Background

The aim of our study is to determine circulating fibroblast growth factor (FGF21) levels in obese and diabetic db/db mice, and role of serotonin (5-HT) in the regulation of hepatic FGF21 expression and circulating FGF21 levels in relation to hepatic gluconeogenesis in obese and diabetic db/db mice.

Methods and Results

Plasma FGF21 levels and expression of hepatic FGF21 were significantly decreased in obese and diabetic db/db mice compared with age-matched C57BL6J mice. Treatment with p-chlorophenylalanine (PCPA), a tryptophan hydroxylase inhibitor, for 3 days significantly increased plasma FGF21 levels, and decreased body weight and hyperglycemia in db/db mice while having no significant effect on plasma insulin levels. In addition, treatment with PCPA significantly increased expression of hepatic FGF21 and decreased expression of hepatic nuclear factor (erythroid-derived 2)-like 2 (Nrf2) in db/db mice, while having no significant effects on expression of hepatic peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor (PPAR) α, PPAR γ, and activating transcription factor 4. Moreover, treatment with PCPA significantly decreased phosphoenolpyruvate carboxykinase, glucose 6-phosphatase, fructose 1,6-bisphosphate1, Nur77, forkhead box protein O1 and peroxisome proliferatoractivated receptor γ coactivator-1α, which are involved in hepatic gluconeogenesis, in db/db mice.

Conclusions

These findings suggest that hepatic FGF21 production is decreased in db/db mice, and that a tryptophan hydroxylase inhibitor increases expression of hepatic FGF21 production and decreases hepatic gluconeogenesis and hyperglycemia independently of insulin in db/db mice.


Although vertical (mother-to-offspring) information transfer has been reported in dolphins, it is unclear whether horizontal information transfer takes place between peers of non-parental individuals. We hypothesized that horizontal information transmission takes place within juvenile social play-forage subgroups and within pairs of juveniles in the form of social learning, as a way for older juveniles to contribute to the further development of younger juveniles' foraging skills. Since 1985, a long-term study in the Bahamas has involved the collection of underwater videos and sound recordings on the social structure of a resident community of free-ranging Atlantic spotted dolphins Stenella frontalis. Foraging behaviors of juvenile dolphins were analyzed in 24 independent foraging events recorded on video from 1994 to 2013. Forty-nine juveniles in total were observed, including eight individually identified juveniles foraging alone, eight individually identified juveniles foraging in pairs, and 33 juveniles foraging in eight subgroups of three or more dolphins. The comparison of older juveniles' behavior against younger juveniles' behavior in juvenile play-forage subgroups suggested the potential for horizontal transmission of information about prey location. However, we found no direct evidence for social learning or of teaching in pairs. This new information about wild Atlantic spotted dolphin social structure is a starting point in horizontal information transmission research and is important in terms of cognitive processes and welfare implications.


This paper looks at the monetary policy decisions of the U.S. Federal Reserve and asks whether those decisions have been influenced solely by national concerns, or whether regional factors have played a role. All of the Federal Reserve's policymakers have some regional identity, i.e., either their positions explicitly carry some regional affiliation or their region of origin is a factor that must be considered in the selection process. This research is relevant for the Fed, and it may also be relevant for Europe's fledgling central bank in Frankfurt. Critics have asserted that ECB policymakers have an incentive to base policy on national developments and respond to national political pressures. We find that Fed policymakers do take into account developments in regional unemployment when deciding monetary policy, and that these regional developments are more important for central bankers at the hub than in the spokes. These findings are robust to a variety of different specifications of the voting equation.


OBJECTIVE
The aims of this study are to propose a new set of Japanese diagnostic reference levels (DRLs) for 2014 and to study the impact of tube voltage and the type of reconstruction algorithm on patient doses. The volume CT dose index (CTDI(vol)) for adult and paediatric patients is assessed and compared with the results of a 2011 national survey and data from other countries.

METHODS
Scanning procedures for the head (non-helical and helical), chest and upper abdomen were examined for adults and 5-year-old children. A questionnaire concerning the following items was sent to 3000 facilities: tube voltage, use of reconstruction algorithms and displayed CTDI(vol).

RESULTS
The mean CTDI(vol) values for paediatric examinations using voltages ranging from 80 to 100 kV were significantly lower than those for paediatric examinations using 120 kV. For adult examinations, the use of iterative reconstruction algorithms significantly reduced the mean CTDI(vol) values compared with the use of filtered back projection. Paediatric chest and abdominal scans showed slightly higher mean CTDI(vol) values in 2014 than in 2011. The proposed DRLs for adult head and abdominal scans were higher than those reported in other countries.

CONCLUSION
The results imply that further optimization of CT examination protocols is required for adult head and abdominal scans as well as paediatric chest and abdominal scans.

ADVANCES IN KNOWLEDGE
Low-tube-voltage CT may be useful for reducing radiation doses in paediatric patients. The mean CTDI(vol) values for paediatric scans showed little difference that could be attributed to the choice of reconstruction algorithm.


Real time topic detection in Twitter streams is an important task that helps discovering natural disasters in a real time from users' posts and helps political parties and companies understand users' opinions and needs. In 2014 the number of active users on Twitter is reported to be more than 288 million users who are posting around 500 million tweets daily. Therefore, detecting topics from Twitter streams in a real time becomes a challenging task that needs scalable and efficient techniques to handle this large amount of data. In this work, we scale an Exemplarbased technique that detects topics from Twitter streams, where each of the detected topics is represented by one tweet (i.e, exemplar). Using exemplar tweets to represent the detected topics, makes these topics easier to interpret as opposed to representing them by uncorrelated terms as in other topic detection algorithms. The approach is implemented using Apache Giraph and is being extended here to efficiently support sliding windows. Experimental results on four datasets show that the optimized Giraph implementation achieves a speedup of up to nineteen times over the native implementation, while maintaining good quality of the detected topics. In addition, Giraph Exemplar-based approach achieves the best topic recall and term precision against K-means, Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA), Non-negative matrix factorization (NMF) and Latent Semantic Analysis (LSA), while maintaining a good term recall and running time. The approach is also deployed for detecting topics from real-time Twitter streams and its scalability is demonstrated. Moreover, another clustering technique called Local Variance-based Clustering (LVC) is proposed in this thesis for detecting topics from Twitter streams. Local Variance-based Clustering (LVC) defines the data points densities based on their similarities. The proposed local variance measure is calculated based on the variance of the data points similarity histogram and is shown to well distinguish between core, border, connecting and outliers points. Experimental results show that LVC outperforms spectral clustering and affinity propagation in clustering quality using control charts, Ecoli and images datasets, while maintaining a good running time. In addition, results show that LVC can detect topics from Twitter with higher topic recall by 15% and higher term precision by 3% over DBSCAN.


There is an ever growing demand for the development of high charge storage capacity, biocompatible microelectrodes, which are essential for neural recording and stimulation applications. The challenge here is to increase the charge storage capacity. Higher charge density would enable to pump in higher charge at the electrode/biological element interface even in with a smaller area electrode. However, there is a tradeoff between electrode dimension and interface impedance. A decrease in the electrode dimension results in low capacitance and high impedance which is a major drawback for stimulation because higher signal amplitudes are required for efficiently stimulating the cells. In order to overcome this bottleneck, it is imperative to develop materials having higher active area for the same geometric area. This not only reduces the interface impedance but also increases the specific capacitance. In developing these materials, biocompatibility and long term stability considerations must be taken into consideration.

Biocompatible conducting polymers are good candidates for these applications and are being utilized as electrode materials in neuro prosthesis research for the past two decades. Yet the quest of high charge density electrode is still unmet. Among them, PEDOT (Poly Ethylene Dioxy Thiophene) is considered to be one of the promising conducting polymers due to its excellent electronic and ionic conductivity which cater low impedance and high specific capacitance, ease of fabrication by electro chemical polymerization along with excellent biocompatibility and bio stability. But PEDOT suffers from low cycling stability due to its low mechanical strength leading to decrease in pseudo capacitance and conductivity. Choosing the right dopant in PEDOT could potentially overcome these issues.

In this work, we have synthesized different hybrid nanocomposites of PEDOT by doping different types carbon based 2D nanomaterials. The syntheses of these nanocomposites were carried out using electro polymerization. The electrode deposition was carried out using Chrono Amperometry, a widely used Potentiostatic technique. The idea behind using these 2D nanomaterials is well explored owing to the inherent advantages of these materials such as extraordinary mechanical strength, electrical conductivity and high chemical stability. Furthermore, the high surface to volume ratio results in higher surface charge, thereby resulting in a higher storage capacity. The focus of this endeavor is to study the charge storage capacity of the synthesized hybrid nanocomposites.

The dopants that were used to synthesize the nano composites were Graphene nano platelets, Graphene Oxide, Multiwalled Carbon Nanotubes (MWCNTs) and functionalized MWCNTs. Similar conditions were adapted for electro polymerization. All the experiments were carried out at a scan rate of 100 mV/s using CH Instruments electro chemical setup shown in Fig.1. These include finite pulse potential amplitude of 1V and 120s pulse duration. Amongst all the materials, functionalized MWCNTs demonstrated the highest charge storage capacity as can be inferred by the cyclic voltammograms shown in Fig. 2(a). Functionalized CNTs not only disperse well in the precursor solution but also get embedded in a greater quantity in PEDOT matrix owing to their inherent negative charge.

