in the Union. REGULATING FINANCIAL SERVICES IN EUROPE: A NEW APPROACH


While three-quarters of the population in Ireland still declare to be Catholic in census data collection, the position and role of the Catholic Church has changed dramatically. A fruitful relationship between the state, church, and nation that developed in the 19th century became meaningfully embedded in social and political relations from the 1920s. Involvement of the church in the running of education, health, and welfare meant that its "moral monopoly" extended into both the institutional and individual spheres of life. The Irish Republic relied on the church organizations and personnel to provide education and guidance in absence of the state's infrastructure and Will to consolidate the new political entity around a state-building project based on inclusivity, reciprocity, and diversity. The confessional state that emerged with its own constitution favored one religion over others, economic stagnation over progress, and patriarchal social values over equality. The internal processes of social change and the external impetus for economic development sent Ireland into modernization and changes in attitudes and behaviors. It became obvious that the church did not hold a monopoly on truth and that accountability of the relations between the state and the church should be called into question. Economic prosperity propelled Ireland into the world of consumerism, materialism, and instant gratification, teaching a new generation that religion helps keep your parents appeased and at times can provide solace, and that the Catholic Church is just an institution that seems to be around but nobody is quite sure what its role is. The vicariousness of the church coupled with cultural Catholicism makes the Ireland of today more open to change.


This study analyzes what "emergency sources" (authorities, emergency managers, and experts) expect from journalists during a disaster, using a mixed-method approach with six focus groups and a survey of 166 official Chilean sources. Based on the first three levels of the hierarchy of influences model, we explore how they perceive journalists' roles and performance when covering disasters. The results suggest that emergency sources' evaluations, while affected by a combination of individual, routine, and organizational variables, are mostly shaped by sources' direct and mediated experience with journalists. Thus, a more fluid relationship between journalists and emergency sources, as well as more communication experience by sources, could lead to a better understanding between both groups, which, ultimately, may lead to delivering more accurate and timely information.


This is a submission for the doctoral consortium at NorDes 2011. The research described herein focuses on how existing design tools and techniques need to be appropriated when used in a new context – in this case service design. It is argued that the nature of services poses new challenges for designers. A theoretical introduction to these challenges is given, presenting a view of service design as the intersection between the user-centred design tradition and thoughts on service from marketing and management. The specific challenges in conducting stakeholder research for service design are introduced. The research objectives of the PhD candidate are given. The findings which were used for the licentiate thesis of the author are presented; they focus on visualisations for service design. The licentiate thesis confirms the view that visualisations are a crucial part of service design practice, but also shows that many visualisations primarily highlight those features of service which have been the traditional focus of design and lack in representing other service traits. Finally, the planned direction of the continued research is highlighted.


Mid-ocean ridges account for more than 75% of the annual magmatic output of planet earth and are a critical piece of the plate tectonic model. Understanding the mantle melting process beneath ridges is essential for discerning basic physical and chemical processes of the earth. For instance, ridges play an intrinsic role in the geochemical flux balance for many elements on the earth and provide a tectonic framework for investigating the physical process of solid mantle flow. Ridges are also the simplest tectonic regime to study the mantle melting process because interactions with the lithosphere are thought to be minimal. Yet major questions remain about the rates and timescales of melt transport and solid mantle flow. Because uranium series (U-series) nuclides are sensitive to processes occurring at timescales similar to their half-lives (e.g., Allegre and Condomines 1976; McKenzie 1985), U-series disequilibria can provide constraint on the velocities of ascending melts and upwelling solid mantle as well as constraint on the depth of melting beneath mid-ocean ridges.

This chapter begins with a brief introduction to the most important decay series nuclides for studying melting processes. Next, I discuss analytical issues involved with measuring U-series disequilibria in mid-ocean ridge basalts (MORB), including sample preparation and instrumental techniques. I summarize the observations of U-series disequilibria in MORB to date and applications of U-series data to geochronology of MORB. Geochemical data bearing on the issue of secondary contamination are used to argue that the majority of U-series disequilibria observed in MORB reflect the melting process and do not reflect alteration processes. Given the observation of disequilibria, geochemical models for MORB genesis are described and assessed for their ability to realistically explain the disequilibria observations. Finally, I discuss the interpretations of the combined U-series models and observations and relate these to constraints on MORB genesis …


Background A novel oncogenetic clinic was established in 2002 at the Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust offering advice and specialist follow-up for families with a germline mutation in BRCA1 or BRCA2. The remit of this multidisciplinary clinic, staffed by individuals in both oncology and genetics, is to provide individualised screening recommendations, support in decision making, risk reducing strategies, cascade testing, and an extensive research portfolio. Methods A retrospective analysis was performed to evaluate uptake of genetic testing, risk reducing surgery and cancer prevalence in 346 BRCA1/BRCA2 families seen between January 1996 and December 2006. Results 661 individuals attended the clinic and 406 mutation carriers were identified; 85.8% mutation carriers have chosen to attend for annual follow-up. 70% of mutation carriers elected for risk reducing bilateral salpingo-oophorectomy (RRBSO). 32% of unaffected women chose risk reducing bilateral mastectomy. 32% of women with breast cancer chose contralateral risk reducing mastectomy at time of diagnosis. Some women took over 8 years to decide to have surgery. 91% of individuals approached agreed to participate in research programmes. Interpretation A novel specialist clinic for BRCA1/2 mutation carriers has been successfully established. The number of mutation positive families is increasing. This, and the high demand for RRBSO in women over 40, is inevitably going to place an increasing demand on existing health resources. Our clinic model has subsequently been adopted in other centres and this will greatly facilitate translational studies and provide a healthcare structure for management and follow-up of such people who are at a high cancer risk.


In a now-classic paper, Nancy Cartwright argued that the Humean conception of causation as mere regular co-occurrence is too weak to make sense of our everyday and scientific practices. Specifically she claimed that in order to understand our reasoning about, and uses of, effective strategies, we need a metaphysically stronger notion of causation and causal laws than Humeanism allows. Cartwright's arguments were formulated in the framework of probabilistic causation, and it is precisely in the domain of (objective) probabilities that I am interested in defending a form of Humeanism. In this paper I will unpack some examples of effective strategies and discuss how well they fit the framework of causal laws and criteria such as CC from Cartwright's and others' works on probabilistic causality. As part of this discussion, I will also consider the concept or concepts of objective probability presupposed in these works. I will argue that Cartwright's notion of a nomological machine, or a mechanism as defined by Stuart Glennan, is better suited for making sense of effective strategies, and therefore that a metaphysically primitive notion of causal law (or singular causation, or capacity, as Cartwright argues in (1989)) is not – here, at least – needed. These conclusions, as well as the concept of objective probabilities I defend, are largely in harmony with claims Cartwright defends in The Dappled World. My discussion aims, thus, to bring out into the open how far Cartwright's current views are from a radically anti-Humean, causal-fundamentalist picture.


In this paper we investigate iterative source-channel
decoding for robust JPEG coded images transmission over noisy channels. Huffman codes used as the variable-length coding scheme in JPEG coding can be represented by an irregular trellis structure proposed by Balakirsky (1997). State transition probabilities can be derived from the irregular trellis and can be used as a priori information to help iterative decoding between channel and source a posteriori probability (APP) decoders. Iterative decoding of JPEG coded images does not perform well due to the poor distance property of the original JPEG Huffman codes. In
this paper, we proposed a symmetric reversible variable length code with free distance df = 2 which can dramatically improve the system performance when iterative decoding is adopted. A maximum coding gain of 4 dB was observed from the simulation results. Subjective results in terms of reconstructed images were also presented


A revisionist view of Bartolome de las Casas as the 'author' of the introduction of African slaves to the Indies/Americas in the early 16th century. The article details Las Casas' thinking and actions and concludes that while Las Casas did—among other contemporaries—suggest the importation of African slaves to lift the burden of oppression off the Amerindians, his perspective and view was altered radically in the last third of his life. The article explores the meaning of African slavery in the context of the place and time where Las Casas grew up—Andalucia in southern Spain—where slavery was quite different from the way it developed on the plantations of the Americas. And the article relates how Las Casas' theoretical and practical defense of Amerindians eventually was extended by Las Casas' into a defense of liberty for all men, including African slaves.


Whereas a large majority of universities have been proactive about claiming ownership of intellectual property such as patents or teaching materials, only a small percentage have been similarly assertive about copyright. However, amidst continued debate over the affordability of and access to scholarly communication, what practical attempts have been made to retain copyright within the academy rather than assign it to publishers? Elizabeth Gadd has examined copyright policies at 81 UK universities and found that, while a majority still relinquish copyright in scholarly works, an encouraging 20% of university policies sought to share rights with academic staff through licensing. Moreover, the development of a UK equivalent to 'Harvard-style' open access policies should help further coordinate efforts to retain copyright within the academy.


