The present study provides evidence of a novel neuronal pathway for the control of GnRH secretion involving bradykinin neurons. Bradykinin neurons were shown by immunohistochemistry to be densely localized in several regions of the brain including the cortex, hippocampus and supraoptic nucleus, as well as two regions critical in the control of GnRH secretion, the organum vasculosum of the lamina terminalis and arcuate nucleus. Bradykinin dose-dependently stimulated GnRH release from male and proestrous female rat hypothalami in vitro. Antagonist studies revealed that bradykinin effects are mediated by the bradykinin B2 receptor. The effect of bradykinin on GnRH release is not mediated by the classical major transmitter, glutamate, as glutamate antagonists had no effect on bradykinin stimulation of GnRH release. Rather, bradykinin appears to act directly on the GnRH neuron as bradykinin stimulated GnRH release directly from immortalized GnRH (GT1-7) neurons in vitro, and immunoblot studies revealed that the bradykinin B2 receptor is present in GT1-7 neurons. The bradykinin B2 receptor was also demonstrated in the rat hypothalamus and pituitary by immunoblotting. Bradykinin-induced exocytosis of GnRH appears to involve activation of the PKC signaling pathway, as a PKC inhibitor blocked bradykinin-induced GnRH release. Finally, bradykinin neurons appear to be important mediators of steroid signals in the hypothalamus to produce the LH surge, as central administration of a B2 antagonist, but not a B1 antagonist, significantly attenuated the steroid-induced LH surge in the ovariectomized female rat.


There has been recent progress in the development of anti-fibrotic drugs for the treatment of idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) (1,2). Interestingly, the precise mechanisms of action of these drugs are not known (3). Importantly, although both drugs have been shown to slow the progression of disease, neither has been shown to definitively improve quality of life or survival. Clearly, improved therapies for the treatment of IPF and other fibrotic diseases are needed. It has been suggested that core pathways that mediate fibrosis in multiple organ systems may serve as better targets for anti-fibrotic drug development (4). Liepelt and Tacke (5) recently highlight redox imbalance in the context of aging as one of these core pathways.


Overweight and obesity are frequently reported to be a significant issue in schizophrenia resulting in the inherent complications of these disorders. Body weight gain also commonly results from treatment with the most tolerable and efficacious pharmacological treatments, second-generation antipsychotics. However there are numerous other factors that contribute to increased body mass in individuals with schizophrenia prior to the initiation of treatment. With prior research indicating that individuals with schizophrenia have higher rates of overweight and obesity before treatment. Therefore this article provides a review of pertinent issues associated with body weight gain in schizophrenia in an attempt to delineate the impact of both the disease and treatment upon body weight gain. The results of the review indicate that body weight gain in schizophrenia occurs from both psychosocial and biological factors that are further compounded by antipsychotic treatment. The article concludes with recommendations for future research.


Recent work on the theory of teams and team reasoning in game interactive settings is due principally to the late Michael Bacharach (Bacharach, 2006), who offers a conception of the individual as a team member, and also to Martin Hollis (1998) and Robert Sugden and Natalie Gold (Sugden, 2000; Gold & Sugden, 2007), and is motivated by the conflict between what ordinary experience suggests people often to do and what rationality prescribes for them, such as in prisoner's dilemma games where individuals can choose to cooperate or defect. The source of the conflict, they suggest, is an ambiguity in the syntax of standard game theory, which is taken to pose the question individuals in games ask themselves as, "what should I do?," but which might be taken to pose the question, particularly when individuals are working together with others as, "what should we do?" When taken in the latter way, each individual chooses according to what best promotes the team's objective and then performs the role appropriate as a member of that team or group. Bacharach understood this change in focus in terms of the different possible cognitive frames that individuals use to think about the world and developed a variable frame theory for rational play in games in which the frame adopted for a decision problem determines what counts as rational play (Janssen, 2001; Casajus, 2001).In order to explain how someone acts, we have to take account of the representation or model of her situation that she is using as she thinks what to do. The model varies with the cognitive frame in which she does her thinking. Her frame stands to her thoughts as a set of axes does to a graph; it circumscribes the thoughts that are logically possible for her (not ever, but at that time). (Bacharach, 2006, p. 69)Sugden understands this framing idea in terms of the theory of focal points following Thomas Schelling's emphasis on the role of salience in coordination games (Schelling, 1960), and his theory similarly ties decision-making to the way the game is understood (Sugden, 1995). This all recalls what Tversky and Kahneman (1981, 1986) termed standard's theory's description invariance assumption, whose abandonment makes it possible to bring a variety of the insights from psychology to bear on rationality in economics.


This thesis presents a broad study of methods for increasing the efficiency of narrow-band radio transmitters. The study is centered around the base station application and TETRA/TEDS networks. The general solution space studied is that of envelope tracking applied to linear class-A/B radio frequency power amplifiers (RFPAs) in conjunction with Cartesian feedback (CFB) used to linearize the overall transmitter system. On a system level, it is demonstrated how envelope tracking is particularly useful for RF carriers with high peak-to-average power ratios, such as TEDS with 10dB. It is also demonstrated how the envelope tracking technique introduces a number of potential pitfalls to the system, namely in the form of power supply ripple intermodulation (PSIM), reduced RFPA linearity and a higherimpedance supply rail for the RFPA. Design and analysis techniques for these three issues are introduced and demonstrated. On subcomponent level, solutions for implementing the envelope tracking power supply are proposed and demonstrated. A number of buck-type DCDC converter topologies are investigated and compared, with the objective of showing the trade-offs involved between switching frequency, control bandwidth and ripple voltage. It is found that the simple fourth-order filter buck converter is ideal for TETRA and TEDS envelope tracking power supplies. The problem of extracting maximum control bandwidth from a given power topology is given particular attention, with a range of, arguably new, insights resulting. It is clearly shown that single-phase switch-mode control systems based on oscillation (controlled unstable operation) of the whole power train provide the highest possible control bandwidth. A study of the limitations of Cartesian feedback is also included. It is shown that bandwidths in excess of 4MHz can be achieved for a 400MHz carrier frequency using readily available discrete components. Even higher CFB bandwidths are the key to flexible RFPA system capable of transmitting multiple RF carriers simultaneously. A number of key problem areas are identified and shown to need further research. Practically demonstrated is a high-efficiency 25W TEDS transmitter capable of meeting all base station adjacent channel power ratio and wideband noise specifications with ample margins. Efficiency is improved from 23% to 44% by application of envelope tracking almost a doubling at the cost of a single-phase buck converter and without any penalties in RFPA output spectrum purity.


PSK is a protein-bound polysaccharide prepared from cultured mycelium of Coriolus versicolor. The appearance of an immunosuppressive effect in sera of tumor-bearing mice and its elimination by oral administration of PSK were investigated using an in vitro assay of blastoid transformation of normal spleen cells in response to PHA. (1) An inhibitory effect appeared in sera of X5563 plasmacytoma-bearing mice, while a facilitating effect was noted in sera of MH134 hepatoma- and MM 102 mammary tumor-bearing mice. (2) The presence of both an inhibitory and a facilitating factor was shown by Sephacryl gel fractionation. (3) Oral administration of PSK resulted in the elimination of the inhibitory effect from sera of X5563-bearing mice. The facilitating effect of sera from MH134-bearing mice was augmented by PSK administration, but that in sera from MM102-bearing mice was not influenced by such treatment. The summarized effects of these factors may be expressed as various types of effects in serum and PSK may be effective in the elimination of a suppressive factor from such sera.


Public participation in local water councils is one method to involve different actors in the implementation of the EU Water Framework Directive. In this study we investigate which beliefs explain why the public participate and also how motives to participate are related to willingness to comply with decisions related to the water management framework. In total 910 respondents answered a web survey regarding their participation in the council work. Structural equation modelling was conducted with willingness to comply and motives to participate as the main dependent latent constructs. Other included latent constructs were perceived need for change, fairness, trust, and social- and personal norms. The results show that motives to participate did not have an effect on willingness to comply. Perceived need for change had indirect effects on nearly all latent constructs in the model and personal norms and social norms (through personal norms) had an effect on willingness to comply. The results are discussed in the context of water management methods.


The axonal guidance molecules slit and robo are known to interact producing a repulsive signal to the growing processes of nerve cells during development. These signals contribute to the proper 'wiring' of nervous systems. Ascidians possess comparatively simple nervous systems, yet still require mechanisms to establish proper synaptic connectivity. In this paper I attempted to identify and clone slit and robo from two ascidians, Boltenia villosa and Molgula oculata. I was unable clone slit or robo sequences from either of these organisms, but was wable to analyze the sequences from the Molgula transcriptome sequences. I constructed gene trees for both genes with available Genbank sequences. These trees grouped vertebrates together, but in both cases the high sequence divergence in the invertebrates resulted in a weak phylogenetic signal leading to a polytomy among the invertebrates.


In this paper the authors reflect on a case of action research conducted in a health and social service organization that provides services for people who are elderly or have disabilities. The aim of the intervention was to explore and support the possibility, at different organizational levels, of building and maintaining a sustainable working life despite the difficult situations faced by this type of organization and the turbulence in the delivery of its services. The authors discuss the concept of sustainability and the action research approach, referring to the description and analysis of the case study: the initial steps to create a committee group and a research group, the proposed process and its development, and an evaluation of and conclusions concerning the intervention. The case will contribute to the debate around some epistemological research questions and issues concerning the validity of the knowledge created: what kind of knowledge does action research produce? What are the proper link and balance needed between theory and practice, and between knowledge and action? What kind of validity is necessary to sustain people's recognition in an action research process?


