The Google Online Marketing Challenge is a global competition in which student teams run advertising campaigns for small and medium-sized businesses (SMEs) using AdWords, Google's text-based advertisements. In 2008, its inaugural year, over 8,000 students and 300 instructors from 47 countries representing over 200 schools participated. The Challenge ran in undergraduate and graduate classes in disciplines such as marketing, tourism, advertising, communication and information systems. Combining advertising and education, the Challenge gives student hands-on experience in the increasingly important field of online marketing, engages them with local businesses and motivates them through the thrill of a global competition. Student teams receive US$200 in AdWords credits, Google's premier advertising product that offers cost-per-click advertisements. The teams then recruit and work with a local business to devise an effective online marketing campaign. Students first outline a strategy, run a series of campaigns, and provide their business with recommendations to improve their online marketing. Teams submit two written reports for judging by 14 academics in eight countries. In addition, Google AdWords experts judge teams on their campaign statistics such as success metrics and account management. Rather than a marketing simulation against a computer or hypothetical marketing plans for hypothetical businesses, the Challenges has student teams develop and manage real online advertising campaigns for their clients and compete against peers globally.


The computer model PERMEBAL (which stands for Permafrost and Energy Balance) simulates the persistence of snow cover and daily ground surface temperatures of snow‐free gridpoints. It was developed for high‐mountain conditions. The model describes different vertical energy fluxes at the surface. With meteorological and site‐specific input data, PERMEBAL delivers daily ground surface temperatures of snow‐free gridpoints. Special emphasis is given to simulation of snow‐cover development (snow fall, snow redistribution, snowmelt). The resulting ground surface temperature data are intended for use as input data for future ground heat flux simulations. The aim is to model ground thermal conditions and thus permafrost distribution. The model was applied to the Corvatsch‐Furtschellas area (16 km2, Engadin, eastern Switzerland). The results show that the area could be divided into three classes of mean annual sums of daily ground surface temperatures of snow‐free pixels, similar to 'permafrost probable', 'permafrost possible' and 'permafrost improbable' classifications used in earlier empirical permafrost distribution models. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.


This paper presents an induction motor drive using a method of direct torque and stator flux control. One disadvantage of the algorithm is a variable switching frequency of a voltage source inverter although it is used a constant period for the direct torque control processing in a digital signal controller. It is difficult to carry out a good filtration of the variable switching frequency; therefore it finally leads to higher level of interference. It is possible to avoid the problem and ensure the constant switching frequency of the voltage source inverter by the application of a pulse-width modulator in the control structure of the induction motor drive. In the paper it is described basic mathematical equations of the direct torque control of the induction motor and it is shown simulation results which confirm theoretical assumptions of the induction motor drive properties.


Concurrent systems maintain a distributed state and thus require coordination and synchronization between components to ensure consistency. To provide a coherent design approach to concurrent systems, recent work has employed an object-based methodology which emphasizes interactions through well-deened interfaces. The Actor model has provided formal reasoning about distributed object systems. Nonetheless, due to the complex interactions among components and the high volume of observable information produced, understanding and reasoning about concurrent algorithms in terms of simple interactions is a diicult task. Coordination patterns, which abstract over simple interactions, are not biased by low-level event orderings and are the appropriate mechanism for reasoning about concurrent algorithms. We outline a methodology for visualizing coordination patterns in concurrent algorithms which emphasizes observable interactions and causal connections between objects. We introduce visualizers as a linguistic mechanism for mapping coordination patterns to visualization. Visualizers are speciied separately from algorithm code and thus respect code integrity. Moreover, visualizers may be implemented strictly in terms of object interfaces and thus preserve object encapsulation.


: A statistical downscaling method based on regressing precipitation data is introduced and applied to 60-km resolution Atmospheric General Circulation Model (AGCM60km) output for daily precipitation. The method utilizes a regression domain with a 3×3 60-km grid, and the downscaling target is 3×3 20-km grids in the center of the regression domain. By shifting the regression domain one grid by one grid in 60-km resolution, the same form of regression model, but different regression coefficients for each 20-km grid, can be applied to all the downscaling target areas. Based on application tests for the Asian Monsoon region, the statistical downscaling algorithm shows extremely effective results with a certain pattern of regression error. The monthly based downscaled results from AGCM60km output shows a rather good match to the monthly mean precipitation amount of AGCM20km. The downscaled results also show a plausible mimic to the AGCM20km output in the frequency of daily precipitation amounts; however, the results showed noticeable limitations in simulating low rainfall amounts (e.g., less than 5 mm d –1 ), especially on land.


A new type of museum appeared – the corporate museum. The museum institution in this instance has been used as a new marketing device for building corporate identity strategies. Their inception is not based on the existing context of a place, but appears to be integrated with the corporate identity program, exposing the company's values and philosophy. The corporate museums are thematic, commercial buildings, owned by a particular firm, where the history of the company brand and products development is presented. Architecture of corporate museums must doubtless be identified with the brand, reflecting the high quality of a brand's products. The surveys were carried out on freshly constructed corporate museums like Porsche, Mercedes and BMW Welt. They are located next to the factories where the brand products are manufactured. The immediate vicinity of the corporate museum to the production zone allows the exhibition to extend to the production line. Corporate museums generate considerable benefits, as the cultural potential of a space where the museums are built increases. Their outside-the-city location economically activates forgotten zones of the town. Corporate museums extend the city's tourist and cultural offer and their buildings become a recognizable element in a city's marketing image. These facts prove that museum institutions can be successfully used for commercial purposes.


How costly were the banking panics of the National Banking Era (1861-1913)? I combine two hand-collected data sets - the weekly statements of the New York Clearing House banks and the monthly holding period return of every stock listed on the NYSE - to estimate the cost of banking panics in an era before "too big to fail." The bank statements allow me to construct a hypothetical insurance contract which would have allowed investors to insure against sudden deposit withdrawals and the cross-section of stock returns allow us to draw inferences about the marginal utility during panic states. Panics were costly. The cross-section of gilded-age stock returns imply investors would have willing paid a 14% annual premium above actuarial fair value to insure $100 against unexpected deposit withdrawals The implied consumption of stock investors suggests that the consumption loss associated with National Banking Era bank runs was far more costly than the consumption loss from stock market crashes.


Insolvency systems play a crucial role in protection of creditor rights, yet micro-level empirical evidence on the functioning of insolvency regimes worldwide is sparse. We investigate whether creditors' recovery of outstanding claims, a measure of ex-post efficiency of an insolvency regime, depends on the characteristics of the trustee delegated the administration of the liquidation proceedings. To this end, we draw on a novel dataset of firm liquidations from Slovenia and exploit courts' de facto random assignment of firm liquidation cases to licensed liquidation trustees. Using a wide range of specifications and controls, we find that a subset of trustee characteristics indeed matters for debt recovery. Thus, ex-post efficiency of an insolvency regime depends not only on its formal rules and procedures, but also on who implements them in practice.


Three-dimensional anatomical models have long been essential to the learning of science and lend a sense of "control" to those practicing in the field. As the development of embryology [4] grew in importance during the late 1800s, so did the need for models to show intricate details of embryos. Embryologists such as Wilhelm His [5], Ernst Haeckel [6], and Oscar Hertwig all initially constructed their own wax models of embryos but later handed over the modification and reproduction of their models to various "plastic artists." The most renowned among these artists was Adolf Ziegler [7].


Printing plasmonic nanoparticles is of interest e.g. in the fields of large area printing for photovoltaic applications, biomedical and photonic sensor developments, as well as for digital printing of security tags for smart packaging and anti-counterfeit applications. We have studied plasmonic gold nanoparticles embedded in printable PEDOT:PSS (poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene)-poly(styrenesulfonate), a transparent hole conducting organic semiconductor material). Aqueous dispersions of chemically stabilized gold nanoparticles (e.g. 40 nm in diameter) were used as plasmonic nanoparticle additives for the nanocomposite coating materials and inks. Inkjet printing and spincoating experiments have been performed on glass substrates. The inkjet printed nanocomposite microstructures and thin film coatings were investigated by true non-contact atomic force microscopy (AFM), 3D profilometry, optical microscopy. Absorbance spectroscopy was used to characterize the gold nanoparticle dispersions upon synthesis and encapsulation in comparison to commercial gold nanoparticles. AFM topography and phase contrast data reveal the domain structure of PEDOT:PSS, and indicate embedding of the nanoparticles within the transparent conducting polymer printed structures. Successive printing of the PEDOT:PSS ink and gold nanoparticle dispersions leads to the contrary to significant topographic contrasts in AFM and optical profilometry. Using the coffee stain effect, we generate inkjet printed plasmonic nanocomposite microstructures that are of potential interest for the application field of smart electrically conducting and plasmonic security tags.


Grindr is a smartphone application for men who have sex with men (MSM). Despite its reputation as a 'hook-up app', little is known about its users' self-presentation strategies and how this relates to objectification - this paper explores objectification on Grindr. The results of Study 1 showed that Grindr users objectified other men more than non-Grindr users. A content analysis of 1400 Grindr profiles in Study 2 showed that profile pictures with objectifying content were related to searching for sexual encounters. Finally, a survey of Grindr users in Study 3 revealed that objectification processes and sexualized profile pictures were related to some objectification-relevant online behaviors (e.g., increased use of Grindr, discussion of HIV status). Interestingly, the presence of body focused profile content was more related to sexual orientation disclosure (not being 'out') than to objectification. This paper presents evidence that Grindr usage and online presentation are related to objectification processes.