What would be the aggregate effects of adopting a more generous and universal childcare subsidy program in the U.S.? We answer this question in a life-cycle equilibrium model with heterogeneous married and single households with three key features: (i) joint labor-supply of married households along extensive and intensive margins; (ii) heterogeneity in terms of the presence of children across households; (iii) skill losses of females associated to non participation. We find that subsidies have substantial effects on female labor supply and lead to a large reallocation of hours worked from males to females. Fully subsidized childcare available to all households leads to longrun increases in the participation of married females and total hours worked by about 10.1% and 1.0%, respectively, and to a decline of male hours by 1.5%. There are large differences across households in welfare gains, as a small number of households –poorer households with children – gain significantly while others lose. Welfare gains of newborn households amount to 1.9%.


In addition to scaling semiconductor devices down to their physical limit, novel devices show enhanced functionality compared to conventional CMOS. At advanced technology nodes, many devices exhibit ambipolar behavior, i.e., they show n- and p-type characteristics simultaneously. This phenomenon can be tamed using double-gate structures. In this paper, we present a complete framework relying on Double-Gate-all-around Vertically stacked NanoWire FETs (DG-NWFETs). Such device enables a compact realization of arithmetic logic functions and presents unprecedented interest for structured ASIC applications.


Continuous Integration is an Agile Practice for the continuous integration of new Source Code into the Code Base including the automated compile, build and running of tests. From traditional Quality Assurance we know Software Metrics as a very good approach to measure Software Quality. Combining both there is a promising approach to control and ensure the internal Software Quality. This paper introduces the 3C Approach, which is an extension to the Agile Practice Continuous Integration: It adds Continuous Measurement and Continuous Improvement as subsequent Activities to CI and establishes Metric-based Quality-Gates for an Agile Quality Assurance. It was developed and proven in an Agile Maintenance and Evolution project for the Automotive Industry at T-Systems International - a large German ICT company. Within the project the approach was used for a (legacy) Java-based Web Application including the use of Open Source Tools from the Java Eco-System. But the approach is not limited to these technical boundaries as similar tools are available also for other technical platforms.


Amyloid imaging plays an important role in the research and diagnosis of dementing disorders. Substantial variation in quantitative methods to measure brain amyloid burden exists in the field. The aim of this work is to investigate the impact of methodological variations to the quantification of amyloid burden using data from the Dominantly Inherited Alzheimer's Network (DIAN), an autosomal dominant Alzheimer's disease population. Cross-sectional and longitudinal [11C]-Pittsburgh Compound B (PiB) PET imaging data from the DIAN study were analyzed. Four candidate reference regions were investigated for estimation of brain amyloid burden. A regional spread function based technique was also investigated for the correction of partial volume effects. Cerebellar cortex, brain-stem, and white matter regions all had stable tracer retention during the course of disease. Partial volume correction consistently improves sensitivity to group differences and longitudinal changes over time. White matter referencing improved statistical power in the detecting longitudinal changes in relative tracer retention; however, the reason for this improvement is unclear and requires further investigation. Full dynamic acquisition and kinetic modeling improved statistical power although it may add cost and time. Several technical variations to amyloid burden quantification were examined in this study. Partial volume correction emerged as the strategy that most consistently improved statistical power for the detection of both longitudinal changes and across-group differences. For the autosomal dominant Alzheimer's disease population with PiB imaging, utilizing brainstem as a reference region with partial volume correction may be optimal for current interventional trials. Further investigation of technical issues in quantitative amyloid imaging in different study populations using different amyloid imaging tracers is warranted.


The human gammaherpesviruses, Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) and Kaposi's sarcoma–associated herpesvirus (KSHV), are both associated with tumors. Standard antiviral therapies are ineffective at treating these tumors. A serine/threonine kinase important for viral replication is conserved across the herpesviruses. Expression of the KSHV protein kinase in transgenic mice under the control of a ubiquitin promoter was associated with B cell lymphoproliferative disease and lymphoma. If the viral protein kinase is important in the pathogenesis of KSHV lymphoproliferative disease or lymphoma, the kinase may present a very good target for pharmacologic therapies.


In this article I review Borrowing Together: Microfinance and Cultivating Social Ties by Becky Yang Hsu. Introducing the book I analyse the emergence of the microfinance project and the contested debates around its efficacy in the light of backlash resulting from the suicides of overindebted borrowers in India. I contextualise the book through critical socio-legal and transnational legal pluralist scholarship which focuses on the production of norms by private actors, the social and public law consequences of these norms and the growing inter-connectivity of relations. Against this background, I show how Hsu's rich ethnography of two field sites in rural China exposes how the primary drivers for loan repayment are the informal social norms of personhood, morality and social relations that are grounded in a holistic Chinese understanding of personhood called 'Guanxi' in Chinese. A 'Guanxi' typology of personhood connected to material and emotional components and personal relations conflicts with the individualistic typology of personhood upon which the dominant 'Grameen' economic model for group lending microfinance has been based, with the backing of economists like Stiglitz. Hsu shows how examining loan repayment through the lens of the 'living' Guanxi behaviour she observes within her field sites tell us much more about the use, operation and effect of microfinance than a reading of the loan repayment data would expose. In this way, Hsu captivatingly navigates how local 'social' ties and behavioural norms impact upon what people did with microfinance and are thus directly relevant to the development outcomes within her field sites. Her work adds much needed insight into the current work of scholars and development practitioners concerned with understanding where microfinance went wrong and what can be done about it in the context of the project's resurgence.


The geographical distribution and persistence of regional/local unemployment rates in heterogeneous economies (such as Germany) have been, in recent years, the subject of various theoretical and empirical studies. Several researchers have shown an interest in analysing the dynamic adjustment processes of unemployment and the average degree of dependence of the current unemployment rates or gross domestic product from the ones observed in the past. In this paper, we present a new econometric approach to the study of regional unemployment persistence, in order to account for spatial heterogeneity and/or spatial autocorrelation in both the levels and the dynamics of unemployment. First, we propose an econometric procedure suggesting the use of spatial filtering techniques as a substitute for fixed effects in a panel estimation framework. The spatial filter computed here is a proxy for spatially distributed region-specific information (e.g., the endowment of natural resources, or the size of the 'home market') that is usually incorporated in the fixed effects parameters. The advantages of our proposed procedure are that the spatial filter, by incorporating region-specific information that generates spatial autocorrelation, frees up degrees of freedom, simultaneously corrects for time-stable spatial autocorrelation in the residuals, and provides insights about the spatial patterns in regional adjustment processes. We present several experiments in order to investigate the spatial pattern of the heterogeneous autoregressive parameters estimated for unemployment data for German NUTS-3 regions. We find widely heterogeneous but generally high persistence in regional unemployment rates.


Poetry is formed as a poet's intellectual coordination in direct connection with society and its progresses. Thus, the analysis of poetry can provide a comprehensive representation of the society and its developments. Saeb Tabrizi is one of the poets of the Safavid period who is known as a prominent representative of the Indian style. The period of the Safavid rule (1355-1907 AH) was a period of ebb and flow in the intellectual and artistic life of the Iranian society. The issue that can be raised in this regard is how the developments of this period were reflected in the poetry of Saeb Tabrizi. This research seeks to answer the mentioned problem by relying on analytical and descriptive methods and library data. The research findings indicate that Indian style poets experienced two diverse stages in their lives; regarding the first stage; whilst bearing with poverty and financial incapacity, they composed poems in their homeland, and in the second phase, with the wealth accumulated from the support of the courtiers of India, they expressed poetic fantasies in a new and extraneous means. Saeb is one of the Indian style poets who has spent some time of his poetic life in India by emigrating; Therefore, "homeland" and related concepts in his poetry can demonstrate how the poet views the cultural, social and geographical environment of his time; moreover, the reasons for his immigration to India can be understood amongst the verses of his poetry. Alternatively, his poems are full of concepts of traditional arts that can be a manifestation of the artistic prosperity of the Safavid era. Research aims: 1. Investigating the role of social and cultural space in the concept of homeland and traditional arts in the poetry of Saeb Tabrizi 2. Drawing different dimensions of the concept of homeland in Saeb Tabrizi's poetry Research questions: 1. What effect has the cultural, social and geographical atmosphere had on the poetic atmosphere of Saeb Tabrizi? 2. What is Saeb Tabrizi Saeb's attitude about homeland and exile?