ABSTRACT Objective: Neuropathic pain is often difficult to treat due to a complex pathophysiology. This study evaluated the efficacy, tolerability and safety of combination therapy with 5% lidocaine medicated plaster and pregabalin for neuropathic pain in patients with post-herpetic neuralgia (PHN) or painful diabetic polyneuropathy (DPN). Methods: Patients completing 4-week monotherapy with 5% lidocaine medicated plaster or pregabalin were enrolled in an 8-week combination phase. Patients with adequate response to monotherapy (recalled average pain intensity of 4 or less on 11-point numeric rating scale in the previous 3 days [NRS-3 score]) continued their previous therapy, whereas those with insufficient response received combination therapy. Efficacy endpoints included change in NRS-3 from combination phase baseline, Patient and Clinical Global Impression of Change (PGIC/CGIC), and patient's satisfaction with treatment. Safety evaluation included adverse events (AEs), drug-related AEs (DRAEs), and withdrawal due to AEs. Clinical trial registration: EudraCT No. 2006-003132-29. Results: Of 229 patients in the per-protocol set (PPS: 68 PHN and 161 DPN), 71 received 5% lidocaine medicated plaster monotherapy, 57 had pregabalin added to 5% lidocaine medicated plaster, 57 pregabalin monotherapy and 44 received 5% lidocaine medicated plaster in addition to continued pregabalin treatment. There were no meaningful differences in demographic data between the treatment groups. Patients continuing on monotherapy demonstrated additional decreases in NRS-3 scores. Patients receiving combination therapy achieved clinically relevant reduction in NRS-3 values in addition to improvement achieved during the 4 weeks of monotherapy. Improvement was similar between the two combination therapy groups. Considerable improvements in patients' treatment satisfaction were reported. Incidences of AEs were in line with previous reports for the two treatments and combination therapy was generally well tolerated. Conclusions: In patients with PHN and painful DPN failing to respond to monotherapy, combination therapy with 5% lidocaine medicated plaster and pregabalin provides additional clinically relevant pain relief and is safe and well-tolerated.


Cities are key in urban climate mitigation. Since the early 2000s, a trend of urban climate governance experimentation has been observed in which cities, and especially city governments, are trialing novel governance interventions, processes, and instruments to learn from their development and implementation. This article explores the role of the government of the city of Seoul, South Korea, in a range of local experiments. It particularly focuses on the factors that contribute to the success (or lack thereof) of urban climate governance experimentation. It finds that the city's government has been successful in developing and trialing some but not all experiments and that the overall results of these are promising in certain areas of city development and use. The article also highlights some less promising results, indicating the fragile nature of urban climate governance experimentation—in both the scientific and political senses of the term.


"Optimal Observation for Cyber-physical Systems" addresses the challenge, fundamental to the design of wireless sensor networks (WSNs), presented by the obligatory trade-off between precise estimates and system constraints. A unified theoretical framework, based on the well-established theory of optimal experimental design and providing consistent solutions to problems hitherto requiring a variety of approaches, is put forward to solve a large class of optimal observation problems. The Fisher information matrix plays a key role in this framework and makes it feasible to provide analytical solutions to some complex and important questions which could not be answered in the past. Readers with an applied background in WSN implementation will find all the understanding of the key theory of optimal experimental design they need within this book. The use of multiple examples to illustrate the theoretical parts of the book brings the subject into sharper focus than would an abstract theoretical disquisition.


Gender and mental health is a growing field in psychiatry and in the last three to four decades, many different aspects of women's mental health have bloomed. Researchers have gained a better understanding of the psychological, social, and cultural aspects of mental health problems in women, and it is possible to describe, classify, and circumscribe different diagnoses as they appear in the female gender. Epidemiological data has also shown an increased frequency in different clinical aspects of many psychiatric disorders. In addition, research into areas including eating disorders, perinatal, psychiatric disorders, and the long term effects of abuse have helped us to appreciate the societal, parental, and personal consequences of mental health problems. The Oxford Textbook of Women and Mental Health is dedicated to fundamental aspects in women's mental health. Part one of the text covers topics from women's health as a global issue to different medical psychological theories, giving an overview of the role of gender in mental health. The second part of the book examines clinical aspects of women and mental health. In part three, special clinical topics such as PTSD, self-harm, menopause, violence and its management are investigated. Part four of the text focuses on parental psychiatric disorders, clarifying how mental health and behavioural problems in children can be a marker or consequence of maternal distress. The final two parts look at the topics of women and disability, and legislation and policy. A book of exceptional scope and depth, it will be essential for all those health professionals involved in managing mental health problems in women.


The writer presents the essence of the iconographic-iconological method (in Erwin Panofsky's interpretation) and draws our attention to the unclear methodological status of iconography (there are some who consider it "a general science about visual message", according to others it is a method, a technique).

In the second part the writer relates and draws conclusions from previous iconographic analyses (by Christian Metz, Roland Barthes, Erwin Panofsky, Linda Williams). The conclusion is the conviction that iconographic studies in the field of film are possible only in the case of:

a) strongly codified works, supplied with artificially created and commonly accepted symbolism,

b) specific series of kinds and genres (Wild West films, fables, morality films, "films of the cape and sword"),

c) the works of distinct cultural circles, requiring special heuristics.

In other cases the efficacy of iconography as a method "wains", the distinguishing of level becomes an incoherent confusion of several different analytic techniques.


This paper focuses on the recently changed perspectives in the Netherlands' risk reduction philosophy, aimed at protecting a densely populated delta at a lasting high safety level throughout this century while addressing the impacts of climate change and socio-economic developments. The changed perspectives reflect a shift from policy development and implementation following a disaster (reactive) to a nationwide approach of climate-proofing the delta and thus anticipating projections of climate change and socio-economic developments at the end of this century (proactive: prevention). In addition to presenting these changed perspectives, lessons learnt are presented from Dutch experience, which can be applied to flood-prone areas around the globe. The connecting theme through these lessons learnt is the realisation that a proactive approach to flood prevention instead of reacting to flood disasters pays off and should be the way forward for densely populated, flood-prone areas.


Invenio is a free comprehensive web-based document repository and digital library software suite originally developed at CERN. It can serve a variety of use cases from an institutional repository or digital library to a web journal. In order to fully use full-text documents for efficient search and ranking, Solr was integrated into Invenio through a generic bridge. Solr indexes extracted full-texts and most relevant metadata. Consequently, Invenio takes advantage of Solr's efficient search and word similarity ranking capabilities. In this paper, we first give an overview of Invenio, its capabilities and features. We then present our open source Solr integration as well as scalability challenges that arose for an Inveniobased multi-million record repository: the CERN Document Server. We also compare our Solr adapter to an alternative Xapian adapter using the same generic bridge. Both integrations are distributed with the Invenio package and ready to be used by the institutions using or adopting Invenio.


This paper addresses the problem of adaptation of E-Learning to a given or proposed context. Current learning technology standards are available for various purposes, such as contents, learner profiles or learning activities, but there are no specifications to describe the context of learning scenarios. Such a description is crucial to identify change-requirements or to compare situations when learning scenarios are re-used. In this paper, we define a specification of context metadata. We show how they can be used to adapt learning scenarios from a given to a new context, in particular to identify change requirements for the internationalization of learning scenarios.


We use 5 years (2001–2005) of CHAMP (Challenging Minisatellite Payload) satellite data to study average spatial and temporal mass density perturbations caused by magnetospheric substorms in the thermosphere. Using statistics from 2306 substorms to construct superposed epoch time series, we find that the largest average increase in mass density of about 6% occurs about 90 min after substorm expansion phase onset about 3 h of magnetic local time east of the onset region. Averaged over the entire polar auroral region, a mass density increase of about 4% is observed. Using a simple model to estimate the mass density increase at the satellite altitude, we find that an energy deposition rate of 30 GW applied for half an hour predominantly at an altitude of 110 km is able to produce mass density enhancements of the same magnitude. When taking into account previous work that has shown that 80% of the total energy input is due to Joule heating, i.e., enhanced electric fields, whereas 20% is due to precipitation of mainly electrons, our results suggest that the average substorm deposits about 6 GW in the polar thermosphere through particle precipitation. Our result is in good agreement with simultaneous measurements of the NOAA Polar‐orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite (POES) Hemispheric Power Index; however, it is about 1 order of magnitude less than reported previously.


Midbrain dopaminergic (mDA) neurons are involved in the regulation of
movement and behavior, and their loss causes severe neurological disorders, such as
Parkinson's disease. Foxa1 and Foxa2 (Foxa1/2), members of the Foxa family of
forkhead/winged helix transcription factors, are expressed in mDA neurons throughout
their development and display overlapping functions. Previously, it has been shown that
Foxa1/2 regulate specification and differentiation of mDA neuron development. During
specification, Foxa1/2 are required for the expression of Lmx1a, an intrinsic determinant
of mDA identity. Recent data strongly suggests that Foxa2 cooperate with Lmx1a and
Nurr1 (Nr4a2) in subsequent feed forward loops to regulate differentiation of mDA
neurons. However, Foxa2 regulated direct targets and the mechanisms underlying its
roles in mDA development are largely unknown.
In this study, we performed chromatin immunoprecipitation (ChIP) and massively
parallel Illumina 2G sequencing (ChIP-seq) using in vitro and in vivo DA systems. We
produced a genome wide profile of Foxa2 binding sites at two stages of mDA neuron
development: specification (in vitro), and differentiation (E12.5 and E14.5 in vivo tissue).
Foxa2 binding was observed on known regulated elements, the Shh brain enhancer and
the Foxa2 floor plate enhancer in both in vivo and in vitro data sets. Validation of
candidate targets was carried out by independent in vivo ChIP-qPCR analysis and reverse
transcriptase-qPCR expression assays using ventral midbrain tissue from both wild type
and transgenic Foxa1;Foxa2 null mice. Furthermore, genomic regions in the Lmx1a and
Lmx1b loci identified in our ChIP-seq analysis were validated for enhancer activity by
transgenic LacZ reporter mice. These results strongly suggest that Foxa2 directly
regulates the Lmx1a and Lmx1b enhancers emphasizing its key role in mDA specification. In addition, luciferase reporter assays in P19 cells demonstrate the
combinatorial role of Foxa2 with Lmx1a and/or Nurr1 in regulating candidate enhancer
regions of genes expressed in mDA neurons. These results confirm the quality of our data
sets in predicting Foxa2 regulated target genes.