Cn Saturday, December 14, 1963 at 3:30 P.M. a break in the Baldwin
Hills Dam in Los Angeles sent a torrent of water onto the hillside and
valley below, causing extensive destruction in an estimated one square
mile residential and business area.
The 292.4 million gallons of water that had been stored in the reservoir battered out the sides of houses and
completely demolished many buildings; household items such as furniture
and refrigerators were swept away and mud and debris were spread for
miles. Many residents who either did not hear the warnings to evacuate or
failed to heed them fled to their rooftops and other buildings and were later
rescued by helicopters. Only five people were killed, but 27 other persons were injured enough to require hospitalization despite the extensive damage
to both public and private property which ran to several million dollars.
On Sunday, December 15 at 1l:30 A.M. a three man Disaster Research
Center team arrived in Los Angeles.
The primary purpose of the trip was
to provide the team with field experience, and thus it represented for the
most part a training exercise rather than a systematic study. Also important
in the DRS's decision to send a field team to Los Angles was the
 was fact the disaster took place in a major metropolitan area. While most
disaster studies have involved urban areas, very few have had metropolitan
areas as their chief focus. Finally, the DRC felt that a study of the Baldwin
Hills disaster afforded an opportunity to obtain greater insight into group
and organizational problems and responses in a dam disaster occurring in
a domestic setting. Some observations concerning this type of disaster in a foreign setting were obtained from a study by the DRC of the Vaiont Dam disaster which occured in northeastern Italy on October 9, 1963.


DNA damage is thought to be the initial event that causes sulfur mustard (SM) toxicity, while the ability of cells to repair this damage is thought to provide a degree of natural protection. To investigate the repair process, we have damaged plasmids containing the firefly luciferase gene with either SM or its monofunctional analog, 2-chloroethyl ethyl sulfide (CEES). Damaged plasmids were transfected into wild-type and nucleotide excision repair (NER) deficient Chinese hamster ovary cells; these cells were also transfected with a second reporter plasmid containing RENILLA: luciferase as an internal control on the efficiency of transfection. Transfected cells were incubated at 37 degrees C for 27 h and then both firefly and RENILLA: luciferase intensities were measured on the same samples with the dual luciferase reporter assay. Bioluminescence in lysates from cells transfected with damaged plasmid, expressed as a percentage of the bioluminescence from cells transfected with undamaged plasmid, is increased by host cell repair activity. The results show that NER-competent cells have a higher reactivation capacity than NER-deficient cells for plasmids damaged by either SM or CEES. Significantly, NER-competent cells are also more resistant to the toxic effects of SM and CEES, indicating that NER is not only proficient in repairing DNA damage caused by either agent but also in decreasing their toxicity. This host cell repair assay can now be used to determine what other cellular mechanisms protect cells from mustard toxicity and under what conditions these mechanisms are most effective.


We examined the photosensitivity and stability in an ultraviolet (UV)-preexposure method that locks the photosensitivity of refractive index by hydrogen loading in the fabrication of long-period fiber gratings (LPFGs). Photosensitivity and stability comparisons are made between the UV-preexposure method, a typical hydrogen-loading method, and a UV-exposure method without hydrogen loading. The UV-preexposure method can enhance the photosensitivity to induce effective refractive index modulations up to 1.6/spl times/10/sup -4/, which is sufficient for fabricating LPFGs in a practical manner under the hydrogen-loading condition at a relatively low pressure of 2.9 MPa. The sensitivity is preserved in terms of the length of time at least over 10 000 h. The spectrum changes after the completion of the LPFG writing are more stable than under the typical hydrogen loading. Therefore, the proposed UV-preexposure method is one of the most useful techniques for fabricating precise and stable fiber gratings, because there are no free hydrogen molecules in the fiber when the fiber gratings are written.


To re-evaluate the various hypotheses on the systematic position of Parergodrilus heideri Reisinger, 1925 and Hrabeiella periglandulata Pizl & Chalupský, 1984, the sole truly terrestrial non-clitellate annelids known to date, their phylogenetic relationships were investigated using a data set of new 18S rDNA sequences of these and other five relevant annelid taxa, including an unknown species of Ctenodrilidae, as well as homologous sequences already available for 18 polychaetes, one aphanoneuran, 11 clitellates, two pogonophorans, one echiuran, one sipunculan, three molluscs and two arthropods. Two different alignments were constructed, according to an algorithmic method (Clustal W) and on the basis of a secondary structure model (DCSE), A maximum parsimony analysis was performed with arthropods as an unambiguous outgroup. With both alignments, the resulting topology confirms the validity of grouping P. heideri and Stygocapitella subterranea Knollner, 1934 into the family Parergodrilidae. Hrabeiella periglandulata never clusters with them and its position relative to this and other polychaete families is still obscure, but a close relationship with aphanoneurans is suggested by the most parsimonious trees. All these taxa appear to be far from the Clitellata. Most relationships among polychaetes are not supported by significant bootstrap and Bremer values. These polytomies are corroborated by independent evidence and are interpreted as resulting from an ancient emergence and a rapid radiation of Polychaeta.


GH promotes longitudinal growth and regulates multiple cellular functions in humans and animals. GH signals by binding to GH receptor (GHR) to activate the tyrosine kinase, Janus kinase 2 (JAK2), and downstream pathways including signal transducer and activator of transcription 5 (STAT5), thereby regulating expression of genes including IGF-I. GH exerts effects both directly and via IGF-I, which signals by activating the IGF-I receptor (IGF-IR). IGF-IR is a cell surface receptor that contains intrinsic tyrosine kinase activity within its intracellular domain. In this study, we examined the potential role of IGF-IR in facilitating GH-induced signal transduction, using mouse primary calvarial osteoblasts with Lox-P sites flanking both IGF-IR alleles. These cells respond to both GH and IGF-I and in vitro infection with an adenovirus that drives expression of Cre recombinase (Ad-Cre) dramatically reduces IGF-IR abundance without affecting the abundance of GHR, JAK2, STAT5, or ERK. Notably, infection with Ad-Cre, but not a control adenovirus, markedly inhibited acute GH-induced STAT5 activity (more than doubling the ED(50) and reducing the maximum activity by nearly 50%), while sparing GH-induced ERK activity, and markedly inhibited GH-induced transactivation of a STAT5-dependent luciferase reporter. The effect of Ad-Cre on GH signaling was specific, as platelet-derived growth factor-induced signaling was unaffected by Ad-Cre-mediated reduction of IGF-IR. Ad-Cre-mediated inhibition of GH signaling was reversed by adenoviral reexpression of IGF-IR, but not by infection with an adenovirus that drives expression of a hemagglutination-tagged somatostatin receptor, which drives expression of the unrelated somatostatin receptor, and Ad-Cre infection of nonfloxed osteoblasts did not affect GH signaling. Notably, infection with an adenovirus encoding a C-terminally truncated IGF-IR that lacks the tyrosine kinase domain partially rescued both acute GH-induced STAT5 activity and GH-induced IGF-I gene expression in cells in which endogenous IGF-IR was reduced. These data, in concert with our earlier findings that GH induces a GHR-JAK2-IGF-IR complex, suggest a novel function for IGF-IR. In addition to its role as a key IGF-I signal transducer, this receptor may directly facilitate acute GH signaling. The implications of these findings are discussed.


The paper focuses on the main unresolved safety issue for hydrogen-powered vehicles, i.e. the fireresistance of onboard hydrogen storage. The experimental study supported by numerical analysis hasbeen undertaken in order to achieve fire resistance rating of high-pressure hydrogen tank beyondpotential car fire duration, i.e. of the order of 2 hours. The experimental programme comprised ofbonfire tests of carbon-fibre reinforced plastic tanks with polymer liner both bare and thermallyprotected, in line with Global Technical Regulation on Hydrogen and Fuel Cell Vehicles #13. Testedparameters included different levels of thermal protection, different bonfire heat release rates, tankswith and without prehistory of pressure cycling. It was experimentally demonstrated that the thermalprotection solution in form of epoxy-based intumescent paint is capable to increase fire resistancerating of carbon-fibre plastic tank from current 6-12 minutes to beyond 2 hours. This breakthroughachievement in fire resistance rating of on-board hydrogen storage has a potential to impact on safety design of tanks and to reduce range of hazards in case of accident scenario like a car fire, e.g. complete elimination of catastrophic tank rapture in a fire or longer release from a pressure relief device resulting in a shorter hydrogen jet fire. Smaller bonfire heat release rate was shown to increase fire resistance rating of the tested tank though still complying with the Global Technical Regulation #13. Tank pressure cycling did not have impact on the tank fire resistance rating.