After identifying the right choice of dopant, the next step is to optimize the electro polymerization conditions so as to enhance the charge storage capacity to the best possible value. Cyclic voltammograms (CV) of PEDOT/Functionalized MWCNTs (PEDOT/FCNTs) as shown in Fig. 2(b) reveals that the area of the CV curve is highest for a loading percentage (wt/vol) of 1 mg/ml compared to other loading percentages. We observed that beyond 1 mg/ml, the excess concentration of MWCNTs is impeding the electro polymerization and is not resulting in a good film. The loading was fixed to 1 mg/ml for subsequent experiments. The next parameter that was optimized is the potential of electro polymerization with the duration of electro polymerization being 800s. As can be observed from Fig. 2(c), the suitable potential is 1 V. Voltages beyond this show a reduced charge storage and may be attributed to over oxidation during polymerization. Similarly, Fig. 2(d) reveals that area of the CV curve has attained maximum at pulse duration of 800s by keeping the amplitude as constant at 1V. Fig. 3 depicts the magnitude plot of electrode interface impedance for the PEDOT/CNT-COOH nanocomposite deposited at 1V with pulse duration of 800s in the frequency range of 0.1Hz to 1MHz. Hence, the best possible charge storage capacity and lowest interface impedance is obtained for a ratio of 1mg/ml (wt/vol) with electro polymerization amplitude of 1V and pulse duration 800s. Further morphological studies would be carried out in due of course of time to gain a deeper understanding in the synthesis of hybrid nanocomposite of PEDOT/FCNTs.


Many companies know that the essence of business success lies in a responsible approach to entrepreneurship. Smart companies therefore not only focus on financial issues and economics, but also on the environmental and social issues related to their business activities. Green marketing is a modern tool with which to adopt current environmental trends across a broad spectrum of business activities, including those of the hotel industry, and is increasingly being perceived as providing a competitive advantage. The aim of this article is to find out consumers' perceptions of green marketing as a source of competitive advantage in the hotel industry. It includes a literature review of both domestic and foreign sources on the issue of green marketing and its usage within the hotel industry. The main part of the article is an analysis of the principles that underly the use of green marketing in the hotel industry, which is based on the results of a questionnaire survey conducted among Slovak consumers. On the basis of the analysis, proposals are put forward for the effective implementation of these principles in the hotel industry.


Short-term overseas study tours are integral in tertiary education, and even more so in disciplines, such as design, that utilize and create culture. While these study tours offer limited and guided breadth of experience of a foreign culture, they represent an innovative global opportunity for students whom otherwise may not have the time, inclination, or simply cannot afford to travel overseas. This intercultural experience opens students' vision of the world to new cultures, different people and their customs, and different ways of thinking and doing. Experiential learning is especially important in creative disciplines such as design, where a user-centred approach is crucial. In the design disciplines creation has a very definite purpose, which is to cater to the needs and wants of people. A better understanding of different cultures also means a better understanding of different people, and this knowledge, which is vital for designers working in this interconnected global world, can be acquired through study trips. To support design study tours, the authors have applied for and secured continuing Australian Government funding to organize and facilitate an annual series of short-term study tours. The tours give students in the Bachelor of Graphic and Industrial Design at the University of Canberra experiences creating, exhibiting and critiquing design in Asia. Funding has supported tours to Shanghai (2012), Hong Kong (2013), Singapore (2014) and a future tour to Japan (2015) and Shanghai/Beijing (2015). The initial trip "Inspired by Shanghai" in 2012 focused on creating an original body of design work and tasked students with creating an exhibition of graphic posters to visualise their experience in a culture different to their own. Subsequently in 2013, students were provided an understanding of Chinese culture and design through an experience of studying wayfinding and signage in Hong Kong and in the most recent trip, to Singapore in 2014, the program was opened up to include Industrial Design students and looked at Packaging Design and Environmental Graphics in Singapore. The paper reflects on how these experiences can offer elements such as student recruitment and retention as well as opportunities to create new products and IP, build partnerships and industry relationships for continued research funding thus supporting a more sustainable approach to supporting design disciplines in higher education.


The Finite-Element coupled Sea ice--Ocean Model (FESOM) has been developed at the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research.Its sea-ice component is a dynamic-thermodynamic model with an elastic-viscous-plastic rheology.The ocean component is the primitive-equation Finite Element Ocean Model (FEOM).An eight-compartment model of the marine ecosystem, featuring nitrate and silicate cycles and considering possible iron limitation, has been implemented.The coupled model has been configured on a global grid with $1.5^\circ$ mean resolution.Vertical coordinate follows a z-level approach and uses a tetrahedral discretization.Shaved cells at the bottom ensure a continous (not step-wise) representation of topography with correct depths.Multi-decadal simulations have been performed using atmospheric forcing data from the NCEP reanalysis. Results are analysed with regard to ice concentration and thickness, as well as ocean hydrography and circulation.The model features a largely realistic representation of sea-ice coverage and large-scale ocean circulation.Weddell Sea water mass characteristics and formation pathways are quite realistic.Salinity of High Salinity Shelf Water exceeds 35 psu and therefore appears to be overestimated; this however enables the model HSSW to trigger the formation of Weddell Sea Deep and Bottom Water despite the model's relatively coarse resolution.Simulated mean ACC transport at Drake Passage is about 130 Sv; its variability is strongly correlated with bottom pressure gradients and reflects the Southern Annular Mode.Small but significant out-of-phase variations of the ACC transports at different sections imply a fluctuating redistribution of water mass between the Atlantic, Indic, and Pacific Oceans.


Context: Although there is now substantial evidence that pulmonary artery(PA) catheterization does not reduce mortality in critically ill patients, it is unknown whether national utilization has decreased in response. Objective: To determine trends in PA catheterization use in the United States. Design, Setting, and Participants: A time trend analysis on national estimates of PA catheterization utilization from 1993-2004 using data from all US states contributing to the Nationwide Inpatient Sample. Hospital admissions for those participants aged 18 years or older were assessed, with primary analysis focused on admissions with a medical diagnosis related group and a secondary analysis focused on surgical admissions. PA catheterization was identified by 5 International Classification of Diseases, Ninth Revision procedure codes describing PA or wedge-pressure monitoring, measurement of mixed venous blood gases, or monitoring of cardiac output by oxygen consumption or other technique. Main Outcome Measure: Annual PA catheterization use per 1000 medical admissions. Results: Between 1993 and 2004, PA catheterization use decreased by 65%from 5.66 to 1.99 per 1000 medical admissions(risk ratio[RR], 0.35; 95%confidence interval[Cl], 0.29-0.42). Among patients who died during hospitalization, a group whose disease severity may be consistent across time, the relative decline was similar, decreasing from 54.7 to 18.1 per 1000 deaths(RR, 0.33; 95%Cl, 0.28-0.38). A significant change in trend occurred following a 1996 study that suggested increased mortality with PA catheterization. The decline in utilization was similar in surgical patients(RR, 0.37; 95%Cl, 0.25-0.49). Among common diagnoses associated with PA catheterization, the decline was most prominent for myocardial infarction, which decreased by 81%(RR, 0.19; 95%Cl, 0.15-0.23), and least prominent for septicemia, which decreased by 54%(RR, 0.46; 95%Cl, 0.38-0.54). Sensitivity analyses suggested findings were not due to artifact of changing procedure coding practice. Conclusion: Use of the PA catheter, previously a hallmark of critical care practice, has decreased in the United States during the last decade, possibly due to growing evidence that this invasive procedure does not reduce mortality.


This paper attempts to address the problem of recognizing human actions while training and testing on distinct datasets, when test videos are neither labeled nor available during training. In this scenario, learning of a joint vocabulary, or domain transfer techniques are not applicable. We first explore reasons for poor classifier performance when tested on novel datasets, and quantify the effect of scene backgrounds on action representations and recognition. Using only the background features and partitioning of gist feature space, we show that the background scenes in recent datasets are quite discriminative and can be used classify an action with reasonable accuracy. We then propose a new process to obtain a measure of confidence in each pixel of the video being a foreground region, using motion, appearance, and saliency together in a 3D MRF based framework. We also propose multiple ways to exploit the foreground confidence: to improve bag-of-words vocabulary, histogram representation of a video, and a novel histogram decomposition based representation and kernel. We used these foreground confidences to recognize actions trained on one data set and test on a different data set. We have performed extensive experiments on several datasets that improve cross dataset recognition accuracy as compared to baseline methods.


It is currently extremely challenging to bridge the gap between the hardware configuration of sensor-based systems and algorithm implementation. When an algorithm on live sensor data needs to be tried out, preferably in an embedded state, a first barrier to cross would be to get access to the sensor data in a programming environment that would offer sufficient resources for the algorithms. This poster proposes a in minimalist description language of how to acquire sensor data from a wide variety of interface protocols, and briefly illustrates how it has been implemented and used in our current research thus far.


Harry Potter has provided a portal to the wizarding world for millions of readers, but an examination of Harry, his friends and his enemies will take us on yet another journey: through the psyche of the Muggle (and wizard!) mind. The twists and turns of the series, as well as the psychological depth and complexity of J. K. Rowling's characters, have kept fans enthralled with and puzzling over the many mysteries that permeate Hogwarts and beyond: Do the Harry Potter books encourage disobedience? Why is everyone so fascinated by Professor Lupin? What exactly will Harry and his friends do when they finally pass those N.E.W.T.s? Do even wizards live by the ticking of the clock? Is Harry destined to end up alone? And why did it take Ron and Hermione so long to get together? Now, in The Psychology of Harry Potter, leading psychologists delve into the ultimate Chamber of Secrets, analyzing human mind and motivation by examining the themes and characters that make the Harry Potter books the bestselling fantasy series of all time. Grab a spot on the nearest couch, and settle in for some fresh revelations about our favorite young wizard!


