The tragic events of 2001/9/11 threw the United States into a state of anti-terrorism war. From that moment onwards multiple acts, laws and regulations have been approved not only in the US but worldwide aiming to regulate the security in the border inspections. Its goal: preventing any hazardous or even suspicious material from crossing the border of the country. This paper deals with the effects of installing scanning facilities in an already operating seaport terminal, and assesses what would the best number and placement of the equipment in terms of cost and quality of the service provided. The assessment is conducted by means of a simulation model of the delivery and receipt process of the terminal where different scenarios have been introduced, depending on the scanners performance as well as whether complimentary buffer areas are used or not in order to balance (or attenuate) the truck arrivals at the terminal. The model and scenarios are conducted using data from a real semiautomatic terminal in Barcelona in its construction stage.


Problem-solving courts (PSCs) are a critical part of a societal effort to mitigate the opioid epidemic's devastating consequences. This paper reports on a national survey of PSCs (N = 42 state-wide court coordinators; N = 849 local court coordinators) and examines the structural factors that could explain the likelihood of a local PSC authorizing medication-assisted treatment (MAT) and MAT utilization. Results of the analyses indicate that MAT availability at the county level was a significant predictor of the likelihood of local courts authorizing MAT. The court's location in a Medicaid expansion state was also a significant predictor of local courts allowing buprenorphine and methadone, but not naltrexone. Problem-solving courts are in the early stages of supporting the use of medications, even when funding is available through Medicaid expansion policies. Adoption and use of treatment innovations like MAT are affected by coordinators' perceptions of MAT as well as structural factors such as the availability of the medications in the community and funding resources. The study has important implications for researchers, policymakers, and practitioners.


The objective of this study was to evaluate the effects of ractopamine supplementation, castration method, and their interaction on the behavioral and physiological response to preslaughter stress and carcass and meat quality of 2 Piétrain genotypes. A total of 1,488 male pigs (115 ± 5 kg BW) were distributed according to a 2 × 2 × 2 factorial arrangement of treatments. The first factor was ractopamine supplementation with 2 groups of pigs (376 and 380 pigs each) receiving 7.5 mg/kg of ractopamine (RAC) or not (NRAC) in their diet during the last 28 d of the finishing period. The second factor was castration method, with 744 surgical castrates (SC) and 744 immunized males (IM), and the third factor was the genotype with 2 crossbreeds containing 50% (genotype A, GA; n = 744) or 25% (genotype B, GB; n = 744) Piétrain genetics. Surgical castration took place at 2 d of age, whereas immunization against gonadotropin-releasing factor (GnRF) was performed through 2 subcutaneous injections of GnRF analog (Improvest, 2 mL) at 10 and 4 wk before slaughter. At loading more vocal stimulation was needed by the handler to drive GB pigs forward through the farm alley (P = 0.01) and RAC-fed GB pigs through the ramp (P = 0.02). Feeding RAC to IM increased the number of fights in lairage compared with SC (P = 0.03). Feeding RAC shortened fighting bouts compared with NRAC pigs (P = 0.05). The SC-GA pigs showed a greater gastrointestinal tract temperature during unloading (P = 0.05) and lairage time (P = 0.03). Blood creatine kinase (CK) concentrations were greater (P = 0.04) in SC compared with IM, and no difference was found in the concentrations of stress hormones in urine collected postmortem. Dressing yield was greater (P = 0.01) in RAC and SC-GB pigs. Carcasses from RAC pigs and IM were leaner than those from NRAC and SC pigs (P < 0.001 and P = 0.002, respectively). Feeding RAC to IM increased drip loss in the LM (P = 0.05). Warner-Bratzler shear force values were slightly greater in the LM from RAC-GB pigs and from IM compared with SC (P = 0.01 and P < 0.001, respectively) and in the semimembranosus muscle of RAC pigs (P = 0.006). In conclusion, immunization against GnRF more than the use of Piétrain genotypes appears to be a viable alternative to the use of ractopamine, as it seems to promote production of lean carcasses without compromising animal welfare and pork quality.


This essay addresses two questions: (1) Is the search for scientific truth a self-sufficient activity? or (2) Does scientific right reasoning depend upon a form of truth-telling that lies beyond the limits of scientific investigation? Put differently, is there a sense of metaphysics as a form of human culture that is the embodiment of this general sense of truth-telling? The answers to these questions involve the relationship of science, philosophy, and metaphysics. As a means for answering them I wish first to examine Ernst Cassirer's conception of science as a symbolic form. Then I wish to join this conception with Giambattista Vico's conception of metaphysical narration. Cassirer understands science, like culture, as arising from the distinctively human power to form the world through symbols. Scientific truth depends upon a particular use of this power of symbolic formation that exists within that system of symbolic forms we call culture. Vico understands the "civil world," or culture itself, to arise from a special sense of imagination (fantasia) that forms universals within its narrations. Within these narrations are stated the primordial truths of human culture upon which science is later to depend. My aim is to put Cassirer's conception of science together with Vico's conception of metaphysical narration. It is a long-standing point that scientific thinking involves metaphysical presuppositions. My interest is not in the interconnection of science and metaphysics as a traditional logical or epistemological question, but in their interconnections as cultural activities. I wish to approach this through Vico's original association of metaphysical knowledge with the basic human act of narrating a truth. I Science as Symbolic Form. Cassirer's notion of the symbol is a transformation of the Kantian notion of the "schema," that is, the notion of a "sensuous-intellectual form" that lies at the basis of knowledge. Kant reaches this notion of a schema through a process of making distinctions within his transcendental analysis of the elements of experience. Cassirer wishes to find this schema in experience as a phenomenon. He does so in his discovery of the symbol as the medium through which all knowledge and culture occur. Cassirer understands his philosophy as an idealism that he, in fact, traces back to the problem of form in Plato, but he insists that the object of which he speaks is truly "there." It is not a creation of the mind of the knower. This is a point on which he insisted in a lecture to the Warburg Institute in 1936, "Critical Idealism as a Philosophy of Culture," and later, to his students at Yale in the 1940s.(1) The notion of the perceptual object as something "there" being pregnant at the same time with something that is "not there" Cassirer connects to Leibniz's term praegnans futuri, as well as to the psychology of perception. In his full phenomenology of knowledge (Erkenntnis), which Cassirer claims derives most directly from Hegel rather than Kant or Husserl, he distinguishes three basic functions of consciousness.(2) These might be thought of as basic ways in which sensory content is symbolically pregnant for the knowing consciousness. The expressive function or Ausdrucksfunktion does not separate knower and known. It forms the object mimetically. It is the object "felt" and portrayed as a benign or malignant force. Culturally this function is developed in the symbolic form of myth. The representational function or Darsteuungsfunktion enacts a separation of knower and known. It is typified by the analogical power to "liken" things into groups, to develop a referential relation between knower and known and attain a logic of classification of objects. Cassirer sees this as tied to the powers of language, of logos as separated from mythos. This is the power of language to organize the world as a system of discrete objects. The significative function or Bedeutungsfunktion is the power of the knower freely to construct symbol systems through which the known can be ordered and which themselves can become elements in wider systems of symbols. …


Objective To identify priorities for the delivery of community-based Child and Adolescent Mental health Services (CAMHS). Design (1) Qualitative methods to gather public and professional opinions regarding the key principles and components of effective service delivery. (2) Two-round, two-panel adapted Delphi study. The Delphi method was adapted so professionals received additional feedback about the public panel scores. Descriptive statistics were computed. Items rated 8–10 on a scale of importance by ≥80% of both panels were identified as shared priorities. Setting Eastern region of England. Participants (1) 53 members of the public; 95 professionals from the children's workforce. (2) Two panels. Public panel: round 1,n=23; round 2,n=16. Professional panel: round 1,n=44; round 2,n=33. Results 51 items met the criterion for between group consensus. Thematic grouping of these items revealed three key findings: the perceived importance of schools in mental health promotion and prevention of mental illness; an emphasis on how specialist mental health services are delivered rather than what is delivered (ie, specific treatments/programmes), and the need to monitor and evaluate service impact against shared outcomes that reflect well-being and function, in addition to the mere absence of mental health symptoms or disorders. Conclusions Areas of consensus represent shared priorities for service provision in the East of England. These findings help to operationalise high level plans for service transformation in line with the goals and needs of those using and working in the local system and may be particularly useful for identifying gaps in ongoing transformation efforts. More broadly, the method used here offers a blueprint that could be replicated by other areas to support the ongoing transformation of CAMHS.


