After 30 years and thousands of scientific papers published on AIDS and its virus, can we see the wood for the trees? Would earlier diagnosis and treatment, by interrupting HIV transmission and limiting its rising incidence, better control its spread and ultimately reduce costs?

Analogies sometimes help. Even before HIV had been discovered AIDS was being compared with chronic hepatitis B. The groups at risk and the routes of transmission were similar, and in both infections a carrier state eventually led to the exhaustion of the target tissue. HIV has, however, proved itself unlike hepatitis B virus—it has continued to resist attempts to develop a vaccine against it, but is much more susceptible to antiviral treatment.

With the drug treatment of HIV now offering such promise, a better analogy lies in the conquest of tuberculosis by combined drug treatment in the 1950s. The stigma that attached to tuberculosis might have allowed case finding and contact tracing to be deemed too difficult, but it was generally accepted that intensified measures to find cases of active tuberculosis were justified …


A rational bubble would involve a self-confirming belief that an asset price depends on information that includes variables or parameters that are not part of market fundamentals. The existing literature shows that, if market fundamentals are economically interesting, i.e., forward looking, any rational bubbles would be either explosive or implosive. Further arguments based on the existing literature show that utility maximizing behavior implies finite bounds on asset prices and, accordingly, precludes both explosive and implosive rational price expectations, except for the possible case of an implosion in the value of fiat money. These arguments rule out both positive and negative rational bubbles, except for the poissibility of rational inflationary bubbles.This paper extends the theoretical analysis of rational bubbles in two ways. First, it shows that, although a supply response of the current asset stock to the current asset price dampens fluctuations in market fundamentals, such a response would cause a rational bubble to explode or to implode even faster.Thus, the explosiveness or implosiveness of rational bubbles isnot an artifact of assuming that the asset stock evolves autonomously. Second, and more importantly, the present analysis considers the inception of rational bubbles and shows that, for anegative rational bubble -- such as a rational inflationary bubble -- to get started, a positive rational bubble also would have to have positive probability. Specifically, the expected initial absolute value of a potential negative rational bubble cannot exceed the expected, initial value of a potential positive rational bubble.This result dramatically expands the theoretical basis for precluding rational bubbles. Specifically, because utility maximization directly rules out rational deflationary bubbles, the inception of a rational inflationary bubbles is also precluded.


Notable moves, either towards or away from equity in Primary Health Care (PHC) provision in South Africa, are observed when comparing the 1997/98 and the 2000 PHC Facility Surveys. Significant strides towards improvement have undoubtedly been accomplished. Sadly there are also areas in which inequity has increased. Given the supposed increased prioritisation of and budgetary allocation to PHC in South Africa in recent years, improvement across the spectrum of indicators measured in this survey could have been expected. Sadly many areas of PHC remainin dire straits. Undoubtedly there have been marked changes for the better in PHC provision; equally true is that such improvements seem to come at the expense of other areas of PHC.


This paper presents the design flow from system-level specifications to transistor-level design for three different fully-differential amplifiers composing the first and the second integrator of a second-order hybrid multi-bit ΔΣ modulator. The circuit-level specifications for each amplifier are extracted using behavioral models and time-domain system-level simulations with a SNDR target value of 93 dB ± 2 dB. The amplifiers are designed using the structured analog design methodology consisting of circuit partitioning into basic analog blocks, specification derivation for each basic block, and transistor sizing in a specific design sequence. Transistor-level design is based on the choice of the inversion factor and the transistor length to achieve the required specifications of each block. After all three analog amplifiers are sized, the system-level performance is confirmed by time-domain simulations, and the obtained SNDR value is within the specified range.


This paper addresses the application of Article 4 and Article 26 ("Public Policy of the forum") of Rome II Regulation specifically in relation to claims for bereavement damages in cross-border fatal accidents. It does so by first illustrating an Italian Supreme Court's judgment that disapplied Austrian law denying awards for nonpecuniary damages to secondary victims. This precedent and other developments, including recent ECJ judgments on Motor Insurance Directives, show that there are grounds for national judges to limit the negative effects of Article 4: the 'public policy' rule can be an effective weapon against any denial of or any relevant restriction to victims' right to full and fair compensation. More in general this paper's conclusion is that a national judge, pursuant to Article 26, is entitled to disapply the foreign law which, in contrast with his internal public policy, would require him to discriminate in peius among victims suffering violations of fundamental rights.


ABSTRACTAn International Aerosol Conference (IAC), held once in every four years, is the largest and most prestigious professional meeting in the aerosol research community worldwide. The 9th IAC was organized by the Korean Association for Particle and Aerosol Research (KAPAR) on behalf of the International Aerosol Research Assembly (IARA) and held from August 31 to September 5, 2014 in Busan, Republic of Korea. A total of 1215 participants from 52 countries presented 1059 papers, including 529 oral and 530 poster presentations. More than a half (51%) of the presentations was from Asia followed by Europe (35%), and North America (15%). The presentations covered a wide range of aerosol-related studies. Among 17 topics, the theme 'atmospheric aerosols and air quality' had the most presentations (21% of the total number of papers presented), followed by 'aerosol chemistry' (10%), 'atmospheric aerosols and global climate' (9%), 'instrumentation' (8%) and 'aerosol physics' (8%). This suggests that air quality issues related to ambient aerosols is of a major concern, especially, in East Asian countries.
In addition to research presentations, various educational and social activities were carried out during the IAC-2014. There were tutorial lectures attended by 166 participants as well as several plenary and keynote lectures given by distinguished speakers. One of the popular social activities was a conference tour to the traditional Korean folk village and Buddhist temples, both are UNESCO world heritage sites. Also, there was a large and interesting exhibition from 29 companies and institutions related to aerosols.


The study bring together in a systematic manner the available information from recent expenditure and consumption surveys for Laos as they relate to the impact of the East West Economic Corridor (EWEC) on different social and economic aspects of households in the Lao province of Savannakhet. The results of the study sustain a number of conclusions in terms of the transformation of the EWEC from a transport to an economic corridor. In the first place, the central districts of Savannakhet have benefited more from the transport infrastructure of the EWEC that the surrounding districts. Nevertheless, the peripheral areas surrounding the Corridor have benefited in a substantial way from improvements in the feeder road system. The second important finding of the study is that infrastructure development has been an effective way of directly impacting on household well-being and indirectly contributing to human endowments of those households by enhancing their consumption of education and health services. However, the results also indicate that infrastructural developments have not been allocated among districts in the province in a way that could have produced a more equitable distribution of their effects on living standards. The implication of this third finding is that infrastructural investment needs to better target low-income rural areas in the peripheral districts. In that way, public investments could help to reduce the growing inequality among districts in Savannakhet, especially if it were to target low-income groups in remote villages.


This article examines how health care services in Canada are denied to precarious status migrants, either through outright exclusion based on immigration status, or due to the realities in migrants' lives that make it difficult for them to access health care services. The author argues that this situation is unfair, given the contribution made by precarious status migrants to Canada's sociocultural and economic fabric, and exhorts the courts and policymakers to do more to make health care services available to these migrants.


Natural environments feature mixtures of odorants of diverse quantities, qualities and complexities. Olfactory receptor neurons (ORNs) are the first layer in the sensory pathway and transmit the olfactory signal to higher regions of the brain. Yet, the response of ORNs to mixtures is strongly non-additive, and exhibits antagonistic interactions among odorants. Here, we model the processing of mixtures by mammalian ORNs, focusing on the role of inhibitory mechanisms. Theoretically predicted response curves capture experimentally determined glomerular responses imaged by a calcium indicator expressed in ORNs of live, breathing mice. Antagonism leads to an effective "normalization" of the ensemble glomerular response, which arises from a novel mechanism involving the distinct statistical properties of receptor binding and activation, without any recurrent neuronal circuitry. Normalization allows our encoding model to outperform noninteracting models in odor discrimination tasks, and to explain several psychophysical experiments in humans.


We explore the effect of regularizing prediction entropy in a weakly supervised setting with inexact class labels. When underlying data distributions are biased toward a specific subclass, we hypothesize that entropy regularization can be used to bootstrap a training set that mitigates this bias. We conduct experiments over multiple datasets under supervision of an oracle and in a semi-supervised setting finding substantial reductions in training set bias capable of decreasing test error rate. These findings suggest entropy regularization as a promising approach to de-biasing weakly supervised learning systems.


An analysis is presented for a two-conductor problem in which the source conductor, a sphere with either constant charge or constant potential, approaches a ground plane. Capacitance coefficients are calculated; body potentials, energies, and charges are compared for typical geometries using the two models. In real charged device model events, the device potential and probability of discharge are a function of the charge on the device, its size, and position relative to a ground plane. Proposed test methods specify the potential of the device; the resulting charge on the device and the energy dissipated in the discharge can be lower compared to the actual event. Results are also presented which show the effect of the variation in the impedance elements of the discharge path on the peak value and rise time of the discharge current.


The avoidance of being overweight or obese is a daily challenge for a growing number of people. The growing proportion of people suffering from a nutritional imbalance in many parts of the world exemplifies this challenge and emphasizes the need for a better understanding of the mechanisms that regulate nutritional balance. Until recently, research on the central regulation of food intake primarily focused on neuronal signaling, with little attention paid to the role of glial cells. Over the last few decades, our understanding of glial cells has changed dramatically. These cells are increasingly regarded as important neuronal partners, contributing not just to cerebral homeostasis, but also to cerebral signaling. Our understanding of the central regulation of energy balance is part of this (r)evolution. Evidence is accumulating that glial cells play a dynamic role in the modulation of energy balance. In the present review, we summarize recent data indicating that the multifaceted glial compartment of the brainstem dorsal vagal complex (DVC) should be considered in research aimed at identifying feeding-related processes operating at this level.


