Existing literature exposes poor eating habits and low vegetable consumption as rife amongst adolescents. Increased autonomy in relation to decision-making around food often follows the onset of secondary school education. Studies have shown that adolescents are vulnerable to peer pressure because they want to fit in with their peers. The aim of this research was to develop a detailed insight into young adolescents' (aged 11to 13-years-old) behaviour concerning vegetables through exploratory research. The findings will inform the vegetable marketing of the company partner, Puffin Produce (who currently package Welsh fresh produce for supermarkets across Wales). A triangulated research methodology incorporated quantitative and qualitative data collection predominantly from schools in South Wales. Phase One involved collecting data from school canteen purchases (n=3 secondary schools), qualitative school catering manager interviews (n=6), catering staff focus groups (n=14) and parent focus groups (n=5). Phase Two included school canteen observations (n=3 secondary schools) and adolescent focus groups (n=42). A design period preceded the participatory design research with adolescents (n=41) and final parent focus groups (n=16) (Phase Three). Abductive thematic analysis resulted in numerous themes, the three most pertinent being convenience, taste preferences and parenting. This study fills three identified 'gaps' in the literature: the novel use of catering staff participants, the geographical research area of South Wales and the incorporation of adolescents in the participatory design research. The original contributions to knowledge includes an understanding into the factors influencing Welsh adolescents' (aged 11to 13-yearsold) attitudes towards vegetables in addition to their food consumption routines and behaviours. Moreover, these insights are of commercial interest and could potentially inform the marketing communications of food companies seeking to target this market and improve healthful eating. The NPD process resulted in a vegetable-based snacking concept that is innovative yet feasible, suitable for Puffin Produce to develop further.


Since it joined the European Union, Greece has been pushed toward modernization at a faster speed. A country still very tied to the legacy of its ancient civilization, Greece has been struggling to find balance between modernity and the country's rich cultural heritage. Even as the country advances technologically, the power of tradition continues to exert tremendous influence. Greek women, in particular, are caught in this paradox. It is a quiet struggle, but a fascinating one worthy of greater study. Unfortunately, in American schools, teachers who examine Europe often limit their study to the powerful countries of the continent like Britain, France, Germany, or Italy. Although some aspects of ancient Greece are covered in the social studies curriculum, American students rarely study the vibrant contemporary Greek society. One significant aspect of modernization has been the change in women's status-the result of a blend of tradition and innovation, according to some scholars. (2) After providing a brief overview of Greek women's historical struggles for autonomy, this article will offer suggestions for teaching about contemporary Greek women. Women in Ancient Greece Of all creatures who live and have intelligence, we women are the most miserable. [...] People say that we women lead a life without danger inside our homes, while men fight in war; but they are wrong. I would rather serve three times in battle than give birth once. Medea's complaint, Athens, Greece, 431 BC (Euripedes, Medea 230-51. G) (3) As Medea's distressed words indicate, the glorious democratic freedom of the classical Greek polis was not applied to women. On the contrary, in everyday life, women of ancient Greece were under the authority of men--either fathers or husbands. In fact, Greek law required the bride's family to pay a dowry to the groom when getting married. In a period when the nuclear family and the oikos (household) served as the foundation of proper citizenship, a woman's neglect of domestic duties could lead to severe legal and social consequences. (4) A man's parallel household violation, such as the sexual exploitation of young slaves or hetairai, was not similarly punished. Nonetheless, not all women were absorbed with their domestic tasks; some dared to undertake employment outside the home. (5) Women also played an important role in religious festivals. (6) The work of classical Greek writers demonstrates that Greek women's desire for self-determination is not simply a modern phenomenon. Plato's Symposium, for example, tells the story of Diotima, a woman who challenged Athenian men with her bold opinions. Kallipateira, a name quite familiar to Greek schoolchildren, was the first woman to participate--albeit secretly--in the ancient Olympic games. Still, despite some advances in women's political and social rights during the Hellenistic and Roman eras that followed the classical Greek era, the household remained the foundation of social cohesion. Throughout the centuries leading up to the modern era, many cultural patterns affecting gender relations proved remarkably resilient in the face of new economic and political conditions. As scholar Marilyn Arthur puts it, although Greek gods "ceased to hate men," unfortunately, men did not cease "to hate women" (7) The Greek Women's Rights Movement The emergence of a women's movement in Greece traces its origins to the late nineteenth century, although this effort involved only a small proportion of middle and upper class urban women. (8) Even as they dared to demand better treatment, these pioneering women did not totally question their traditional female role, fearing that upsetting the institution of family would be seen as threatening society as a whole. (9) At that time, Greek women fought mainly for their right to education; in fact, the first people to speak out in support of more education for women were teachers. …


