INTRODUCTION I. IMPORTANT LEGAL DOCTRINES IN KIRIN-AMGEN AND PHILLIPS A. History of Claim Interpretation in the United States B. The Development of Problems with the Doctrine of Equivalents II. THE CASES A. Phillips v. AWH, Corp. B. Kirin-Amgen, Inc. v. Hoechst, Inc. III. SIMILARITIES BETWEEN PHILLIPS AND KIRIN-AMGEN AND BENEFITS OF ELIMINATING THE DOCTRINE OF EQUIVALENTS A. Similarities between the Cases B. Benefits of Eliminating the Doctrine of Equivalents C. Other Options Available to Patentees for Broadening Claims D. Many Still Favor the Doctrine of Equivalents CONCLUSION INTRODUCTION As noted by several U.S. courts, the doctrine of equivalents has been "unworkable" for a number of years. (1) However, as American courts move toward a more holistic approach to claim interpretation, the doctrine of equivalents will become unnecessary as a means of expanding patent scope. (2) The holistic approach to claim interpretation involves a contextual reading of the patent claims that takes into account the definitions used throughout the patent document, including the specification and prosecution history. (3) It places less emphasis on extrinsic sources, like dictionary definitions and treatises, and more emphasis on the patentee's intent when he drafted his claims. In this way, the holistic approach protects the intent of the patentee, while avoiding over-broad claim interpretation. (4) U.S. courts have adopted the standard used by the House of Lords in the landmark claim interpretation case, Kirin-Amgen v. Hoechst, whereby the House of Lords defines claim language as would a person reasonably "'skilled in the art.'" (5) This standard for claim interpretation is consistent with the holistic approach recently favored by the Federal Circuit in Phillips v. AWH, Corp., and will push U.S. patent law further toward abolishing the doctrine of equivalents as a means of expanding claim scope. (6) Claims delimit a patentee's intellectual property rights and notify the public of what information a patentee owns, so the claims and the way in which they are interpreted are very important in patent litigation. Some U.S. courts focus heavily on abstract dictionary definitions and other extrinsic sources in order to objectively interpret claim meaning. (7) Such abstract methods of claim interpretation lead to over-broad patent rights in some cases, and they also fail to account for the patentee's intentions when he wrote the claims. (8) The courts' reliance on abstract extrinsic definitions in claim interpretation has meant that patentees did not always receive the protection they expected when they drafted their patent claims; this interpretive method has also made it difficult for third parties to determine what information falls within the claims' scope. (9) In short, abstract claim interpretation provides very little predictability for concerned parties who are seeking to predict their rights or to avoid infringement. Although abstract claim interpretation leads to unpredictable results, the results seem to be more objective, at least at first glance. (10) Dictionary definitions, treatises, and similar resources provide uniform definitions that are easy for most people to understand. However, patentees often draft claims using terminology that has special meaning to them and to other members of their professions. Dictionary definitions do not always adequately express what a patentee intended to convey, and this Comment will explore a new standard adopted by the Federal Circuit in Phillips v. AWH, Corp. that addresses this very issue. This Comment will also discuss the similarities between the standard adopted in Phillips with the standard adopted by the House of Lords in the United Kingdom case, Kirin-Amgen v. Hoechst, and its implications for U.S. doctrine of equivalents law. While extrinsic sources remain an important part of claim interpretation in the United States, the context of the claims (including intrinsic evidence of meaning, contained in the specification and prosecution history, and the inventor's intent) should carry more weight in deciding the claims' meanings. …


Malnutrition is a significant issue around the world, especially in developing countries. But it's not just a problem for poor nations; a large number of older Australians also suffer from this insidious condition, which has some very serious repercussions. Disciplines Medicine and Health Sciences | Social and Behavioral Sciences Publication Details Charlton, K. & Walton, K. (2015). Starvation in the land of plenty: why Australians are malnourished. The Conversation, 4 February 1-4. This journal article is available at Research Online: http://ro.uow.edu.au/smhpapers/2870 There's still time to make a tax deductible donation before June 30. Make a donation February 4, 2015 3.03pm AEDT Karen Charlton Associate Professor, School of Medicine at University of Wollongong Karen Walton Associate Professor, School of Medicine at University of Wollongong Malnutrition is a significant issue around the world, especially in developing countries. But it's not just a problem for poor nations; a large number of older Australians also suffer from this insidious condition, which has some very serious repercussions. Encompassing both under-nutrition and over-nutrition, malnutrition is when the body doesn't receive enough nutrients for proper function. Under-nutrition occurs when insufficient food is consumed, resulting in weight loss or muscle Among older adults living in the community, almost 10% are malnourished, while another 40% are considered to be at high risk of malnutrition. Kevin Dooley/Flickr, CC BY-SA Starvation in the land of plenty: why Australians are malnourished https://theconversation.com/starvation-in-the-land-of-plenty-why-austr... 1 of 4 26/06/2015 2:52 PM wasting – or both. Or it can occur when the diet is of poor quality and results in micronutrient deficiencies such as anaemia (iron, vitamin B12 or folate) or scurvy (vitamin C). Over-nutrition refers to excess energy intake, or too much food, and leads to obesity and other chronic diseases. Nutritional deficiencies in older people can result in impaired immune function, poor wound healing and loss of muscle mass, strength and function. The type of malnutrition that affects older Australians is generally under-nutrition, with too little energy or protein consumed. A serious problem A third of hospitalised Australians aged 65 years and older are overtly malnourished. A further 50% of this group are at high risk of malnutrition. Of greater concern still is the fact that most of these frail older adults are discharged home, where they face the possibility of a downward spiral of ill health. Even among older adults living in the community, almost 10% are malnourished, while another 40% are considered to be at high risk of malnutrition. The many reasons older adults don't meet their dietary requirements include dementia, depression, delirium, decreased vision, dental health issues, polypharmacy (taking three or more over-the-counter or prescribed medications) and acute or chronic diseases. Certain medical conditions can impair the ability to properly digest or absorb nutrients from consumed food. Commonly prescribed medications may cause a loss of appetite, drugs such as antibiotics and aspirin may induce nausea and anti-cancer drugs may impair swallowing because of reduced saliva production and dry mouth. Social factors such as isolation, loneliness, poverty and lack of access to an adequate food supply (food insecurity) also contribute. Among bereaved widowers in particular, inadequate knowledge about food preparation compounds the problem as they are ill-equipped to plan and prepare balanced meals. On top of all this are age-related physical changes that impact nutrient digestion and absorption. The stomachs of up to a third of older adults have reduced capacity to secrete hydrochloric acid. This lowers their vitamin B12 and folate absorption, which, in turn, may lessen calcium and iron uptake and place them at risk of anaemia. About half of total muscle mass is lost between 30 and 80 years of age. This natural consequence of ageing reduces strength, slows the metabolism and affects other key bodily functions, such as the performance of the heart. Age-related physical changes impact nutrient digestion and absorption. Richard Riley/Flickr, CC BY Starvation in the land of plenty: why Australians are malnourished https://theconversation.com/starvation-in-the-land-of-plenty-why-austr... 2 of 4 26/06/2015 2:52 PM All these changes compromise longevity. What's more, coupled with older people's lower energy expenditure and requirement, there is an increased need for nutrients such as calcium, vitamin D and some B vitamins. Put simply, older people need to run on less fuel but that fuel needs to be super-charged to provide sufficient nutrients for good health. Cost to the health service Malnutrition increases the risk of falls, osteoporosis, fractures, chronic disease, prolonged hospitalisation and increased complications, all of which heighten the risk of premature mortality and reduced quality of life. Even accounting for underlying illness and age, it predicts a greater than threefold risk of death within 12 to 18 months in older Australians. The high proportion of elderly people occupying hospital beds means that malnutrition in this age group places a large burden on the health-care system. And it's something of a vicious circle. Being malnourished increases the risk of repeated hospitalisations in this age group, and nutritional status declines during each hospital stay because of poor appetite, dislike of hospital meals, lack of assistance at mealtimes, meal interruptions because of diagnostic tests and procedures, and general malaise. The cost of treating a nutritionally-at-risk patient is 20% higher than the average for age-matched patients who have a similar underlying illness. In the United Kingdom, malnutrition-related costs are estimated to exceed €9.2 billion per year, which is more than the cost of treating conditions associated with obesity. Similar data from Australia is not available. Mind the gap, but how? Poor referral systems between hospital and community services means that many frail older people may fall between the cracks, and have to fare for themselves in the critical two-week period of recovery following discharge. And community-based services generally require an in-home assessment that may take several weeks to complete. Older people themselves often do not recognise that they need additional dietary support. The problem is often not a lack of foods in the home, but rather an inability or desire to prepare meals. Many older people may feel too ill or frail to shop or prepare their own meals, may have poor appetite, or simply forget to eat if there is some cognitive decline. Malnutrition is a wicked problem that will require a complex of solutions provided by a range of intersectoral players, including health, community and social services. General practitioners can play an important role by focusing on early identification and Malnutrition among older people often lands them in hospitals where nutritional status may further decline. stavros karabinas/Flickr, CC BY Starvation in the land of plenty: why Australians are malnourished https://theconversation.com/starvation-in-the-land-of-plenty-why-austr... 3 of 4 26/06/2015 2:52 PM management of malnutrition. A model of care piloted at three general practices in the Illawarra region of New South Wales, for instance, demonstrated the feasibility of including a malnutrition screening tool in the routine management of older patients. Getting general practitioners and practice nurses involved – so they can screen older people for malnutrition, recognise the problem early and refer them to relevant community services – is a crucial, but currently missing, key piece in the puzzle. Starvation in the land of plenty: why Australians are malnourished https://theconversation.com/starvation-in-the-land-of-plenty-why-austr... 4 of 4 26/06/2015 2:52 PM


ChatGPT is attracting a cross-field interest as it provides a language interface with remarkable conversational competency and reasoning capabilities across many domains. However, since ChatGPT is trained with languages, it is currently not capable of processing or generating images from the visual world. At the same time, Visual Foundation Models, such as Visual Transformers or Stable Diffusion, although showing great visual understanding and generation capabilities, they are only experts on specific tasks with one-round fixed inputs and outputs. To this end, We build a system called \textbf{Visual ChatGPT}, incorporating different Visual Foundation Models, to enable the user to interact with ChatGPT by 1) sending and receiving not only languages but also images 2) providing complex visual questions or visual editing instructions that require the collaboration of multiple AI models with multi-steps. 3) providing feedback and asking for corrected results. We design a series of prompts to inject the visual model information into ChatGPT, considering models of multiple inputs/outputs and models that require visual feedback. Experiments show that Visual ChatGPT opens the door to investigating the visual roles of ChatGPT with the help of Visual Foundation Models. Our system is publicly available at \url{https://github.com/microsoft/visual-chatgpt}.