We have used Spitzer images of a sample of 68 barred spiral galaxies in the local universe to make systematic measurements of bar length and bar strength. We combine these with precise determinations of the corotation radii associated with the bars, taken from our previous study, which used the phase change from radial inflow to radial outflow of gas at corotation, based on high-resolution two-dimensional velocity fields in Hα taken with a Fabry–Pérot spectrometer. After presenting the histograms of the derived bar parameters, we study their dependence on the galaxy morphological type and on the total stellar mass of the host galaxy, and then produce a set of parametric plots. These include the bar pattern speed versus bar length, the pattern speed normalized with the characteristic pattern speed of the outer disk versus the bar strength, and the normalized pattern speed versus , the ratio of corotation radius to bar length. To provide guidelines for our interpretation, we used recently published simulations, including disk and dark matter halo components. Our most striking conclusion is that bars with values of < 1.4, previously considered dynamically fast rotators, can be among the slowest rotators both in absolute terms and when their pattern speeds are normalized. The simulations confirm that this is because as the bars are braked, they can grow longer more quickly than the outward drift of the corotation radius. We conclude that dark matter halos have indeed slowed down the rotation of bars on Gyr timescales.


Juta has recently published the 11th edition of John Grogan's Workplace Law. This book is an invaluable source of information on employment law in South Africa and contains everything you need to know about how to manage the employment relationship. From the basic terms and conditions of employment, how to terminate employment fairly, how to guard against unfair labour practices and unfair discrimination in the workplace, as well as, how to implement affirmative action measures and ensure compliance with the employment equity laws in South Africa. This book also contains information on collective labour law and industrial action.


This article describes a method for the modification of paper with single-wall carbon nanohorns (SWCNHs) to form stable suprastructures. The SWCNHs form stable dahlia-like aggregates in solution that are then self-assembled into superior structures if the solvent is evaporated. Dipping paper sections into a dispersion of SWCNHs leads to the formation of a thin film that can be used for microextraction purposes. The coated paper can be easily handled with a simple pipette tip, paving the way for disposable extraction units. As a proof of concept, the extraction of antidepressants from urine and their determination by direct infusion mass spectrometry is studied. Limits of detection (LODs) were 10 ng/L for desipramine, amitriptyline, and mianserin, while the precision, expressed as a relative standard deviation, was 7.2%, 7.3%, and 9.8%, respectively.


We propose software designs that perform incremental computation with monotonic distortion reduction for two-dimensional convolution and frame-by-frame block-matching tasks. In order to reduce the run time of the proposed designs, we combine bitplane-based computation with a packing technique proposed recently. In the case of block matching, we also utilize previously-computed motion vectors to perform localized search when incrementing the precision of the input video frames. The applicability of the proposed approach is demonstrated by execution time measurements on the xo-laptop ("100$ laptop") and on a mainstream laptop; our software is also made available online. In comparison to the conventional (non-incremental) software realization, the proposed approach leads to scalable computation per input frame while producing identical (or comparable) precision for the output results of each operating point. In addition, the execution of the proposed designs can be arbitrarily terminated for each frame with the output being available at the already-computed precision.


High-Resolution MHD Spectroscopy of External Kinks in a Tokamak Plasma Daisuke Shiraki This thesis describes the first results of passive and active MHD spectroscopy experiments on the High Beta Tokamak-Extended Pulse (HBT-EP) device using a new array of magnetic diagnostics and coils. The capabilities of the HBT-EP experiment are significantly extended with the installation of a new adjustable conducting wall, high-power modular control coil arrays, and an extensive set of 216 magnetic sensors that allow simultaneous high-resolution detection of multimode MHD phenomena. The design, construction, and calibration of this system are described. The capability of this new magnetic diagnostic set is demonstrated by biorthogonal decomposition analysis of passive measurements of rotating resistive wall modes (RWMs). A strong multimode effect is detected for the first time in HBT-EP plasmas consisting of the simultaneous existence ofm/n = 3/1 and 6/2 RWMs which cause the plasma to evolve in a non-rigid multimode manner. Additional mode numbers as high as n = 3 are also observed. Active MHD spectroscopy experiments using a "phase-flip" resonant magnetic perturbation (RMP) are able to excite a clear three-dimensional response. By adjusting the helicity of the magnetic field applied by the control coils, the driven plasma response is shown to be predominantly resonant field amplification. When the amplitude of the applied field is not too large, the driven resonant response appears linear, independent of the presence of background MHD phenomena and consistent with the predictions of single-helicity modeling of kink mode dynamics. The spatial structures of both the naturally rotating kink mode and the externally driven response are observed to be identical, while the temporal dynamics are consistent with the independent evolution of each mode. The phase-flip driven plasma response is measured as a function of edge safety factor, plasma rotation, and the amplitude of the applied magnetic perturbation. As the RMP amplitude increases, the plasma response is shown to be linear, saturated, and ultimately, disruptive.


For the past half-century, a debate has raged over when "peak oil" will occur—the point at which output can no longer increase and production begins to level off or gradually decline. Determining how long the oil supply will last has become even more pressing because the world's energy supply still relies heavily on oil, and global energy demand is expected to rise steeply over the next twenty years. ; This article seeks to bring the peak oil debate into focus. The author notes that a number of factors cloud the energy outlook: Estimates of remaining resources are typically given as a range of probabilities and are thus open to interpretation. Variations also occur in estimates of future oil production and in the ways countries report their reserve data. ; The lack of a common definitional framework also confuses the debate. The author provides definitions of frequently used terms, delineating types of reserves and conventional versus nonconventional resources. She also discusses how technological innovations, government policies, and prices influence oil production. ; Regardless of the exact timing of peak oil production, the world must address the challenge of adapting to a new model of energy supply. Perhaps the world would be better served, the author notes, if the peak oil debate could be more solution-oriented, focusing on discovering the best way to transition to a world with less conventional oil rather than locking horns about discrepancies in terminology.


DESIGNER is a layout specification system for generically coded documents. It is based on the paradigm design by example and the methodology of using layout objects to provide graphics artists with an ergonomically sound user interface for their trade. In this paper we introduce layout objects and present DESIGNER'S graphical user interface using some simple examples to explain the main ideas of our system.


Moral and cognitive reasoning (within the Piagetian theory) aspects of congenitally blind children ranging in age from 6 to 12 years were examined and compared with those of a sighted sample, matched in age and socio-economic background. The results of the study show that moral and cognitive development in the congenitally blind proceeds at a slower rate, but the developmental lag in the moral domain does not apply to all moral reasoning features examined. The dimension of retributive vs. distributive justice, for example, seems to develop in the same manner in the two samples. Regarding the prerequisite relationships between cognitive and moral development, the reciprocal interaction prediction was the more powerful for the sighted children, whereas for their blind counterparts, cognitive capacity seemed to exert greater influence on moral development. Possible explanations of the findings are discussed.


The brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) is critical for brain development, and the functional BDNF Val66Met polymorphism is implicated in risk for mood disorders. The objective of this study was to determine how the Val66Met polymorphism influences amygdala-cortical connectivity during neurodevelopment and assess the relevance for mood disorders. Age- and sex-specific effects of the BDNF Val66Met polymorphism on amygdala-cortical connectivity were assessed by examining covariance of amygdala volumes with thickness throughout the cortex in a sample of Caucasian youths ages 8-22 that were part of the Philadelphia Neurodevelopmental Cohort (n = 339). Follow-up analyses assessed corresponding BDNF genotype effects on resting-state functional connectivity (n = 186) and the association between BDNF genotype and major depressive disorder (MDD) (n = 2749). In adolescents, amygdala-cortical covariance was significantly stronger in Met allele carriers compared with Val/Val homozygotes in amygdala-cortical networks implicated in depression; these differences were driven by females. In follow-up analyses, the Met allele was also associated with stronger resting-state functional connectivity in adolescents and increased likelihood of MDD in adolescent females. The BDNF Val66Met polymorphism may confer risk for mood disorders in females through effects on amygdala-cortical connectivity during adolescence, coinciding with a period in the lifespan when onset of depression often occurs, more commonly in females.


Abstract : This thesis analyzes the cost associated with the Minuteman III (MM III) weapon system. The research develops three models for determining MM III costs per alert hour (CPAH). The first model is based on the Air Force Cost Analysis Improvement Group cost per flying hour model. The model is modified to include depot level reparables, consumables, and personnel costs. The second model is based on the Office of the Secretary of Defense, Cost Analysis Improvement Group cost per flying hour model and is formulated using service-wide data from the Air Force Total Ownership Cost tool. The third model is a comprehensive model including indirect costs associated the ICBM-supporting installations. Additionally, this thesis includes a CPAH for each echelon or level of management for the MM III. The data reveals a relatively small marginal CPAH at the lowest levels. However, due to the robust support structure for the MM III, the models reveal significant fixed alert-hour costs. Finally, the thesis discusses the workings of the MM III cost structure that may benefit future budgeting decisions. Specifically, the step functions associated with each level of management and the large fixed costs. This thesis presents the three models as a starting point for developing a CPAH predictive model in future research.