Background Most patients with locally advanced, unresectable, non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC) have disease progression despite definitive chemoradiotherapy (chemotherapy plus concurrent radiation therapy). This phase 3 study compared the anti-programmed death ligand 1 antibody durvalumab as consolidation therapy with placebo in patients with stage III NSCLC who did not have disease progression after two or more cycles of platinum-based chemoradiotherapy. Methods We randomly assigned patients, in a 2:1 ratio, to receive durvalumab (at a dose of 10 mg per kilogram of body weight intravenously) or placebo every 2 weeks for up to 12 months. The study drug was administered 1 to 42 days after the patients had received chemoradiotherapy. The coprimary end points were progression-free survival (as assessed by means of blinded independent central review) and overall survival (unplanned for the interim analysis). Secondary end points included 12-month and 18-month progression-free survival rates, the objective response rate, the duration of response, the time to death or distant metastasis, and safety. Results Of 713 patients who underwent randomization, 709 received consolidation therapy (473 received durvalumab and 236 received placebo). The median progression-free survival from randomization was 16.8 months (95% confidence interval [CI], 13.0 to 18.1) with durvalumab versus 5.6 months (95% CI, 4.6 to 7.8) with placebo (stratified hazard ratio for disease progression or death, 0.52; 95% CI, 0.42 to 0.65; P<0.001); the 12-month progression-free survival rate was 55.9% versus 35.3%, and the 18-month progression-free survival rate was 44.2% versus 27.0%. The response rate was higher with durvalumab than with placebo (28.4% vs. 16.0%; P<0.001), and the median duration of response was longer (72.8% vs. 46.8% of the patients had an ongoing response at 18 months). The median time to death or distant metastasis was longer with durvalumab than with placebo (23.2 months vs. 14.6 months; P<0.001). Grade 3 or 4 adverse events occurred in 29.9% of the patients who received durvalumab and 26.1% of those who received placebo; the most common adverse event of grade 3 or 4 was pneumonia (4.4% and 3.8%, respectively). A total of 15.4% of patients in the durvalumab group and 9.8% of those in the placebo group discontinued the study drug because of adverse events. Conclusions Progression-free survival was significantly longer with durvalumab than with placebo. The secondary end points also favored durvalumab, and safety was similar between the groups. (Funded by AstraZeneca; PACIFIC ClinicalTrials.gov number, NCT02125461)


Due to a lack of primary care providers (PCP) in a rural family practice clinic, patient access to health care is being compromised with patients experiencing difficulties scheduling appointments within a timely manner. Periodic health exams (PHE) can be time consuming and lack strong evidence that they improve patient outcomes, however, the actual preventative health services (PHS) reduce morbidity and mortality rates. Suggestions have been made to incorporate preventative health services counseling into other office visits to eliminate lengthy PHE or by use of a panel managed approach. A panel managed preventative health service protocol was developed and implementation was piloted by two PCP at the clinical project site. The goal of this project was to improve patient access by decreasing the number of days to schedule an appointment with a PCP in a rural family practice clinic over a 3-months. A secondary aim was to decrease the daily patient census of the urgent care walk-in clinic partially related to inappropriate use. Thirty days prior to the implementation of the panel managed preventative health service protocol, the mean number of days to schedule an appointment with a PCP was 42.57 days and 50.87 days of month one and 52.19 days of month three of project implementation. The mean daily patient census count in the urgent care walk-in clinic for 30 days prior to project implementation, was 73.57 days and month three of the project implementation was 57.07 days, reflecting the expected change. Despite somewhat conflicting results and several limitations experienced in the implementation portion of this project, a panel managed preventative health service protocol has the potential to benefit the healthcare system by displacing some of the workload from PCP to nonclinican staff and improve compliance of recommended PHS. Recommendations of implementation over a longer timeframe, appropriate allocated staff, and data collection of the recommended PHS patients obtained, may strengthen future, similar projects.


The Italian artist Caravaggio (1571-1610) had a profound impact on a wide range of baroque painters of Italian, French, Dutch, Flemish, and Spanish origin who resided in Rome either during his lifetime or immediately afterward. This captivating book illustrates the notion of 'Caravaggism', showcasing 65 works by Peter Paul Rubens and other important artists of the period who drew inspiration from Caravaggio; these pieces are the focus of a North American exhibition. Also depicted are Caravaggio canvases that fully exhibit his distinctive style, along with ones that had a particularly discernible impact on other practitioners. Caravaggio's influence was greatest in Rome, where his works were seen by the largest and most international group of artists, and was at its peak in the early decades of the 17th century both before and after his untimely death at the age of 39. Not since Michelangelo or Raphael has one European artist affected so many of his contemporaries and over such broad geographic territory. Essays by an array of major Caravaggio scholars illuminate the underlying principles of the exhibition, reveal how Caravaggio altered the presentation and interpretation of many traditional subjects and inspired unusual new ones, and explore the artist's legacy and how he irrevocably changed the course of painting.


Post-starburst or "E + A" galaxies are rapidly transitioning from star-forming to quiescence. While the current star formation rate (SFR) of post-starbursts is already at the level of early-type galaxies, we recently discovered that many have large CO-traced molecular gas reservoirs consistent with normal star-forming galaxies. These observations raise the question of why these galaxies have such low SFRs. Here we present an ALMA search for the denser gas traced by HCN (1–0) and HCO+ (1–0) in two CO-luminous, quiescent post-starburst galaxies. Intriguingly, we fail to detect either molecule. The upper limits are consistent with the low SFRs and with early-type galaxies. The HCN/CO luminosity ratio upper limits are low compared to star-forming and even many early-type galaxies. This implied low dense gas mass fraction explains the low SFRs relative to the CO-traced molecular gas and suggests that the state of the gas in post-starburst galaxies is unusual, with some mechanism inhibiting its collapse to denser states. We conclude that post-starbursts galaxies are now quiescent because little dense gas is available, in contrast to the significant CO-traced lower density gas reservoirs that still remain.


Pattern is often studied by zoologists who wish to re-identify an individual animal within a population. For pattern to prove a reliable method of identification, it must be unique between individuals and constant throughout time, as has been demonstrated in species such as badgers (Dixon, 2003), polar bears (Anderson and Waterman, 2007) and grey nurse sharks (Bansemer and Bennett, 2008). However, little work has been undertaken on reptiles, which are often identified by injecting or surgically implanting PIT tags (Jemison et al., 1995; Hilterman et al., 2007) or toe-clipped (Sacchi et al., 2007). Pattern is a less intrusive and more potentially reliable method of distinguishing individuals.

There is currently no information available on pattern stability in the blotched blue tongue lizard (Tiliqua nigrolutea). Markings displayed by blue tongue lizards are a combination of very dark blotches and bands on a paler background, and differences in these patterns between individuals are immediately distinguishable. However, it is not enough simply to state that these patterns appear unchanged over time, they must be quantified and scored in some way to confirm that this is so. This project has investigated whether pattern remains sufficiently constant over time to be used as a reliable method of individual identification in T. nigrolutea.

METHODS

We created a key of ten characters, each with multiple possible character states, focusing on features such as the colour shades of the paler regions (e.g. grey/gold/salmon), the arrangement of individual blotches into connected bands (e.g. Figure 1), and particular regions of the body such as neck, pelvis and tail (e.g. Figure 2) (dorsal pattern only). This key allowed a more objective assessment of digital photographs taken over a period of four years as individuals (N=29) from five litters grew in captivity from neonatal (snout to vent (SVL) length ≈10 cm to adult body length (SVL > 24 cm in males, SVL > 26 cm in females). Digital images of the dorsal surface of individual lizards taken at 12 and 18 months and 4 years were scored using the key and compared. Not all photos displayed all 10 characters clearly, so only characters that were visible in the photos were scored. Only characters where a score was available for at least two of the sample periods dates were considered. The proportion of characters scored for which each individual achieved an identical character state over time was calculated as a percentage for each litter, and overall.


Improvement of mechanical and chemical properties can be achieved by melt blending of thermoplastic polyurethane (TPU) with polyolefins (PO's). Since TPU and PO's are completely immiscible polymers, property enhancement cannot be attained. Effect of incorporation of polypropylene copolymer (PPCP), TPU-g-MA, TPU-g-AA as compatibiliser on the miscibility of the blends and effect of mica filler to enhance the mechanical properties were studied. A single screw extruder was used to manufacture blends by melt mixing. The results of mechanical and morphological properties show that the blend of thermoplastic polyurethane (TPU)/PO's with suitable compatibiliser and mica gives excellent performance in all aspects.


The constructs of global integration and local responsiveness have been widely used in describing and analyzing international HRM strategy and practices of MNEs. A significant amount of research tends to assume that the global integration means standardization of HRM practices by imposing parent practices to subsidiaries and the local responsiveness connotes localization of subsidiary HRM practices by following local practices. However, emerging developments in IHRM research suggest a more nuanced understanding of the constructs by recognizing multiple modes of integration as well as a pattern of hybridization in practices. This research extends the insights from the emerging developments in the IHRM literature by examining the modes of global integration and local responsiveness in HRM of MNEs from a newly industrialized economy, South Korea and exploring how they are put into practice through subsidiary HRM practices. A multi-sited qualitative study was conducted across nine MNEs at the corporate level as well as across three India subsidiaries and three U. S. subsidiaries of an MNE. The analysis of data from sixty seven interviews reveals that the firms pursued various modes of global integration and local responsiveness simultaneously in HRM of MNEs, namely: global cultural integration; global workforce integration; global HR capability integration; localization of people; local customization of HRM practices to avoid legal risks in a host country or to position in local labor markets. The modes were also reflected in subsidiary HRM practices through hybridization between global standardization and localization at the component-level of practices based on the particular modes. The results of this study contribute to the literature on IHRM strategy and practices by providing (1) a more comprehensive understanding of the higher-level modes of global integration as well as local responsiveness in managing human resources in MNEs, (2) a sophisticated IHRM strategy framework, namely, IHRM strategy as a configuration of the multiple modes, and (3) a more detailed insight on the specific mechanisms of hybridization in terms of level and logic of standardization and localization of practices. The study also makes a broader contribution to the studies of MNEs by providing a function-specific GI-LR framework which integrates the metalevel and the operational level analysis based on the refined view on modes and mechanisms in managing the dual demands of global integration and local responsiveness in MNEs.