Flowering time in bread wheat ( Triticum aestivum L.) is controlled by vernalization and photoperiod response, and earliness per se genes. The genetic basis of flowering time has not been investigated in Pakistani bread wheat. This study was, therefore, conducted to determine the allelic composition at Vrn-A1 , Vrn-B1 , Vrn-D1 , Vrn-B3 and Ppd-D1a loci of 59 Pakistani spring bread wheat cultivars. These cultivars, along with 4 isogenic lines for vernalization genes were characterized with previously reported DNA markers designed for detecting allelic variation at 4 Vrn (Vernalization) and 1 Ppd (Photoperiod) loci.  Dominant Vrn-B3 was absent in all cultivars studied. All cultivars except Era had the photoperiod insensitive allele Ppd-D1a . We did not find any association between the flowering time and Vrn allelic composition of the studied cultivars. This indicated that the partial vernalization requirement of cultivars with Vrn-B1 and Vrn-D1 alleles is probably fulfilled during Pakistani growing season. Earliness per se and the photoperiod sensitive loci other than Ppd-D1 need to be investigated to further understand the genetic basis of flowering time in Pakistani wheat.


Data obtained at the N.A.C.A. tank from tests on the models of three flying-boat hulls - N.A.C.A. models 11-A, 16, and 22 - are used to demonstrate the effect of trim angle on water resistance. A specific example is taken, and data from Model 11-A are used to show that the trim angle giving the minimum water resistance will give minimum total air-plus-water resistance. Total-resistance curves for best trimmed angles and other angles are compared for the same example. The effect of wind on best trim angles and upon the take-off and run is shown by the working of an example. The possibility of using tank data on trim angles as aid in piloting is discussed, and an instrument for use in determining the trim angle of seaplanes is described. The importance of maintaining the best trim angle throughout the take-off is indicated.


Background The opioid epidemic has disproportionately impacted areas in the Appalachian region of the United States. Characterized by persistent Medicaid nonexpansion, higher poverty rates, and health care access challenges, populations residing in these areas of the United States have experienced higher opioid overdose death rates than those in other parts of the country. Jefferson County, Alabama, located in Southern Appalachia, has been especially affected, with overdose rates over 2 times greater than the statewide average (48.8 vs 19.9 overdoses per 10,000 persons). Emergency departments (EDs) have been recognized as a major health care source for persons with opioid use disorder (OUD). A program to initiate medications for OUD in the ED has been shown to be effective in treatment retention. Likewise, continued patient engagement in a recovery or treatment program after ED discharge has been shown to be efficient for long-term treatment success. Objective This protocol outlines a framework for ED-initiated medications for OUD in a resource-limited region of the United States; the study will be made possible through community partnerships with referral resources for definitive OUD care. Methods When a patient presents to the ED with symptoms of opioid withdrawal, nonfatal opioid overdose, or requesting opioid detoxification, clinicians will consider the diagnosis of OUD using the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (fifth edition) criteria. All patients meeting the diagnostic criteria for moderate to severe OUD will be further engaged and assessed for study eligibility. Recruited subjects will be evaluated for signs and symptoms of withdrawal, treated with buprenorphine-naloxone as appropriate, and given a prescription for take-home induction along with an intranasal naloxone kit. At the time of ED discharge, a peer navigator from a local substance use coordinating center will be engaged to facilitate patient referral to a regional substance abuse coordinating center for longitudinal addiction treatment. Results This project is currently ongoing; it received funding in February 2019 and was approved by the institutional review board of the University of Alabama at Birmingham in June 2019. Data collection began on July 7, 2019, with a projected end date in February 2022. In total, 79 subjects have been enrolled to date. Results will be published in the summer of 2022. Conclusions ED recognition of OUD accompanied by buprenorphine-naloxone induction and referral for subsequent long-term treatment engagement have been shown to be components of an effective strategy for addressing the ongoing opioid crisis. Establishing community and local partnerships, particularly in resource-limited areas, is crucial for the continuity of addiction care and rehabilitation outcomes. International Registered Report Identifier (IRRID) DERR1-10.2196/18734


ABSTRACT The author discusses the notation of action-based music, in which physical gestures and their characteristics, such as shape, direction and speed (as opposed to psychoacoustic properties such as pitch, timbre and rhythm), play the dominant role in preserving and transferring information. Grounded in ecological perception and enactive cognition, the article shows how such an approach mediates a direct relationship between composition and performance, details some action-based music notation principles and offers practical examples. A discussion of tablature, graphic scores and text scores contextualizes the method historically.


Summary. We have reported on the smooth and clean skin surface of the pilot whale Globicephala melas (Baum et al 2000 Aquatic Mammals 26:7). Smoothness and self-cleaning abilities of the skin surface are based on a gel that filles the nanoscalic inter-cellular space between the corneocytes. This gel is an important factor in the defence against adhesive glycoconjugates and organisms, that may negatively influence health and hydrodynamic demands of the dolphin. It was our aim to measure the rheological properties of the gel in order to confirm its viscoelastic behaviour predicted from our previous findings.Untreated fresh frozen skin samples of the pilot whale and centrifugates of mechani-cally ablated corneocytes were prepared for cryo-scanning electron microscopy (see Baum et al 2000 Aquatic Mammals 26:7). We examined the surface sculptures of the samples and documented different grades of polymerization seen in the centrifugates. Changes in viscoelasticity of the centrifugates were immediately after centrifugation monitored by means of a stress-controlled rheometer (Haake RS 150) with cone-and-plate geometry (35 mm, apex angle 1°) under oszillatory shear conditions.When centrifugates polymerized, their surface morphology appeared similar to the sur-faces of the untreated fresh skin samples. The gelation kinetics measured confirm that the centrifugates underwent polymerization within 2.5 - 3 hours after processing. At the beginning of the experiments, the high fluctuating pattern of the storage modul GŽ showed the presence of performed aggregates, which were destroyed by the oszillating force. After 2.5 - 3 hours new aggregates built up a gel. We found that in vitro the gela-tion terminates in a duroplastic gel, indicating gelation based on covently cross-linked network bridges.We thank Dr. D. Bloch and Dr. H.-P. Joensen, University of the Faroe Islands, for their help in specimen collection from legal harvest. This study was supported by a grant of the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (ME 1755/ 1-1).


In 2004 the American Ornithological Union divided Canada Goose into two species, Canada Goose, Branta canadensis, and Cackling Goose, B. hutchinsii. The Canada Goose is currently divided into seven subspecies and the Cackling Goose into four subspecies. Some of these forms are easy to identify whereas other create more of a challenge. Fortunately for Arizona birders, not all Canada and Cackling Goose subspecies are likely to be encountered in the state. Two forms of Canada and three forms of Cackling are the most likely. Here we present information on how to differentiate the forms that are most likely to be observed in Arizona.


Consider a house cleaning robot planning its activities for the day. Assume that the robot expects the human inhabitant to first dress, then have breakfast, and finally go out. Then, it should plan not to clean the bedroom while the human is dressing, and to clean the kitchen after the human has had breakfast. In general, robots operating in inhabited environments, like households and future factory floors, should plan their behavior taking into account the actions that will be performed by the humans sharing the same environment. This would improve human-robot cohabitation, for example, by avoiding undesired situations for the human. Unfortunately, current task planners only consider the robot's actions and unexpected external events in the planning process, and cannot accommodate expectations about the actions of the humans.
 In this article, we present a human-aware planner able to address this problem. Our planner supports alternative hypotheses of the human plan, temporal duration for the actions of both the robot and the human, constraints on the interaction between robot and human, partial goal achievement and, most importantly, the possibility to use observations of human actions in the policy generated for the robot. Our planner has been tested both as a stand-alone component and within a full framework for human-robot interaction in a real environment.


Introduction: Epilepsy is one of the most common neurological disorders which can occur in any age, strain, and social classes. Seizures can effect on daily life of infants and adolescents and can have a considerable effect on presence in school, society, participating in social activities and performing of especial sports at the school. Therefore, the aim of the present study was to accurate determining and investigating of life quality on function of children with epilepsy. Method: The present study was performed prospectively and cross sectional on patients with epilepsy referring to Ahvaz Golestan Hospital. All data about the disease will be collected verbally with presence of interviewer and patient's family. The questionnaire of child epilepsy (parent's form) CEQ-P was used in order to evaluate the quality of life (QOL). Results: The average of seizures during the last month was 6.4 ± 10.8 times, the results showed that the average of cognitive function in patients was significantly higher than mean score of 50 (p>0.001). on the other hand, the mean score of emotional function, social function and physical function were 46.03 ± 14.85, 33.50 ± 33.75, and 41.57±24.95, respectively which were significantly higher than the mean score of 50 (p=0.001), and finally, the results showed that the total mean score of life quality which was 38.52 ± 18.29 was significantly higher than the mean score of 50 (p<0.001). Conclusion: The results of survey showed that epilepsy has a negative effect on various aspects of life quality of children. We can endeavor with performing appropriate approaches to improve it with recognizing the life quality and trying to improving of life quality and with paying attention to its various aspects.