Deep learning (DL) methods have recently gained popularity. Training this class of models is, however, computing-intensive, and frequently GPUs are used to boost performance. Although the costs of GPU-based systems are gradually reducing due to the high demand, they are still prohibitive: in public clouds, GPU-powered virtual machines (VMs) time unit price is 5-8x higher than CPU-only VMs. While the cloud remains the most cost-effective and flexible deployment, operation costs can be reduced, in large settings, by rightsizing and sharing resources among multiple processes. This work addresses the online joint capacity planning and job scheduling with due dates problem and proposes alternative matheuristic solution methods. Our objective is to optimize operation costs by: i) rightsizing the VM capacities at each node, ii) partitioning the set of GPUs among multiple concurrent jobs on the same VM, and iii) determining a due-date-aware job schedule. The effectiveness of the proposed hierarchical approach, coupled with an appropriate Mixed Integer Linear Programming formulation, is validated against first-principle methods by relying on simulation. The experiments prove that the efficiency of GPU-based systems evaluated in terms of costs can be improved by 50-70%. Finally, scalability analyses show that the proposed approach enables to solve problem instances with up to 100 nodes in less than one minute on average, making it suitable for practical scenarios.


Technology bears important relationships to our health and wellness and has been utilized over the past two decades as an aid to support both self-management goals as well as collaboration among treatment teams.However, when chronic illnesses such as eating disorders (ED) are managed outside of institutionalized care settings, designing effective technology to support collaboration in treatment necessitates that we understand the relationships between patients, clinicians, and support networks. We conducted in-depth, semi-structured, interviews with 9 ED patients and 10 clinicians to understand the ED journey through the lens of collaborative efforts, technology use, and potential detriments. Based on our analysis of these 19 interviews, we present novel findings on various underlying disconnects within the collaborative ED treatment process disconnects among clinicians, between treatment foci, among preferences in tracking, within support networks, and inpatients' own identities. Our findings highlight how these various disconnects are concomitant with and gaps can stem from a lack of collaboration between different stakeholders in the ED journey. We also identify methods of facilitating collaboration in these disconnects through technological mediators.


: Social media influencers are winning over the Internet with their outstanding work and presence. Their opinions have a powerful impact on people, especially on young generation. We can mark them as a modern phenomenon that has seen a huge increase in cooperation with marketing agencies over recent years. More and more people are following such influencers so that they do not miss out on their content. Brands flock to such influencers for mentions, reviews and recommendations. Even though influencer marketing is a relatively new strategy, it continues to be a viable solution for marketers who are willing to think outside the box while building relationships with their target market. The aim of the study is to offer a comprehensive reflection on influencer marketing opportunities and determine the impact of influencers on consumer behaviour of Generations Y and Z . We wanted to find out whether influencers, who promote products, can attract potential customers and encourage them for purchase, as well as find differences between the given consumer generations. In order to meet the objectives of the study, own research was conducted (459 respondents from the Slovak Republic belonging to Generations Y and Z were involved in the inquiry). The research findings confirm that there are significant differences between the above-mentioned consumer generations in the area of impact of influencers on consumer behaviour, which leads to different marketing opportunities. For statistical processing of the results, we used the Kruskal-Wallis Test, Kolmogorov-Smirnov Test, Fisher's Exact Test and Dunn's Test of Contrasts.


Why are blue-collar blacks less likely to help jobseekers than jobholders from other ethnoracial groups or even than more affluent blacks? Drawing from in-depth, semi-structured interviews with 97 black and Latino workers at one large, public sector employer, we find that blue-collar black workers both helped less proactively and rejected more requests for assistance than did blue-collar Latino and white-collar black workers. We attribute blue-collar blacks' more passive engagement to their stronger conviction, born from personal experience, that providing help was too risky and, more often than not, a waste of time. These experiences contributed to their belief that job-finding hardships were less the result of opportunity deficits than deficits in work ethic, a position they then deployed to justify their reluctance to help in the future. We end with a discussion about how prior helping experiences shape beliefs about inequality and inform jobholders' willingness to help in the future, often to the detriment of disadvantaged black jobseekers.


Athletes' practice environment can influence their competitive performance. The influencing performance factors present in practice are understudied, and the aim of this study was to explore these factors. Using a case-study approach, the authors investigated a basketball practice environment to reveal influencing performance factors. Participants were 15 members of a U.K. Elite Academy Basketball League team based in a sixth-form college (equivalent to American high school age) that included 10 players, 2 coaches, 1 strength and conditioning coach, 1 academic teacher, and the head of sport (mean age 21.8 yr). A case-study approach was adopted to collect data from interviews, focus groups, and direct observations to provide a holistic assessment of the practice environment. Data were analyzed using inductive thematic analysis, which revealed 6 overarching themes: effort, status, individuality, preparation, team drive, and practice vision. Data analysis exposed several themes of influencing performance factors unreported in previous literature, suggesting that practice environments should be viewed as a stand-alone field of investigative enquiry. The results from this study provide a much-needed foray into the psychological influences of practice and give practitioners the opportunity to reflect on the results against their own practice environments.


Background: Pregnant women empowerment is viewed by policy makers and health care practitioners as a mechanism to help pregnant women adapt to physical and psychological changes after pregnancy, and gain a satisfactory experience of childbirth. The aim of this study was to determine the pregnancy-related empowerment of urban women in Tonekabon, Iran Methods: The design of the study was cross-sectional. A valid empowerment scale for pregnant women was used to determine pregnancy-related empowerment. The questionnaire containing 27 questions comprised five factors: self-efficacy, future image, self-esteem, support and assurance from others, and joy of an addition to family. Higher scores in all factors mean better empowerment score. In addition, a demographic and reproductive questionnaire was also used to obtain demographics and reproductive information. A total of 200 individuals, from two active urban primary healthcare centers in Tonekabon, were selected using cluster random sampling method. All analyses were performed using SPSS version 17. Independent t-test was used to determine the relationship between demographic and reproductive variables with empowerment. Results: The mean for the empowerment score of pregnant women was 78.7±6.7 (27 items scored from 1 to 4). The women who worked outside home had higher self esteem score than those who worked just at home (19.3 vs. 17.7) (p= 0.024). Also the mean score of self efficacy in women with support of spouse was higher than those without their spouse support (18.1 vs. 16.1) (p= 0.001). In women with wanted pregnancy, the joy of an addition to the score was higher compared with those with unwanted pregnancy (P= 0.048). There was no statistically significant result found in the mean scores of the five factors (self-efficacy, future image, self-esteem, support and assurance from others, and joy of an addition to family) with age, own education, husband education, and number of pregnancy. Conclusion: The results of this survey could be used not only to make efficient interventions for pregnant women, but also to promote empowerment of pregnant women.


In these essays and reviews, written over the last decade, Barbara Kruger addresses that power with intelligence and wit, in the hope of engaging both our criticality and our dreams of affirmation. Who speaks? Who is silent? Who is seen? Who is absent? These questions focus on how cultures are constructed through pictures and words, how we are seduced into a world of appearances: into a pose of who we are and aren't. On both an emotional and an economic level, images and texts have the power to make us rich or poor. In these essays and reviews, written over the last decade, Barbara Kruger addresses that power with intelligence and wit, in the hope of engaging both our criticality and our dreams of affirmation.


Background Population-based, prospective studies can provide important insights into Parkinson's disease (PD) and other parkinsonian disorders. Participant follow-up in such studies is often achieved through linkage to routinely-collected healthcare datasets. We systematically reviewed the published literature on the accuracy of these datasets for this purpose. Methods We searched four electronic databases for published studies that compared PD and parkinsonism cases identified using routinely-collected data to a reference standard. We extracted study characteristics and two accuracy measures: positive predictive value (PPV) and/or sensitivity. Results We identified 18 articles, resulting in 27 measures of PPV and 14 of sensitivity. For PD, PPVs ranged from 56-90% in hospital datasets, 53-87% in prescription datasets, 81-90% in primary care datasets and was 67% in mortality datasets. Combining diagnostic and medication codes increased PPV. For parkinsonism, PPVs ranged from 36-88% in hospital datasets, 40-74% in prescription datasets, and was 94% in mortality datasets. Sensitivities ranged from 15-73% in single datasets for PD and 43-63% in single datasets for parkinsonism. Conclusions In many settings, routinely-collected datasets generate good PPVs and reasonable sensitivities for identifying PD and parkinsonism cases. Further research is warranted to investigate primary care and medication datasets, and to develop algorithms that balance a high PPV with acceptable sensitivity.