Over the next several years, crop prices are projected to be below to slightly above commodity loan rates. As a result, marketing loan benefits to farmers, in the form of loan deficiency payments and marketing loan gains from the commodity loan program, are likely to continue to be sizeable. The level of realized per-unit revenues facilitated by marketing loans exceeds commodity loan rates, thereby raising expected net returns to farmers. Model simulations show that the loan program can raise total acreage planted to major field crops, generally increasing levels of domestic use and exports while lowering crop prices. Cross-commodity effects of supply response to relative returns (including marketing loan benefits), however, result in acreage shifts among competing crops, which can lead to reductions in plantings of some crops in some years. Most impacts occur in the years when there are marketing loan benefits, with little effect in subsequent years when prices rise high enough to eliminate marketing loan benefits. The livestock sector benefits from these outcomes because of generally lower feed costs.


1.0 INTRODUCTION On 26 September 2001 Ms Puangthong Simaplee died in Vilkwood Detention Centre after being discovered by immigration officials during a raid on a Surry Hills brothel. She told the immigration officials that at a young age she had been sold into sexual servitude by her parents and trafficked from Thailand to Maylasia, then re-trafficked to Australia more recently as a young adult. After being discovered, Ms Simaplee was detained in Villawood Detention Centre as an unlawful non-citizen, weighing 38kg. Three days later, weighing only 31kg, she died as a result of heroin withdrawal.1 The inquest into the death of Ms Simaplee remains a particularly illustrative event that highlights the failure in the Australian legal system, and particularly the migration system, to deal effectively with the phenomenon of trafficking.2 Acknowledging the magnitude of the trafficking industry and the existence of Australia as a destination country for victims of many kinds of trafficking, this paper will focus on the scope and limitations of Australia's migration and criminal justice approaches to sex trafficking. The paper will outline the nature and extent of trafficking in Australia, current responses of the Australian government towards trafficking, the successes and failures of Australia's criminalisation approach, and the limitations of Australia's visa system for victims of trafficking in regard to international standards and human rights. Finally, the paper concludes with a number of recommendations that the government adopt a transparent, coordinated, monitored and holistic human rights and social justice approach to combat trafficking and slavery, developed in conjunction with human rights and non-government organisations, to ensure unconditional culturally-appropriate victim protection to prevent retrafficking and address wider systemic issues of globaUsation, poverty and gendered harms. 2.0 TRAFFICKING IN AUSTRALIA The United Nations 2002 Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, especially Women and Children, ratified by Australia on 27 May 2004, defines human trafficking in Article 3 as: the recruitment, transportation, transfer, habouring or receipt of persons, by means of the threat or use of force or other forms of coercion, of abduction, or fraud, of deception, of the abuse of power of a position of vulnerability or receiving of payments or benefits to achieve the consent of a person having control over another person, for the purposes of exploitation. Divergent definitions of what constitutes sex trafficking have largely characterised policy debates on the issue and dictated responses to it. When the offences of slavery, sexual servitude and deceptive recruiting were introduced to the Australian Criminal Code Act in 1995, the Act required an element of bondage or coercion to establish a case of trafficking, a legal test that was arguably more onerous than international best practice by not accepting that trafficking could result from more insidious means such as fraud or abuse of power. The Act was also criticised for failing to address the experiences of vulnerable groups, the gendered nature of trafficking and reimposing border control.3 Despite amendments through the Criminal Code Amendment (Trafficking in Persons) Act 2005 that recognised factors such as threats, force, deception or debt bondage, feminist debates linger over the extent to which women can freely consent to sex work,4 and how such frameworks should be adopted into the definition of trafficking. Some anti-trafficking organisations view women's 'choice' as limited in the context of wider socioeconomic circumstances and argue that sex work victimises women and widens gender inequality: the Coalition Against Trafficking in Women argues, 'All prostitution exploits women, regardless of women's consent.'5 Other anti-trafficking organisations defend the right to self determination and expression and recognise women's agency in making informed decisions. …


Purpose: The rise of out-of-school youth arts organizations, especially those dedicated to addressing social issues with young people, suggests a growing need for spaces in which we prepare young people to creatively and critically shape their communities. While the popularity of these programs is certainly positive, it does little to tell us what pedagogical lessons we might learn from how youth arts organizations approach social justice teaching in the arts. In order to understand what it takes to do social justice art education, our research team investigated the pedagogical strategies used by Center for Urban Pedagogy, an out-of-school youth arts organization. Method: Through qualitative interviews, observations, and document analyses, this case study examined the specific pedagogical strategies used by educators in the Center for Urban Pedagogy's (CUP) Urban Investigations program to engage young people in creating art for social justice aims.  Findings: Our initial findings revealed that the process of interviewing is at the center of CUP's approach to both social engagement and art-making. According to our research, interviewing reveals hidden layers of meaning to learners, offers opportunities to visualize personal connections, and provides a means to critically and collaboratively create artwork.


In recent years, the Ray Tracing of Implicit Surfaces on a GPU has been studied by many researchers. However, the existing methods have challenges that mainly includes solving for self-intersecting surfaces. General solutions for Ray Tracing suffer from the problem of false roots, and robust solutions are hard to generalize. In this paper, we present a robust algorithm based on Extended Taylor-Test Adaptive Marching Points, which allows a robust rendering of Self-Intersecting Implicit Surfaces on a GPU. We are using the Second Order Taylor Series expansion to alleviate the problem of double-roots in Self-Intersecting Implicit Surfaces. Our approach is simple to implement and is based on the Hessian Matrix of the Implicit Surface that can be attributed to the Hessian Matrix can be used to obtain second-order Taylor Series expansion for the univariate ray-equation. We compare our results using the simulated ground-truth with the smallest step-size possible with the proposed algorithm, and our proposed algorithm gives the best visual results as well as highest SSIM percentage than other approaches.


We use ab initio computations to investigate the effect of filler ions on the properties of CoSb3 skutterudites. We analyze global and local structural effects of filling, using the Ba-filled system as an example. We show that the deformation of Sb network induced by the filler affects primarily nearest neighboring Sb sites around the filler site as the soft Sb rings accommodate the distortion. Rearrangement of Sb atoms affects the electronic band structure and we clarify the effect of this local strain on the band gap. We compute the phonon dispersions and identify the filler-dominated modes from the lowest-frequency optical modes at Gamma. Their weak dispersion across the Brillouin zone indicates that they are localized and a force-constant analysis shows that the filler vibration is strongly coupled with nearby Sb atoms.


Abstract Natural and anthropogenic landscape features, such as rivers, mountain ranges, and roads can alter animal dispersal paths and movement patterns. Consequently landscape, through its effects on dispersal, may influence many ecological processes, including disease transmission, invasion dynamics, and gene flow. To investigate influences of landscape features on dispersal patterns of a large mammal, we captured and radiomarked 363 juvenile male white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus), including 212 confirmed dispersers, in 2 topographically dissimilar study areas in Pennsylvania, USA. Dispersal azimuths were uniformly distributed in the western study area (WSA), where there was irregular, hilly topography. Mean dispersal azimuths paralleled ridge direction in the eastern study area, where long parallel ridges were aligned northeast–southwest. Major roads in both areas and a large river in the WSA were semipermeable barriers to dispersal of juvenile males; dispersal paths were less likely to intersect these linear features. Dispersal movements were direct and brief, typically lasting <12 hours. For all dispersers, we found no evidence for preference or avoidance of establishing adult, postdispersal ranges in proximity to roads; however, deer that encountered roads near the terminus of their dispersal path were more likely to stop on the near side. Further, for deer that established postdispersal home ranges near major roads, these features influenced range placement such that locations were typically clustered on one side of the road. The influence of roads, rivers, and mountains on dispersal paths and postdispersal locations of white-tailed deer suggest that landscape-specific features should be considered in conservation and management of this and possibly other species of large mammals.


The paper production process is significantly affected by direct and indirect effects of microorganism proliferation. Microorganisms can be introduced in different steps. Some microorganisms find optimum growth conditions and proliferate along the production process, affecting both the end product quality and the production efficiency. The increasing need to reduce water consumption for economic and environmental reasons has led most paper mills to reuse water through increasingly closed cycles, thus exacerbating the bacterial proliferation problem. In this work, microbial communities in a paper mill located in Italy were characterized using both culture-dependent and independent methods. Fingerprinting molecular analysis and 16S rRNA library construction coupled with bacterial isolation were performed. Results highlighted that the bacterial community composition was spatially homogeneous along the whole process, while it was slightly variable over time. The culture-independent approach confirmed the presence of the main bacterial phyla detected with plate counting, coherently with earlier cultivation studies (Proteobacteria, Bacteroidetes, and Firmicutes), but with a higher genus diversification than previously observed. Some minor bacterial groups, not detectable by cultivation, were also detected in the aqueous phase. Overall, the population dynamics observed with the double approach led us to hypothesize a possible role of suspended bacteria in the re-formation mechanisms of resistant biofilms.