From the bestselling author of 'The Queen's Conjuror', comes the story of Nicholas Culpeper - legendary rebel, radical, Puritan, and author of the great 'Herbal'. This is a powerful history of medicine's first freedom fighter set in London during Britain's age of revolution. In the mid-17th century, England was visited by the four horsemen of the apocalypse: a civil war which saw levels of slaughter not matched until the Somme, famine in a succession of failed harvests that reduced peasants to 'anatomies', epidemics to rival the Black Death in their enormity, and infant mortality rates that left childless even women who had borne eight or nine children. In the midst of these terrible times came Nicholas Culpeper's 'Herbal' - one of the most popular and enduring books ever published. Culpeper was a virtual outcast from birth. Rebelling against a tyrannical grandfather and the prospect of a life in the church, he abandoned his university education after a doomed attempt at elopement. Disinherited, he went to London, where he was to find his vocation in instigating revolution. London's medical regime was then in the grip of the College of Physicians, a powerful body personified in the 'immortal' William Harvey, anatomist, royal physician and discoverer of the circulation of the blood. Working in the underground world of religious sects, secret printing presses and unlicensed apothecary shops, Culpeper challenged this stronghold at the time it was reaching the very pinnacle of its power - and in the process helped spark the revolution that toppled a monarchy. In a spellbinding narrative of impulse, romance and heroism, Benjamin Woolley vividly recreates these momentous struggles and the roots of today's hopes and fears about the power of medical science, professional institutions and government. 'The Herbalist' tells the story of a medical rebel who took on the authorities and paid the price.


How successful is Dickens in his portrayal of women? Dickens has been represented (along with William Blake and D.H. Lawrence) as one who championed the life of the emotions often associated with the "feminine." Yet some of his most important heroines are totally submissive and docile. Dickens, of course, had to accept the conventions of his time. It is obvious, argues Holbrook, that Dickens idealized the father-daughter relationship, and indeed, any such relationship that was unsexual, like that of Tom Pinch and his sisterbut why? Why, for example, is the image of woman so often associated with death, as in Great Expectations? Dickens's own struggles over relationships with women have been documented, but much less has been said about the unconscious elements behind these problems. Using recent developements in psychoanalytic object-relations theory, David Holbrook offers new insight into the way in which the novels of Dickensparticularly Bleak House, Little Dorrit, and Great Expectationsboth uphold emotional needs and at the same time represent the limits of his view of women and that of his time.


The reverse transcriptase inhibitor efavirenz is currently used at a fixed dose of 600 mg/d. However, dosage individualization based on plasma concentration monitoring might be indicated. This study aimed to assess the efavirenz pharmacokinetic profile and interpatient versus intrapatient variability in patients who are positive for human immunodeficiency virus, to explore the relationship between drug exposure, efficacy, and central nervous system toxicity and to build up a Bayesian approach for dosage adaptation.


Biodiversity Patterns on an Inshore to Offshore Gradient Using Metabarcoding and Barcoding Molecular Tools Rodrigo Villalobos Vazquez de la Parra It has been estimated that coral reefs shelter 830 000 species. Well-studied biodiversity patterns provide tools for better representation of species in marine protected areas. A cross-shelf gradient in biodiversity exists for fishes, corals, and macroalgae. Here, an inshore to offshore gradient in biodiversity on the Saudi Arabian coast of the Red Sea was sampled using Autonomous Reef Monitoring Structures (ARMS) with barcoding and metabarcoding techniques. It was hypothesized that differences in community structure would be driven by an increase in habitat area. The difference was attributed to the greater accumulation of sediments close to shore that increases the area habitable for sediment dwelling organisms and favors macroalgal cover. Macroalgae are inhabited by a greater number of species than live coral. Only 10% of the sequences of the barcoded fraction and <1% of the metabarcoded fraction had a BLAST hit on the NCBI database with a previously identified species sequence. In addition, the rarefaction curves for all fractions did not plateau. The ARMS community composition changed from inshore to offshore and was significantly correlated with the percentage of algal and bryozoan plate cover. The differences in community composition were related to changes in habitat but not to sediments retrieved from the ARMS.


energy efficiency in railway operation has been a topic of high interest for years. lowering energy costs can make railway operation not only more sustainable, but also more competitive towards other modalities. energy efficiency can be reached in two ways: system efficiency and operational efficiency. Innovation can be found in combining the right system measures with the right operational measures. Introducing the right system measures can even lead to energy efficiency independent of operational strategies, such as coasting and regenerative braking. rail infra providers struggle with the question which innovations – system, operational or both – will bring them closer to their targets. To determine which measures will contribute best, the authors developed a new universal method based on energy efficiency at three levels: individual rolling stock performance, rolling stock performance in networks and operational strategies. The authors used this three-level method to study the energy efficiency effect of a system change from the current 1,500 V Dc to a 3 kV Dc traction power supply system, including operational strategies. The results of the study revealed that in the Netherlands this system change will result in a return on investment (rOI) within 15 years and a reduction of energy consumption ranging up to 20%.


The osteology of Ornithosuchus is described in some detail. This study is largely based on material discussed by previous workers, but also takes into account specimens hitherto undescribed. It is considered that the species O. taylori Broom 1913 is invalid, being based on larger individuals of the form previously named O. woodwardi by Newton (1894). Furthermore, evidence is presented to show that specimens previously described by Huxley (1877) and Walker (1961) as Dasygnathus longidens are also referable to Ornithosuchus. It is concluded that but one species is present in the material, the correct name for which is Ornithosuchus longidens (Huxley). At least eleven individuals are present with skulls ranging from about 50 to 450 mm in length. Observations on the smaller members of this series suggest that changes in the shape and proportions of the skull took place with growth in a similar manner to those seen in living crocodiles. In the light of new information concerning the osteology of Ornithosuchus it is considered that this reptile is a primitive carnosaur, occupying a position very close to the ancestry of the Jurassic and Cretaceous members of this group. An examination of descriptions and figures of Triassic reptiles referred by von Huene (1932) and later authors to the Carnosauria has led to the conclusion that the great bulk of this material is more properly allocated to the Prosauropoda, and that the only Triassic carnosaurs known at the present time, apart from Ornithosuchus, are Teratosaurus and Sinosaurus, these two names being here used in a restricted sense. It is suggested that Ornithosuchus is close to the common ancestry of both the Megalosauridae and the Tyrannosauridae, and the derivation of the skull patterns of these forms from that of Ornithosuchus is discussed. Additional fenestrations marginal to the preorbital fossa and in the surangular of advanced carnosaurs are held to be related to the development of the pterygoid musculature rather than to the need to lighten the skull. In the course of a brief review of the Carnosauria the view is put forward that Acrocanthosaurus is a Lower Cretaceous representative of the tyrannosaur group, using this term in a broad sense, and is perhaps related to the Cenomanian Spinosaurus and the Wealden Altispinax. As a result of examination of English megalosaurian material, the name Eustreptospondylus oxoniensis gen. et sp.nov. is proposed for the Oxford specimen previously known as 'Streptospondylus' cuvieri, and Metriacanthosaurus gen.nov. for Megalosaurus parkeri. The incomplete cranium from Dives figured by Piveteau (1923) is made the type of a new species, E. divesensis, to which certain other carnosaurian material from Normandy is provisionally allocated. Following Chakravarti (1935), the endoskeletal elements included by Matley (1923) in the type material of the Indian nodosaur Lametasaurus are held to belong to one or other of the two carnosaurs Indosuchus and Indosaurus, but the numerous scutes are not thought to be carnosaurian and the name Lametasaurus is here restricted to them. It is suggested that Indosuchus from the ? Turonian is a tyrannosaund. On the other hand Ceratosaurus and Proceratosaurus are regarded as coelurosaurs. A modified classification of the Infra-order Carnosauria is given, in which two main groups are recognized; Superfamily Megalosauroidea to include the Megalosauridae, and Superfamily Tyrannosauroidea to include the Ornithosuchidae (restricted), Spinosauridae and Tyrannosauridae.


In this article, an efficient rule-based clustering algorithm for static dataflow subgraphs in a dynamic dataflow graph is presented. The clustered static dataflow actors are quasi-statically scheduled, in such a way that the global performance in terms of latency and throughput is improved compared to a dynamically scheduled execution, while avoiding the introduction of deadlocks as generated by naive static scheduling approaches. The presented clustering algorithm outperforms previously published approaches by a faster computation and more compact representation of the derived quasi-static schedule. This is achieved by a rule-based approach, which avoids an explicit enumeration of the state space. A formal proof of the correctness of the presented clustering approach is given. Experimental results show significant improvements in both, performance and code size, compared to a state-of-the-art clustering algorithm.