Tourism industry in the light of sustainability tourism development can play an important role towards environment protection and its surroundings. So, it is an utmost and foremost responsibility of the stakeholders to take care of the pristine environment through the adoption of sustainable tourism practices in their daily business. This study has taken only one important form of tourism which does not only provides livelihood to the local community but also protects the environment from getting depleted and tries to explore the promotional strategies for its promotion i.e, HBT. Considering the need of the objectives, the study has adopted the qualitative method in order to explore about HBT, with the data collection through the in-depth interviews, as very least information with regard to HBT was found in the literature. In this study almost ten local horse riders, whose livelihood is on horse tourism were contacted and their in-depth interviews were conducted. The collected data was analyzed after applying the coding method of grounded theory method for conceptualizing the definition of HBT. The study concluded with the conceptualization of the horse based tourism as a very dynamic type of tourism having tremendous employment generation for the local community in the context of alpine destinations of Indiaand also the promotional strategies are discussed in this study. Key Words; Horse based tourism, local community, sustainability, tourism promotion


Migrant labor, particularly Hispanic migrants in Louisiana, positively impact the fiscal health of the Louisiana economy. Small and large Louisiana business owners cannot maximize their economic potential without an ample supply of migrant labor. Historically, and today, the Louisiana market demands the use of cheap labor. A Louisianan ideological tenent is one of hard work and fair compensation. But our business owners and migrant workers are not able to achieve independent economic goals because of a systematic breakdown in the supply of labor. The failure of the federal H2A and H2B worker programs is contributing to the economic loss of numerous local Louisiana businesses. These businesses are not able to access enough workers in part because the federal program's cap on the number of workers allowed in the United States to work. The numeric cap does not provide enough workers, and the federal program suffers from weak program management and implementation. Louisiana's passage of laws that effectively prevent migrant workers from accessing and contributing to the economy is also a contributing factor. Migrant workers are not legally protected, and crimes are committed against them without recourse. Migrant labor in Louisiana should be legislatively controlled and protected. The tax base would expand and bring in more revenue for the state if wages of migrant labor were legally legitimized by Louisiana. This paper focuses on the need for a legislatively created guest-worker permit program for Louisiana.


BACKGROUND: Problematic communication among providers, patients, and their family members can affect the quality of patient care, causing stress to all parties involved and decreased opportunities for collaborative decision making. OBJECTIVES: The purpose of this article is to present one case from a pilot study of a family caregiver intervention focused on communication. METHODS: The nurse‐delivered communication intervention includes a written communication guide for family caregivers, as well as a one‐time nurse communication coaching call. The call is aimed at identifying caregiver communication concerns, providing communication education, and role playing problematic communication. FINDINGS: Psychological distress and caregiver confidence in communication were improved for the caregiver. Data presented from the case study demonstrate the need for family caregiver communication support and training and the potential benefits of such training.


In the aftermath of the credit crisis of 2007-2009, there was considerable public frustration with regard to executive remuneration, particularly in the banking industry. Consequently, the need for regulated remuneration practices became essential. For this purpose, the Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA) aims to align risk and reward by encouraging good risk management and discouraging excessive risk-taking. This paper aims to demonstrate the correlation between the health of the banking industry and economic activity, as well as the change in executive remuneration pre and post the credit crisis. In addition, the paper aims to measure the correlation between executive remuneration in the form of cash and equity, and risk-taking. The unique features of banking emphasized the interconnectedness to the broader economy. The statistical package for social sciences (SPSS) was used to perform these analyses. It was found that as executive remuneration in the form of cash increased, risk-taking decreased. In addition, as executive remuneration in the form of equity decreased, risk-taking increased. In summary, the research points to the fact that executives have in fact been remunerated in terms of equity. However, the results indicate that this may not have enticed the executives to take on more risks.


Evidence-based medicine is the distillation of a large volume of medical research and standards into treatment protocols for diseases and preventive care procedures that represent the most accurate knowledge available. In this project, we implement evidence-based medicine principles via a decision support system that provides suggested actions for physicians based on individual patient characteristics and established treatment protocols. Such a reminder system may enable physicians to make better-quality decisions, and may enable patients more consistently follow medical recommendations. We present a prototype DSS, called Clinical Reminder System, that combines a relational database, a knowledge base consisting of algorithms that implement disease treatment protocols, integration with hospital legacy systems and a web-based interface allowing for physician management of patient data and suggested medical responses. This application has been in use within a clinical setting since 2001. Formal evaluation and assessment of patient outcomes associated with use of this system is currently being performed by Carnegie Mellon University and The Western Pennsylvania Hospital.


The paper reviews the possibilities of overcoming the current economic and financial crisis by implementing an efficient monetary policy. The theoretical and practical aspects of monetary functions, and the role of banks as intermediaries between those who supply and demand monies, are substantiated in the first part of the study. The second part of the paper is dedicated to analyzing the relationship between the products of labor and the movement of money (cash flow). An inescapable conclusion is made that problems concerning a surplus or deficit of money can be solved successfully between the economic agents involved in the creation of the products of labor. The third part of the research highlights the rational use of money. It is emphasized that the monetary phenomenon is effective when the analysis of its relationship to its roots - production – is taken into account. Of important significance here is a strong and efficient banking system alongside an adequate credit and interest policy. The fourth part of the article substantiates the necessary monetary measures and policies for overcoming the current crisis: the stability of currency; the necessity for investment; the stability of the banking system; an adequate deposit and credit policy; an increase in state expenditure; tax cuts and an amnesty for "hidden" income.


The use of multilingual language models for tasks in low and high-resource languages has been a success story in deep learning. In recent times, Arabic has been receiving widespread attention on account of its dialectal variance. While prior research studies have tried to adapt these multilingual models for dialectal variants of Arabic, it still remains a challenging problem owing to the lack of sufficient monolingual dialectal data and parallel translation data of such dialectal variants. It remains an open problem on whether the limited dialectical data can be used to improve the models trained in Arabic on its dialectal variants. First, we show that multilingual-BERT (mBERT) incrementally pretrained on Arabic monolingual data takes less training time and yields comparable accuracy when compared to our custom monolingual Arabic model and beat existing models (by an avg metric of +$6.41$). We then explore two continual pre-training methods-- (1) using small amounts of dialectical data for continual finetuning and (2) parallel Arabic to English data and a Translation Language Modeling loss function. We show that both approaches help improve performance on dialectal classification tasks ($+4.64$ avg. gain) when used on monolingual models.


ABSTRACT Mielck, F.; Hass, H.C., and Betzler, C., 2014. High-resolution hydroacoustic seafloor classification of sandy environments in the German Wadden Sea. The knowledge regarding the distribution of seabed environments in the North Sea is still fragmentary. Hydroacoustic devices can provide rapid and reliable information on the acoustic characteristics of the seafloor. Data of a typical, exclusively sandy and shallow investigation area located in the German Wadden Sea are here presented. The study area includes shallow sublittoral areas and deep channels. The acoustic ground discrimination system RoxAnn was used to measures backscatter intensities, which indicate roughness and hardness parameters of seafloor. Sidescan-sonar data provide acoustic images that are instrumental in seafloor characterization. For ground truthing, surface-sediment samples were collected. The results reveal surficial sediments that range from fine to coarse sand. Finer material is rather restricted to the shallow patches, while coarser sediments characterize the deeper tidal channels. The determined roughness and hardness parameters also strongly increase within these inlets following the change in grain size. The sidescan-sonar imagery shows flow-transverse subaqueous dunes of different sizes. Both ebb- and flood-dominated structures are present. RoxAnn reflects these zones of subaqueous dunes basically through the formation of distinct clusters of data points in hardness vs. roughness scatter plots. Further, the results show that areas characterized by similar grain-size spectra and sonar imagery occasionally reveal completely different roughness and hardness properties. This is caused by varying amounts of shell fragments on the seafloor. Both in situ and hydroacoustic methods are suitable for identifying seafloor properties, but the combination of methods yields more information at higher precision, especially about shell content and grain-size distribution.


We study the optical response of two coupled oriented dipoles with the dimer axis perpendicular to the wave vector of light by analyzing how their scattering matrix can be decomposed. The scattering matrix can be written as a linear combination of three terms with a clear physical meaning: one for each particle and another that is responsible for the coupling and that vanishes for noninteracting or distant particles. We show that the interaction term may generate optical activity for certain scattering directions and that this effect manifests itself mostly in the near field. This simple and intuitive theory based on matrix and vector states of oriented dipoles also describes hybridization processes and Fano resonances. The decomposition method can be also formulated in terms of a hybrid basis that allows us to quantitatively determine the individual contribution of the in-phase and out-of-phase coupling modes to the overall intensity. Our method can help to understand the optical response of more complex nanostructures that can be decomposed into dipole terms. The results are illustrated in gold nanoantenna dimers which exhibit a strong dipolar resonance.


The poetry reading has, for decades, been an unavoidable aspect of the professional poet's life. And the institutionalization of creative writing, government sponsorship of the arts, access to audio and video recording technologies, and the digitization of audio recordings, have accelerated the number of poetry readings and provided scholars with greater access to recordings of them. This situation presents profound opportunities for sound studies research, which have been answered by groundbreaking work. However, among poetry scholars, even those who study poetry recordings, the methods of linguistics, and the computational approaches of the digital humanities, are often missing in the study of recorded poetry readings. Our research addresses that gap, and also offers ways to test the rich intuitions of traditional poetry scholarship about poetry reading styles and their evolution.


In multi layered reservoirs the fluid composition may differ from one layer to another. The knowledge of the lateral and vertical fluid heterogeneities may help to better understand the fluid distribution in the field and consequently contribute to enlighten production. Several mechanisms can affect the fluid composition, like origin, maturity, alteration or physical conditions. The objective of this study is to present a methodology aiming at characterizing and quantifying the compositional differences between fluids from different layers in an oil reservoir. It allows mapping the vertical and lateral heterogeneities in fluid composition. In order to measure the hydrocarbon composition, samples are analyzed by HRGC (High Resolution Gas Chromatography). In a first step this method aims at finding the peak ratios discriminating the oils from different reservoirs. Data are processed for peak recognition and statistical comparison is performed to compare samples. This statistical interpretation allows identifying similarities and differences between chromatograms e.g. oils. The results allowed identification of two end members. All the other samples of the field could be described as a mixture of these two fluids. Different cross-sections have been analyzed aiming at better understanding the field by linking geochemical data with geological features. By coupling the result with geological (lithology, cross-sections, logs…) and reservoir data (porosity, permeability, saturation…), different explanations could be proposed: Possibility of having different end members originating from a same fluid.Water washing as a possible process affecting fluids from different layers in similar and continuous way."Structural heights" susceptible to reduce the water washing effect for some wells.The dip of the layers might increase water washing effect on fluids. This study showed the possibility to allocate the production in a carbonate field and allowed a better understanding of the fluids distribution. The molecular fingerprinting made it possible to understand the origin of fluids in comingled wells and particularly to identify the most producing part of the well in horizontal drains.