A new biaxial test procedure, known as the 'plate bending method' is investigated for thin multilayered generally orthotropic laminated plate structures. The method is evaluated with reference to the four criteria for a satisfactory biaxial test. A number of experiments have been performed to determine the applicability of the criteria to the new method. Surface strains, transverse displacements and visual observations have been recorded, from which the bending behaviour and failure mechanisms in the experiments are examined. A classical 2-dimensional thin plate finite element analysis has been developed to predict the stresses generated in the small (linear) and large (non-linear) deformation domains. To minimise computing effort in the analyse of non-linear bending, the formulation omitted the effects of shear deformation, shear stresses, material non-linearities and the exact position of the neutral axis. The omission of these factors has been examined and it is shown that the individual errors are small. Analytical solutions for simple isotropic, and, where available, laminated plate bending examples, have been used to establish the limitations of the finite element analysis. Numerical results have been compared with the measured surface strains and transverse displacements. From the comparison it is shown that the plate bending method can be accurately modelled by the linear analysis. However, the non-linear analysis is shown to be inaccurate when predicting the measured bending for reasons which are discussed.


Twenty healthy, non-smoking, normal-weight omnivores volunteered for a nutrition counselling programme and changed from a mixed to a Scandinavian lactovegetarian diet. Dietary surveys were performed before and 3, 6 and 12 months after the dietary shift. The major trends when changing from a mixed diet to a lactovegetarian diet included an increase in the consumption of fruits, berries, vegetables, herbal tea and dairy products, and a decrease in the intake of biscuits and buns, sweets, alcoholic beverages, coffee and tea. There was a total absence of fish, eggs and meat products at 3 and 6 months after the dietary shift. At 12 months after the dietary shift two subjects ate small amounts of these animal products. The energy intake decreased throughout the study. The nutrient intake showed the greatest change between the period before and 3 months after the dietary shift. Between 3, 6 and 12 months after the dietary shift there were only minor changes. The observed change in meal pattern is associated with the change in consumption of various food items, the change in nutrient intake and the change in food preparation methods. Further studies should try to clarify the relationship between meal pattern and food intake, nutrient intake and food preparation methods, because counselling on meal pattern most certainly is more rapid and more easily understood than counselling on food and nutrient intake.


### Geological relevance of grain boundary diffusion

As a rule of thumb, diffusion along grain boundaries is several orders of magnitude faster than within minerals and hence it could enable mass transport on much larger spatial scales within geological time scales. Therefore Earth scientists are interested in the transport properties of grain and interphase boundaries (and other short circuit diffusion paths such as dislocations or a fluid network) since they may provide very efficient transport paths controlling a variety of processes operating on very different spatial scales. For example, on a micron scale, corona formation around minerals is a common phenomenon that is typically controlled by grain boundary diffusion. Similarly, element and isotopic exchange between a physically separated mineral pair (used, for example, as a geothermometer) requires transport along grain boundaries. Metasomatic reaction zones on the centimeter to meter scale are not always simply related to fluid flow but are also induced by fluid assisted diffusive fluxes between two different rock types imposed on each other due to tectonic processes (e.g., Miller et al. 2009). It has been also argued that the observed strong gradual fractionation of Li isotopes on the meter scale was a result of diffusion, where a strong contribution comes from grain boundary diffusion within these rocks (Teng et al. 2006). Further, new data on grain boundary diffusion of siderophile elements and carbon in polycrystalline MgO suggest that grain boundary diffusion provides an efficient mechanism to exchange these elements between the mantle and the core even on the kilometer scale within reasonable time scales (Hayden and Watson 2007, 2008). In addition to the significant role of grain boundary diffusion for element transfer in rocks, grain boundary diffusion can also dominate the bulk physical properties of rocks, e.g., their viscosity (Coble creep) or electrical conductivity, which is for example relevant for the interpretation of …