A comparative study was conducted to compare two approaches to engineering design curriculum across different schools (inter-school) and across two curricula Project Lead the Way and Engineering Projects in Community Service (inter-curricula). The researchers collected curricula material including handouts, lesson plans, guides, presentation files, design descriptions, problem statements, and support guides. The researchers conducted observations in the classrooms to collect qualitative indicators of engineering/technology reasoning, collect data on the nature of students' questions, how students define problems, and operate within the constraints of a design problem. Todd R. Kelley, Ph.D. is an assistant professor in the Department of Industrial Technology at Purdue University. He can be reached at firstname.lastname@example.com. Mr. Daniel C. Brenner is a high school teacher at Bartlett High School. He can be reached at firstname.lastname@example.com. Mr. Jon T. Pieper is a graduate student in the Engineering/Technology Education program at Purdue University. He can be reached at email@example.com. 6 JOURNAL OF STEM TEACHER EDUCATION Observational protocol studies were conducted on students participating in Project Lead the Way curriculum programs and with students participating in Engineering Projects in Community Service (EPICS). Students were asked to work through an ill-defined problem, in this case the problem of creating a new playground for an elementary school. The data from these protocols were analyzed using a coding process; a list of universal technical mental processes (Halfin,1973) and a computer program OPTEMP, (Hill,1997) to accurately record frequency and time of each mental process employed by the students. The data from the protocol results were used to identify common cognitive strategies employed by the students to determine where these students placed greatest emphasis throughout the observational protocol. General findings indicated that participants in the EPICS-High program were more solution-driven problem solvers, where the Project Lead the Way participants were generally problem-driven as defined by Kruger & Cross (2006). Additionally, the participants in both groups had completed advanced courses in mathematics, very little mathematics was employed (less than 3%) to describe constraints of the problem or predict results of proposed solutions. Over half of the students became fixated at some point on the provided picture. (Smith; Ward; & Schumacher, 1993). This study provides important insight about how students solve ill-defined problems, providing vital information for technology education as it seeks to implement engineering design.


The study focuses on artists who adopt performance art as a form of creative expression within the world of contemporary visual art. Some performances are extreme exhibitions which often assume violent and aggressive forms; others are quasi-visible events like communication misunderstandings or reiterated behaviors which make the flow of ordinary interaction unusual and sometimes create a feeling of anxiety in the audience. There are of course basic differences between these kinds of performance; nevertheless, in the case of both the most spectacular events and «minimal performances», the artist acts at the borderline of what is explainable, and his/her artistic practices highlight the need to traverse the frontiers between traditional genres, mixing them up or forsaking them. A performance essentially consists in the creation of an interactive event, and artists manage the central elements of the interactive order: the dimension which, according to Erving Goffman, represents a reality in itself, possesses its own logic, and cannot be reduced either to macro-structural dimensions or to individual psychology. The topic of the research reported here can be summarized in the following question: how is it possible to turn a «social interaction» into an «artistic object»? The answer can be articulated on different dimensions: how a performance is projected, arranged and carried out; what happens during performance events; how such events can be recorded and conserved. A performance results from cooperation among a group of people which cannot be defined as a «system»: there are no formal roles, there are no fixed positions, there are no decisional centers. Nevertheless, the basic elements are in place for it to be possible to talk of the existence of an interactional unit: different social actors act together in an intentional, reiterated and settled manner. It is possible to find a great number of events which take place on specific sites and during which artists, venue managers, critics, collectors and performance audiences meet, work together, and share their interests. It is thus possible to use the term «sphere» to refer to a place to which admittance is granted only after an initiation process and rite of passage. In such «spheres» people follow careers based on internal, formal and informal hierarchical ladders. Moreover, there are subjects who act as gatekeepers, and myths and symbols are shared. The research was conducted in Northern Italy, where several towns were selected as central nodes in the Italian contemporary art field. I conducted in-depth interviews with subjects occupying the three main roles in the artistic field: artists, venue managers and curators, and art critics. The selection of the interviewees was based on their strategic position in the field. My purpose was to investigate the node that they occupied in the art world by combining two criteria: first, the spatial position of the environment in which they lived and worked (marginal, peripheral, central); second, the stage of their professional career (beginning, emerging, established).


The Hydraulic Fracturing process and its engineering applications have been studied and reported in this thesis. The Distinct Element Method (DEM) was adopted as the main and preferred numerical technique because of its distinctive features and advantages. This method allows the phenomenon to be modelled and viewed microscopically at the inter-particle level by conceptualising the rock mass as an assembly of discrete particles interacting with each other via contacts. This method allows for a more detailed and dynamic monitoring of the hydraulic fracturing process.

Sequel to a detailed review on the study of the hydraulic fracturing phenomenon, the research was extended to investigate specific cases of applications of hydraulic fracturing in geo-mechanical and environmental problems. Examples of such cases include carbon dioxide injection and storage in a reservoir system, and the behaviour of naturally occurring faults subjected to hydrostatic fluid pressures. The key factors governing the geo-mechanical responses of porous media (rocks), including reservoir formations were identified and further examined to ascertain the following: the role and inter-relationship between operating and material/fluid variables such as injection flow rate, fluid pressure, and interstitial velocity; type and pattern of fracture propagation; influence of environmental conditions as well as the configuration of the well-reservoir system, amongst others.

Because of broad similarities in enabling conditions, analyses and applications of the phenomenon were also extended to study the sand production process. However, since the emphasis of the study was on identifying and examining the controlling variables as well as establishing patterns of sanding production rates rather than the study of the cavitation process, investigations were conducted using a finite element procedure; moreover, the limit of computational capacity has prevented a large scale DEM model for such problems. Modelling results show that fracturing mode, pattern and intensity are highly dependent on operating and environmental conditions; the reservoir erosion processes also indicate likewise tendencies. The numerical modelling techniques adopted and results obtained facilitate an improved understanding of geo-mechanical mechanisms at sub-surface systems, and could be further improved for industrial applications, such as site evaluation and assessment of the efficiency of stimulation techniques.


Modern societies appear to be unthinkable without intense exchange across geographical distances, without extensive mobilities of people, goods, ideas and information (Canzler et al. 2008: 1). While, in pre-modernity, spatial mobility had been associated with insecurity and danger (…), in modernity, mobility (…) gradually turned into a common right claimed among equals." (Rammler 2008: 61). Thus, the continuous increase of mobility associated with a continuous increase of progress, freedom and autonomy appears to be the still valid promise of modernity. However, the present threat of climate change and the finite nature of fossil and other nonrenewable energy fuels, as well as issues of global justice, question the possibility of prolonging a growth of mobility into the future. On the level of cities and communities also, motorised traffic produces increasingly negative impacts on the social and spatial level. Moreover, what is commonly understood as a freedom turns more and more into the compulsion to move. This tension between two major human goals in relation to mobility, which we label provisionally 'freedom' and 'sustainability', form the point of departure of our short explorative paper. In order to untangle the herein contained strands of values and arguments, we will firstly sketch the connection between capitalist growth and increase of movement of goods, information and people. Secondly, we will look more closely at the association of mobility and freedom and argue that it is a very specific concept of freedom – the nuclear individual, freed of spatial and social bonds – which constitutes the basis of this mobility-as-freedom ideology. In regards to the social and ecological costs of this mobility dispositiv, we will thirdly make an attempt to think of future mobilities in a new, utopian way drawing on examples from history and literature, through which we hope to better reconcile freedom and sustainability.


OBJECTIVEDiffuse intrinsic pontine glioma (DIPG) is a highly aggressive and lethal brainstem tumor in children. In the 1980s, routine biopsy at presentation was abandoned since it was claimed "unnecessary" for diagnosis. In the last decade, however, several groups have reincorporated this procedure as standard of care or in the context of clinical trials. Expert neurosurgical teams report no mortality and acceptable morbidity, and no relevant complications have been previously described. The aim of this study was to review needle tract dissemination as a potential complication in DIPG.METHODSThe authors retrospectively analyzed the incidence of dissemination through surgical tracts in DIPG patients who underwent biopsy procedures at diagnosis in 3 dedicated centers. Clinical records and images as well as radiation dosimetry from diagnosis to relapse were reviewed.RESULTSFour patients (2 boys and 2 girls, age range 6-12 years) had surgical tract dissemination: in 3 cases in the needle tract and in 1 case in the Ommaya catheter tract. The median time from biopsy to identification of dissemination was 5 months (range 4-6 months). The median overall survival was 11 months (range 7-12 months). Disseminated lesions were in the marginal radiotherapy field (n = 2), out of the field (n = 1), and in the radiotherapy field (n = 1).CONCLUSIONSAlthough surgical tract dissemination in DIPG is a rare complication (associated with 2.4% of procedures in this study), it should be mentioned to patients and family when procedures involving a surgical tract are proposed. The inclusion of the needle tract in the radiotherapy field may have only limited benefit. Future studies are warranted to explore the benefit of larger radiotherapy fields in patients with DIPG.


We propose a practical non-episodic PSRL algorithm that unlike recent state-of-the-art PSRL algorithms uses a deterministic, model-independent episode switching schedule. Our algorithm termed deterministic schedule PSRL (DS-PSRL) is efficient in terms of time, sample, and space complexity. We prove a Bayesian regret bound under mild assumptions. Our result is more generally applicable to multiple parameters and continuous state action problems. We compare our algorithm with state-of-the-art PSRL algorithms on standard discrete and continuous problems from the literature. Finally, we show how the assumptions of our algorithm satisfy a sensible parameterization for a large class of problems in sequential recommendations.