In this chapter, we discuss the use of narrative fiction and semi-fiction in organizational research and explore the strengths and weaknesses of these alternative approaches. We begin with an introduction reviewing the existing literature and clarifying what we mean by fiction and semi-fiction. We then present and discuss examples of fiction and semi-fiction focusing on how these approaches can be used in organizational research. We argue that fiction is more useful as a source of data and as a way of representing theory to an audience. Semi-fiction, on the other hand, provides a novel approach to the production and representation of theory. In both cases, researchers face a number of challenges, but also gain access to new and powerful techniques for developing insights into organizational topics.


Cyanide can be toxic to aquatic organisms, and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has developed ambient water‐quality criteria to protect aquatic life. Recent work suggests that considering free, rather than total, cyanide provides a more accurate measure of the biological effects of cyanides and provides a basis for water‐quality criteria. Aquatic organisms are sensitive to free cyanide, although certain metals can form stable complexes and reduce the amount of free cyanide. As a result, total cyanide is less toxic when complexing metals are present. Cyanide is often present in complex effluents, which requires understanding how other components within these complex effluents can affect cyanide speciation and bioavailability. The authors have developed a model to predict the aqueous speciation of cyanide and have shown that this model can predict the toxicity of metal–cyanide complexes in terms of free cyanide in solutions with varying water chemistry. Toxicity endpoints based on total cyanide ranged over several orders of magnitude for various metal–cyanide mixtures. However, predicted free cyanide concentrations among these same tests described the observed toxicity data to within a factor of 2. Aquatic toxicity can be well‐described using free cyanide, and under certain conditions the toxicity was jointly described by free cyanide and elevated levels of bioavailable metals. Environ. Toxicol. Chem. 2012; 31: 1774–1780. © 2012 SETAC


Can managers influence the formation of organizational networks? In this article, we evaluate the effect of joint tasks on the creation of network ties with data from a novel field experiment with 112 aspiring entrepreneurs. During the study, we randomized individuals to a set of 15 joint tasks varying in duration (week-long teams to 20minute conversations). We then evaluated the impact of these interactions on the formation and structure of individuals' social networks. We find strong evidence that these designed interactions led to the systematic creation of new friendship and advice relations as well as changes to the participants' network centrality. Overall, network ties formed after a randomized interaction account for about one-third the individuals a participant knows, of their friendships, and their advice relations. Nevertheless, roughly 90% of randomized interactions never become social ties of friendship or advice. A key result from our research is that while joint tasks may serve to structure the social consideration set of possible connections, individual preferences strongly shape the structure of networks. As a consequence, there will likely remain a considerable unpredictability in the presence of specific ties even when they are designed.


ABSTRACT The success of machine-learning methods is spreading their use to many different fields. This paper analyses one of these methods, the Kernel Logistic Regression (KLR), from the point of view of Random Utility Model (RUM) and proposes the use of the KLR to specify the utilities in RUM, freeing the modeler from the need to postulate a functional relation between the features. A Monte Carlo simulation study is conducted to empirically compare KLR with the Multinomial Logit (MNL) method, the Support Vector Machine (SVM) and the Random Forests (RF). We have shown that, using simulated data, KLR is the only method that achieves maximum accuracy and leads to an unbiased willingness-to-pay estimator for non-linear phenomena. In a real travel mode choice problem, RF achieved the highest predictive accuracy, followed by KLR. However, KLR allows for the calculation of indicators such as the value of time, which is of great importance in the context of transportation.


OBJECTIVE
To quantify microbiology indicators of fecal contamination in the effluents of two waste water treatment plants and in samples collected in several canals in Xochimilco.

MATERIAL AND METHODS
A cross sectional study was performed. Ten sites, 5 from plant effluents and 5 from canals, were selected for sampling during November and December 2001. Fecal coliforms and enterococci were quantified by membrane filtration, male specific (F+) and somatic coliphages by double agar layer technique, and Cryptosporidium oocysts and Giardia cysts by concentration with Envirocheck filter followed by immunofluorescence microscopy quantification. The average of organisms counts from effluents and canal water were compared with t Student test.

RESULTS
Treated water discharge in canals showed a low count of Fecal Coliforms (average 40.4/100 ml), enterococci (average 58.8/100 ml) and Cryptosporidium oocysts (average 13.2/100 l), while coliphages and Giardia cyst rendered higher counts (average 1467.5/100 ml and 1199.8/100 l, respectively) suggesting the water treatment methods could fail to remove these agents. A significant lower count of Giardia cysts (average 45/100 l) and no Cryptosporidium oocysts were found in irrigation canals, which suggests a natural clearance of these pathogens. Strains of Escherichia coli isolated in one of the canals contaminated with sewage had antimicrobial multi-resistance that was transferred by conjugation suggesting that resistance is encoded in a plasmid potentially transferable to other pathogenic bacteria.

CONCLUSIONS
Cost effective and culturally acceptable waste treatment methods will require careful planning and consultation if they are to be adopted and mantained by local populations.


From the man known as the father of the Harlem Renaissance comes a powerful, provocative, and affecting anthology of writers who shaped the Harlem Renaissance movement and who help us to consider the evolution of the African American in society. With stunning works by seminal black voices such as Zora Neale Hurston, Countee Cullen, and W.E.B. DuBois, Locke has constructed a vivid look at the new negro, the changing African American finding his place in the ever shifting sociocultural landscape that was 1920s America. With poetry, prose, and nonfiction essays, this collection is widely praised for its literary strength as well as its historical coverage of a monumental and fascinating time in the history of America.


More than 150 years after the end of the Civil War, scores of websites, articles, and organizations repeat claims that anywhere between 500 and 100,000 free and enslaved African Americans fought willingly as soldiers in the Confederate army. But as Kevin M. Levin argues in this carefully researched book, such claims would have shocked anyone who served in the army during the war itself. Levin explains that imprecise contemporary accounts, poorly understood primary-source material, and other misrepresentations helped fuel the rise of the black Confederate myth. Moreover, Levin shows that belief in the existence of black Confederate soldiers largely originated in the 1970s, a period that witnessed both a significant shift in how Americans remembered the Civil War and a rising backlash against African Americans' gains in civil rights and other realms.
Levin also investigates the roles that African Americans actually performed in the Confederate army, including personal body servants and forced laborers. He demonstrates that regardless of the dangers these men faced in camp, on the march, and on the battlefield, their legal status remained unchanged. Even long after the guns fell silent, Confederate veterans and other writers remembered these men as former slaves and not as soldiers, an important reminder that how the war is remembered often runs counter to history.


Objectives The aim of this study was to compare the anatomical registration of preoperative magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and prostate whole-mount obtained with 3D-printed, patient-specific, MRI-derived molds (PSM) versus conventional whole-mount sectioning (WMS). Materials and Methods Based on an a priori power analysis, this institutional review board–approved study prospectively included 50 consecutive men who underwent 3 T multiparametric prostate MRI followed by radical prostatectomy. Two blinded and independent readers (R1 and R2) outlined the contours of the prostate, tumor, peripheral, and transition zones in the MRI scans using regions of interest. These were compared with the corresponding regions of interest from the whole-mounted histopathology, the reference standard, using PSM whole-mount results obtained in the study group (n = 25) or conventional WMS in the control group (n = 25). The spatial overlap across the MRI and histology data sets was calculated using the Dice similarity coefficient (DSC) for the prostate overall (DSCprostate), tumor (DSCtumor), peripheral (DSCPZ), and transition (DSCTZ) zone. Results in the study and control groups were compared using Wilcoxon rank sum test. Results The MRI histopathology anatomical registration for the prostate gland overall, tumor, peripheral, and transition zones were significantly superior with the use of PSMs (DSCs for R1: 0.95, 0.86, 0.84, and 0.89; for R2: 0.93, 0.75, 0.78, and 0.85, respectively) than with the use of standard WMS (R1: 0.85, 0.46, 0.66, and 0.69; R2: 0.85, 0.46, 0.66, and 0.69) (P < 0.0001). Conclusions The use of PSMs for prostate specimen whole-mount sectioning provides significantly superior anatomical registration of in vivo multiparametric MRI and ex vivo prostate whole-mounts than conventional WMS.


The definition of 'Archetype' typically refers to an original which has been imitated. The origin of the concept of Archetype in the traditional sense of the term
refers to the primitive, universal perceptual imprint – a theory that dates back to Plato. The idea of the archetypal image is conceptually integrated with the
aesthetics of visual arts and discussed under the guise of widely researched equivalent terms. The philosophical and scientific propositions on the concept of
Archetype with reference to visual arts tended to have a neurological constitution even from ancient times. Starting from the 1990s, a radical outlook emerged
in the field of cognitive aesthetics in the form of 'neuroaesthetics' which shows a significant potential in dealing with the problem of construction of the
symbolic system in visual arts. Does the represented image of an aesthetically appealing artwork have structured within it the roots of an archetype? Is it
innately constructed? And finally, is there at all any difference between pattern recognition among humans and other animals and the philosophical
descriptions of Ideal, Form and Archetype? The review tries to interpret the development.