The aim was to determine the effect of tannin on the nutritive value and microbial enzyme activity in vitro. The leaves and pods of the Acacia sieberiana and Acacia nilotica trees were subjected to chemical analysis and in vitro fermentation with and without polyethylene glycol (PEG; 35 mg/g). Gas production (GP), true degradability (TD) and the proteolytic and fibrolytic enzyme activities in digesta were determined. Data analyses accounted for the effects of feed type, feed fraction, PEG and their interactions. Leaves and pods had similar NDF and ADF contents in A. sieberiana but differed in both attributes in A. nilotica. The leaves had a higher protein, but lower condensed tannin (CT) contents than the pods. A. sieberiana had more CT than A. nilotica, but both had a similar maximum GP. PEG increased the maximum GP, stimulated GP from the soluble fraction and shortened the lag phase. PEG increased the TD for leaves and pods of A. sieberiana, but suppressed TD in fractions of A. nilotica. PEG also increased the activity of protease enzymes, xylanase, endo- and exocellulases, indicating that tannins depress the digestibility of feeds partly by suppressing the activity of these enzymes. Consequently, condensed tannin depressed the digestibility of feed in the rumen by affecting the activity of enzymes involved in carbohydrate and protein breakdown, the effects of which could be reduced with the use of PEG.


The authors describe an efficient algorithm design for lossless video compression by using MPEG-2 as a basic research platform. Starting from MPEG motion estimation and compensation, the proposed algorithm focuses on a context tree design to fine tune the statistics and thus optimise the estimation of conditional probabilities to drive an arithmetic coder. In comparison with the existing work on context tree design, the proposed algorithm features: (i) prefix sequence matching to locate the statistics model at the internal node nearest to the stopping point, where successful match of context sequence is broken; (ii) traversing the context tree along a fixed order of context structure with a maximum number of four motion compensated errors; and (iii) context thresholding to quantise the higher end of error values into a single statistics cluster. As a result, the proposed algorithm is able to achieve competitive processing speed, low computational complexity and high compression performances, which bridges the gap between universal statistics modelling and practical compression techniques. When JPEG-LS and CALIC, the existing state-of-the-art in lossless compression of still images, are applied to those motion compensated error-frames as well as individual non-predicted frames to formulate benchmarks, the authors' experiments illustrate that the proposed algorithm outperforms JPEG-LS by up to 24% and CALIC by up to 22%, yet the processing time ranges from less than 2 s per frame to 6 s per frame on a typical PC computing platform.


Scanning electron microscope–cathodoluminescence (SEM-CL) analysis of quartz reveals
textures that cannot be observed using optical microscopy or backscattered electrons.
These cryptic textures yield insight into timing and physical conditions of quartz growth,
especially in environments with multiple quartz-precipitation events. Hydrothermal quartz
from quartz-sulfide veins in the porphyry copper deposit in Butte, Montana, was analyzed
by SEM-CL, revealing the following textures: euhedral growth zones, wide nonluminescing
bands that cut across multiple quartz grains, rounded luminescent quartz grain cores
with euhedral overgrowths, nonluminescing ''splatters'' of quartz connected by networks
of cobweb-like nonluminescing quartz in otherwise luminescent quartz, concentric growth
zones, and wide nonluminescent grain boundaries. These textures indicate that many veins
have undergone fracturing, dilation, growth of quartz into fluid-filled space, quartz dissolution,
and recrystallization of quartz. Precipitation and dissolution textures indicate
that early quartz-molybdenite veins formed as a result of pressure fluctuations between
lithostatic and hydrostatic at high temperatures, and later pyrite-quartz veins formed near
hydrostatic pressure in response to temperature decrease through and beyond the field of
retrograde quartz solubility.


This paper argues that the traditional emphasis of scholarly communications, citation analysis, and faculty evaluation, limited to books, book chapters, and journal articles is out-moded and fails to capture a significant share of scholarly activity that is now being posted online. Planning academics, as social scientists, should value the extended range of dissemination provided by the web, and should also leverage its inherent functionality to evaluate scholarship. Scholarly output is further characterized relative to productivity, visibility, reputation, and impact for the purposes of a new evaluation paradigm. An example shows that both individual and faculty metrics can be used as a meaningful element of scholarly assessment. The implications of this approach touch on issues of scholarly communications and the promotion and tenure process.


A fascinating glimpse into the creative process of a major contemporary sculptor, featuring many previously unseen works on paper American sculptor Martin Puryear (b. 1941) creates work that combines the clean elegance of minimalism and the simplicity of traditional materials. His stunning sculptures explore themes of identity, ethnicity, and history, and are rich with social and cultural commentary. Puryear, who is known for abstract, large-scale pieces in wood, stone, and bronze, has captured the attention of the art world for the past 30 years. Despite the apparent simplicity of his works, however, he engages in an extensive iterative process that has, until now, been unknown. Martin Puryear: Multiple Dimensions explores that process, featuring numerous drawings, prints, and small-scale sculptures that have never before been published. This catalogue is the first to examine Puryear's work across media, providing invaluable insight into his visual thinking, from sketches to working drawings and constructions for sculpture. Handsomely illustrated with nearly 120 color plates that demonstrate the evolution of Puryear's ideas between drawings, prints, and sculptures, this beautiful volume draws back the curtain on the methodology of this important and enigmatic artist.


Sexual violence is a significant and longstanding problem on college campuses that has been made even more visible by recent media attention to the #MeToo movement. Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 addresses discrimination (including sexual violence) that impedes access to education; the law demands compliance from federally funded schools related to their prevention of and response to this problem. The U.S. Supreme Court has interpreted the law to contain an implied private right of action that can be brought against a school for its deliberate indifference to severe and pervasive sex discrimination about which it has knowledge. However, over the past several years, a handful of courts in the United States have rendered opinions that have defined, and effectively narrowed, the class of individuals who are entitled to protection under Title IX. These cases create two separate classes of individuals with different rights: students and non-students, or put another way, insiders and outsiders. This Article seeks to add to the ongoing and complex Title IX conversation by exposing a novel, yet very real conundrum: To whom does Title IX apply? Should universities extend greater safety protections to those who are officially a part of an institution like students, faculty or staff, as opposed to those who are not? Are non-students and other individuals who temporarily interact within the university context simply left out of the spectrum of Title IX protections? What sort of campus safety dynamic exists if certain classes of victims are denied access to Title IX? After extensive analysis, this Article ultimately concludes that facilitating safer campus communities likely demands an extension of Title IX rights to those individuals who participate in campus life, regardless of their official connection to the university.


Abstract. Snow avalanches generate seismic signals as many other mass movements.
Detection of avalanches by seismic monitoring is highly relevant to assess
avalanche danger. In contrast to other seismic events, signals generated by
avalanches do not have a characteristic first arrival nor is it possible to
detect different wave phases. In addition, the moving source character of
avalanches increases the intricacy of the signals. Although it is possible to
visually detect seismic signals produced by avalanches, reliable automatic
detection methods for all types of avalanches do not exist yet. We therefore
evaluate whether hidden Markov models (HMMs) are suitable for the automatic
detection of avalanches in continuous seismic data. We analyzed data recorded
during the winter season 2010 by a seismic array deployed in an avalanche
starting zone above Davos, Switzerland. We re-evaluated a reference catalogue
containing 385 events by grouping the events in seven probability classes.
Since most of the data consist of noise, we first applied a simple amplitude
threshold to reduce the amount of data. As first classification results were
unsatisfying, we analyzed the temporal behavior of the seismic signals for
the whole data set and found that there is a high variability in the seismic
signals. We therefore applied further post-processing steps to reduce the
number of false alarms by defining a minimal duration for the detected event,
implementing a voting-based approach and analyzing the coherence of the
detected events. We obtained the best classification results for events
detected by at least five sensors and with a minimal duration of
 12 s . These processing steps allowed identifying two periods of
high avalanche activity, suggesting that HMMs are suitable for the automatic
detection of avalanches in seismic data. However, our results also showed that
more sensitive sensors and more appropriate sensor locations are needed to
improve the signal-to-noise ratio of the signals and therefore the
classification.


Background—Increased rates of glucose uptake and glycolysis have been repeatedly observed in cardiac hypertrophy and failure. Although these changes have been considered part of the fetal gene reactivation program, the functional significance of increased glucose utilization in hypertrophied and failing myocardium is poorly understood. Methods and Results—We generated transgenic (TG) mice with cardiac-specific overexpression of insulin-independent glucose transporter GLUT1 to recapitulate the increases in basal glucose uptake rate observed in hypertrophied hearts. Isolated perfused TG hearts showed a greater rate of basal glucose uptake and glycolysis than hearts isolated from wild-type littermates, which persisted after pressure overload by ascending aortic constriction (AAC). The in vivo cardiac function in TG mice, assessed by echocardiography, was unaltered. When subjected to AAC, wild-type mice exhibited a progressive decline in left ventricular (LV) fractional shortening accompanied by ventricular dilation and decreased phosphocreatine to ATP ratio and reached a mortality rate of 40% at 8 weeks. In contrast, TG-AAC mice maintained LV function and phosphocreatine to ATP ratio and had <10% mortality. Conclusions—We found that increasing insulin-independent glucose uptake and glycolysis in adult hearts does not compromise cardiac function. Furthermore, we demonstrate that increasing glucose utilization in hypertrophied hearts protects against contractile dysfunction and LV dilation after chronic pressure overload.