Diseases of the thoracic aorta are increasing in prevalence. In the UK, there has been a steady rise in admissions for thoracic aortic dissection (TAD) from 7.2 to 8.8 per 100 000 population over the last decade.1 At the same time, admissions for thoracic aortic aneurysms (TAA) have increased from 4.4 to 9.0 per 100 000. Thoracic aortic disease is deadly; most patients with TAA are likely to die of a complication attributable to their aneurysm, accounting for up to 47 000 deaths annually in the USA.2 TAD affecting the ascending aorta has a 30-day mortality of 25–50%.3 The increase in numbers of patients presenting with disease of the thoracic aorta is predominantly due to an increase in elderly patients, over 75 years of age.1 This means that the upward trend is likely to continue as the population ages, and that these patients are more likely to suffer from multiple additional comorbid conditions, presenting greater challenges for clinicians. In the face of this increasing problem, our understanding of the pathophysiology and natural history of this condition remains poor. Aortic disease is readily amenable to treatment; mortality rates for surgery and thoracic endovascular aortic repair (TEVAR) are low, and in fact, overall mortality rates for patients hospitalised with thoracic aortic disease are decreasing.1 However, there is wide variation in the management of these patients; in the UK, the number of complex aortic surgical procedures varies widely between cardiac centres despite comparable geographical populations (figure 1). This reflects uncertainty as to the appropriate indications for, and modality of treatment. In this edition …


In the year 2011, the first wave of the baby boom generation reached age 65, the age of retirement. Over the next 18 years the U. S. Administration on Aging (2010) reports that these boomers will turn 65 years old at the rate of approximately 8,000 per day. Substance abuse among this cohort has been called an invisible and silent epidemic. Many social service agencies will have to deal with the negative and complicating factors which substance abuse causes. Alcohol and substance misuse among the elderly is associated with many negative consequences, including functional impairment, increase risk of dementia, raised mortality and higher utilization of healthcare services. In addition, it is estimated that 4.4 million adults age 50 and older will be substance dependent and in need of treatment by the year 2020. The focus of this clinical research project was to evaluate the Senior Recovery Program and how effective the program is at meeting its goals through the eyes of its participants. The researcher measured former clients overall satisfaction with the Senior Recovery Program by assessing their perceptions of sobriety maintenance, age appropriate program design, relationship with family, social skills and support and overall program satisfaction. Findings of this program evaluation indicated the Senior Recovery Program is effective in delivering quality chemical health recovery services to older adults through the focus of five areas of service. This program evaluation will add to the research collection and improve understanding and needs of older adults who require substance abuse treatment. OLDER ADULTS AND SUBSTANCE ABUSE: A PROGRAM EVALUATION 3


Synopsis The paper presents some of the results of a recent survey of the whole ophiolite complex and the adjacent basement. It combines previously published work with new field, petrographic and chemical results obtained principally from the mafic components of the ophiolite and offers an outline account of the evolution of the complex. The Shetland Ophiolite Complex occupies the largest part of the islands of Unst and Fetlar, part of the Shetland Islands lying north of Scotland. The complex is composed of two ophiolitic nappes, a lower nappe and an overlying upper nappe represented by erosional remnant klippen. The nappes are separated by and underlain by, imbricate zones of basement gneisses, ophiolitic rocks, metavolcanic and ophiolite-debris-bearing metasedimentary rocks. The lower nappe presents a 7 km continuous section through the ophiolite succession from a 2 km thick layer of mantle to the base of the sheeted dyke zone. The mantle layer has been uniformly and pervasively lizardite serpentinized (metaharzburgite), but has later been recrystallized to antigorite in a 100 m zone immediately above the basal obduction thrust. It is considered that obduction took place cold (<500°). Immediately below the obduction thrust are hornblende schists in a relationship to the nappe usually interpreted as a dynamothermal aureole in underlying volcanic rocks caused by obduction over them of hot nappe. However the Shetland hornblende schist is seen to be of MORB composition and to have been intruded up the obduction thrust into the serpentinized nappe, where it became hydrated and crystallized as hornblende schist. Above the metaharzburgite layer are successive layers of metadunite and metagabbro in igneous contact and each up to 2.5 km thick. The y are uniformly and pervasively hydrated to lizardite serpentinite and to amphibole and saussurite respectively. The absence of an intervening cumulate layered unit implies the lack of a magma chamber so that sheeted dykes and metamicrogabbros forming the uppermost levels in the lower nappe cannot have been derived from within the nappe. Also they are of compositions distinctly different to that of the metagabbro. Some of the dykes are of boninitic composition and more primitive than the metagabbro. Hornblende from the hornblende schists in the obduction thrust has given an age of c. 500 Ma for the obduction. The uniformity and complete nature of the hydration of the nappe and the absence of any evidence that hydration was based on fractures needed to allow sea-water penetration is considered to preclude hydration when the ophiolitic slab formed sea-floor. It is suggested that the slab was first subducted to the east and hydrated by water driven upwards within the slab from lower levels and that the magmas forming the sheeted dykes and metamicrogabbro were created by water escaping from the slab into the overlying mantle wedge, followed by their intrusion into the slab from above. Closure of Baltica against Laurentia reversed the subduction and obducted the slab westwards onto Laurentia at about the same time that the older western Norwegian ophiolites were obducted eastwards onto Baltica. A period of subaerial erosion and deposition followed, during which sediments containing ophiolitic debris and volcanic rocks were deposited on the surface of the obducted nappe. Then further pressure from the east thrust a section of the already obducted slab westwards over the lower nappe and its cover of sediments to form the upper nappe, dragging with it slices of underlying ophiolite and basement to form the imbricate zone between the two nappes. The nappe pile was thrust further west-wards to form an imbricate zone beneath the pile and fold, deform and metamorphose the rocks of the imbricate zones. It is possible that the emplacement of the upper nappe coincided with the final closure of Baltica against Laurentia and the eastwards obduction of the younger west Norwegian ophiolites during the Scandian orogeny.


Research indicates that tobacco cessation rates are at least doubled when smokers receive assistance from a clinician; receiving tobacco cessation advice from multiple types of clinicians increases quit rates even further.1 To address a decades-long deficiency in the tobacco cessation training of health professionals in general, a shared curriculum, Rx for Change: Clinician-Assisted Tobacco Cessation, was developed in 1999 as a collaboration of the schools of pharmacy in California.2,3 Between 2003 and 2005, pharmacy faculty members (n=191) participated in national train-the-trainer workshops designed to equip faculty with the necessary knowledge and skills to implement the Rx for Change curriculum at their academic institutions.4 The studies that comprise this dissertation are a logical extension of this national initiative, applying a mixed-methods approach to: (a) evaluate the long-term impact of training pharmacy faculty using the Rx for Change program, (b) delineate recommendations for developing and disseminating shared curricula for health-care programs, and (c) evaluate utilization of the Rx for Change website, which hosts faculty resources and curricular files for download. In combination, these (along with a previously-conducted qualitative study) provide a comprehensive "view" of the long-term impact of this unique shared curriculum. Results from the three studies provided evidence for: (1) reach to the majority of pharmacy institutions, (2) a high level of adoption of the Rx for Change in health professional schools, (3) a positive impact on faculty trainees' careers and their level of confidence for teaching, precepting clinical students, and assisting tobacco users, (4) implementation of the Rx for Change curriculum with a variety of teaching methodologies, and (5) continuity of use within the core curriculum of pharmacy institutions. Seven key factors were found to have contributed to the success of the Rx for Change program, and thus the following are recommended for future shared curriculum developers: (1) appeal to attendees, (2) relate content to clinical practice, (3) deliver live training (in-person), (4) develop high quality materials delivered by experts, (5) meet accreditation standards, (6) provide support for teaching, and (7) demonstrate effectiveness. Data from the website analysis provided evidence for interprofessional reach of the Rx for Change website to educators, learners, and professionals.


The bitterness of vegetables is a leading reason why they are avoided by children and some adults. Bitterness is perceived via TAS2R receptors located on the tongue. In contrast, astringency is a mouthfeel rather than a taste, and is perceived as a dry, puckering sensation. To date few reports have suggested any interactions between the two processes even though they often occur simultaneously in many real foods. In this study, we have used Brussels sprouts as an exemplar bitter vegetable and examined the influence of a number of different interventions on perceived intensity. Subjects rated the intensity of Brussels sprouts before and after three interventions: gravy, red wine, and water. Only red wine caused a significant (p < .0001) decrease in VAS scale, from 5.5 to 3.5 on a 10-point labeled magnitude scale. The results suggest the astringency of the red wine affected the perception of bitter in the Brussels sprout. Some possible mechanisms are discussed. PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS: This report reveals a possible insight into how bitterness is perceived in humans. By using astringency to affect salivary proteins, we suggest they may play a role in the detection of bitterness. This may be by helping to transport bitterness compounds to the taste bud receptors or a separate mechanism. Potentially this also opens up new ways to block bitterness.


This paper explains the project which is a special kind of circular rotating 8 LED display. With the help some mechanical assembly, LED count, hardware requirement, and hence overall cost is cut to very affordable price and power is also saved. Also, maintenance and repairing of the display is so easy, that anyone having a little electronics knowledge can take care of this. All the synchronizing can be imp lemented through software. First of its kind, made using the 20-pin 8051 series microcontroller, this project use the principle of Space Multiplexing. This propeller display is mechanically scanned and displays the characters in digital format. Made from scrap it can be used anywhere and everywhere and the most amazing fact about this display is its crystal clear display. This display consists of just 8 bright LEDs which are rotated to show the display. For building this project, requirement is just a small 20 pin microcontroller, a position encoder, and LEDs. This display can show the messages, which will require a whopping 525 LEDs. So hardware and cost minimization is achieved and power which is required to run the 525 is also saved by using rotating 8 led display.


Second- and third-harmonic generations of femtosecond and picosecond laser pulses have been measured from chicken skin, muscle, and fat tissues. The magnitude of the harmonic signals showed a strong structural dependence with the signal from skin interface being the strongest. The polarization dependence of the signal was also measured and found to be consistent with the fact that the tissue samples were highly scattering random media. The second-harmonic- and third-harmonic-generation conversion efficiencies were found to be in the range of ~10(-7) to ~10(-10).