I. A compilation of 362 cooling ages, including 52 newly reported in this study, from nine thermochronometric systems, 40K/39Ar amphibole, 40K/39Ar white mica, 87Rb/86Sr white mica, 40K/39Ar biotite, 87Rb/86Sr biotite, zircon and apatite fission track, zircon and apatite (U-Th)/He, indicate that the base of the Austroalpine allochthonous 'orogenic lid' was not in full thermal equilibrium with its Penninic substrate until at least the middle Oligocene, approximately 29-28 Ma, to allowably as late as the early Miocene, ca. 18 Ma. There is about a factor-of-five difference in cooling rates between the hanging wall (ca. 4°C/m.y.) and footwall (ca. 20°C/m.y.) during this period. In addition, there are demonstrably higher metamorphic grades, including blueschist- and eclogite-facies, in the Pennine footwall compared to lower greenschist-facies in the Austroalpine hanging wall. Together these two facts demonstrate that hot, high-pressure Penninic nappes were forced upward against the cold, low-pressure overriding Austroalpine plate in a very short time window of approximately 7-10 m.y. between the time of peak metamorphism during the Eocene and the time of thermal equilibration with the overriding plate during the Oligo-Miocene. The most likely mechanism to produce such a cold-on-hot juxtaposition is a normal fault, and therefore, we conclude that an important period of nappe emplacement in the Central Swiss Alps occurred concurrently with orogen-perpendicular normal fault motion at the base of the Austroalpine allochthon persisting well into the Oligocene and possibly into the early Miocene, post-dating the 32-30 Ma age of the Bergell intrusion. Mesoscopic structural measurements made at the top and bottom of the Pennine zone in eastern Switzerland indicate multiple, spatially heterogeneous directions of movement. At the top, in the Oberhalbstein Valley, movement directions vary from dominantly top-east to top-south-southeast a very minor top-north component within Pennine rocks of the Martegnas shear zone and no preferred movement direction within the Austroalpine hanging wall. Near Piz Toissa, a minimum of two kilometers of nearby structural section in the Err and Platta nappes have been faulted out. At the bottom of the Pennine zone in Val Lumnezia and the Chur Rhein Valley at Trimmis, we observe top-northwest, top-north, and top-northeast movements. In Val Lumnezia, the Sub-Penninic Scopi zone (Gotthard cover rocks) shows movement in a top-northwest direction; the superjacent Peidener imbricate fault zone, a relatively thin (ca. 50 to 100 m thick) structural zone consisting of Scopi zone lithologies, shows movement in a northeasterly direction; above that, the basal Penninic Bundnerschiefer shows no dominant movement direction. To the east, in the Chur Rhine Valley, movement is well defined as exclusively top-north. Therefore, movement directions in the lower Bundnerschiefer are broadly top-north but heterogeneous in direction along strike between Val Lumnezia and Chur Rhein Valley, and, as first suggested by Weh and Frotizheim (2001), it may be erroneous to regard the basal Pennine thrust as a simple through-going structure. In Val Lumnezia, the Scopi-Peidener-Pennine nappes resemble a "jelly sandwich" in which the thick Pennine mass utilized the Peidener zone to move in an oblique sinistral-normal slip sense past the southeast-dipping allochthonous Scopi zone and its east-dipping Gotthard "massif" substrate. If the Peidener zone continues northeastward beneath alluvial cover of the Chur Rhein Valley, it may serve as a late, NE-directed shear zone that separates the Pennine nappes from European units. If so, it would explain the apparent truncation and progressive omission of allochthonous elements of European affinity along the zone from southwest to northeast beneath alluvium of the Chur Rhein Valley. We therefore infer that the direct juxtaposition of Penninic units to the east with the Helvetic autochthon to the west at the latitude of Trimmis records an episode of top-northeast, orogen-parallel strike-slip and extensional movement. Zircon (U-Th)/He (ZHe) cooling ages from the Oberhalbstein Valley indicate that the Austroalpine-Pennine contact was still active at ca. 27 Ma, and that the Martegnas shear zone was active, in part, between ca. 27 and 24 Ma. It is likely that the Piz Toissa klippe formed around this time during the late Oligocene. The pattern of much younger ZHe ages at the bottom of the Pennine zone is independent of any nappe boundaries, including the Peidener imbricate fault zone, but is consistent with the rise of the Aar massif during the Miocene. Tectonic movements, as recorded by the mesostructure in the Austroalpine, Penninic, and Sub-Penninic domains, and local ZHe cooling ages generally support the conclusion drawn strictly from cooling ages that the Pennine zone was emplaced en masse as a coherent 'piston' or 'mega-pip' during Oligocene to early Miocene time (approximately 29 to 18 Ma), well after juxtaposition of Apulia with cratonic Europe (continent-continent collision) and during the development of Alpine topography and the peripheral basins (viz. Molasse and Lombardi). Additional top-north movement and late uplift and flexure of the nappe stack, along with the Aar massif, occurred primarily in middle to upper Miocene time, following the post-collisional structural interposition of the Pennine zone between Europe and Apulia. II. Nine carbonate phases at Kennecott, Alaska were measured for their clumped isotope (∆47) equilibration temperatures. The total range for carbonate temperatures spans 38-164°C. Premineral phases are relatively cool (43-71°C); synmineral phases are relatively warm (89-157°C); late postmineral phases are the most cool (38-59°C) but overlap some premineral phases. Zebra dolomite precipitated in the range 130-163°C. Dedolomite, a hallmark alteration feature of the mineralizing fluids, falls into a narrow range of 98-109°C, consistent with the stability field for the low-temperature chalcocite polymorph. Except for one sample, none of the synmineral calcites crystallized within the stability field of djurleite, a volumetrically significant component of the main-stage ore, which suggests that intergrown djurleite may have been a somewhat later recrystallization product of chalcocite rather than a coeval phase. Calculated compositions for δ18Owater vary from -4.2 to +11.0‰. The most depleted water precipitated hydrothermal baroque dolomite, whereas the most enriched water was associated with recrystallized limestone wallrock on the periphery of the orebody. Waters that precipitated calcite+copper vary from -1.1 to +9.3‰. Intriguingly, rhythmic layering in zebra dolomite can be resolved in ∆47 space, and preliminary data indicate that the coarser-grained baroque dolomite bands precipitated at temperatures 5-10°C cooler than the surrounding, finer-grained dolomite wall rock bands. The calculated values of δ18Owater support a genetic model that invokes redox changes associated with fluid mixing as the likely mechanism responsible for copper deposition. In this model a sulfidic, basinal fluid having δ18O similar to seawater mixes with a cuprous fluid having heavier δ18O (5 to 8‰) which was derived from the Nikolai Greenstone during prehnite-pumpellyite-facies metamorphism.


We show that the transmission of a periodic grating with circular symmetry can be composed of the sum of the transmissions of positive and negative axicons of different orders. The properties of the light beams generated by the gratings can be understood from the well-known properties of the light beam of an axicon, which is approximately a Bessel beam of zeroth order. The method is applied to a circular binary phase grating, which is investigated both theoretically and experimentally in the spatial domain and the Fourier domain. A simple and accurate method for determining the focal length of a lens with use of Bessel light beams is presented.


Scholarly interest in religio-political movements in the Muslim world has increased dramatically in recent times. Given the considerable variety of movements that are inspired by Islam, it is imperative that overly general and descriptive analyses be avoided in favor of thoroughly contextualized studies of individual movements. In this article I adopt an interdisciplinary approach bridging the fields of history, anthropology, and politics to study the emergence of what I call the "new jihad in Swat" in northern Pakistan spearheaded by the Tehrik-e-Nifaz-e-Shariati-Muhammadi (TNSM) and Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP). Acknowledging the importance of the wider geopolitical environment, I argue that the rise of the TNSM and TTP is a function of the historical salience of Islamic (jihad) idiom in Pashtun society, localized sources of discontent, and historical-structural changes that have facilitated the emergence of a distinct agenda of "Shariatization." My findings are based on extensive interaction with Swatis, both in their homes and workplaces, over an extensive period. I have also interviewed many who have been residing in refugee camps after May 2009. I conclude that the wider geostrategic environment, class, and other social cleavages in Swat and the ideational power of Islam ensure that spaces for the "new jihad" will continue to proliferate in Swat and its environs.


As part of a large-scale project, the current qualitative study investigated the possible contribution of a consciousness-raising interactive workshop (as a form of professional development activity) to 30) 22 female and 8 male) Iranian EFL teachers' professional identity construction. Thirty Iranian EFL teachers were asked to write two reflective journals (one individually and one collectively) before and two others after they attended an eight-session interactive workshop on Reflective Journal Writing (RJW). The workshop aimed at raising their consciousness of RJW based on the framework proposed by Richards (1995) and the journal content guide developed by Soodmand Afshar (in press). Subsequently, in order to demonstrate how the consciousness-raising interactive workshop contributed to the participants' professional identity construction, interviews were conducted with them. The data collected were analyzed through the grounded-theory approach and qualitative content analysis. The results indicated that the workshop contributed to the participants' professional identity construction in various ways which are discussed at length in the paper.