Dopaminergic neurons in the substantia nigra express dopamine transporters in their dendrites. However, the function of these transporters is not fully understood. Falkenburger et al. (see the Perspective by Blakely) combined electrophysiology and amperometry to study dopamine-mediated inhibitory postsynaptic currents. Dopamine can be released from dendrites, and this release was inhibited by the reuptake blocker GBR 12935. In this preparation, a distinctive mechanism causes dendro-dendritic inhibition through reversal of normal dopamine transport. B. H. Falkenburger, K. L. Barstow, I. M. Mintz, Dendrodendritic inhibition through reversal of dopamine transport. Science 293, 2465-2470 (2001). [Abstract] [Full Text] R. D. Blakely, Dopamine's reversal of fortune. Science 293, 2407-2409 (2001). [Full Text]


Total hip replacement is a highly effective surgical procedure for patients suffering from end stage osteoarthritis and its success in improving symptoms of osteoarthritis has meant that its use has increased across many healthcare systems. Although in experi - enced hands the procedure provides very effective outcomes one must be aware of the potential complications of the procedure. These can be divided into general and proce - dure specific. General complications include infections, postoperative pulmonary issues and thromboembolic complications. Procedural specific complications include a surgi - cal site infection, haemorrhage, nerve injury, dislocation, leg length discrepancy, periprosthetic fractures and heterotrophic ossification. This chapter explores and describes the complications a surgeon may face when performing a total hip replacement and how one may avoid and address these.


Surplus Cameo Decor is Edgar Schmitz' first solo exhibition in Scotland. Expanding on recent works that explore how best to withdraw from the present, Schmitz will install a series of ambient backdrops in Cooper Gallery that turn the space into a semi-fictional hub for cinematic plots and invited cameo appearances.

The exhibition is organised in three episodes. Schmitz' work mobilises gallery settings toward film by orchestrating the way they oscillate between material, atmospheric and narrative promises. Across a diverse body of work including sculpture, sound, animation and writing, his sub-filmic clusters act as portals into and escape hatches from the exhibition as event


The Latent heat storage technology is being used worldwide to bridge the gap between supply and demand of energy. The material store energy during the charging process (melting) and releases energy during the discharging process (solidification). In spite of having various advantages such as high storage energy density, it suffers from the fact that most Phase Change Materials (PCMs) commonly used have a very low thermal conductivity, hence, very slow charging /discharging times. In the current work, a shell and tube type heat exchanger with phase change material on the shell side and heat transfer fluid on the tube side are considered. The effect of flow rate and inlet temperature of heat transfer fluid on melting and solidification times are investigated with single and double pass (counter and parallel) arrangements of Heat Transfer Fluid (HTF). The major difficulty encountered in the melting of the PCM is the accumulation of solid (unmelted) part at the bottom during the charging process, while the liquid part remains at the top during the discharging process, which decreases the efficiency of the system to quite a great extent. In this study, an attempt has been made to improve the efficiency of the system by considering two configurations (double and triple tube) of the shell and tube heat exchanger and it is found that the latter case has better performance.


We identify two policy strategies that state governments pursue to reduce uninsurance, and we classify policies as being either state based or market based. The two policy strategies are distinguished by whether states rely on the institutional capabilities of the state or market processes to provide insurance. We develop and test models to explain states' adoptions of each type of policy. Using Poisson regression, we evaluate hypotheses suggested by the two strategies with data from U.S. states in the 1990s. The results indicate that institutionally more-capable state governments with strong liberal-party presence in the legislature adopt more state-based policies and fewer market-based policies. By contrast, the model of market-based, business-targeted reforms reveals that government capability plays a smaller role. Instead, these policies are driven by economic affluence, political competition, higher incomes, greater uninsurance, and more previous attempts to address the uninsurance problem. These findings reveal distinct institutional, partisan, electoral and demographic influences that shape state-based and market-based strategies. First, policy choices can be driven by the presence or absence of state capability. The domain of feasible policy choices open to states with institutional capability may be decidedly different than that available to states with fewer institutional resources. Second, while marketbased policy approaches may be the most feasible politically, they may be the least successful in remedying practical uninsurance issues. These results thus reveal that institutional characteristics of states create an important foundation for policy choice and policy success or failure. These results would suggest that the national government's strategy of pursuing market-based solutions to the problem will not result in