In this article, the author seeks to provide the first comprehensive typology of philosophical approaches to the book of Qohelet (Ecclesiastes). Six overlapping, yet functionally distinct, meta-philosophical categories are identified, namely (1) general philosophical profiling, (2) ancient philosophical comparisons, (3) modern philosophical comparisons, (4) topical philosophical exegesis, (5) philosophical reception histories and actualisations and (6) antiphilosophical readings. The conclusion of the study is that research on Qohelet in relationship to philosophy is quantitatively more complex and multifaceted than traditional overviews tend to show. Intradisciplinary and/or interdisciplinary implications: This study challenges the context of currently available perspectives on Qohelet in relationship to philosophy, resulting in the provisioning of a quantitatively more functional framework for meta-philosophical commentary, which in turn both demands and makes possible a change in the way philosophical approaches to the text are construed.


This first chapter sets the stage for the later technical development of Dr. Whit's career in applied seismics. Experiments, f'wst at the Acoustics Laboratory of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and later at Mobil Oil and Marathon Oil, provided insight into the general problems of impedance measurements, transduction, filtering, and attenuation. These papers also serve as a bridge to show geophysicists how theft own experiments in seismology naturally interface with (indeed, arose out of) the larger world of sound measurements in air and water. These experiments demonstrate the power of geometrically constrained experiments to allow verification of approximate (and in some cases, exact) theories of sound.


This article aims to provide a systematic review of estimates and methodology of studies quantifying the costs of endometriosis. Included studies were cost-of-illness analyses quantifying the economic impact of endometriosis and cost analyses calculating diagnostic and treatment costs of endometriosis. Annual healthcare costs and costs of productivity loss associated with endometriosis have been estimated at $2801 and $1023 per patient, respectively. Extrapolating these findings to the US population, this study calculated that annual costs of endometriosis attained $22 billion in 2002 assuming a 10% prevalence rate among women of reproductive age. These costs are considerably higher than those related to Crohn's disease or to migraine. To date, it is not possible to determine whether a medical approach is less expensive than a surgical approach to treating endometriosis in patients presenting with chronic pelvic pain. Evidence of endometriosis costs in infertile patients is largely lacking. Cost estimates were biased due to the absence of a control group of patients without endometriosis, inadequate consideration of endometriosis recurrence and restricted scope of costs. There is a need for more and better-designed studies that carry out longitudinal analyses of patients until the cessation of their symptoms or that model the chronic nature of endometriosis.


This paper demonstrates that automatic selection of the right interpolation/smoothing method in a GNSS-based network real-time kinematic (NRTK) interpolation segment can improve the accuracy of the rover position estimates and also the processing time in the NRTK processing center. The methods discussed and investigated are inverse distance weighting (IDW); bilinear and bicubic spline interpolation; kriging interpolation; thin-plate splines; and numerical approximation methods for spatial processes. The methods are implemented and tested using GNSS data from reference stations in the Norwegian network RTK service called CPOS. Data sets with an average baseline between reference stations of 60–70 km were selected. 12 prediction locations were used to analyze the performance of the interpolation methods by computing and comparing different measures of the goodness of fit such as the root mean square error (RMSE), mean square error, and mean absolute error, and also the computation time was compared. Results of the tests show that ordinary kriging with the Matern covariance function clearly provides the best results. The thin-plate spline provides the second best results of the methods selected and with the test data used.


This article examines the current legal regime applicable to animal-human combinations under the Assisted
Human Reproduction Act (Canada). The Act prohibits as criminal offences the use of non-human reproductive material
in humans, the use in humans of human reproductive material previously transplanted into a non-human life form, the
creation of chimeras made from human embryos, and the creation for reproductive purposes of human/non-human
hybrids. Additional animal-human combinations, such as transgenic life forms, may be regulated pursuant to section 11
of the Act in the future.
The underlying concerns of the Act in establishing this regime appear to be the protection of human health and
safety, human dignity and individuality, and the human genome. The Act seems calibrated to prohibit the creation of
animal-human combinations that are currently unsafe and scientifically and ethically problematic, while leaving open
the possibility of regulating other such combinations with more immediate scientific potential, although these also raise
ethical questions.
Currently, certain differences subsist in Canada between what is permissible for researchers and institutions
funded by federal agencies and those in privately funded research. The development of the regulatory framework under
the Act will reveal how freedom of research will be balanced against the need for scientifically valid and ethically
justifiable research, and whether these differences will continue to apply.


N-Propargylamines are one of the most useful and versatile building blocks in organic synthesis that are successfully transformed into many significant N-heterocycles. Due to high atom economy and shorter synthetic routes, the synthesis of 1,4-oxazepane and 1,4-diazepane cores from N-propargylamines have undergone an explosive growth in recent years. This review gives an overview of new developments in the synthesis of the title compounds from N-propargylamines in recent years. Mechanistic aspects of the reactions are considered and discussed in detail.


MATTHEW REYNOLDS. Godly Reformers and Their Opponents in Early Modern England: Religion in Norwich c. 1550-1643. Studies in Modern British Religious History. Woodbridge, Suffolk, England: The Boydell Press, 2005. $90.00. Matthew Reynolds' monograph, based on his doctoral dissertation at the University of Kent, outlines in great detail the contest over religion in early modern Norwich. The focus on godly reformers and their opponents, however, creates a false polarization given the great variety of goals and methods on both sides. The chronological culmination in Laud's program and the Civil War undoubtedly influenced this perspective. The book follows chronological development from the first years of the reign of Elizabeth I to the Civil War, or as his chapter title would have it, the "Puritan Revolution." His narrative is as follows. From the ascension of Elizabeth through the 1580s, an alliance between Protestant aldermen and Bishop Parkhurst sought to advance godly religion with support of inspiring preachers, while also supporting magisterial authority. However, the Puritans' nonconformity prompted Elizabeth to select Edmund Freke bishop in order to bring discipline to the diocese. In the early years of James, Bishop John Jegon balanced the desires of the godly for further reform with the crown's concern for conformity. In 1619 James chose the anti-Calvinist Samuel Harsnett as bishop to deal with Puritan criticism of his foreign policy. Harsnett manipulated James' fears to further his own religious agenda by curtailing the preaching of lecturers and parish preachers in favor of those in the cathedral, curtailing the preaching of predestinarian ideology in favor of its critics. Thus, religious conflict already existed when Matthew Wren became bishop in 1635 to implement Laud's "altar policy." While Reynolds notes that people had to take sides at this point, he continues to show the godly Parliamentarians as strongly committed and the opposing royalists, such as Mayor William Lane, as vacillating. With the "godly" at the center of the narrative and the "puritan revolution" near the end, the "Godly Reformers" are the obvious heroes of the tale. He disagrees with the Haigh-Walsham thesis that the Caroline church flowed from an unbroken strand of Catholicism, but rather sees the potential appeal of Laudianism as a focus for anti-Puritan feeling. Nevertheless, the story is one of conflict and Reynolds' thesis is that there was a contest. The motivations of the opponents of the "godly," however, remain little known in spite of the voluminous prosopographical detail. This fuzziness accords with the conclusion that support for the conservative bishops Harsnett and Wren "demonstrates the shifting nature of lay conformity in the early Stuart church as other parishioners, approving the new ceremonialist agenda, took the opportunity to beautify their church with religious images, deemed idolatrous by the godly, turning their backs on the march of forward Reformation as a consequence. …


retina and iris scanners, face-recognition cameras, digitized fingerprints, and even implantable chips containing personal information can benefit us. Such technologies will find their way into cell phones and mobile computers, car doors, doorknobs, and office keys. They can bolster online commerce, locate a missing child, and transmit medical information to doctors. They promise increased security by preventing identity theft. But no one wants to be treated like a human bar code by the authorities. What are the benefits and concerns surrounding the further deployment of biometric identification techniques into our lives? Do they promise new levels of physical security and secure commerce—or do they threaten fundamental values of privacy and liberty? What are the distinctions between governmental, commercial, and private use of biometric technologies? Biometrics range from completely involuntary to potentially involuntary to completely voluntary—in decreasing order of risk. The most pressing threat to liberty is an all-inclusive database mandated by government—a national identification card with biometric identifiers. Such an ID will increase unwelcome surveillance, will blur the distinction between public and private databases, and will undercut a presumptive right to maintain anonymity. The ID would devolve into a general law enforcement tool having nothing to do with response to terrorism. A less sweeping biometric database would contain criminals and suspects but not the general population. Individuals would be observed, but presumably only to see if they matched a face already in the database. Allegedly, the collection of information pertaining to criminals will have already taken place by way of proper legal procedures. Nevertheless, many observers doubt that governments can be trusted to discard incidental data collected on innocents. Because the deliberate identification and tracking of individuals using biometrics can constitute an unreasonable search, stringent Fourth Amendment safeguards are critical. The challenge of the biometric future is to prevent mandatory national IDs, ensure Fourth Amendment protections with respect to public surveillance, and avoid the blurring of public and private databases. Private industry must generate its own information, for purposes limited by consumer choice and consumer rejection. Privacy, security, liberty, and even authentication technology itself will be all the better for it. Human Bar Code Monitoring Biometric Technologies in a Free Society


Violence, the Old Testament and a new South Africa In the light of the current violence in South Africa the question posed in the paper is the question on how the appearance of violence in the Old Testament should be evaluated from a theological point of view. After a brief survey of the present state of research on this theme, a theological insight into the problem of violence in the Old Testament is proposed. Finally, the relevance of this theme for a new South Africa is pointed out.


