Yam (Dioscorea cayennensis Lam.) is a promising crop for small growers in the Northeast of Brazil, but productivities are limited due to low fertilization rates. Green manure could be an alternative due to its low cost and high availability. However, there is little information available regarding the effects of green manures on the productivity of yam. The quality and yield of yam tubers, "da costa" variety, were evaluated under application of three different green manures and a control treatment: 1) yam intercropped with sunn hemp (Crotalaria juncea L.); 2) yam intercropped with pigeon pea (Cajanus cajan L.); 3) yam intercropped with a combination of sunn hemp and pigeon pea; and 4) conventional yam crop system. The experiment was laid out in a randomized block design, with four repetitions. The data was submitted to analysis of variance and averages compared by Tukey´s test at 5%. Percentage values were transformed into arc sen (x/100)0.5. Sunn hemp and the combination of sunn hemp with pigeon pea produced the highest green manure biomasses (3.8 and 3.6 t DM ha-1, respectively) versus 2.1 t ha-1 with the use of only pigeon pea. However, the N concentration was higher in pigeon pea than in sunn hemp (26 and 16 g kg-1). Intercropping with pigeon pea led to the highest yield for total tubers (33.1 t ha-1), for market quality (32.2 t ha-1) and standard exportation quality tubers (23.0 t ha-1).


Visna virus is a pathogenic lentivirus of sheep whose gene expression is developmentally regulated in cells of the monocyte-macrophage lineage. Gene expression directed by the visna virus long terminal repeat (LTR) is increased in infected cells by a virus-encoded trans-acting protein. trans-Activation is mediated in part by increases in the steady-state level of mRNA. Deletion and linker-scanner mutants were constructed to locate sequences in the LTR that regulate transcription and are responsive to viral trans-activation. The activities of these mutants were tested by using them to drive transcription of the bacterial gene for chloramphenicol acetyltransferase in transient expression assays. Three regions located between-140 and the cap site were found to be important for basal transcriptional activity, and the importance of each region was found to be dependent on the cell type. Sequences responsive to viral trans-activation were found to be the same sequences required for basal transcriptional activity. The visna virus LTR contains six sequences that are homologous to the recognition site for cellular transcriptional factor AP-1 and a single sequence homologous to the recognition site for transcriptional factor AP-4. Both of these classes of binding sites appear to be important for regulating the basal level of transcription of visna virus. The AP-1-binding site most proximal to the TATA box was found to be one target for viral trans-activation. The visna virus promoter was found to be activated by serum; this serum response has also been mapped to the AP-1-related sequences in the LTR.


Tectonic evolution of the Paleoproterozoic Vaasa migmatitic complex (VMC) in the central part of the Svecofennian accretionary orogen is deciphered using aeromagnetic and gravity maps, deep seismic and magnetotelluric profiles, and structural and metamorphic data. The VMC is a semicircular structure with migmatitic rim and granitic core composed of several subdomes. It evolved in three main tectonic events (D1–D3). The D1 event (ca. 1.89–1.88 Ga) corresponds to the stacking of supracrustal rocks and the formation of an inverted metamorphic gradient. Anatexis at LP‐HT metamorphic conditions enabled the material to flow. The D2 event (ca. 1.88–1.87 Ga) corresponds to large‐scale folding of the partially molten crust within an orocline. It is marked by folds with an E‐W vertical axial planar foliation. The late D3 event resulted from mass redistribution owing to mechanical instabilities within the hinge of the orocline. It is marked by vertical shearing (ca. 1.87–1.85 Ga) in the marginal parts of the complex and along the granitoid subdomes. The seismic reflection profile (FIRE 3a) and magnetotelluric profiles (MT‐PE and MT‐B2) image large‐scale D1 stacking structures within an accretionary prism. Near vertical breaks in crustal‐scale reflectivity and conductivity models are interpreted as D3 shear zones. The VMC is an example of early mass and heat transfer within a collage of hot supracrustal rocks in an accretionary belt. Partial melting enhanced the flow of material, the production, and rise of magma as well as exhumation, marked by magmatic domes in the hinge of the orocline.


The Lower Main zone of the Lorraine alkalic porphyry Cu-Au district, BC, Canada, is hosted in an intrusive complex that comprises pre- and late mineral biotite pyroxenites, monzonites, and syenites. Some of the biotite pyroxenites have interstitial sulfides, which appear similar to net-textured sulfides in magmatic ore deposits; however, the pyroxenites have undergone several stages of hydrothermal alteration. Main-stage mineralization produced sulfide zonation patterns consisting of a bornite-chalcocite or bornite-chalcopyrite core grading outward to domains of chalcopyrite, chalcopyrite > pyrite, and a peripheral domain of pyrite with minor chalcopyrite. Syenite in the inner bornite-chalcopyrite zone typically contains abundant turbid K-feldspar (>70%), whereas syenite marginal to the bornite-chalcopyrite core contains less K-feldspar (50–70%), indicating an increase in K metasomatism of syenites toward the core of the deposit. Main-stage mineralization predominantly occurs as fine-grained disseminated sulfides in syenite, biotite pyroxenite, and fine-grained K-feldspar biotite rock. Textural analyses have shown that (1) primary magmatic diopside in contact with sulfides has corroded and actinolite-altered margins, suggesting alteration of primary minerals, (2) scalloped relicts of biotite and diopside occur as inclusions in sulfides, implying that sulfides have replaced primary minerals, and (3) the deposit-scale sulfide zonation patterns overprinted numerous rock types, including the biotite pyroxenites that contain interstitial sulfides. These results provide evidence for replacement-style mineralization at Lorraine, where primary magmatic biotite and diopside were totally or partially replaced by sulfide minerals during main-stage alteration. U-Pb zircon dates from pre- and late mineral syenite dikes show that the timing of main-stage mineralization occurred between 178.8 and 176.0 Ma. Lorraine is hosted within the Quesnel island arc terrane, and mineralization and magmatism at Lorraine postdate accretion of the Quesnel terrane to ancestral North America by approximately 7 to 10 m.y. The Lorraine deposit represents the youngest known alkalic Cu-Au porphyry deposit within the Quesnel terrane, and appears to coincide with the last gasp of alkalic magmatism within the Quesnel terrane during the Mesozoic.


NAND flash is a key storage technology in modern computing systems. Without it, many devices would probably not exist today or would at least not benefit from as many features. The very large success of this technology motivated massive efforts to scale it down in order to increase its density further. However, NAND flash is currently facing physical limitations that prevent it reaching smaller cell sizes without severely reducing its storage reliability and lifetime. Accordingly, in the present thesis we aim at relieving some constraints from device manufacturing by addressing flash irregularities at a higher level. For example, we acknowledge the fact that process variation plus other factors render some regions of a flash device more sensitive than others. This difference usually leads to sensitive regions exhausting their lifetime early, which then causes the device to become unusable, while the rest of the device is still healthy, yet not exploitable. Consequently, we propose to postpone this exhaustion point with new strategies that require minimal resources to be implemented and effectively extend flash devices lifetime. Sometimes, our strategies involve unconventional methods to access the flash that are not supported by specification document and, therefore, should not be used lightly. Hence, we also present thorough characterization experiments on actual NAND flash chips to validate these methods and model their effect on a flash device. Finally, we evaluate the performance of our methods by implementing a trace-driven flash device simulator and execute a large set of realistic disk traces. Overall, we exploit properties that are either neglected or not understood to propose methods that are nearly free to implement and systematically extend NAND flash lifetime. We are convinced that future NAND flash architectures will regularly bring radical physical changes, which will inevitably come together with a new set of physical properties to investigate and to exploit.


We study expansion and information diffusion properties of dynamic networks, i.e., networks whose topologies evolve over time as nodes enter or leave the system and edges are continuously created or destroyed. In this scenario, we investigate flooding as a basic information diffusion mechanism. We are interested in models that are likely to result in sparse networks, i.e., in networks containing $O(n)$ edges, with $n$ the number of nodes that are present at any given time of interest, with a focus on models in which edges are created randomly according to simple probabilistic mechanisms, rather than according to carefully designed distributed algorithms. In this perspective, in all models we consider, upon joining the network, a node connects to $d=O(1)$ random nodes currently in the system. On the other hand, an edge remains alive as long as both its endpoints are. For the case in which edges that fail (because one endpoint left the network) are not replaced, we show that, although the network is likely to contain $\Omega_{d}(n)$ isolated nodes, flooding still informs a fraction $1-\exp(-\Omega(d))$ of the nodes in time $\mathrm{O}(\log n)$ with large, constant probability. Moreover, we are able to show, that at any given time, the graph exhibits a "large-set expansion" property. We further investigate models that exhibit edge regeneration, meaning that, whenever an edge $(v, w)$ established by $v$ fails because $w$ leaves the network, it is replaced by a new random edge $(v, z)$. We show that models with edge regeneration result in evolving networks that, at any given time, are vertex expanders with high probability, so that flooding takes $\mathrm{O}(\log n)$ time. The above results hold both for a simplfied streaming model of node churn and in a more realistic, continuous-time setting, in which the interval between two consecutive node arrivals follows a Poisson distribution, while nodes' lifetimes follow an exponential distribution. Previous work considered models in which either the vertex set is fixed or edges are established according to more or less sophisticated algorithms. Our motivation for studying models with simple and random edge creation mechanisms is to move one step further towards models that may eventually capture key aspects of the formation of social or peer-to-peer networks.


44 Grade 3 children and 45 Grade 5 children from English primary schools were given the British abilities scales basic number skills subtest, and a Mathematics Attitude and Anxiety Questionnaire, using pictorial rating scales to record their Self-rating for maths, Liking for maths, Anxiety about maths, and Unhappiness about poor performance in mathematics. There were few year group differences in attitudes. Boys rated themselves higher than girls, but did not differ significantly in actual performance. Overall, Anxiety was not related to actual performance, but Self-rating was. This relationship between Self-rating and actual performance seemed to develop between Grade 3 and Grade 5. Implications of the findings are discussed.


