Biogenic calcification is influenced by the concentration of available carbonate ions. The recent confirmation of this for hermatypic corals has raised concern over the future of coral reefs because [CO32−] is a decreasing function of increasing pCO2 in the atmosphere. As one of the overriding features of coral reefs is their diversity, understanding the degree of variability between species in their ability to cope with a change in [CO32−] is a priority. We cultured four phylogenetically and physiologically different species of hermatypic coral (Acropora verweyi, Galaxea fascicularis, Pavona cactus and Turbinaria reniformis) under 'normal' (280 mu;mol kg−1) and 'low' (140 μmol kg−1) carbonate–ion concentrations. The effect on skeletogenesis was investigated quantitatively (by calcification rate) and qualitatively (by microstructural appearance of growing crystalline fibres using scanning electron microscopy (SEM)). The 'low carbonate' treatment resulted in a significant suppression of calcification rate and a tendency for weaker crystallization at the distal tips of fibres. However, while the calcification rate was affected uniformly across species (13–18%reduction), the magnitude of the microstructural response was highly species specific: crystallization was most markedly affected in A. verweyi and least in T. reniformis. These results are discussed in relation to past records and future predictions of carbonate variability in the oceans.


The compositional rule of inference, grounded on the modus ponens law, is one of the most effective fuzzy systems. We modify the classical version of the Zadeh rule to propose an original model, which concerns determining an operation chance for gastric cancer patients. The operation prognosis will be dependent on values of biological markers indicating the progress of the disease.


Abstract 1855 Background: Conflicting data regarding the survival benefit of thalidomide maintenance exist in the literature. Recent phase 3 study MMRC.M10 has demonstrated significant toxicity with thalidomide maintenance in combination with steroids. The role of thalidomide maintenance in prolonging PFS and OS is less clear. We conducted a meta-analysis of phase III randomized control trials (RCT) that evaluated thalidomide as maintenance therapy in transplant-eligible patients. Methods: We conducted an electronic literature search of public databases (MEDLINE, EMBASE, Cochrane library) and manual search of conference proceedings of ASH and ASCO. There were seven phase III RCTs that reported the maintenance therapy of thalidomide and survival in MM (Total Therapy 2, IFM 99-02, ALLG trial, HOVON 50, MRC IX trial, NCIC CTG MY.10). One study (Abdelkefi et al., 2008) was retracted and hence not included in the analysis. A formal meta-analysis was conducted using Comprehensive Meta Analysis software (Version 2.0). The outcome data were pooled and reported as hazard ratio (HR). The primary outcome of interest was progression free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS). Results: A total of 3194 patients (maintenance arm/control arm- 1479/1715, median age 58 years) were evaluated. The 3 year-OS ( HR 0.80, 95% CI 0.70 to 0.917, P=0.001) and 3 year-PFS (HR 0.62, 95% CI 0.55 to 0.69, P=0.000) were superior with maintenance therapy. 'Steroid and thalidomide' maintenance therapy was associated with significant OS and PFS improvement (OS HR 0.65, 95% CI 0.47 to 0.89); PFS (HR 0.54, 95% CI 0.44 to 0.67). Overall toxicities with thalidomide maintenance were peripheral neuropathy (PN) 2.184 (95% CI 1.523–3.133) and thromboembolic events (TEE) 1.632 (95% CI 1.076–2.475). Toxicities were increased with thalidomide and steroid maintenance - PN 28.78 (95% CI 1.676–494.13); TEE 2.896 (95% CI 0.76–11.06). Conclusions: Thalidomide as a single agent or in combination with steroids as maintenance therapy improves progression free survival and overall survival. However, high toxicity with steroid combination was observed. Disclosures: Kaufman:Millenium; Onyx; Novartis; Keryx: Consultancy; Merck, Celgene: Research Funding. Lonial:Millennium: Consultancy; Novartis: Consultancy; Celgene: Consultancy; BMS: Consultancy; Onyx: Consultancy; Merck: Consultancy.


Methoxycarbonyl compounds of the type [Pd(X)(CO(_2)Me)(L(_2))] (1) and [Pd(X)(CO(_2)Me)(L)(_2)] (2) were used as models in the work related to hydroesterification using methyl formate instead of CO and MeOH. The behaviour of the complexes (1) and (2) in solution was examined, as was their behaviour in the presence of alkenes and nucleophiles. Many of these derivatives were too unstable to isolate, forming the corresponding dichloride complexes [Pd(X)(_2)(L(_2))] (3) and [Pd(X)(_2)(L)(_2)] (4). Several crystal structures of such complexes were obtained. The cationic complex [Pd(CO(_2)Me)(MeCN)(PPh(_3))(_2)](BF(_4)) (5) was synthesised from (2) by removal of the chloride ligand with silver tetrafluoroborate. This is the first isolated cationic methoxycarbonyl complex of palladium. A crystal structure of (5) was obtained. Some of the factors which affected the stability of methoxycarbonyl complexes were examined. Some of these systems were used as precursors for catalytic studies of hydroesterification. The second part of the work involved the chemistry of an unusual phosphine ligand and sohie of its analogues. The bidentate ligand dppn (6) has been reacted with some first row transition metal halides to give novel complexes such as [NiCl(_2)(dppn)] (7) and [CoCl(_2)(dppno)] (8). The ligand (6) also reacted with [Pd(MeCN)(_4)](BF(_4))(_2) (9) to give [Pd(MeCN)(_2)(dppn)](BF(_4))(_2) (10). Upon addition of dppe to (10), the acetonitrile and dppn ligands were entirely replaced by dppe to give the complex [Pd(dppe)(_2)](BF(_4))(_2) (11). When dppe was added to the nickel complex (7), the dppe displaced the chelating dppn ligand to give [NiCl(_2)(dppe)] (12) and free dppn. The cyclohexyl analogue of dppn, called dcpn (13) was synthesised. The complexes [PdCl(_2)dcpn)] (14) and [Pd(MeCN)(_2)(dcpn)](BF(_4))(_2) were made using the ligand (13). The phosphine oxides of (6) and (13) were made by exposure to air in solution. These compounds are called dpno (15) and dcno (16) respectively. Preliminary catalytic work using the ligand (6) was carried out.


The impacts of global climate change are conventionally discussed in terms of changes in temperature averaged over the year and over the globe. Much less emphasis has been placed on anticipated changes in weather variability. Of particular interest are extreme events such as windstorms, hurricanes, floods, droughts, hailstorms, tornadoes, etc. In the last decade, the number of catastrophic weather events is three times as great, and the cost to world economies, eight times higher than the decade of the 1960s. In part, the higher cost in the last decade is due to greater vulnerability of society as a result of increasing urbanization. In 1997, a year with exceptionally few natural disasters, 13,000 deaths could be attributed to weather-related events, and the economic losses were $30 billion, as compared to $60 billion in 1996. The most frequent natural disasters in 1997 were windstorms and floods, which accounted for 82% of the economic losses and no less than 97% of the insured losses. Floods devastated large areas of China, Latin America and the United States. As in 1996 Central Europe, experienced a flood when the heaviest precipitation ever recorded inundated areas in Poland, Germany, the Czech Republic and Austria. Whether the frequency and intensity of extremes will increase or decrease in a warmer world is not known; the spatial scales of most extreme events are much too small to be captured in current climate models. However, a small increase in the surface temperature of the oceans will undoubtedly lead to increased water content of the atmosphere, since the vapor pressure of water rises exponentially with temperature. Thus, it is highly likely that at least some regions of the globe will experience higher precipitation and more flooding in a warmer world.


Introduction: Management of bilateral long length ureteric strictures is difficult with few options for reconstruction. In this report, we describe our experience with the use of a single, 15- 20 cm ileal segment for reconstruction of bilateral long length (involving more than 2/3rd ureter) ureteric strictures. Patients and Methods: A retrospective analysis of 5 cases operated between 2015 and 2020for bilateral long length ureteric strictures, using a single segment ileal interposition in a cat tail configuration was performed. We evaluated renal function, surgical success, incidence of urinary tract infection and complications of the procedure. Surgical success was defined as an asymptomatic patient with no hydronephrosis and/or prompt drainage of the kidney on radiological investigations. Results: The average age of presentation was 42.8 ± 7.4 years (33-53) years). All the cases were secondary to a gynaecological intervention. The mean creatinine prior to surgery was 0.81 ± 0.36 mg % (range 0.5 -1.4 mg%). Mean duration of follow-up was 28.6 ± 20.6 months (Range 10 – 56 months). Mean hospital stay was 14.4 ± 3.36 days (range 12-20 days). Two patients developed ileus and one patient developed deep venous thrombosis in the post-operative period. One patient developed pyelonephritis within one month of surgery. There was no deterioration of renal function with the mean serum creatinine at last follow-up being 0.9 ± 0.36 mg% (range 0.6 – 1.5 mg%). Conclusion: The use of an ileal segment in cat-tail configuration for bilateral simultaneous ileal replacement is a feasible and safe option. The medium-term result states that it is effective in the preservation of renal function and provides a good conduit for drainage.