There are awkward, and in some instances troubling, parallelisms, resemblances and interconnections
between right-wing populism and the populism of agrarian movements, past and present. These are
not random accidents. The political economy upon which such populisms emerged partly shapes the
kind of broader politics that get constructed. The boundaries between right-wing populist currents and
their social base in the countryside on the one hand, and the populism of agrarian movements on the
other hand are constantly porous, blurring and malleable. This means partly that there is a slippery
slope down which the populism of progressive agrarian movements may slide to reinforce rather than
undermine right-wing populism. There are two urgent tasks and challenges: to avoid such a slippery
slope, and to transform such parallelism, resemblances and interconnections into an extraordinary
political opportunity and emancipatory force that can contribute to strategically eroding right-wing
populism and to building a positive future. Accomplishing such twin tasks requires (re)claiming
populism but without its authoritarian trappings, being class conscious, and eschewing romantic
restorative tendencies among agrarian movements some of which are utopian, conservative or
reactionary. Finally, in their political struggles within and/or against capitalism, agrarian movements
are more effective if they take a socialist perspective that is broadly cast in terms of what it might
mean and who could be its prime movers. Such a perspective can be grounded in simultaneous and
interlinked political struggles for redistribution, recognition, restitution, and regeneration in a
framework of a revolution against the entrenched centrist strategy of 'anti-subversive petty reform
incrementalism' that has been promoted alongside neoliberalism. These tasks could be made to lead
to, and could be pursued within, the construction of a class-conscious left-wing populism as countercurrent
to right-wing populism.


Abstract Background Implementation of population-based surveys is resource intensive and logistically demanding, especially in areas with rapidly changing demographics and incomplete or no enumeration of the underlying population and their residences. To remove the need for pre-enumeration and to simplify field logistics for the population healthcare utilization survey used for the Surveillance for Enteric Fever in Asia Project in Nepal, we incorporated a geographic information system–based geosurvey and field mapping system into a single-stage cluster sampling approach. Methods A survey was administered to ascertain healthcare-seeking behavior in individuals with recent suspected enteric fever. Catchment areas were based on residential addresses of enteric fever patients using study facilities; clusters were randomly selected from digitally created grids using available satellite images and all households within clusters were offered enrollment. A tablet-compatible geosurvey and mapping system that allowed for data-syncing and use in areas without cellular data was created using the ArcGIS suite of software. Results Between January 2017 and November 2018, we surveyed 25 521 households in Nepal (16 769 in urban Kathmandu and 8752 in periurban Kavrepalanchok), representing 84 202 individuals. Overall, the survey participation rate was 90.9%, with geographic heterogeneity in participation rates within each catchment area. Areas with higher average household wealth had lower participation rates. Conclusion A geographic information system–based geosurvey and field mapping system allowed creation of a virtual household map at the same time as survey administration, enabling a single-stage cluster sampling method to assess healthcare utilization in Nepal for the Surveillance for Enteric Fever in Asia Project . This system removed the need for pre-enumeration of households in sampling areas, simplified logistics and could be replicated in future community surveys.


This article offers an overview of the configuration of the I in Xela Arias's work and its complex relationship with the Other in her four poetry books, published between 1986 and 2003 . My aim is to analyse Arias's work from this perspective, to discuss several key factors that situate the author in her context, and to assess both the originality of her work and her contribution to modernizing Galician poetry. Some final notes on the re- ception of Arias's poetry at the time of publication and in subsequent years are also offered.


Central European landscape has undergone dramatic changes during the last decades. Big changes in the political and economic systems resulted in a large-scale transformation in land use, especially in the agricultural and silvicultural sectors. At the same time, significant changes in urban regions were recorded. In order to quantify and compare the most important processes in land cover changes, we analyzed so-called land cover flows within four post-communist countries in Central Europe – Czech Republic, Slovakia, Poland and Hungary – using CORINE Land Cover databases for 1990, 2000 and 2006. Contradictory processes in landscape change were recorded such as large scale agricultural extensification vs. intensification, or afforestation vs. deforestation. Moreover, there are significant regional differences in the changes in spatial patterns.


In a pair of cases decided by 5-4 majorities (Mertens, 1993; Great-West, 2002) interpreting the scope of remedy for wrongdoing under ERISA, the Supreme Court construed the statute's grant of "appropriate equitable relief" to prevent the victims of ERISA-prohibited conduct from being compensated for consequential injury. The Court read ERISA's authorization of "appropriate equitable relief" to have disinterred the law/equity division from the era before the two systems were fused in the 1930s, and the Court treated equity as not having awarded monetary relief. As a consequence, lower courts have held ERISA to preclude remedy in a host of situations in which wrongful plan administration (almost always in violation of ERISA's fiduciary rules) has caused expense, physical harm, or other suffering. This Article explains why and how the Court's interpretation of ERISA remedy law went wrong, beginning with the Court's earlier encounter with the field in Russell (1985). The main theme is that the reach of trust-law principles in ERISA is far deeper and more controlling than the opinions in Mertens and Great-West allow. When federalizing the administration of pension and employee benefit plans in ERISA, Congress made a deliberate choice to subject these plans to the pre-existing regime of trust law rather than to invent a new regulatory structure. In this dimension, ERISA is federal trust law. Congress intended ERISA remedy law to replicate the core principles of trust remedy law in the regulation of pension and benefit plans, including the long-familiar make-whole standard of trust remedy law.


Central banks sometimes evaluate their own policies. To assess the inherent conflict of interest, we compare the research findings of central bank researchers and academic economists regarding the macroeconomic effects of quantitative easing (QE). We find that central bank papers report larger effects of QE on output and inflation. Central bankers are also more likely to report significant effects of QE on output and to use more positive language in the abstract. Central bankers who report larger QE effects on output experience more favorable career outcomes. A survey of central banks reveals substantial involvement of bank management in research production.


Media usaged during election campaign is still an effective method for reaching the constituens. In 2010's, election at five regions in Bali, printed media was the most effective way of communication. The candidate with most frequently appeared in printed media, won the election. However during 2015's election, the role of printed media/ newspaper was declining while the used of socialmedia was increasing. This is partly due to: (1) the media/ newspapers are less independent and tend to promote a certain candidate; (2) the reader/constituent have better media literacy so they are not easily affected by the media's agenda and (3) the election had been held together in the nation make local newspapers have less interest in printing local politics. Accordingly, the candidates used more social media, since it reach the constituent directly, the cost if more effective and the social media already became more and more common among people. Keywords: Bali, local election, media power, political communication


The purpose of this study was to develop an instrument to measure the views of educational researchers across the dimensions that comprise research paradigms. The development of the instrument, entitled the Research Paradigm Inventory (RPI), was conducted in the hope of providing a mechanism for future research that will enable the examination of prospective links between the ontological, epistemological and methodological orientations of researchers and graduate students who will serve as future inquirers in the field of education. During its development and validation, various aspects of the RPI were examined in accordance with the validity framework outlined by Samuel Messick (1989). According to Messick (1989), the validity of measure interpretation and corresponding action can be examined in terms of content, substantive, structural, generalizability, external and consequential forms of evidence. During this study, the content aspect of validity was addressed through the creation of instrument specifications and the development of items that were mapped to those specifications. In addition, the content aspect of validity was addressed by selecting items that were reviewed by experts, pilot tested, field tested and exhibited high technical quality. The substantive aspect of validity was addressed through an analysis of item rating scale functioning, person fit, item difficulty hierarchies and relationships among instrument scale measures. The structural aspect of validity was addressed through a confirmation of the instrument"s dimensionality. The generalizability aspect of validity was addressed through an analysis of person reliability, the precision of item/person parameter estimates and item calibration invariance. The development activities and analyses described above resulted in the creation of six subscales measuring: (1) Realism in Research, (2) Research Objectivism, (3) Quantitative Methodology, (4) Relativism in Research, (5) Research Interpretivism and (6) Qualitative Methodology. Given the evidence collected, these scales appear to provide reasonably reliable and defensible estimates of individuals" attitudes toward various research practices and beliefs, and should be appropriate for future research studies exploring educational research paradigms.


The topology of the hyperlink graph among pages expressing different opinions may influence the exposure of readers to diverse content. Structural bias may trap a reader in a 'polarized' bubble with no access to other opinions. We model readers' behavior as random walks. A node is in a 'polarized' bubble if the expected length of a random walk from it to a page of different opinion is large. The structural bias of a graph is the sum of the radii of highly-polarized bubbles. We study the problem of decreasing the structural bias through edge insertions. 'Healing' all nodes with high polarized bubble radius is hard to approximate within a logarithmic factor, so we focus on finding the best k edges to insert to maximally reduce the structural bias. We present RePBubLik, an algorithm that leverages a variant of the random walk closeness centrality to select the edges to insert. RePBubLik obtains, under mild conditions, a constant-factor approximation. It reduces the structural bias faster than existing edge-recommendation methods, including some designed to reduce the polarization of a graph.


The dynamic mechanical properties of multiwalled carbon nanotube (MWCNTs) reinforced acrylonitrile butadiene styrene (ABS) high performance composites, which were prepared using a micro twin screw extruder with a back flow channel that enabled proper dispersion of MWCNTs into the polymer matrix are studied in detail. The dynamic characteristics of the MWCNTs/ABS composites, such as storage, loss modulus and damping factor were significantly affected by the incorporation of MWCNTs. The dynamic mechanical properties of polymers strongly depend on the adhesion of MWCNTs and polymer and entanglement density of the polymer chains in the presence of MWCNTs. Herein, the entanglement density and C-factor of MWCNTs/ABS composites are evaluated using the dynamic mechanical properties results obtained from a dynamic mechanical analyser and correlated with their mechanical properties. The entanglement density of the MWCNTs/ABS composites increased from 4.31 × 104 mol m−3 (pure ABS) to 7.6 × 104 mol m−3 (5 wt% MWCNTs/ABS composites). C-factor measures the effectiveness of the filler on the modulus of the composites, which decreased from 1.086 (1 wt% MWCNTs/ABS composites) to 0.78 (5 wt% MWCNTs/ABS composites), and beyond this loading, the value of C-factor began to increase; this showed that the utilization of 5 wt% MWCNTs in the ABS matrix is sufficient for their effective use. The "b" factor increased from 6.16 (1 wt% MWCNTs/ABS composites) to 7.625 (5 wt% MWCNT/ABS composites) and after that started to decrease. A larger value of "b" strengthens the MWCNTs/ABS matrix interaction. In addition, Cole–Cole analysis was carried out to understand the phase behaviour of the composites.