The purpose of the study was to identify the challenges facing the implementation of SMASSE project in Kericho District, Kericho County. The study was guided by the following objectives: 1.To identify the challenges faced by public secondary school principals as they facilitate the implementation of SMASSE project. 2. To investigate the challenges faced by mathematics and science teachers on the use of ASEI/PDSI concept in their lessons. 3. To find out the effect of ASEI/PDSI approach on student attitude and participation in mathematics and science lessons. 4. To make suitable recommendations. The study was conducted using survey design. The target population for the study was 21 principals, 84 Mathematics and Science teachers and 1763 form 2 students. The study sampled 7 out of 21 public secondary schools using purposive simple random sampling. Lottery technique was employed to get samples from different categories of schools. 7 principals, 28 teachers and 210 students were sampled to participate in the study out which all the 7 principals, 25 teachers and 201 students responded to the questionnaires which were used to collect data in the study. 2 schools were randomly selected for piloting of the instruments. These schools were not part of the sample for the main study. Content validity of the instruments was ascertained by a panel of three district SMASSEINSET trainers. Reliability of the instruments was tested during piloting using test-retest method. After the piloting and testing, the instruments were adjusted accordingly before the actual data collection. Having established the validity and reliability of the instruments, the researcher administered the questionnaires to the sampled respondents. After collection, the data was organized to facilitate analysis. The coded data was entered into the computer using the statistical package for social sciences (SPSS).Descriptive statistics was used to analyze data quantitatively. Data was analyzed using means, frequencies and percentages. Results were presented in form of frequencies, charts and percentages as they easily communicate the research findings to the majority of the readers. From the findings the main challenge faced by the principals was shortage of teachers in mathematics and science subjects. The teachers on the other hand listed low morale, lack of sufficient time, heavy workload, overloaded syllabus, large class sizes and pressure to cover the syllabus as major impediments to the application of ASEI-PDSI approach in teaching. Despite the challenges, use of ASEIPDSI approach has contributed to students having a positive attitude towards Mathematics and Science subjects and increased their participation in learning activities. Follow-up visits on the project implementation by the Quality Assurance and Standards Officers were found to be minimal. These findings will be of great significance to CEMASTEA and District planning committees, Principals and teachers who are charged with implementation of the SMASSE project. From the study many students express a positive attitude and were satisfied with the teaching of mathematics and sciences. However performance in these subjects in the K.C.S.E examination is still very poor in most schools. There is need for further research to find out the causes of poor performance despite the positive change in attitude of students and implementation of SMASSE project.


Early identification of school alienation is of great importance for students' educational outcomes and successful participation in society. This study examined the psychometric characteristics of a newly developed assessment instrument, the School Alienation Scale (SALS), to measure school alienation among primary and secondary school students. The SALS consists of three school-related domains, namely, classmates, teachers, and learning. Based on the responses of Swiss (1) and Luxembourgish (2) students from two school-specific cohorts — primary (grade 4; n1=486, n2=503) and secondary schools (grade 7; n1=550, n2=534), we assessed instrument reliability, validity, and cross-cultural equivalence. The scale showed evidence of reliability and internal validity across two samples, confirming that the hypothesized first-order three-factor model fits the data better than several alternative models. The results of measurement invariance tests revealed that the measurement model operated equally well for primary and secondary school students in both countries. The construct validity of the SALS was additionally supported by demonstrated criterion-related validity. Specifically, school alienation domains were negatively associated with positive attitudes to and enjoyment in school; social problems in school were positively related to alienation from classmates and teachers. Our key contributions to the measurement of school alienation are the disclosure of the core domains of school alienation, development of a reliable and valid instrument, and justification for its use. Therefore, the results of this study have important implications for further theoretical work in alienation research and contribute to comparative research by examining the construct of school alienation in different educational settings.


The Toroda Creek half graben is one of several north-northeast–trending Eocene extensional basins associated in time and space with the Okanogan and Kettle metamorphic core complexes in the southern Omineca crystalline belt of Washington and British Columbia. Sedimentary rocks of the middle Eocene Klondike Mountain Formation are the youngest stratified, nonvolcanic rocks in the Toroda Creek half graben. These sedimentary rocks preserve details of the character of Toroda Creek half-graben basin development in a humid temperate setting, help constrain the timing of brittle faulting in the basin, and provide insight into approximate rates of Okanogan core-complex uplift. Facies distributions and provenance determinations indicate that the Klondike Mountain Formation accumulated in a localized basin. There is no evidence that the Klondike Mountain Formation strata in the Toroda Creek half graben were once part of a more widespread deposit that later was segmented by faulting into its present configuration. Klondike Mountain sedimentary strata consist of sedimentary, gravity-dominated rock-avalanche, slide, and debris-flow deposits that accumulated on alluvial fans that delivered their sediments into either a single elongate lake or a series of possibly interconnected lakes. Provenance determinations and facies distribution patterns suggest that Klondike Mountain detritus primarily was derived from steep, unstable highlands exposed in the footwall of the Bodie Mountain fault on the east side of the basin. Sediments at the southern end of the basin were shed from an upland created by a west-northwest–trending transfer fault (Granite Creek fault). Rates of footwall uplift (and/or basin subsidence) estimated from unroofing of plutonic and presumed mylonitic rocks suggest rapid and significant basin margin uplift.


Abstract The NEXRAD program is deploying a network of approximately 160 weather radars throughout the United States and at selected overseas sites. The WSR-88D systems provide highly sensitive, fine-resolution measurements of reflectivity, mean radial velocity, and spectrum width data and generate up to 39 categories of analysis products derived from the base data every five to ten minutes. This paper provides an overview of the analysis products that are available on the WSR-88D systems. Primary uses and limitations of these products are discussed, and several examples are presented. A brief description of the WSR-88D system, including primary components, antenna scanning strategies, and product dissemination plans is also included.


PARKER, TARA W. Understanding the Private School Choice Decision Process: A QMethodology Study. (Under the direction of Dr. Matthew Militello). The availability of school choice options has increased the schools' accountability to both parents and students. This study's purpose was to gain a deeper understanding of the subjectivity of the school choice decision process that private school parents undergo. Q methodology was utilized to explore this decision process. Research literature was reviewed and led to the development of statements addressing influential factors on school choice decisions. These statements were printed, and thirty-five private school parents sorted these statements based on the factors' influence on their school choice decision. Post-sort interviews further explored the subjectivity of the decision process. The Q sorts were factor analyzed to determine the statistical correlations between the statements. Three emerging factors surfaced as distinct preferred school environments by private school parents. Data analysis explored these factors and a name for each factor was assigned based on the strongest influential statements. These three factors included a Developing the Whole Child Environment, a Strong, Academic Environment, and a Safe Environment with Like Peers. Findings presented numerous factors that influence school choice decisions. Data also provided information regarding perceived strengths and weaknesses of both public schools and private schools. The findings directed implications for both public and private school administrators and policymakers. These implications can help drive school reform initiatives. Without addressing these parent preferences, schools will not be able to compete in the market economy created by school choice. © Copyright 2015 by Tara Wooten Parker All Rights Reserved Understanding the Private School Choice Decision Process: A Q-Methodology Study by Tara Wooten Parker A dissertation submitted to the Graduate Faculty of North Carolina State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Education Educational Administration and Supervision Raleigh, North Carolina 2015


Deletion of tumor suppressor gene, lethal(2)giant larvae [l(2)gl], leads to brain tumor in Drosophila melanogaster at larval stage of development and severe brain dysplasia in mice. We have studied the effect of two potential antitumor drugs artemisinin and curcumin in the perspective of inhibiting l(2)gl brain tumor. Efficacies of these drugs are characterized morphologically by measuring brain sizes of untreated and treated larvae on the basis of tumor inhibition and anatomically by looking at the cellular patterning via antibody staining of the third instar Drosophila larval brains. Behavioral experiments were done in form of locomotion to correlate tumor inhibition with the revival of brain function and longevity assays to assess general health span. It was observed that both drugs show antitumor properties individually and in combination when larvae were treated with these drugs. We also found evidence for reactive oxygen species‐mediated action of these drugs. Both the drugs when treated individually or together show better median life span and locomotory response. Although the efficacies of various treatments varied, overall, the positive effects of artemisinin and curcumin demonstrate a potential applicability of these drugs against brain tumor in higher organisms. It also paves a way for a simpler model system for screening such natural products for antitumor property. © 2014 IUBMB Life, 66(7):496–506, 2014


Microspectrophotometric (msp) studies have shown that the colour-vision system of many bird species is based on four pigments with absorption peaks in the red, green, blue and UV regions of the spectrum. The existence of a fourth pigment (UV) is the major difference between the trichromacy of humans and the tetrachromacy of such birds, and recent studies have shown that it may play a determining role in such diverse aspects of behaviour as mate selection and detection of food. Avian visual pigments are composed of an opsin protein covalently bound via a Schiff-base linkage to the chromophore 11-cis-retinal. Here we report the cDNA sequence of a UV opsin isolated from an avian species, Melopsittacus undulatus (budgerigar or small parakeet). This sequence has been expressed using the recombinant baculovirus system; the pigment generated from the expressed protein on addition of 11-cis-retinal yielded an absorption spectrum typical of a UV photopigment, with lambdamax 365+/-3 nm. This is the first UV opsin from an avian species to be sequenced and expressed in a heterologous system. In situ hybridization of this sequence to budgerigar retinas selectively labelled a sub-set of UV cones, representing approx. 9% of the total cone population, that are distributed in a semi-regular pattern across the entire retina.