Abstract. The individual influences of ocean warming and acidification on marine organisms have been investigated intensively, but studies regarding the combined effects of both global change variables on natural marine phytoplankton assemblages are still scarce. Even fewer studies have addressed possible differences in the responses of phytoplankton communities in pelagic and coastal zones to ocean warming and acidification. We conducted shipboard microcosm experiments at both off-shore (SEATS) and near-shore (D001) stations in the northern South China Sea (NSCS) under three treatments, low temperature (30.5 °C at SEATS and 28.5 °C at D001) and low pCO2 (390.0 µatm at SEATS and 420.0 µatm at D001) (LTLC), high temperature (33.5 °C at SEATS and 31.5 °C at D001) and low pCO2 (390 µatm at SEATS and 420 µatm at D001) (HTLC), and high temperature (33.5 °C at SEATS and 31.5 °C at D001) and high pCO2 (1000 µatm at SEATS and 1030 µatm at D001) (HTHC). Biomass of phytoplankton at both stations were enhanced by HT. HTHC did not affect phytoplankton biomass at station D001 but decreased it at station SEATS. At this offshore station HT alone increased daily primary productivity (DPP, µgC (µg chl a)−1 d−1) by ~ 64 %, and by ~ 117 % when higher pCO2 was added. In contrast, HT alone did not affect DPP and HTHC reduced it by ~ 15 % at station D001. HT enhanced the dark respiration rate (µg C (µg chl a)-1 d−1) by 64 % at station SEATS, but had no significant effect at station D001, and did not change the ratio of respiration to photosynthesis at either station. HTHC did not affect dark respiration rate (µg C (µg chl a)−1 d−1) at either station compared to LTLC. HTHC reduced the respiration to photosynthesis ratio by ~ 41 % at station SEATS but increased it ~ 42 % at station D001. Overall, our findings indicate that responses of coastal and offshore phytoplankton assemblages in NSCS to ocean warming and acidification are contrasting, with the pelagic phytoplankton communities being more sensitive to these two global change factors.


Abstract Most of the climate change models for South Africa predict a reduction in freshwater availability by 2050. Population growth is projected at 3% per annum, implying increased domestic water use. In addition to these factors, the concern for ecological sustainability and increased water pollution due to increased industrial, mining and agricultural activities, water availability for sectoral production activities is expected to decline. This decline has an impact on sectoral output, value added and households' welfare. Using a computable general equilibrium approach, this study investigates the possible impact of global change on households' welfare. The simulation results show that water scarcity due to global change can potentially lead to a general deterioration in households' welfare. The poor households, whose incomes are adversely impacted, are the most vulnerable to the consequences of the impact of global change on water resources in South Africa. This vulnerability can only be reduced if welfare policies that maintain food consumption levels for the least and low-income households are implemented.


This article explores our experiences with negotiating tensions when conducting research. As three female researchers in various stages of our academic careers, we describe our own reflexive accounts of the research process as we negotiated our roles and responsibilities in relation to academic institutions and feminism. We discuss the literature related to responsibilities of academics, the tensions associated with conducting research, and the feminist methodologies addressing gendered issues in the current study. We contextualize the research project by outlining our positionalities and the methodology for our reflexive process. We then discuss our experiences of negotiating ourselves within an academic institution and within feminism. We conclude by discussing the importance of creating a feminist space through collaboration within academic institutions. URN: http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:0114-fqs1203100


Ius commune is the amalgamation of Roman and canon laws on the continent. Helmholz addresses the ius commune's relation to and influence on English law. He begins by observing that there were many overlapping areas between English institutions. Through four studies (the law of sanctuary, the law of compurgation, mortuaries and the law of custom, and civil jurisdiction and the clergy), he draws out the coincidences between English law and the ius commune and shows where they developed parallel bodies of doctrine. Helmholz aims to fill in some of the gaps in scholarship on the common legal past of Western law, the history of the Roman and canon laws, the history of the ecclesiastical courts, parallels between the ius commune and English common law, and English church history.


In inductively coupled plasma spectrometry, signal suppression by acids has been recognized for a long time. It is always explained as the physical effects on the sampling processes, plasma conditions, and aerosol properties. In some cases, signal suppression apparently relates to the chemical properties of element. However, there was no publication discussed this phenomenon. In this work, it has been proven that mercury signal suppression depends on the plasma properties and nitric acid concentration. It relates to the atomization yield of mercury compounds, which is governed by the red-ox equilibrium in the central channel of plasma. Mercury complex formation equilibrium has been proven to exert in the heated droplets in plasma. The equilibrium state is governed by the complex formation with ammonium nitrate, the complex dissociation by nitric acid, and the heat obtained from plasma. Mercury halogen complex is not sensitive to the changes in acidity. Therefore, it is able to keep mercury free from nitric acid interferences and unify mercury atomization in the central channel of plasma. Similar to mercury, the uncertain signal and memory effect of platinum group elements and gold mainly arises from the chemical interference on the atomization efficiency. It not only depends on nitric acid concentration, but also on the standard reduction potential (Eo) of precious metal species in solution. Chemical interference on the spectrometric signals is governed by the robustness of the plasma, the capabilities to ingest aerosol and to protect foreign disturbance. The robustness of plasma is not equal to the excitation conditions. It has been observed that nitric acid has no significant interferences on mercury signal intensity of MIP-OES. When wet aerosol enters into the resonant cavity, it is completely desolvated in the powerful electromagnetic field. Liquid phase instantly disappears from the plasma observation zone. No doubt, the chemical equilibrium does not exist. In conclusion, chemical reactions exist in the plasma and interference the spectrometric signal. The best way to overcome the chemical matrix interferences in the plasma source spectrometry is to realize the controllable atomization.


The inclusion in the Visa Waiver Programme (VWP) would mean more favourable development of the relationships between Bulgaria and the USA. It would also serve as recognition of the economic, political and social stability of the country. However, membership in the program is not automatic. In the past, Bulgaria has made significant progress, but there are still pending areas that hinder the finalization of the process. Specifically, Bulgaria is facing very difficult issues with its minority Roma population and its integration within its boundaries. In this paper, we will evaluate the Roma's socio-economic difficulties that they have to deal with, specifically as workers in this region. In order to complete the task, we would evaluate the historical background of the Bulgarian Roma. Specifically, we would analyse the political movement post-communism as it relates to the VWP. We believe that Bulgaria needs to support its minority Roma population and such social reforms would help the country to establish itself and to help enter into the VWP list. Bulgaria could implement programs in relationships with the "other 3 EU Member omitted States" and together work towards the inclusion in the US Visa Waiver Programme and resolution of its population issues. We believe that a coordinated strategy would help all the member states and would solve the issue in the shortest possible time and help the country enter the VWP quicker.


The creation of an environment conducive to learning is vitally important in the academic achievement of learners. Such an environment extends beyond the classroom and school to include the home. It is from these environments that learners draw resources, both tangible and intangible, that impact on their educational experience. While current bodies of literature focus on either school or home resources, this paper looks at both. Multiple regression analyses were conducted on the 2011 Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) data to determine the resources factors that influence South African learners' performance in mathematics. The findings reveal that both school and home environments play significant roles in learners' mathematics performance. This paper therefore suggests that it is not only the socio-economic factors of schools that impact learners' mathematics performance, but also that higher levels of parental education have a significant positive influence. Keywords : home resources; learning environment; mathematics performance; predictors of performance; school resources; TIMSS 2011


It was between the Late Neolithic and the Early Bronze Age when wool was introduced as raw material for textile production. It is expected that this innovation had a comprehensive effect on the socio-economic life of people and their environment. However, little is known about spatio-temporal trajectories of the process and the environmental influences it actually had. The approach presented demonstrates how such a comprehensive and complex research question may be operationalized. Decomposition of the overall process and gathering of information from different fields allows to reconstruct particular aspects of the phenomenon and their diachronic change. Subsequent synthesis enables addressing the overall question. This paper focuses on the role of landscape within the process of wool sheep introduction. Besides covering the particular approach to reconstruct herdingrelated landscape changes it is shown how deeply different disciplinary approaches are interconnected. Finally, difficulties and constraints of data integration are addressed.


Professionalism can be a complex concept to define (McLachlan et al. 2002; Finn et al. 2009). Within nursing, the majority of studies have explored professionalism within the clinical environment, and very few examine how student nurses construct their talk regarding professionalism while they study at university, highlighting this as a distinct gap in the knowledge and understanding. The aim of this study was to uncover the discourses used by student nurses and lecturers, and offer insight into the influences on student professional language from within and outside of the nursing profession and offer an appreciation of the processes of language (discourse) adoption.

The theoretical position adopted was social constructionism, where it is assumed we jointly construct our world on shared assumptions and that language is central to this process (Potter and Wetherell 2009).

The methodological approach employed was Discourse and Social Psychology (DASP) (Potter and Wetherell 1987). Seventeen (17) interviews were conducted. Eight (8) of which were one-off interviews with lecturers. Seven (7) students from adult, child and mental health nursing were interviewed multiple times over the three years of their nursing programme. FIGURE 1 presents an overview of the research process.

The analysis suggested that participants drew upon a number of interpretative repertoires and memes. These led to the identification of discursive threads, which were proposed as entangled within discursive knots, serving to position students and lecturers within a dynamic process of professional discourse development. The theoretical perspectives of Foucault, Goffman, Bourdieu and Harre informed the interpretation of the talk.