D Abstract — Brain grafts directly placed in their target regions often lack proper connections and normal regulation. When brain grafts are placed in their ontogenetic normal area, the axonal outgrowth of grafts to distal target regions is a major obstacle. We previously demonstrated that directional axonal growth of grafts can be facilitated by laminin. In this study we demonstrated that excitochemicals induced trophic environment can be strategically used as a bridge to guide transplanted neurons to innervate a distal target of millimeter distance, and has a unique effect on fiber expansion in the target region. To distinguish dopamine (DA) growth from that of transplants, 6-hydrox) dopamine was unilaterally injected into medial f orebrain bundle to remove dopamine innervation to the striatum. Ibotenic acid (IB), kainic acid (KA), or phosphate buffer (vehicle) were microinjected through a glass-pipet to make a 7 mm long tract between the substantia nigra and the striatum in SpragueDawley rats. Gestational 14-15 days brainstem slurry was transplanted either in the same or a separate tract into nigra at the bottom of the bridge. All transplants survived with abundant serotonin (5-HT) and DA neurons. Traceable DA fibers formed distinct bundles from grafts along the length of IB/KA tracts. Upon arrival at their major target regions, fibers from bundles were capable of leaving the tracts, and reinnervating the DA-vacated striatum. The 5-HT fibers formed bundles similar to DA fibers but left the tract earlier upon arrival at their major target the globus pallidus and when arriving at the striatum and cortex. Fibers from grafts with vehicle tracts grew randomly and not into the tract. These results indicate that the trophic effects of chemical lesioning serves as a remarkably effective axonal guidance for more than one type of fetal neuron to innervate distal brain regions. This method has great potential in directing fibers in many transplant models.


Children with upper respiratory tract infections are commonly encountered in general practice. Most respiratory infections, including acute otitis media, a sore throat and sinusitis, are self-limiting, and symptomatic treatment is usually adequate. Despite this, upper respiratory tract infection may still be problematic owing to inappropriate use of corticosteroids, over-the-counter medicines and antibiotics in an attempt to prevent secondary bacterial infection. This increases the burden of antibiotic resistance and causes unnecessary side-effects for the patient. Usually, little benefit is obtained as the course of the disease is not altered. The South African guideline for the management of upper respiratory tract infections has made recommendations based on appropriate pathogens and relevant publications.


In order to study the deployment of cells during gastrulation and early organogenesis, it is necessary to have an in situ cell marker which can be used to follow cell fate. To create such a marker a transgenic mouse strain, designated Tg(Act-lac Z)-1, which carries 6 copies of the Escherichia coli lac Z gene under the control of the rat beta-actin promoter, was made by pronuclear injection of DNA. Staining early postimplantation hemizygous mouse conceptuses, during gastrulation and early organogenesis, for beta-galactosidase activity shows that lac Z expression is ubiquitous and constitutive in all epiblast derivatives of the 10th day conceptus. No activity is seen in trophectoderm and primitive endoderm derivatives. Postimplantation grafts of [3H]thymidine-labelled transgenic cells establish the cell autonomy of this transgenic marker. Preliminary observations on the distribution of inner cell mass (ICM) descendant clones, identified in situ in midgestation conceptuses, confirm the pluripotency of individual ICM cells. The implications regarding patterns of cell growth in nascent fetal primordia are discussed.


In this work, we address the open problem of finding low-complexity near-optimal multi-armed bandit algorithms for sequential decision making problems. Existing bandit algorithms are either sub-optimal and computationally simple (e.g., UCB1) or optimal and computationally complex (e.g., kl-UCB). We propose a boosting approach to Upper Confidence Bound based algorithms for stochastic bandits, that we call UCBoost. Specifically, we propose two types of UCBoost algorithms. We show that UCBoost($D$) enjoys $O(1)$ complexity for each arm per round as well as regret guarantee that is $1/e$-close to that of the kl-UCB algorithm. We propose an approximation-based UCBoost algorithm, UCBoost($\epsilon$), that enjoys a regret guarantee $\epsilon$-close to that of kl-UCB as well as $O(\log(1/\epsilon))$ complexity for each arm per round. Hence, our algorithms provide practitioners a practical way to trade optimality with computational complexity. Finally, we present numerical results which show that UCBoost($\epsilon$) can achieve the same regret performance as the standard kl-UCB while incurring only $1\%$ of the computational cost of kl-UCB.


"Every C++ professional needs a copy of Effective C++. It is an absolute must-read for anyone thinking of doing serious C++ development. If you've never read Effective C++ and you think you know everything about C++, think again." - Steve Schirripa, Software Engineer, Google "C++ and the C++ community have grown up in the last fifteen years, and the third edition of Effective C++ reflects this. The clear and precise style of the book is evidence of Scott's deep insight and distinctive ability to impart knowledge." - Gerhard Kreuzer, Research and Development Engineer, Siemens AGThe first two editions of Effective C++ were embraced by hundreds of thousands of programmers worldwide. The reason is clear: Scott Meyers' practical approach to C++ describes the rules of thumb used by the experts - the things they almost always do or almost always avoid doing - to produce clear, correct, efficient code.The book is organized around 55 specific guidelines, each of which describes a way to write better C++. Each is backed by concrete examples. For this third edition, more than half the content is new, including added chapters on managing resources and using templates. Topics from the second edition have been extensively revised to reflect modern design considerations, including exceptions, design patterns, and multithreading.Important features of Effective C++ include: Expert guidance on the design of effective classes, functions, templates, and inheritance hierarchies. Applications of new "TR1" standard library functionality, along with comparisons to existing standard library components. Insights into differences between C++ and other languages (e.g., Java, C#, C) that help developers from those languages assimilate "the C++ way" of doing things.


Abstract. The formation and growth of atmospheric aerosols depend on several steps, namely nucleation, initial steps of growth and subsequent – mainly condensational – growth. This work focuses on the initial steps of growth, meaning the growth right after nucleation, where the interplay of curvature effects and thermodynamics has a significant role on the growth kinetics. More specifically, we investigate how ion clusters and aerosol particles grow from 1.5 nm to 20 nm (diameter) in atmospheric conditions using experimental data obtained by air ion and aerosol spectrometers. The measurements have been performed at a boreal forest site in Finland. The observed trend that the growth rate seems to increase as a function of size can be used to investigate possible growth mechanisms. Such a growth rate is consistent with a recently suggested nano-Kohler mechanism, in which growth is activated at a certain size with respect to condensation of organic vapors. The results also imply that charge-enhanced growth associated with ion-mediated nucleation plays only a minor role in the initial steps of growth, since it would imply a clear decrease of the growth rate with size. Finally, further evidence was obtained on the earlier suggestion that atmospheric nucleation and the subsequent growth of fresh nuclei are likely to be uncoupled phenomena via different participating vapors.


Previous research has demonstrated similarities in the rhythmic characteristics of the speech and instrumental music within individual languages, such as French or English, but clear differences in these rhythmic patterns between languages. A recent finding has shown a comparable result for the rhythmic patterns of the spontaneous speech and instrumental music of musicians who speak different dialects of English, such that within-dialect speech and music rhythms are more similar to one another than are across-dialect rhythms. We extend the latter finding by comparing the rhythmic characteristics of the spontaneous speech and jazz productions of jazz musicians who speak American English with those of the spontaneous speech and riddim productions of Jamaican musicians, who speak Jamaican English. We found that the speech and music rhythmic patterns were similar within each dialect but different across dialects. Though scholars have suggested a link between speech prosody and jazz in the past, this is the first study known to us to demonstrate a link between the rhythmic properties of the speech and music of jazz musicians.


Catholic social teaching is, by design, ill-suited to abstract formulation. It can be understood only through exploration in the context of pressing social problems. At the same time, the value of the teaching emanates from its grounding in truths that are not cabined by the contingent nature of modern epistemological understanding. The Church offers lessons to particular participants in a particular scene of the human drama because its foundational principles speak to all participants in the human drama, everywhere and in every age. Nowhere is this attribute reflected more clearly than in discussions of the two pillars of Catholic social teaching - solidarity and subsidiarity. In simple terms, solidarity represents the "commitment to the good of one's neighbor," and subsidiarity represents the conviction that "needs are best understood and satisfied by people who are closest to them." The relevance of the interplay between these principles becomes clear against the background provided by the expanding norms of consumer autonomy in American law. Increasingly, the state has taken upon itself the responsibility to compel providers to honor the individual consumer's decisions, regardless of how morally problematic those decisions might be from the provider's perspective. Examples of this trend abound when it comes to the provision of goods such as health care, education, and law. This chapter - part of a forthcoming volume titled Recovering Self-Evident Truths: Catholic Perspectives on American Law - introduces solidarity and subsidiarity into the conversation.


This paper presents an innovative modeling strategy for the construction of efficient and compact surrogate models for the uncertainty quantification of time-domain responses of digital links. The proposed approach relies on a two-step methodology. First, the initial dataset of available training responses is compressed via principal component analysis (PCA). Then, the compressed dataset is used to train compact surrogate models for the reduced PCA variables using advanced techniques for uncertainty quantification and parametric macromodeling. Specifically, in this work sparse polynomial chaos expansion and least-square support-vector machine regression are used, although the proposed methodology is general and applicable to any surrogate modeling strategy. The preliminary compression allows limiting the number and complexity of the surrogate models, thus leading to a substantial improvement in the efficiency. The feasibility and performance of the proposed approach are investigated by means of two digital link designs with 54 and 115 uncertain parameters, respectively.


This unique Russian-language textbook draws on printed mass media, especially up-to-date Internet media sources, to introduce intermediate and advanced students to varied aspects of modern Russian life. Presenting fascinating material on armed conflicts, government and politics, business and economics, accidents and catastrophes, the new Russian class society, problems of youth, and more, the book provides the cultural and linguistic background necessary to better understand Russian media reports and to gain insights into Russia's current political, economic, and cultural issues. Features of the book include: vocabulary development exercises; pre- and post-reading classroom activities; information on Russian media, government, politics, economics, and military; a Web site with extensive Internet tasks, interactive dictionary, updates, instructor material, and links to relevant information; and a multimedia supplement based on current Russian television programs.


This article examines how attitude and law firm culture affect peer review and principal accountability by using empirical data obtained from a survey of Texas law firms. Part I briefly describes the research design and the general profiles of respondents of the survey. Part II discusses the peer review measures used by the firms surveyed for this article. Part III analyzes attitudes about peer review. Part IV focuses on the obstacles to peer review. Part V considers the connection between firm culture and the implementation of peer review measures. Finally, the conclusion explains how firm managers can reshape attitudes to address the resistance to peer review and institute peer review measures which serve the firm, its attorneys, its clients, and the community.