Spin-Echo Modulated Small Angle Neutron Scattering with spatial resolution, i.e. quantitative Spin-Echo Dark Field Imaging, is an emerging technique coupling neutron imaging with spatially resolved quantitative small angle scattering information. However, the currently achieved relatively large modulation periods of the order of millimeters are superimposed to the images of the samples. So far this required an independent reduction and analyses of the image and scattering information encoded in the measured data and is involving extensive curve fitting routines. Apart from requiring a priori decisions potentially limiting the information content that is extractable also a straightforward judgment of the data quality and information content is hindered. In contrast we propose a significantly simplified routine directly applied to the measured data, which does not only allow an immediate first assessment of data quality and delaying decisions on potentially information content limiting further reduction steps to a later and better informed state, but also, as results suggest, generally better analyses. In addition the method enables to drop the spatial resolution detector requirement for non-spatially resolved Spin-Echo Modulated Small Angle Neutron Scattering.


Because of increasing costs, owners are demanding longer coating service life. Ten to 15 years is no longer satisfactory. Simply adding dry film thickness will not work since many coatings crack at excessive thicknesses. Recent coating technology advances permit the use of solvent-free epoxy and polyurethane systems having >15-year lives. Newer combinations of epoxy and polysiloxane resins will make a 25-year life achievable.


Laguna Potrok Aike (51° 58'S, 70° 23'W), is a ~770 ka maar lake in southern Patagonia (Province of Santa Cruz, Argentina). In the austral spring 2008, the PASADO international team of scientists cored Laguna Potrok Aike using the GLAD800 equipment in order to obtain a high-resolution geological archive for paleoenvironmental reconstructions. Two long sedimentary sequences of approximately 100 meters each were recovered close to the center of the lake at 100 m water depth. In the field, the magnetic susceptibility was measured using a Multi Sensor Core Logger at 2 cm intervals. At the Paleo and Environmental Magnetism Laboratory of ISMER in Rimouski (Quebec, Canada), core catcher samples (core 5022 2A) were analyzed using an alternating gradient force magnetometer to determine the magnetic mineralogy and grain size. In the framework of the PASADO project, the aim of this paleomagnetic study is to 1) reconstruct the first full paleomagnetic vector (inclination, declination and relative paleointensity) recorded from southern South America and presumably back to Oxygen Isotope Stage 5, 2) use magnetostratigraphy as a chronostratigraphic tool in Laguna Potrok Aike in addition to radiocarbon and optical (OSL) dating as well as tephrochronology and 3) develop high-resolution magnetic proxies of paleoenvironmental changes in southern Patagonia. Here we present the paleomagnetic study outline, the magnetic susceptibility profiles obtained in the field and preliminary laboratory results as a first step to characterize the magnetic mineralogy and grain size.


This article offers a diachronic analysis of the concept of "cyclic" time in Russian, more specifically of temporal adverbials such as utrom 'in the morning' and vesnoj 'in the spring' that refer to the diurnal and annual temporal cycles in nature. It is argued that evidence from diachrony bears on important theoretical questions: Is the sensitivity to "cyclic" time in language due to cultural factors? How does the external factor of culture interact with language internal factors in the formation of temporal concepts? The proposed analysis indicates that the linguistic development in Russian does not mirror changes in cultural practices and values. Instead, the main burden of explanation is placed on a language internal factor, namely the general drift towards more analytic constructions in Russian, which I argue paved the way for the concept of "cyclic" time as reflected in the grammar of the Russian language today.


Performance on a target can be modified by contextual elements. For example, thresholds strongly increase when a vernier is flanked by two lines. Increasing the number of flankers reduces contextual interference when the flankers are shorter or longer than the vernier: bigger is better. However, there is no improvement when flankers have the same length as the vernier (Malania et al, 2007 Journal of Vision 7(2):1 1–7). Stimuli were 80 cd/m² on a black background. Here, we used stimuli with the luminance of 1 cd/m². Performance deteriorated similarly as in the 80 cd/m² condition when the vernier was flanked by two lines that were longer than the vernier. However, increasing the number of flankers did not improve performance as in the 80 cd/m² condition: bigger is not better. Our results show that contextual modulation is highly dependent on the luminance of the stimuli.


In this paper we seek to empirically study the use of location-awareness of others in the context of mobile collaboration. We report on a field experiment carried out using a pervasive game we developed called CatchBob!. Using both quantitative and qualitative data, we show the underwhelming effects of automating location-awareness. Our results indeed shows that automating this process does not necessarily improve the task performance and that it can be detrimental to socio-cognitive processes involved in collaboration such as communication or the modeling of partners' intents. The paper concludes with some potential impacts for location-based application practitioners.


There has been a recent upsurge of interest in exploring how choices of methods and timing of instruction affect the rate and persistence of learning. The authors review three lines of experimentation—all conducted using educationally relevant materials and time intervals—that call into question important aspects of common instructional practices. First, research reveals that testing, although typically used merely as an assessment device, directly potentiates learning and does so more effectively than other modes of study. Second, recent analysis of the temporal dynamics of learning show that learning is most durable when study time is distributed over much greater periods of time than is customary in educational settings. Third, the interleaving of different types of practice problems (which is quite rare in math and science texts) markedly improves learning. The authors conclude by discussing the frequently observed dissociation between people's perceptions of which learning procedures are most effective and which procedures actually promote durable learning.


Recently the University of Missouri-Columbia has implemented a Nuclear Safeguards graduate certificate to help satisfy the need for increased accountability in the growing field of nuclear technology. In order to fulfill partially the requirements of this certificate, a Nuclear Safeguards Science and Technology course has been established to link the concepts of nuclear science with those of nuclear security. Courses have already been available to allow a student to become familiar with the nature and properties of radioactive isotopes as well as their nonproliferation risks and other associated hazards. However, this new course strives to provide access to the methods and principles that connect the concepts of nuclear science with their applications to the safeguarding of nuclear materials. The three primary aspects of nuclear safeguards are material protection, control, and accountability. First, a tool is developed using a statistical model called EASI that can be used to aid in the design of physical protection systems. Secondly, an example laboratory experiment is presented that shows a calibration of a hand-held radiation detector for the use in preventing theft of a radioisotope for the purpose of material control. Finally, the development of a script in MATLAB for use in simulating gamma ray spectra, a method commonly used in material accounting, for various radioactive isotopes is presented.


Adversarial examples can be defined as inputs to a model which induce a mistake - where the model output is different than that of an oracle, perhaps in surprising or malicious ways. Original models of adversarial attacks are primarily studied in the context of classification and computer vision tasks. While several attacks have been proposed in natural language processing (NLP) settings, they often vary in defining the parameters of an attack and what a successful attack would look like. The goal of this work is to propose a unifying model of adversarial examples suitable for NLP tasks in both generative and classification settings. We define the notion of adversarial gain: based in control theory, it is a measure of the change in the output of a system relative to the perturbation of the input (caused by the so-called adversary) presented to the learner. This definition, as we show, can be used under different feature spaces and distance conditions to determine attack or defense effectiveness across different intuitive manifolds. This notion of adversarial gain not only provides a useful way for evaluating adversaries and defenses, but can act as a building block for future work in robustness under adversaries due to its rooted nature in stability and manifold theory.


Background Aging of skin is associated with environmental factors such as ultraviolet rays, air pollution, gravity, and genetic factors, all of which can lead to wrinkling of skin. Previous reports suggest that the wound repair is impaired by the aging process and strategies to manipulate the age-related wound healing are necessary in order to stimulate repair. Objective Several traditional plant extracts are well-known for their properties of skin protection and care. Piper cambodianum P. Fourn. (PPF), a member of Piperacecae, is a plant found in Vietnam that might have therapeutic properties. Therefore, the effects of PPF stem and leaf extract on aging process were investigated in vitro and in vivo. Methods PPF extract dissolved in methanol was investigated using Western blotting, real-time quantitative reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction, flow cytometry, and cell wound-healing assays. We assessed the anti-aging effect of PPF in mouse using the wound-healing assay. The results were analyzed by Student's unpaired t-test; *P<0.05 and **P<0.01 were considered to indicate significant and highly significant values, respectively, compared with corresponding controls. Results PPF treatment demonstrated in vitro and in vivo anti-aging activity. Western blot analysis of PPF-treated normal human dermal fibroblast cells showed a dose-dependent increase in the expression of extracellular matrix genes such as collagen and elastin, but decreased expression of the aging gene matrix metalloproteinase-3. Quantitative polymerase chain reaction showed that PPF-treated cells displayed dose-dependent increase in messenger RNA expression levels of collagen, elastin, and hyaluronan synthase-2 and decreased expression levels of matrix metalloproteinase-1 aging gene. PPF treatment led to decreased production of reactive oxygen species in cells subjected to ultraviolet irradiation. Furthermore, PPF extract showed positive wound-healing effects in mice. Conclusion This study demonstrated the anti-aging and wound-healing effects of PPF extract. Therefore, PPF extract represents a promising new therapeutic agent for anti-aging and wound-healing treatments.