Initially, students were positioned in a place of high surveillance through authoritative language used by lecturers. This position informed the discursive know of 'separation' which serves to maintain student nurses as 'different' and 'special', and to distance them from other university students. Clinical practice experience was seen as influencing students' talk when back in University, emphasising differences. The discursive knot of 'maintaining quality and credibility' questions the 'real' place of nursing and the credibility of lecturers, and brings about a positioning of students that influences agency. The final discursive know of 'permission' is located in the talk of lecturers and final-year student nurses only. This knot illustrates students adopting the discourses of the registered nurse, including the surveillance talk used by lecturers to first-year students. This suggests that final-year students 'become' enforcers and protectors of 'difference'.

This study highlights the intricacies and complexities of the 'professionalism discourses' woven into the talk of lecturers and nursing students, and their spread via both the overt and hidden curricula. Indeed, the adoption of the 'permission' discourse by third-year students suggests the perpetuation of a discourse via a socialisation process. The discursive 'knots' seem to function to instill, maintain and perpetuate wider discourses. The 'separation' and 'permission' knots may be viewed as serving to 'other' to maintain the 'specialness' of the profession, while the 'maintaining quality and credibility' knot may indicate tensions related to academic and clinical professional sub-groups and sites of knowledge development.


OF DISSERTATION FACTORS INFLUENCING WOMEN'S PSYCHOLOGICAL WELL-BEING WITHIN A POSITIVE FUNCTIONING FRAMEWORK Women suffer a high prevalence rate of several mental disorders. National U.S. data (N = 9,282) shows that 23.4% of women meet the criteria for an anxiety disorder, 8.6% for depression, and 11.6% for a mood disorder (Kessler et al., 2005). Compared to men, women are two times more likely to be depressed (Lewinsohn, Rhode, Seeley, & Baldwin, 2001) and two to three times more likely to suffer from anxiety disorders such as panic disorders, phobias, obsessive compulsive disorders, and Posttraumatic Stress (Kessler et al., 2005). Due to experiencing a high number of mental disorders, women's psychological well-being (PWB) has been questioned (OWH, 2009). Considerable research describes the negative influence psychological distress has on women's lives, but little is understood of what constitutes PWB. Ryff (1989) proposed that existing models of mental health too often focus on illness and disorders, neglecting important aspects of positive functioning. This study was based on Ryff's (1989) conceptualization that improved PWB would reflect the perception of functioning well in life (Ryff, 1989). The purpose of the present study was to identify factors important in women's PWB. Factors included: age, household income, education, marital status, race/ethnicity, perceived social support, psychological distress, and PWB. The design of the study was a secondary data analysis based on an existing study, "The Psychological Well-Being of Women Preand Posta Breast Cancer Diagnosis." Women recalled for a diagnostic mammogram, but not diagnosed, were included in the study (N = 2,746). Measures used included: a demographic questionnaire, Scales of psychological well-being (Ryff, 1989); Depression, Anxiety, and Stress Scales (Lovibond & Lovibond, 1995); and a Visual Analog Scale of Perceived Social Support. Findings showed that income, education, and perceived social support showed statistically significant different PWB scores in the positive direction. Married women scored higher PWB scores than women of other types of marital status, but neither age nor race/ethnicity showed differences in outcome scores. Psychological distress and PWB were strongly and inversely correlated, suggesting that the constructs are more directly related than previously identified. Implications for therapeutic practice and future research are discussed.


The iteration complexity of the block-coordinate descent (BCD) type algorithm has been under extensive investigation. It was recently shown that for convex problems the classical cyclic BCGD (block coordinate gradient descent) achieves an O(1/r) complexity (r is the number of passes of all blocks). However, such bounds are at least linearly depend on K (the number of variable blocks), and are at least K times worse than those of the gradient descent (GD) and proximal gradient (PG) methods. In this paper, we close such theoretical performance gap between cyclic BCD and GD/PG. First we show that for a family of quadratic nonsmooth problems, the complexity bounds for cyclic Block Coordinate Proximal Gradient (BCPG), a popular variant of BCD, can match those of the GD/PG in terms of dependency on K (up to a log2 (K) factor). Second, we establish an improved complexity bound for Coordinate Gradient Descent (CGD) for general convex problems which can match that of GD in certain scenarios. Our bounds are sharper than the known bounds as they are always at least K times worse than GD. Our analyses do not depend on the update order of block variables inside each cycle, thus our results also apply to BCD methods with random permutation (random sampling without replacement, another popular variant).


NASA's Interstellar Boundary Explorer (IBEX) mission has recently opened a new window on the interstellar medium (ISM) by imaging neutral atoms. One "bright" feature in the sky is the interstellar wind flowing into the solar system. Composed of remnants of stellar explosions as well as primordial gas and plasma, the ISM is by no means uniform. The interaction of the local ISM with the solar wind shapes our heliospheric environment with hydrogen being the dominant component of the very local ISM. In this paper, we report on direct sampling of the neutral hydrogen of the local ISM over four years of IBEX observations. The hydrogen wind observed at 1 AU has decreased and nearly disappeared as the solar activity has increased over the last four years; the signal at 1 AU has dropped off in 2012 by a factor of ∼8 to near background levels. The longitudinal offset has also increased with time presumably due to greater radiation pressure deflecting the interstellar wind. We present longitudinal and latitudinal arrival direction measurements of the bulk flow as measured over four years beginning at near solar minimum conditions. The H distribution we observe at 1 AU is expected to be different from that outside the heliopause due to ionization, photon pressure, gravity, and filtration by interactions with heliospheric plasma populations. These observations provide an important benchmark for modeling of the global heliospheric interaction. Based on these observations we suggest a further course of scientific action to observe neutral hydrogen over a full solar cycle with IBEX.


Orientation: The generation and development of knowledge for the benefit of the discipline of industrial and organisational psychology by means of research is a core academic focus. Research purpose: The purpose of this study was to explore general research trends in the field of industrial and organisational psychology in South Africa from 1950 to 2008. Motivation for study: Research in the field tends to be influenced by either the changing needs of business or the occupational or personal fields of interest of academics, which often lead to an overemphasis on specific subdisciplines at the expense of others. This research aims to critically review dominant trends in the research focus areas in the field, in the light of present challenges in the changing work context. Recommendations are also made for possible future research. Research design, approach and method: A broad systematic review was carried out to analyse documented published and accredited South African research in the field ( n = 2501). Main findings: Although there has been a proportional decline in personnel psychology research since 1990, there has been a proportional increase in both organisational psychology and employee wellness research since 1980 and 1990, respectively. Some areas of the industrial and organisational psychology field appear to be consistently under-researched. Practical implications: The insights derived from the findings can be used by academia and researchers in the field to plan future research initiatives. Contribution/value-add: The findings provide preliminary insights that contribute to the body of knowledge concerned with the industrial and organisational psychology field in the South African context.


Abstract The year 1991, the year when the current Romanian fundamental law came in to force, designed a constitutional moment built on profound political and societal emotions. These emotions pushed the Constituent Assembly in search of an answer, in the form of a solution, to the question "What do we not want?" The answer was: "An authoritarian president / chief of state!" Consequently, the position of the head of state in the political scaffolding received an increased attention. Unlike the Communist president, who exercised great powers, the new president was thought and designed antagonistic to his predecessor. He was reduced to a role of a simple mediator. However, more than 20 years after the fall of the communist regime, the "traditional" authoritarian personality of the president transcended - of course, not as pronounced as in the communist era - the finality of the presidential role and of the presidential attributions stated in the Constitution. As we shall see, the "player president" emerged and got confirmed by the Romanian Constitutional Court against the desideratum of the constitutional moment of 1991.


THERE can be little doubt that the spectre of false rape allegations has significantly influenced the development of legal doctrine and its enforcement. The fear of false allegations has been used to justify evidential rules in cases involving sexual offences such as the corroboration warning, the retention of the marital rape immunity and continues to influence police and prosecutorial decision-making.


The pancreas is an endodermally derived organ consisting of three major cell lineages. The endocrine cells, organised into the Islets of Langerhans, regulate blood glucose homeostasis by producing and secreting hormones such as glucagon and insulin into the bloodstream. The major part of the pancreas consists however of acinar cells that produce digestive enzymes that are transported via a highly branched ductal system to the duodenum where they function in breakdown of food. Early in pancreas development a dorsal and ventral evagination of the foregut epithelium appear, resulting in the formation of the dorsal and ventral pancreatic bud. These pancreatic buds subsequently grow, branch and differentiate to form the mature pancreas via a process controlled by intrinsic factors, such as transcription factors, and extracellular signals. Insulin promoter factor 1 (Ipf1), also known as Pdx1 (for Pancreatic duodenal homeobox gene 1), is required for pancreas development. Although the evagination of pancreatic buds still occurs in Ipf1/Pdx1 mutant mice, the subsequent proliferation, branching and differentiation is impaired, resulting in complete pancreatic agenesis. Gene array profiling identified several candidate Ipf1/Pdx1 target genes, including FgfR2IIIb, ErbB3, Ptf1a/p48, Pax6 and Nkx6.1, in pancreatic progenitor cells. Together these genes provide a mechanistic explanation for the pancreatic growth arrest observed in Ipf1/Pdx1 deficient mice. In addition, Spondin1, which has not previously been described in the pancreas, was identified to be regulated by Ipf1/Pdx1. The spatial and temporal expression pattern of Spondin1 defines Spondin1 as a marker for early pancreatic progenitor cells. The Notch signalling pathway controls cell type specification and differentiation during pancreas development. The Fringe family of proteins have previously been shown to regulate Notch signalling by altering the interaction between Notch receptors and their ligands, hence affecting the cellular response. Manic Fringe (MFng) is transiently expressed in pancreatic pro-endocrine cells between E9.5 and E14.5. The expression of MFng is regulated by Ngn3, which may suggest a role for MFng in pro-endocrine cell maturation. The lack of a pancreatic phenotype in transgenic mice overexpressing MFng in the pancreatic epithelium and in MFng null mutant mice, however, provide evidence that MFng is dispensable for the specification, differentiation and function of the adult pancreas. Inhibitors of DNA binding (Id) proteins are generally known as inhibitors of differentiation, a feature they mainly perform by forming non-functional heterodimers with bHLH proteins, thereby inhibiting downstream targets of the bHLH proteins. Id proteins also promote cell proliferation by interacting with the cell cycle machinery. In the developing pancreas Id2 and Id3 are co-expressed in an overlapping manner during the period of massive proliferation and expansion of the pancreatic epithelium, suggestive of a role for the Id proteins during these processes. In addition, Id4 expression is also detected in the embryonic pancreas, albeit at lower levels. Gain- and loss- of- function analyses suggest however that specification, differentiation and function of the adult pancreas are largely independent of Id function.