An inexpensive and robust method for acquiring multiple outputs from integrated optical sensor devices using a 1D CCD array is described in this paper. An example is gven of the development of an instrument based on the use of an integrated optical Mach-Zehnder interferometer (MZI) refractive index transducer. The technique is especially promising for application to multianalyte sensors where several outputs need to be interrogated simultaneously. The high sensitivity and low noise demonstrated by the system will enable the use of cheap, stable LED light sources in practical instruments. Introduction: Integrated optical transducers for the real-time measurement of interactions between biological molecules and for the specific detection of chemical and biochemical species are the subject of growing interest. Applications of this technology include environmental pollution monitoring, industrial process control and medical diagnostics. Integrated optical sensors provide the high detection sensitivity achievable using optical transduction techniques in a compact and robust format. This approach also offers advantages for the fabrication of multianalyte sensors through the integration of multiple transducers on a single chip by straightforward scaling of the photolithographic production process. Several types of integrated optical sensor have been described (e.g. [1-3]), but no commercially viable multianalyte system currently exists and, in order to fully exploit this technology in practical instrumentation, inexpensive and reliable techniques for addressing the multiple outputs of waveguide devices must be found. Fibre-to-chip pigtailing of integrated optical devices formed in 'passive' materials such as glass, where it is difficult to truly integrate monolithic light sources and detectors, is not the best solution when dealing with multiple outputs due to the necessity of producing and pigtailing fibre arrays. For single input devices, however, fibre input coupling is still a viable option as only a single pigtail needs to be made. In this paper we present measurements on multiple-output integrated optical sensor devices using fibre input coupling and a cheap, readily available, 1D CCD array detector to simultaneously address all outputs. A lens is used to focus the waveguide outputs onto the array, resulting in a compact unit that can be housed in a standard instrument package. A further advantage of this arrangement is that other optical elements such as filters and polarisers can readily be inserted into the beam path


The integration of structural and stratigraphic data is fundamental for determining rates of deformation in the uppermost continental crust. The high temporal resolution provided by Neogene marine sediments is used here to examine deformation rates in part of a thrust belt chosen from the Maghrebian orogen of Sicily. Conventional biozonal stratigraphy, calibrated against the geomagnetic polarity time scale, shows that individual thrust-fold structures grew steadily over many millions of years. Structures across the thrust belt were active at the same time and accommodated bulk shortening rates of c. 0.5 mm a-1. In contrast the basal detachment operated about ten times faster. These results are in broad agreement with some theoretical models for orogenic wedge kinematics. Shore-line carbonate successions, calibrated with precession cycles of sea-level change, provide a very high-resolution, temporal scale with which to chart tilt rates on fold limbs (1°/27.6 ka = 0.036° ka-1). These show that fold amplification was continuous although the rates may have varied with time. Incremental tilting of limbs during fold amplification is not predicted by popular models of fault-bend and 'fault-propagation' folding. Geometric modelling suggests that folding occurred by limb rotation, with minor hinge migration during buckling above buried thrusts. Thus stratigraphic data may be used to examine the kinematic evolution of thrust-fold systems along regional cross-sections, and of local structures. However, the types of structural models that can be tested using estimates of deformation rates depend upon the chrono-stratigraphic resolution available for the syn-tectonic sediments.


Femtosecond-laser-written patterns at the surface of brittle materials may show at random times spontaneous alternations from regular to disordered structures and vice versa. Here, we show that these random transitions carry relevant statistical information, such as the Weibull parameters characterizing the fracture of brittle materials. The regular-erratic cycles of random lengths of the observed patterns suggests a phenomenological analogy with the idle and busy periods arising in queuing systems. This analogy enables us to establish experimentally that the random durations of the successive cycles are statistically independent. Based on these observations, we propose an experimental method bypassing the need for many specimens to build up statistically relevant ensembles of fracture tests. Our method is potentially generic, as it may apply to a broad number of brittle materials.


You Shall Know Our Velocity is a compelling and thought-provoking novel by award-winning Dave Eggers. Will and Hand are burdened by $38,000 and the memory of their friend Jack. Taking a week out of their lives, they decide to travel around the world to give the money away. They can't really say why they're doing it, just that it needs to be done. Perhaps it's something to do with Jack's death - perhaps they'll find the reason later. But as their plans are frustrated, twisted and altered at every step and the natives prove far from grateful to their benefactors, Will and Hand find that the world is an infinitely bigger, more surreal and exhilarating place than they ever realised. In fact, it's somewhere to get lost in..."Dave Eggers has become J. D. Salinger, Ken Kesey and Jack Kerouac rolled into one." (The Times). "Endearing, funny...the prose is high on energy and Eggers' talents make it worth the trip." (Guardian).


Clustering of extremes has a large societal impact. The extremal index, a number in the unit interval, is a key parameter in modelling the clustering of extremes. We build a connection between the extremal index and the stable tail dependence function, which enables us to compute the value of extremal indices for some time series models. We also construct a nonparametric estimator of the extremal index and an estimation procedure to verify $D^{(d)}(u_n)$ condition, a local dependence condition often assumed for studying the extremal index. We prove that the estimator is asymptotically normal. The simulation study which compares our estimator to two existing methods shows that our method has better finite sample properties. We apply our method to estimate the expected durations of heatwaves in the Netherlands and in Greece.


Background: CD4+CD25+ regulatory T cells (Tregs) regulate immunotolerance. Treg depletion causes autoimmune disease, whereas Treg expansion can prevent effective immunosurveillance of 'non-self' antigens in many clinical settings, including cancer. Objective: Patent WO2008081581 presents an invention to target Tregs therapeutically via vaccination with immunogenic peptides from the forkhead box P3 (FOXP3) transcription factor. Our objective was the scientific evaluation of this patent and advantages versus potential risks of this therapeutic strategy. Methods: There are 432 patents on Tregs and a diverse array of approaches for their therapeutic targeting; these have already been reviewed elsewhere. This article focuses on the utility of the selected peptides for specifically targeting FOXP3, whether FOXP3 expression is Treg specific and the likely effectiveness versus risk of autoimmunity relating to FOXP3-targeted immunotherapy. Results/conclusions: Our analysis of the immunogenic FOXP3 peptides found many (10/21) with significant (i.e. only one or two amino-acid differences) or complete identity with other proteins; these are not suitable for specific FOXP3 targeting. Some peptides have the ability to target specific FOXP3 isoforms. FOXP3 vaccination might be an effective method for reducing Treg numbers in cancer patients. However, this must be balanced against the risks of developing autoimmunity and targeting effector T cells.


. The paper focuses on a series of blends prepared with different contents of polystyrene-block-poly-(ethylene-ran-butylene)-block-polystyrene (SEBS) and polypropylene (PP) for the purpose of examining the potential as proton exchange membranes. Polymer blends were prepared by twin-screw extrusion and then compressed by means of a hot-press device into thin films of 125 μm and then ionic sides were created by solid state sulfonation in a chlorosulfonic acid solution. Obtained films were characterized by means of water-uptake, mechanical properties, ion-exchange capacities (IEC) and ion conductivities. It was observed that the rigidity of the films increased with rising sulfonation durations. However humidity absorption from the air decreased the rigidity at high sulfonation levels. Improved water uptake values were obtained when compared to previously reported values in the literature. On the other hand ion exchange values showed an increase parallel to the sulfonation duration up to 45 minutes, but a decrease thereafter was observed due to the diffusion of some sulfonated polymer chains into the ion-exchange medium thereby calculated ion exchange values of S-SEBSH45 and S-SEBSH60 were found less than expected. All films showed ion conductivities up to 432 mS/cm at 25°C. Only S-SEBSH45 and S-SEBSH60 were successful in conducting protons at 80°C owing to the high water retaining capacity.


We present MOPED, a framework for Multiple Object Pose Estimation and Detection that seamlessly integrates single-image and multi-image object recognition and pose estimation in one optimized, robust, and scalable framework. We address two main challenges in computer vision for robotics: robust performance in complex scenes, and low latency for real-time operation. We achieve robust performance with Iterative Clustering Estimation (ICE), a novel algorithm that iteratively combines feature clustering with robust pose estimation. Feature clustering quickly partitions the scene and produces object hypotheses. The hypotheses are used to further refine the feature clusters, and the two steps iterate until convergence. ICE is easy to parallelize, and easily integrates single- and multi-camera object recognition and pose estimation. We also introduce a novel object hypothesis scoring function based on M-estimator theory, and a novel pose clustering algorithm that robustly handles recognition outliers. We achieve scalability and low latency with an improved feature matching algorithm for large databases, a GPU/CPU hybrid architecture that exploits parallelism at all levels, and an optimized resource scheduler. We provide extensive experimental results demonstrating state-of-the-art performance in terms of recognition, scalability, and latency in real-world robotic applications.


This article focuses on geographic communities as fields in which human-made and natural events occasionally disrupt the lives of organizations. We develop an institutional perspective to unpack how and why major events within communities affect organizations in the context of corporate philanthropy. To test this framework, we examine how different types of mega-events (the Olympics, the Super Bowl, political conventions) and natural disasters (such as floods and hurricanes) affected the philanthropic spending of locally headquartered Fortune 1000 firms between 1980 and 2006. Results show that philanthropic spending fluctuated dramatically as mega-events generally led to a punctuated increase in otherwise relatively stable patterns of giving by local corporations. The impact of natural disasters depended on the severity of damage: while major disasters had a negative effect, smaller-scale disasters had a positive impact. Firms' philanthropic history and communities' intercorporate network cohesion moderated some of these effects. This study extends the institutional and community literatures by illuminating the geographic distribution of punctuating events as a central mechanism for community influences on organizations, shedding new light on the temporal dynamics of both endogenous and exogenous punctuating events and providing a more nuanced understanding of corporate-community relations.