Knutby Filadelfia is a Christian congregation of approximately 85 members residing outside Uppsala, Sweden. The group became publicly known in January 2004 when a pastor allegedly persuaded a young female member to shoot two other members, one of whom died. The perpetrator of the crime was under the impression that she acted according to God's will. The murdered member's sister, pastor Asa M Waldau, called "the bride of Christ" by the media, has a unique position as the group´s charismatic leader. . Since 2008 Waldau has gone into seclusion, leaving her post as a pastor as an effect of the media coverage. Her role in the congregation is still, however, of great importance. This presentation aims at describing the children in the congregation with special focus on how they perceive their relation to Waldau, and argues that her role as a charismatic leader was enhanced by her withdrawal from the group.


Aptamers are short single-stranded DNA or RNA, which can be selected from a random combinatorial library by the systematic evolution of ligands by exponential enrichment (SELEX) in vitro. In order to obtain novel selective light-up ligands for berberine, we selected DNA aptamers for berberine by a modified affinity chromatography-based SELEX. The ssDNA library was coupled on streptavidin-coated agarose beads through the hybridization with a biotin labeled complementary oligonucleotide capture strand, and the aptamer sequences were released from agarose beads through berberine binding. This method to isolate the aptamers was simple, straightforward and effective, and three aptamers with low micromolar dissociation constants (Kds) were achieved after only 6 rounds of selection. The best of them was further optimized, and the shortened aptamers showed similar Kds to the full length sequences. The light-up phenomenon of the berberine–aptamer pair was also investigated and the final minimized 21-mer aptamer which showed higher fluorescence enhancement than G-quadruplex structures could be used as a novel light-up fluorescent probe for various biosensing applications.


An excimer laser sheath has recently been used for extraction of pacing and ICD leads. By using this technique, leads are removed more easily and it has to take a shorter time to extract leads. Although lead extraction with this method can cause fatal complications such as large vessel injury, little has been reported regarding anesthetic management during the lead extraction. We experienced two cases of pacing lead extraction using an excimer laser sheath under general anesthesia. The procedures were mainly performed by cardiologists in the operating theater. A wide area was prepared with sterile drapes as for cardiac surgery with cardiovascular surgeons standing by. Vascular access catheters were placed in the right femoral artery as well as vein, and in the right internal jugular vein so that immediate PCPS introduction could be performed in case of sudden hemodynamic collapse by massive bleeding. In the first case, lead extraction was completed without any complication, but in the second case sternotomy was performed by cardiac surgeons for safe separation of leads from vessels. There were also no bleeding episodes in the second case. Preparation for bleeding and cooperation among cardiologists, cardiovascular surgeons, medical engineers and anesthesiologists are necessary from the safety point of view of this procedure under general anesthesia.


Although research has previously been done on multilingual speech recognition, it has been found to be very difficult to improve over separately trained systems. The usual approach has been to use some kind of "universal phone set" that covers multiple languages. We report experiments on a different approach to multilingual speech recognition, in which the phone sets are entirely distinct but the model has parameters not tied to specific states that are shared across languages. We use a model called a "Subspace Gaussian Mixture Model" where states' distributions are Gaussian Mixture Models with a common structure, constrained to lie in a subspace of the total parameter space. The parameters that define this subspace can be shared across languages. We obtain substantial WER improvements with this approach, especially with very small amounts of in-language training data.


Today there is unanimous agreement that the country's production model must change. But Greeks are very confused about the direction of the necessary changes. For, as the recent elections revealed, the vast majority of citizens have been brainwashed into believing outra-geous promises about what the Greek leviathan state can do for them. Hence, the situation may be expected to worsen, unless Greeks start soon to realize: first, that the model of nearly centrally planned economy that we inherited has failed us miserably; and, secondly, that it must be replaced by a new model based on the flexibility of competitive markets and export oriented policies and entrepreneurship. If and when this change of mind and heart takes effect, the answer to the question which economic growth model is best for Greece will become self-evident. It is the model of ocean shipping because in the same time that a small number of dynamic Greeks control 17% of world trade shipments and contributes not less than 6% to the country's GDP, organized minorities of politicians, labor unions, professional associations, etc., do everything in their power to keep Greece in the role of a global beggar. The aim of this paper is to document that the model of ocean shipping, in which Greeks dominate for centuries, offers by far the most promising growth model, because it can get us quickly out of the impasse we find ourselves presently.


Although twin pregnancies are usually welcome, the excitement of a twin pregnancy can often be overshadowed by unforeseen complications. These pregnancies are associated with an increased perinatal morbidity and mortality when compared to singleton pregnancies. In addition there may be significant maternal complications such as early onset pre-eclampsia and preterm labour. These factors certainly contribute to the psychological impact on the parents.
The incidence of twins is variable but the increased use of assisted reproductive technology has increased the frequency of multiple pregnancies in developed societies. Approximately two-thirds of twins are dizygotic (non-identical) and one-third monozygotic (identical). Early ultrasound can confirm the diagnosis and accurately establish chorionicity, amnionicity and gestational age. Later, structural anomalies can be excluded and growth monitored, while Doppler velocimetry of the umbilical artery can detect placental insufficiency. Monochorionic pregnancies are at highest risk of adverse outcome due to specific complications, such as twin-to-twin transfusion syndrome. O & B Forum Vol.14(2) 2004: 13-19


The binding of ligands to distinct sites at proteins or at protein clusters is often cooperative or anti-cooperative due to allosteric signalling between those sites. The allostery is usually attributed to a configurational change of the proteins from a relaxed to a configurationally different tense state. Alternatively, as originally proposed by Cooper and Dryden, a tense state may be achieved by merely restricting the thermal vibrations of the protein around its mean configuration. In this work, we provide theoretical tools to investigate fluctuation allostery using cooling and titration experiments in which ligands regulate dimerisation, or ring or chain formation. We discuss in detail how ligands may regulate the supramolecular (co)polymerisation of liganded and unliganded proteins.


This article turns to Hobbes's theory of laughter to determine the role collective laughter plays in democratic politics. After examining the political themes in Hobbes's various accounts of laughter as well as the appearances laughter makes in his political philosophy, I argue that the Hobbesian body politic is a laughing body politic at the moment of its foundation. The individuals who contract with one another to establish a commonwealth perform the same sudden, "vainglorious," and counter-sovereign political enactment as the laughing individual in Hobbes. This notion of a "laughing body politic" illuminates how Hobbes—the philosophical champion of sovereign power—provides resources for theorizing the counter-sovereign, democratic possibilities of collective laughter today.


Few topics in the development of humans have prompted as much interest and debate as those of the origins of pottery and agriculture. The first appearance of pottery in any area of the world is heralded as a new stage in the progress of humans toward a more complex arrangement of thought and society. Cultures are defined and separated by the occurrence of pottery types, and the association of pottery with mobility and agriculture continues to drive research in anthropology. For these reasons, the discovery of the earliest fiber-tempered pottery in the New World and carbonized remains identified as maize kernels is exciting. San Jacinto 1 is the archaeological site located in the savanna region of the north coast of Colombia, South America, where excavations by led by the authors have revealed evidence of mobile hunter-gatherers who made pottery and who collected and processed plants from 6000 to 5000 B.P. The site is believed to show an early human adaptation to the tropics in the context of significant environmental changes that were taking place at the time. This volume presents the data gathered and the interpretations made during excavation and analysis of the San Jacinto 1 site. By examining the social activities of a human population in a highly seasonal environment, it adds greatly to our contemporary understanding of the historical ecology of the tropics. Study of the artifacts excavated at the site allows a window into the early processes of food production in the New World. Finally, the data reveals that the origins of ceramic technology in the tropics were tied to a reduction in mobility and an increase in territoriality and are widely applicable to similar studies of sedentism and agriculture worldwide.


In response to DNA damage, the tumor suppressor protein p53 moves to the nucleus and activates transcription of target genes. Two papers appearing this week explore aspects of how this signaling is accomplished. Giannakakou et al. find that p53 associates with tubulin, preferably the polymerized form of tubulin in microtubules. Furthermore, they show that transport of p53 to the nucleus in response to DNA damage in human lung carcinoma cells is inhibited by agents that either stabilize or destabilize microtubules or by agents that impair the activity of the microtubule-motor protein dynein. Once it gets to the nucleus, what does p53 do? Guo et al. conclude that it interacts with the product of the PML gene. In acute promyelocytic leukemia, the PML gene undergoes a chromosomal translocation, resulting in formation of a chimeric oncoprotein. The wild-type PML protein localizes in nuclear structures called PML nuclear bodies and functions in the regulation of transcription. Guo et al. describe several experiments that indicate that PML functions to promote signals that induce apoptosis in response to DNA damage. Mouse thymocytes lacking PML were less susceptible than control cells to DNA damage-induced cell death. PML interacted in vivo and in vitro with p53 and, in reporter assays in transfected cells, expression of PML increased transcriptional activation by p53. And finally, transcription of p53 target genes in cells exposed to gamma irradiation was reduced in cells lacking PML. Thus, the PML protein appears to promote apoptosis, at least in part, by acting as a transcriptional coactivator with p53. Giannakakou, P., Sackett, D.L., Ward, Y., Webster, K.R., Blagosklonny, M.V., and Fojo, T. (2000) p53 is associated with cellular microtubules and is transported to the nucleus by dynein. Nature Cell Biol. 2: 709-717. [Online Journal] Guo, A., Salomoni, P., Luo, J., Shih, A., Zhong, S., Gu, W., and Pandolfi, P.P. (2000) The function of PML in p53-dependent apoptosis. Nature Cell Biol. 2: 730-736. [Online Journal]


It is common for wind turbines to be installed in remote locations on land or offshore, leading to difficulties in routine inspection and maintenance. In addition, wind turbines in these locations are often subject to harsh operating conditions. These challenges mean there is a requirement for a high degree of maintenance. Consequently, monitoring and diagnostics of wind turbines play an increasingly important role in the competitive operation of wind farms. The data generated by monitoring systems can be used to obtain models of wind turbines operating under different conditions, and hence predict output signals based on known inputs. By comparing output data obtained from operational turbines with those predicted by the models, it is possible to detect changes that may be due to the presence of faults. This paper discusses model-based condition monitoring methods for wind turbines, in which the relationships between measured variables are modelled using linear models and artificial neural networks identified from data acquired from operational turbines. The relationships between variables are also modelled using non-linear state dependent `pseudo' transfer functions. Although these state dependent parameter models have been used extensively as the basis of non-linear controllers, the research described here represents the first occasion for which they have been employed for a condition monitoring system. It is found that artificial neural network-based models outperform state dependent parameter models; however, the computing power required for the latter is considerably less. Finally, the monitoring data are used to develop adaptive threshold rules for critical output signals, forming the basis of an early warning system.