Efficient methods of biodiversity assessment and monitoring are central to ecological research and crucial in conservation management; technological advances in remote acoustic sensing inspire new approaches. In line with the emerging field of Soundscape Ecology (Pijanowski et al., 2011), the acoustic approach is based on the rationale that the ecological processes occurring within a landscape are tightly linked to and reflected in the high-level structure of the patterns of sounds emanating from those landscapes ‐ the soundscape. Rather than attempting to recognise species-specific calls, either manually or automatically, analysis of the high-level structure of the soundscape tackles the problem of diversity assessment at the community (rather than species) level (Pijanowski et al., 2011; Farina, 2014). Preliminary work has attempted to make a case for community-level acoustic indices (e.g. Pieretti et al., 2011; Farina, 2014; Sueur et al., 2008); existing indices provide simple statistical summaries of the frequency or time domain signal. We suggest that under this approach, the opportunity to analyse spectro-temporal structural information is diminished, limiting power both as monitoring and investigative tools. In this paper we consider sparse-coding and source separation algorithms (specifically, shift-invariant probabilistic latent component analysis in 2D) as a means to access and summarise ecologically-meaningful sound objects. In doing so we highlight a possible new approach for understanding and assessing ecologically relevant interactions within the conceptual framework of Soundscape Ecology.


A game theoretical model featuring a manufacturer and two dealers is proposed to investigate the effects of downstream horizontal integration on network performance. It is shown that the decision to integrate depends on both horizontal and vertical externalities. The manufacturer and dealers are mutually better off when integration leads to an increase in consumer demand through higher prices and better investments in services and national advertising. However, downstream integration harms the manufacturer's profit when the integrated dealer sets the price and service decisions in such a way as to free-ride on the manufacturer's brand. Surprisingly, under certain conditions, both the manufacturer and the dealers prefer downstream competition to integration regardless of whether it increases or reduces retail prices. The scenario in which the manufacturer prefers horizontal integration and the dealers opt for competition is not sustainable at the equilibrium. Mechanisms to implement horizontally integrated strategies such as the use of RPM and dealer cut are discussed.


The need to capture the complexity of biological systems in a simpler formalism is the underlying impetus of biological sciences. Understanding the function of many biological complex systems, such as genetic networks or molecular signalling pathways, requires precise identification of the interactions between their individual components. A number of questions in the study of complex systems are then important-in particular, what can be inferred about the interactions in a complex system from an arbitrary set of experiments, and, what is the minimum number of experiments required to characterize the system? This paper shows that the problem of finding the minimal causal structure of a system based on a set of observations is computationally intractable for even moderately sized systems (it is NP-hard), but a reasonable approximation can be found in a relatively short (polynomial) time. Next, it is shown that the number of experiments required to characterize a complex system grows exponentially with the upper bound on the number of immediate upstream influences of each element, but only logarithmically with the number of elements in the system. This makes it possible to study biological systems with extremely large number of interacting elements and relatively sparse interconnections, such as gene regulatory and cell signalling networks. Finally, the construction of a randomized experimental sequence which achieves this bound is discussed.


Social norms are a ubiquitous feature of social life and pervade almost every aspect of human social interaction. However, despite their importance we still have relatively little empirical knowledge about the forces that drive the formation, the maintenance and the decay of social norms. In particular, our knowledge about how norms affect behavior and how norm obedience and violations shape subsequent normative standards is quite limited. Here, we present a new method that makes norms identifiable and continuously observable and, thus, empirically measurable. We show – in the context of public goods provision – the quick emergence of a widely accepted social cooperation norm that demands high contributions but – in the absence of the punishment of free-riders – norm violations are frequent and, therefore, the initial normative consensus as well as the high cooperation demands required by the norm break down. However, when peer punishment is possible, norm violations are rare from the beginning and a strong and stable normative consensus as well as high contribution requests prevail throughout. Thus, when norm compliance is costly social norms tend to unravel unless norm violations are kept to a minimum. In addition, our results indicate that – in an environment that has previously shown to be detrimental for cooperation and welfare – the opportunity to form a social norm unambiguously causes high public good contributions and group welfare when peer-punishment is possible.


Lateral Flow Immunoassay-Raphael Wong 2008-12-16 Due to the simplicity, relative accuracy, fast result reporting, and user-friendliness of lateral flow immunoassay, its use has undergone tremendous growth in the diagnostic industry in the last few years. Such technology has been utilized widely and includes pregnancy and woman's health determination, cardiac and emergency conditions monitoring and testing, infectious disease including Flu screening, cancer marker screening, and drugs abuse testing. This book covers the scope of utilization, the principle of the technology, the patent concerns, information on the development and production of the test device and specific applications will be of interest to the diagnostic industry and the general scientific community.


Artificial Intelligence (AI) is always in various domain of science, literature, animation, medical filed and other real world applications. AI makes the system to store large amount of data in a systematic manner and translate the information into functional tools as per the requirement of application. AI is in use for specific applications such as defense, space exploration, and medical science. The implementation of AI in healthcare is experienced through AI-based systems for more accurate and precise diagnosis, cure and treatment of debilitating conditions. Artificial Bee Colony [ABC] algorithm is a metaheuristics algorithm has been applied in various fields of health care in recent time. There are various techniques available for image processing of MRI images, noise removal techniques for EEG, ECG, EMG signals, detection of tumor, detection of breast cancer cell, all these have merits along with limitation. When these techniques are embedded with ABC algorithm their use can be extended in such a way that, they overcome their limitation and can be used in a broad domain.


Deterrence theory, rooted in the methodology of law and economics, continues to dominate both the theory and practice of white-collar crime enforcement. By manipulating the disincentives of prospective wrongdoers, deterrence aims to efficiently reduce crime and maximize taxpayers' utility. However, the rise of international commerce presents a challenge it cannot meet. Using a combination of empirical evidence and quantitative modeling, and drawing on anti-bribery law (particularly the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act) as an example, this Article shows that deterrence will tend to increase, rather than decrease, net levels of corporate crime in developing countries.The ever-increasing power of multinational corporations thus calls for a new theory of punishment, one that uses criminal enforcement to address the systemic causes of crime. That theory, quite ironically, is restorative justice. By involving the perpetrator, victim, and community in the sentencing process, restorative justice does not merely punish the wrongdoer, but remedies the harm caused by the crime, prevents future harm, and reintegrates the defendant into the very community it violated. Though generally thought to apply only to the traditional crimes of natural persons, this Article demonstrates that the U.S. Constitution and Sentencing Guidelines already authorize corporate sentencing practices rooted in restorative justice principles. More to the point, for two decades the U.S. Department of Justice has quietly been implementing restorative justice principles in domestic white-collar environmental sentencing. Drawing on those precedents, this Article builds a model for extraterritorial white-collar criminal punishment that advances the interests of U.S. corporations and enforcement agencies alike, benefits the overseas victims of corporate crime, and requires no new legal authorization to implement.


Abstract Terrorist attacks often dominate news coverage as reporters seek to provide the public with information. Yet, not all incidents receive equal attention. Why do some terrorist attacks receive more media coverage than others? We argue that perpetrator religion is the largest predictor of news coverage, while target type, being arrested, and fatalities will also impact coverage. We examined news coverage from LexisNexis Academic and CNN.com for all terrorist attacks in the United States between 2006 and 2015 (N = 136). Controlling for target type, fatalities, and being arrested, attacks by Muslim perpetrators received, on average, 357% more coverage than other attacks. Our results are robust against a number of counterarguments. The disparities in news coverage of attacks based on the perpetrator's religion may explain why members of the public tend to fear the "Muslim terrorist" while ignoring other threats. More representative coverage could help to bring public perception in line with reality.


Concept Induction refers to the problem of creating complex Description Logic class descriptions (i.e., TBox axioms) from instance examples (i.e., ABox data). In this paper we look particularly at the case where both a set of positive and a set of negative instances are given, and complex class expressions are sought under which the positive but not the negative examples fall. Concept induction has found applications in ontology engineering, but existing algorithms have fundamental performance issues in some scenarios, mainly because a high number of invokations of an external Description Logic reasoner is usually required. In this paper we present a new algorithm for this problem which drastically reduces the number of reasoner invokations needed. While this comes at the expense of a more limited traversal of the search space, we show that our approach improves execution times by up to several orders of magnitude, while output correctness, measured in the amount of correct coverage of the input instances, remains reasonably high in many cases. Our approach thus should provide a strong alternative to existing systems, in particular in settings where other systems are prohibitively slow.


From 2020 Personal, Social, Health and Economic Education will be compulsory in UK schools for adolescents, however less is known about how it can be taught in a an effective manner. We examine, through a randomised trial, the impact of an evidenced based health related quality of life (HRQoL) curriculum called Healthy Minds that ran in 34 high schools in England over a four-year period. We find robust evidence that Healthy Minds positively augments many physical health domains of treated adolescents. We also find some evidence that Healthy Minds positively affects behaviour, but has no impact on emotional wellbeing. We find notable gender effects, strongly favouring boys. We also present evidence that Healthy Minds changes career aspirations, with those exposed to treatment being less likely to choose competitive work and more likely to choose work that involves "people-skills". Overall our work illustrates the potential for later childhood interventions to promote HRQoL and develop the career aspirations of adolescents.