An Introduction to Bibliometrics: New Development and Trends provides a comprehensible, readable and easy to read introduction to bibliometrics. Importantly, the book surveys the latest developments of bibliometrics (such as altmetrics, etc.) and how the field is likely to change over the next decade. In the literature, bibliometrics is generally discussed from one of two perspectives: (1) Purely mathematical/statistical or (2) Its sociological implications. Both approaches are very far from how most users want to apply bibliometrics. This book fills that need by providing tactics on how bibliometrics can be applied to their sphere of scientific activity.Provides readers with an understanding of bibliometric indicators, including their background and significance, classification in quantitative performance, and an evaluation of science and researchIncludes an overview of the most important indicators, their areas of application, and where and when they should and should not be usedDiscusses future trends in the quantitative performance evaluation of scientific research


We announce confirmation of Kepler-418b, one of two proposed planets in this system. This is the first confirmation of an exoplanet based primarily on the transit color signature technique. We used the Kepler public data archive combined with multicolor photometry from the Gran Telescopio de Canarias and radial velocity follow-up using FIES at the Nordic Optical Telescope for confirmation. We report a confident detection of a transit color signature that can only be explained by a compact occulting body, entirely ruling out a contaminating eclipsing binary, a hierarchical triple, or a grazing eclipsing binary. Those findings are corroborated by our radial velocity measurements, which put an upper limit of ~1 Mjup on the mass of Kepler-418b. We also report that the host star is significantly blended, confirming the ~10% light contamination suspected from the crowding metric in the Kepler light curve measured by the Kepler team. We report detection of an unresolved light source that contributes an additional ~40% to the target star, which would not have been detected without multicolor photometric analysis. The resulting planet-star radius ratio is 0.110 +/- 0.0025, more than 25% more than the 0.087 measured by Kepler, leading to a radius of 1.20 +/- 0.16 Rjup instead of the 0.94 Rjup measured by the Kepler team. This is the first confirmation of an exoplanet candidate based primarily on the transit color signature, demonstrating that this technique is viable from ground for giant planets. It is particularly useful for planets with long periods such as Kepler-418b, which tend to have long transit durations. Additionally, multicolor photometric analysis of transits can reveal unknown stellar neighbors and binary companions that do not affect the classification of the transiting object but can have a very significant effect on the perceived planetary radius.


Depression and substance abuse has on the increase all over the world. The poor and the rich are also involved in this dangerous habit that has impact not only on reproductive health but also has an impact on family, society, increase in health care expense and increased criminal activity. Health care providers have more concerned with treating the victims and less concerned on its prevention. Pregnant women beara greater brunt and there has adverse pregnancy outcome. Low birth weight, preterm labor, increased in miscarriage and raised perinatal mortality has some of the adverse effects. Children of such parents have more likely to inherit this bad trait. Children living in abusive homes where drugs and alcohol abuse occur simultaneously has often deprived of more than just the basics of food and shelter. Depression has, "Any act on the partof the husband, partner or family which causes physical, mental, social or psychological trauma to the woman and preventsher from developing her personality." Reason for the increasein depression violence has; urbanization, industrialization, growth of urban slums, co-education and co-working in offices and factories, modern movies, television, obscene and pornographic literature and decreasing religious restrictions.


BACKGROUND
There is considerable variation in alcohol use and problems across the United States, suggesting that systematic regional differences might contribute to alcohol involvement. Several neighborhood contextual factors may be important aspects of this "alcohol environment."

METHODS
Participants were 15,197 young adults (age 18 to 26) from Wave III of the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health, a nationally representative U.S. survey. Measures of past-year alcohol use and problems were obtained via structured in-home interviews. Tract-level neighborhood contextual factors (density of on- and off-premises alcohol outlets, neighborhood disadvantage, rural vs. urban residence) were derived from census indicators and geocoded state-level alcohol outlet licenses. Multivariate logistic regression, ordered logistic regression, or negative binomial regression models, including age, sex, race, and household income as covariates, were fit to examine the relation of the neighborhood contextual factors with alcohol use and problems.

RESULTS
The most consistent finding across 4 of the 5 measures of alcohol involvement was their association with neighborhood advantage; the active ingredient underlying this effect was primarily the proportion of educated residents in the neighborhood. The densities of alcohol outlets were associated with any alcohol use-they were not associated with binge drinking or alcohol problems, nor could they explain any of the neighborhood advantage effects. The influence of alcohol outlet densities on alcohol involvement did not differ for those above or below the legal age to purchase alcohol. Living in a rural versus an urban neighborhood was associated with a different alcohol use pattern characterized by a lower likelihood of any drinking, but among those who drank, consuming more alcohol per occasion.

CONCLUSIONS
Living in a more advantaged and educated urban neighborhood with greater densities of bars and restaurants is associated with greater alcohol involvement among 18- to 26-year-olds in the United States.


A rabbit antiserum developed against purified rat liver daunorubicin-binding protein of M(r) 54,000 (DNR-BP54) cross-reacted with a mouse protein of the same molecular weight. This protein was expressed in the liver and several other organs of mice. A series of tumors and cell lines tested for the presence of the protein were negative. By immunocytochemistry, we found that DNR-BP54 was abundantly expressed in the cytoplasm of normal hepatocytes but was expressed at much lower levels in urethane-induced mouse liver tumors. By immunoscreening of a mouse liver cDNA library, we cloned the cDNA coding for DNR-BP54 and we found that this protein is aldehyde dehydrogenase-2 (EC 188.8.131.52). This result was confirmed by the dehydrogenase activity found in pure preparations of DNR-BP54 from normal rat and mouse livers, assayed with acetaldehyde as substrate and NAD as cofactor. The enzyme activity was inhibited by daunorubicin. The inhibition was found to be competitive with respect to NAD.


BACKGROUND
Sub-Saharan Africa has a disproportionate burden of disease and an extreme shortage of health workers. There are already too few doctors to train doctors in specialities and sub-specialties. E-health is seen as a possible solution through distance education, telemedicine, and computerized health information systems but there are few people trained in e-health. We describe 12 years of experience at the University of KwaZulu-Natal (UKZ-N) in education and training in postgraduate medical disciplines, medical informatics, and telemedicine.

MEDICAL EDUCATION
Videoconferencing of seminars and grand rounds to regional training hospitals commenced in 2001 and has grown to 40 h of interactive conferencing taking place weekly during academic terms involving over 33,000 participants in 2010. Videoconferenced sessions are directly recorded to DVD and DVDs are sent to other medical schools in Africa that do not have the infrastructure to directly connect. E-HEALTH EDUCATION: Students and academic staff were initially sent to the United States for training in medical informatics and workshops were held in South Africa for people from sub-Saharan Africa. This led to the development of postgraduate academic programs in medical informatics and telemedicine at UKZ-N. African students were then brought to UKZ-N for training. The model was changed from UKZ-N to students and staff based at their home universities with the aim of building capacity in the staff at partner institutions so that they can in time offer their own e-health academic programs.

CONCLUSIONS
The need for capacity development in all aspects of e-health in sub-Saharan Africa is great and innovative solutions are required.


Perovskite-type (ABO3) relaxor ferroelectric crystals have perhaps the most simplest and at the same time the most puzzling structure.
Relaxor ferroelectrics are a special type of ferroelectrics possessing remarkably high dielectric permittivity, electrostrictive coefficients, and electrooptical constants related to the complex nanoscale structure of this type of materials.
These properties open a wide field of applications.
Thus, it is of great significance to understand the atomistic mechanism that tailors the desired properties.
Pb-based B-site complex perovskite-type materials commonly show relaxor behavior, which has been attributed to the existence of dynamic polar nanoregions, associated with local electric and/or elastic fields triggered by substitutional disorder. Recently long-range anti-ferrodistortive order has been detected at pressures up to 10GPa, which at ambient conditions coexists with the polar order on the mesoscopic scale. This may also be an important factor for the outstanding relaxor properties.\par

The objective of this study was to analyze in detail the role of the coexisting polar and anti-ferrodistortive coupling for the development of the relaxor state.
For this purpose first the pressure-induced structural changes up to 30GPa in pure and doped PbSc0.5Ta0.5O3 (PST) and PbSc0.5Nb0.5O3 (PSN) were studied by complementary Raman spectroscopy and XRD, in order to determine whether or not the anti-ferrodistortive order persists at high pressure up to 30GPa.
Next, to gain further insights into the competitive behavior between the mesoscopic polar and anti-ferrodistortive order in-situ high-temperature high-pressure Raman spectroscopy at temperatures above the Curie temperature has been applied, at which relaxors are in ergodic state.
Finally, the knowledge obtained from the structural investigations of relaxors was applied to study the ferroelectric structure of the solid solution PbZn1/3Nb2/3O3-xPbTiO3 with x = 0.1 by combined Raman scattering and x-ray diffraction (XRD) at ambient pressure and different temperatures from 800-100 K as well as at ambient temperature and different pressures up to 18GPa. The study intended to elucidate the origin of the giant piezoelectric effect close to the morphotropic phase boundary of this system.