This dissertation investigates the extent and evolution of income and educational inequality, as well as governments' tax and expenditure policies and their implications for inequality in Ghana over the long-term. The results of the dissertation are presented in four-thematically related papers. Paper I uses a social tables approach to measure the extent of income inequality in colonial Ghana and in the early years of Ghana's independence. The paper finds that income inequality was high prior to the adoption of cocoa cultivation in the last decade of the 19th century. Inequality remained fairly stable in the decades that followed, declined in the global depression years of the 1930s and increased in the closing decades of the colonial era. Paper II examines inequalities in education and assesses how economic constraints affected educational demand and the diffusion of education. The paper finds that differences in educational spread reflected differences in demand, and that, the educational sector mirrored existing socio-economic inequalities, it did not alter them. Paper III bridges the colonial and post-colonial historiographical divide and examines continuities and changes in governments' fiscal policies and their effects on inequality. The paper finds that governments' tax and expenditure policies have had limited effects on inequality because of their low levels and limited coverage. Finally, Paper IV based on a historical analysis of four major tax reforms in Ghana from the 1850s to the late 1990s, captures the various ways in which state-society interactions limit the state's fiscal capacity. The paper demonstrates that reciprocity and fiscal contracts between governments and society are the foundation of effective taxation. (Less)


1. A description is given of the main features of the central nervous system of Myxicola infundibulum Renier.

2. The nerve-cord is double in the first four thoracic segments and single posteriorly. It shows segmental swellings but is not ganglionated in the usual sense in that nerve-cell accumulations are not related directly to such swellings of the cord.

3. A very large axon lies within the dorsal portion of the nerve-cord and extends from the supra-oesophageal ganglia to the posterior end of the animal. It is small in the head ganglia where it passes transversely across the mid-line, increases in diameter in the oesophageal connectives, and expands to very large size, up to 1 mm., in the posterior thorax and anterior abdomen, and gradually tapers off to about 100µ in the posterior body. It shows segmental swellings corresponding to those of the nerve-cord in each segment. It occupies about 27 per cent, of the volume of the central nervous system and 0.3 per cent, of the volume of the animal. The diameter of the fibre increases during contraction of the worm.

4. The giant fibre is a continuous structure throughout its length, without internal dividing membranes or septa. Usually a branch of the giant fibre lies in each half of the nerve-cord in the anterior thoracic segments and these several branches are continuous with one another longitudinally and transversely.

5. The giant fibre is connected with nerve-cells along its entire course; it arises from a pair of cells in the supra-oesophageal ganglia, and receives the processes of many nerve-cells in each segment. There is no difference between the nerve-cells of the giant fibre and the other nerve-cells of the cord.

6. A distinct fibrous sheath invests the giant fibre. A slight concentration of lipoid can be revealed in this sheath by the use of Sudan black.

7. About eight peripheral branches arise from the giant fibre in each segment. They have a complex course in the nerve-cord where they anastomose with one another and receive the processes of nerve-cells. Peripherally, they are distributed to the longitudinal musculature.

8. Specimens surviving 16 days following section of the nerve-cord in the thorax have shown that the giant fibre does not degenerate in front of or behind a cut, thus confirming that it is a multicellular structure connected to nerve-cells in the thorax and abdomen.

9. It is concluded that the giant fibre of M. infundibulum is a large syncytial structure, extending throughout the entire central nervous system and the body-wall of the animal.

10. The giant fibre system of M. aesthetica resembles that of M. infundibulum .

11. Some implications of the possession of such a giant axon are discussed. It is suggested that its size, structure, and simplicity lead to rapid conduction and thus effect a considerable saving of reaction time, of considerable value to the species when considered in the light of the quick contraction which it mediates. The adoption of a sedentary mode of existence has permitted this portion of the central nervous system to become developed at the expense of other elements concerned with errant habits.


Religio-legalism – the enforcement of religious law by specifically-religious courts that are tolerated or endorsed by civil government – has long operated against women's interests in liberty and equality. In the 21st century, religious tribunals – Protestant, Catholic, Jewish, and Muslim – operate throughout the world. Almost all are male-dominated, patriarchal, and sex-discriminatory. Harms to women produced by Muslim or sharia courts have come into focus in recent years, but present realities of religio-legalism operating through Christian and Jewish – as well as Muslim – religious courts in Western nations have been under-examined. This essay documents controversies concerning sharia-courts that have arisen in Canada and in the United Kingdom during the past decade and also looks at concurrent developments relating to sharia and to other-than-Muslim religious courts in the US.Religious courts – Christian, Jewish, and Muslim – have in common that they assert original or exclusive jurisdiction over certain matters. In calls for "official recognition" of sharia courts, proponents have advanced a religious-equality argument, claiming that denial of that status to Muslim tribunals would violate the governmental obligation to avoid discrimination among religions. At the same time, sharia-related controversy has raised sharply the question about the implications for women's liberty and equality rights that are produced by governmental accommodations of the religious-equality and religious-liberty interests asserted by all religious entities enjoying governmental recognition. While recognizing the legitimacy and weight of the complaint against inequitable treatment of religions, we argue here that whenever governmental action to "resolve" sharia-related conflict adopts the avoidance of discrimination among religions as its single goal and therefore expands its "official recognition" to include additional religious courts, it will have the effect of enlarging religions' power and at the same time exacerbating harms to women. Referencing feminist writings that have documented the global spread of religious fundamentalisms from the 1990s to the present and that have exposed capitulations of liberalism to those fundamentalisms, we call for reconceptualization of the law-religion-women nexus. We urge recognition that governmental goals of equitable treatment of religions and protection of women's rights will together be served not by expansions of governmental engagements with religion, but by retrenchment from religio-legalism. Thus, we urge, in policy and in law, clear prioritization of the protection of women's rights and concurrent retreat from the formal recognition of all religious courts and of civil-law enforcement of the orders of any such bodies.


In this paper, we discuss the use of the electromagnetic time reversal (EMTR) method to locate lightning strikes. After a brief description of the EMTR and its application to lightning location, we mathematically demonstrate that the time-of-arrival method can be seen as a subset of EMTR. We propose three different models of backpropagation to address the issue of EMTR not being invariant for lossy media. Two sets of simulations are carried out to evaluate the accuracy of the proposed methods. The first set of simulations is performed using numerically generated fields and the proposed algorithm is shown to give very good results even if the soil is not perfectly conducting. In particular, we show that considering a model in which losses are inverted in the back propagation yields theoretically exact results for the source location. We show also that a lack of access to the complete recorded waveforms may lead to higher location errors, even though the computed errors are found to be within the range of performance of current lightning location systems (LLS). A second set of simulations is performed using the sensor data reported by the Austrian LLS. The locations obtained by way of the proposed EMTR method using only the available sensor data (amplitude, arrival time, and time-to-peak), are observed to be within a few kilometers of the locations supplied by the LLS.


This work shows the results of the comparative study of characteristic frequencies in terms of Power Spectral Density (PSD) or RMS generated by a blower unit and the SKFNU322 bearing. Data is collected following ISO 10816, using Emonitor software and with speed values in RMS to avoid high and low frequency signal masking. Bearing failure is the main cause of operational shutdown in industrial sites. The difficulty of prediction is the type of breakage and the high number of variables involved. Monitoring and analysing all the variables of the SKFNU322 bearing and those of machine operation for 15 years allowed to develop a new predictive maintenance protocol. This method makes it possible to reduce from 6 control points to one, and to determine which of the 42 variables is the most incidental in the correct operation, so equipment performance and efficiency is improved, contributing to increased economic profitability. The tests were carried out on a 500 kW unit of power and It was shown that the rotation of the equipment itself caused the most generating variable of vibrational energy.


SUMMARY Grain yields of cowpea [Vigna unguiculata (L.) Walp.] in the Nigerian savannas are low even with the cultivation of improved varieties. The recommended spacing for cowpea is 75 × 20 cm with two seeds planted per stand. This corresponds to plant population of 133333 plants ha−1, which may not be sufficient for optimal cowpea yield. Field experiments were conducted to determine plant density effects on cowpea performance in the Northern Guinea and the Sudan savannas of Nigeria and also to determine if genotypes varied in their response to plant density. Four cowpea varieties with contrasting maturity duration were planted in single, double and triple rows on ridges spaced 75 cm apart to achieve corresponding densities of 133333, 266666 and 400000 plants ha−1, respectively. Plant densities of 266666 and 400000 plants ha−1 gave higher crop performance in terms of light interception, biomass production, yield and yield components for all cowpea varieties. Yield increases were related largely to increased pod and seed production but the effect of seed size on yield was relatively minor. Our results provide evidence that the current density of 133333 plants ha−1 used by farmers is not optimum for cowpea production. Smallholder farmers can increase cowpea grain and fodder yields if they use a density of 266666 plants ha−1 in cowpea cultivation. Further yield increases when cowpea is planted at 400000 plants ha−1 may not be sufficient to offset the cost of seed.


Human parsing has received considerable interest due to its wide application potentials. Nevertheless, it is still unclear how to develop an accurate human parsing system in an efficient and elegant way. In this paper, we identify several useful properties, including feature resolution, global context information and edge details, and perform rigorous analyses to reveal how to leverage them to benefit the human parsing task. The advantages of these useful properties finally result in a simple yet effective Context Embedding with Edge Perceiving (CE2P) framework for single human parsing. Our CE2P is end-to-end trainable and can be easily adopted for conducting multiple human parsing. Benefiting the superiority of CE2P, we won the 1st places on all three human parsing tracks in the 2nd Look into Person (LIP) Challenge. Without any bells and whistles, we achieved 56.50% (mIoU), 45.31% (mean APr) and 33.34% (APp0.5) in Track 1, Track 2 and Track 5, which outperform the state-of-the-arts more than 2.06%, 3.81% and 1.87%, respectively. We hope our CE2P will serve as a solid baseline and help ease future research in single/multiple human parsing. Code has been made available at https://github.com/liutinglt/CE2P.