This paper investigates about water quality monitoring system through a wireless sensor network. Due to the rapid development and urbanization, the quality of water is getting degrade over year by year, and it leads to water-borne diseases, and it creates a bad impact. Water plays a vital role in our human society and India 65% of the drinking water comes from underground sources, so it is mandatory to check the quality of the water. In this model used to test the water samples and through the data it analyses the quality of the water. This paper delivers a power efficient, effective solution in the domain of water quality monitoring it also provides an alarm to a remote user, if there is any deviation of water quality parameters.


The efficacy, reliability and versatility of the light emitting diode (LED) can outcompete most established light source technologies. However, they are particularly sensitive to high temperatures, which compromises their efficacy and reliability, undermining some of the technology s key benefits. Consequently, effective thermal management is essential to exploit the technology to its full potential. Thermal management is a well-established subject but its application in the relatively new LED lighting industry, with its specific constraints, is currently poorly defined. The question this thesis aims to answer is how can LED thermal management be achieved most effectively? This thesis starts with a review of the current state of the art, relevant thermal management technologies and market trends. This establishes current and future thermal management constraints in a commercial context. Methods to test and evaluate the thermal management performance of a luminaire system follow. The defined test methods, simulation benchmarks and operational constraints provide the foundation to develop effective thermal management strategies. Finally this work explores how the findings can be implemented in the development and comparison of multiple thermal management designs. These are optimised to assess the potential performance enhancement available when applied to a typical commercial system. The outcomes of this research showed that thermal management of LEDs can be expected to remain a key requirement but there are hints it is becoming less critical. The impacts of some common operating environments were studied, but appeared to have no significant effect on the thermal behaviour of a typical system. There are some active thermal management devices that warrant further attention, but passive systems are inherently well suited to LED luminaires and are readily adopted so were selected as the focus of this research. Using the techniques discussed in this thesis the performance of a commercially available component was evaluated. By optimising its geometry, a 5 % decrease in absolute thermal resistance or a 20 % increase in average heat transfer coefficient and 10 % reduction in heatsink mass can potentially be achieved . While greater lifecycle energy consumption savings were offered by minimising heatsink thermal resistance the most effective design was considered to be one optimised for maximum average heat transfer coefficient. Some more radical concepts were also considered. While these demonstrate the feasibility of passively manipulating fluid flow they had a detrimental impact on performance. Further analysis would be needed to conclusively dismiss these concepts but this work indicates there is very little potential in pursuing them further.


It has been argued that three factors characterise the HIV epidemic in subSaharan Africa – its female face; the implications it poses for sexual and reproductive health services (particularly those provided to women); and the pervasive discrimination following those who are infected. These factors also form the context within which there have been an increasing number of reports of HIV-positive women being coerced or forced into being permanently sterilised in order to prevent future pregnancies. The recent decision in LM and Others v Government of the Republic of Namibia deals with the alleged discriminatory and coerced sterilisation of three women living with HIV. This article describes and critiques the LM judgment. It concludes with brief comments on the way forward for similar litigation in other Southern African countries.


This project will examine the impact and the progress of Methodist missionary work on Choiseul from 1905 to 1941. The predominant European contact on Choiseul was with missionaries and this was significantly more recent than many of the other islands in the group. Choiseul was unattractive for settlement or commercial development because the lack of arable land meant that it was unsuitable for large plantations to be established. A lacuna exists in the current historiography of the Solomons with regard to Choiseul. A study of the Methodist Mission on Choiseul offers the opportunity to examine the development of the mission, and the people on the island during the period under study, and fill that gap. The nature of conversion to Christianity on Choiseul, and the way the missionaries, including European, Solomon Islanders and Pacific Islanders, operated, cooperated, and disagreed with the Choiseulese and with each other will be examined to help answer the question, to what extent was Choiseul a Methodist, or a missionary, island.


Epidemiological studies have suggested a reduced risk of several cancers associated with an adequate vitamin D (VD) status. Previous meta-analyses evaluating serum vitamin D and cancer risk showed a consistent inverse relationship between serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D levels and colorectal cancer. Single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) of the vitamin D receptor (VDR) are important regulators of the vitamin D pathway and they may indirectly modulate cancer risk. Several studies have investigated VDR SNPs, but the results on their associations with cancer risk are controversial. We carried a meta-analysis to investigate the association of the major VDR SNPs with colorectal cancer risk (CRC). A systematic literature search was performed following a pre-defined protocol and using validated search strategies up to April 2014. This meta-analysis shows the summary odd ratio (SOR) overall and by ethnicity, obtained with random effect models and investigating heterogeneity. The meta-analysis included for BsmI 13 studies with 8,709 and 10,010 controls, for FokI 16 studies with 8,877 cases and 10,548 controls, and for ApaI, Cdx2 or TaqI 10 studies with 6,443 cases and 6,915 controls. We found a significant increased risk between the TaqI tt genotype and CRC: SOR= 1.43 (95%CI: 1.30-1.58), evaluating eight studies. Moreover we found similar results for non Caucasians (SOR= 1.47; 95%CI: 1.28-1.7). Furthermore BsmI showed a significant risk reduction (SOR=0.89; 95%CI: 0.80-0.98) for BB genotype versus bb and borderline significant for Bb vs bb (SOR=0.94; 95%CI: 0.87-1.01). FokI, ApaI and Cdx2 polymorphisms did not show any significant association for CRC. For FokI we estimated a SOR=1.05 (95%CI: 0.84-1.31) for ff vs FF genotype. Five studies evaluated ApaI and Cdx2 with SOR=1.21 (95%CI: 0.82-1.78) and SOR=1.24 (95%CI: 0.94-1.63), respectively for ApaI aa vs AA, and Cdx2 gg vs GG. We also found a significant 6-7% reduction of cancer risk at any site respectively for carriers of Bb genotype (SOR= 0.94; 95%CI: 0.90-0.99) and for carriers of BsmI BB genotype (SOR; 95%CI: 0.93; 0.89-0.98) compared to bb carriers. BsmI B allele has a very wide range from 0.5% to 46% (with a outlier deviating from Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium up to 74%). FokI f allele was from 25% to 48%, among control subjects and for three studies, a significant departure from Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium was observed. The TaqI t allele frequency is relatively broad ranging from 4% to 41%. Interestingly in Asian populations the t allele appear to be quite rare and several studies did not present homozygote tt carriers but only subjects with tT genotype. ApaI a allele frequency ranges from 23% to 50%. Cdx2 g in Caucasian and Asian populations ranges from 21% to 34%; interestingly in a study, evaluating the risk for other cancer site in African-American, the a allele ranges from 73% to 79%. No indication of publication bias was found. In conclusion, in our meta-analysis TaqI tt genotype showed an increased risk for colorectal cancer. BsmI might affect VD activities especially in Caucasians. FokI, ApaI and Cdx2 SNPs did not show a significant cancer risk association. A differential effect due to ethnicity is suggested. The VDR genotype might become more relevantly clustered in specific haplotype, for specific tumor biology, subjects characteristics or with other genes involved in the vitamin D metabolisms, especially for VD binding protein. Citation Format: Sara Gandini, Patrizia Gnagnarella, Sara Raimondi, Elena Tagliabue, Davide Disalvatore, Davide Serrano. Meta-analysis on vitamin D Receptor polymorphisms and colorectal cancer risk. [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the Thirteenth Annual AACR International Conference on Frontiers in Cancer Prevention Research; 2014 Sep 27-Oct 1; New Orleans, LA. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Can Prev Res 2015;8(10 Suppl): Abstract nr A39.


Data decoding, format, or language ambiguities have been long known for amusement purposes. Only recently it came to attention that they also pose a security risk. In this paper, we present decoder manipulations based on deliberately caused ambiguities facilitating the error correction mechanisms used in several popular applications. This can be used to encode data in multiple formats or even the same format with different content. Implementation details of the decoder or environmental differences decide which data the decoder locks onto. This leads to different users receiving different content based on a language decoding ambiguity. In general, ambiguity is not desired, however in special cases it can be particularly harmful. Format dissectors can make wrong decisions, e.g. A firewall scans based on one format but the user decodes different harmful content. We demonstrate this behavior with popular barcodes and argue that it can be used to deliver exploits based on the software installed, or use probabilistic effects to divert a small percentage of users to fraudulent sites.


BACKGROUND
There is no standard of care with respect to the use of neoadjuvant chemotherapy (NAC) in resectable malignant pleural mesothelioma (MPM). We performed an intention-to-treat analysis with data from a single institution and the National Cancer Database (NCDB) to identify whether the use of NAC impacts survival in resectable MPM.

METHODS
Patients with MPM who had surgery with curative intent at Duke University from 1995-2017 were selected, and the 2004-2015 NCDB was used to identify MPM patients with clinical stage I-IIIB who underwent definitive surgery. For both cohorts, patients were stratified by receipt of neoadjuvant chemotherapy. Primary outcomes were overall survival (OS) and post-resection survival (RS), which were estimated using Kaplan-Meier and multivariable Cox Proportional Hazards models.

RESULTS
257 patients met inclusion criteria in the Duke cohort. Compared to immediate resection (IR), NAC was associated with similar OS but an increased risk for post-resection mortality in both unmatched (adjusted HR = 1.85; 95%CI=1.21-2.83) and propensity-matched (HR 1.62; 95%CI 1.03-2.55) cohorts. A total of 1949 NCDB patients were included: 1597 (81.9%) IR and 352 (18.1%) NAC. Post-resection survival was worse for patients undergoing NAC in both unmatched (HR 1.85; 95%CI 1.21-2.83) and propensity-matched (HR 1.29; 95%CI 1.06-1.57) analyses compared to patients receiving IR.