The complementary XRD and Raman scattering analysis on pure PST and PSN up to 30GPa revealed that Pb-based relaxors exhibit four characteristic pressures:

(i) an intermediate pressure p*1 at which the off-centered Pb and B-cations in PNRs decouple while local anti-polar order of Pb cations as well as quasi-dynamical long-range order of anti-phase BO6 tilts is developed;

(ii) a critical pressure pC1 at which a continuous phase transition from relaxor-cubic to non-polar rhombohedral symmetry occurs, which is associated with anti-phase a-a-a- tilt order;

(iii) a second intermediate pressure p*2 at which the octahedral tilts around the three cubic axis become unequal from each other;

(iv) a second critical pressure pC2 at which a transition to a non-polar monoclinic or triclinic phase occurs, involving long-range ordering of anti-phase tilts with unequal magnitudes (a-b-b-) or long-range order of mixed BO6 tilts (a+b-b-) accompanied by long-range anti-polar Pb2+ order.

Doping on the A or B site changes the critical pressures. The enhancement of compositional disorder on the B site shifts pC2 to higher pressures, while the change in pC1 depends on the local structural distortions in the vicinity of the doping element.
Homovalent substitution of Pb2+ with cations having a larger ionic radius (Ba2+) induces local elastic fields and thus considerably shifts pC1 and pC2 to higher pressures and suppresses the development of long-range anti-polar Pb2+ ordering.
Lowering the tolerance factor by A-site doping favors the BO6 tilting and thus reduces pC1 and pC2.
However, in the case of heterovalent substitution of Pb2+ (La3+) the local B-site cation polar shifts persist to higher pressures due to the chemically-induced local electric fields, and thus the variation of the dopant concentration can tune the ratio between polar and anti-ferrodistortive order on the mesoscopic scale in order to vary the relaxor properties.

The in-situ high-pressure high-temperature Raman scattering data allowed me to construct a pT-phase diagram for Pb-based relaxors, which unambiguously confirms the coexistence of mesoscopic polar and anti-ferrodistortive order in perovskite-type relaxors and the proposed ferrielectric nature of the relaxor state. Using temperature and pressure as two separate tuning mechanisms, one can select a structural state with a certain degree of polar order (by changing temperature) or of anti-ferrodistortive order (by applying pressure). At elevated temperatures the first pressure-induced phase transition drops to lower pressures as the polar coupling is suppressed, which in turn facilitates the development of the mesoscopic anti-ferrodistortive order existing at ambient pressure into a long-range ordered anti-ferrodistortive state at high pressure.

Raman spectroscopy at different temperatures on PZN-0.1PT shows that there are two different intrinsic cubic states of Pb ions in regions with a local chemical order of the type Pb(B2+ 2/3B5+ 1/3)1/2B5+ 1/2O3:
(i) less abundant Pb1 ions surrounded by Nb5+ and
(ii) more abundant Pb2 ions surrounded by both Zn2+ and Nb5+.
The temperature dependence of the Raman spectra of PZN-0.1PT indicates that off-centered Pb2 ions induce coherent polar shifts of ferroelectrically active B-cations, which in turn leads to the off-centering of Pb1 ions.
Also, Raman data suggest the predominance of monoclinic-type ferroelectric domains over tetragonal-type domains in the room temperature structure of as-synthesized (unpoled) crystals.
At room temperature and high pressures PZN-0.1PT undergoes several structural transitions. Near 1GPa the preexisting multiphase (monoclinic + tetragonal) multidomain state changes to another, most probably, single-phase multidomain state. Near 2GPa the system reaches a cubic relaxor state, in which the polar order exists only on the mesoscopic scale, as polar nanoregions. At 5.9GPa PZN-0.1PT undergoes a reversible pressure-induced phase transition from a cubic to an anti-ferrodistortive phase comprising long-range ordered antiphase octahedral tilts, similar to all other Pb-based relaxors.
In the low-pressure range up to 1GPa twinning is strongly enhanced, while the ferroic deviation of the atomic structure is reduced.
This region coincides with the pressure range where the piezoelectric and electrochemical coefficients are decreased.
Thus, the large shear piezoelectric and electromechanical responses are related with the intrinsic structural complexity on the local scale, rather than with the domain texture.
Low levels of Ru doping on the B-site (Ru/(Zn+Nb+Ti) ~ 0.002) enlarges the temperature range where the tetragonal state is preferred at ambient pressures, but has a negligible effect on pressure.

The results of this study indicate the coexistence of polar and anti-ferrodistortive order on the mesoscopic scale as well as the doubling of the perovskite unit cell, which is typical of all Pb-based relaxors and relaxor-based solid solutions. The findings imply that the structure of the dynamic polar nanoregions is ferrielectric rather than ferroelectric in nature.
Hence, the structure of polar nanoregions can be chemically tailored by tuning the polar as well as the anti-ferrodistortive coupling.


Intermittent convective transport caused by blobs is universally observed at the edge of laboratory plasmas and it is of great importance for future fusion reactors. We present recent advances in the basic study of blob formation and propagation dynamics and related universal properties in TORPEX simple magnetized plasmas. Blobs are generated from quasi-coherent interchange modes and, driven by ∇B and curvature-induced charge separation, propagate radially outwards. Depending on the regime, their velocity is determined by the available current paths (parallel or cross-field currents) to damp charge separation. In TORPEX, regimes dominated by either of the two current paths are achieved by varying the ion mass. An analytical expression for the blob velocity including cross-field ion polarization currents, cross-field ion currents due to neutral friction and parallel currents to the sheath is derived and shows good quantitative agreement with the experimental data. To confirm this interpretation, we show preliminary direct measurements of the 2D structure of the blob-induced parallel current using magnetic probes. Parallel blob dynamics are further studied with a Mach probe, revealing the convection of parallel momentum by blobs. Finally, the intermittency associated with blobs results in universal properties of plasma fluctuations, such as the skewness-versuskurtosis diagram, which is here extended to fluctuations of plasma potential and electron temperature.


ABSTRACT The core promoters of protein-encoding genes play a central role in regulating transcription. M1BP is a transcriptional activator that associates with a core promoter element known as Motif 1 that resides at thousands of genes in Drosophila. To gain insight into how M1BP functions, we identified an interacting protein called GFZF. GFZF had been previously identified in genetic screens for factors involved in maintenance of hybrid inviability, the G2-M DNA damage checkpoint, and RAS/mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) signaling, but its contribution to these processes was unknown. Here, we show that GFZF resides in the nucleus and functions as a transcriptional coactivator. In addition, we show that GFZF is a glutathione S-transferase (GST). Thus, GFZF is the first transcriptional coactivator with intrinsic GST activity, and its identification as a transcriptional coactivator provides an explanation for its role in numerous biological processes.


The patella is an uncommon place for the appearance of bone tumors, benign or malignant, and pseudotumoral lesions. In the literature, there is a small amount of work on this topic. This case report is about a patient with a metastatic tumor in the patella and reconstruction of the deformity with an anterolateral reverse flow thigh flap. Skin and soft tissue reconstruction in the region around the knee are often challenging for the plastic surgeon and aim to cover the exposed bone, preserving the joint function of the knee and providing a good esthetic result. There is an option for the use of free flaps, where there is a need for adequate material and trained staff. However, the vascular anastomosis region at the back of the knee makes the procedure even more complex. The anterolateral reverse thigh fasciocutaneous flap, first described in 1990 by Zhang et al., appears to be an effective and reliable option for reconstructing defects around the knee. It has a long vascular pedicle length and the availability of soft parts. There are some anatomical variations in which the cutaneous perforator does not originate from the descending branch. This report presents a patient with a skin perforator originating from the transverse branch of the lateral femoral circumflex artery, with an acceptable aesthetic result for skin coverage in the anterior region of the knee. ■ ABSTRACT


Twenty years have passed since the Iceman's discovery and the archaeological consequences of the rapid melting of the alpine glaciers have become well known. However, hardly any methodological procedures for glacial archaeology have been developed in Central Europe. In 2011, at the Dept. for Prehistory at the University of Zurich a project was founded with the aim to map ice patches with high archaeological potential throughout the Canton of Grisons/Switzerland. These valuable archaeological archives are to be studied before their eminent disappearance in order to answer questions regarding (pre)historic alpine land use, concentrating on communication routes, hunting, pastoral activities, trade and war. To be able to evaluate the ice patches a set of criteria influencing the probability of the presence of finds and the quality of their conservation was compiled. Analysis and visualizations based on aerial photography, landscapes models, glacial and cultural history, historical maps as well as calculations were made using ArcGIS. The resulting predictive model has been tested and continuously adapted during the late summer of 2011 and 2012 through systematic surveying. Such a model will become the basis of a monitoring programme from 2013 onwards.