Virtually all human cultures routinely wear garments or some sort of attire, both for protection against the elements and as part of a complex social display of everything from class status to gender to the act of belonging to a particular subculture. Smart garments, in addition to performing their social functions, can act as transmitters, sensors, or energy-harvesting entities. Furthermore, such garments may also possess some processing capability, enabling them to perform a variety of tasks, perhaps in conjunction with cloud-based server resources.


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Bringing innovative scientific techniques to an aesthetic endeavour, paintings conservators face countless decisions as they implement a course of treatment for each picture in their care. The papers in this book, originally presented at a recent seminar organized by the Getty Museum, explore the values, assumptions and goals that shape the work of paintings conservators. Six conservators, three curators, and a conservation scientist candidly reflect on the challenges in approaching specific works of art. Each conservator describes a successful conservation effort, as well as a project that, in hindsight, might have been approached differently. Their insights, the responses of the curators and conservation scientist, and the panel discussions contribute to a thoughtful analysis of the ever-evolving art and science of paintings conservation.


This article argues that the community of inquiry notion of the classical pragmatists has much to offer public administration theory and practice. The community of inquiry is an ideal position from which public administrators can effectively examine how they approach problems, consider data, and communicate. Participatory democracy is a vital component of the community of inquiry developed by John Dewey and Jane Addams. The recognition of participatory democracy's place in public administration is underdeveloped. The community of inquiry context provides a useful lens to show how participatory democracy can nurture a creative public service.


This thesis aims to identify the relationships, structures and actors shaping the gender composition of the teaching workforce in Pakistan, with attention to the societal (or macro) level and through the experiences and interpretations of women and of men employed in school teaching and in higher education. In addition, the thesis compares the rewards of teaching for men and for women in different sectors of education and at different levels, and explores women and men teachers' perceptions of the status of the teaching profession. The methodological approach is that of a multi-level analysis, so as to understand women teachers' experiences of employment in the education sector at different levels as well as those of male teachers within the broader cultural, political and economic context of Pakistan. The thesis draws on secondary data sources including published research, statistical employment data and documentary evidence to address state policy in respect to education provision and employment policies and practices in public and private educational institutions. The original data is collected through semi-structured interviews – 70 in total - with women and men school teachers and university faculty in Lahore.
The findings demonstrate that the feminisation of teaching is relative, not absolute in Pakistan. The private teaching sector is feminised to a larger extent and the public sector remains male-dominated. Women and men referred to teaching as respectable employment for women, which cohered with societal expectations of women and conserved the propriety of the household. Working hours in the teaching profession were thought of as accommodative of women's 'homemaker' role and an incentive, for men, to hold multiple paid job-roles. Pay, while commonly thought of as inadequate for teachers in general, was typically better in the public sector compared to the private sector. The occupational status of teaching varied in respect to the level of teaching and sector. The public sector with standard pre-service credential requirements and career advancement opportunities is seen as a better employer compared to the private sector. On the one hand, the feminisation of teaching depicts gender segregation of society while associating teaching with 'women's work'. On the other hand, it presents women with an opportunity to gain entry into a socially and culturally respected and accepted profession while empowering them through reducing their economic dependability.


This is an Internet era. Most of the organizations try to establish their development centers and branch offices across the World. Employees working from their homes are also becoming very popular and organizations benefit financially by utilizing less office space, and reducing total expenses incurred by having office workers on site. To meet such requirements organizations develop a need to communicate with these offices over highly secure, confidential and reliable connections regardless of the location of the office. Here the VPN plays a vital role in establishing a distributed business model.


OPENING PRAYER Mary, my Mother, you were the first to live the Way of the Cross. You felt every pain and every humiliation. You were unafraid of the ridicule heaped upon you by the crowds. Your eyes were ever on Jesus and His Pain. Is that the secret of your miraculous strength? How did your loving heart bear such a burden and such a weight? As you watched Him stumble and fall, were you tortured by the memory of all the yesterdays-His birth, His hidden life and His ministry? You were so desirous of everyone loving Him. What a heartache it was to see so many hate Him hate with a diabolical fury. Take my hand as I make this Way of the Cross. Inspire me with those thoughts that will make me realize how much He loves me. Give me light to apply each station to my daily life and to remember my neighbor's needs in this Way of the Pain. Obtain for me the grace to understand the mystery, the wisdom and the Divine love as I go from scene to scene. Grant that my heart, like yours, may be pierced through by the sight of His sorrow and the misery and that I may determine never to offend Him again. What a price He paid to cover my sins, to open the gates of heaven for me and to fill my soul with His own Spirit . Sweet Mother, let us travel this way together and grant that the love in my poor heart may give you some slight consolation. Amen.


Purpose: This work investigates the dosimetric changes due to inter‐factional organ motion during the treatment course for IMRT of prostate cancer with in room CT guidance. Methods: Fifteen prostate cancer patients were recruited for this retrospective study. For each patient, MR and CT images were fused. IMRT treatment planning was performed on the simulation CT images. Inter‐fractional organ motion during the course of treatment was corrected using a Siemens CT‐on‐rails system. The prostate, rectum, bladder and femoral heads were outlined on both the original treatment plan and the subsequent daily CT images for 98 treatment factions by the same investigator. Dose distributions on these daily CT images were recalculated with the isocenter shifts relative to the simulation CT images. The doses from the subsequent daily CTs were co‐registered and compared with the original doses planned on the simulation CT. Results: Our results based on 15 patients (98 daily CT sets) with anatomical matching (i.e., matching the prostate contours from simulation CT scans with the prostate on daily CT‐on‐rails scans) showed that 7.1% of the treatment fractions exhibited poor target coverage (Dmin < 65Gy). For critical structures, 27.6% and 26.5% of the treatment fractions violated our rectal criteria of V65 < 17% and V40 < 35% for the rectum and 10% and 6% of the treatment fractions violated our bladder criteria of V65 < 25% and V40 < 50% for the bladder, respectively. Conclusion: The IGRT procedure for target localization using 3D imaging for prostate cancer is still not ideal if only anatomy matching is used. Future studies are warranted for improvements in target dose coverage using adaptive therapy through re‐planning or other target localization techniques such as that to match prescription isodose surfaces with target volumes to correct for both translational and rotational organ motion.


Fruit (berry) growth, maturity and nutritional composition of deshi (Diospyros peregrina Gurke) and bilati Gab (D. discolor Gurke) were investigated at the Botanical Garden of Bangladesh Agricultural University, Mymensingh (24o26' and 24054' N and 90015' and 90030' E) between April and August, 2011. Flowers were tagged at first opening (days after flowering, DAF) and fruit growth was investigated up to maturity. Fruit size (length and diameter), individual fruit weight, AGR and proximate composition of matured fruits were investigated. Morphological and growth parameters were recorded at 7-days interval up to 63 DAF in deshi and 85 DAF in bilati gab. All the morphological characters of fruits were gradually increased with increasing DAF and followed sigmoid pattern. The length and diameter of the berry became 5.80 and 4.61 cm, respectively at 63 DAF in deshi gab, and 9.13 and 7.62 cm, respectively at 85 DAF in bilati gab. The fresh and dry weights of berries were also maximum at 63 DAF in deshi and at 85 DAF in bilati gab. The maximum dry weight of seed i.e. PM in deshi gab attained at 56 DAF and that of bilati gab at 83 DAF. The proximate composition of matured berries of deshi and bilati gab at PM showed little variation between the species and hence, average crude protein, crude fat, ash and total carbohydrate was 5.35, 1.08, 3.74 and 67.47%, respectively. It might be concluded that harvest maturity attained around two months after flowering in deshi gab with yellowish green colour on fruit coat and three months from flowering in bilati gab when fruits turn into deep red colour with average fruit fresh weight of 60 g and 220 g, respectively.


Abstract This paper reports Japanese activities on tungsten material development and the basic studies on plasma and tungsten interactions. Effects of helium ion irradiation on embrittlement and bubble formation of various tungsten materials have been intensively investigated in Japan. Details of the helium bubble formation mechanism, its effects on surface morphology, and the impacts on dust formation are presented. Fine-grained and TiC fine-particles dispersed tungsten are being developed to increase the resistance of the material to degradation in the fusion reactor environment. Microstructures and specific features amenable to fusion environments are presented. The experimental results on repetitive heat pulses on surface roughening and cracking are shown. The repetitive heat pulse effects are very serious and further studies are needed. Important issues of tungsten material development for DEMO and commercial devices will be discussed.


The financial services industry has struggled to develop innovative retirement-income solutions. Such solutions are elusive because providers suffer from behavioral biases that blind them to post-retirement changes in risk and psychology, trapping themselves in habitual modes of thought that strangle the imagination needed to see new solutions. This paper reviews the changes in post-retirement risk and psychology that demand new approaches, offers a critique of existing retirement-income solutions, and presents an alternate model called "adaptive distribution theory." Adaptive distribution theory for retirement-income portfolios redefines risk and captures investor psychology by incorporating key features of prospect theory. Risk and cash flow are addressed by managing the portfolio using acceptable annualized erosion rates and building a buffer of earnings. The ability to see the obvious is a recurring theme and the key to retirement-income solutions.