The stemborer Sesamia nonagrioides is an important pest of maize in the Mediterranean Basin. Like other moths, this noctuid uses its chemosensory system to efficiently interact with its environment. However, very little is known on the molecular mechanisms that underlie chemosensation in this species. Here, we used next-generation sequencing (454 and Illumina) on different tissues from adult and larvae, including chemosensory organs and female ovipositors, to describe the chemosensory transcriptome of S. nonagrioides and identify key molecular components of the pheromone production and detection systems. We identified a total of 68 candidate chemosensory genes in this species, including 31 candidate binding-proteins and 23 chemosensory receptors. In particular, we retrieved the three co-receptors Orco, IR25a and IR8a necessary for chemosensory receptor functioning. Focusing on the pheromonal communication system, we identified a new pheromone-binding protein in this species, four candidate pheromone receptors and 12 carboxylesterases as candidate acetate degrading enzymes. In addition, we identified enzymes putatively involved in S. nonagrioides pheromone biosynthesis, including a ∆11-desaturase and different acetyltransferases and reductases. RNAseq analyses and RT-PCR were combined to profile gene expression in different tissues. This study constitutes the first large scale description of chemosensory genes in S. nonagrioides.


This paper describes an 802.15.6 compliant 2360-2484 MHz multiband transmitter that digitally multiplexes the appropriate phases from an 800 MHz poly-phase filter output to generate π/4 DQPSK signals at 2.4 GHz using injection locking. Modulation at one-third the RF frequency reduces the transmitter power consumption and enables channel selection using an integer-N PLL running at 800 MHz. The modulation technique does not require phase calibration and resolves the problems of traditional injection lock based modulators. The prototype transmitter consumes 2.4 mW while delivering -10 dBm RF power at the TX output resulting in an energy efficiency of 2.5 nJ/bit at 1.2 Mbps raw data rate. The measured RMS EVM for π/4 DQPSK modulation is 3.21%.


Definitions of Japan's Shugendō tradition often emphasize how its adherents, known as yamabushi or shugenja, took as their primary goal the acquisition of supernatural power and enlightenment via ascetic practice in the mountains. While mountain austerities were central to the tradition, settled, spouse-keeping yamabushi organized into households constituted the majority of its members in the late medieval and early modern periods; the study of their economic, political, and social activities have been neglected. The Shugendō organization headquartered at Mt. Haguro, one of the Dewa Sanzan triad of sacred mountains within present-day Yamagata prefecture, administered yamabushi and miko priestesses based in communities throughout northern Japan. Using the Sanada Shichirōzaemon and Sanada Shikibu households, elite yamabushi families based in Tōge at the foot of Mt. Haguro, this study investigates the lives and activities of spouse-keeping shugenja within the Shugendō tradition during Japan's early modern period (1600-1867). Existing in a liminal space between the seeming dichotomies of worldly and ascetic, lay and monastic, and folk and elite, the Sanadas and their peers navigated a complicated web of relationships to preserve their positions and fortunes. Working with documents from the previously unread Sanada Gyokuzōbō archive, this study argues for the centrality of the household unit within Japanese religious traditions. The privileges and obligations of the Sanada households, as well as their relationships with superiors and subordinates, both at Mt. Haguro and in its parishes, were based on the household rather than the individual, and were passed on from house head to house head. As local elites, the Sanada households enjoyed a hereditary place of honor within Haguro's social, ritual, and political hierarchies. Documentation was a necessary strategy to maintain their customary privileges and duties both at the organization's headquarters at Mt. Haguro and within its parishes across northern Japan. Networks that linked the Sanada families with superiors on Haguro's summit and subordinates in parishes, as well as their lay patrons, the Nanbu family of daimyo, were defined and defended by documents exchanged within these networks. Degree Type Dissertation Degree Name Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) Graduate Group East Asian Languages & Civilizations First Advisor Linda H. Chance


An exploration of the theme of art in Shakespeare's Tempest casts light on Eliot's use of the play in The Waste Land. Art has powers of redemption because it involves qualities of restraint, balance, timing - of "government" in the broadest sense - which are analogous to those required in the control of a life, a state, or a destiny. A further analogy is suggested between receptivity to the harmonious and healing effects of art and a character's capacity for compassion. the qualities of control and compassion involved in the creation of and response to art are those necessary to attaining a "clear life": art is a means of redemption because it teaches us to "give, sympathize, and control." the key to releasing the curse on the modern Waste Land, the means to the feeling and remembrance that might revitalize it, are precisely those actions and attitudes which Shakespeare's last play affirms as central. Correspondences exist between the play and poem of which Eliot was no doubt aware, as he wove allusions to the play throughout his work: "What the Thunder Says" is, in the deepest sense, what The Tempest says - "give, sympathize, control."


Background: Small adult patients with lower bodyweight wait-listed for liver transplantation may face a shortage of size-matched whole-liver grafts. The objective of this study is to compare time to transplantation in adult patients with a bodyweight of <60 kg to patients with bodyweight ≥60 kg. Methods: A matched case–control study was conducted. Patients aged 18 years and older listed for liver transplantation at our transplant center, from 2007 to 2016 with a bodyweight <60 kg were manually matched 1:2 to control patients ≥ 60 kg. Matching was performed based on ABO blood type, model for end-stage liver disease score, (non)-standard exception status, and eligibility for donation after cardiac death. Time to transplantation was assessed with univariable Cox-regression. Results: In total, 23 cases with a bodyweight < 60 kg were matched to 46 average-sized control patients. Small adults were significantly disadvantaged for receiving a liver transplantation as compared to their average-sized counterpart (hazard ratio 0.47; 95% confidence interval 0.29-0.75, P = .002). At the end of follow-up, 14/23 (60.9%) of cases versus 35/46 of controls (76.1%) had received a liver transplantation. Conclusion: Small adults with a bodyweight below 60 kg are disadvantaged on the waitlist for a size-matched whole liver graft.


Well-preserved remains of bone, tissue, and eggshell of Adelie Penguin (Pygoscelis adeliae) have been recovered from numerous abandoned colonies in the Ross Sea region, Antarctica. Radiocarbon dates on these remains provide an occupation history for this species ranging from hundreds to tens of thousands of years ago. We completed 62 new radiocarbon dates on these remains, which now indicate that an open-water marine environment existed in the Ross Sea from ca. 45,000 to 27,000 14 C yr before present (B.P.) and provide constraints for the timing of the last advance of the Ross Ice Sheet. Penguins did not recolonize the Ross Sea until ca. 8000 calendar years (cal yr) B.P., after the early Holocene retreat of the Ross Ice Sheet. Two subsequent periods of abandonment at 5000-4000 and 2000-1100 cal yr B.P. correlate with cooling episodes that caused unfavorable marine conditions for breeding penguins. Most modern colonies were established only within the past 2000 yr.


There are many books on data structures and algorithms, and some books laying out useful libraries of C functions, but this book aims to give you a unique combination of theoretical background and working code. In offering robust solutions for everyday programming tasks, Mastering Algorithms with C avoids the abstract style of most classic data structures and algorithms texts but still provides all the information you need to understand the purpose and use of common programming techniques. Implementations, as well as interesting, real-world examples of each data structure and algorithm, are shown in the text. Full source code appears on the accompanying disk. Using both a programming style and a writing style that are exceptionally clean, Kyle Loudon shows you how to use such essential data structures as lists, stacks, queues, sets, trees, heaps, priority queues, and graphs. He shows you how to use algorithms for sorting, searching, numerical analysis, data compression, data encryption, common graph problems, and computational geometry. He also describes the relative efficiency of all implementations. The compression and encryption chapters not only give you working code for reasonably efficient solutions, they explain concepts in an approachable manner for people who never have had the time or expertise to study them in depth. Anyone with a basic understanding of the C language can use this book. In order to provide maintainable and extendible code, an extra level of abstraction (such as pointers to functions) is used in examples where appropriate. Understanding that these techniques may be unfamiliar to some programmers, Loudon explains them clearly in the introductory chapters. Contents include: PointersRecursionAnalysis of algorithmsData structures (lists, stacks, queues, sets, hash tables, trees, heaps, priority queues, graphs)Sorting and searchingNumerical methodsData compressionData encryptionGraph algorithmsGeometric algorithms


51 All Rights Reserved © 2012 IJARCET  Abstract— Hybrid cloud combines the external public services and the internal private cloud providing services thereby enhancing the capabilities to secure, manage and govern the entire cloud spectrum. In this paper, online business management system is implemented using a hybrid cloud architecture which provides faster and greater ease of access to business transaction and management. The implemented system effectively favors the small scale, large scale, Business to Business (B2B) and Business to Consumers (B2C) by using E-commerce for management solution.


Background Chagas disease, caused by Trypanosoma cruzi, remains a serious public health concern in many areas of Latin America, including México. It is also endemic in Texas with an autochthonous canine cycle, abundant vectors (Triatoma species) in many counties, and established domestic and peridomestic cycles which make competent reservoirs available throughout the state. Yet, Chagas disease is not reportable in Texas, blood donor screening is not mandatory, and the serological profiles of human and canine populations remain unknown. The purpose of this analysis was to provide a formal risk assessment, including risk maps, which recommends the removal of these lacunae. Methods and Findings The spatial relative risk of the establishment of autochthonous Chagas disease cycles in Texas was assessed using a five–stage analysis. 1. Ecological risk for Chagas disease was established at a fine spatial resolution using a maximum entropy algorithm that takes as input occurrence points of vectors and environmental layers. The analysis was restricted to triatomine vector species for which new data were generated through field collection and through collation of post–1960 museum records in both México and the United States with sufficiently low georeferenced error to be admissible given the spatial resolution of the analysis (1 arc–minute). The new data extended the distribution of vector species to 10 new Texas counties. The models predicted that Triatoma gerstaeckeri has a large region of contiguous suitable habitat in the southern United States and México, T. lecticularia has a diffuse suitable habitat distribution along both coasts of the same region, and T. sanguisuga has a disjoint suitable habitat distribution along the coasts of the United States. The ecological risk is highest in south Texas. 2. Incidence–based relative risk was computed at the county level using the Bayesian Besag–York–Mollié model and post–1960 T. cruzi incidence data. This risk is concentrated in south Texas. 3. The ecological and incidence–based risks were analyzed together in a multi–criteria dominance analysis of all counties and those counties in which there were as yet no reports of parasite incidence. Both analyses picked out counties in south Texas as those at highest risk. 4. As an alternative to the multi–criteria analysis, the ecological and incidence–based risks were compounded in a multiplicative composite risk model. Counties in south Texas emerged as those with the highest risk. 5. Risk as the relative expected exposure rate was computed using a multiplicative model for the composite risk and a scaled population county map for Texas. Counties with highest risk were those in south Texas and a few counties with high human populations in north, east, and central Texas showing that, though Chagas disease risk is concentrated in south Texas, it is not restricted to it. Conclusions For all of Texas, Chagas disease should be designated as reportable, as it is in Arizona and Massachusetts. At least for south Texas, lower than N, blood donor screening should be mandatory, and the serological profiles of human and canine populations should be established. It is also recommended that a joint initiative be undertaken by the United States and México to combat Chagas disease in the trans–border region. The methodology developed for this analysis can be easily exported to other geographical and disease contexts in which risk assessment is of potential value.