Based upon multiple time series studies, an agent-based model (ABM) of women's decision-making related to partner violence was developed. However, help-seeking, legal action and leaving could be modeled as catastrophic phenomena, but catastrophic effects were not included in this prior ABM. The purpose of this study was to incorporate cusp catastrophe equations into the prior ABM to determine the impact upon her action-taking. Building upon this prior ABM of women's decision-making, we added cusp-related equations and compared resultant patterns and impacts of stress and interventions against those of the prior ABM. To assess the potential impact that random stress and her behavior could have on violence and stalking, the effect of variable parameter settings of these factors were assessed. Adding cusp equations to the prior ABM resulted in more legal action-taking for most of these patterns, many showing the effects of the bifurcation variables, and more women leaving in half of the patterns, but at the expense of increasing instability and more distortion effects. However, help-seeking was most impacted by possible interventions. In conclu-sion, adding cusp equations to the model had significant effects on modeling action-taking, especially for legal action and leaving while affecting the impact of interventions on help-seeking.


This memo discusses issues that arise when multiplexing RTP data packets and RTP Control Protocol (RTCP) packets on a single UDP port. It updates RFC 3550 and RFC 3551 to describe when such multiplexing is and is not appropriate, and it explains how the Session Description Protocol (SDP) can be used to signal multiplexed sessions.


A number of synthetic polyamine derivatives that included five achiral gem-dimethylspermidines and two analogous tetramethylated spermines were tested for their abilities to serve as substrates for enzymes metabolizing polyamines and for their capacities to substitute for the natural polyamines in cell growth. It was found that none of the compounds were effective substrates for spermine synthase, and only one, namely 8,8-dimethylspermidine, was a substrate for spermidine/spermine N1-acetyltransferase. However, all of the spermidine derivatives and 1,1,12,12-tetramethylspermine were able to support the growth of SV-3T3 cells in which endogenous polyamine synthesis was prevented by the addition of alpha-difluoromethylornithine. These results suggest that either spermidine or spermine can support cell growth without the need for metabolic interconversion. In contrast with the result with 1,1,12,12-tetramethylspermine, 3,3,10,10-tetramethylspermine did not restore growth of polyamine-depleted SV-3T3 cells. Comparison of the properties of these derivatives may prove valuable in understanding the physiological role of polyamines.


In this paper, we describe the extraction of source code metrics from the Jazz repository and the application of data mining techniques to identify the most useful of those metrics for predicting the success or failure of an attempt to construct a working instance of the software product. We present results from a systematic study using the J48 classification method. The results indicate that only a relatively small number of the available software metrics that we considered have any significance for predicting the outcome of a build. These significant metrics are discussed and implication of the results discussed, particularly the relative difficulty of being able to predict failed build attempts.


SARS-CoV-2 transmission from humans to animals has been reported for many domesticated species, including cats, dogs and minks. Identification of novel spike gene mutations appearing in minks has raised major concerns about potential immune evasion and challenges for the global vaccine strategy. The genetic variant, known as "cluster-five", arose among farmed minks in Denmark and resulted in a complete shutdown of the world's largest mink production. However, the functional properties of this new variant are not established. Here we present functional data on the Y453F cluster-five receptor-binding domain (RBD) and show that it does not decrease established humoral immunity or affect the neutralizing response in a vaccine model based on wild-type RBD or spike. However, it binds the human ACE-2 receptor with a four-fold higher affinity suggesting an enhanced transmission capacity and a possible challenge for viral control.


In recent years, there have been substantial changes in the factors that affect a growth in water demand and in the framework and constraints for providing the solutions that will meet these demands. Requirements are growing at the speed of light, whereas solutions are being established at a snail's pace. In the past, there was considerable headroom where guaranteeing the supply were concerned, but unfortunately the leeway that once existed is being rapidly eroded away. The procedures for facing up to these challenges and new frameworks and problems require new ways of analysis and approach to the solutions. This paper explains the factors that are determinants for the requirements and their solutions, provides figures of reference for the Autonomous Region of Madrid supply system in Spain (5.5 million inhabitants) and the lines that are being followed to reduce the uncertainties involved in demand prediction, so that planning investment in infrastructures can be adapted and water can be managed in a way that is consistent with a set of factors that determine the eventual water consumption as a result of a profound interaction between territorial, social, environmental and economic factors.


The natural-step framework is used by over 100 organizations, including many global corporations in Europe and the United States, to provide strategic direction for their sustainability initiatives. The framework is built on the concept of simplicity without reduction. Out of respect for complexity, we designed it to provide a compass, a guide for strategic direction. The framework consists of a backcasting planning process for sustainable development based on four principles (system conditions) for sustainability. The framework does not prescribe detailed actions. Once an organization understands the framework, it identifies and specifies the detailed means by which to achieve the strategy, because it knows its business best. The steps in the planning process are understanding and discussing the system conditions for sustainability, describing and discussing how the company relates to the system conditions in today's situation, creating a vision of how the company will fulfill its customers' needs in the future while complying with the system conditions, and specifying a program of actions that will take the company from today's situation to the future vision.


To the Editor: Legionella pneumophila serogroups (SGs) 1–16 cause pneumonia in humans. Although SG 1 is the serogroup most commonly associated with disease (1), we report a case of community-acquired legionellosis caused by SG 11.

In November 2010, a 42-year-old man was admitted to Modena University Hospital, Modena, Italy, with a 4-day history of fever, dyspnea, and cough. His vital signs were as follows: temperature 40.0°C, pulse 135 beats/min, blood pressure 110/60 mm Hg, respiratory rate 30 breaths/min, and oxygen saturation 85% in room air. Inspiratory crackles were heard in the left lower lung lobe. Chest radiographs and successive high-resolution computerized tomography revealed left lobar infiltrates (Figure, panels A and B). Blood count documented severe pancytopenia together with high levels of inflammation markers: fibrinogen (1,031 mg/dL), C-reactive protein (33 mg/dL), and procalcitonin (28.5 ng/mL). The patient's medical history was unremarkable; however, results of tests conducted at the time of hospital admission led to the diagnosis of acute leukemia.

Figure

Imaging studies of 42-year-old man with severe pneumonia caused by Legionella pneumophila serogroup 11, showing lobar consolidation of the left lower lung lobe, with an air-bronchogram within the homogeneous airspace consolidation. Consensual mild pleural ...

Empirically prescribed antimicrobial treatment for neutropenic patients was initiated and consisted of meropenem (3 g/day) and levofloxacin (500 mg/day), combined first with vancomycin (2 g/day) and later with linezolid (1,200 mg/day). A few days later, antifungal therapy was empirically added to the treatment regimen (liposomal amphotericin B at 3 mg/kg/day). The patient received continuous positive airway pressure, which resulted in progressive improvement of blood gas exchange, until normalization was achieved.

Serologic and molecular examination and culture of bronchoalveolar lavage fluid, blood, urine, and feces produced negative results for fungal, viral, and bacterial pathogens. Test results for L. pneumophila urinary antigen (Biotest AG, Dreieich, Germany) and IgM and IgG against L. pneumophila (Serion-Immundiagnostica GmbH, Wurzburg, Germany) were negative. Culture of sputum collected at the time of hospital admission showed growth of legionella-like colonies on buffered charcoal yeast extract, with and without the addition of antimicrobial drugs (Oxoid, Basingstoke, UK). The colonies were identified as L. pneumophila SGs 2–14 by the Legionella latex test (Oxoid). The strain was further characterized as L. pneumophila SG 11, according to a polyclonal latex reagent set (Biolife, Milan, Italy). Environmental investigations were conducted in the patient's house and workplace, but L. pneumophila SG 11 was not detected in any of the locations tested.

A week after hospital admission, the patient was persistently febrile and experienced pain in the left thorax. High-resolution computerized tomography of the chest was repeated and showed increased pulmonary infiltrate (Figure, panels C and D) that was consistent with L. pneumophila pneumonia (2). Highly potent antimicrobial therapy against L. pneumophila was administered, consisting of high-dosage levofloxacin (1 g/day) combined with azithromycin (500 mg/day), while the other antimicrobial agents were progressively reduced (3). The fever subsided 14 days after the onset of targeted antimicrobial drug treatment; at that time, the sputum culture and test results for urinary L. pneumophila antigen were negative, but serologic assay results were positive for IgG and negative for IgM against L. pneumophila. Subsequent computerized tomographic scans of the chest documented progressive improvement of lung infiltrates, and nearly complete resolution was obtained 3 months after hospital admission.

L. pneumophila SG 11 infection has, thus far, been reported only rarely in humans. The first SG 11 strain was isolated in the United States in 1982 from a patient with multiple myeloma (4). Since then, few other cases of SG 11 strains have been reported in Europe (5,6); it is conceivable that this strain is not as widely distributed and is less pathogenic than other SGs, especially SG 1. It can be argued that infections caused by SG 11 have been underdiagnosed. L. pneumophila SG 11 cannot be detected by Legionella urinary antigen or serologic tests, the assays most frequently used to diagnose legionellosis (7–9). The negative urinary antigen test result for this patient is consistent with a non–SG 1 infection. The single positive serologic result for IgG was probably caused by cross-reactivity because the commercial assay kit was designed to recognize only L. pneumophila SGs 1–7. Culture is the only useful diagnostic tool for identifying SGs. However, this tool is not always feasible because it requires specialized media and skills to identify the organism. In addition, sensitivity is low, depending on the severity of the disease and the availability of adequate respiratory specimens (9). Despite these limitations, culture is needed to detect all SGs of L. pneumophila, especially in immunocompromised patients, who are more susceptible to infections caused by strains of non–SG 1 L. pneumophila (10).