Drawing on her years of experience as an Arabic instructor and course developer, Samia Louis has used a functional approach to create a bright, innovative coursebook for the study of Egyptian colloquial Arabic - the spoken dialect most frequently studied and most widely understood in the Arab world. Designed according to the ACTFL guidelines for teaching Arabic as a foreign language, in ten highly structured lessons "Kallimni 'Arabi" trains students in the crucial skills, with particular emphasis on listening and speaking. The accompanying audio CD carries recordings of the dialogues and exercises in each chapter, made by Egyptian native speakers. From the basics of communicating (asking directions, the language of shopping) to more advanced conversations (future plans, hobbies and free time), "Kallimni 'Arabi" is structured so that students learn Egyptian Arabic using real-life situations and expressions. The key topics covered gradually lead students to understand, use, and speak Arabic, rather than simply memorize fixed phrases. "Kallimni 'Arabi" is aimed at students with some ability to read and write Arabic, who have had the equivalent of 30 hours of a beginner Colloquial Arabic class or 40 hours of a Modern Standard Arabic program.


The last comprehensive study of dona militaria was that of Steiner in 1906 (Bonner Jahrbűcher, 114/5), since when the amount of epigraphic evidence on the subject has increased by over fifty per-cent, casting doubts upon some of the hypotheses put forward by Steiner and largely accepted since his time. The object of the present study is to trace the developments of the system of award from its origins in the Republic till its disappearance or radical transformation in the Severan period. In the Republic each decoration had a specific meaning and was awarded with regard only to the nature of the deed it rewarded; much of this meaning was lost in the Principate when types of award received depended largely on rank. However, the system never became as hidebound and impersonal as has hitherto been believed, for although rules appear to have existed as to the types of award for which each rank was eligible, the quantity and combination thereof remained flexible, giving ample scope for the recognition of individual merit. The evidence for the Republic is largely literary and the information it yields deals more with the nature of the awards than with details of the recipient; the evidence for the Principate is almost wholly epigraphic, being concerned with specific awards to specific people. The treatment of the two periods differs, therefore, the one being approached from the standpoint of the decoration itself, the other from the standpoint of the recipient. Working from the specific to the general a detailed prosopographical study has been made of each individual case in order to determine what rules lay behind the granting of dona and the scale on which they were given, whether the practice changed over the years, who was eligible to be decorated and in what type of campaign.


OBJECTIVE--To evaluate the technical, short-term, and long-term outcomes in cats with benign ureteral obstructions treated by means of double-pigtail ureteral stent placement. DESIGN--Retrospective case series. ANIMALS--69 cats (79 ureters). PROCEDURES--The diagnosis of benign ureteral obstruction was made via abdominal ultrasonography, radiography, and ureteropyelography. Ureteral stent placement was attempted endoscopically, surgically, or both, with fluoroscopic guidance. The medical records were reviewed for pre-, intra-, and postoperative data; complications; and outcome. RESULTS--69 cats (79 ureters) had stent placement attempted for various causes: ureterolithiasis (56/79 [71%]), stricture (10/79 [13%]), both ureterolithiasis and stricture (12/79 [15%]), or a purulent plug (1/79 [1%]). Stent placement was successful in 75 of 79 ureters (95%). Median number of stones per ureter was 4 (range, 0 to > 50), and 67 of 79 (85%) had concurrent nephrolithiasis. Preoperative azotemia was present in 95% (66/69) of cats (median creatinine concentration, 5.3 mg/dL [range, 1.1 to 25.8 mg/dL]), and 71% (49/69) remained azotemic (median, 2.1 mg/dL [range, 1.0 to 11.8 mg/dL]) after successful surgery. Procedure-related, postoperative (< 7 days), short-term (7 to 30 days), and long-term (> 30 days) complications occurred in 8.7% (6/69; 7/79 ureters), 9.1% (6/66), 9.8% (6/61), and 33% (20/60) of cats, respectively; most of these complications were minor and associated with intermittent dysuria or the need for ureteral stent exchange. The perioperative mortality rate was 7.5% (5/69), and no deaths were procedure related. The median survival time was 498 days (range, 2 to > 1,278 days). For patients with a renal cause of death, median survival time was > 1,262 days, with only 14 of 66 cats (21%) dying of chronic kidney disease. Nineteen (27%) cats needed a stent exchange (stricture in-growth [n = 10], migration [4], ureteritis [2], dysuria [2], pyelonephritis [1], or reflux [1]). No patient died of the procedure or recurrent ureteral obstruction. CONCLUSIONS AND CLINICAL RELEVANCE--Results of the present study indicated that ureteral stenting is an effective treatment for benign ureteral obstructions in cats regardless of obstructive location, cause, or stone number. The perioperative morbidity and mortality rates were lower than those reported with traditional ureteral surgery. The short- and long-term complications were typically minor but may necessitate stent exchange or use of an alternative device, particularly with ureteral strictures. The prognosis for feline ureteral obstructions after ureteral stenting could be considered good when the procedure is performed by trained specialists.


Morphological examination of the human temporal bone in the apical region supports the benefits of deep electrode insertion. Initiation of spikes on peripheral processes close to the basilar membrane would provide improved channel selectivity during electrical stimulation but recruiting of nerve fibres requires a higher current. A clinical study was performed on 10 users of the MED-EL COMBI 40 + implant to evaluate the effect of the insertion depth of the cochlear implant electrode on speech perception. All subjects were implanted with the standard COMBI 40 + electrode with an insertion depth of > 30 mm. Acute speech tests were carried out in which stimulation was restricted to the apical, middle and basal regions of the cochlea in turn, and using electrode arrangements in which contacts were either distributed over the whole length of the cochlea or concentrated at the basal end, thus mimicking an insertion depth of approximately 20 mm only. The results showed that stimulation of the apical region of the cochlea supports a significant degree of speech understanding, and that distributing the contacts over the whole length of the cochlea improves speech perception in quiet and in noise.


Organized crime in the Nordic countries shares some common traits and usually takes the form of small and flexible networks. There are very few, if any, Mafia-like groups. The level of corruption of officials is low and the level of violence between groups is, with some exceptions, quite low. Organized crime reflects the societies, the economy, and the historic and cultural background of the Nordic countries. Organized crime can not be said to be strongly integrated in the central trade and industry. Criminal networks are not a new feature. There have been well-established groups of smugglers and illegal makers of alcohol since the early twentieth century. Organized crime as a topic, problem, and social phenomenon was not focused on before the early 1990s.


Abstract. Observational studies of aerosol optical properties are useful for reducing uncertainties in estimations of aerosol radiative forcing and forecasting visibility. In this study, the observed near-surface aerosol optical properties in urban Nanjing are analysed from March 2014 to February 2016. Results show that near-surface urban aerosols in Nanjing are mainly from local emissions and the surrounding regions. They have lower loadings but are more scattering than aerosols in most cities in China. The annual mean aerosol extinction coefficient (EC), single-scattering albedo (SSA) and asymmetry parameter (ASP) at 550 nm are 381.96 Mm−1, 0.9 and 0.57, respectively. The aerosol absorption coefficient (AAC) is about 1 order of magnitude smaller than its scattering coefficient (SC). However, the absorbing aerosol has a larger Angstrom exponent (AAE) value, 1.58 at 470∕660 nm, about 0.2 larger than the scattering aerosols (SAE). All the aerosol optical properties follow a near-unimodal pattern, and their values are mostly concentrated around their averages, accounting for more than 60 % of the total samplings. Additionally, they have substantial seasonality and diurnal variations. High levels of SC and AAC all appear in winter due to higher aerosol and trace gas emissions. AAE (ASP) is the smallest (largest) in summer, possibly because of high relative humidity (RH) which also causes considerably larger SC and smaller SAE, although intensive gas-to-particle transformation could produce a large number of finer scattering aerosols in this season. Seasonality of EC is different from the columnar aerosol optical depth. Larger AACs appear during the rush hours of the day while SC and back-scattering coefficient (Bsp) only peak in the early morning. Aerosols are fresher in the daytime than at night-time, leading to their larger Angstrom exponent and smaller ASP. Different temporal variations between AAC and SC cause the aerosols to be more absorbing (smaller SSA) in autumn, winter and around rush hours. ASP has a good quasi-log-normal growth trend with increasing SC when RH is below 60 %. The correlation between AAC and SC at the site is close but a little smaller than that in suburban Nanjing in spring. Atmospheric visibility decreases exponentially with increasing EC or SC, more sharply in spring and summer, and it could be further deteriorated with increasing SSA and ASP.