The transmission of vibration to people through seats was studied with the final objective of being able to predict the dynamic performance of seats. It was necessary to investigate both the dynamic response and the subjective response of a person sitting on a seat, in addition to the dynamic response of the seat itself. Initial experiments were conducted to investigate the effect of variables, such as the magnitude of the vibration and the posture of the body, on the transmission of vibration through a seat. Seat transmissibilities measured in a laboratory with vertical-only vibration were shown to be similar to those measured in a vehicle with multiple vibration. Frequency response functions were determined for the transmission of multiple axis translational vehicle vibration to the cushion and the backrest of a seat. The apparent mass of the seated body was measured as a pre-requisite for the prediction of seat transmissibilities. It was found that the resonance frequency of the body decreased when the magnitude of the vibration was increased. Increased muscle tension tended to have the opposite effect. The apparent masses of sixty people - men, women and children - were very similar once they were normalised to remove the effect of the different static weights on the seat. Some correlations with the body characteristics were significant - such as that between the normalised apparent mass at resonance and total body mass. A method of measuring the dynamic stiffness of a seat using a rigid indenter instead of a person to load the seat was developed. The results, in conjunction with measurements of the apparent mass of the body, were used to predict seat transmissibilities. Predicted seat transmissibilities were shown to be similar to transmissibilities that were measured with a person sitting on the seat. It was investigated how the weight of a person and the magnitude of the vibration could affect predicted seat transmissibilities. The discomfort caused by vibration transmitted to a seated person was measured using a novel method of adjustment. It was investigated whether the discomfort caused by simultaneous vertical and fore-and-aft vibration could be predicted from the discomfort that would have been caused if the vibration in each axis had occurred separately. A root-sum-square summation procedure was found to be the best.


In this paper, we discuss the different ways in which modern European boardgames ("Eurogames") are converted for digital play. We review digitised versions of three popular tabletop boardgames: Puerto Rico, Agricola and Ascension. Using these examples, we demonstrate the tension between the interaction metaphor of the original analogue medium and the metaphor of a digital game. We describe the importance of housekeeping chores to gameplay and position them as a form of articulation work, which is typically hidden by digital implementations. Further, we demonstrate the types of information that are created through digital play and discuss how this influences game play of both digital and physical boardgames.


The spectra of graphs and their relation to graph properties have been well-studied. For digraphs, in contrast, there are relatively few results. The adjacency matrix of a digraph is usually difficult to work with; it is not always diagonalizable and the interlacing theorem does not hold (in general) for adjacency matrices of digraphs. All acyclic digraphs have the same spectrum as the empty graph. This motivates the need to work with a different matrix which captures the adjacency of the digraph. To this end, we introduce the Hermitian adjacency matrix. Another way to extract more information out of the spectrum is by restricting to specific classes of digraphs. In this thesis, we look at vertex-transitive digraphs with simple eigenvalues. Intuitively, the property of having many simple eigenvalues tends to coincide with having few automorphisms. For example, the only vertex-transitive graph with all eigenvalues simple is K2. In the case of graphs, we restrict to the cubic vertex-transitive case, where we find combinatorial properties of graphs with multiple simple eigenvalues. We also explore the eigenvectors of vertex-transitive digraphs with all eigenvalues distinct.


In cloud gaming systems, the game program runs at servers in the cloud, while clients access game services by sending input events to the servers and receiving game scenes via video streaming. In this paradigm, servers are responsible for all performance-intensive operations, and thus suffer from poor scalability. An alternative paradigm is called graphics streaming, in which graphics commands and data are offloaded to the clients for local rendering, thereby mitigating the server's burden and allowing more concurrent game sessions. Unfortunately, this approach is bandwidth-consuming, due to large amounts of graphic commands and geometry data. In this paper, we present LiveRender, an open-source gaming system that remedies the problem by implementing a suite of bandwidth optimization techniques including intraframe compression, interframe compression, and caching, establishing what we call compressed graphics streaming. Experiments results show that the new approach is able to reduce bandwidth consumption by 52%-73% compared to raw graphics streaming, with no perceptible difference in video quality and reduced response delay. Compared to the video streaming approach, LiveRender achieves a traffic reduction of 40%-90% with even improved video quality and substantially smaller response delay, while enabling higher concurrency at the server.


The study of uranium toxicity is very important for public health in general and especially for workers involved in the processes of uranium mining and milling because of the immediate and/or mediate risks of exposure. Most available studies show unsuccessful attempts to eliminate uranium from target organs once the poisoning has occurred. Our group has managed to avoid damage to target organs (short-term kidney and long-term bone damage) in a high percentage of animals treated with lethal doses of uranyl nitrate through the effective chelating action of a single dose of bisodic etidronate. In this context, the contributions of our team and other groups working on chelating therapies provide a starting point for progress in the search for agents for preventing and/or reducing the toxic effects of uranium.


Background and Purpose: Healthy nutrition and preventive food strategies can play an important role in decreasing geriatric complications. According to the Persian medicine point of view, the first step on disease prevention and treatment is a healthy diet. Methods and Materials: A review on available literature including credible textbooks and scientific papers from both Persian medicine and conventional medicine was performed. Similarities and differences between the two medical viewpoints were evaluated and presented. Conclusion: in Persian medicine, healthy diet and nutrition for different age groups are described in detail. Some points presented in Persian medicine are in accordance with conventional medicine. On the other hand, the differences may provide valuable ideas for future research projects.


Abstract A multiresolution approach to curve extraction in images is described. Based on a piecewise linear representation of curves, the scheme combines an efficient method of extracting line segments with a grouping process to identify curve traces. The line segments correspond to linear features defined at appropriate spatial resolutions within a quadtree structure and are extracted using a hierarchical decision process based on frequency domain properties. Implementation is achieved through the use of the multiresolution Fourier transform, a linear transform providing spatially localized estimates of the frequency spectrum over multiple scales. The scheme is simple to implement and computationally inexpensive, and results of experiments performed on natural images demonstrate that its performance compares favorably with that of existing methods.


Secreted by the pineal gland to regulate the circadian rhythm, melatonin is a powerful antioxidant that has been used to combat oxidative stress in the central nervous system. Melatonin-based therapies have been shown to provide neuroprotective effects in the setting of ischemic stroke by mitigating neuroinflammation and accelerating brain tissue restoration. Melatonin treatment includes injection of exogenous melatonin, pineal gland grafting and melatonin-mediated stem cell therapy. This review will discuss the current preclinical and clinical studies investigating melatonin-based therapeutics to treat stroke.


Our research project (http://www.shaileyminocha.info/digital-health-wearables/) at UK's Open University and in collaboration with Age UK Milton Keynes aims to investigate whether behaviour changes in people aged over 55 years through the use of wearable activity-tracking technologies. Example technologies include those from Fitbit, Jawbone, or smart watches from Apple or Samsung. Typically, these devices record steps walked, sleep patterns, or calories expended.

The benefits of regular physical activity for older adults and those with chronic disease and/or mobility limitations are indisputable. Regular physical activity attenuates many of the health risks associated with obesity, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, depression and anxiety, and cognitive decline. As physical activity levels among older adults (both with and without chronic disease) are low, facilitating an increase in activity levels is an important public health issue. Walking has been identified as an ideal means of low-impact, low-risk physical activity that can boost physical and mental wellbeing. An author of a recent study said: "Physical activity may create a 'reserve' that protects motor abilities against the effects of age-related brain damage". Walking has been shown to improve cognitive performance in older people. Our previous research has shown that walking with others can help reduce social isolation and loneliness among people aged 55 and over.

In our year-long project (May 2016 – April 2017) and funded by the Sir Halley Stewart Trust, we have given activity-trackers to 17 participants in the age range from 55 – 80. Through monthly workshops, diaries that the participants are maintaining and sharing with us on a weekly basis, and through one-to-one interviews with them, we are investigating how the behaviours of our participants is changing – whether there is an increase in their activity such as walking or gardening, lifestyle changes, attitudes towards food/diet, and so on. There is already some evidence emerging such as: increase in activity levels in all the participants; increased awareness of food intake; and sharing of data with the GPs to diagnose the non-optimal sleep patterns (one of them now has a treatment plan in place for poor sleep). A couple of participants have joined the gym when they realised that their desk-based work-life doesn't give them the opportunity to stay active during the week.

In addition, we have conducted two surveys: the first survey is aimed at people aged 55 years and over who are already using these devices - to investigate their experiences and the changes in their behaviours that they perceive; and the second survey is aimed at medical professionals to explore whether they use the data from these devices for diagnosis and intervention. Most importantly, do medical professionals use data from these devices to determine the behaviour or lifestyle changes in people aged over 55 years?

The Open University's Human Research Ethics Committee has approved the research design of this project (HREC/2016/2191/Minocha/1).


The mdx mouse model of Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) is used to study disease mechanisms and potential treatments, but its pathology is less severe than DMD patients. Other mouse models were developed to more closely mimic the human disease based on knowledge that upregulation of utrophin has a protective effect in mdx muscle. An mdx:utrophin−/− (dko) mouse was created, which had a severe disease phenotype and a shortened life span. An mdx:utrophin+/− mouse was also created, which had an intermediate disease phenotype compared to the mdx and dko mice. To determine the usefulness of mdx:utrophin+/− mice for long‐term DMD studies, limb muscle pathology and function were assessed across the life span of wild‐type, mdx, mdx:utrophin+/−, and dko mice. Muscle function assessment, specifically grip duration and rotarod performance, demonstrated that mdx:utrophin+/− mice were weaker for a longer time than mdx mice. Mean myofiber area was smaller in mdx:utrophin+/− mice compared to mdx mice at 12 months. Mdx:utrophin+/− mice had a higher percentage of centrally nucleated myofibers compared to mdx mice at 6 and 12 months. Collagen I and IV density was significantly higher in mdx:utrophin+/− muscle compared to mdx at most ages examined. Generally, mdx:utrophin+/− mice showed an intermediate disease phenotype over a longer time course compared to the mdx and dko mice. While they do not genetically mirror human DMD, mdx:utrophin+/− mice may be a more useful animal model than mdx or dko mice for investigating long‐term efficacy of potential treatments when fibrosis or muscle function is the focus.