This paper explores how individuals determine acceptable levels of risk (ALR) when making investment decisions on climate change adaptation. An incentivised lab experiment (n=161) is conducted on a sample of the Bilbao population. A 2x2 factorial between-subject design measures ALR in response to visual (photo vs. text-only) and numeric (single-value vs. range) impact framings. The effect of experience on ALR is also measured using a 2-period repeated game within-subject design. Findings support an extension of the dual processing model that argues people exert practical rationality, based on both objective reasoning and subjective experience, when making decisions over moral dilemmas, such as climate change. Subjects in visual conditions had lower ALR, due to greater negative affect, concern, and sense of personal duty and responsibility towards climate change. This suggests a moral judgement of the risk in question. The effect of the visual appeal was lower in the range condition, where greater mental effort led to more objective reasoning. Those that experienced damages in period 1 displayed lower ALR in period 2. No difference in ALR was found between periods for those that did not experience damages. The implications of these findings are discussed.


This qualitative study explored resident and nonresident fathers' perspectives about factors that facilitated and inhibited their ability to play a positive and active role in their children's lives. A total of 30 fathers were recruited from a support/mentoring group and from the general population to complete a semi-structured, audio-taped interview. A content analysis revealed that both groups of fathers were committed to maintaining a relationship with their children, and that by being present, they protected their children, helped them emotionally and financially, helped in their overall development, acted as a role model, and shared parenting responsibilities with their children's mothers. Factors that facilitated parenting for resident and nonresident fathers included receiving proper guidance about fathering, a positive mother−father relationship, support from family, and church. Inhibiting factors were more prevalent for nonresident fathers that included mothers obstructing the father−child relationship, negative views/remarks about them as fathers, father−child visitation that is contingent upon child support, and fathers' financial difficulties. The findings suggest a need for coparenting counseling, faith-based interventions, and employment services to address the complex socio-economic challenges that fathers face.


Synopsis A neighbourhood health centre in the US is compared with the mental health services in an area of the UK. Patients with severe, but long-standing psychiatric illnesses, or patients with transient emotional problems are likely to be treated by a general practitioner in London and by non-medical mental health specialists in Boston. These patients receive more overall care, more specialist, non-medical care but make as many visits to a medical provider, other than a psychiatrist, in Boston as they do in London. Psychiatrists see more acutely ill patients for a shorter time than non-medical specialists in both places, and in both Boston and London there is a highly selective referral process which results in psychiatrists from both areas seeing approximately the same proportion of the population of their catchment areas. The integration of these findings with community attitudes in planning services is discussed.


Since their discovery, RNA molecules have been shown to carry functions that extend far beyond their initially ascribed role as intermediates in protein biosynthesis. These noncoding RNAs (ncRNAs) are involved in fundamental cellular processes including the regulation of gene expression and maintenance of genome stability. In most cases the biogenesis or function of the RNA molecule is only possible if the molecule folds into a characteristic two- and three-dimensional shape via formation of intra-molecular base pairs. The disruption of these paired regions through mutations in the primary sequence can result in conformational changes of the molecule that impair its ability to function correctly. However, compensatory mutations can restore the original conformation of the molecule. Under the influence of various evolutionary forces, such as mutation and selection, a paired region (helix) will accumulate these nucleotide double-substitutions (covariations). The chance of a substitution and thus the rate of evolution depends on different properties of the helix.

We developed a logistic regression approach to analyze the evolutionary dynamics of RNA secondary structures (Piskol and Stephan, 2008). This method was applied to a set of computationally predicted RNA secondary structures in vertebrate introns. Our aim was to discover structural and population genetic determinants of the compensatory mutation rate in RNA molecules. As predicted by Kimura's (1985) model of compensatory evolution, our results are in agreement with the hypothesis that the physical distance between pairing nucleotides has a negative influence on the occurrence of covariations. Furthermore, we found that longer pairing regions have the ability to tolerate more wobbles (GU base pairs) and mismatches, and ultimately also contain more covariations. The position-wise analysis of all nucleotides in paired regions revealed that covariations occur preferentially at the helix ends, whereas wobbles and mismatches are more frequent in the middle of a helix. This pattern is largely determined by the GC content.

We extended the study described above from structured regions in introns of vertebrate genes to folded RNA molecules that are scattered across the whole nuclear genomes of drosophilids (Drosophila melanogaster/D. simulans) and hominids (human/chimp). For these molecules we estimated genome wide selective constraints (Piskol and Stephan, 2011). In comparison to neutrally evolving regions of the same genomes we observed substantially reduced rates of substitutions at paired and unpaired sites of folded molecules. We found that more than 90% of novel mutations in ncRNAs are removed from the sequence by purifying selection. These values exceed estimates that were previously obtained for amino-acid changing positions of protein coding genes. It points to the overall importance of many folded genomic regions, which carry quite diverse functions (correct splicing, splicing efficiency, protein localization, RNA editing). We did not find significant differences in constraints between folded molecules based on their genomic location (coding/noncoding, genic/intergenic, UTR/non-UTR). Therefore, the restricted evolution of ncRNAs seems to be mostly driven by the basic need of the molecule to remain in its original conformation through continuous maintenance of pairings between nucleotides and only to a smaller extent by the location of the molecule in the genome. In addition, a comparison of selective coefficients between drosophilids and hominids enabled us to find evidence for the impact of the effective population size on RNA evolution, which resulted in significantly higher constraints in drosophilids than hominids and led to larger differences in selective constraints at unpaired than at paired positions.

Motivated by the evidence for a potential role of the effective population size in the evolution of ncRNA molecules we explored this topic in greater detail. The effective population size of a species (N_e) is a fundamental quantity in population genetics. Its impact on the efficacy of selection has been the focus of many theoretical and empirical studies over the recent years. Yet, the effect of N_e was mostly investigated in connection with the evolution of independently evolving sites in a genome, while its impact on the evolution of epistatic interactions is not well understood. Our previous work (see previous paragraph) showed evidence for the role of N_e in the evolution of ncRNA molecules (which consist to a large extent of coevolving regions). To increase our knowledge of the impact of N_e on the evolution at independently evolving and coevolving sites, we focused on transfer RNAs (tRNAs) - a class of RNA molecules with well studied structure and function. We compared the rates of evolution at paired and unpaired positions in orthologous tRNAs of various vertebrate and Drosophila species. Therefore, we chose groups of species that differ in their long-term effective population sizes and compared the level of selective constraint between them. These pairs included human/macaque, macaque/marmoset, dog/cat, chicken/zebra finch, mouse/rat, D. melanogaster/D. yakuba, and D. melanogaster/D. simulans. Indeed, we were able to detect differences in selective constraints between species pairs of different N_e. These differences can be explained well by theoretical predictions for the evolution of independently evolving and coevolving sites. Specifically, we found that constraints in orthologous tRNAs of a species pair increase with increasing long-term N_e. Thereby, the effect of N_e is stronger at unpaired(independently evolving) sites than paired (coevolving) sites. Furthermore, for all species pairs we identified sets of orthologous tRNAs with high structural similarity to tRNAs from all major kingdoms of life ('core' sets), and tRNAs with lower similarity ('peripheral' sets). We found the core sets to be under strong overall constraints and only subject to a negligible effect of N_e. In the peripheral set, however, we discovered a strong influence of N_e on constraints. We also investigated whether the difference in N_e between autosomes and X chromosome, due to the presence of the X chromosome in one copy in males, has an effect on differences in evolutionary rates. We were able to show that constraints are more relaxed in X-linked tRNAs.