OF DISSERTATION FATHERS AND SONS IN MODERN BRITISH, IRISH, AND POSTCOLONIAL FICTION In this dissertation, I examine the portrayal of filial relationships in the fiction of James Joyce, Hanif Kureishi, and Zadie Smith. I assert that each of these authors, albeit in different ways, uses the archetypal father and son relationship to interrogate the formation of national identity and the concept of national belonging in modern, anticolonial or postcolonial cultures, including Ireland at the dawn of the twentieth century and Britain in the late twentieth century. Chapter one focuses on Joyce's A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man (1916) and Ulysses (1922). I argue that rather than solely bonding in a symbolic father and son relationship, Stephen Dedalus and Leopold Bloom also develop a companionable friendship and their differing qualities merge to uncover a modern voice with which an artist may represent Ireland. In chapter two, I analyze Hanif Kureishi's The Buddha of Suburbia (1990) and argue that the protagonist's relationship with his father illustrates the benefits of commodifying one's identity in postcolonial Britain. Chapter 3 examines Zadie Smith's first two novels: White Teeth (2000) and The Autograph Man (2002). I argue that the father, Samad Iqbal in White Teeth, refuses to embrace his multifaceted, ambiguous identity, and instead adopts a binary mindset, which significantly affects his parenting choices and therefore influences the national identity formation of his twin sons. Alex Li-Tandem, the protagonist of The Autograph Man, similarly works to understand his complex identity with oversimplified methods. I assert that both texts demonstrate the inadequacies of essentialist thinking because the multicultural environment of the twentieth century necessitates a willingness to accept multiple, complex identities and to explore one's own intersectionality. Taken together, the works of Joyce, Kureishi, and Smith show that the archetype of the father and son relationship remains a valuable lens through which to explore essentialism, multiculturalism, and hybridity.


The goal of this study was to explore the effects of drivers' personal characteristics and the in-car and out-car conditions associated with a car crash on the types of crashes that drivers are most likely to be involved in. It was hypothesized that personal and environmental characteristics surrounding a car crash will affect the types of crashes the drivers get involved in. Also, it was hypothesized that some differences in crash type patterns exist among the four Midwestern states (Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, and Nebraska) and between the Midwest and the country as a whole. The results of this study confirmed that these differences do exist. Another goal of this study was to analyze the effect of different types of driver distractions on the crash types drivers get involved in. The results of this analysis showed that different sources of distraction lead to different types of crashes.


The importance of contact and diffusible pheromones in the reproductive biology of the harpacticoid Tigriopus japonicus was studied. When given a choice, males preferred developmentally advanced conspecific female partners over less mature or congeneric females. Males judged female attractiveness on a relative scale, based on the locally available females. The attractiveness of a female copepodid was reduced with non-fatal proteolytic treatment, but only if normal females were also present. To sample the available females, males repeatedly grabbed the caudal rami and terminal urosome segment of potential partners before committing themselves to guarding one female. Males occasionally dropped their copepodid partners. Releases increased in frequency in water conditioned from virgin adult females and adult males, decreased in mated-female conditioned water and were unaffected by copepodids or their treated water. The waning attractiveness of a recently mated female was tracked over 16 h. Relationships between Tigriopus japonicus adults appeared to involve both contact and diffusible pheromones. No evidence of a diffusible copepodid pheromone was uncovered.


No matter how elegant ecosystem management is scientifically, it will not reach its potential in western U.S., with its abundant public lands, unless it is effective public policy. Such policy is (1) an adaptive process, (2) utilizes the most appropriate science and technology, (3) is implementable, and (4) has low transaction cost. This paper focuses on the latter two characteristics which are shaped by social legitimacy, and proposes a procedure termed Collaborative Learning as a promising decision-making process for ecosystem management. Two defining criteria of social legitimacy in contemporary American public policy are (1) policy solutions must be recognized as technically sound; and (2) if people's lives are affected, they must have a voice in policy process. The increasing sophistication of science and technology makes them less understood by the general public, and creates a dilemma between the narrow politics of expertise and a broad politics of public inclusion. Land management of any form in western U.S., with its mixed land ownership, is complicated and constrained by deeply held public values; multiple world views, parties and issues; legal constraints; and an entrenched conflict industry. Ecosystem management compounds these difficulties by adding more technical complexity and uncertainty, a systems view, increased focus on mixed-ownership solutions, and the importance of institutional continuity. Collaborative Learning (CL) is a framework for natural-resources policy making with public involvement. It is a hybrid between soft-systems methodology, which promotes learning and systems thinking, and alternative dispute resolution, which deals with value differences and strategic behaviors. CL stresses improvement rather than solution, situation over problem or conflict, concerns and interests rather than positions, progress over success, desirable and feasible change rather than desired future condition. Evaluations of CL conclude that the process broadens participants' understanding, improves communication between diverse communities, and implements improvements. And while strategic behaviors persist, there is increased rapport, respect, and trust among participants. It is well-suited to ecosystem management.


Across the United States, enrollment in high school computer science (CS) courses is increasing. These increases, however, are not spread evenly across race and gender. CS remains largely an elective class, and fewer than three-fourths of the states allow it to count towards graduation. The Chicago Public Schools has sought to ensure access for all students by recently enacting computer science as a high school graduation requirement. The primary class that fulfills the graduation requirement is Exploring Computer Science (ECS), a high school introductory course and professional development program designed to foster deep engagement through equitable inquiry around CS concepts. The number of students taking CS in the district increased significantly and these increases are distributed equitably across demographic characteristics. With ECS serving as a core class, it becomes critical to ensure success for all students independent of demographic characteristics, as success in the course directly affects a student's ability to graduate from high school. In this paper, we examine the factors that correlate with student failure in the course. At the student level, attendance and prior general academic performance correlate with passing the class. After controlling for student characteristics, whether or not teachers participated in the professional development program associated with ECS correlates with student success in passing the course. These results provide evidence for the importance of engaging teachers in professional development, in conjunction with requiring a course specifically designed to provide an equitable computer science experience, in order to broaden participation in computing.


This paper develops an instrumental variable (IV) estimator for consistent estimation of dynamic panel data models with error cross-sectional dependence when both N and T, the cross-section and time series dimensions respectively, are large. Our approach asymptotically projects out the common factors from regressors using principal components analysis and then uses the defactored regressors as instruments to estimate the model in a standard way. Therefore, the proposed estimator is computationally very attractive. Furthermore, our procedure requires estimating only the common factors included in the regressors, leaving those that influence the dependent variable solely into the errors. Hence aside from computational simplicity the resulting approach allows parsimonious estimation of the model. The finite-sample performance of the IV estimator and the associated t-test is investigated using simulated data. The results show that the bias of the estimator is very small and the size of the t-test is correct even when (T,N) is as small as (10,50). The performance of an overidentifying restrictions test is also explored and the evidence suggests that it has good power when the key assumption is violated.


Communication networks are embracing the software defined networking (SDN) paradigm. Its architectural shift assumes that a remote SDN controller (SDNC) in the control plane is responsible for configuring the underlying devices of the forwarding plane. In order to support flexibility-motivated network slicing, SDN-based networks employ another entity in the control plane, a network hypervisor (NH). This paper first discusses different protection strategies for the control plane with NHs and presents the corresponding availability models, which assume possible failures of links and nodes in the forwarding plane and the control plane. An analysis of these protection alternatives is then performed so as to compare average control plane availability, average path length for the control communication that traverses NH, and infrastructure resources required to support them. Our results confirm the intuition that the NH introduction generally results in a reduction of the control plane availability, which stresses the need for appropriate protection. However, the availability achieved by each of the considered strategies is impacted differently by the node availability and the link failure probability, thus calling for a careful selection that is based on the infrastructure features.


Abstract. The mass of carbon stored as organic matter in terrestrial systems is sufficiently large to play an important role in the global biogeochemical cycling of CO2 and O2. Field measurements of radiocarbon-depleted particulate organic carbon (POC) in rivers suggest that terrestrial organic matter persists in surface environments over millennial (or greater) timescales, but the exact mechanisms behind these long storage times remain poorly understood. To address this knowledge gap, we developed a numerical model for the radiocarbon content of riverine POC that accounts for both the duration of sediment storage in river deposits and the effects of POC cycling. We specifically target rivers because sediment transport influences the maximum amount of time organic matter can persist in the terrestrial realm and river catchment areas are large relative to the spatial scale of variability in biogeochemical processes. Our results show that rivers preferentially erode young deposits, which, at steady state, requires that the oldest river deposits are stored for longer than expected for a well-mixed sedimentary reservoir. This geometric relationship can be described by an exponentially tempered power-law distribution of sediment storage durations, which allows for significant aging of biospheric POC. While OC cycling partially limits the effects of sediment storage, the consistency between our model predictions and a compilation of field data highlights the important role of storage in setting the radiocarbon content of riverine POC. The results of this study imply that the controls on the terrestrial OC cycle are not limited to the factors that affect rates of primary productivity and respiration but also include the dynamics of terrestrial sedimentary systems.