This paper uses a queuing model to evaluate completion times in accident and emergency (A&E) departments in the light of the Government target of completing and discharging 98% of patients inside 4 hours. It illustrates how flows though an A&E can be very accurately represented as a queuing process, how the outputs of a queuing model can be used to visualise and interpret the 4-hour hours Government target in a simple way and how queuing models can be used to assess the practical achievability of A&E targets in the future. The paper finds that A&E targets have resulted in significant improvements in completion times and thus deal with a major source of complaint by users of the National Health Service. It finds that whilst some of this improvement is attributable to better management, some is also due to the way some patients in A&E are designated and therefore counted. It finds for example that the current target would not have been possible without some form of patient re-designation or re-labelling taking place. Further it finds that the current target is so demanding that the integrity of reported performance is open to question and that a different approach is needed. Related incentives and demand management issues resulting from this Government target are also briefly discussed.


The purpose of the present study is to identify problems of internship course (teacher training) in teacher training centers and to provide appropriate solutions for eliminating the problems and improving the quality of internship courses in order to prepare student teachers to obtain qualifications for teaching job. In a qualitative-quantitative one-group research design, the data were collected via internship problems questionnaire. In effect, the questionnaire was categorized into four groups of pedagogical, attitudinal, structural and physical problems. The participants were selected based on whole-sampling. Data were analyzed qualitatively and quantitatively using the descriptive statistics such as frequency statistics. The findings showed that the most significant problems of internship courses were cooperating teachers' lack of using technology-based teaching materials as well as having little knowledge in education theories, developmental psychology and learning theories, and not using new and innovative teaching methodologies (pedagogical), lack of opportunity for cooperating teachers to talk with student teachers about their teaching methodologies and attempt to tackle their potential problems as well as supervisors' lack of provision of a teaching sample for student teachers (attitudinal), training in urban schools (structural), and lack of appropriate physical space for implementing new teaching methodologies (physical).


1 Abstract: The stapes is the last of the middle ear ossicle chain and the smallest bone of the mammalian skeleton. Because it rests on the membrane of the fenestra vestibuli during life, the stapes may often fall within the bony labyrinth cavity when soft structures decay after death. In this work, we highlight the unexpected role that the bony labyrinth plays in the preservation of the stapes. Systematic investigation of the bony labyrinth of 50 petrosal bones of extinct and extant artiodactyls led to the discovery of eight cases of "intralabyrinthine" stapes. Three dimensional reconstructions of these stapes allow documenting stapes morphology of four extinct artiodactyl taxa: Microstonyx erymanthius (Suidae), Elomeryx borbonicus (Hippopotamoidea), ?Helohyus plicodon (Helohyidae), and an undetermined Cainotheriidae; and four extant ones Choeropsis and Hippopotamus (Hippopotamidae), and Tayassu and Phacochoerus (Suoidea). ?Helohyus plicodon from the Middle Eocene documents the oldest stapes known for the order Artiodactyla. Morphological study and metric analyses of our sample of artiodactylan stapes show that stapes are likely to carry relevant phylogenetic characters/signal within artiodactyls, and a potential Euungulata signature.


Human exploitation of yeast fermentation dates back to the Neolithic. S. cerevisiae has been the most important yeast used for numerous fermentations of biotechnological interest, including grape fermentation for wine production. Despite its abundant use, the molecular mechanisms controlling alcoholic fermentation are rather unclear and the choice of S. cerevisiae as an inoculum is often the consequence of a mere habit, rather than the result of rational analyses.
In this work we focused on the role of different yeasts in the winemaking process. I was interested in understanding how the specific strain used for inoculum could influence the wine aroma formation. Furthermore, I wished to investigate the yeast genetics and ecology by characterizing their population and strain diversity in one of the wine regions of Slovenia.
To evaluate the effect of the yeast species on the fermentation outcome, we performed successive fermentations with five different species in combination with the industrial strain S. cerevisiae Lalvin T73. The experiment showed that at least two more yeast species, Kazachstania gamospora and Zygosaccharomyces kombuchaensis have good potential to be applied in the winemaking. , The main conclusions of this study are the possibility of: i) expanding the palette of alternative starters to widen the aromatic components ii) co–fermenting using two different yeast species. Mixed yeast culture fermentations are present in the natural context, but this practice has been neglected in biotechnological processes.
Positive results of wine fermentations with non – conventional yeast urged us to explore the diversity of Slovenian wine region natural isolates. The resulting yeast collection counts more than 1200 strains for which phenotype and genotype have been defined. Numerous isolates, including non – Saccharomyces species, showed promising oenological and biotechnological traits because of their capacity of rapid utilization of various carbon sources, growth at low pH and at presence of copper sulfite and potassium metabisulfite. Sampling also revealed sharp discrimination between the ecological niches of S. cerevisiae and S. paradoxus, which is a striking feature of European vineyards. While S. cerevisiae habitats are strongly associated with human activity, S. paradoxus was mainly isolated from the forest sources. Profound analysis of the collected data could give some explanations to the driving forces of S. cerevisiae domestication and S. paradoxus geographic isolation population structure.


Our present knowledge of the marine climate, as represented by data sets such as COADS (Woodruff et al., 1987), is based on meteorological observations from the Voluntary Observing Ships (VOS). Because the VOS are merchant ships, rather than specially designed meteorological platforms, errors and biases exist in the data. However there is little information readily available to the climatologist either on the nature of the VOS fleet or on the observing practises which are used. This report, describing the forty-six ships that participated in the Voluntary Observing Ships' Special Observing Project - North Atlantic (VSOP-NA), therefore serves two purposes:

(i) it provides a reference document to aid analysis of the VSOP-NA data set,
(ii) it gives a detailed description of a subset of the VOS, which will be of value in the interpretation of marine climate data sets.

This report is in two parts, Part 1 is an overall summary of the ship characteristics, Part 2 is a ship by ship description. The next section will briefly describe the VSOP-NA project, followed by a summary of the characteristics of the VSOP-NA ships (Section 3). Since these ships were specially selected (Section 2.2), the degree to which they are representative of the whole VOS fleet will be carefully considered. The meteorological instrumentation used by the VOS varies depending on which meteorological agency recruited the ships. That used on the chosen VSOP-NA ships is typical of VOS recruited by the countries bordering the North Atlantic, and will be described in Section 4. Section 5 is a summary of Part 1 of the report.

Part 2 presents the VSOP-NA ship catalogue. This includes, for each ship, diagrams of the layout (indicating in particular the exposure of the sensors), a summary of the geographical positions at which observations were obtained, and details of the instrumentation used.


This research evaluates the relative merits of two established and two newly proposed methods for modeling impressions of social events: stepwise regression, ANOVA, Bayesian model averaging, and Bayesian model sampling. Models generated with each method are compared against a ground truth model to assess performance at variable selection and coefficient estimation. We also assess the theoretical impacts of different modeling choices. Results show that the ANOVA procedure has a significantly lower false discovery rate than stepwise regression, whereas Bayesian methods exhibit higher true positive rates and comparable false discovery rates to ANOVA. Bayesian methods also generate coefficient estimates with less bias and variance than either stepwise regression or ANOVA. We recommend the use of Bayesian methods for model specification in affect control theory.


Vigorous and controversial, this book develops a sustained argument for a realist interpretation of science, based on a new analysis of the concept of predictive novelty. Identifying a form of success achieved in science-the successful prediction of novel empirical results-which can be explained only by attributing some measure of truth to the theories that yield it, Jarrett Leplin demonstrates the incapacity of nonrealist accounts to accommodate novel success and constructs a deft realist explanation of novelty. To test the applicability of novel success as a standard of warrant for theories, Leplin examines current directions in theoretical physics, fashioning a powerful critique of currently developing standards of evaluation. Arguing that explanatory uniqueness warrants inference, and exposing flaws in contending philosophical positions that sever explanatory power from epistemic justification, Leplin holds that abductive, or explanatory, inference is as fundamental as enumerative or eliminative inference, and contends that neither induction nor abduction can proceed without the other on pain of generating paradoxes. Leplin's conception of novelty has two basic components: an independence condition, ensuring that a result novel for a theory have no essential role, even indirectly, in the theory's provenance; and a uniqueness condition, ensuring that no competing theory provides a basis for predicting the same result. Showing that alternative approaches to novelty fall short in both respects, Leplin proceeds to a series of test cases, engaging prominent scientific theories from nineteenth-century accounts of light to modern cosmology in an effort to demonstrate the epistemological superiority of his view. Ambitious and tightly argued, A Novel Defense of Scientific Realism advances new positions on major topics in philosophy of science and offers a version of realism as original as it is compelling, making it essential reading for philosophers of science, epistemologists, and scholars in science studies.