Abstract A method is developed to determine the response of digital seismographs from transient calibration pulses. Based on linear system theory, the digital seismograph is represented by a set of first- and higher-order linear filters characterized by their cutoff frequencies and damping coefficients. The transient calibration pulse is parameterized by a set of instrument constants, and the problem is linearized for small perturbations of the constants with respect to their nominal values. The observed calibration pulse shape is matched in the time domain using an iterative linearized inverse technique. The method is used to derive complete instrument responses for digital seismographs operating at the Borovoye Observatory (BRVK) in Kazakhstan, for which previously only the amplitude responses have been determined. To test this method, we apply it to calibration pulses from a modern digital seismograph system at Kislovodsk (KIV) in northern Caucasus, Russia, and obtain good agreement between known and derived instrument constants. The results of the calibration pulse shape inversion for these seismographs indicate that the method is efficient and that the results are reliable even when microseismic noise is present in the recorded transient calibration pulse. The derived parameters make possible improved quantitative waveform analysis of digital seismograms recorded at BRVK.


During construction projects, the productive deployment of operations depends on the reliable supply of the production control function, where the proper coordination of teams, meetings and managerial processes is crucial for performance. Currently the use of the Last Planner System for providing this function has been successful; despite the importance it claims in the social domain, it does not explicitly regulate the coordination of teams and meetings with the managerial processes. In order to address this gap, we developed a prototype tool, based on a Multi- Domain Matrix, for handling and tracking the performance of these elements. This paper introduces the Matrix of Interacting Groups, which evaluates the interaction of teams, meetings and managerial processes during the production control function supply. It was initially tested in a Chilean housing project and it allows the identification of team members, meetings, processes, and provides insight into the system key properties. It enables a comprehensive description of the production control function and generates a framework for tracking and for potentially fine tuning it. Although the tool is still under development, it seems promissory for providing a high level and practical regulation of production control.


For many decades, the Gulf states' significant oil reserves have rendered the region among the most important energy suppliers in the world, and there is similar potential for the region's natural gas reserves. However, the Gulf states' rapidly rising regional consumption has begun to play a critical role in the region's future export prospects, including the size and longevity of domestic oil and gas production, both for domestic and export market supply. This paper by Laura El-Katiri aims to discuss the current and future challenges evolving from the Gulf region's growing domestic energy use, coupled to its continued, almost exclusive, reliance on oil and natural gas, on the region's future export potential, as well as the security of its domestic energy supplies. It suggests that only a more proactive Gulf policy response to rising domestic energy consumption can help safeguard the stability of the Gulf's role as a global energy supplier as well as its domestic long-term energy security; such a policy response would include the diversification of the region's energy base and the effective management of domestic demand.


Semantic segmentation is generally associated with second generation video coders, or object-based coders. Object-based coders encode different video objects separately in order to achieve lower bitrates and to enable object-based functionalities. In this paper, we present an encoding framework that uses semantic segmentation to improve the performance of first generation video coders, or frame-based coders. Semantic segmentation is exploited in a prefiltering step prior to encoding. This prefiltering step mimics the way humans treat visual information by separating relevant information from contextual information. Contextual information is then simplified, thus reducing the information to be coded. Experimental results on indoor as well as on outdoor test sequences, when the semantics is defined by motion, show that the proposed prefiltering improves the perceived quality with respect to traditional video coders.


Objective: to investigate the efficacy and safety of Mexidol ® FORTE 250 in patients with chronic cerebral ischemia (CCI) in the presence of hypertension and atherosclerosis. Patients and methods. The investigation enrolled 20 patients aged 45 to 75 years with CCI in the presence of hypertension and atherosclerosis, who received intravenous Mexidol ® administered dropwise at a dose of 500 mg once a day for 14 days, followed by oral Mexidol ® FORTE 250 mg thrice a day for 60 days (a study group). A control group consisted of 14 patients with CCI in the presence of hypertension concurrent with atherosclerosis, who were prescribed combination therapy for CCI without using these drugs. The patients were examined before and at 14 and 60 days of treatment. The investigators studied subjective complaints, neurological symptoms, and the indicators of the Tinetti Performance-Oriented Mobility Assessment in Elderly Patients; the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA); the Hamilton Anxiety Rating Scale (HARS); asthenia rating scales (Multidimensional Fatigue Inventory, MFI-20); and the Clinical Global Impression (CGI) scale over time. Results and discussion. Therapy with Mexidol ® in patients with CCI in the presence of hypertension and atherosclerosis was found to be accompanied by positive changes in the asthenia rating scale MFI-20, cognitive functions assessed by MoCA, as well as Tinetti movement coordination. No significant differences in these indicators were noted in patients of the control group. Combination treatment for CCI with Mexidol ® and Mexidol ® FORTE 250 as a sequential therapy was twice more effective than that without using these drugs, as shown by the scales as a whole and it was up to 10 times greater for individual scale parameters.  Conclusion. The study of Mexidol ® FORTE 250 as part of the sequential therapy, which was used according to the above regimen, indicates its clinical efficacy and safety in patients with CCI.


Abstract Historically, civil wars ended in one-sided victory. With the end of the Cold War, however, the very nature of how civil wars end shifted: wars became two times more likely to terminate in negotiated settlement than in victory. Since the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, the proportion of victories has increased, especially for civil wars that include a terrorist group; wars are also ending less frequently. Why would civil war termination vary by time period? The literature on civil wars looks to three basic types of causes: domesticstructural factors, bargaining dynamics, and types of international intervention. Current explanations cannot account for why civil wars would end differently in different time periods because, as Kenneth Waltz might say, they are "reductionist" in nature. Material and ideational factors constitute the international political environment, which varies in different time periods. This environment drives outside actors' normative strategies of viewing victory, negotiation, or stabilization as the appropriate solution to civil war. These norms, in turn, directly affect how civil wars end. A novel, three-part methodological approach using quantitative analysis, case studies, and original content analysis demonstrates that civil wars tend to end the way external actors think they ought to end.


We implemented the connectionist model of social-pragmatic word learning (Caza & Knott, 2012) to test the hypothesis that reduced joint attention between infant and mother would increase the difference in acquisition between nouns and verbs as observed in Autistic Spectrum Disorder (ASD). The ratio of objects to actions in the observed event stream was manipulated to create an original noun-verb asymmetry. Ten simulations were run for each of the combinations of three conditions of communicative reliability and two conditions of unfiltered random associative learning, which is regarded by some researchers as the primary mechanism of language learning in ASD. The simulations indicated that the reduction in the reliability of communicative actions does not lead to increased noun-verb asymmetry within the originally planned training epochs. A trend in the predicted direction appeared toward the end of training, suggesting that further simulations may help resolve the issue within the current architecture.


Enzyme immunoassay (EIA) was used to detect antibodies to Trichomonas vaginalis in sera from Zimbabwe. The EIA showed a sensitivity of 95 and 94% when compared with vaginal swab culture among women attending a family planning clinic (FPC) and female commercial sex workers (CSW) respectively. The specificity was 85 and 77% in the two groups. Culture-negative FPC women were sub-divided into high risk or low risk of exposure to trichomoniasis. The seroprevalence was 10% (6/61) among low risk women, 21% (10/48) among high risk women and 23% (9/39) among culture negative CSW. The EIA was positive in 46% (18/39) men with genital discharge but only 5% (2/37) healthy blood donors. None of 31 sera from prepubescent children was positive. The EIA may be useful for community surveys of trichomoniasis. Because T. vaginalis is a common sexually transmitted disease, the test may indicate behaviour that increases the risk of STD transmission.


A Framework for the Performance Analysis and Tuning of Virtual Private Networks Fridrich Shane Perez School of Technology, BYU Master of Science With the rising trend of personal devices like laptops and smartphones being used in businesses and significant enterprises, the concern for preserving security arises. In addition to preserving security measures in outside devices, the network speed and performance capable by these devices need to be balanced with the security aspect to avoid slowing down virtual private network (VPN) activity. Performance tests have been done in the past to evaluate available software, hardware, and network security protocol options that will best benefit an entity according to its specific needs. With a variety of comparable frameworks available currently, it is a matter of pick and choose. This study is dedicated to developing a unique process-testing framework for personal devices by comparing the default security encryptions of different VPN architectures to the Federal Information Processing Standards (FIPS) set of complying encryptions. VPN architectures include a vendor-supplied VPN, Palo Alto Networks, open-sourced OpenVPN application, and a Windows PPTP server to test security protocols and measure network speed through different operating platforms. The results achieved in this research reveal the differences between the default security configurations and the encryption settings enforced by FIPS, shown through the collected averaged bandwidth between multiple network tests under those settings. The results have been given additional analysis and confidence through t-tests and standard deviation. The configurations, including difficulty in establishing, between different VPNs also contribute to discovering OpenVPN under FIPS settings to be favorable over a Palo Alto firewall using FIPSCC mode due to higher bandwidth rate despite following the same encryption standards.


We report the rapid detection (20 min) of Streptococcus agalactiae, Group B Streptococcus (GBS) employing on-chip magnetic isolation of GBS based on immiscible filtration assisted by surface tension (IFAST), followed by detection of the isolated GBS using an adenosine triphosphate (ATP) bioluminescence assay. Up to 80% GBS cells were isolated from spiked artificial urine samples with linear responses of bioluminescence signals from isolated cells at 2.3 × 102-9.1 × 105 CFU mL-1, demonstrating great promise for point-of-care detection of pathogenic bacteria in screening urine samples from pregnant women. Practical challenges during initial testing of the developed protocol with urine samples in Kenya are also described.