Abstract. Global mapping of satellite tropospheric NO2 vertical column
density (VCD), a key gas in air quality monitoring, requires accurate
retrievals over complex urban and industrialized areas and under any
atmospheric conditions. The high abundance of aerosol particles in regions
dominated by anthropogenic fossil fuel combustion, e.g. megacities, and/or
biomass-burning episodes, affects the space-borne spectral measurement.
Minimizing the tropospheric NO2 VCD biases caused by aerosol
scattering and absorption effects is one of the main retrieval challenges
from air quality satellite instruments. In this study, the reference Ozone
Monitoring Instrument (OMI) DOMINO-v2 product was reprocessed over cloud-free
scenes, by applying new aerosol correction parameters retrieved from the
477 nm O2−O2 band, over eastern China and South America for 2 years
(2006–2007). These new parameters are based on two different and separate
algorithms developed during the last 2 years in view of an improved use of
the OMI 477 nm O2−O2 band:
 the updated OMCLDO2 algorithm, which derives improved effective cloud
parameters, the aerosol neural network (NN), which retrieves explicit aerosol
parameters by assuming a more physical aerosol model.
The OMI aerosol NN is a step ahead of OMCLDO2 because it primarily estimates an
explicit aerosol layer height (ALH), and secondly an aerosol optical
thickness τ for cloud-free observations. Overall, it was found that all
the considered aerosol correction parameters reduce the biases identified in
DOMINO-v2 over scenes in China with high aerosol abundance dominated by fine
scattering and weakly absorbing particles, e.g. from
[-20%:-40%] to
[0 %:20 %] in summertime. The use of the retrieved OMI aerosol
parameters leads in general to a more explicit aerosol correction and higher
tropospheric NO2 VCD values, in the range of [0 %:40 %], than
from the implicit correction with the updated OMCLDO2. This number overall
represents an estimation of the aerosol correction strategy uncertainty
nowadays for tropospheric NO2 VCD retrieval from space-borne visible
measurements. The explicit aerosol correction theoretically includes a more
realistic consideration of aerosol multiple scattering and absorption
effects, especially over scenes dominated by strongly absorbing particles,
where the correction based on OMCLDO2 seems to remain insufficient. However,
the use of ALH and τ from the OMI NN aerosol algorithm is not a
straightforward operation and future studies are required to identify the
optimal methodology. For that purpose, several elements are recommended in
this paper. Overall, we demonstrate the possibility of applying a more explicit
aerosol correction by considering aerosol parameters directly derived from
the 477 nm O2−O2 spectral band, measured by the same satellite
instrument. Such an approach can, in theory, easily be transposed to the
new-generation of space-borne instruments (e.g. TROPOMI on board Sentinel-5
Precursor), enabling a fast reprocessing of tropospheric NO2 data
over cloud-free scenes (cloudy pixels need to be filtered out), as well as
for other trace gas retrievals (e.g. SO2, HCHO).


A basic question in the theory of fault-tolerant quantum computation is to understand the fundamental resource costs for performing a universal logical set of gates on encoded qubits to arbitrary accuracy. Here we consider qubits encoded with constant space overhead (i.e. finite encoding rate) in the limit of arbitrarily large code distance d through the use of topological codes associated to triangulations of hyperbolic surfaces. We introduce explicit protocols to demonstrate how Dehn twists of the hyperbolic surface can be implemented on the code through constant depth unitary circuits, without increasing the space overhead. The circuit for a given Dehn twist consists of a permutation of physical qubits, followed by a constant depth local unitary circuit, where locality here is defined with respect to a hyperbolic metric that defines the code. Applying our results to the hyperbolic Fibonacci Turaev-Viro code implies the possibility of applying universal logical gate sets on encoded qubits through constant depth unitary circuits and with constant space overhead. Our circuits are inherently protected from errors as they map local operators to local operators while changing the size of their support by at most a constant factor; in the presence of noisy syndrome measurements, our results suggest the possibility of universal fault tolerant quantum computation with constant space overhead and time overhead of O(d/logd). For quantum circuits that allow parallel gate operations, this yields the optimal scaling of space-time overhead known to date.


Modelling grape-vines from a two-dimensional image has a number of interesting problems which have to be overcome. Due to their growth patterns and the surrounding environment vines tend to grow in ways which result in a large number of occlusions from a single perspective, making identification difficult. In addition the presence of wires, posts and other foreign objects increase complexity. We propose a method which uses the contours extracted from an image to identify canes. An emphasis has been made on identifying only sections of canes which are not occluded. Our method extracts the contours, creates a model of all edges and pairs up edges which contain similar properties such as their width and direction. High quality edge pairs are then selected to produce partial cane models. These models have been quantitatively assessed by comparing their structure to near perfect hand drawn versions. From this analysis we have found a mean overall accuracy of 71.3% (σ = 5.9%) for all images used in our study. These results are promising as the models produced have a high correspondence with the ground truth, although are missing some information. Finally we propose several techniques which could be investigated in the future in order to further improve the accuracy and reliability of our method. Acknowledgements Richard Green and Tom Botterill for their constant support and help throughout the year on this project.


Objective:The objective of this study was to summarize the evolution of multivisceral transplantation over a decade of experience and evaluate its current status. Summary Background Data:Multivisceral transplantation can be valuable for the treatment of patients with massive abdominal catastrophes. Its major limitations have been technical and rejection of the intestinal graft. Methods:This study consisted of an outcome analysis of 98 consecutive patients who received multivisceral transplantation at our institution. This represents the largest single center experience to date. Results:The most common diseases in our population before transplant were intestinal gastroschisis and intestinal dysmotility syndromes in children, and mesenteric thrombosis and trauma in adults. Kaplan Meier estimated patient and graft survivals for all cases were 65% and 63% at 1 year, 49% and 47% at 3 years, and 49% and 47% at 5 years. Factors that adversely influenced patient survival included transplant before 1998 (P = 0.01), being hospitalized at the time of transplant (P = 0.05), and being a child who received Campath-1H induction (P = 0.03). Among 37 patients who had none of these 3 factors (15 adults and 22 children), estimated 1- and 3-year survivals were 89% and 71%, respectively. Patients transplanted since 2001 had significantly less moderate and severe rejections (31.6% vs 67.6%, P = 0.0005) with almost half of these patients never developing rejection. Conclusions:Multivisceral transplantation is now an effective treatment of patients with complex abdominal pathology. The incidences of serious acute rejection and patient survival have improved in the most recent experience. Our results show that the multivisceral graft seems to facilitate engraftment of transplanted organs and raises the possibility that there is a degree of immunologic protection afforded by this procedure.


Background: Healthcare-acquired infections are significant causes of morbidity and mortality among hospitalized patients worldwide, most especially in resource-limited settings. Similarly, the tuberculosis (TB) clinic is a high-risk area due to the nature of the clients being managed, and the infectivity of the implicated microorganism. TB infection control is an essential, but often-overlooked, component of a comprehensive infection control program in developing countries like Nigeria. The knowledge and attitude of the relevant health workers would be a determinant of their preventive practice toward preparedness and infection prevention and control (IPC) Objectives: The study assessed IPC practices among health-care workers in TB Clinic, in Ondo State, Nigeria. Methodology: A descriptive crosssectional study was carried out among 400 healthcare workers in selected TB clinics in Ondo State Nigeria, and these were selected using the multistage sampling method. Research instruments used were semi-structured self-administered pretested questionnaire. Data were analyzed using the SPSS software version 23.0. Mean scores were generated for the major outcome variables of knowledge, attitude, and practice of IPC. The P value was assumed significant at values ≤0.05 for all inferential statistics. Results: Mean age of respondents was 34 years ± 8.1 years, majority (83%) of the health-care workers had good knowledge of IPC, another majority (80%) of the health-care workers interviewed had good attitude toward IPC, 314 (78.5%) have read the guideline, while 68% of the health-care workers had good practice. Year of experience, type of facility, and facility settings were statistically significantly associated with respondents' knowledge, attitude, and practice of IPC (P < 0.05). On binary logistic regression, having working experience of >1 year, and working in a TB facility were significant predictors of good knowledge, attitude, and practice of IPC. Conclusion: There are huge gaps between knowledge and practice of IPC among respondents in this study. Since TB clinics are major sources of cross infection within the hospital setting, stakeholders have significant roles to play in IPC in the health-care setting.


Real estate investments are typically characterized by high degrees of leverage and long loan tenures. In perfect capital markets, leverage has no impact on the investment decision apart from tax considerations. However, the mortgage financing market is imperfect in many countries. In the presence of market imperfections, an optimal holding period exists for real property investments. We provide a simple rule to calculate the optimal holding period is to compare the required rate of return with the leveraged rate of return on equity.


THE OBJECTIVE OF THIS STUDY WAS TO EVALUATE the efficacy of a prototype interactive music awareness program (IMAP) for adult cochlear implant (CI) users. An unblinded, randomized crossover design was used. Twenty-one CI users were recruited and allocated to two groups. Group 1 received the IMAP first, followed by a retention of learning phase. Group 2 were given the IMAP after 12 weeks. Participants were instructed to undertake two half-hour sessions per week at home over 12 weeks. Both groups attended appointments at the start, halfway through, and at the end of the trial. At each appointment participants completed tests of speech perception, melodic contour identification, and instrument recognition, rated the sound quality of music, and indicated their music listening habits. Sixteen participants completed the study. Following training both groups showed improved instrument recognition abilities and feedback suggests further positive impact on participants' lives. The findings suggest that the IMAP is beneficial for music perception and in particular, improved instrument recognition.