As per the technical evolution and technical trends taken into consideration so we have created a "Advanced Hybrid Multi-power Station Turbine Structure for Efficient Power Generation.This system uses an advanced savonius hybrid turbine which will rotate over multiple natural resources water force, wind power and related things having efficiency greater than aerodynamic turbine. The advancement of this turbine is that, this turbine not only rotate over multiple natural resources and artificial resources but also having capability of resources settlement into it according to multiple savonius blade structure. The advantages of this project as compared to other system is that, on one single Savonius structure unit we can able to rotate multiple power substation and other power station uses single turbine which will rotate only single generator. So power output is more efficient than that normal. This project we can able to implement at industries, factories, agricultural areas, home, airport, hill station and artificial creations. This is not a simple structure like simple turbine. This is advanced technical structure created specially taken vision over multiple natural resources and artificial resources. This structure having natural resources settlement and re-utilization capacity, that means this structure not only uses multiple resources i.e. wind power, water force and other but also settle them to reutilization so that this turbine rotate with more toque and able to create more output so that we can able to charge battery within minimum time. ________________________________________________________________________________________________________


Dental porcelains rely on the high-thermal-expansion mineral leucite to elevate their bulk thermal expansion to levels compatible with dental PFM alloys. The microcracks that form around these leucite particles when cooled during porcelain manufacture are a potential source of change in bulk porcelain thermal expansion during fabrication of porcelain-fused-to-metal crowns and bridges. The purpose of the present study was to determine whether multiple firings of commercial dental porcelains could produce changes in microcrack density. Specimens of six commercial porcelains and the "Component No. 1" of the Weinstein patent were fabricated and subjected to 1, 2, 4, 8, and 16 firings. The microcrack densities were determined by quantitative stereology, whereby intersections of microcracks were counted with a test grid. The microcrack data were subjected to linear regression analysis and analysis of variance. The microcrack densities of four of the six porcelains and the Component No. 1 frit were not significantly affected by the number of firings (p > 0.05). One porcelain exhibited a weak but highly significant positive correlation between microcrack density and multiple firings ( r 2 = 0.24, p = 0.0003), while the remaining porcelain exhibited a weak but statistically significant negative correlation between microcrack density and multiple firings (r 2 = 0.15, p = 0.006). The results of this study indicate that even for porcelains that exhibit a measurable change in microcrack density as a function of multiple firings, the magnitude of the increase or decrease in microcrack density after several firings is sufficiently small to cause only negligible shifts in porcelain bulk thermal expansion.


This paper investigates if design research in e-government should be conducted in some special way compared with standard models for design research. It reviews literature in e-government and design research in order to generate an answer to this research question. The result is affirmative that the policy character of e-government should have consequences for the way that e-government design research is conducted. A tentative e-government design research model, consisting of different activities is formulated. This model consists of the activities: theorizing, policy analysis, workpractice analysis, co-design and co-evaluation of IT artefact and workpractice. One important result from this paper is the formulation of the concept of the policy-ingrained artefact as an important empirical result from e-government design research.


Defective decidualization of human endometrial stromal cells (ESCs) has recently been highlighted as an underlying cause of implantation failure. FK-506-binding protein 51 (FKBP51) has been shown to participate in the steroid hormone response and the protein kinase B (AKT) regulation process, both of which are important pathways involved in decidualization. The objective of the present study was to investigate the potential effects and mechanisms of FKBP51 in the regulation of ESC decidualization. By performing immunohistochemical staining on an endometrial tissue microarray (TMA) derived from normal females, we found that FKBP51 expression was much higher in the luteal phase than in the follicular phase in ESCs. Primary ESCs were isolated from patients to build an in vitro decidualization model through co-culture with medroxyprogesterone acetate (MPA) and 8-bromoadenosine (cAMP). SC79, a specific AKT activator in various physiological and pathological conditions, and shRNA-FKBP51 were used to examine the roles of AKT and FKBP51 in decidualization. The Western blot and RT-PCR results showed that FKBP51, insulin-like growth factor-binding protein 1 (IGFBP1) and prolactin (PRL) expression increased in ESCs treated with MPA + cAMP; meanwhile, the level of p-Ser473 AKT (p-S473 AKT) decreased and forkhead box protein O1 (FOXO1A) expression increased. Decidualization was inhibited by the AKT activator SC79 and the transfection of FKBP51-shRNA by affecting protein synthesis, cell morphology, cell growth and cell cycle. Furthermore, this inhibition was rescued by FKBP51-cDNA transfection. The results supported that FKBP51 promotes decidualization by reducing the Ser473 phosphorylation levels in AKT.


To enter its target cells, HIV first attaches to the cells and fuses with the cell membrane. The attachment and fusion involves envelope glycoprotein trimers on the surface of the virion, and the CD4 receptor and chemokine co-receptors on the surface of the target cell. The stoichiometry of entry, that is the number of bonds between such trimers and CD4 that are required for infection, is unknown. Pseudo-typed virions that express mixed trimers consisting of functional and nonfunctional envelope proteins, have been used to study how many trimer-receptor interactions are required for virus entry. However, to extract information on the stoichiometry of entry from data generated in in vitro infectivity assays with such viruses, mathematical models are required. Here, we develop mathematical models that can be used to infer the stoichiometry of entry. Fitting our simplest model to previously published data by Yang et al. (Yang et al., 2005b), we estimate that the number of trimer-receptor interactions required for HIV to infect a target cell is approximately 8, which is higher than previous estimates. We also consider model extensions which explain some systematic deviations of the data from the prediction of the simplest model. However, these extended models yield very different estimates of the stoichiometry of entry ranging from 2–19. These results strongly suggest that, based on our present knowledge of HIV entry, the stoichiometry of this process cannot be reliably estimated. Our study identifies parameters that need to be defined to render the estimation of the stoichiometry of entry possible.


The concept of heritability as generally used, involves the assumption that additive genetic variance is a constant proportion of total variance over the entire range of phenotypes. If this assumption holds, selection response will be linearly related to selection differential. If not, prediction of selection response will not be possible from a knowledge of the phenotypic selection differential and the average proportion of additive genetic variance. Thus the validity of this assumption has a bearing on the design of efficient selection schemes for many situations. In the field of applied animal breeding, for example, this will affect such important questions as the increase in rate of genetic improvement to be expected from the use of artificial insemination. Milk production records from 5740 first lactation dam-daughter pairs were studied to determine if the heritable fraction of total variation is related to selection differential. Heritability was essentially constant over the entire range of phenotypic variability, there being no evidence for curvilinearity of the offspring-parent regression line. Thus at least short-term selection response is predicted to be linearly related to selection differential, and also to be independent of direction of selection. The estimate of heritability from the total data was .43 ± .03, substantially higher than many published estimates for this trait. The estimate by the paternal half-sib method from the proportion of the data provided by artificially sired daughters (2568) was .25, while the daughter-dam estimate from the same subsample was .44. Possible reasons for the difference between the two estimates are discussed.


In this work, readers are taken through the planning and delivery of the different aspects of the therapy. Issues commonly encountered with people with delusions and hallucinations are considered and strategies are provided to help avoid or overcome these. This book can be used as an instruction or practice reference manual as it gives step-by-step guidance on delivering the therapy using case studies and clinical examples to illustrate applications. The accessible style ensures that this book is appropriate for all health professionals working with people with delusional beliefs and auditory hallucinations.


Comparative effectiveness of interventions for children with autism spectrum disorders (ASDs) that incorporates costs is lacking due to the scarcity of information on health utility scores or preference‐weighted outcomes typically used for calculating quality‐adjusted life years (QALYs). This study created algorithms for mapping clinical and behavioral measures for children with ASDs to health utility scores. The algorithms could be useful for estimating the value of different interventions and treatments used in the care of children with ASDs. Participants were recruited from two Autism Treatment Network sites. Health utility data based on the Health Utilities Index Mark 3 (HUI3) for the child were obtained from the primary caregiver (proxy‐reported) through a survey (N = 224). During the initial clinic visit, proxy‐reported measures of the Child Behavior Checklist, Vineland II Adaptive Behavior Scales, and the Pediatric Quality of Life Inventory 4.0 (start measures) were obtained and then merged with the survey data. Nine mapping algorithms were developed using the HUI3 scores as dependent variables in ordinary least squares regressions along with the start measures, the Autism Diagnostic Observation Schedule, to measure severity, child age, and cognitive ability as independent predictors. In‐sample cross‐validation was conducted to evaluate predictive accuracy. Multiple imputation techniques were used for missing data. The average age for children with ASDs in this study was 8.4 (standard deviation = 3.5) years. Almost half of the children (47%) had cognitive impairment (IQ ≤ 70). Total scores for all of the outcome measures were significantly associated with the HUI3 score. The algorithms can be applied to clinical studies containing start measures of children with ASDs to predict QALYs gained from interventions. Autism Res 2014, 7: 649–663. © 2014 International Society for Autism Research, Wiley Periodicals, Inc.


This paper proposed online control system can optimize management and efficiency of street lighting systems. It uses ZigBee based wireless devices which enable more efficient street lamp-system management. In this work an advanced interface and control architecture are used. It uses a sensor based ZigBee combination to control and guarantee the desired system parameters. The information is transferred point by point using ZigBee transmitters and receivers and is sent to a control terminal used to check the state of the street lamps and to take appropriate measures in case of failure.