Ever shrinking device structures result in an increased susceptibility of modern embedded systems to radiation and temperature-dependent aging effects. This work introduces a runtime placement algorithm for dynamically reconfigurable systems that have to meet varying safety requirements. The algorithm first allocates replicas of modules to cope with soft-errors and meet the safety-level of the module and then places the modules onto the FPGA in such a way that the stress, and therefore aging, is minimized. For the replica allocation, a lifetime analysis is employed to predict the reliability of a module depending on its sensitive configuration bits and the expected runtime of the module. Moreover, the temperature profile of each active module is utilized to predict the degradation of each part of the reconfigurable area. The presented algorithm then equally distributes active modules to minimize the degradation effects while respecting placement constraints that arise from the need for majority voting between the different replicas of a module. A case study gives evidence of the capability of the proposed online placing algorithm to harden a system against radiation effects and meet safety constraints while extending the overall lifetime of the reconfigurable device by minimizing stress.


The negotiations over the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) and the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) exemplify the efficacy and the consequences of fragmentation as a "divide and conquer" strategy. By choosing this negotiating strategy and by maintaining secrecy over the contents of the envisioned rules, the negotiators exclude diverse stakeholders in developed and developing countries who will be affected by agreements that are set to establish rules for the global economy. This Essay outlines the challenges to democracy – both at the domestic level and at the global level – posed by these negotiation processes and by their envisioned outcomes. It then moves on to assess the potential institutional responses that might eventually arise and replicate, at the global level, checks and balances among stakeholders that have traditionally been secured domestically by national constitutions and enforced by national courts and legislatures.


SOFTWARE management is a term which inspires many different reactions from the broad range of practitioners in the field of data processing. The term has many dimensions ranging from the first and second line manager of a software development activity who plies his trade with little to fall back on other than his prior experience, and native skills and intuition. Contrast this with a senior executive who, because of lack of understanding of software management, is frustrated in trying to determine if his company can produce a software program on schedule and within budget. The data processing landscape is littered with examples of major software developments which faltered and then expired. That this situation should exist, after almost a quarter-century of experience with implementing these systems, is one of the enigmas of the rapidly expanding data processing industry.


ABSTRACT The paper approaches the issue of school choice in an indirect manner by investigating the effectiveness of public, private government-dependent and private independent schools in 19 Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development countries selected from the PISA 2000 survey for this purpose. In a multilevel approach we estimate these sector effects, controlling for sociological characteristics of students and parents, school composition, teaching and learning conditions of schools and students', and principals' perception of the climate of their schools. The main explanation of the gross differences in mathematical achievement is the better social composition of private schools, both government-dependent and independent, which is a clear consequence of school choice. But our analysis also reveals that private independent schools are less effective than public schools with the same students, parents, and social composition, while private dependent schools are more effective than comparable public schools. The explanation of these remaining net differences in mathematical achievement seems to be the better school climate of private dependent schools. The comparison concludes that these net differences in mathematical achievement between public and private school sectors are equal across nations, despite the historical and legal variations in their educational systems and school choice approaches.


Substantially scaling up of aid flows will require development partners to address many issues, including the impact of higher aid flows on: the competitiveness of aid recipients; the management of fiscal and monetary policy; the delivery of public services; behavioral incentives; and the rate of growth of the economy. Other issues will include the appropriate sequencing of aid-financed investments; balancing alternative expenditure priorities; the implications for fiscal and budget sustainability; and exit strategies from donor funding. Donors will need to ensure greater long-term predictability and reduced short-term volatility of aid. The international financial institutions can play a critical role in helping countries address these scaling-up issues.