PGC-1α [peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor (PPAR) γ coactivator-1α] is a coactivator for many transcription factors and has an established role in controlling metabolism, including mitochondrial respiration and gluconeogenesis. Lin et al. report that mice deficient in PGC-1α are resistant to diet-induced obesity despite having increased hepatic gluconeogenesis, aberrant brown fat with large lipid droplets, reduced oxygen consumption (a measure of mitochondrial respiration), and increased sensitivity to cold. In vivo, the aberrant hepatic gluconeogenesis appeared to be due to constitutive activation of the gluconeogenic pathway by excessive CAAT-enhancer-binding protein β (C/EPBβ), a transcription factor that is normally increased in abundance by fasting and that stimulates the expression of genes involved in glucose synthesis. The resistance to diet-induced obesity appeared to be due to hyperactivity of the mice. In addition, the mice exhibited several behavioral characteristics of neurological disorders. Histological analysis of the brains from the mutant mice showed spongiform lesions in the striatum and, to a lesser extent, in other brain regions, including the cortex, thalamus, and substantia nigra, which also contribute to control of movement. Analysis of gene expression (based on real-time PCR analysis) indicated not only that the expression of mitochondrial genes was reduced, but that the expression of several neuronal genes was also impaired. Cultured striatal neurons from the mutant mice showed reduced neurite growth and branching compared with cells from wild-type mice. Houten and Auwerx discuss these results and their implication for understanding metabolic disorders and neurodegenerative movement disorders. J. Lin, P. H. Wu, P. T. Tarr, K. S. Lindenberg, J. St-Pierre, C. Y. Zhang, V. K. Mootha, S. Jager, C. R. Vianna, R. M. Reznick, L. Cui, M. Manieri, M. X. Donovan, Z. Wu, M. P. Cooper, M. C. Fan, L. M. Rohas, A. M. Zavacki, S. Cinti, G. I. Shulman, B. B. Lowell, D. Krainc, B. M. Spiegelman, Defects in adaptive energy metabolism with CNS-linked hyperactivity in PGC-1α null mice. Cell 119, 121-135 (2004). [Online Journal] S. M. Houten, J. Auwerx, PGC-1α: Turbocharging mitochondria. Cell 119, 5-7 (2004). [Online Journal]


To what extent can the decline in British trade union density between 1990 and 1998 be attributed to declining opportunities to unionize compared to declining propensity to unionize among workers with the opportunity to do so and to compositional change? This question is answered using data to from both workplaces (from 1990 and 1998 Workplace Employee Relations Surveys) and individuals (fro m the British Household Panel Survey). Results show that both falling opportunities and falling propensities to unionize accounted for membership decline during this period. Membership fell because unions lacked the power to maintain bargaining relationships with management, to organize new workplaces, or to uphold the ?social custom? of union membership among new workers who took union jobs. However, there was little evidence that declining union membership was the result of a change in employee attitudes towards unions.


There is a growing disconnect between the traditional patent-centric approach to protecting biotechnological innovation and the emerging intellectual property imperatives of "synthetic biology," a promising new manifestation of biotechnology that enables the design and construction of artificial biological pathways, organisms or devices, as well as the redesign of existing natural biological systems. As explained in previous articles, one way to deal with this disconnect would be to expand the scope of copyrightable subject matter to encompass engineered genetic sequences, much in the way that copyright was expanded in the 1970s and 1980s to include computer programs. The present article expands upon that work and explores the possible contours of a copyright regime encompassing engineered genetic code (EGC), explaining how a policy-optimized application of existing copyright doctrine, facilitated perhaps by some relatively conservative amendments to the Copyright Statute, could provide synthetic biologists with a beneficial supplement to patents, while at the same time addressing legitimate concerns that have been raised in response to this proposal. The use of the term "EGC," as opposed to "DNA," is intended to focus the attention where it rightly belongs, i.e., on the information content encoded by a synthetic genetic sequence, and to make clear that I am in no way proposing that naturally-occurring DNA sequences should be copyrighted. It also highlights the close analogy between computer code and engineered DNA sequences. The article includes a description of a recent attempt to register an engineered genetic sequence as a copyrighted work with the U.S. Copyright Office.


Distributed databases have become the most essential technology for recent business organizations. In most of the cases Distributed Databases are developed in a Bottom- Up approach, fragmentation exists beforehand. The optimum allocation of those fragments is the only way, which can be exploited by the designers to increase the performance, efficiency, reliability and availability of the Distributed Database in the realistic dynamic environment, where the access probabilities of nodes to fragments change over time. In this paper, a new dynamic fragment allocation algorithm is proposed in Non-Replicated allocation scenario, which incorporates the time constraints of database accesses, volume threshold and the volume of data transmitted in successive time intervals to dynamically reallocate fragments to sites at runtime in accordance with the changing access patterns. It will migrate a fragment to a particular site only when that site has made data transfer higher than all other sites and greater than the threshold value from or to that fragment consistently in some recent time intervals. The choice of the volume threshold, the number of time intervals and the duration of each time interval are the most important factors which regulate the frequency of fragment reallocations. The proposed algorithm will decrease the movement of fragments over the network and data transfer cost and will also improve the overall performance of the system by dynamically allocating fragments in a most optimum and intuitive manner.


This thesis investigates the creation of site-specific augmented reality (AR)narratives. AR is a complex medium comprised of both physical and virtual worlds, employing a screen space where the two are synthesized. As a nascent technology, the methods and language for the creation of AR content are still developing. This paper analyzes elements that come into play when creating an AR narrative, including learned behaviours within specific architectural zones. I consider architecture as a medium and frame for AR narrative, as architecture engages with the mobile device and screen where the story unfolds. My research is informed by different disciplines and theories, including the concept of the architectural fold introduced by Bernard Cache and Elizabeth Grosz. Through the fold, virtual architecture interrupts physical space by annexing it into a new form. My research also applies cinematic language as a means to articulate the on-screen story, and to apply the concept of montage to physical space in real time. All of these elements and concepts inform Homunculus, an AR Narrative in the Gladstone Hotel.


John D. C. Little of MIT's Sloan School of Management is famous for his contributions to operations research and marketing science. He formulated a fundamental theorem in queuing theory known as Little's Law, which is used widely in a variety of fields. His work on such topics as optimal advertising experimentation, advertising budgeting, and aggregate marketing models, and its subsequent applications, has generated entire streams of research. This volume gathers papers from prominent researchers, including many of Little's colleagues and former colleagues, that reflect this pioneering scholar's lasting influence. The book includes a profile of Little, detailing his career accomplishments; writings on managerial models, including papers on advertising media selection, customer lifetime value, and micromarketing; discussions of decision information models, covering topics that range from customer channel choice to stochastic variance assumption; and (in a paper coauthored by Little) an examination of Little's Law today. ContributorsMakoto Abe, Rene Befurt, Andre Bonfrer, Robert Bordley, Maria Luisa Ceprini, Peter J. Danaher, Xavier Dreze, Daria Dzyabura, Theodoros Evgeniou, Fred M. Feinberg, John R. Hauser, Kamel Jedidi, Laoucine Kerbache, Janghyuk Lee, Guilherme (Gui) Liberali, John D. C. Little, Erin MacDonald, Dina Mayzlin, Wendy W. Moe, Elisa Montaguti, Ricardo Montoya, Pamela D. Morrison, Scott A. Neslin, Oded Netzer, John H. Roberts, Linda Court Salisbury, Jiwoong Shin, Rajendra Srivastava, Olivier Toubia, Michael Trusov, Glen L. Urban, Sara Valentini, Masahiko Yamanaka


Knowledge about crystal anisotropy is mainly provided by crystal orientation fabric (COF) data from ice cores. To gain a broader understanding about the distribution of crystal anisotropy in ice sheets and glaciers seismic data from Antarctica and the Swiss Alps are analysed here. Two effects are important: (i) sudden changes in COF lead to englacial reflections and (ii) the anisotropic fabric induces an angle dependency on the seismic velocities and, thus, also recorded traveltimes. A framework is presented here to connect COF data with the elasticity tensor to determine seismic velocities and reflection coefficients
for cone and girdle fabrics from ice-core data. These results are compared to vertical seismic profiling (VSP) measurements form Antarctica to validate the overall approach. The best agreement between measured velocities from the VSP survey and theoretically calculated velocities from COF eigenvalues is obtained using the elasticity tensor of Gammon et al. (1983).
Reflection coefficients calculated for layers of different anisotropic ice fabrics and ice-bed interfaces show the weak influence of the anisotropic fabric on the reflection coefficient. Therefore, the focus is set on the analysis of the anisotropic ice fabric using the two-way traveltimes of englacial and bed reflections. Two approaches are applied: (i) the analysis of anisotropic normal moveout velocities (NMO) velocities from normal-spread seismic data (offset/depth-ratio � 1) in combination with other data sets determining the depth of reflectors and (ii) the analysis of the anisotropy parameter h determined from long-spread seismic data (offset/depth-ratio > 1). These anisotropic NMO velocities determined for the stacking process differ from the zero-offset velocities needed for the depth conversion. For the Antarctic and Alpine site, it is found, that this difference is up to 9% for the P-wave but only up to 2% for the SH-wave. This sensitivity of the P-wave velocity to the anisotropic ice fabric is used to derive information about the COF from NMO analysis.
An improved understanding of COF-induced reflections is gained by the combination of seismic, radar and ice-core data. Use is made of the fact that the common reflection mechanism of seismic and radar data in cold glacier ice below the firn ice-transition is an abrupt change in the distribution of the anisotropic ice crystals. Thus, englacial reflectors in seismic and radar data can be identified as COF induced. Additionally, a new S-wave–density relationship is derived by analysing continuously refracted SH-waves of the firn from the Alpine field site.
The results show the great potential that is within the combined interpretation of seismic and radar data to identify COF-induced reflections. It is shown, that the analysis of normal spread reflection seismic data in combination with radar data and of long-spread seismic data alone gives a tool to determine the anisotropic ice fabric of glaciers and ice sheets. This is an important contribution to constrain results from the upcoming generation of ice-flow models with anisotropic rheology by remotely sensed data.


The advertising technology industry, known as 'adtech', is a complicated network of organisations and individuals that collect, aggregate and deal with large amounts of personal data. As children engage with digital networks for many aspects of their lives, they are increasingly exposed to adtech practices. Depending on their age, children may have less knowledge of the commercial digital environment and less maturity in their decision-making processes than adults have. Their limited resilience in the face of adtech's onslaught offers a particularly stark illustration of why it is problematic to look to 'consent' as the exclusive or predominant mechanism to control the use of consumer data in the digital ecosystem. This article examines the problems arising from adtech's data practices and makes recommendations on how to strengthen the agency and control exercised by children and protect their best interests in the context of adtech.