The family of lemnacae colloquially known as duckweed contains the world's smallest species of flowering plants (macrophytes). Aquatic and free-floating, their most striking qualities are a capacity for explosive reproduction and an almost complete lack of fibrous material. They are widely used for reducing chemical loading in facultative sewage lagoons, but their greatest potential lies in their ability to produce large quantities of protein rich biomass, suitable for feeding to a wide range of animals, including fish, poultry and cattle. Despite these qualities there are numerous impediments to these plants being incorporated into western farming systems. Large genetically determined variations in growth in response to nutrients and climate, apparent anti-nutritional factors, concerns about sequestration of heavy metals and possible transference of pathogens raise questions about the safety and usefulness of these plants. A clear understanding of how to address and overcome these impediments needs to be developed before duckweed is widely accepted for nutrient reclamation and as a source of animal feed. (Asian-Aust. J. Anim. Sci. 2003. Vol 16, No. 2 : 297-305)


Purpose

Social commerce websites have emerged as new platforms which integrate social media features with traditional commerce aspects to enhance users' purchasing experience. The purpose of this paper is to examine the role of social factors such as trust toward site members in determining users' trust and risk evaluations, and the role of social commerce use habit in attenuating users' rational risk and trust considerations for developing purchase intentions.

Design/methodology/approach

Relying on the risk deterrence perspective and rational decision-making models involving trust and habit, this study proposes a set of hypotheses which are tested through analyzing survey data using structural equation modeling techniques.

Findings

Results show that commerce risk deters purchasing intentions; trust toward the social commerce website increases users' purchasing intentions; and trust toward the site members indirectly increases purchasing intentions. Moreover, trust toward site members reduces perceived commerce risk. Findings also show that habit modulates trust and risk effects on use decisions in this context; habit moderates (weakens) the relationships between commerce risk and purchase intentions and between trust toward the social commerce site and purchase intentions.

Originality/value

This study extends theories on decision making in social settings such as in the case of social commerce. It does so by accounting for unique modulating effects of habit in social settings in which social aspects such as trust in other members and risk are unique and important.


Doubling desire : the Yeatsian Daimon
Through the agency of Daimonic desire, Yeatsian spiritualism repeats empirical existence. In positing a desire that extends beyond the limits of individual human life, Yeats denies the definitive value of an exclusive finitude, such as that perceived by Michel Foucault in The Order of Things(1974). If Yeats, involved in a qualified manner in an aspect of Foucault's analytic of finitude, is a modernist, he is related to that type Fredric Jameson calls the "anti-modern modernist" (Jameson, 1991:304), the modernist who reacts against modernisation.
In discussing Daimonic desire, then, it is congruous with a reading of Yeats to do so both from the perspective of the empirical realm of the "dying generations", and the spiritual realm of the "artifice of eternity". In the first case the Daimon can surely be understood as a manifestation of the Zeitgeist, but how do we understand the spirits in the second case, who have transcended the ultimate limit of finitude, death itself, and who thus rock the three Foucauldian cornerstones of finitude - life, labour, and language, "marked by the spatiality of the body, the yawning of desire, and the time of language" (Foucault, 1974:315)? Clearly, for Yeats, life is not limited by death; labour is not limited by a somnolent desire; and language is not confined within the span of a single life


Railroads are important for development and economic growth of a region. They are also heavily regulated and struggle to get timely public investment and clearances for consolidation and improving revenue generation when attempting to achieving economies of scale and scope. Where the state (government) runs the railroads, the effort is to direct them to serve the larger aspirations of the citizens. In both the cases, governmental support in form of grants or subsidies has become a bone of contention. Further, strategic orientation leading to capacity creation in advance and adaptation to changing customer preferences have been lacking universally in all railroads. Result is that universally railroads have failed to invest in capacity ahead of demand, have only partially adapted to changing customer needs and are struggling to meet varied aspirations of the citizens as part of development and inclusive growth. This paper takes the view that regulation of rail road has only focused on price impact on public through emphasis on efficiency as they were working under a stable and slow changing business environment where growth was assured. With their business environment becoming more complex and dynamic and emphasis on conservation of environment and fossil fuels increasing, the changed goal of achieving effective services at least resource cost to society must be done through focus on revenue maximization by striking a fine balance between explorative and exploitative activities — ensure effectiveness and efficiency thereafter. This would be achieved by developing the core competency of strategic orientation which facilitates development of innovativeness as a competency. The transformation of the standard data based training system to a competency based training system would enable generation of this core competency continuously over time. This would enable railroads to serve the public better by continuously adapting to changing technologies and customer preferences using innovation as the core driver of business logic. This key message is articulated by the use of the case of Indian railways.


Cyber security is the most critical aspect nowadays of our technologically based lives. Government institutions, banking sectors, public and private services, nuclear power plants, power grid operators, water suppliers or waste water treatment companies use information technologies in their day-to-day operations. Everything that uses technologies are based on communication and information systems and that means that it depends on cyber security. The public and private sector each year spend millions of dollars on technologies, security software and hardware devices that will increase the cyber security inside their companies, but they are still vulnerable. The main problem of this situation is that cyber security is still usually treated as a technical aspect or technology which can be easily implemented inside the organization and this implementation will guarantee cyber security. This attitude must change, because cyber security nowadays is something more than just the technology. This article presents the taxonomy of the critical infrastructure attacks, analyzes attack vectors and attack methods used to damage critical infrastructure as well as the most common cyber security mistakes which organizations make in the cyber security field when trying to make themselves safer from vulnerabilities. The main aim of this article is to provide theoretical aspects of the cyber security management model which can be used to ensure security of critical infrastructure in an organization or company. The cyber security management model that is presented in this article is analyzed from management perspectives and is not concerned with technological aspects and products that are used to protect critical infrastructure from cyber security attacks and vulnerabilities.


Since it is now clear that in the future many raw materials will only be available to us in limited quantities, scientists have for some time been conducting intensive research into possible alternatives. Sustainability is the order of the day and the magic word for a better future in politics and industry. Moreover, environmental consciousness and a penchant for thinking in terms of material cycles have caught on with consumers: the use of environmentally compatible materials and production methods is desired, even taken for granted by the client. Designers and architects thus have a special role and responsibility. For they are the ones who decide what materials will be used on their projects and thus wield enormous influence on the sustainability of our product world. At the same time, we are dealing with a flood of new materials, which calls for specialized knowledge of their properties, their possible use, and their handling. Materials Matter bridges the gap between research and industry on the one hand and designers and architects on the other by offering a systematic overview of the currently available sustainable materials and providing the reader with all the information he or she needs to assess a new material's suitability and potential for a given project. Along the way, it examines natural and biodegradable materials, while also presenting materials with multifunctional properties and the potential for diminishing energy requirements.


The objective of this study is to offer a different way of seeing and understanding defences in international criminal law. By contrast to the standard texts on defences which identify what the law is - and in some few cases to suggest what it should be - this work seeks to understand why the law is the way it is, and in doing so, reveal the gender biases that international criminal law defences conceal. International criminal law evolved out of a need to respond to gross wrongdoings that amounted to international offences perpetrated during conflict. The paradox is that conflict is about the 'legalised' use of violence by men and it is through this process that all too often women, subsumed within the category of civilians, become the direct and indirect victims of that violence. From its inception international criminal law has primarily addressed wrongs committed in conflict - but as perceived and defined by men. Moreover, because war crimes trials have always been about selective narratives that are controlled by the most powerful, women's voices have consistently been excluded. This study questions whether, as with offences, defences have evolved in such a way as to prefer the interests of the male soldier over the civilian and thereby foster a gendered view of defences in international criminal law. This work has been guided by some of the more recent theoretical debates that have engaged the scholarly community on the domestic level that challenges the traditional explanations of defences and that exposes the law to be fundamentally incoherent and characterised by bias. It offers an alternative perspective on defences in international criminal law that seeks to understand the interests that legal defences serve to protect. This thesis concludes that defences play a vital function in regulating relations between individuals and between the state and citizens by articulating the responsibilities of the different participants in a social grouping. Defences provide a powerful means through which the law delineates a society's moral boundaries and an effective mechanism through which specific normative values of liberal states are conveyed. The overriding objective of this study is to emphasise the need to take greater account of the inherent gender bias that continues to characterise the law in the process of judging the defendant who is charged with serious violations of international law perpetrated in a conflict.


Objective: Balancing is the most basic function of the neuromuscular system in per-forming all simple and complex activities that contribute to health-related physical fitness. Core stability may be a contributing factor to static and dynamic balance. The aim of this study was to investigate the relationship between core stability muscle endurance and static and dynamic balance in basketball players. Methods: 100 basketball players (50 female and 50 male players) were selected randomly based on the including criteria.To evaluate core stability muscle strength, a set of tests from core stability exercises was used. Static and dynamic balance were evaluated by Bass Stick and Y balance test respectively. Normality of the data was evaluated using the Kolmogorov Smirnoff test. Data analysis was performed by Spearman product moment coefficient test and independent samples t test. Significant level of p≤0/05 was used in all statistical analyses. Results: Results of t-test showed no significant difference between static balance in boys and girls, while significant differences were observed between dynamic balance and core stability in males and females. In other words, core stability and dynamic balance in boys were more than girls. Also, the results of correlation analysis showed a significant relationship between core stability and dynamic balance (p=0.00) However, no significant relationship was observed between core stability and static balance (p=0.451). Conclusion: Due to the correlation between muscle endurance and dynamic balance in the present study, it can be implied that core stability exercises can improve balance.