Improved understanding of complex soil system's change over time and space can advance our forecasts and plans for changes related to critical societal needs. Taking a holistic and evolutionary view, this paper synthesizes three general principles of soil change and pedogenesis in time and space (especially time). First, the principle of conservation plus evolution provides the reconciliation of fast and slow changes in multiphase soil systems. Incomplete closure and partial irreversibility of many cyclic processes of soil functioning produce a range of residual solid products that are accumulated over time, giving rise to structured and informative soil profiles. Second, the principle of dissipation plus organization explains the simultaneous occurrence of soil matrix and soil structure during pedogenesis. Soil entropy changes provide potential indices for the degree of soil weathering (residuals) and soil structural development (fluxes) once appropriate quantification is made. Third, the principle of space plus time highlights the fundamental differences and intimate links between time and space. While space is reversible, conservative, and structured, time is irreversible, evolutionary, and nonstructured. Both time and space, however, share the common characteristics of preferentiality and threshold that govern soil functions and soil evolution. Many unknowns, however, remain regarding how complex soil systems work. The three principles offer useful perspectives for modeling and predicting soil change and pedogenesis. Considerable efforts are needed to reach a more quantitative treatment of the complex interaction between soil systems and their environment across time and space. This is an important direction for future soil science and its sustained contributions to societal needs.


The paper presents a classification and a review of the updating procedures currently used in real-time flood forecasting modelling. On the basis of results from the WMO project 'Simulated Real-Time Intercomparion of Hydrological Models', comprising more than 10 commonly used hydrological models and a variety of different updating procedures, an analysis of the relative importance of updating procedures and hydrological simulation models is provided. In particular, an intercomparison is made beteween two models (NAMS11/MIKE11 and NAMKAL) consisting of the same hydrological model (NAM conceptual rainfall-runoff) but containing different routing modules (linear reservoirs versus hydraulic routing) and different updating procedures (error prediction versus state variable updating based on an extended Kalman filter). A main conclusion is that updating procedures significantly improve the performances of hydrological models for short-range forecasting. Furthermore, there are no clear conclusions regarding which type of updating procedure performs the better. However. intercomparison of the NAMS11 and NAMKAL models indicates that the extended Kalman filter is marginally better than an error prediction model in cases where the basic hydrological model simulation is good. Finally, it is concluded that the basic simulation is very essential for accurate forecasts, and that the better the basic simulations are the better the updating routines in general function. This puts emphasis on the importance of thoroughly calibrating and validating the hydrological simulation models before applying them together with updating routines in operational real-time forecasting.


There is a fair amount of evidence that mesh (static multihop wireless) networks are gaining popularity, both in the academic literature and in the commercial space. Nonetheless, none of the prior work has evaluated the feasibility of applications on mesh through the use of deployed networks and real user traffic. The state of the art is the use of deployed testbeds with synthetic traces consisting of random traffic patterns.In this paper, we evaluate the feasibility of a mesh network for an all-wireless office using traces of office users and an actual 21-node multi-radio mesh testbed in an office area. Unlike previous mesh studies that have examined routing design in detail, we examine how different office mesh design choices impact the performance of user traffic. From our traces of 11 users spanning over a month, we identify 3 one hour trace periods with different characteristics and evaluate network performance for them. In addition, we consider different user-server placement, different wireless hardware, different wireless settings and different routing metrics.We find that our captured traffic is significantly different from the synthetic workloads typically used in the prior work. Our trace capture and replay methodology allows us to directly quantify the feasibility of office meshes by measuring the additional delay experienced by individual transactions made by user applications. Performance on our mesh network depends on the routing metric chosen, the user-server placement and the traffic load period. The choice of wireless hardware and wireless settings has a significant impact on performance under heavy load and challenging placement. Ultimately we conclude that for our traces and deployed system, under most conditions, all-wireless office meshes are feasible. In most cases, individual transactions incur under 20ms of additional delay over the mesh network. We believe this is an acceptable delay for most applications where a wired network to every machine is not readily available. We argue that our results are scalable to a network of over 100 users.


Vemurafenib induces endoplasmic reticulum stress in melanoma cells. This Podcast features an interview with Friedegund Meier, senior author of a Research Article that appears in the 29 January 2013 issue of Science Signaling. Beck et al. focuses on the role of endoplasmic reticulum (ER) stress in tumor cell killing by the drug vemurafenib. Vemurafenib is an effective therapy for melanomas that harbor a particular mutant form of the kinase BRAF, but melanomas often develop resistance to the drug, thus reducing its efficacy. The authors found that, in addition to inhibiting survival signaling mediated by the kinase ERK, vemurafenib also triggered apoptosis by inducing ER stress. Treating vemurafenib-resistant melanoma cells with an ER stress inducer in combination with vemurafenib improved cell killing, suggesting that this might be an effective combined therapy for treating melanoma.


Throughout the course of history, states and non-state actors have developed themes, values and ideas to promote their visions. Such deliberate and well-constructed ideologies are termed as narratives either to face the challenges or to run a rules-based national and international system while looking their goals and power apparatus. A national narrative is constructed in a way that identity, history, ideology, geography, culture, foreign policy and other national discourses become components of it. Pakistan, since its independence in 1947, has been in search of a comprehensive narrative that should suit the fabric of the state. The existing narrative has been unresponsive to the needs of people and becomes outdated for several reasons. A new narrative for identity construction, political maturity, educational growth, strong security, economic prosperity, good governance, religious reorientation, innovative skills, media maturity and ethnic unity is required which can establish a new societal architecture for a strong and resilient state and society. Building of such a new narrative is a strategic imperative which could bring national stability in Pakistan in the 21st century.


We report an unusual presentation in an elderly woman with a previous diagnosis of benign tremulous Parkinson's disease who developed a severe Parkinsonian-like syndrome with profound immobility following small bowel resection. Her Parkinsonism was largely unresponsive to conventional medical therapy. However, she was found to be profoundly hypomagnesaemic and a dramatic improvement in her symptoms and functional ability was achieved after correction of the severe hypomagnesaemia. A brief discussion is included.


We measure the velocity dispersions of clusters of galaxies selected by the redMaPPer algorithm in the first three years of data from the Dark Energy Survey (DES), allowing us to probe cluster selection and richness estimation, λ, in light of cluster dynamics. Our sample consists of 126 clusters with sufficient spectroscopy for individual velocity dispersion estimates. We examine the correlations between cluster velocity dispersion, richness, X-ray temperature and luminosity as well as central galaxy velocity offsets. The velocity dispersion-richness relation exhibits a bimodal distribution. The majority of clusters follow scaling relations between velocity dispersion, richness, and X-ray properties similar to those found for previous samples; however, there is a significant population of clusters with velocity dispersions which are high for their richness. These clusters account for roughly 22 per cent of the λ < 70 systems in our sample, but more than half (55 per cent) of λ < 70 clusters at z > 0.5. A couple of these systems are hot and X-ray bright as expected for massive clusters with richnesses that appear to have been underestimated, but most appear to have high velocity dispersions for their X-ray properties likely due to line-of-sight structure. These results suggest that projection effects contribute significantly to redMaPPer selection, particularly at higher redshifts and lower richnesses. The redMaPPer determined richnesses for the velocity dispersion outliers are consistent with their X-ray properties, but several are X-ray undetected and deeper data is needed to understand their nature.


We present an ab initio study of the spin-resolved optical conductivity of two-dimensional (2D) group-VIB transition-metal dichalcogenides (TMDs). We carry out fully relativistic density-functional-theory calculations combined with maximally localized Wannier functions to obtain band manifolds at extremely high resolutions and focus on the photoresponse of 2D TMDs to circularly polarized light in a wide frequency range. We present extensive numerical results for monolayer TMDs involving molybdenum and tungsten combined with sulfur and selenium. Our numerical approach allows us to locate with a high degree of accuracy the positions of the points in the Brillouin zone that are responsible for Van Hove singularities in the optical response. Surprisingly, some of the saddle points do not occur exactly along high-symmetry directions in the Brillouin zone, although they happen to be in their close proximity.


The investigation of Shallow Processing, also known as Underspecification, and 'Good Enough' processing, is a relatively new branch of psycholinguistics. A growing body of evidence within this field indicates that, in some cases, the comprehension system will fail to build or retain a fully specified representation for linguistic input. As a result, the construction of underspecified representations may lead to erroneous interpretations, and the phenomenon of Pragmatic Normalisation is a central instance of this: comprehenders sometimes construct interpretations that reflect pragmatic knowledge rather than the grammatically licensed meaning of the input. Some researchers have suggested that shallow processing can be explained in terms of the comprehension system using reliable – but essentially statistical – heuristic interpretation processes. This heuristic style of interpretation is in contrast with interpretative processes that construct meaning based on the syntactic structure of a string, and one outstanding question is how these different interpretation processes operate in real time.
 In a series of eight experiments this thesis investigated the time course of sentence interpretation via a study of pragmatic normalisation. Experiments 1-6 probed interpretations of syntactically unambiguous, implausible sentences, replicating some earlier studies and reporting surprisingly high levels of unlicensed interpretations. Experiments 2-8 used a variety of implausible constructions to investigate the temporal relation of syntax-based interpretation to heuristics-based interpretation. Both self-paced reading and eyetracking data are supportive of a processing model in which syntax informs the interpretation process first, but is later overruled by pragmatic constraints. Investigations into the conditions for shallow processing indicate a role for memory and syntactic complexity, and the opportunity to reread implausible material. An investigation into the impact of reading skill on the tendency to normalise implausible sentences yielded inconsistent results, and there is apparently little difference in the processing styles of skilled and less-skilled readers when reading implausible material. The thesis concludes with suggestions for future work to further elucidate the time course of syntactic vs. heuristic interpretation.