This paper addresses the challenge of jointly learning both the per-task model parameters and the inter-task relationships in a multi-task online learning setting. The proposed algorithm features probabilistic interpretation, efficient updating rules and flexible modulation on whether learners focus on their specific task or on jointly address all tasks. The paper also proves a sub-linear regret bound as compared to the best linear predictor in hindsight. Experiments over three multi-task learning benchmark datasets show advantageous performance of the proposed approach over several state-of-the-art online multi-task learning baselines.


NPY, previously known as a sympathetic vasoconstricting co-transmitter, recently has also emerged as an important vascular growth factor, stimulating proliferation of vascular smooth muscle and endothelial cells (ECs). Both in vitro and in vivo, NPY stimulates angiogenesis starting at sub-picomolar, non-vasoconstrictive concentrations, and with maximal effects similar to those of other known angiogenic factors e.g. vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF). To determine if NPY is a physiological mediator in vivo, we studied 1 ) ischemic angiogenesis in a rodent model of femoral artery occlusion 2) vascular development in rats over-expressing NPY gene; 3) changes in angiogenesis with aging. Hindlimb ischemia increased local NPY release and shifted NPY receptor (R) expression from predominantly Yl to the Y2R type, and up-regulated dipeptidyl peptidase IV (DPPIV, peptidase forming Y2/YS agonist). Increasing local NPY levels 2-fold with a slow-release pellet (Il.g/14 days, below arterial occlusion), additionally induced YSR mRNA, and stimulated capillary angiogenesis and collateral vessel growth - leading to restoration of blood flow and contractile function of ischemic muscles. These effects were markedly reduced in Y2R-/- mice, as was NPY-induced aortic sprouting ex vivo; the latter was also reduced by anti-VEGF antibody and completely abolished in endothelial nitric oxide synthase (eNOS)-/- mice. The role of NPY in vascular development was further revealed by the severe impairment of spontaneous aortic sprouting in NPY-/- mice and changes in vascular density of non-ischemic muscles: reduction in Y2-/- mice and marked increase in NPY-Tg rats. With aging, in mice, NPY-induced angiogenesis decreased together with Y2 and DPPIV expression, and in human ECs, the proliferative effects of NPY declined too, similarly to those of VEGF or basic fibroblast growth factor (bFGF). Since NPY-induced EC proliferation was similarly blocked by anti-VEGF and anti-FGF antibodies in young and old patients, this suggests that age-induced impaired activity of the NPY-Y2R system could lead to lower secretion of these growth factors, in addition to decreased responsiveness of old vessels to VEGF and bFGF. Taken together, our studies indicate that NPY is a physiological neurogenic factor playing an important role ip revascularization of ischemic tissues and in age-related changes in vascular development. NPY's angiogenic activity requires Y2Rs and eNOS, and involves release of VEGF and bFGF. Thus, sympathetic nerve activity, via NPY, may be an important upstream mechanism triggering a cascade of molecular events leading to vascular remodeling during tissue ischemia and growth.


BACKGROUND
In a previous study of Chinese men, we found that men with a higher waist-to-hip ratio (WHR) have a higher prostate cancer risk. Because leptin and insulin are related to body fat distribution, we examined whether leptin and insulin were associated with prostate cancer risk.

METHODS
Blood samples were collected from 128 case patients with incident prostate cancer and from 306 healthy control subjects randomly selected from residents of Shanghai, CHINA: Epidemiologic information and anthropometric measurements were collected in personal interviews. Serum leptin, insulin, and sex hormone levels were measured by radioimmunoassay, and insulin-like growth factor-I (IGF-I) was measured by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay. Multiple logistic regression analyses were used to estimate odds ratios for prostate cancer in relation to serum insulin and leptin levels. All statistical tests were two-sided.

RESULTS
After adjustment for body mass index, WHR, IGF-I, and sex hormone levels, higher serum insulin levels were associated with a statistically significantly elevated risk of prostate cancer (P<.001). Men in the highest tertile of insulin levels had a 2.56-fold (95% confidence interval [CI] = 1.38 to 4.75) risk of prostate cancer compared with men in the lowest tertile. Regardless of the tertile level of WHR, higher serum insulin levels were associated with an increased risk of prostate cancer: Men in the highest tertiles of WHR (>0.900) and insulin (>8.83 microU/mL) had 8.55 times (95% CI = 2.80 to 26.10) the prostate cancer risk of men in the lowest tertiles of both, and those in the lowest tertile of WHR (<0.873) and highest tertile of insulin had 4.30 times (95% CI = 1.17 to 15.70) the risk. By contrast, the association between leptin levels and prostate cancer risk was not statistically significant.

CONCLUSION
Our results suggest that serum insulin levels may influence the risk of prostate cancer in Chinese men. Further research, especially prospective studies, is needed to confirm these findings in high-risk populations and to clarify the underlying mechanisms involved.


As a step toward elucidating the physical conditions in nearby active galaxies, this paper presents spectral energy distributions (SEDs) of a sample of seven low-luminosity active galactic nuclei (AGNs). SEDs for four objects are presented for the first time (NGC 4261, NGC 4579, NGC 6251, and M84); the data for the remaining three (M81, M87, and NGC 4594) have been substantially updated compared to previous studies. The nuclear fluxes were carefully selected so as to avoid contamination by emission from the host galaxy, which can be substantial for very weak nuclei. The present sample of low-luminosity nuclei exhibits SEDs that look markedly different from the canonical broadband continuum spectrum of luminous AGNs. The most striking difference is that the low-luminosity objects lack an ultraviolet excess (the "big blue bump"), a feature normally associated with emission from a standard optically thick, geometrically thin accretion disk. The weakness of the ultraviolet band leads to an unusually steep optical-ultraviolet continuum shape and a more pronounced contribution from the X-rays to the ionizing spectrum. It is argued that the absence of the big blue bump is a property intrinsic to the SEDs and not an artifact of strong dust extinction. Another notable property of the SEDs is the prominence of the compact, flat-spectrum radio component relative to the emission in other energy bands. All seven nuclei in the sample, including three hosted by spiral galaxies, technically qualify as "radio-loud" objects according to conventional criteria. Finally, the integrated spectra confirm the exceptional weakness of the nuclei: the bolometric luminosities range from 2 × 1041 to 8 × 1042 ergs s-1, or ~10-6-10-3 times the Eddington rate for the black hole masses previously reported for these galaxies.


This study investigated the effect of unilateral occlusal elevation in the molar region on facial and mandibular development in growing rats.

 Thirty 5-week-old male Wistar rats were randomly allocated to three groups (n = 10). The control group was allowed to develop naturally until 9 weeks of age. A device fitted on the caused unilateral occlusal elevation at 5 weeks in the removal group. The device was removed at 7 weeks and the rats were observed until 9 weeks. In the continuation group, the same device fitted on the left-side molars caused unilateral occlusal elevation continuously for 9 weeks. All groups underwent craniofacial scanning with three-dimensional micro-computed tomography at 5, 7, and 9 weeks.

 In the removal and continuation groups, the mandible was displaced to the unelevated side. At 7 weeks, both these groups showed greater skeletal growth and molar extrusion on the elevated side, with significant differences between the elevated and unelevated sides. At 9 weeks, there were significant differences in both skeletal and alveolar growth between these groups; the asymmetry ameliorated in the removal group.

 We evaluated three-dimensional morphometry by fitting a device to rat molars for a short observation period; thus, future studies are warranted to acquire data following long-term observation.

 Unilateral occlusal elevation during the growth period suppressed molar eruption and extrusion on the elevated and unelevated sides, respectively. The height of the mandibular ramus increased on the elevated side, resulting in asymmetric growth.


We examine the causal effect of legal institutional quality on informal norms of cooperation and study the interaction of institutions and culture in sustaining economic exchange. A total of 346 subjects in Italy and Kosovo played a market game under different and randomly allocated institutional treatments, which generated different incentives to behave honestly, preceded and followed by a noncontractible and nonenforceable trust game. Significant increases in individual trust and trustworthiness followed exposure to better institutions. A 1-percentage-point reduction in the probability of facing a dishonest partner in the market game, which is induced by the quality of legal institutions, increases trust by 7–11 percent and trustworthiness by 13–19 percent. This suggests that moral norms of cooperative behavior can follow improvements in formal institutional quality. Cultural origin, initial trust, and trustworthiness influence opportunistic behavior in markets, but only in the absence of strong formal institutions.


This study involves an update of our earlier Timber Supply Model, which was fully developed in our book, The Adequacy Of Global Timber Supply by Sedjo and Lyon (1990), published by Resources for the Future. The new version, called Timber Supply Model 1996 (TSM96), uses an economic market supply/demand approach to project an intertemporal time path of the world's price and output level of industrial wood. As did the original TSM, the TSM96 provides projections of the time path of the equilibrium output levels of the several regions into which the world has been subdivided. A major new feature of TSM96 is that industrial wood, treated as homogeneous in the earlier study, has be subdivided into two different wood types — pulpwood and solidwood. The supply of these two commodities is not independent. Rather they can be viewed as joint products in production. The study develops a base-case projection, which gives the authors' best judgment of the timber situation likely to develop over the next few decades. Over that period total industrial wood production increases from about 1.7 billion cubic meters to 2.3 billion cubic meters, an increase of about 35 percent, while global pulpwood production increases from about 700 million cubic meters in 1995 to about 1.325 billion in 2045. Pulpwood price shows a fairly substantial increase throughout the first one-third of the period, a more modest increase over the second third, and a slight decline during the last third. Solidwood prices are almost the inverse of pulpwood, declining over the first third of the decade, increasing slightly over the next third and increasing in the last third of the decade. Over the whole of the 50-year period overall price increases are 30 percent for pulpwood and only about 8 percent for solidwood.