CONCLUSION
In this intention-to-treat study, NAC was associated with worse post-resection survival compared to IR in patients with MPM. The risks and benefits of induction therapy should be weighed before offering it to patients with resectable MPM.


Objective. To compare obstetric and perinatal outcome in teenage and non-teenage pregnancies. Methods. A retrospective analysis of case records of teenage pregnancies from January 2006 to December 2008. The subjects gave birth in the Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, University of Malaya Medical Centre, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, a referral tertiary care and teaching hospital with over 5 000 deliveries annually. Pregnancy outcomes in girls aged ≤19 years were compared with those in women aged >19 years. A total of 177 teenage pregnancies were compared with 200 pregnancies in older women. Results. The prevalence of teenage pregnancies was 1.1%. Almost all the subjects were in their first pregnancies. The study showed that teenage mothers had a significant risk of delivering low-birth-weight babies. There were no differences in the risk of anaemia, severe pre-eclampsia, caesarean delivery, postpartum haemorrhage or fetal distress in labour compared with the 200 women in the older age group. Of the pregnant teenagers, 26.9% did not receive any antenatal care at all. Conclusion. The findings suggest that the long-held beliefs about the risks related to teenage pregnancy are not all justified. Early booking, adequate antenatal care and delivery by trained personnel should improve the obstetric and perinatal outcome in this age group.


We propose a knowledge representation based on prototype theory in order to improve human-robot interaction. Since robots are becoming increasingly important in our everyday life, one day they might be used to do the chores, e.g., in kitchens. In order to tidy objects, however, robots have to be able to find the places where items belong; thus they need to categorise them. We develop a paradigm that mimics human categorisation, in order to provide flexible, human-like solutions. In order to identify a suitable approach to the prototype theory, we augmented and implemented the approach by Hampton and the one described by Minda and Smith, and compared their performance. We found that prototype models represent similarities between objects well. Furthermore, we found that the approach described by Minda and Smith is preferable over Hampton's, although on the whole they do not differ to a great extent. We provide an idea how the approach by Minda and Smith - augmented by us - could be used in order to contribute to a human-like knowledge representation. One final question is to what
extent the proposed knowledge representation is able to reflect human categorisations and if the resulting behaviour of a robot is intuitively understandable for users.


Graphene is not the only prominent example of two-dimensional (2D) materials. Due to their interesting combination of high mechanical strength and optical transparency, direct bandgap and atomic scale thickness transition-metal dichalcogenides (TMDCs) are an example of other materials that are now vying for the attention of the materials research community. In this article, the current state of quantum-theoretical calculations of the electronic and mechanical properties of semiconducting TMDC materials are presented. In particular, the intriguing interplay between external parameters (electric field, strain) and band structure, as well as the basic properties of heterostructures formed by vertical stacking of different 2D TMDCs are reviewed. Electrical measurements of MoS_2, WS_2, and WSe_2 and their heterostructures, starting from simple field-effect transistors to more demanding logic circuits, high-frequency transistors, and memory devices, are also presented.


Teaching, as a social justice project, seeks to undo and re-imagine oppressive pedagogies in order to transform teachers, their students, and the knowledge with which they work. In this article, I argue that self-study can contribute to social justice in a number of ways by, for instance, making the sometimes limiting norms that frame teaching and learning visible; inviting my own vulnerability through peer and student reflections and feedback, and noticing the important relationship between ontology and epistemology in teaching and learning. One means to avoid the narrow way in which self-study might apply to only one person's practice is to use theory to legitimise it and make it more broadly applicable. In this study, I use Judith Butler's ideas relating to vulnerability in order to explain the way in which my teaching and learning is framed and to show how normative frameworks that define teaching can be expanded to be more inclusive. I use excerpts of peer and student feedback in order to demonstrate how vulnerability, reconfigured, can lead to powerful new knowledge.


Abstract Water markets were first introduced in Australia in the 1980s, and water entitlement and allocation trade have been increasingly adopted by both private individuals and government.Irrigators turned to water markets (particularly for allocation water) to manage water scarcity and Governments to acquire water for the environment (particularly water entitlements. It is expected that further adoption of water markets will be essential for coping with future climate change impacts. This report reviews the available literature related to the relationship between southern Murray-Darling Basin (sMDB) water markets and anticipated climate change effects; the economic, social and environmental impacts of water reallocation through markets; and future development requirements to enhance positive outcomes in these areas. The use of water markets by irrigators can involve both transformational (selling all water entitlements and relocating or switching to dryland) and incremental (e.g. buying water allocations/entitlements, using carry-over, changing water management techniques) adaptation to climate change. Barriers to both adaptations include: current and future climate uncertainty; poor (or non-existent) market signals; financial constraints; information barriers; mental processing limits; inherent attitudes toward or beliefs about climate change; institutional barriers and disincentives to adapt. A better understanding of trade behaviour, especially strategic trade issues that can lead to market failures, will improve the economic advantages of water trade. There remains community concerns about the impacts of transfers away from regional areas such as reduced community spending and reinvestment; population losses; loss of jobs; declining taxation base, loss of local services and businesses, regional production changes; and legacy issues for remaining farmers. However, it is hard to disentangle these impacts from those caused by ongoing structural change in agriculture. Rural communities that are most vulnerable to water scarcity under climate change and water trade adjustment include smaller irrigation-dependent towns. Communities less dependent on irrigation are better able to adapt. Further, where environmental managers use water markets to deal with water variability and to ensure ecological benefits, irrigators are concerned about its impact on their traditional use of markets to manage scarcity. Climate change and water scarcity management are intertwined, suggesting that policy, institutional and governance arrangements to deal with such issues should be similarly structured. Water users will adapt, either out of necessity or opportunity. The cost of that adaptation at individual, regional and national levels—particularly to future water supply variability—can be mitigated by the consideration of the existing advantages from future opportunities for water marketing in Australia.


Rigorous analysis of traveling-wave coplanar waveguide electrodes for LiNbOs optical modulator applications is presented by using an extended full-wave mode-matching method. The microwave propagation characteristics under the composite influence of substrate anisotropy, uniform or etched buffer layers, finite electrode thickness and conductivity, and metallization undercutting are accurately assessed by employing a network equivalent formulation. Variations of the coplanar waveguide microwave effective index and the characteristic impedance at low frequencies due to finite electrode conductivity are illustrated, and are important even though the mode is quasi-TEM in nature. The effect of etching the Si02 buffer layer is shown to be one possible method for lowering the microwave effective index while keeping the conductor loss at a fixed level.


The Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) has a diverse set of knowledge products: economic and sector work, knowledge products associated with loans, and a variety of non-reimbursable technical cooperation products (TCs) funded by either income from ordinary capital or donor trust funds. With growing emphasis on IDB's capacity to make effective non-financial contributions to its borrowers, there has been substantial focus on how to increase the development impact of TCs. This involves balancing client demand and the institution's own view of country and regional priorities. IDB has struggled to achieve this balance and to put in place supporting systems to manage and monitor TCs effectively. Since 2008 the definition and classification of TCs and guidance on how to manage them has changed almost yearly. The IDB-9 Agreement reflected both a general intention to make this area of IDB's work more effective, and a more specific mandate to look into the possibility of providing fee-based services in the future. This evaluation identified several areas in which there are continuing issues pertaining to TCs, some of which also relate to IDB's knowledge products more generally. First, the strategic alignment between TCs and lending products needs to be strengthened; it has improved somewhat in annual country programs, but needs to be strengthened in the periodic Country Strategies and overall. Second, the management of TCs is complicated by the various constraints imposed on the inter- and intrasectoral allocation of both ordinary capital and donor trust funds, and IDB Management's efforts to find ways to work around these constraints have met with limited success, as evidenced by the substantial under-utilization of available resources. Third, IDB does not have a system for monitoring and reporting on the results of TCs, and this needs to be rectified, given their importance to development effectiveness. Fourth, proposals for fee-based services have been slow to get off the ground, though some progress now appears likely. Finally, the accessibility of reports and studies is a long-standing problem, though Management has recently begun to address this more systematically with the development of a new system for data access.


OBJECTIVE
To investigate the relationship between interdigestive migrating motor complex (MMC) and plasma gastrointestinal hormones in patients with diarrhea or constipation-predominant irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) to elucidate the pathophysiology of IBS.

METHODS
A small intestine manometry was used to record the MMC cycles for at least 4-6 h in 19 IBS patients and 10 healthy volunteers. The plasma gastrointestinal hormone levels were examined according to altered MMC phases.

RESULTS
Compared with the healthy controls, IBS-D patients exhibited shortened duration of the small intestinal MMC cycle, prolonged phase III duration with greater amplitude, as well as faster propagation velocity, whereas the contrary alterations were found in IBS-C patients. The peak plasma motilin level occurred in phase III of the MMC cycle. The plasma somatostatin level was higher in IBS groups than in the healthy controls, but comparable between the diarrhea and constipation groups. Plasma 5-hydroxytryptamine showed periodical fluctuations with the phases of MMC cycles, reaching the peak level in phase II. IBS-D patients had higher 5-hydroxytryptamine levels than IBS-C patients and the healthy controls.

CONCLUSIONS
Plasma hormone levels are correlated with the MMC cycles, and the hormone level changes and small intestine motility disorder may play important roles in IBS pathophysiology.