Philip Pullman, an outspoken critic of Christianity, has frequently voiced his desire to
overturn the core elements of the Fall; to break it down, tear it apart, and allow for a new vision
of the old story. In his trilogy consisting of three novels, The Golden Compass, The Subtle
Knife, and The Amber Spyglass, (called collectively His Dark Materials), Philip Pullman creates
a universe in which consciousness (in the form of Dust) is dying. This Dust can only be saved
by a second Eve, a prepubescent girl named Lyra, who will re-create the fall by being tempted
into knowledge. The original story of the Fall in Genesis essentially creates unequal divisions
between men and women; if Pullman's desire is to overturn what he perceives as Christianity's
repressions, this essay investigates if Pullman has created equal gender roles in his version of the
Fall. By examining power and rebellion of particularly female characters in His Dark Materials,
I conclude that Pullman has not made any significant progression for female equality in his Fall,
and that at the conclusion of the trilogy, Lyra has conformed into a traditional Western female
gender role.


Treatment seeking behavior by individuals diagnosed as substance abusers is examined. A benefit/cost framework is utilized to analyze the decision to seek substance abuse treatment services. It is argued that treatment services are sought when the present value of the expected future stream of benefits from treatment are greater than the present value of its expected future costs. It is also argued that events that either raise the expected benefits or lower the expected costs of seeking treatment increase the probability that these services will be sought. The data for this study were selected from a telephone survey of non-institutionalized adults residing in the state ofMontana and the rural communities of Colorado. Multinomial logistic (logit) regression models were used to estimate the willingness to seek substance abuse treatment services as a function of twelve economic and socio-demographic variables and four external pressure variables. Results are presented for the total adult sample and five pairs of population subgroups: low and high-income individuals, men and women, lowincome men and women, high-income men and women, and the employed and unemployed. The reported findings on the external pressure to individuals about their substance use, employment status, income levels, educational status, marital and primary child care responsibilities, and gender issues confirm that these variables have a significant influence on the substance user's decision to seek treatment services for the total population and subgroups studied. Although Likelihood Ratio tests did not reject the hypotheses that the treatment seeking decision is identical for each pair of subgroups analyzed, the results obtained nevertheless provide new and interesting insights into the decision to seek substance abuse treatment services.


External auditory canal (EAC) stenosis is commonly seen in patients with fibrous dysplasia of the temporal bone. Postoperative canal restenosis is more likely to be encountered after initial surgical management. We present a case of monostotic fibrous dysplasia of the temporal bone with EAC invasion in a 37-year-old man who presented with recurrent canal stenosis and resultant conductive hearing loss after several rounds of revision surgery. The technique of using a composite Foley catheter as a stent gave promising results in terms of improving the canal's patency and closing the preoperative air-bone gap in the hearing threshold after 18 months of follow-up. This suggests that long-term stent use with a Foley catheter offers a treatment of choice to prevent such troublesome canal restenosis.


Zoning regulations provide benefits, but they also restrict housing supply and hence raise prices. This paper quantifies their importance by comparing prices to the marginal costs of supply at different points in time. For detached houses, marginal costs comprise the dwelling structure and the land that other home owners need to forego. Relative to our estimates of these costs, we find that, as of 2016, zoning raised detached house prices 73 per cent above marginal costs in Sydney, 69 per cent in Melbourne, 42 per cent in Brisbane and 54 per cent in Perth. Zoning has also raised the price of apartments well above the marginal cost of supply, especially in Sydney. We emphasise that this is not the amount that housing prices would fall in the absence of zoning. The effect of zoning has increased dramatically over the past two decades, likely due to existing restrictions binding more tightly as demand has risen.


The past decade saw heightened hurricane activity and more than $150 billion in damage in 2004 and 2005. Libraries responded by taking steps to better prepare for the information needs of the libraries and their communities arising from these emergency situations. Libraries adapted their service roles in support of their communities to manage information services tailored to emergency support and assistance to hurricane victims.

There has been no systematic effort to organize and assist libraries toward providing information services related to hurricane/disaster planning and response. This project included interviews with over 150 experienced officials and librarians throughout the Gulf Coast area. Key findings include the need for libraries: to collaborate with local agencies to build coalitions focused on disaster preparedness; to become emergency responders, prepared to offer shelter, relief, communications, and emergency services; to serve as vital links in the emergency response network, helping in key areas as communication and information centers, and as distribution centers for food, water, and supplies; and to develop into command and control points, as integrated nodes in the disaster response network.

The importance of this research effort centers upon the coordination, management, and integration of information resources that improve the library and community infrastructure related to hurricane preparedness and response. The effort identified the library's service roles, developed strategies for libraries to better prepare to assist their communities, and investigated how libraries and other governmental agencies leverage their resources during the response and recovery period. The study has captured and actively disseminated the best practices offered by the survivors of such events via a web portal and training sessions.


The striatum supports learning from immediate feedback by coding prediction errors (PEs), whereas the hippocampus (HC) plays a parallel role in learning from delayed feedback. Both regions show evidence of decline in human aging, but behavioral research suggests greater decline in HC versus striatal functions. The present study included male and female humans and used fMRI to examine younger and older adults' brain activation patterns during a learning task with choice feedback presented immediately or after a brief delay. Participants then completed a surprise memory task that tested their recognition of trial-unique feedback stimuli, followed by assessments of postlearning cue preference, outcome probability awareness, and willingness to pay. The study yielded three main findings. First, behavioral measures indicated similar rates of learning in younger and older adults across conditions, but postlearning measures indicated impairment in older adults' ability to subsequently apply learning to discriminate between cues. Second, PE signals in the striatum were greater for immediate versus delayed feedback in both age groups, but PE signals in the HC were greater for delayed versus immediate feedback only in younger adults. Third, unlike younger adults, older adults failed to exhibit enhanced episodic memory for outcome stimuli in the delayed-feedback condition. Together, these findings indicate that HC circuits supporting learning and memory decline more than striatal circuits in healthy aging, which suggests that declines in HC learning signals may be an important predictor of deficits in learning-dependent economic decisions among older adults. SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT The hippocampus (HC) and striatum play distinct and critical roles in learning. Substantial research suggests that age-related decline in learning supported by the HC outpaces decline in learning supported by the striatum; however, such inferences have been drawn by comparing performance in tasks with fundamentally different structures. The present study overcomes this obstacle by implementing a single fMRI-learning paradigm with a subtle variation in feedback timing to examine differential age effects on memory supported by the HC and striatum. Our results provide converging behavioral and brain-imaging evidence showing that HC circuits supporting learning and memory decline more than striatal circuits in healthy aging and that declines in HC learning signals may predict early deficits in learning-dependent decisions among older adults.


CRISPR-Cas9 systems are enriched in human pathogenic bacteria and have been linked to cytotoxicity by an unknown mechanism. Here, we show that upon infection of human cells, Campylobacter jejuni secretes its Cas9 (CjeCas9) nuclease into their cytoplasm. Next, a native nuclear localization signal enables CjeCas9 nuclear entry, where it catalyzes metal-dependent nonspecific DNA cleavage leading to cell death. Compared to CjeCas9, native Cas9 of Streptococcus pyogenes (SpyCas9) is more suitable for guide-dependent editing. However, in human cells, native SpyCas9 may still cause some DNA damage, most likely because of its ssDNA cleavage activity. This side effect can be completely prevented by saturation of SpyCas9 with an appropriate guide RNA, which is only partially effective for CjeCas9. We conclude that CjeCas9 plays an active role in attacking human cells rather than in viral defense. Moreover, these unique catalytic features may therefore make CjeCas9 less suitable for genome editing applications.


Global health aid is exceedingly complex. It encompasses more than one hundred bilateral agencies, global funds, and independent initiatives that interact with an equally complex and diverse set of institutions involved in financing and providing health care in developing countries. Numerous efforts have been made to better coordinate these activities in the interest of making them more effective. The Health Systems Funding Platform is one of the most recent of these initiatives. Established in 2009, it has advanced farthest in two countries, Ethiopia and Nepal, and is currently expanding to several others. This paper briefly assesses the Platform and argues that the way the initiative is proceeding differs little from prior initiatives, such as sectorwide approaches and budget support. However, the initiative does represent an opportunity to make global health aid more effective if it were to deepen its commitment to improving information for policy, link funding explicitly to well-chosen independently verified indicators, and establish an evaluation strategy to learn from its experience.


Theories of cognition that are based on information processing and representation are reactive (Rosen, 1985) or backwards looking, not anticipatory. In a previous article (Thibault, 2005a), I looked at the reasons why humans and bonobos do not need an innate language faculty in order to be minded, languaging beings. The present article takes up some of the questions explored there, but, it asks, on the other hand, what sort of a minded agent has language and what kind of account of language and more broadly meaning do we need to explain minded, languaged agents and the activities they participate in? Following Rosen (1985), I also take up and further develop a point first raised in Thibault (2004a: 187) on language as an anticipatory system, rather than a reactively 'representational' one (see also Bickhard, 2005).