This monograph is the most comprehensive comparative law study of legal responsibility arising from medical care presently available. It is written for doctors as well as health care administrators and legal professionals. Focusing on the problems of civil liability, it presents the development, points of contact with, and differences between the modern law of medical liability stemming from both the Common Law and Civil Law traditions of England, Scotland, Eire, New Zealand, Australia, Canada, the United States, South Africa, France, Belgium, West Germany, Switzerland, and Austria. It demonstrates the extent to which both problems of medical law and trends towards their solution are already familiar in these legal systems. The work describes principles and trends, not by confronting the reader with national reports' and separate chapters on different legal systems; rather, the relevant legal problems are analyzed from an integrative, comparative viewpoint. The main thrust of the presentation is the analysis of numerous court decisions -- the number of which is rising ominously in the United States -- on the civil liability of doctors and hospitals for damages arising from substandard treatment or inadequate disclosure of information to the patient. References to the legal and medical literature, indexes, and a refined system of cross-references, together with an important collection of appendices covering legal and ethical declarations make this work accessible as a handbook and reference work for the legal and social problems encountered today in the wide area of law, ethics, and medicine.


On several simple models of isotropic and anisotropic media, we have studied the accuracy of the two-point paraxial traveltime formula designed for the approximate calculation of the traveltime between points S 0 and R 0 located in the vicinity of points S and R on a reference ray. The reference ray may be situated in a 3D inhomogeneous isotropic or anisotropic medium with or without smooth curved interfaces. The twopoint paraxial traveltime formula has the form of the Taylor expansion of the two-point traveltime with respect to spatial Cartesian coordinates up to quadratic terms at points S and R on the reference ray. The constant term and the coefficients of the linear and quadratic terms are determined from quantities obtained from ray tracing and linear dynamic ray tracing along the reference ray. The use of linear dynamic ray tracing allows the evaluation of the quadratic terms in arbitrarily inhomogeneous media and, as shown by examples, it extends the region of accurate results around the reference ray between S and R (and even outside this interval) obtained with the linear terms only. Although the formula may be used for very general 3D models, we concentrated on simple 2D models of smoothly inhomogeneous isotropic and anisotropic (∼8% and ∼20% anisotropy) media only. On tests, in which we estimated twopoint traveltimes between a shifted source and a system of shifted receivers, we found that the formula may yield more accurate results than the numerical solution of an eikonal-based differential equation. The tests also indicated that the accuracy of the formula depends primarily on the length and the curvature of the reference ray and only weakly depends on anisotropy. The greater is the curvature of the reference ray, the narrower its vicinity, in which the formula yields accurate results.


The Passion has all the elements of classical tragedy: powerful characters, and a powerful plot filled with suspense and tension. But the centrality of the Passion to the Jesus film genre reflects not only the dramatic power of Jesus' Passion but also its importance within the first-century Gospel traditions themselves. It is sometimes said that the Gospels are Passion stories with extended introductions (Kähler). The Passion is anticipated from the very first chapter of each of the Gospels, and the detailed description of its events constitute the climax of each of the four canonical narratives. It is Jesus' death, and the resurrection that Christianity believes followed upon it, that give meaning to his life and to his messianic identity as the Christ and Son of God, and hence to his role in the Western history and culture that has been dominated by Christianity. No wonder, then, that artists, composers, playwrights and filmmakers continue to take up the challenge of putting image and sound to this powerful story. This article is available in Journal of Religion & Film: https://digitalcommons.unomaha.edu/jrf/vol8/iss1/5


The purpose of this review is to summarize studies that have examined associations between maternal adiposity prior to and during pregnancy and cognitive and psychiatric problems in offspring. Of the 11 studies published since a 2011 systematic review, four examined cognitive outcomes alone, four assessed psychopathology exclusively, and three reported on both cognitive and psychiatric endpoints. Ten studies provided evidence of a link. These data suggest that the offspring of women who are overweight or obese during pregnancy are at increased risk for cognitive deficits, externalizing problems (particularly attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder), and internalizing psychopathology in childhood and adolescence; however, the effect sizes were small to medium and a definitive causal association remains to be proven.


Creativity underpins innovation; innovation underpins enterprise. In the business world it is enterprises, not ideas or products on their own, that make money. Much attention is given to new product development and to processes of innovation. Indeed, there are increasingly popular techniques to support these processes. However, successful enterprises and effective corporate entrepreneurship need both ideas and people. While considerable attention is given to the product development side of innovation, it is a matter of debate whether the same degree of attention is always given to the people side, and the identification and development of people with entrepreneurial potential. When we consider entrepreneurs we have to look at how they think as well as at how they act – and thinking contains both conscious and unconscious elements. Techniques generally address conscious rather than unconscious thought processes. There are some aspects of our creative thinking processes that we can't readily explain. We need to get "inside the mind" of the innovator.


Evolving video applications impose requirements for high image quality, low bitrate, and/or small computational cost. This paper combines state-of-the-art coding and superresolution (SR) techniques to improve video compression both in terms of coding efficiency and complexity. The proposed approach improves a generic decimation-quantization compression scheme by introducing low complexity single-image SR techniques for rescaling the data at the decoder side and by jointly exploring/optimizing the downsampling/upsampling processes. The enhanced scheme achieves improvement of the quality and system's complexity compared with conventional codecs and can be easily modified to meet various diverse requirements, such as effectively supporting any off-the-shelf video codec, for instance H.264/Advanced Video Coding or High Efficiency Video Coding. Our approach builds on studying the generic scheme's parameterization with common rescaling techniques to achieve 2.4-dB peak signal-to-noise ratio (PSNR) quality improvement at low-bitrates compared with the conventional codecs and proposes a novel SR algorithm to advance the critical bitrate at the level of 10 Mb/s. The evaluation of the SR algorithm includes the comparison of its performance to other image rescaling solutions of the literature. The results show quality improvement by 5-dB PSNR over straightforward interpolation techniques and computational time reduction by three orders of magnitude when compared with the highly involved methods of the field. Therefore, our algorithm proves to be most suitable for use in reduced complexity downsampled compression schemes.


Heavy oil and bitumen are of a great interest for Canadian economics. Thermal recovery techniques are widely used across Alberta. To produce heavy oil its viscosity should be significantly decreased. One of the approaches is to heat the reservoir. Effective thermal conductivity of oil sands is an important parameter in reservoir simulation of thermal recovery processes such as steam assisted gravity drainage (SAGD). There are several mixing rules available in the literature, which allow for calculating effective thermal conductivity of porous material based on porosity and thermal conductivities of their components (matrix and fluid). Most of them use a so-called structural approach, which assumes that porous media consist of certain structures for each of which effective thermal conductivity can be calculated analytically. The other class of models uses statistical techniques. In all predictive equations, the overall thermal conductivity of the oil sands is calculated by knowing the individual properties of the fluids and the rock. The fluid properties are measured relatively easy. However, the thermal conductivity of sand is more challenging. When measuring the thermal conductivity of an oil sand sample, the obtained value is not only based on the fluid and solid properties but also on the structure of the pore space. Thus composite oil sand experimental measurements need to be complemented by predictive modeling that addresses the effects of pore structure.


In this paper I consider a General Equilibrium framework to evaluate the role and the importance of the interactions between Monetary and Fiscal policies in the sense outlined by Leeper (1991) and the Fiscal Theory of the Price Level, in the determination of nominal and real term structure. The main results show that the term structure will depend not only upon monetary and technological factors - as in the traditional models - but also upon the fiscal policy reaction function parameters. This aspect is very useful in explaining the recent experience of some countries, like Italy, whose term structure shifted down after the fiscal retrenchement imposed by Fiscal Rules of Maastricht Treaty. In this paper the term structure is derived by using a very general approach, starting from implicit assumptions on the driving stochastic processes of the model, rather than imposing a specific structure right from the beginning. The results are consistent with the more recent results outlined by Fiscal Theory of the Price Level and by monetary models of the term structure.


This article presents a two-stage adaptive robust coordinated generation and transmission expansion planning model for a wind farm-integrated power system. Also, dynamic thermal rating (DTR) systems, energy storage systems, and optimal line switching maneuvers are considered as various flexible sources to enhance the flexibility of the power system in response to uncertain variations of net system demand. The proposed approach characterizes the uncertainty of demands, wind power, and DTRs in each representative day by a polyhedral uncertainty set. Additionally, the $k$-means clustering technique is used to obtain upward/downward variations of correlated uncertain parameters in each representative day and to construct the uncertainty set. The proposed model is inherently intractable as it includes infinite constraints modeling enforced techno-economic limitations for all realizations of uncertain parameters. To resolve this limitation, the proposed intractable model is recast as a tractable mixed-integer linear programming problem using affine policies. The proposed approach is implemented on the Garver 6-bus and IEEE 73-bus test systems. Simulation results illustrate its flexibility, practicality, and tractability.


Descriptive norms provide social information on others' typical behaviors and have been shown to lead to prescriptive outcomes by "nudging" individuals towards norm compliance in numerous settings. This paper examines whether descriptive norms lead to prescriptive outcomes in the gender domain. We examine whether such social information can influence the gender distribution of candidates selected by employers in a hiring context.  We conduct a series of laboratory experiments where 'employers' decide how many male and female 'employees' they want to hire for male- and female-typed tasks and examine whether employers are more likely to hire more of one gender when informed that others have done so as well. In this set-up descriptive norms do not have prescriptive effects. In fact, descriptive norms do not affect female employers' hiring decisions at all and lead to norm reactance and backlash from male employers when informed that others have hired more women.


PURPOSE
To compare the perioperative, short-term and long-term postoperative results of radical retropubic prostatectomy (RRP), laparoscopic radical prostatectomy (LRP) and robotic assisted laparoscopic prostatectomy (RALP) in the most recent studies evaluable.

MATERIALS AND METHODS
Using PubMed we have undertaken a search based on references from major and recent articles with considerable sample sizes.