Marketing is an essential component of any business, including agriculture. Despite the important role of marketing, many smallholding operators/growers are reluctant to create a marketing plan. This 5-page fact sheet provides a rationale for developing a marketing plan, a step-by-step process for creating one, and a marketing plan worksheet. Written by Edward A. Evans and Fredy H. Ballen, and published by the UF Department of Food and Resource Economics, August 2015. (Photo credit: iStock/Thinkstock)
FE967/FE967: Eight Steps to Developing a Simple Marketing Plan (ufl.edu)


Rubber is a highly complicated material. Its properties are strongly dependent of temperature, preload, frequency, amplitude and filling materials. In order to have better knowledge about how rubber reacts for these different parameters, a number of different papers that treats these parameters have been reviewed. Main focus is on dynamic properties of carbon-black filled rubber. Mechanical models of rubber isolator with different kinds of possible solution have been suggested. A basic mathematical equation is derived to estimate the static and dynamic stiffness of a rubber isolator depending on the preload for a geometry that is commonly used by Atlas Copco Rock Drills AB. Tests of a rubber isolator with the same geometry is also conducted to validate the model. It is shown that the model corresponds very well to measurement data.


To provide computer scientists with good materials and interesting topics in a class does not necessarily mean that their education is of a high quality, students need to be motivated and evolve skills needed in a real-life employment. Social skills, teamwork, collaboration and competition are valuable aspects they should know in other to become professionals. This paper presents a study with intention to improve education of computer science students in employment-like environments. The study utilizes experience with competitive and collaborative learning in education and Programming Olympiads. Multiple methodological aspects are applied and discussed with regard to students' evaluation. The results show increased student motivation and interest in the course, which produces larger workload in the class.


Whitings are a natural phenomenon of calcium carbonate (CaCO3) precipitation that occurs in both fresh and tropical marine waters. Previous studies have associated whitings with Synechococcus bacillaris and have suggested that these bacteria have an active role in whitings development including acting as nucleation sites and actively alkalinizing the surrounding microenvironment. CaCO3 minerals that have been influenced by bacteria in their formation have been found to have different crystal structures than inorganically precipitated CaCO3. What is unknown is whether the carbonate (CO3 2) that is incorporated into the whitings comes from the external environment or is produced by the bacteria through photosynthesis. Oligotrophic S. bacillaris was grown in the laboratory in L1 medium. Microcosm experiments were conducted under closed conditions. pH in the experimental microcosms rose to 9.5 resulting in the precipitation of CaCO3, but then re-acidified as the bacteria entered death phase resulting in the precipitate re-dissolving. Uncontrolled temperature shocks caused decreased cell counts, clumping and acidification. Inorganic CaCO3, experimental precipitate, and pure cells were examined under scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and electron dispersive x-ray spectrometry (EDS). The inorganic CaCO3 had crystalline structures consistent with previous studies (mostly aragonite and amorphous calcium carbonate[ACC]). Extracellular polysaccharide (EPS) was observed in the experimental precipitate, but no CaCO3 precipitates were found, and no bacteria or CaCO3 could be observed in the pure cell sample. Improvements that could be made include stable isotope analysis, more stringent temperature control, variation of conditions and the use of ESEM or gold-coating SEM.


The Mexican War (1846-1848) was one of the pivotal events in the history of United States-Mexico relations. As a result of this conflict the United States acquired the valuable lands and natural resources that accelerated its industrial growth into the twentieth century. Among Mexican elites the end of the war precipitated a period of self-criticism, self-examination, and debate that culminated in the reform movement of Benito Juarez and a civil war beginning in 1857. The disastrous military defeat in 1848 forced both conservatives and liberals to reevaluate the consequences of their political programs in hopes of finding ways to strengthen the nation (Hale 1957:153-174). The Mexican War set in motion political forces that would drastically change Mexico's future. Given the importance of this war and treaty for the history of Mexico, one would expect Mexican historians to give it a great deal of study. By and large, however, Mexican intellectuals have generally ignored or neglected it. This essay examines the way in which Mexicans have interpreted the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo since the fateful year 1848 when the treaty was signed. I have chosen to focus on the treaty rather than on the war for reason of economy. In fact, the way any historian has interpreted the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo inevitably has been conditioned by their view of the Mexican War. There are many Mexican historians of the war but few of them have studied in any detail the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. In selecting Mexican authors for this essay my criterion has been to choose those historians that have significantly written about the treaty.


In 1996 the Police Service of Western Australia embarked on a major and ongoing period of change regarding all aspects of local policing. Part of this program involved the adoption of a number of practices that included an undertaking to pay increased attention to issues such as a customer focus, problem solving, a commitment to developing and motivating personnel, a localised delivery of policing services and improved management practices.

This research was conducted for the purpose of uncovering the factors that create the unique environment of the Police Service of Western Australia and exploring how these might impact upon the manner in which officers conduct their daily duties. More specifically the purpose was to determine if there existed any aspects of organizational culture or structure that have an influence on the ability and/or willingness of officers to carry out their duties according to the processes and procedures of either the problem solving or the problem-oriented policing philosophy.

The research methodology was guided by the grounded theory approach. Twenty-eight interviews were conducted with constables, sergeants, inspectors and superintendents as it was considered that these ranks best represented the views of the members of the organization in terms of numbers and those most affected by day-to-day events.

The data analysis revealed the existence of 13 factors that all exhibit negative aspects and collectively create a Basic Social Problem that has been termed 'Feeling Vulnerable'. Although all of these factors have been well known for many years, the current research integrates these in a new way in order to produce a model of the organization that demonstrates how they combine to create an environment that is counter-productive to the implementation of a problem-solving or problem-oriented approach to policing by members of The Police Service of Western Australia at many levels.

The Basic Social Process disclosed by the current research has been termed 'Controlling By Avoidance'. It is based on four tactics used by officers to control their working environment. The employment of one or more of these tactics by officers is designed to give the impression of engaging with issues while simultaneously exerting control over events in order to prevent the occurrence of outcomes that experience tells them are likely to have undesirable personal consequences. The intention is to create an environment where they hope to be safe from the consequences of problems that will inevitably occur at some time.

As well as providing an explanation for the conduct of officers under the problem solving model the analysis also provides an insight into why the organization has apparently avoided coming to grips with the implementation of the full Goldstein model of problem-oriented policing. This appears to be due to concerns on the part of senior management about the likelihood of a loss of control over subordinate ranks and the personal problems that this would generate for them.

Recommendations are made about the need to adopt the Goldstein model and the steps required to successfully implement this approach are listed.


Pathogenic variants in the X‐linked gene ZC4H2, which encodes a zinc‐finger protein, cause an infrequently described syndromic form of arthrogryposis multiplex congenita (AMC) with central and peripheral nervous system involvement. We present genetic and detailed phenotypic information on 23 newly identified families and simplex cases that include 19 affected females from 18 families and 14 affected males from nine families. Of note, the 15 females with deleterious de novo ZC4H2 variants presented with phenotypes ranging from mild to severe, and their clinical features overlapped with those seen in affected males. By contrast, of the nine carrier females with inherited ZC4H2 missense variants that were deleterious in affected male relatives, four were symptomatic. We also compared clinical phenotypes with previously published cases of both sexes and provide an overview on 48 males and 57 females from 42 families. The spectrum of ZC4H2 defects comprises novel and recurrent mostly inherited missense variants in affected males, and de novo splicing, frameshift, nonsense, and partial ZC4H2 deletions in affected females. Pathogenicity of two newly identified missense variants was further supported by studies in zebrafish. We propose ZC4H2 as a good candidate for early genetic testing of males and females with a clinical suspicion of fetal hypo‐/akinesia and/or (neurogenic) AMC.


Dehalorespiration is a process during which microbes derive energy by the reductive dehalogenation of chlorinated organic pollutants, by using them as electron acceptors. Characterization of the full dehalorespiration pathway in dehalogenating organisms is of great importance, as their physiological properties and substrate range will determine the extent of the bioremediation process and the conditions that should be used. Various Desulfitobacterium strains and Dehalobacter restrictus harbor the pceABCT gene cluster responsible for tetrachloroethene (PCE) anaerobic respiration. Our lab has previously focused on isolation & characterization of the proteins PceA and PceT, the reductive dehalogenase and its specific maturation factor, respectively. PceB is expected to play the role of the membrane anchor for PceA. We are now currently investigating the role of PceC in dehalorespiration. Sequence analysis revealed that PceC is homologous to CprC encoded in the chlorophenol reductive dehalogenase operon which has been postulated to be a membrane-bound FMN-binding transcription regulator of the NosR /NirI family. The goal of the work presented here is the heterologous production and purification of the predicted soluble FMN-binding domain in E. coli in order to raise PceC antibodies and allow an accurate detection and localization of PceC in membranes of Desulfitobacterium and Dehalobacter cells. This should also help in providing stoichiometric analysis of PceC in relation to PceA. For further biochemical characterization reconstitution of the active FMN-binding domain will be attempted.


Farmworkers aiming to transition to independent proprietorship often benefit from beginning farmer incubator programs that offer agricultural training, subsidized farmland rents, and marketing and business assistance. Incubator initiatives often align with various efforts to stem the tide of shrinking U.S. farm numbers and enhance the viability of small-scale, environmentally and socially regenerative enterprises. Yet even as these promising initiatives provide former farmworkers with initial tools for success, structural barriers can impede beginning farmers' eventual transition to independent proprietorship. Land access is one well-known barrier to entry. Impediments to land access for beginning farmers are frequently framed purely in terms of available acreage and/or sufficient start-up capital. Sociocultural and relational factors mediating land access are less well understood. Our study addresses this gap, examining how sociocultural and relational constraints impede land access for former immigrant farmworkers aspiring to independent farming in California's Central Coast region. We employ qualitative methods, including 26 in-depth interviews, focus groups, and participant observation, to explore barriers to land access faced by aspiring small-scale organic farmers participating in an established regional organic farm incubator program. Our findings indicate that these beginning farmers are highly motivated, possess sophisticated farming skills, and wish to shape their livelihoods independently. However, their access to farmland is mediated by landowner and tenant farmer relationships, including lease arrangements, and sociocultural barriers, including ethnicity and/or cultural identity. In a context in which incubator initiatives are envisioned as means to facilitate new entry of former immigrant farmworkers into the agricultural sector, this case study analysis traces specific sociocultural contours associated with land access that impede successful proprietorship for beginning farmers. We conclude by suggesting potential strategies for addressing these barriers to entry in order to facilitate enhanced efficacy of incubator programs.