We give a complete algorithm and source code for constructing what we refer to as heterotic risk models (for equities), which combine: i) granularity of an industry classification; ii) diagonality of the principal component factor covariance matrix for any sub-cluster of stocks; and iii) dramatic reduction of the factor covariance matrix size in the Russian-doll risk model construction. This appears to prove a powerful approach for constructing out-of-sample stable short-lookback risk models. Thus, for intraday mean-reversion alphas based on overnight returns, Sharpe ratio optimization using our heterotic risk models sizably improves the performance characteristics compared to weighted regressions based on principal components or industry classification. We also give source code for: a) building statistical risk models; and ii) Sharpe ratio optimization with homogeneous linear constraints and position bounds.


Introduction Multipotent mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) have become a promising therapeutic approach in many clinical conditions. The hypothesis that MSCs can provide a potential therapy for human anti-glomerular basement membrane (GBM) glomerulonephritis (GN) was tested. Methods Nephrotoxic serum nephritis was induced in Wistar-Kyoto rats on day 0. Groups of animals were given either human MSCs (hMSCs, 3×106) or vehicle by intravenous injection on day 4; all rats were sacrificed at either day 7 or day 13. Results Fluorescently labeled hMSCs were localized in glomeruli and tubulointerstitium 5 h after hMSC administration and persisted until 48 h, but hMSCs were barely detectable after 7 days. hMSC-treated rats had decreased kidney weight, proteinuria, and glomerular tuft area at each time point. The serum creatinine level and degree of glomerular crescent formation were decreased by hMSC treatment on day 13. ED1-positive macrophages, CD8-positive cells, and TUNEL-positive apoptotic cells in glomeruli were reduced by hMSC treatment on day 7, and this trend in apoptotic cells persisted to day 13. Renal cortical mRNA for TNF-α, IL-1β, and IL-17, and the serum IL-17A level were decreased, whereas renal cortical mRNA for IL-4 and Foxp3 and the serum IL-10 level were increased in the MSC-treated group on day 7. Collagen types I and III and TGF-β mRNA were decreased by hMSC treatment on day 13. Conclusion The present results demonstrated that anti-inflammatory and immunomodulatory effects were involved in the mechanism of attenuating established experimental anti-GBM GN by hMSCs. These results suggest that hMSCs are a promising therapeutic candidate for the treatment of anti-GBM GN.


One the major difficulties of microarray technology relate to the processing of large and - importantly - error-loaded images of the dots on the chip surface. Whatever the source of these errors, those obtained in the first stage of data acquisition - segmentation - are passed down to the subsequent processes, with deleterious results. As it has been demonstrated recently that biological systems have evolved algorithms that are mathematically efficient, this contribution attempts to test an algorithm that mimics a bacterial-"patented" algorithm for the search of available space and nutrients to find, "zero-in" and eventually delimitate the features existent on the microarray surface.


The overall bandwidth of guided acoustic-wave Brillouin scattering has been measured in optical fibers with different fiber core diameters. The relative intensity of the light scattering produced by the different acoustic modes is compared with theory and shows good agreement when the optical fiber has its polymer jacket removed. The mode intensities and linewidths in a jacketed optical fiber are modified by the selective damping of individual guided acoustic modes.


Sigmund Freud and his Oedipus complex are among the most often discussed critical and contentious issues of modern psychology and literature. Freud has brought lot of controversies in the field of modern psychology and literary trend through his theory Oedipus complex. Contrariwise, in some other assessor's notions his concept of Oedipus complex deserves a great deal of appreciation. Nonetheless, prominent English novelist D.H. Lawrence is one of those modern writers who are greatly influenced by Freudian theories and have been promoting Freud's notions through their works. His "sons and lovers" are considered as one of the most modern as well as controversial novels of the twentieth century. In this fiction, the protagonist Paul's extremely emotional dealings with his mother are the illustration of Doctor Freud's psychological theory Oedipus complex. Nevertheless, this paper aims to critically analyze the facts lying with the hallucination of Oedipus complex as it is presented in "Sons and Lovers". The evaluation is conducted liberally and objectively as well as through comparisons between the central characters of Lawrence's "Sons and Lovers" and Sophocles' King Oedipus. This attempt also tends to judge the universality of Freud's claim particularly sexual theory with the help of modern biological experiments and the result of relevant laboratory tests, conducted by eminent psychologists and psychiatrists. In short, the critique ultimately endeavors to find out a factual solution for the controversies, raised by Oedipus complex, with the help of logic, fact and scientific researches.