RESULTS
The operative blood loss and the risk of transfusion were lower in the laparoscopic and robotic-assisted approaches. The surgical duration was shorter in the open and robotic group. Regarding the positive margins, continence and potency no substantial differences between the RRP, LRP, and RALP were found.

CONCLUSIONS
Our results suggest that no one surgical approach is superior in terms of functional and early oncologic outcomes. Potential advantages of any surgical approach have to be confirmed through longer-term follow-up and adequately designed clinical studies.


The results of randomized controlled clinical trials of ranibizumab for the treatment of age-related macular degeneration established a new standard of care with the prospect of improved vision in many patients. Subsequent trials have explored different strategies to increase response rates and reduce treatment frequency. This review analyzes the key clinical trial data for ranibizumab on the basis of which the author proposes a new treatment regimen with the aim of rationalizing treatment frequency without compromising improvements in vision – the FUSION regimen. This consists of an initiation phase followed by pro re nata (PRN) retreatment combined with fixed injections after a period of disease inactivity of 2–4 months (depending on the time elapsed since the last injection). A randomized clinical trial is recommended for comparing monthly, PRN and the FUSION regimens.


This book gives an overview of advanced emerging technologies for the detection of a range of waterborne pathogens. The book will present existing methodology and highlight where improvements can be made, as well as have a strong focus on applications and the ways in which new technology could be applied in water management. Additionally, it addresses issues of sample preparation (from sampling to concentration and enrichment), a key stage in any detection protocol. * Covers the gap of specific sound methods of pathogen detection by fulfulling the need for a concept book on the novel technologies for pathogen detection in water* Presents all cutting-edge technologies for pathogen detection in water as well as recent emerging technologies* Addresses all three types of pathogens; this combined knowledge helps to understand all potential pathogens in water


Hidden semi-Markov models (HSMMs) are latent variable models which allow latent state persistence and can be viewed as a generalization of the popular hidden Markov models (HMMs). In this paper, we introduce a novel spectral algorithm to perform inference in HSMMs. Unlike expectation maximization (EM), our approach correctly estimates the probability of given observation sequence based on a set of training sequences. Our approach is based on estimating moments from the sample, whose number of dimensions depends only logarithmically on the maximum length of the hidden state persistence. Moreover, the algorithm requires only a few matrix inversions and is therefore computationally efficient. Empirical evaluations on synthetic and real data demonstrate the advantage of the algorithm over EM in terms of speed and accuracy, especially for large data sets.


Nowadays it's still very difficult to find accurate information on land-cover areas and types, which mainly results from the confusion between land use types and land cover types (e.g., many researchers equated land cover with land use and land use types were often employed for the replacements of land cover types) and the absence of a standard land cover classification system with an unambiguous, repeatable definition of land cover and quantificational classification criteria so as to the classification result comparable. In this study, a new logic for land cover classification at regional scale has been introduced. The critical features of this classification are that: it's indeed distinguished from land use classification system and driven by remote sensing so that repeatable and efficient re-classifications of existing land cover will be possible; spectrum and primary attributes of plant-canopy structure (i.e. permanence of aboveground live biomass, leaf longevity and leaf type) are adopted as the primary criterions of land cover classification; based on the phonological difference among broadly defined vegetation, some typical land cover is easily distinguished by using the characteristics of seasonal dynamic; mixed land cover is differentiated by its constituent characteristics and influence on land surface processes. Taking the areas between Yangtze River Basin and Weihe River Basin in China as a case and using time-series MODIS 250 m data (i.e. NDVI and reflectance), a two-level hierarchical land cover classification scheme was produced for the areas. At the initial stage, the entire study area was mapped into seven classes, i.e. evergreen cover (woody), seasonal green cover (woody), seasonal green cover (herbaceous), seasonal green cover (crops), seasonal green cover (mixed), grey cover (non-vegetated and terrestrial) and blue cover (aquatic or regularly flooded). The sub-classes includes Coniferous evergreen forest, Broadleaf deciduous forest, Single cropping in one year, Continuous double cropping in one year, grassland, Wetland, Urban or Built-up land, Barren or Sparsely land, River, Lake, Mixed Cover of Crop and tree, etc.


One of sociology's classic puzzles is how groups motivate their members to set aside self-interest and contribute to collective action. This article presents a solution to the problem based on status as a selective incentive motivating contribution. Contributors to collective action signal their motivation to help the group and consequently earn diverse benefits from group members–in particular, higher status–and these rewards encourage greater giving to the group in the future. In Study 1, high contributors to collective action earned higher status, exercised more interpersonal influence, were cooperated with more, and received gifts of greater value. Studies 2 and 3 replicated these findings while discounting alternative explanations. All three studies show that giving to the group mattered because it signaled an individual's motivation to help the group. Study 4 finds that participants who received status for their contributions subsequently contributed more and viewed the group more positively. These results demonstrate how the allocation of respect to contributors shapes group productivity and solidarity, offering a solution to the collective action problem.


Introduction Placental abruption secondary to pancreatitis is rare. There are two cases in the literature. There are no previous reported cases of placental abruption secondary to pancreatitis caused by hypertriglyceridaemia. Case We present the case of a 30 year old low risk primagravida who presented at 39 weeks and 6 days gestation with severe epigastric pain. Her bedside observations revealed tachypnoea but were otherwise normal. Urinalysis revealed proteinuria (++). Vaginal examination was consistent with early labour. Initial differential diagnosis included a surgical emergency, pre-eclampsia, labour and placental abruption. Initial CTG was normal but became pathological and she went on to have emergency caesarean section within two hours of arrival. Operative findings included milky white ascitic fluid on opening the abdomen and a retroplacental clot. Chemical pathology telephoned to inform the team that her blood tests appeared lipaemic and she had an amylase of 1043 U/L (20–120 U/L) and triglycerides of 134 mmol/L (<1.70 mmol/L). She was transferred to intensive care and has had a complicated recovery, which included cardiac arrest on her first postoperative day. At the time of writing, she remains on intensive care (her seventh week) and is being considered for a pancreatectomy for severe haemorrhagic pancreatitis. Conclusion Acute pancreatitis should be considered in all patients presenting with upper abdominal pain. It can be difficult to diagnose and present non-specifically, particularly in the latter stages of pregnancy. It is an important cause of abruption. Triglycerides increase in pregnancy and are a well established cause of pancreatitis.


GANCHEV, D. and A. NIKOLOV, 2006. Evaluation of biological activity of plant oils and soaps, towards to Sphaerotheca fuliginea. Bulg. J. Agric. Sci., 11: 441-445 In spring and summer of 2003, in Agricultural University in town of Plovdiv, were conducted a trials to control Sphaerotheca fuliginea on cucumber plants growing under greenhouse conditions, with plant oils and soaps. We tested a refined grape - seed oil, emulgated with soybean lethicin, oil and it's soap derived from plants witch are from Brassicaceae family, and treatment with soy-bean lethicin on one's own. A mineral oil applied in Bulgaria as pesticide under target name RZ Maslo was used as standard, and water treatment - as control. The results shown a high curative action of water emulsion of grape-seed oil. The oil and soap from plant from Brassicaceae family had a more strong preventive action, the soybean lethicin - alone treatment - the same action. A tests with grape-seed oil water emulsion was conducted to determine inhibition of fertility of cucumber pollen - they showed decreased germination of pollen die of treatment with grape-seed oil water emulsion, corresponding with doses of application - lower doses - lower inhibition. Another tests with the same oil and with oils and soaps derived from plants from Brassicaceae family were conducted to determine theirs phytotoxic behavior according to cucumber plants.


Out of the chaos of W.W.II emerged three United Nations agencies-FAO,
WHO, and Unicef-endowed with the joint responsibility to help conquer hunger and
malnutrition. Seminal nutritional research before the war along with idealistic policy
makers and nutritionists afterwards set the stage for the first international initiatives to
address nutritional issues in developing countries. This dissertation relies mainly on an
array of primary sources and oral histories to elucidate the evolving position of
nutrition in FAO, WHO, and Unicef.
Nutritionists at the UN agencies, research institutes, the UN agency-supported
Protein Advisory Group, and expert committees contributed substantially to the shape
and focus of international nutrition policies. Alongside developments in nutritional
science, administrators at FAO, WHO, and Unicef implemented complementary policy
changes. During the early-1950s, nutritionists began applying lessons learned from the
treatment and prevention of malnutrition during W.W.II to recently discovered
nutritional problems in developing countries. Consequently, the agency plans for the
developing countries usually entailed dried skim milk distribution and production
projects since these had been successful in Europe. Throughout the 1950s and 1960s
nutritionists concentrated on protein malnutrition and its clinical manifestation,
kwashiorkor. Caloric deficiencies, which in severe cases led to marasmus, were of
secondary importance as was emerging knowledge about the complex interactions of
nutrition and infection. The apparent prevalence of protein malnutrition led
nutritionists to draw attention to pre-school children and to develop high-protein
dietary supplements. Agency policies reflected these developments and emphasized
nutrition education projects, supplementary food distribution, and other schemes
designed to tangibly impact nutritional status, especially of children.
The lack of progress against global hunger and malnutrition inspired the
agencies during the late-1960s and 1970s to promote national development plans that
prioritized the nutritional needs of the population. During the same period, many
nutritionists drew attention to the declining protein intake of the poor and called for
monumental efforts to increase protein production and availability. Although nutrition
policies initially took note of this protein deficit, within a few years the nutritionists'
fears were considered to have been reactionary. As a result of this and the largely
uneven results of nutrition policies, the administrators tired of the influence of the
nutritionists and created a new hierarchy that placed nutritionists lower on the ladder
of power. Toward the end of the 1970s, nutritional enterprises lost their singular
importance and were increasingly integrated with primary health care endeavours.