Ultrasound is a well-established tool for medical imaging. It is non-invasive and relatively inexpensive, but the severe attenuation caused by propagation through tissue limits its effectiveness for deep imaging. In recent years, the ready availability of fast, inexpensive computer hardware has facilitated the adoption of signal coding and compression techniques to counteract the effects of attenuation. Despite widespread investigation of the topic, published opinions vary as to the relative suitability of discrete-phase-modulated and frequency-modulated (or continuous-phase-modulated) signals for ultrasonic imaging applications. This thesis compares the performance of discrete binary-phase coded pulses to that of frequency-modulated pulses at the higher imaging frequencies at which the effects of attenuation are most severe. The performance of linear and non-linear frequency modulated pulses with optimal side-lobe characteristics is compared to that of complementary binary-phase coded pulses by simulation and experiment. Binary-phase coded pulses are shown to be more robust to the affects of attenuation and non-ideal transducers. The comparatively poor performance of frequency-modulated pulses is explained in terms of the spectral characteristics of the signals and filters required to reduce side-lobes to levels acceptable for imaging purposes. In theory, complementary code sets like bi-phase Golay pairs offer optimum side-lobe performance at the expense of a reduction in frame rate. In practice, misalignment caused by motion in the medium can have a severe impact on imaging performance. A novel motioncompensated imaging algorithm designed to reduce the occurrence of motion artefacts and eliminate the reduction in frame-rate associated with complementary-coding is presented. This is initially applied to conventional sequential-scan B-mode imaging then adapted for use in synthetic aperture B-mode imaging. Simulation results are presented comparing the performance of the motion-compensated sequential-scan and synthetic aperture systems with that of simulated systems using uncoded and frequency-modulated excitation pulses. Declaration of Originality I hereby declare that the research recorded in this thesis and the thesis itself was composed and originated entirely by myself in the School of Engineering at The University of Edinburgh.


Remote sensing is a technique that enables to observe the radiation scattered or emitted by the Earth surface. Satellite-based remote sensing allows regular, repetitive, accurate observations of nearly the whole planet, at various spatial and temporal scales, in several wavelength fields. Such observations render the nature, state, temporal and spatial variations of the properties of the objects at the Earth surface. By way of example, water-covered areas, roughness, soil moisture, changes in the nature of land, density and phenological evolution of the vegetation cover, sand winds, are information included in these observations. Nevertheless, these observations usually combine together, making them more or less difficult to extract from the raw data transmitted by satellites. The science of remote sensing consists in interpreting and processing the series of spatial and temporal images in order to extract such parameters, qualitatively or quantitatively. Desertification is a phenomenon of irreversible land degradation. It results from complex processes linked to the coupled and joint evolution of natural and human-induced factors. The beginning, development and results of such processes are materialised by land surface states and their evolution. Remotely sensed data consequently include information that the science of remote sensing allows to partly extract with more or less accuracy. Such information coupled with others are involved in various stages of the desertification process. Remote sensing provides useful data; some of them are essential information impossible to collect otherwise (especially in terms of homogeneity and spatial coverage and/or temporal monitoring) for early warning, monitoring the development of desertification phenomena and acknowledging a final state. Among others, remote sensing may allow to determine the impacts of policies to combat desertification. However, because of the mentioned limits regarding the extraction of useful parameters and the part played by the latter in the processes concerned, remote sensing turns out to be a tool among others certainly a powerful one, but not a scientific, decisional or operational "miracle" solution. After presenting in detail the technique and science of remote sensing and how it allows to monitor various elements of desertification processes, this brochure deals with the most important and significant cases and brings both aspects together. Several key parameters and processes are studied: roughness, albedo, surface temperature, moisture, vegetation indices on the one hand; vegetation cover monitoring, modifications in the land surface composition in dry environments, wind transportation on the other hand. Examples are developed: evolutions of specific sites, projects under way. Lessons taught by previous experiments are critically analysed, options for the future are designed.


Background Morphological examination of blood films remains the reference standard for malaria diagnosis. Supporting the skills required to make an accurate morphological diagnosis is therefore essential. However, providing support across different countries and environments is a substantial challenge. Objective This paper reports a scheme supplying digital slides of malaria-infected blood within an Internet-based virtual microscope environment to users with different access to training and computing facilities. The feasibility of the approach was established, allowing users to test, record, and compare their own performance with that of other users. Methods From Giemsa stained thick and thin blood films, 56 large high-resolution digital slides were prepared, using high-quality image capture and 63x oil-immersion objective lens. The individual images were combined using the photomerge function of Adobe Photoshop and then adjusted to ensure resolution and reproduction of essential diagnostic features. Web delivery employed the Digital Slidebox platform allowing digital microscope viewing facilities and image annotation with data gathering from participants. Results Engagement was high with images viewed by 38 participants in five countries in a range of environments and a mean completion rate of 42/56 cases. The rate of parasite detection was 78% and accuracy of species identification was 53%, which was comparable with results of similar studies using glass slides. Data collection allowed users to compare performance with other users over time or for each individual case. Conclusions Overall, these results demonstrate that users worldwide can effectively engage with the system in a range of environments, with the potential to enhance personal performance through education, external quality assessment, and personal professional development, especially in regions where educational resources are difficult to access.


It is expected that the paper and office products supply chain will move online in the very near future. The hubris of new eBusiness models has ended in a fragmented picture of a multitude of personal views relating to future developments on the eEconomy, eIndustry and eEnterprise levels. This paper endeavors to compile the currently existing knowledge in this field and to identify the basic drivers and inhibitors of the new economy that are of relevance to the forest industry. On the eEconomy level, acceleration in macro-economic growth can be expected due to efficiency and productivity improvements that are triggered by the elimination of information barriers thereby creating more efficient markets. On the eIndustry level, globally operating and more adaptive industry networks will improve economic performance by reaping economies of scale. Less volatile markets will result from improved planning and coordination thereby eliminating redundant capacities. An overly horizontally concentrated market structure might bear the danger of locking the paper industry in an underdevelopment trap of innovation exhaustion and organizational inertia. Business entities on the eEnterprise level will have to adopt the principles of openness, connectivity and strategic integration to fully benefit from networking and integration effects along the entire value chain. However a number of issues, such as sharing critical data in a networked economy, will increase demands for newly adapted business culture and management models.


Several US counties and local governments have recently considered a novel solution to the foreclosure crisis. They plan to use eminent domain to compel the owners of mortgage debt—and specifically of private-label mortgage-backed securities—to sell the debt to the government at a price reflecting the loan's market value. The government would then restructure the debt and resell it to new investors. The plans are striking because—in contrast to both development-driven eminent domain and the federal subprime bank bailout—they would force investors to assume asset devaluation and increased long-term risk. Notably, the plans have emerged as an instance of financialization-focused politics in suburbs and suburban cities of color, specifically majority-black and -Latino/a suburbs. Local support for the plans, we argue, is rooted in the long-term disinvestment of these 'suburbs of exception', which became targets of subprime lending and eventually sites where the 'financial exception' has been localized. But these demographic shifts, fragmentation and fiscal pressures have at the same time created a suburban political terrain in which the plans have gained their strongest political support.


In 2003 WHO published "Working with individuals, families and communities to improve maternal and newborn health", known as the IFC Framework, that promotes integrating the health promotion approach set out in the Ottawa Charter into national maternal and newborn health strategies. More than 10 years after the original framework was published, we have updated the evidence for key interventions and for community participation. This report summarizes the final recommendation and the process for developing the guideline on health promotion interventions for maternal and newborn health. The primary audience for the guideline is health programme managers, including governmental and non-governmental organizations, and policy makers who are responsible for designing maternal, newborn and child health programmes, primarily in low-income settings. The guideline is also aimed at health providers and teaching institutions, to increase knowledge of interventions important for: (i) improving maternal and newborn health; (ii) improving the care provided within the household by women and families; (iii) increasing community support for maternal and newborn health; and (iv) increasing access to, and use of, skilled care. Development programmes and organizations supporting women's empowerment and rights will also find this guideline of use.


The proliferation and final density of Sertoli cells in the testis are regulated by hormones and local growth factors. Glial cell line-derived neurotrophic factor (GDNF), a distantly related member of the transforming growth factor-p (TGF-â) super-family, and its receptor components: GFRal, Ret and neural cell adhesion molecule (NCAM) have been recently reported to be expressed in the testis and to be involved in the proliferation regulation of immature Sertoli cells. However, the number of the reports is very low, and the signalling pathways have not been well characterized. In the present study, we used purified Sertoli cell cultures from 4- to 5-day-old mouse testis to detect the expression of GDNF, to examine the effect of GDNF on Sertoli cell proliferation and possible signalling pathways mediating such effect. GDNF expression in mouse Sertoli cells was detected at both RNA and protein levels by RT-PCR and immunocytochemistry methods. The expression was up-regulated by FSH. GDNF stimulated the proliferation of Sertoli cells and synergized with FSH to promote the proliferation to a higher level. GFRal/Ret and GFRα1/ NCAM are two receptor complexes for GDNF. As GFRal and NCAM not Ret were expressed in cultured Sertoli cells, we proposed that the stimulatory effect of GDNF on Sertoli cell proliferation was through pathways initiating from the GFRal/NCAM receptor. This proposition was supported by the fact that the stimulatory effect of GDNF was significantly reduced by anti-NCAM antibody.


We report all solution-processed manufacture of high performance top-emitting (TE) quantum dot light-emitting diodes (QLEDs) with an aluminum (Al) film as bottom electrode and a homogeneous molybdenum oxide (MoO3) film as hole injection layer deposited on top of Al from water solution. With an optimal organic light outcoupling layer over the top electrode to depress the multiple light beam interference effect, the QLEDs show a maximum luminance and current efficiency of 151 000 cd m−2 and 33.7 cd A−1, respectively, attaining a nearly Lambertian light source. Especially, they exhibit a maximum external quantum efficiency of 7.4%. All solution-processed fabrication of these TE QLEDs is further implemented on some active light display samples of Arabic numerals with 15 × 15 mm2 active area. The resulting simple passive matrix quantum dot light emitting displays possess excellent photoelectric characteristics, which represents a step toward practical application.