The main purpose of this thesis is to theoretically study energy levels and intra-electronic transition intensities for various f-electron systems. The f-f electronic dipole transitions are parity-forbidden for a free ion but become non-zero when the ion is subject to a crystal-field. This is commonly described within the framework of Judd-Ofelt theory which accounts for the mixing of odd parity into the wave-functions. Some refinements and quantitative studies have been made by applying many-body perturbation theory, or the perturbed functions approach, to obtain effective dipole operators due to correlation, spin-orbit and higher order crystal-field effects not included in Judd-Ofelt theory. A software for the computation of f-electron multiplets and Stark levels was implemented and published as well. The single- and pair-functions used for the evaluation of intensity parameters were obtained by solving various inhomogeneous Schrodinger equations. The wave-functions and energies obtained by diagonalizing an effective Hamiltonian have been used together with the oscillator strength methods to simulate absorption spectrum. Consistent crystal-field parameters applied in some of the papers were obtained by fitting crystal polarizabilities to reflect the experimental Stark levels. The same crystal model was then used to generate odd crystal field parameters needed for the f-f transition intensities. The total effect of these refinements are spectral features that usually agree well with experimental findings. Some of these methods have also been applied and seen to be quite useful for the understanding of optical fiber amplifiers frequently used in today's optical networks. Finally, a finite-difference approach was applied for the Helium iso-electronic sequence. The exact wave-function was expanded in a sum of partial waves, and accurate ground- and excited state energies were obtained by using the iterative Arnoldi approach.


The purpose of this project is to find out where straw can be used as a fuel and, in those cases where straw is not a suitable energy source, to find out the reason. The reasons could be lack of straw, that the town already is tied to some other fuel, or even lack of interest or negative attitudes from the town politicians and official employees. Most towns and larger villages in the counties of Stockholm, Uppsala, Sodermanland and Vastmanland have been studied. The problems and possibilities concerning straw as a fuel has been mentioned and three different large scale straw combustion systems have been presented: Nordfab's straw feeding with pusher, the Volund "cigar"-method and The Johnson biocombustor, which in Sweden is marketed by Studsvik Energy. All of these three methods use baled straw; pellets and wafers are so much more expensive, they will have great difficulties competing with other fuels. The prerequisities for profitable straw combustion have been brought up, but no calculations occur in this document. The project was carried through as follows: Town officials and farmers were contacted and the municipal energy plans were read. The available amounts of straw were calculated from statistics over the use of arable area. 20 km was used as the maximum transport distance and an average straw harvest of 500 kg/ha was estimated. Only straw of wheat, rye, barley and oil plants has been considered usable for energy. In some towns/villages, where the prerequisities for using straw as a fuel seemed good, a meeting was arranged, at which straw burning was discussed with a group of farmers. The conclusion from this work is that straw could be used as a fuel much more in the area. The straw supply is in most cases good and the farmers are in common very interested in delivering straw for energy. The reason why so few straw fired district heating plants exist today probably mainly depend on the fact that well functioning reference plants are missing in the area and that the Swedish energy policies have mistreated bio energy and let the prices of oil, coal and electricity go down, in spite of the environmental consequences. We can here compare with Denmark, who let the prices of fossil fuels and electricity stay high, where today straw burning is usual. Another fact that today stops straw fired district heating plants from being built is that the large towns already are tied up by other cheap fuels as coal, waste heat, or combustion of refuse. The smaller places have no distribution nets for hot water and it is today not considered economical to build new ones, specially as the towns/ villages often are very sparsely built. Among both types of towns/villages there are some who think of natural gas as the only fuel for the future. Many towns have negative attitudes against combustion of straw, mainly due to technical problems with early prototype plants. Of the 53 studied towns and villages 10 could start burning straw immediately and further 21 had straw supplies enough to make combustion of straw an interesting energy alternative for the future.


In the early 18th Century, Daniel Defoe found it natural to write a novel whose heroine was a sexually adventurous, socially marginal property offender. Only half a century later, this would have been next to unthinkable. In this paper, the disappearance of Moll Flanders, and her supercession in the annals of literary female offenders by heroines like Tess of the d'Urbervilles, serves as a metaphor for fundamental changes in ideas of selfhood, gender and social order in 18th and 19th Century England. Drawing on law, literature, philosophy and social history, I argue that these broad changes underpinned a radical shift in mechanisms of responsibility-attribution, with decisive implications for the criminalisation of women. I focus in particular on the question of how the treatment and understanding of female criminality was changing during the era which saw the construction of the main building blocks of the criminal process, and of how these understandings related in turn to broader ideas about gender, social order and individual agency.


Currently, four-and-a-half million Americans are afflicted with Alzheimer's Disease, accounting for roughly half the cases of adult dementia, and fourteen million cases are projected by mid-century. With the coalescence of the baby boomers, managed health care, and increasingly scarce health care resources, our society must brace to face a social and legal policy challenge of enormous importance and complexity. In this circumstance, the inevitable call for access to physician-assisted suicide, likely triggered through some form of living will, will need to be considered within a context far different than the current focus of the assisted-suicide debate on terminal illness. Asserting the position that it is not possible to create a workable regulatory regime to legally control physician-assisted suicide (PAS) for the demented, the author posits that the false cultural myth characterizing the demented as "empty shells" diverts us from carefully examining the insurmountable difficulties with allowing PAS for dementia. The author proceeds to debunk this myth, first considering experiences of caregivers, and then demonstrating how these anecdotal stories are in line with both philosophical constructions of personhood, and current psychological theories of the self. Finally, the author explains why meaningful consent to PAS by dementia sufferers is not possible, and he cautions against attempting PAS through advance directives for dementia. Far from protecting the interests of the demented individual, such directives will give what the author terms "total interpretive discretion" over the life or death of the demented person to caregivers who will often have societal misconceptions about dementia or who will ascribe troublesome behavior to manifestations of the disease rather than to clumsy attempts to communicate needs. The author instead urges positive investment in education and research as a bulwark against increased demand and sanction of PAS for dementia as the elder population expands in coming decades.


Crowdfunding, a new Internet-based securities market, was recently authorized by federal and state law in order to create a vibrant, diverse, and inclusive system of entrepreneurial finance. But will people really send their money to strangers on the Internet in exchange for unregistered securities in speculative startups? Many are doubtful, but this Article looks to first principles and finds reason for optimism.Well-established theory teaches that all forms of startup finance must confront and overcome three fundamental challenges: uncertainty, information asymmetry, and agency costs. This Article systematically examines this "trio of problems" and potential solutions in the context of crowdfunding. It begins by considering whether known solutions used in traditional forms of entrepreneurial finance — venture capital, angel investing, and public companies — can be borrowed by crowdfunding. Unfortunately, these methods, especially the most powerful among them, will not translate well to crowdfunding.Finding traditional solutions inert, this Article presents five novel solutions that respond directly to crowdfunding's distinctive digital context: (1) wisdom of the crowd; (2) crowdsourced investment analysis; (3) online reputation; (4) securities-based compensation; and (5) digital monitoring. Collectively, these solutions provide a sound basis for crowdfunding to overcome the three fundamental challenges and fulfill its compelling vision.


The images of devastation and the stories of misery in Aceh during and after the December 2004 tsunami, which had dominated the national and international media for weeks, confronted us with our weaknesses in times of disaster. This lead us to the fact that although disasters are as old as the history of mankind, we are still struggling with the question : what is to be done with disasters? This paper is a small part of the struggle. As a literature survey, it aims to provide a systematic overview on various important issues and debates on efforts in understanding and managing disaster. This paper is organized in two parts. The first part deals with the various theoretical aspects of disaster study such as definitional debates of disaster, classification of calamities, and some themes (risk, vulnerability, ageing, gender) that are important in understanding disasters. The second part examines various aspects of efforts in managing disasters. It discusses themes such as the components of disaster management and the way it has been done at different levels and in different countries.


Protothreads are a extremely lightweight, stackless threads designed
for use in severely memory constrained systems such as embedded
systems. Software for memory constrained embedded systems sometimes
are based on an event-driven model rather than on multi-threading.
While event-driven systems allow for reduced memory usage, they
require programs to be developed as explicit state machines. Since
implementing programs as explicit state machines is hard, developing,
maintaining, and debugging programs for event-driven systems is
difficult.

Protothreads simplify implementation of high-level functionality on
top of event-driven systems, without significantly increasing the
memory requirements. Protothreads can be implemented in in the C
programming language using 10 lines of code and 2 bytes of RAM per
protothread.


Cassava mosaic disease (CMD) is caused by cassava mosaic virus (CMV) and is transmitted by the whitefly vector called Bemisia tabaci. In this paper, the deterministic model for transmission dynamics of CMD is formulated by considering the whitefly vector, cassava resistant and susceptible breeds, and infected cassava. The basic reproduction number $R_{0}$ and sensitivity index for each parameter with respect to basic reproduction number $R_{0}$ are computed to determine which parameters are sensitive to the dynamics of cassava mosaic disease. Analysis shows that the death rate of whitefly vectors, the infection rate for susceptible vectors, the number of vectors that can be supported and the rate of loss of infected cassava due to disease are the most sensitive parameters to the dynamics of cassava mosaic disease. Numerical simulation indicates that, cassava new infections increase as the number of vectors that can be supported increase and acquire cassava mosaic disease. It shows that if control measures are not considered, then the susceptible breed and cassava resistant breed will be wiped out after five and ten months respectively. To control the disease, farmers are encouraged to apply control strategies such as spraying of insecticide, using of vector-resistant varieties, phytosanitation which involve the removal of infected cassava plants from the farm, crop hygiene and the use of free stem cutting method.