Spent automobile catalyst is an important secondary resource of PGMs (platinum group metals), and the recovery is fairly significant. Various recovery technologies have been reported and applied in practical production, including pyroand hydrometallurgical processes. Because the grade of PGMs in the catalysts is quite low, approximately 0.5mass%, present recycling technologies involve high energy consumption. Enriching PGMs with energy-saving physical separation methods as a pre-treatment is therefore of great significance. Automobile catalyst is usually composed of cordierite phase as a substrate and an alumina/ceria phase, with PGMs, which covers the cordierite phase. In this research, a combined flowsheet, jaw crusher, crushing rolls, and attritor, was used to perform selective grinding and concentrate the alumina/ceria phase into finer size ranges. High-grade alumina/ceria phase was recovered into a 10.3mm size fraction with 57% recovery by using the jaw crusher and crushing rolls for pre-crushing. The coarser size fractions, in which the alumina/ceria phase was still present, was fed to the following surface-grinding step with an attritor to concentrate alumina/ceria phase further. By combining pre-crushing and surface grinding as described above, an alumina/ceria concentrate was produced with a grade of 66%, recovery of 76%, and separation efficiency of 52%. This research used the Ouchiyama model, a well-known surface-grinding model, to evaluate attritor surface grinding for various feed size fractions. Results of kinetic analyses and experiments demonstrated that surface grinding became predominant for larger feed size fractions under the condition of low ball-media content because of collisions between sample particles, but for smaller feed size fractions, surface grinding occurred mainly by collisions of sample particles with the grinding media because of the small size of the sample particles. Surface grinding of the cordierite phase was also observed, especially for coarser feed size particles for which the exposure ratio of the alumina coat layer was lower compared with finer feed particles. [doi:10.2320/matertrans.M2014082]


Multibit feedback, being one way of lowering DeltaSigma modulators power consumption, has a major obstacle: the number of components in the internal analog-to-digital converter (ADC) and digital-to-analog converter (DAC). Nevertheless, the number of comparators in the ADC can be significantly reduced depending on the order of noise-shaping and the oversampling ratio. In this paper, we propose an auto-ranging algorithm with a mechanism to keep the structure stable that emulates more quantization levels than that allowed by the number of comparators. As the recourse to segmented DACs allows lowering the complexity of the mismatch shaping encoder, the auto-ranging ADC brings the benefits of multibit feedback without the usual increase in size and power consumption. The internal number of bits in DeltaSigma modulators is no more restricted by the difficulty of building the flash ADC with a low voltage supply.


Kozyrskyj AL, Dahl ME, Ungar WJ, Becker AB, Law BJ. Pediatrics. 2006;117(6). Available at: www.pediatrics.org/cgi/content/full/117/6/e1104 PURPOSE OF THE STUDY. To evaluate time trends and determinants of antibiotic use in children with wheezing episodes. STUDY POPULATION. Children with asthma were identified from population-based health care and prescription databases in Manitoba, Canada, during fiscal years 1995–2001. Asthma was defined as at least 1 physician or hospital visit for asthma or at least 1 prescription for an asthma drug. METHODS. In this descriptive study, using general estimating equations, annual population-based rates of antibiotic prescriptions for wheezing episodes were modeled by age and antibiotic class. Population-based rates for antibiotic use for wheezing were defined as the annual number of antibiotic prescriptions dispensed per 1000 children with asthma. Linear hierarchical rankings were used to calculate odds ratios for receiving an antibiotic prescription according to child demographics and physician factors. RESULTS. Antibiotic prescription rates for wheezing decreased 28% from 708 prescriptions per 1000 children with asthma in 1995 to 511 prescriptions per 1000 children with asthma in 2001. However, an increase in prescriptions was observed for broader-spectrum macrolides (azithromycin and clarithromycin) in preschool-aged children (a 15-fold increase) and in all children (an eightfold increase). Immediate prescriptions (defined as within 2 days of the visit) were given in 23% of physician encounters for wheezing. Sixty-four percent of the visits resulted in an antibiotic prescription within 7 days of the visit. General practitioners prescribed antibiotics for wheezing more often than pediatricians, as did older compared with younger physicians. Physicians trained outside Canada and the United States were 40% more likely to prescribe antibiotics. Visits for younger children and visits during winter months more frequently resulted in antibiotic prescriptions. CONCLUSIONS. Antibiotic prescription rates for wheezing episodes declined in the late 1990s, but broader-spectrum antibiotic prescription rates increased. REVIEWER COMMENTS. Antibiotic use in asthma has gained renewed interest because of the antiinflammatory properties of certain antibiotic classes such as the macrolides. Coupled with the better-tolerated and more-convenient dosing of newer antibiotics (primarily azithromycin), they may provide a future therapeutic option in the treatment of asthma. Nonetheless, little is published about the prescribing patterns of antibiotics for wheezing and asthma. Coexisting maladies such as otitis or pneumonia are not specifically addressed in this publication but may account for the increase in prescription rates at 7 days postvisit. In addition, the possible contribution of antibiotics in the inception of asthma by participating in the "hygiene hypothesis" provides additional interest in these data. Finally, the perceived dangers of resistance with antibiotic use continue to make their use controversial in the treatment of asthma exacerbations.


This article reviews recent research regarding high-skilled migration. We adopt a data-driven perspective, bringing together and describing several ongoing research streams that range from the construction of global migration databases, to the legal codification of national policies regarding high-skilled migration, to the analysis of patent data regarding cross-border inventor movements. A common theme throughout this research is the importance of agglomeration economies for explaining high-skilled migration. We highlight some key recent findings and outline major gaps in the literature that we hope will be tackled in the near future.


The purpose was to interpret the varying morphology of electrospun cellulose acetate (CA) fibres produced from single and binary solvent systems based on solubility parameters to identify processing conditions for the production of defect-free CA fibrous webs by electrospinning. The Hildebrand solubility parameter () and the radius of the sphere in the Hansen space () of acetone, acetic acid, water, N,N-dimethylacetamide (DMAc), methanol, and chloroform were examined and discussed for the electrospinning of CA. The Hildebrand solubility parameter () of acetone and DMAc were found to be within an appropriate range for the dissolution of CA. The suitability of the binary solvent system of acetone: DMAc (2 : 1) for the continuous electrospinning of defect-free CA fibres was confirmed. Electrospun webs exhibited improved tensile strength and modulus after heat and alkali treatment (deacetylation) of the as-spun material, and no major fibre morphological degradation occurred during the deacetylation process.


There is general agreement between teachers in school, lecturers in teacher education and students in training on the importance of teaching practice to initial teacher education courses. It not only provides a vital learning experience but is also the arena in which a student is expected to prove his competence for the award of qualified teacher status. This dual role assigned to teaching practice, experiential learning on the one hand and assessment process on the other, is one of a number of factors which make teaching practice a most complex activity and present student, teacher and tutor with a ser i es of dilemmas about its supervision and assessment .


In this paper, Epidemic models are inevitably influenced by environmental white noise which is an important component in realism, using stochastic models can provide an additional degree of realism in comparison to their deterministic counterparts. Furthermore, it is possible for the population to confront emergency or sudden environmental changes such like chemical leak, abnormal weather, natural disaster and pestilence. In this paper, a toxoplasmosis spread model between cat and oocyst populations with independent stochastic perturbations and a jump process is proposed, the existence of global positive solution is derived. By the method of stochastic Lyapunov functions, we study its asymptotic behavior. When the perturbations about the the susceptible and infective cats are sufficiently small, as well as magnitude of the reproductive number is less than one, the infective cats, recovered cats and population oocysts decay to zero whilst the susceptible components converge to a class of explicit stationary distributions regardless of the perturbations on the recovered cats and population oocysts. When all the perturbations are small and the reproductive number is larger than one, we construct a new class of stochastic Lyapunov functions to show the positive recurrence, and our results reveal some cycling phenomena of recurrent diseases. These results mean that stochastic system has the similar property with the corresponding deterministic system when the white noise is small.