I. Introduction: The Limits of Reanimation When Robert Browning published his 1868-89 book-length "murder poem," The Ring and the Book, his reputation as a poet "with special gifts of intellect and originality" that were at the same time put in the service of a poetics of great "crudity" and "jolting violence" seemed once again confirmed. (1) "I felt ... like a creature with one leg and one wing, half hopping, half flying," Browning's friend William Allingham said after reading the poem's first volume, while others characterized the poem as "incongruous materials" incapable of forming a "harmonious whole," or as simultaneously "life-like" and a "morbid anatomy." (2) These friends and reviewers, torn as they were between awe at the poem's intellectual ambition and disgust at its aesthetic execution, envisioned their ambivalence as states of bodily transformation and incomplete states at that: halfway from legs to wings, from parts to a whole, from life to death. Without acknowledging directly the grotesque corporeality so prevalent in many of Browning's most well-known dramatic monologues, these readers nonetheless see the almost-changed body as a metaphor for Browning's poetic strangeness: a strangeness characterized by the formal tension, as the historian Thomas Carlyle would have it, between "an Old Bailey story that might have been told in ten lines" and a long dramatic monologue, or, as Browning himself wrote in his "Essay on Shelley," between poetry that "reproduces things external" and poetry that is the "radiance and aroma of [the poet's] personality." (3) In Browning's dramatic monologues, as in the responses above, the changing body--specifically, in the monologues, the once-dead body, the almost-alive-again body--is a locus for aesthetic experimentation that both critiques poetry's inevitably subjective relation to facts--historical facts, observable facts, and the facts of literary influence--and uses that relationship as the basis for generic innovation. The reanimated body, whether appearing in poems like The Ring and the Book or in shorter dramatic monologues like "Porphyria's Lover" and "My Last Duchess," becomes a figure through which Browning considers the fraught relation between unassailable historical materiality and original aesthetic practice--between the dictates of what has come before and the desire to create something new out of it. The dramatic monologue, in its dual capacity functioning as a critical and always-ironic foil to the multiple projects of aesthetic "resurrection" so in vogue during the nineteenth century--the Arthurian revival in art and literature, the vogue for museum exhibitions that recreated ancient tombs, and phenomena like magic lantern shows and spirit photography--as a form becomes both a self- conscious vehicle for poems of reanimation and a mode of reanimation itself. While critics have argued that we can see the dramatic monologue as "a form of verbal resuscitation of the dead, a quasi-Spiritualist voicing of dead men and women," (4) and Victorian reviewers especially found in Tennyson's dramatic monologues "the secret of the transmigration of the soul," dramatic monologues in which the dead come to life in turn call our attention to the limits of the poet's reanimating power by exposing the inherent subjectivity of any resuscitative poetic project. (5) These monologues embody the fictive and necessarily inventive nature of aesthetic resuscitation: nothing can come back from the dead unless the poet reanimates it. Browning uses his dramatic monologues to draw an analogy between corporeal reanimation and poetic practice, and in doing so probes, critiques, and reinvents the process by which new, "living" poetry can emerge from the intransigent bodies of the past. His "necropoetics" bring long-dead voices back to life, but not with the expectation that his monologists will speak truth. Rather, the inalterable fact of their deaths creates the condition necessary for Browning to scrutinize and to relish the imaginative truths his own poetics of aesthetic resurrection could reveal. …


Online-learning research has mainly been focusing on minimizing one objective function. In many real-world applications, however, several objective functions have to be considered simultaneously. Recently, an algorithm for dealing with several objective functions in the i.i.d. case has been presented. In this paper, we extend the multi-objective framework to the case of stationary and ergodic processes, thus allowing dependencies among observations. We first identify an asymptomatic lower bound for any prediction strategy and then present an algorithm whose predictions achieve the optimal solution while fulfilling any continuous and convex constraining criterion.


We consider the Rayleigh-Benard problem for a combustible gaseous mixture in a two-dimensionalchannelformed by upper and l ower horizontalpl ates, with periodic boundary conditions employed in the horizontal direction. Fresh unburned fluid is injected through the upper plate and burned products removed through the lower plate. The lower plate is heated to the burning temperature of the mixture so that, for appropriate injection rates, a flame forms within the channel. Using the Boussinesq model we describe the results of numerical computations to illustrate fluid- flame interactions. The modelwe consider is motivated by recent experiments on flames in the thin annular region between two closely spaced, finite, coaxial cylinders, formed by upper and lower horizontal plates. Here, the angular direction in the annulus corresponds to the horizontal direction in the channel. Our model results if the curvature of the cylinders is ignored, as is reasonable for relatively large cylindrical radii. Instabilities can ensue even if thermal expansion is ignored, as in the diffusionalthermalmodelwhere density variations are not accounted for. Moreover, fluid instabilities, e.g., convection cells, can ensue even for nonreactive mixtures. We consider parameter regimes in which the instabilities and resulting patterns that we observe are due to fluid-flame interactions. In addition to stationary flat and cellular flames, we compute a variety of nonstationary, cellular flames, with associated convection rolls, including (i) flames with periodic and aperiodic episodes of cell creation (splitting) and annihilation (merging) at selected locations, (ii) heteroclinic cycles in which long periods of nearly quiescent cellular behavior are interrupted by episodes of cell splitting and merging, (iii) traveling and modulated traveling waves of cellular flames, (iv) traveling blinking modes in which a traveling array of cells is periodically interrupted by merging/splitting events which alternate between the two halves of the spatial domain when viewed in a moving coordinate system, (v) breathing cellular flames in which cells whose mean location is fixed in space oscillate periodically, and (vi) chaotic flames. We also describe perforated flames which exhibit incomplete consumption of the deficient component locally in space and time.


Over the past decades, it has become increasingly clear that many neurodevelopmental disorders can be characterized by aberrations in the neuro-anatomical connectome of intermediary hubs. Yet, despite the advent in unidirectional transsynaptic tracing technologies, we are still lacking an efficient approach to identify individual neurons based on both their precise input and output relations, hampering our ability to elucidate the precise connectome in both the healthy and diseased condition. Here, we bridge this gap by combining anterograde transsynaptic- and retrograde (cATR) tracing in Ai14 reporter mice, using adeno-associated virus serotype 1 expressing Cre and cholera toxin subunit B as the anterograde and retrograde tracer, respectively. We have applied this innovative approach to selectively identify individual neurons in the brainstem that do not only receive input from one or more of the cerebellar nuclei (CN), but also project to the primary motor cortex (M1), the amygdala or the ventral tegmental area (VTA). Cells directly connecting CN to M1 were found mainly in the thalamus, while a large diversity of midbrain and brainstem areas connected the CN to the amygdala or VTA. Our data highlight that cATR allows for specific, yet brain-wide, identification of individual neurons that mediate information from a cerebellar nucleus to the cerebral cortex, amygdala or VTA via a disynaptic pathway. Given that the identified neurons in healthy subjects can be readily quantified, our data also form a solid foundation to make numerical comparisons with mouse mutants suffering from aberrations in their connectome due to a neurodevelopmental disorder.


We incorporate prior knowledge to construct nonlinear algorithms for invariant feature extraction and discrimination. Employing a unified framework in terms of a nonlinear variant of the Rayleigh coefficient, we propose non-linear generalizations of Fisher's discriminant and oriented PCA using Support Vector kernel functions. Extensive simulations show the utility of our approach.


Electronic business (E-business) is one of the most significant opportunities that new computing technologies present to business firms. The primary research objective of this study was to determine the drivers of E-business implementation in a developing country, such as Kenya.
Three conceptual models supported this study: the Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) adoption model of Iacovou, Benbasat and Dexter (1995), the Fillis, Johansson and Wagner (2004a) model on E-business adoption, and the Bosch, Tait and Venter (2006) business environment model. Based on the secondary sources a hypothetical model depicting thirteen variables was constructed. A structured questionnaire was administered via e-mail or a hard copy and 466 usable responses were obtained. The validity of the measuring instrument was confirmed using confirmatory factor analysis and Cronbach alpha coefficients confirmed the inter-item reliability of the identified variables. Structural Equation Modelling (SEM) confirmatory statistical techniques were used to analyse the model fit and statistically significant relationships.
As the hypothetical model only showed one statistically significant relationship, the hypothetical model was re-specified into three sub models, namely: micro-, market-, and macro environmental models depicting the E-business implementation drivers. Four drivers for E-business implementation were identified namely: strategic intent, trading partner readiness, IT infrastructure and international orientation.


Exploring the world through touch requires the integration of internal (e.g., anatomical) and external (e.g., spatial) reference frames - you only know what you touch when you know where your hands are in space. The deficit observed in tactile temporal-order judgements when the hands are crossed over the midline provides one tool to explore this integration. We used foot pedals and required participants to focus on either the hand that was stimulated first (an anatomical bias condition) or the location of the hand that was stimulated first (a spatiotopic bias condition). Spatiotopic-based responses produce a larger crossed-hands deficit, presumably by focusing observers on the external reference frame. In contrast, anatomical-based responses focus the observer on the internal reference frame and produce a smaller deficit. This manipulation thus provides evidence that observers can change the relative weight given to each reference frame. We quantify this effect using a probabilistic model that produces a population estimate of the relative weight given to each reference frame. We show that a spatiotopic bias can result in either a larger external weight (Experiment 1) or a smaller internal weight (Experiment 2) and provide an explanation of when each one would occur.


This collection reflects the growing interest realist critics have shown towards forms of discourse theory and deconstruction. The diverse range of contributions address such issues as the work of Derrida and deconstruction, discourse theory, Eurocentrism and poststructuralism. What unites all of the contributions is a sense that it is essential to provide a realist alternative to the hitherto dominance of social constructionism, hermeneutics and postmodernism, over many of the issues discussed.
By developing a realist perspective the different authors attempt to embed discourse within the structured nature of the reality of the world. Realism can situate language, discourse and ideology within context specific, or 'causally efficacious' circumstances. Realism can help to uncover issues of power, representation, and subjectivity and how discursive and other social practices produce real effects. This can help us understand the manner in which (non-discursive) social structures are reproduced through various forms of ideology and discourse. And by knowing this, we can start to address questions concerning human emancipation and how the world is to be transformed.