Background. Minimally invasive coronary artery bypass graft (MICABG) techniques are evolving. Thoracoscopic internal mammary artery (IMA) harvest is a demanding procedure. Our experiences with MICABG and a new IMA harvest technique (Wolf technique) are descriptionbed here. Materials and methods. Since October 1995, MICABG was applicable in 51 patients with a mean age of 70.2 i?½ 12.5 years, using 40 IMAs (29 left and 11 right), 7 gastroepiploic arteries, 4 saphenous vein grafts and 1 radial artery graft. Thirteen (25%) of the 51 patients were undergoing repeat surgery. A total of 27 IMAs (22 left and 5 right) were harvested with the Harmonic scalpel (Ethicon Endo-Surgery) using a thoracoscopic technique (Wolf technique). Results. MICABG was completed in 46 (90%) patients without cardiopulmonary bypass. Cardiopulmonary bypass was used in 5 patients (3 with small coronary arteries and 2 with intramyocardial arteries), in 3 of whom additional median sternotomies were made. One patient (2.0%), who suffered a pre-operative stroke, expired of stroke progression on the second postoperative day. Each of the IMA pedicles was completely dissected by means of the Wolf technique and 3-month postoperative Doppler studies were used to confirm patency. Conclusion. MICABG is a feasible and viable alternative surgical revascularisation procedure in selected patients with obstructive coronary disease. A new technique for thoracoscopic dissection of the IMA can facilitate the procedure.


Whereas Indonesia is the largest Muslim country in the world, the growth of Islamic microfinance institutions (MFIs) has being sluggish and far behind their conventional MFIs. Islamic MFIs are struggling to survive amid the fierce competition in the provision of microfinance services, from both the conventional and Islamic institutions. Meanwhile the high unemployment rate in Indonesia calls for searching for ways in which financing can be provided to the jobless and poor. One way to resolve this is to provide MFIs with low cost funds that can be used to finance viable micro-businesses. The aim of this thesis is to examine the demand and supply side factors related to operations and growth of Islamic MFIs. It also investigates the scope of integrating microfinance and waqf to enhance the social mission of providing access financial services and opportunities to the needy and the poor. A survey was conducted to explore the perceptions, understanding and preferences of 581 MFI's borrowers from four MFIs—two Islamic (BMT and BPRS) and two conventional (BRI and BPR) in Indonesia. A total of 18 MFIs' managers and two waqf managers/nazirs were interviewed. Secondary data, case-study and a focus group discussion (FGD) were also conducted in order to understand the problems.

The results show that while the majority of MFI's clients indicate preference for Islamic MFIs, in reality their choices of MFI are based on economic/finance (low interest rates and size of loan) and non-economic/non-finance factors (quality of services variables easiness, promptness, nearness, method and loan officers' profile). While the MFIs clients prefer Islamic MFI compared to conventional, in the end, the practical and economic reasons became dominant factors in their choice of MFI. Therefore, the demand for Islamic microfinance can be enhanced if the level of their economic and non-economic factors can be brought to the levels of conventional MFIs. The research reveals that there is still a gap between needs and knowledge of Sharia'h financial products and services. When the practice of murabahah product is considered, there appears to be no difference in substance between conventional and Islamic MFIs.

In order to understand the operational structure of each type of MFI, their performance was assessed by using the balanced scorecard (BSC) with four perspectives. A balanced non-financial and financial performance is extremely important to create sustainability for microfinance institutions. The relationships between the different components of BSC indicate strong significant correlations between the internal process and customer's perspectives. There are also significant correlation between customer's perspectives and learning-and-growth and slightly significant correlation between learning-and-growth and financial performance. Overall scores of the Balanced Scorecard from the four perspectives for MFIs cemented BRI as the best performer, BPRS in the second place, followed by BPR and BMT in the third and fourth place respectively. The advantage of BRI is partly due to robust government support which makes it difficult for other smaller MFIs to compete. In contrast, BMT showed a weak institutional structure in terms of internal processes, learning-and-growth and customer satisfaction. It seems that BMT is not managed well according to BSC's key performance indicators.

This thesis also proposes to add one more perspective i.e, Social Perspective, for 'The BSC based Islamic MFIs' Model' to help waqf institutions to appraise and choose a MFI in a more balanced and comprehensive way. Social perspective comprises the social mission of Islamic MFIs which can be reflected in providing qard hassan and giving more opportunities to the needy, jobless and the poor to start their own micro business. Indicators of the social perspectives can be the amount of funds contributed for qard hassan, how many needy clients are being served, and how many months a MFI permits clients to use the qard hassan loan. Islamic MFIs such as BPRS and BMT are expected by Muslims to perform more social functions than others. Therefore, one way to implement the social mission is to incorporate qard hassan in BPRS and BMT's operations to help the poor and jobless with the low cost loans to start their viable micro-businesses.


Can infrastructure investment win "hearts and minds"? We analyze a famous case in the early stages of dictatorship – the building of the motorway network in Nazi Germany. The Autobahn was one of the most important projects of the Hitler government. It was intended to reduce unemployment, and was widely used for propaganda purposes. We examine its role in increasing support for the NS regime by analyzing new data on motorway construction and the 1934 plebiscite, which gave Hitler greater powers as head of state. Our results suggest that road building was highly effective, reducing opposition to the nascent Nazi regime.


Gaining knowledge on the biochemical profile of primary endothelial cells on a subcellular level can contribute to better understanding of cardiovascular disease. In this work, primary cardiac microvascular endothelial cells (CMECs) isolated from the mouse heart and murine H5V endothelial cell line were characterized with the use of a Raman imaging technique. Primary CMECs displayed a distinct Raman-based biochemical phenotype as compared with other cells isolated from the heart and were characterized by a low lipid content. In contrast to the murine H5V endothelial cell line, CMECs did not display lipid droplets (LDs) in the cytoplasm, while the former have many low-unsaturated LDs. In conclusion, Raman imaging is a fast and efficient tool to analyse single coronary endothelial cells in a non-invasive manner that can prove useful to characterize biochemical changes in a single isolated primary endothelial cell from a diseased heart.


'How I Play Golf' offers a lavishly illustrated instructional book with four-colour photography, original artwork, unique sequential shots of Tiger in action, and easy-to-follow diagrams for golfers of all abilities. Only in his mid-20s, Tiger Woods is already a golfing legend worldwide. Fans everywhere have marvelled at his explosive drives, his accurate approach shots, his steady putter, and most important, how his devastating mental game transcends all the ups and downs of the game of golf. The insights Tiger reveals in HOW I PLAY GOLF are a combination of the physical and psychological practices that Tiger uses daily to keep his game at the top. For fans and followers of Tiger, these secrets will become the gospel of how to improve one's own game.


Increasing the frequency of protein consumption is recommended to stimulate muscle hypertrophy with resistance exercise. This study manipulated dietary protein distribution to assess the effect on gains in lean mass during a rugby preseason. Twenty-four developing elite rugby athletes (age 20.1 ± 1.4 years, mass 101.6 ± 12.0 kg; M ± SD) were instructed to consume high biological value (HBV) protein at their main meals and immediately after resistance exercise while limiting protein intake between meals. To manipulate protein intake frequency, the athletes consumed 3 HBV liquid protein supplements (22 g protein) either with main meals (bolus condition) or between meals (frequent condition) for 6 weeks in a 2 × 2 crossover design. Dietary intake and change in lean mass values were compared between conditions by analysis of covariance and correlational analysis. The dietary manipulation successfully altered the protein distribution score (average number of eating occasions containing > 20 g of protein) to 4.0 ± 0.8 and 5.9 ± 0.7 (p < .01) for the bolus and frequent conditions, respectively. There was no difference in gains in lean mass between the bolus (1.4 ± 1.5 kg) and frequent (1.5 ± 1.4 kg) conditions (p = .91). There was no clear effect of increasing protein distribution from approximately 4-6 eating occasions on changes in lean mass during a rugby preseason. However, other dietary factors may have augmented adaptation.


Ecological changes in the phenology and distribution of plants and animals are occurring in all well-studied marine, freshwater, and terrestrial groups. These observed changes are heavily biased in the directions predicted from global warming and have been linked to local or regional climate change through correlations between climate and biological variation, field and laboratory experiments, and physiological research. Range-restricted species, particularly polar and mountaintop species, show severe range contractions and have been the first groups in which entire species have gone extinct due to recent climate change. Tropical coral reefs and amphibians have been most negatively affected. Predator-prey and plant-insect interactions have been disrupted when interacting species have responded differently to warming. Evolutionary adaptations to warmer conditions have occurred in the interiors of species' ranges, and resource use and dispersal have evolved rapidly at expanding range margins. Observed genetic shifts modulate local effects of climate change, but there is little evidence that they will mitigate negative effects at the species level.


This paper proposes a novel system for the automatic detection and recognition of traffic signs. The proposed system detects candidate regions as maximally stable extremal regions (MSERs), which offers robustness to variations in lighting conditions. Recognition is based on a cascade of support vector machine (SVM) classifiers that were trained using histogram of oriented gradient (HOG) features. The training data are generated from synthetic template images that are freely available from an online database; thus, real footage road signs are not required as training data. The proposed system is accurate at high vehicle speeds, operates under a range of weather conditions, runs at an average speed of 20 frames per second, and recognizes all classes of ideogram-based (nontext) traffic symbols from an online road sign database. Comprehensive comparative results to illustrate the performance of the system are presented.