This article presents a study related to application of pre-chamber ignition system in heavy duty natural gas engine which, as previously shown by the authors, can extend the limit of fuel-lean combustion and hence improve fuel efficiency and reduce emissions. A previous study about the effect of pre-chamber volume and nozzle diameter on a single cylinder 2 liter truck-size engine resulted in recommendations for optimal pre-chamber geometry settings. The current study is to determine the dependency of those settings on the engine size. For this study, experiments are performed on a single cylinder 9 liter large bore marine engine with similar pre-chamber geometry and a test matrix of similar and scaled pre-chamber volume and nozzle diameter settings. The effect of these variations on main chamber ignition and the following combustion is studied to understand the scalability aspects of pre-chamber ignition. Indicated efficiency and engine-out emission data is also presented. It has been found that the performance of a pre-chamber is strongly affected by the size of the engine is it being used in. Even with the same energy content in the pre-chamber at the time of spark, the resulting initial main chamber heat release has been found to scale with engine size, and hence the optimal settings for pre-chamber volume and nozzle diameter are also found to scale with engine size. (Less)


This essay was written for "Supreme Mistakes: Exploring the Most Maligned Decisions in Supreme Court History." A symposium on the worst Supreme Court decision of all time risks becoming an exercise best described by Claude Rains's memorable line in Casablanca: "Round up the usual suspects." Two things saved this symposium from that fate. First, each of the usual suspects was appointed defense counsel, which made things more interesting. Second, a new face found its way into the line-up: Erie Railroad v. Tompkins. My goal in this essay is to explain why Erie is in fact guiltier than all of the usual suspects. I begin, in Part I, by setting out the three criteria that I believe must be satisfied for a decision to qualify as the worst of all time. I also explain briefly why each of the usual suspects fails to meet one or more of those criteria. The heart of the essay is Part II, examining in detail how Erie satisfies each of the three criteria. I close with some concluding thoughts on the surprising relationship between Erie's flaws and those of the other suspects.


The stability of a machining process is a function of the dynamic response between the spindle and table, which varies within the machine work volume. This paper deals with computationally efficient methodology to evaluate and simulate dynamic performance of the machine tool. A positiondependent virtual model is assembled using finite element model reduced via component mode synthesis and transformed to a state-space multi-input-multi-output system. Combination of these techniques allow time-efficient response simulations with significantly less computational effort than conventionally used full finite element models. The presented approach can be used to create position-dependent dynamic stiffness map within the work volume used to predict and reduce unstable behaviour during operation. Furthermore, these techniques are not reserved for machine tools exclusively and can be used in wider spectrum of technical applications, that require time-efficient response simulations.


Virtual avatars are a common way to present oneself in online social interactions. From cartoonish emoticons to hyper-realistic humanoids, these online representations help us portray a certain image to our respective audiences. Immersive VR systems like the Oculus Rift and HTC Vive track a user's physical body movement in real-time and utilize this data to drive the corresponding behavior of an avatar. What is then special about avatars in immersive environments and how does this difference play out in the relationship between a user's physical and virtual sense of presence? In this paper, we summarize academic research in this field, study the conditions that construct selfpresentation in immersive VR, coin the term "immersive VR self" and detail its unique characteristics.


Environmental education (EE) has become necessary due to the environmental problems affecting the world. Schools have made efforts to incorporate the content into the curriculum to educate future generations about the environment, with the goal of increasing environmental literacy and the practice of environmentally responsible behaviors (ERBs) (Chapman, 2014; Conde & Sanchez, 2010). Research and design guidelines have been developed to help schools design buildings that enhance health, wellbeing, and environmental literacy. The design strategies proposed thus far have been successful in creating sustainable learning environments, particularly within new construction (United States Green Building Council, 2018; CHPS, 2006). However, existing aging buildings have more constraints when trying to incorporate these strategies, specifically Title I public schools facilities. High-poverty schools do not receive enough funding to improve learning environments and transform the building into a teaching tool for EE. This research sought to understand the relationship between knowledge and ERBs and explored students' perceptions of the school at one Title I public elementary school. A paper-based questionnaire was used to collect data from 38 fifth-grade students in the exploratory study. The results indicate that students did not have adequate knowledge on the environment, but they did engage in the practice of ERBs. Physical opportunities and visual elements were mentioned as components of the school interior that would encourage ERBs. Considering these findings, low-cost design recommendations were created to be easily implemented in existing buildings that house Title I schools. The goal is that through the implementation of these design recommendations, schools can increase environmental knowledge and encourage the practice of environmentally responsible behaviors without adding more work for teachers.


Today's virtual learning environments are prolifically challenging the ivory tower traditionalist approach. Massive Open Online Courses (or MOOCs), together with students demand for personal learning environments, are driving higher educational institutes to engage more seriously in the practice of digital scholarship. One of the fundamental pillars of education is to provide a platform where an older generation can impart knowledge of the past to the future generations. Historically, such engagement occurred in the classroom with the lecturer driving the student experience. However, in a student led digital environment, the fissures between traditional versus constructivist pedagogy are visible. Students are growing up digital (Tapscott, 2008) and communicating in this form from an early age. Their educational demands are different that a previous generation of students. This shift to digital scholarship demands creative destruction where educators are being asked to detangle their pedagogical approaches to allow for the application of digital tools or skills (if any). This is easier than it sounds! This research investigates if digital technologies are being utilised in Irish tertiary education and to what extent. The need for this research is captured by Watson (2010: pp 15) who points out that 'we are in for rather stormy weather over the next few decades as the analogue minds of both teachers and parents clash with the attitudes and behaviours of digital minds'. The goal of this research is to perform a preliminary audit of the use of digital technologies in third level pedagogy practices in Ireland. It is hoped the results will help inform policymakers addressing the cleavage between traditionalist and digital pedagogy and provide a framework from which digital scholarship is integrated into the Irish pedagogy experience to respond to the 'grown up digital' generation.


Feeding behaviour of giraffe and okapi in captivity can differ significantly from the state in the wild. Duration and complexity of feeding and ruminating behaviour, and total amount of food ingested, are often reduced, while the energy content of the diet is increased compared to the wild. As known from domestic cattle in intensive keeping systems, oral disturbances like tongue-playing or licking of objects are reported to occur in captive giraffe and okapi. Oral disturbances are considered to be related to an intensive feeding system, e. g. characterised by a low intake of (physically) structured feeds like hay or fresh forage. We review evidence for this relation in domestic cattle and in giraffids in zoos, and add some own data on 6 giraffes and 3 okapis, which suggest an increasing influence of a high unstructured/structured feed ratio on oral disturbances. The causal and functional factors responsible for oral disturbances are understood only partly to date. It is unclear whether deprivation of feeding or of ruminating behaviour is more important, whether deprivation of behaviour itself or deviations of the normal physiology of the digestive process are responsible for a relation of oral disturbances with low roughage intake, and whether they can be interpreted as adaptive behaviour. Independent of a detailed explanation for the occurrence of oral disturbances, a higher roughage intake seems to reduce the occurrence of this behaviour. Suggestions are made as to which measures may be taken to achieve an adequate roughage intake in selective ruminants, and which kinds of roughage can be regarded as adequate for them. Further research is needed to be able to judge the suitability of different kinds of roughage for giraffe and okapi.


Indeed, the implicit hypothesis that "there is little possibility, if any, for the Pedi traditional healers to experience the supernatural form of healing without performing music and dancing to it" raises the issue of "What makes the dance potent as a healing therapy?" or 'What is the role of music in such healing processes?'. This article is a result of a guided investigation carried out in order to answer these questions. The primary sources for data collection were literature reviews, informal interviews, observations and recordings. During the study, informal discussions with traditional healers and their trainees revealed that participation in malopo rituals enables community members to inherit their music tradition. The impression created during interviews and observations was that Pedi traditional healers perform malopo songs to communicate with the ancestors. The results suggest that malopo rituals are aimed at enriching the personal and social life of the Pedi community.


Andersson M., Klaesson J. and Larsson J. P. How local are spatial density externalities? Neighbourhood effects in agglomeration economies, Regional Studies. The geographic scale at which density externalities operate is analysed in this paper. Using geocoded high-resolution data, the analysis is focused on exogenously determined within-city squares ('neighbourhoods') of 1 km2. The analysis confirms a city-wide employment density–wage elasticity and an economically significant density–wage elasticity at the neighbourhood level that attenuate sharply with distance. Panel estimates over 20 years suggest a neighbourhood density–wage elasticity of about 3%, while the city-wide elasticity is about 1%. It is argued that the neighbourhood level is more prone to capture learning, e.g. through knowledge and information spillovers. This interpretation is supported by (1) significantly larger neighbourhood elasticities for university educated workers and (2) sharper attenuation with distance of the effect for such workers.


BACKGROUND
Optical flow ratio (OFR) is a novel method for fast computation of fractional flow reserve (FFR) from optical coherence tomography (OCT) images.

AIMS
We aimed to evaluate the accuracy of OFR in predicting post-percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) FFR and to evaluate the impact of stent expansion on within-stent OFR pressure drop (In-stent OFR).

METHODS
Post-PCI OFR was computed in patients with both OCT and FFR interrogation immediately after PCI. Calculation of post-PCI OFR (called simulated residual OFR) from pre-PCI OCT pullbacks after elimination of the stenotic segment by virtual stenting was performed in a subgroup of patients who had pre-PCI OCT images. Stent underexpansion was quantified by the minimum expansion index (MEI) of the stented segment.

RESULTS
A total of 125 paired comparisons between post-PCI OFR and FFR were obtained in 119 patients, among which simulated residual OFR was obtained in 64 vessels. Mean post-PCI FFR was 0.92 ± 0.05. Post-PCI OFR showed good correlation (r = 0.74, p<0.001) and agreement (mean difference = -0.01 ± 0.03, p = 0.051) with FFR. The accuracy in predicting post-PCI FFR≤0.90 was 84% for post-PCI OFR. Simulated residual OFR significantly correlated with post-PCI FFR (r = 0.42, p<0.001). MEI showed moderate correlation (r=-0.49, p<0.001) with In-stent OFR.