Abstract. Metro Manila, home to twelve-million residents scattered in densely populated cities, grows its population at a rate of 1.21% annually. Areas of the metro occupied by residents falling under the poverty line have only been increasing in density per year, and have been prone to fire incidents. One such area, Barangay Addition Hills in Mandaluyong City, has fallen victim to two disastrous fires four years apart: in 2016 and 2020. This study aims to accurately model a portion of Barangay Addition Hills when a fire starts in one of the most densely populated blocks while observing firefighters responding to the incident. The agent-based model adapts features from (Wilensky, 2006)'s Fire model and is virtually simulated with the help of two-dimensional satellite images of the area. The fire-spreading algorithm incorporates solving the heat diffusion equation to determine ignition time of combustible materials per unit area. Firefighters have been incorporated into the model with the help of the Bureau of Fire Protection (BFP)'s Operational Procedures Manual to determine their expected behavior when responding to a fire alarm. Simulations were run on a per-incident basis to determine the total affected area, estimated affected families, and time for the fire to be put under control under varying densities, traffic conditions, firefighter response times and manpower.


Our contribution in this paper is two fold. First, we propose a novel discretization of the forward model for differential phase-contrast imaging that uses B-spline basis functions. The approach yields a fast and accurate algorithm for implementing the forward model, which is based on the first derivative of the Radon transform. Second, as an alternative to the FBP-like approaches that are currently used in practice, we present an iterative reconstruction algorithm that remains more faithful to the data when the number of projections dwindles. Since the reconstruction is an ill-posed problem, we impose a total-variation (TV) regularization constraint. We propose to solve the reconstruction problem using the alternating direction method of multipliers (ADMM). A specificity of our system is the use of a preconditioner that improves the convergence rate of the linear solver in ADMM. Our experiments on test data suggest that our method can achieve the same quality as the standard direct reconstruction, while using only one-third of the projection data. We also find that the approach is much faster than the standard algorithms (ISTA and FISTA) that are typically used for solving linear inverse problems subject to the TV regularization constraint.


Abdominal pumping is a widespread behavior in insects. However, there remains ambiguity surrounding the abdominal pumping behavior, both in terms of describing what exactly abdominal pumping is (i.e., if various modes of operation exist) and also what function(s) abdominal pumping serves (and if function is conserved across groups of insects). In some insects respiratory patterns have been correlated with abdominal movements, although the specific mechanical effects of these movements on the animal's respiratory system are generally unknown. Conversely, some insects (such as beetles, ants, and crickets) create convection in the respiratory system by compressing their tracheal tubes, yet the underlying physiological mechanisms of tracheal collapse are also unknown. This study aimed to investigate the relationship between abdominal pumping and the compression of tracheal tubes in the darkling beetle, Zophobas morio. I observed the movements of the abdomen and tracheal tubes using synchrotron x-ray imaging and video cameras, while concurrently monitoring CO2 expiration. I identified and characterized two distinct abdominal movements differentiated by the synchrony (the pinch movement) or lack of synchrony (the wave movement) of abdominal tergite movement. Tracheal tube compressions (and corresponding CO2 pulses) occurred concurrently with every pinch movement. This study provides evidence of a mechanistic linkage between abdominal movements and tracheal tube compressions in the ground beetle, Zophobas morio.


In recent years, cellular operators throughout the world have observed a rapid increase in the number of mobile broadband subscribers. Similarily, the amount of traffic per subscriber is growing rapidly, in particular with the emergence of advanced mobile phones, smart phones, and real-time services (such as 2D and 3D video, IP telephony, etc.). On the other hand, Long-Term Evolution (LTE) is a technology which is capable of providing high data rates for multimedia applications through its IP-based framework. The Third Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) LTE and its subsequent modification called LTE-Advanced (LTE-A) are the latest standards in the series of mobile telecommunication systems, and they have been already deployed in the developed countries. The 3GPP standard has left the scheduling approaches understandardised, hence this enabled the proposal of standard-compatible solutions to enhance the Quality of Service (QoS) and Quality of Experience (QoE) performance in multi-user wireless network scenarios.
The main objective of the PhD project was the design and evaluation of LTE downlink scheduling strategies for efficient transmission of multi-user 2D and 3D video and multi-traffic classes over error prone and bandwith-limited wireless communication channels. The strategies developed are aimed at maximising and balancing the QoS among the users and improving the QoE at the receiver end. Following a review and a novel taxonomy of the existing content-aware and content-unaware downlink scheduling algorithms and a network-centric and user-centric performance evaluation, this thesis proposes a novel QoS-driven downlink scheduling approach for 2D and 3D video and multi-traffic classes over LTE wireless systems. Moreover, this thesis explores the quality of 3D video over LTE wireless networks through network-centric and user-centric performance evaluation of existing and our proposed scheduling algorithms. Admission control is also proposed by considering the different LTE bandwith sizes, in order to achieve high system resource utilization and deliver high 2D and 3D video quality for the LTE users. This thesis introduces the transmission of 3D video over a modelled LTE wireless network. The channel is modelled via Gilbert-Elliot (GE) parameters which represent real statistics of an LTE wireless channel. The results of subjective and objective assessments of the 3D video sequences are provided for different levels of wireless impairments.


According to www.ceos.org, this body ""was created in 1984 in response to a recommendation from the Economic Summit of Industrialized Nations Working Group on Growth, Technology, and Employment's Panel of Experts on Satellite Remote Sensing. This group recognised the multidisciplinary nature of satellite earth observation and the value of coordination across all proposed missions. Individual participating agencies make their best efforts to implement CEOS recommendations. The main goal of CEOS is to ensure that critical scientific questions relating to earth observation and global change are covered and that satellite missions do not unnecessarily overlap each other.""


Polar shores probably represent the most dynamic and extremely disturbed environ- ments on the globe. Nevertheless intense battles amongst sessile organisms for space are common- place on hard substrata, mainly between fast-growing pioneer species. In this study we examined spatial interactions in encrusting species at 3 sites within each of 2 high Arctic localities, Horsund- fjord (77° N) and Kongsfjord (79° N) in Spitsbergen, and 2 Antarctic localities, Signy Island (60° S) and Adelaide Island (68° S). In both polar regions 1 to 11% of encrusting fauna were involved in intra- specific interactions. Intraspecific competition was common; it usually involved just 1 or 2 pioneer species, mainly ended in tied outcomes, and most variability was at a local scale. The proportion of intraspecific encounters varied considerably at local (km) scales (19 to 99% intraspecific at different sites), reflecting an extremely patchy environment due to ice scour. Most intraspecific encounters resulted in ties (stand-offs) and again most variability was at a local scale. Many intraspecific encoun- ters were constructive, forming large (>1 m 3 ) foliaceous colonies (termed bioconstructions) whose 3D structures can harbour rich biotas. In other colonies intraspecific competition caused crowding and accelerated ovicell production (reproductive activity). Homosyndrome (fusion) was not observed in the Arctic and was rare in the Antarctic, where its frequency differed significantly between competi- tor identities. We found that the likelihood of meeting conspecifics versus other species and of tied outcomes in encounters was related to the performance of species in interspecific competition: ties were most common, and homosyndrome only occurred in poor competitors. In the context of rapid Arctic and west Antarctic warming and ice-loading of nearshore waters, we predict strongly chang- ing patterns of intraspecific competition. Indeed we suggest that decreased patchiness of intra- versus interspecific competition and decreased levels of intraspecific competition should be strong indicators of increases in surface water ice-loading from ice-sheet collapses.


Objective: To compare single-layered hand-sewn cervical end-to-side (ETS) anastomosis with end-to-end (ETE) anastomosis in a prospective randomized fashion. Background: The preferred organ used for reconstruction after esophagectomy for cancer is the stomach. Previous studies attempted to define the optimal site of anastomosis and anastomotic techniques. However, anastomotic stricture formation and leakage still remain an important clinical problem. Methods: From May 2005 to September 2007, 128 patients (64 in each group) were randomized between ETE and ETS anastomosis after esophagectomy for cancer with gastric tube reconstruction. Routine contrast swallow studies and endoscopy were performed. Anastomotic stricture within 1 year, requiring dilatation, was the primary endpoint. Secondary endpoints were anastomotic leak rate and mortality. Results: Ninety-nine men and 29 women underwent esophagectomy and gastric tube reconstruction. Benign stenosis of the anastomosis, for which dilatation was required, occurred more often in the ETE group (40% vs. ETS 18%, P < 0.01) after 1 year of follow-up. The overall (clinical and radiological) anastomotic leak rate was lower in the ETE group (22% vs. ETS 41%, P = 0.04). Patients with an ETE anastomosis suffered less often from pneumonia; 17% versus ETS 44%, P = 0.002 and had subsequently significantly shorter in-hospital stay (15 days vs. 22 days, P = 0.02). In-hospital mortality did not differ between both groups. Conclusion: ETS anastomosis is associated with a lower anastomotic stricture rate, compared to ETE anastomosis. However, prevention of stricture formation was at high costs with increased anastomotic leakage and longer in-hospital stay. This study is registered with the Dutch Trial Registry and carries the ID number OND1317772.


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