The integrating power of the eye has been tested for short flashes of light, ranging in duration from 10−2 to 8×10−9 sec. The shorter flashes were produced by passing the image of the straight filament of an electric lamp across a narrow slit, the light having been reflected from a mirror mounted on an air-driven turbine. The longer flashes were produced by means of a sectored disk. In all cases the number of flashes received by the eye was great enought to avoid flicker and the intensity was well above that required to produce the sensation of vision. It was concluded that the response of the eye depends only upon the total amount of light in the beam and is independent of the length of the light flash. The limit of error was 1.5 percent.


Based in anthropology (Cole & Knowles, 2001), life history inquiry into literature emphasizes deep understandings of literary characters that are expressed through dramatic performance. For teachers or teacher-educators, life histories offer a powerful teaching strategy. Life histories support locating readers in a particular pattern or "grammar" of events, situations, and goals while also revealing the subjective worlds of characters who are involved in such events. In an undergraduate Honors Literacies course, life histories performances in response to the young adult novel, The Skin I'm In(Flake, 1998), enabled examinations of the complex interaction of characters, their lives, and particular contexts.


Roads can have negative impacts on wildlife through indirect effects such as fragmentation of habitat, or through direct effects such as fatal collisions with vehicles. Wildlife deaths on British roads number in the millions per year, so the resulting carcasses represent a substantial carrion biomass available as food for scavengers. By removing roadkill in urban areas, scavengers perform a valuable ecosystem service, but the rapid removal of these carcasses by scavengers could bias estimates of the impacts of roads on wildlife. In order to evaluate the scale and context of urban roadkill scavenging, we examined: (i) which species scavenge on roadkill in urban areas, (ii) the likelihood of roadkill being removed by scavengers, and (iii) whether spatial and temporal factors (habitat type and time of day) influenced the rate of removal. Camera traps baited with chicken heads as simulated 'roadkill corpses' were deployed in six residential and six parkland sites in the city of Cardiff, UK. Seven species were observed removing the roadkill, with corvids being the most common scavengers, responsible for 42% of removals. Of the 120 corpses, 90 (76%) were removed within 12 h. Time of day had a significant effect on the rate of removal, with the number of carcass removals peaking in the first few hours of daylight. Of roadkill placed at 9 am, 62% of carcasses had been removed after only 2 h. Removal of corpses by scavengers could mean that the actual number of road deaths is six times more than that observed during surveys.


The main goal of this research project is to elucidate the fate of organic carbon stored in permafrost in the current context of climate change, looking at microbial-driven carbon degradation in active layer samples from the Lena Delta, Siberia and Herschel Island, Canadian Western Arctic. This is being accomplished by analyzing the abundance, dynamics and function of microbial communities involved in consuming this organic carbon, especially with respect to methane cycling. Microorganisms involved in methane cycling are of particular relevance in these frozen environments, as rising permafrost temperatures eventually lead to an increased degradation of previously conserved organic substrate. This in turn leads to an increased methanogenic activity, creating a potentially dangerous positive feedback-loop for climate change. The point of focus of this research is the biodiversity and function of microorganisms thriving in such difficult conditions, and their reaction to warming temperatures and a rapidly changing environment.Undergoing research activities include: T-RFLP analysis of methanogenic and methanotrophic communities in various active layer profiles from Herschel Island, incubation experiments under controlled variables to relate the methane production rate from active layer samples to rising temperatures, soil characteristics including soil moisture, C/N ratio, grain size, pH and trace elements. The results obtained will be scrutinized to answer the following questions: 1) Will the structure of microbial communities, particularly methanogenic and methanotrophic populations, be affected by rising permafrost temperatures? 2) Are these communities flexible enough to compensate the changes occurring in their environment with regard to carbon mineralization and their function in polar ecosystems? 3) How much of the carbon stored in permafrost is actually available for mineralization?


Objective The brain derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) locus has been implicated in psychiatric and substance related disorders. Recent genome-wide association studies (GWAS) have shown strong associations between single nucleotide polymorphisms in BDNF, smoking behaviour and high body mass index (BMI). Our aim was to test whether genetic BDNF variation alters the risk of smoking related morbidity and mortality. Design Cox proportional hazards models were used to relate the BDNF rs4923461(A/G) polymorphisms to all-cause, cancer and cardiovascular mortality and cardiovascular disease (CVD) incidence adjusted for age, sex, BMI, and smoking quantity. Setting The Malmö Diet and Cancer Study (MDCS), a population based prospective cohort study (n=30 447). Patients We obtained complete data on 25 071 subjects, of whom 6507 were current smokers and 18 564 were non-smokers who underwent a baseline examination from 1991–1996. Main outcome measures During a mean follow-up time of 12 years, 1049 deaths (346 cardiovascular deaths and 492 cancer deaths) and 802 incident CVD events occurred among current smokers. Results The major allele (A) of rs4923461 was significantly associated with ever having smoked (p=0.03) and high BMI (p=0.001). The A-allele was associated with risk of all-cause (HR=1.12, 95% CI 1.00 to 1.25; p<0.05) and CVD (HR=1.23, 95% CI 1.01 to 1.49; p=0.04) mortality. There was no significant association between the rs4923461 and cancer mortality or CVD incidence. Conclusions Our data suggest that smoking- and obesity-associated variation of the BDNF gene affects the risk of death, especially due to cardiovascular causes, in smokers. Determination of the BDNF genotype in smokers may guide the need for smoking cessation interventions.


With the rising interest in autonomous vehicles, developing radio access technologies (RATs) that enable reliable and low-latency vehicular communications has become of paramount importance. Dedicated short-range communications (DSRCs) and cellular V2X (C-V2X) are two present-day technologies that are capable of supporting day-1 vehicular applications. However, these RATs fall short of supporting communication requirements of many advanced vehicular applications, which are believed to be critical in enabling fully autonomous vehicles. Both the DSRC and C-V2X are undergoing extensive enhancements in order to support advanced vehicular applications that are characterized by high reliability, low latency, and high throughput requirements. These RAT evolutions—the IEEE 802.11bd for the DSRC and NR V2X for C-V2X—can supplement today's vehicular sensors in enabling autonomous driving. In this paper, we survey the latest developments in the standardization of 802.11bd and NR V2X. We begin with a brief description of the two present-day vehicular RATs. In doing so, we highlight their inability to guarantee the quality of service requirements of many advanced vehicular applications. We then look at the two RAT evolutions, i.e., the IEEE 802.11bd and NR V2X, outline their objectives, describe their salient features, and provide an in-depth description of key mechanisms that enable these features. While both, the IEEE 802.11bd and NR V2X, are in their initial stages of development, we shed light on their preliminary performance projections and compare and contrast the two evolutionary RATs with their respective predecessors.


Acute HIV-1 infection depletes CD4(+) T cells in gut-associated lymphoid tissue (GALT). The failure of containment of local viral replication, and consequent CD4(+) T cell depletion, might be due to delayed mobilization of effector CD8(+) T cells or absence of functioning HIV-1-specific CD8(+) T cell effectors within GALT. No studies have addressed human intestinal HIV-1-specific CD8(+) T cell functions. We sought to determine whether functional HIV-1-specific CTL were present in GALT and whether the repertoire differed from HIV-1-specific CTL isolated from peripheral blood mononuclear cells. From three HIV-1-infected subjects, we isolated HIV-1-specific CD8(+) T cells expressing the mucosal lymphocyte integrin CD103 from GALT. These antigen-specific effector cells could be expanded in vitro and lysed target cells in an MHC class I-restricted manner. HIV-1-specific CTL could be isolated from both duodenal and rectal GALT sites, indicating that CD8(+) effectors were widespread through GALT tissue. The breadth and antigenic specificities of GALT CTL appeared to differ from those in peripheral blood in some cases. In summary, we found HIV-1-specific CD8(+) effector T cells in GALT, despite HIV-1-induced CD4(+) T cell lymphopenia. This suggests that HIV-1-specific CTL in gut tissue can be maintained with limited CD4(+) T cell help.


Background: Road traffic accidents (RTAs) are a preventable cause of death. The government of India enacted the motor vehicle amendment (MVA) act on September 01, 2019, to curtail the alarming trend of RTAs and their associated fatality. The study objective was to compare the epidemiology and pattern of fatal RTAs before and after the MVA Act 2019 of India. Methods: An autopsy-based cross-sectional study was conducted at the Department of Forensic Medicine and Toxicology (FMT) of a tertiary-care hospital from March 2019 to February 2020. The sample comprised 75 fatal RTA victims who underwent postmortem at FMT. Patients were studied in two groups: One pre-MVA group (n = 47) and one Post-MVA group (n = 28). The data were obtained from medical records and inquest reports with autopsy correlation. Data pertaining to sociodemographic profile, mechanism, injury profile including injury-severity-score (ISS) and survival-time was recorded. Results: There was a 40.4% decline in mortality among RTA victims (P = 0.057) in the post-MVA group. The case fatality rate also declined during post-MVA implementation months compared to pre-MVA months (1.61 vs. 1.96). A significant correlation was noted between the ISS and survival-time of victims (P < 0.001, r = −0.522). The mean age of patients was 39.87 ± 17.44 years. Heavy motor vehicles along with motorized two-wheeler were the most common offending-vehicle. The median ISS of all victims was 41 (33–57). Head injury was the most common cause of death (60%). Conclusion: Study results signal-toward early triumph of the new MVA act, probably due to enhanced adherence to safety gears and constructive behavioral change.