 Key words: Freudian psychoanalysis, Oedipus complex, "Sons and Lovers"


BACKGROUND: Most previous reports to analyze risk factors for peritoneal recurrence in patients with colon cancer have been observational studies of a population-based cohort. OBJECTIVE: This study aimed to determine the risk factors for peritoneal recurrence in patients with stage II to III colon cancer who underwent curative resection. DESIGN: This was a pooled analysis using a combined database obtained from 3 large phase III randomized trials (N = 3714). SETTINGS: Individual patient data were collected from the Japanese Foundation for Multidisciplinary Treatment of Cancer clinical trials 7, 15, and 33, which evaluated the benefits of postoperative 5-fluorouracil–based adjuvant therapies in patients with locally advanced colorectal cancer. PATIENTS: We included patients who had stage II to III colon cancer and underwent curative resection with over D2 lymph node dissection. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Main outcomes measured were risk factors for peritoneal recurrence without other organ metastasis after curative surgery. RESULTS: Peritoneal recurrence occurred in 2.3% (86/3714) of all patients undergoing curative resection. Mean duration from operation to peritoneal recurrence was 17.0 ± 10.3 months. Of these patients with peritoneal recurrence, 29 patients (34%) had recurrence in ≥1 other organ. Multivariate analysis showed that age (≥60 y: HR = 0.531; p = 0.0182), pathological T4 (HR = 3.802; p < 0.0001), lymph node involvement (HR = 3.491; p = 0.0002), and lymphadenectomy (D2: HR = 1.801; p = 0.0356) were independent predictors of peritoneal recurrence. The overall survival was lower in patients who developed peritoneal recurrence than in those with other recurrence (HR = 1.594; p = 0.002). LIMITATIONS: The regimens of adjuvant chemotherapy were limited to oral 5-fluorouracil. CONCLUSIONS: Our findings clarified the risk factors for peritoneal recurrence in patients who underwent curative resection for colon cancer. See Video Abstract at http://links.lww.com/DCR/A609.


In this study, the cardiac effects of anemia and venous thromboembolism (VTE), reportedly caused by the hemolyzed erythrocytes occurring in sheep with babesiosis, were investigated using cardiac markers and D-dimer (DD). The study included 34 sheep: 24 infected Akkaraman sheep (1-3 years old, diagnosed with babesiosis based on clinical and laboratory findings) and a control group of 10 noninfected healthy sheep of the same breed and age. Hematocrit (Hct) levels were measured in blood obtained from both groups. Cardiac troponin I (cTnI), creatine kinase-MB (CK-MB), and aspartate aminotransferase (AST) levels were measured in serum samples. In addition, the levels of DD were also measured in plasma samples. Sheep with babesiosis were subsequently divided into 3 subgroups according to their Hct levels, which ranged from 13.2% to 16.3% in the first group (n = 8), 20.1% to 25.6% in the second group (n = 8), and 27.4% to 30.3% in the third group (n = 8). Evaluations of the measurements of cTnI, CK-MB, and AST levels indicated statistically significant differences between infected and healthy sheep. Statistically significant differences were not found for DD levels between the 2 groups.


Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is one of the major causes of chronic morbidity and mortality worldwide. The development of markers of COPD onset is hampered by the lack of accessibility to the primary target tissue, and there is a need to consider other sample sources as surrogates for biomarker research. Airborne toxicants pass through the nasal epithelium before reaching the lower airways, and the similarity with bronchial histology makes it an attractive surrogate for lower airways. In this work, we describe the transcriptomics findings from the nasal epithelia of subjects enrolled in a clinical study focusing on the identification of COPD biomarkers. Transcriptomic data were analyzed using the biological network approach that enabled us to pinpoint the biological processes affected in the upper respiratory tract in response to smoking and mild-to-moderate COPD. Our results indicated that nasal and lower airway immune responses were considerably different in COPD subjects and caution should be exercised when using upper airway samples as a surrogate for the lower airway. Nevertheless, the network approach described here could present a sensitive means of identifying smokers at risk of developing COPD.