This study examines the validity of the twin or triple deficits hypotheses using bootstrap panel Granger causality analysis and an annual panel dataset of six post-communist countries (Russia, Poland, Ukraine, Romania, the Czech Republic, and Hungary) during the period from 1994 to 2015. The results corroborate neither the validity of the twin deficits hypothesis nor its extended version, the triple deficits hypothesis, for any of the sample countries. In other words, we find no Granger causal relationship between budget deficits and external (trade or current account) deficits or among budget deficits, private savings-investment deficits, and external deficits in the countries examined. On the basis of these results, we reject the Keynesian view of the twin or triple deficits hypotheses. Rather, we confirm the Ricardian view.


In current 4G systems growing demand of multimedia services and the growth of internet related contents lead to increasing interest to high speed communications. One indispensable problem of the wireless channel is fading, which can be mitigated by diversity. There are various coding methods to achieve high reliability for Multiple Input Multiple OutputOrthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (MIMO-OFDM) systems earlier. Recently, Space Time Block Codes (STBC) have gained much attention as an effective transmit diversity technique to provide reliable transmission with high peak data rates to increase the speed and performance of wireless communication systems. This paper presents the performance evaluation of OFDM system, in which fading is reduced by using diversity techniques along with coding methods under various fading channels such as Rician and Rayleigh fading channels. In this work, a performance criterion such as Bit Error Rate (BER) for low Signal to Noise Ratio (SNR) ranging from 10dB to 20dB is analyzed. The BER for OFDM system without including STBC is 1.776x10 and including STBC is 1.621x10 over Rician Channel. Whereas, over Rayleigh channel the BER for OFDM system without including STBC is 1.834x10 and including STBC, it is reduced to 6.345x10 for the same SNR of 14dB. Thus, OFDM system with STBC provide high data rate with good reliability.


Both the United States and India have had longstanding experiences with polygamy and its regulation. In the United States, the dominant Protestant majority has sought to abolish Mormon practices of polygamy through criminalization. Moreover, the public policy exception has been used to deny recognition of plural marriages conducted legally elsewhere. India's approach to polygamy regulation and criminalization has been both similar to and different from that of the United States. With a sizable Muslim minority and a legal framework that recognizes religious law as family law, India recognizes polygamy in the Muslim minority community. However, it has criminalized it in the Hindu majority community. Despite the existence of criminal sanctions for Hindus, the incidence of polygamy among the majority community is roughly equivalent to that of Muslims for whom it is permitted. In the United States, despite harsh measures to abolish the practice, it continues and might even be growing in urban communities. This article takes seriously the feminist critique of traditional polygamy as distributionally unfair to women. However, it also acknowledges that polygamy may be an attractive alternative and an acceptable family form. This is particularly true if it is reformed and made to progress as was monogamous marriage in the mid-twentieth century. This article argues that rather than focusing on the criminalization of a family form that has been in existence for millennia, a more fruitful approach to regulating polygamy is focus on the distribution of rights and obligations within the family. This approach accepts that abolition is a goal that is unlikely to be met and that women and men may choose polygamy for rational reasons. As such, feminists are more likely to see gains for women by directing their efforts toward reform and recognition rather than criminalization and abolition.


Since the 1970s, the bicycle has been a motherhood issue for U.S. transportation planning. At least in the abstract, everyone is in favor of increased use of these non-polluting, energy-efficient, quiet, and fitness- promoting vehicles. However, when one begins to investigate the use of bicycles for transportation, one finds that there are a number of dilemmas facing bicyclists and the bicycle planner. The first dilemma is that the public has many misconceptions about bicycling, including the skills required, which places are safe for riding, and the rights of bicyclists to use public roads. Second, professionals have often ignored bicycling, failing to consider bicyclists in roadway design or traffic enforcement. Third, the locations where bicycling is the most useful for transportation are also some of the most challenging, especially for the beginner. Fourth, the bicycle is not generally a "design vehicle," so roads are not routinely designed with bicyclists in mind. Fifth, transportation funding emphasizes capital spending over maintenance, although the latter is often more important to cyclists. Sixth, traffic enforcement officials in many localities routinely ignore even the most flagrant and dangerous violations by bicyclists. Seventh, designated bicycle facilities often do not serve the purposes their advocates propose, and sometimes can create dangerous conditions. Eighth, bicycle education has not yet become available on a wide scale, in part because advocates, funding programs, politicians, and public opinion focus on building facilities. Getting beyond these dilemmas requires a focus on changing public opinion through advertising, politician and celebrity endorsement, making the bicycle a design vehicle, and widespread availability of bicycle training programs.


Dietary recommendations for the treatment of diabetic patients issued by national and international diabetes associations consistently emphasize the need to increase carbohydrate consumption. However, these recommendations have been questioned on the basis of growing evidence that, in both insulin-dependent and non-insulin-dependent diabetic patients, a high-carbohydrate diet does not offer any advantage in terms of blood glucose and plasma lipid concentrations compared with a high-fat (mainly unsaturated) diet. It has been shown repeatedly that a high-carbohydrate diet increases plasma insulin and triglyceride levels and can deteriorate blood glucose control in the postprandial period. However, much of the controversy between advocates and detractors of dietary carbohydrate can be settled by taking into account dietary fiber. Several studies have shown that the adverse metabolic effects of high-carbohydrate diets are neutralized when fiber and carbohydrate are increased simultaneously in the diet for diabetic patients. In particular, these studies demonstrated that a high-carbohydrate/high-fiber diet significantly improves blood glucose control and reduces plasma cholesterol levels in diabetic patients compared with a low-carbohydrate/low-fiber diet. In addition, a high-carbohydrate/high-fiber diet does not increase plasma insulin and triglyceride concentrations, despite the higher consumption of carbohydrates. Unfortunately, dietary fiber represents a heterogenous category, and there is still much to understand as to which foods should be preferred to maximize the metabolic effects of fiber. There are indications that only water-soluble fiber is active on plasma glucose and lipoprotein metabolism in humans. Therefore, in practice, the consumption of legumes, vegetables, and fruits–rich in water-soluble fiber–should be particularly encouraged. The mechanisms by which dietary fiber exerts its hypoglycemic and hypolipidemic activities are unknown. However, the ability of dietary fiber to retard food digestion and nutrient absorption certainly has an important influence on lipid and carbohydrate metabolism. The beneficial effects of high-fiber foods are also exerted by some foods not particularly rich in fiber. The fiber content and physical form of the food can influence the accessibility of nutrients by digestive enzymes, thus delaying digestion and absorption. The identification of these foods with a low-glycemic response would help enlarge the list of foods particularly suitable for diabetic patients. In conclusion, a diet low in cholesterol and saturated fat should be recommended to all diabetic patients to prevent cardiovascular disease. A balanced increase in consumption of fiber-rich foods and unsaturated fat is the most rational way to replace foods rich in saturated fat and cholesterol in the diabetic diet.


Objectives Portal hypertension in cirrhosis is associated with endothelial dysfunction, impaired wound healing, and decreased platelet count. Increased von Willebrand factor (VWF) formation has been suggested as a compensatory mechanism, but the role of VWF processing has not been directly assessed. The aim was to measure the processing of activated VWF (VWF-A) in addition to VWF release (VWF-N) to investigate the association of primary hemostasis with disease activity and portal hypertension in liver cirrhosis. Participants and methods Plasma samples from 105 participants undergoing liver vein catheterization and with liver cirrhosis of varying severity were included in the study together with 20 controls without liver disease. Competitive enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay format was used to estimate biomarkers of VWF turnover using neo-epitope-specific monoclonal antibodies. Results VWF-N levels and VWF-A levels were significantly elevated in cirrhotic patients compared with controls (P<0.0001), and both markers could discriminate mild from severe cirrhosis (VWF-N, P<0.0001; VWF-A, P<0.05). Both markers correlated well with increasing portal hypertension and could identify patients with clinically significant portal hypertension (VWF-N, area under the curve: 0.78; VWF-A, area under the curve: 0.67). Only VWF-A significantly separated compensated from decompensated patients (P<0.05). Conclusion The data indicate that both VWF release and processing of active VWF are increased in cirrhosis, reflecting ongoing wound healing initiation. VWF-N and VWF-A may specifically contain information to assess the presence and severity of PHT as an early indicator of cirrhosis, and for acute damage in decompensated cirrhosis. Whether the increased wound healing affects long-term outcome needs to be addressed in future studies.


This paper investigates the limit behavior of Markov decision processes made of independent particles evolving in a common environment, when the number of particles goes to infinity.

In the finite horizon case or with a discounted cost and an infinite horizon, we show that when the number of particles becomes large, the optimal cost of the system converges to the optimal cost of a deterministic system. Convergence also holds for optimal policies.

We further provide insights on the speed of convergence by proving several central limits theorems for the cost and the state of the Markov decision process with explicit formulas for the limit.

Then, our framework is applied to a brokering problem in grid computing. Several simulations with growing numbers of processors are reported. They compare the performance of the optimal policy of the limit system used in the finite case with classical policies by measuring its asymptotic gain.