In mice, weaning stress increases intestinal permeability partly through a mechanism that involves TNF-α, intestinally-produced glucocorticoids, and myosin like chain kinase (MLCK). Recent evidence suggests that this interplay takes place predominantly in the colonic mucosa and has long-lasting effects on intestinal development and function. Interestingly, the impact of weaning-induced intestinal dysfunction is inversely correlated to age at weaning. However, little is known about the impact that pre-weaning growth has on postweaning gut permeability and animal performance. The aim of this experiment was to investigate the effect of pre-weaning growth on intestinal permeability and underlying regulatory pathways. To this end, 18 piglets ((LW × LD) × Pietrain) were weighed and identified at birth. At weaning (21 d of age) piglets were divided into 2 groups (n = 9): fast growers (FG) or slow growers (SG) according to their growth rate from birth to weaning. Thereafter, piglets were housed individually and fed ad libitum non-medicated pre-starter (21–35 d) and starter (35–56 d) feeds. Individual BW and feed intake were registered weekly. On Day 56, plasma for cortisol determination and recovery of permeability markers (Co-EDTA and mannitol) was obtained 1 h after marker intragastric infusion. Immediately after, ascendant colon samples were harvested for measurement of cortisol, TNF-α and MLCK mRNA in colonic mucosa. Performance data were analyzed with a mixed-effect model with repeated measures in which pig was treated as random and treatment, week and its interaction were considered fixed effects. Pigs in the SG group had a lower pre-weaning growth rate (181 vs. 208 ± 13.1 g/d; P < 0.04) and BW at d 21 (6.0 vs. 6.3 ± 0.005 kg; P < 0.05) than FG counterparts. At d 56, plasma cortisol was not different between groups. However, the ratio Co/mannitol in plasma was higher in SG than FG (28.7 vs. 11.9 ± 13.0; P < 0.001). In addition, SG pigs had a higher concentration of cortisol (20.0 vs. 2.5 ± 2.7 ng/mg of protein; P < 0.001) and TNF-a (0.15 vs. 0.09 ± 0.01 ng/mg of protein; P < 0.001) in the colonic mucosa. Interestingly, abundance of MLCK mRNA in colon mucosa was 35% lower (P < 0.05) in FG compared with SG. In conclusion, pre-weaning growth rate has a long-lasting impact on gut permeability and the mechanism underlying this phenomenon appears to be regulated locally at the colon epithelium.


Cardiac amyloidosis of transthyretin type in the elderly may be senile or familial. The senile form is not typically associated with specific genetic changes. However, the familial form is and also occurs more frequently in African Americans than in the general population. One transthyretin mutation, V122I, is common in the African-American population, has a carrier frequency of 4%, and has marked cardiac specificity. Symptoms generally develop in the eighth and ninth decades. Here, we report the case of a 60-year-old African-American man who had a 2-year history of dyspnea and diffuse left ventricular wall thickening. Endomyocardial biopsy showed interstitial deposits of amorphous material confirmed as amyloid by Congo red staining and electron microscopy. Mass spectrometry showed a shift in protein mass of 14 d, indicative of transthyretin and confirming the production of abnormal protein. Bidirectional whole gene sequencing showed a homozygous mutation leading to a valine 122 isoleucine substitution (V122I). The 14-d mass shift observed using mass spectrometry is consistent with the V122I mutation. Homozygosity for the V122I mutation may be associated with earlier onset of cardiac disease. Transthyretin analysis should be considered for older African Americans with amyloid heart disease of transthyretin type. (J Mol Diagn 2007,


In Ports in a Storm a team of Harvard Kennedy School scholars focus diverse conceptual lenses on a single high-stakes management task --enhancing port security across the United States. Their aims are two: to understand how a public manager might confront that complex undertaking, and to explore the similarities, differences, and complementarities of their alternative approaches to public management. The book takes as its pivot point the singular case of U.S. Coast Guard Captain Suzanne Englebert and her leadership of efforts to secure America's ports after the September 11 attacks. The Coast Guard had always been responsible for securing America's ports and coastline. But now it was tasked with safeguarding these critical, complex, and vulnerable assets during a time of war, a job it clearly could not handle alone. Ports in a Storm considers the monumental challenge of driving rapid change in a complex system involving hundreds of private organizations and scores of government agencies with their operations intricately intertwined. The book examines Englebert's actions from varied conceptual vantage points, sometimes critiquing questionable calls but more often celebrating her initiative, creativity, persistence, and skill. The authors use the Coast Guard episode as a testing ground for the eclectic intellectual constructs they have been developing to guide public managers. Instead of starting with theory and searching for examples that fit, they begin with the concrete and then harness scholarship to the service of better practice. And rather than mimic management principles from the business world, they tailor their approach to the very different challenges of managing in a public sector context. The volume allows readers in both the scholarly and practical worlds to see how the theories measure up. Contributors, including the two volume editors, are Robert D. Behn, John D. Donahue, Archon Fung, Stephen Goldsmith, Elaine Kamarck, Herman B. Leonard, Mark H. Moore, Malcolm K. Sparrow, Pamela Varley, and Richard Zeckhauser.


Current changes in the Taiwan's Teacher Education Law has brought forth new and diverse outlook on Taiwan's teacher education. The law aims at breaking the traditional conservative approach on teacher education; a provision which allow students of non-education degree (as oppose to graduates of normal colleges) to pursue teaching credentials, hence providing a more diverse choice in teacher selection. However, the over expansion of schools who provide such kind of teaching credentials, has resulted in the over saturation of the market with surplus workforce, thus leading to extreme competition of the job market and the appearance of the concept of teachers without regular jobs , vagabond teachers , or just simply displaced teachers . This phenomenon is being herald as the resulting problem of the Taiwan's Teacher Education Law, however, few studies has been conducted on such relevant issues. Therefore, in order to further understand the issue, this case study shall focus on the so-called displaced teachers' educational beliefs and the factors that may affect the teachers' choice of career. Individual semi-structured interviews were conducted on twelve (12) displaced teachers, to understand the impact of educational beliefs on their attitude in facing the intense career competition. Result shows that there is a direct correlation between the teachers' current career choice and their initial educational beliefs. Findings shall serve as a point of reference for contemporary visions on future teacher education policy.


This essay was originally published in 1953 in the Southern Economic Journal. Clarence Philbrook (1909–1978) proclaims as his point of departure "the rule of love," "universal love," and asks the central question of comparative institutions: Does undermining the liberal system of free enterprise, by pervasive government intervention—the awe-filling trend of his era—really better serve the rule of love? He contends that interventionism and extensive government serve the rule of love less well than capitalism does: "capitalism does less violence to the rule of love than would any other system so far conceived." For that position he mounts a case that is noteworthy in many respects, but especially for the great emphasis he puts on system "signals"—a term he uses 17 times—"signals to tell individuals what they are to contribute toward the performance of some social function." It had been only recently, in 1945, that contemplating system performance in terms of its "communication" had gotten started, by Friedrich Hayek. Here Philbrook boldly asks us to think in terms of pieces of communication, signals, in assessing how well institutional systems serve the rule of love.


We present the results of a numerical investigation of the turbulent kinematic dynamo problem in a high Prandtl number regime. The scales of the magnetic turbulence we consider are far smaller than the Kolmogorov dissipative scale, so that the magnetic wavepackets evolve in a nearly smooth velocity field. Firstly, we use a stochastic Euler-Maruyama method to simulate the Kraichnan-Kazantsev model (KKM) in which the strain matrix is taken to be independent of coordinate and Gaussian white in time. We test the theoretical predictions for the growth of rates of the magnetic energy and higher order moments (Kazantsev 1968; Chertkov et al. 1999; Kulsrud & Anderson 1992), the shape of the energy spectrum (Schekochihin et al. 2002a; Kazantsev 1968; Nazarenko et al. 2003; Kulsrud & Anderson 1992) and the behavior of the polarization and spectral flatness, new measures introduced in Nazarenko et al. (2003). In general, the results appear to be in good agreement with the theory, with the exception that the predicted decay of the polarization in time is not reproduced well in the stochastic numerics. Secondly, in order to study the sensitivity of the KKM predictions to the choice of strain statistics, we perform additional simulations for the case of a Gaussian strain with a finite correlation time and also for a strain taken from a DNS data set. These experiments are based on non-stochastic schemes, using a timestep that is much smaller than the correlation time of the strain. We find that the KKM is generally insensitive to the choice of strain statistics and most KKM results, including the decay of the polarization, are reproduced well. The only exception appears to be the flatness whose spectrum is not reproduced in accordance with the KKM predictions in these simulations.


In rats shuttling between a variably placed landmark of origin and a fixed goal, place fields of hippocampal CA1 cells encode location in two spatial reference frames. On the initial part of the outbound journey, place fields encode location with respect to the origin while on the final segment, place fields are aligned with the goal (Gothard et al., 1996b). An abrupt switch of reference frame can be induced experimentally by shortening the distance between the origin and the goal. Two linked hypotheses concerning this effect were addressed: (1) that the persistent, landmark-referenced firing results from some internal dynamic process (e.g., path integration or "momentum") and is not a result of maintained sensory input from the landmark of origin; and (2) that this hypothetical process is generated by connections either within CA3 or between CA3 and CA1, in which case the effect might be absent from the dentate gyrus. Neuronal ensemble recordings were made simultaneously from CA1 and the dentate gyrus as rats shuttled on a linear track between a variably located box and a goal, under light or dark conditions. The box-referenced firing persisted significantly longer in the dark in both hippocampal subfields, suggesting a competitive interaction between an internal dynamic process and external sensory cues. The similarity between reference frame transitions in the dentate gyrus and the CA1 region suggests that this process probably occurs before CA3, possibly in the entorhinal cortex or subiculum.