The digital technology underlying the concept of Industry 4.0 has brought new disruptive changes to the economy. As an innovative service model, the unique characteristics of the space-sharing economy require the understanding of emotional and psychological aspects in managing such a disruptive service model. We empirically examine the impact of unstructured emotional information that service providers offer (i.e., marketer-generated content) on the popularity and sales of services in space-sharing platforms (e.g., Airbnb) above and beyond objective qualities such as guest ratings or the size and amenities of the properties. For this, we leverage a unique dataset of a large-scale sample of Airbnb listings from New York City (NYC). The results of a panel analysis and a series of robustness checks reveal a curvilinear association between the affective expression of service providers and the sales of their services, that is, the effect of emotional expressions is positive at low levels, but it diminishes at high levels. To address the potential endogeneity, we use a 2SLS-IV approach, and the results validate our findings. Moreover, we conduct a randomized experiment to further establish causal inference. This study makes valuable contributions to the literature on service operation management and the sharing economy. Our findings shed light on how operations managers and service providers can use emotional information in space-sharing platforms. We provide practical examples to guide their actions. These insights also have implications for other platform owners and users to leverage emotional information and improve outcomes.


To most Americans, the United States tax code has become a vast and confounding puzzle. In 1940, the instructions to the form 1040 were about four pages long. Today they have ballooned to more than a hundred pages, and the form itself contains more than ten schedules and twenty worksheets. The complete tax code totals about 2.8 million words-about four times the length of War and Peace. In this intriguing book, Michael Graetz maintains that our tax code has become a tangle of loopholes, paperwork, and inconsistencies-a massive social program that fails tests of simplicity and fairness. More important, our tax system has failed to keep pace with the changing economy, creating burdens and wastes of resources that weigh our nation down. Graetz offers a solution. Imagine a world in which most Americans pay no income tax at all, and those who do enjoy a far simpler tax process-all this without decreasing government revenues or removing key incentives for employer-sponsored health care plans and pensions. As Graetz adeptly and clearly describes, this world is within our grasp.


It is widely accepted that consciousness or, more generally, mental activity is in some way correlated to the behavior of the material brain. Since quantum theory is the most fundamental theory of matter that is currently available, it is a legitimate question to ask whether quantum theory can help us to understand consciousness. Several approaches answering this question armatively, proposed in recent decades, will be surveyed. It will be pointed out that they make dierent epistemological assumptions, refer to dierent neurophysiological levels of description, and use quantum theory in dierent ways. For each of the approaches discussed, problematic and promising features will be equally highlighted.


We propose a graphical technique to analyze the entirety of landforms in a catchment to define quantitatively the spatial variation in the dominance of different erosion processes. High-resolution digital elevation data of a 1.2 km2 hilly area where the channel network had been mapped in the field were used in the digital terrain model, TOPOG, to test threshold theories for erosion. The land surface was divided into ∼20 m2 elements whose shapes were then classified as convergent, planar, or divergent. The entire landscape plotted on a graph of area per unit contour length against surface gradient shows each planform plotting as a separate field. A simple steady-state hydrologic model was used to predict zones of saturation and areas of high pore pressure to mimic the extreme hydrologic events responsible for erosive instability of the land surface. The field observation that saturation overland flow is rare outside convergent zones provided a significant constraint on the hydrologic parameter in the model. This model was used in threshold theories to predict areas of slope instability and areas subject to erosion by saturation overland flow, both of which can contribute to channel initiation. The proportion of convergent elements predicted to exceed the threshold varies greatly with relatively small changes in surface resistance, demonstrating a high sensitivity to land use such as cattle grazing. Overall, the landscape can be divided, using erosion threshold lines, into areas prone to channel instability due to runoff and stable areas where diffusive transport predominates.


This paper addresses the blurring of a distinction between subordinate clause and nominal phrase in colloquial Indonesian conversation. Specifically, it presents a discourse-based analysis of the forms and functions of constructions introduced by the morpheme yang . Previous literature has generally described these constructions as relative clauses; however, this paper shows that they form a continuum around three general foci. They range from traditional relative clauses serving as modifiers of head nouns, to headless referring expressions serving as presupposed information in clefts, to referring expressions functioning as direct nominal arguments of predicates. The findings call into question the label "relative clause" for these Indonesian constructions, and support a view of grammatical categories as emerging from their use in discourse.


This paper introduces some relatively straightforward computational tools for estimating poverty measures from the sort of data that are typically available from published sources. All that is required for using these tools is an elementary regression package. The methodology also easily lends itself to a number of poverty simulations, some of which are discussed. The paper addresses the central question: How do we construct poverty measures from grouped data on consumption and income? Two broad approaches can be identified: simple interpolation methods and methods based on parameterized Lorenz curves. The paper briefly describes the two approaches and discusses why the second may be considered preferable.


The soluble form of the transmembrane glycoprotein CD23 corresponding to the low‐affinity receptor for the immunoglobulin E (sCD23) is found in the serum of patients with chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL). In this disease, an increase in sCD23 level is predictive of poor prognosis at diagnosis as well as during clinical outcome. Quantification of sCD23 is classically performed by enzyme‐linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA), a method not routinely used in hematology laboratories. Our aim was to apply cytometric bead array (CBA) technology to measure sCD23 levels. We tested 420 serum samples, 360 from patients and 60 from healthy volunteers. We selected three pairs of monoclonal antibodies recognizing the CD23 molecule that were tested in various conditions of temperature, centrifugation, washing, or chemical supplementation. Satisfactory performances in terms of repeatability (CV: 5%) and reproducibility (CV: 6%) were obtained with the selected pair of antibodies, with a threshold of positivity at 6 ng/mL. CBA and ELISA techniques were correlated with a Spearman coefficient at 0.99. The reproducibility and reliability of the sCD23 CBA assay were confirmed, with a Spearman coefficient at 0.99 in a series of 23 CLL patients and 13 controls tested in two laboratories equipped with different cytometers and using different lots of CBA reagents. Data obtained with serum and plasma samples were correlated with a Spearman coefficient at 0.99. Our study validates a simple method that allows the clinicians to benefit from an indicator of prognosis at the diagnosis as well as a marker of the evolution of CLL disease. © 2013 International Clinical Cytometry Society


Essentially all guidelines and regulations require that biomedical research studies have an acceptable risk-benefit profile. However, these documents offer little concrete guidance for implementing this requirement and determining when it is satisfied. As a result, those charged with risk-benefit evaluations currently assess the risk-benefit profile of biomedical research studies in unsystematic ways, raising concern that some research participants are not being protected from excessive risks and that some valuable studies involving acceptable risk are being rejected. The present paper aims to address this situation by delineating the first comprehensive framework, which is based on existing guidelines and regulations as well as the relevant literature, for risk-benefit evaluations in biomedical research.


Introduction Nasopharyngeal carcinomas (NPC) have a low incidence in western countries, but are endemic in South China where the incidence is 19.7 per 100 000, M: F ratio of 2:1 (1). It has a bimodal peak at presentation of 16–20 and 46–50 years (2). Due to the nasopharynx being a silent symptom area, they have an indolent course and the diagnosis is usually made at an advanced stage. Aetiological factors have been linked to genetic, environmental, dietary factors (nitrosoamines) and the Epstein Barr virus (3). We present a case of an unusual presentation of nasopharyngeal carcinoma with bilateral orbital invasion.


Defined as "the division of public authority between two or more constitutionally defined orders of government – and a set of ideas which underpin such institutions", federalism emphasizes issues such as shared and divided sovereignty, multiple loyalties and identities, and governance through multi‐level institutions. Proponents of federalism have linked federalism with improved economic and social benefits, including increased political participation and personal liberties, efficient public and private markets, and a check on governmental power. Nevertheless, few studies have attempted to empirically prove these claims. In "Federalism's Values and Value of Federalism", Robert Inman created a multiple regression model to assess the contribution of federal governance to a country's economic and social performance. Although Inman's model provides an important empirical framework, his broad analysis did not incorporate the unique context and history of different countries, or explain the variation in the results. Hence, through a case‐study of six Latin American countries and analysis of key social, economic, and rights indicators, this paper seeks to answer the following research question: How does federalism affect the economic and social performance of Latin American countries? The conclusions are as follows: (1) Diffusion of political power improves rights performance and democratic accountability, of which federalism provides an important institutional framework, (2) The contribution of federalism to aggregate economic performance remains ambiguous, (3) Decentralization improves access to public goods, in both federal and unitary governments, (4) Federalism, however, potentially creates political fragmentation that may block important reforms or give rise to a power vacuum for populist leaders. As a result, rights performance, democratic accountability, and economic and social progress may stall or deteriorate.


This Talk presents and discusses advanced neural networks by focusing on complex-valued neural networks (CVNNs) and their applications in the remote sensing and imaging fields. CVNNs are suitable for adaptive processing of complex-amplitude information. Since active remote sensing deals with coherent electromagnetic wave, we can expect CVNNs to work more effectively than conventional neural networks or other adaptive methods in real-number space. Quaternion (or Hypercomplex-valued) neural networks are also discussed in relation to polarization information processing. The beginning half of the Talk is devoted to presentation of the basic idea, overall framework, and fundamental treatment in the CVNNs. We discuss the processing dynamics of Hebbian rule, back-propagation learning, and self-organizing map in the complex domain. The latter half shows some examples of CVNN processing in the geoscience and remote sensing society (GRSS) fields. Namely, we present distortion reduction in phase unwrapping to generate digital elevation model (DEM) from the data obtained by interferometric synthetic aperture radar (InSAR). In polarization SAR (PolSAR), we apply quaternion networks for adaptive classification. Another example is ground penetrating radar (GPR) to visualize underground objects to distinguish specific targets in high-clutter situation. Finally we discuss the prospect of the CVNNs in the GRSS fields.