CONCLUSIONS
Post-PCI OFR showed good diagnostic concordance with post-PCI FFR. Simulated residual OFR significantly correlated with post-PCI FFR. Stent underexpansion significantly correlated with in-stent pressure drop.


From 2004 to 2006, the author led the pro bono representation of the Sudan People's Liberation Movement ("SPLM"), assisting the SPLM in drafting and negotiating the National Interim Constitution of Sudan, the Interim Constitution of Southern Sudan and the Constitutions of two "transitional" states. The representation was part of an emerging trend in pro bono representations. In small but increasing numbers, private law firms have begun to take on pro bono projects with global significance - assisting governments and civil society in post-conflict countries to deal on an even footing with foreign investors, for instance, or working with international criminal courts to prepare indictments of war criminals. This development within the legal community is connected to changes in the scope and ambition of the "corporate responsibility" initiatives of many multinational corporate clients of the firms leading the internationalization of pro bono services. Private law firms are hardly unique as third-party participants in the highest levels of inter- and intra-sovereign processes. Certainly, it is well known that foreign government assistance, inter-governmental organizations such as the UN or World Bank, and non-governmental organizations play a large role in the social and economic development of poorer countries. Less light has been shed, however, on the role those same entities play in the fundamental sovereign processes of formation, dissolution, war, and peace, and no discussion at all exists regarding the new role of law firms in such weighty international affairs. A close look at the way law firms operate in that rarefied space provides an illuminating contrast to the behavior of other actors.The entry of law firms and multinational corporations into the 'market' of global affairs - long the exclusive domain of governments and inter-governmental organizations - offers many advantages to clients in developing and post-conflict countries, but also poses dangers which can and should be mitigated. One of the foremost benefits private law firms offer is their unique ability to ensure - even to guarantee - local ownership of the process and its content due to the strict requirements of the attorney-client relationship. These include attorneys' obligations to follow the directives of their clients, to keep the confidences of the client and to act independently of any third party. Unlike other players in the field of international aid such as foreign donor governments, inter-governmental organizations (IGOs), non-governmental organizations (NGOs), and private foundations, private lawyers providing pro bono services do not receive donations, do not have "mandates" other than those dictated by the client (bounded, of course, by ethical regulations), and do not have real or imagined "constituencies" to which they are accountable, other than the client. Yet the enforceability of the ethical code that gives rise to those advantages is questionable in a transnational representation. A lack of regulation raises questions about legitimacy and accountability, and may suggest a specter of legal imperialism. A practical approach to mitigating those disadvantages can be gleaned from the novel work of an increasing number of scholars writing within the Global Administrative Law ("GAL") paradigm. GAL scholars have analyzed the myriad ways in which disparate national administrative standards have been synchronized, though not necessarily harmonized, in various contexts (e.g., environmental concerns, accounting standards). A key concept in GAL scholarship is that of transnational networks - patterns of regular and purposive relations (and institutions) among like regulatory bodies working across borders dividing countries and demarcating the "domestic" from the "international." The article will draw on this and other concepts and principles identified by GAL scholars proposing ways to bring a measure of accountability to transnational pro bono activities (indeed to transnational lawyering, generally) that respect the domestically self-regulated legal profession and which cannot (and should not) be harmonized across jurisdictions. Rather, the article suggests that regulation of global pro bono service should graduate from "accidental distributed administration" to "deliberate transnational network administration." Without some attention paid to the way law firms operate in this arena, there is a risk that the ethical obligations of attorneys will become little more than a cover for advancing Western corporate interests.


Chemometric techniques have been utilised for the study of automotive lubricant oil degradation. The initial investigations were performed by analysis of data from top ring zone engine test datasets. Principal component analysis (peA) was used to explore the ring zone data. The difference in the performance of various lubricant formulations sampled from the ring zone region of operating Petter AA-I diesel and Petter W-1 petrol engines was established by the partial least squares discriminant model (PLS-DA). The results from the study of the test engine data provided optimised insight into the break down of the chemical/physical parameters of the lubricants during operative conditions. This work proceeded onto condition monitoring techniques. Over a hundred used oil samples were obtained from the sump of various petrol and diesel engine vehicles, in addition fresh oil samples were also collected. Series sets of used oil samples were acquired by periodic sampling from a Honda 1.8 L petrol engine, a Peugeot 1.9 L diesel engine and a diesel engine sump test. Following sample acquisition, each oil sample was analysed using FTIRIATR and conductimetric titrations were performed. These analytical equipments are used to monitor and assess the extent of degradation. A novel model was developed to enhance the IP 400 conductimetric titration method of measuring base number of new and used lubricants. This nonlinear least-squares model was integrated into the titration programme along with two linear least-squares curve fitting methods. The models were effectively used to estimate the titration endpoint which was subsequently used in base number calculation. The results demonstrated the robustness of the three endpoint estimation methods and indicate reliability of the titration equipment and programme. peA was used to analyse the FTIR spectra data of the oil samples. peA performed on different sets of pre-processed data uncovered objective information on the condition of the lubricants. peA models of the series set oil samples highlighted difference between samples as a result of progressive degradation. The effect of adding fresh oil (top-up) to the engine was apparent. This work has demonstrated the importance and efficiency of mathematical/statistical models in lubricant oil engine testing and condition monitoring.


The next level of breakthrough thinking in organizational learning, leadership, and change Harvard professor Amy Edmondson shows how leaders can make organizational learning happen by building teams that learn. Based on years of research and case studies from Verizon, Bank of America, and Children's Hospital, Edmondson outlines the factors that typically prevent groups from learning, such as the fear of failure, groupthink, power structures, and information hording. She shows how leaders can control these factors by encouraging reflection, creating psychological safety, and overcoming defensive routines that inhibit the sharing of ideas, among others. Leaders can use practical management strategies to help organizations realize the benefits inherent in both success and failure.


Latin America's widespread poverty and multi-dimensioned inequalities have long perplexed and provoked observers. Until recently, economic historians could not contribute much to the discussion of living standards and inequality, because quantitative evidence for earlier eras was lacking. Since the 1990s, historians, economists, and other social scientists have sought to document and analyze the historical roots of Latin America's relatively high inequality and persistent poverty. This edited volume with eight compelling chapters by preeminent economists and social scientists brings together some of the most important results of this work: scholarly efforts to measure and explain changes in Latin American living standards as far back as the colonial era. The recent work has focused on physical welfare, often referred to as 'biological' well-being. Much of it uses novel measures, such as data on the heights or stature of children and adults (a measure of net nutrition) and the Human Development Index (HDI). Other work brings to the discussion new and more reliable measurements that can be used for comparing countries, often with unexpected and startling results.


Short-lived radionuclides were present in the solar protoplanetary disk in abundances much higher than in the ambient interstellar medium and require a last minute origin. 26Al (T1/2 = 0.73 Myr) and 41Ca (T1/2 = 0.1 Myr) abundances in the protoplanetary disk constrain models for the origin of short-lived radionuclides because they share a common origin. It is usually assumed that these isotopes were injected into the disk from a nearby Type II supernova. Here we show that the oxygen isotopic composition of the protoplanetary disk would have shifted by several percent relative to the Sun as a result of such injection. Therefore, the supernova injection model will be tested by the anticipated measurement of the solar wind oxygen isotopic composition from the Genesis sample return mission.


An increasing variety of malware, including spyware, worms, and bots, threatens data confidentiality and system integrity on computing devices ranging from backend servers to mobile devices. To address these threats, exacerbated by dynamic network traffic patterns and growing volumes, network security has been undergoing major changes to improve accuracy and scalability in the security analysis techniques. This dissertation addresses the problem of detecting the network anomalies on a single device by inferring the traffic dependence to ensure the root-triggers. In particular, we propose a dependence model for illustrating the network traffic causality. This model depicts the triggering relation of network requests, and thus can be used to reason about the occurrences of network events and pinpoint stealthy malware activities. The triggering relationships can be inferred by means of both rule-based and learning-based approaches. The rule-based approach originates from several heuristic algorithms based on the domain knowledge. The learning-based approach discovers the triggering relationship using a pairwise comparison operation that converts the requests into event pairs with comparable attributes. Machine learning classifiers predict the triggering relationship and further reason about the legitimacy of requests by enforcing their root-triggers. We apply our dependence model on the network traffic from a single host and a mobile device. Evaluated with real-world malware samples and synthetic attacks, our findings confirm that the traffic dependence model provides a significant source of semantic and contextual information that detects zero-day malicious applications. This dissertation also studies the usability of visualizing the traffic causality for domain experts. We design and develop a tool with a visual locality property. It supports different levels of visual based querying and reasoning required for the sensemaking process on complex network data. The significance of this dissertation research is in that it provides deep insights on the dependency of network requests, and leverages structural and semantic information, allowing us to reason about network behaviors and detect stealthy anomalies.


Currently, Hadoop MapReduce framework has been applied to many productive fields to analyze big data. MapReduce applications based on the MapReduce programming model are used to generate and process such huge data. Due to various computational purpose, MapReduce applications have different resource requirements. For specific applications, the resource bottleneck of the cloud computing platform must inevitably impact its executive performance. Therefore, identification of the bottleneck about the allocated resource for MapReduce applications is crucially needed from the viewpoint of either cloud operators or program developers. In this paper, we model the relationship of resource usage parameters of MapReduce applications using multiple linear regression methods and investigate the minimum sampling time for stable modeling. Based on the analysis, we propose the approach which can be used to build stable performance model to expose the bottleneck resource of Hadoop platform and give the effective optimization suggestion.