Technological advancement is widely viewed as an essential component to any effective climate change strategy. However, there is no consensus as to the degree to which the law should promote technological innovation and development. This iBrief analyzes government involvement in encouraging such technology and divides the various policies into four categories. On one end are policies that rely mainly on market forces to encourage scientific advancement naturally, requiring minimal government involvement. A second category of policies involves technological development promoted indirectly through laws addressing climate change generally. A third type of policy involves directly offering government funding and financing for technological research and development. These three methods are currently the most popular means of encouraging scientific development in this field. Recently, however, there have been increasing calls for major government action of the scale of such programs as the Apollo Project. This iBrief classifies such proposals as a fourth category of policies encouraging technological solutions to climate change: the creation of institutional structures dedicated to bringing about rapid, radical technological advancements.


In human cardiomyopathy, anatomical abnormalities such as hypertrophy and fibrosis contribute to the risk of ventricular arrhythmias and sudden death. Here we have shown that increased myofilament Ca2+ sensitivity, also a common feature in both inherited and acquired human cardiomyopathies, created arrhythmia susceptibility in mice, even in the absence of anatomical abnormalities. In mice expressing troponin T mutants that cause hypertrophic cardiomyopathy in humans, the risk of developing ventricular tachycardia was directly proportional to the degree of Ca2+ sensitization caused by the troponin T mutation. Arrhythmia susceptibility was reproduced with the Ca2+-sensitizing agent EMD 57033 and prevented by myofilament Ca2+ desensitization with blebbistatin. Ca2+ sensitization markedly changed the shape of ventricular action potentials, resulting in shorter effective refractory periods, greater beat-to-beat variability of action potential durations, and increased dispersion of ventricular conduction velocities at fast heart rates. Together these effects created an arrhythmogenic substrate. Thus, myofilament Ca2+ sensitization represents a heretofore unrecognized arrhythmia mechanism. The protective effect of blebbistatin provides what we believe to be the first direct evidence that reduction of Ca2+ sensitivity in myofilaments is antiarrhythmic and might be beneficial to individuals with hypertrophic cardiomyopathy.


This journal was founded seventy-four years ago with the ambition of launching a "new" architectural history and expanding the scope of the discipline. While the readership expanded in the next three decades, the confines of the field became increasingly narrow in the 1950s and 1960s. This was the subject of John Maass's 1969 article that demonstrated the near absence of "non-Western" and "vernacular" topics in JSAH .1 This was followed a year later by Sibyl Moholy-Nagy's acerbic criticism of the journal for promoting disciplinary obsolescence.2 Despite these consecutive depth charges that shattered SAH's carapace of disciplinary ecumenism, both the society and the journal sailed seemingly untroubled into the next millennium.

As for inclusion of "non-Western" content, changes were slow but steady. In the decade following Maass's critique, two articles on Japanese architecture, one article on house types in Teotihuacan, an introduction to African architecture, and two articles on Burmese town planning were published. When James O'Gorman took on the editorship with the March 1974 issue, he professed the journal's inability to publish "nontraditional" material unless he received manuscript submissions on such topics, but affirmed: "As the mirror of scholarship in architectural history it is ready to reflect the reassessment of the profession and its methods currently under way."3 The situation improved significantly in the 1980s with at least twelve articles that could be categorized as "non-Western" by scholars who would become stalwarts in their fields.4 During these intervening years the readership appeared to be bickering over the ascendancy of Western European versus American (meaning U.S.) topics in the journal, so much so that Tod Marder in his concluding editorial in the March 1990 issue noted with relief that with "global awareness" this quarrel or "creative tension," as he put it, has "subsided."5 Yet the question …


We consider an array of waveguides with identical widths but alternating spacings using the discrete nonlinear Schroumldinger model (tight-binding approximation). In the highly discrete (anticontinuous) limit when one of the spacings is infinite, the model reduces to an integrable chain of uncoupled dimers. From this limit, we identify the two fundamental, antisymmetric and symmetric, discrete gap solitons, which can be numerically continued to a continuum limit gap soliton at one band edge. Other composite solutions at the uncoupled limit disappear in bifurcations. Similarly to the case of waveguides with alternating widths and constant spacings, oscillatory instabilities appear for the fundamental solutions only for frequencies in the upper half of the gap. In contrast to the alternating-width case, there is no stability exchange between the two fundamental solutions: the symmetric solution is always unstable while the antisymmetric solution is always stable in the lower half of the gap. Thus, the Peierls-Nabarro barrier can vanish only in the continuum limit.


. In this paper an adaptive heterogeneous multiscale model, which couples two sub-structures with different length scales into one numerical model is introduced for the simulation of damage in concrete. In the presented approach the initiation, propagation and coalescence of microcracks is simulated using a mesoscale model, which explicitly represents the heterogeneous material structure of concrete. The mesoscale model is restricted to the damaged parts of the structure, whereas the undamaged regions are simulated on the macroscale. As a result an adaptive enlargement of the mesoscale model during the simulation is necessary. In the first part of the paper the generation of the heterogeneous mesoscopic structure of concrete, the finite element discretization of the mesoscale model, the applied isotropic damage model and the cohesive zone model are briefly introduced. Furthermore the mesoscale simulation of a uniaxial tension test of a concrete prism is presented and own obtained numerical results are compared to experimental results. The second part is focused on the adaptive heterogeneous multiscale approach. Indicators for the model adaptation and for the coupling between the different numerical models will be introduced. The transfer from the macroscale to the mesoscale and the adaptive enlargement of the mesoscale substructure will be presented in detail. A nonlinear simulation of a realistic structure using an adaptive heterogeneous multiscale model is presented at the end of the paper to show the applicability of the proposed approach to large-scale structures.


The role of knowledge management in addressing the quality of care rendered by registered nurses has received little attention in Nigerian teaching hospitals. This study investigated the relationship between knowledge management and performance of nursing care in selected teaching hospitals. A quantitative study comprising of a survey design was employed. Data was collected from 320 registered nurses using the proportionate stratified sampling method from two purposively selected teaching hospitals in South West, Nigeria. Questionnaires were distributed to registered nurses across the clinical units in the selected teaching hospitals. Structural equation modelling using SPSS version 22 was used to test the hypothesised relationships. The findings revealed that information technology, organisational structure and organisational culture in knowledge management infrastructure are found to positively and significantly influence knowledge management processes (knowledge acquisition, conversion, application and protection) in the selected teaching hospitals. The study further revealed that the mutual relationship between the dimensions of knowledge management infrastructure and knowledge management process strongly and significantly influence nursing care performance in the teaching hospitals. Knowledge management infrastructure and process can contribute to the overall performance of nursing care and simultaneously improve the performance of teaching hospitals.


Beitrage zum Symposium "Urban design and dictatorship in the 20th century: Italy, Portugal, the Soviet Union, Spain and Germany. History and Historiography". Weimar, 21.-22. November 2013


Theodore Dreiser's image of the pathetic Hurstwood sitting idly in his rocking chair ranks as one of the most memorable in all of American literature. The image, like others before and since, is one of the seeker. This seeker's gaze, however, is fixed not on a whale or a green light at the end of a dock but on a newspaper. In his obsession with newspapers, Hurstwood resembled his real-life contemporaries, the Americans of the nineteenth century, who were fascinated by the phenomenon of journalism. "A hunger for print journalism has often seemed to set Americans apart from the lands they came from," Thomas Leonard has noted, adding, "This New World was frequently defined by its obsession with a page of news." Such a hunger and the growing means for satiating it would seem to have held great promise for America's literary realists, who had built a movement around their insistence on an authentic representation of reality. Who could more credibly lay claim to such a representation than journalists, who were—at least in theory—delivering facts about real people and real events to readers? Not surprisingly, many American realist fiction writers—including Mark Twain, W. D. Howells, Stephen Crane, Dreiser, and even Henry James—had, in fact, worked for newspapers or magazines; however, with the exception of Crane, all eventually not only abandoned journalism, but also singled it out for caustic criticism. What went wrong?
One answer lies in Sister Carrie, one of the era's major literary statements on journalism.