This paper describes a digital method that is capable of automatically focusing optical coherence tomography (OCT) en face images without prior knowledge of the point spread function of the imaging system. The method utilizes a scalar diffraction model to simulate wave propagation from out-of-focus scatter to the focal plane, from which the propagation distance between the out-of-focus plane and the focal plane is determined automatically via an image-definition-evaluation criterion based on information entropy theory. By use of the proposed approach, we demonstrate that the lateral resolution close to that at the focal plane can be recovered from the imaging planes outside the depth of field region with minimal loss of resolution. Fresh onion tissues and mouse fat tissues are used in the experiments to show the performance of the proposed method.


Abstract Recent findings have shown that it is possible to use the Layer-by-Layer technique to create nanofibrillated cellulose / polyethyleneimine interference films whose colour change with relative humidity. This study uses different optical models to describe spectral ellipsometry measurements data of interference films and how the film properties alter in dry and humid environments. The results indicate that water condensation initially is filling the surface pores within seconds whereas relaxation of the film to adjust to the added water is a slower process that reaches a steady state after »20 min. The maximum swelling ratio of the LbL films is almost independent of the number of layers within the film, but decreases considerably by crosslinking via heat treatment. The films show a distinct birefringence with optical axis perpendicular to the surface. Analysis of the moisture response with different optical models indicates that the films swell uniformly in the thickness direction with no separate water film on top. The results provide important understanding for the design of NFC based LbL films for visual moisture sensors and interactive security paper.


Business—or the sum of privately run enterprises in all sectors of the economy, their owners, and managers—can have an important impact on the holding of peace talks, on agreement substance, and on the speed and depth of implementation. In fact, business has been part of peacebuilding processes in many conflict-affected societies in Latin America, both by spoiling ongoing efforts and by supporting negotiations, social dialogue, and transformative projects. The examples of El Salvador, Guatemala, and Colombia show that there is not a uniform model whereby private sector actors define their interests and strategies in relation to peace talks and peacebuilding processes. Rather, factors related to the nature and intensity of conflict, the economic and international context, company traits and private sector organizational forms, as well as access to the policymaking process play an important role. Whether peace is achieved or not ultimately depends on a variety of factors. However, whether as spoiler, supporter, or simple bystander, the private sector is a crucial actor in societies seeking to build lasting peace.


We assess the detectability of city emissions via a tower-based greenhouse gas (GHG) network, as part of the Indianapolis Flux (INFLUX) experiment. By examining afternoon-averaged results from a network of carbon dioxide (CO 2 ), methane (CH 4 ), and carbon monoxide (CO) mole fraction measurements in Indianapolis, Indiana for 2011–2013, we quantify spatial and temporal patterns in urban atmospheric GHG dry mole fractions. The platform for these measurements is twelve communications towers spread across the metropolitan region, ranging in height from 39 to 136 m above ground level, and instrumented with cavity ring-down spectrometers. Nine of the sites were deployed as of January 2013 and data from these sites are the focus of this paper. A background site, chosen such that it is on the predominantly upwind side of the city, is utilized to quantify enhancements caused by urban emissions. Afternoon averaged mole fractions are studied because this is the time of day during which the height of the boundary layer is most steady in time and the area that influences the tower measurements is likely to be largest. Additionally, atmospheric transport models have better performance in simulating the daytime convective boundary layer compared to the nighttime boundary layer. Averaged from January through April of 2013, the mean urban dormant-season enhancements range from 0.3 ppm CO 2 at the site 24 km typically downwind of the edge of the city (Site 09) to 1.4 ppm at the site at the downwind edge of the city (Site 02) to 2.9 ppm at the downtown site (Site 03). When the wind is aligned such that the sites are downwind of the urban area, the enhancements are increased, to 1.6 ppm at Site 09, and 3.3 ppm at Site 02. Differences in sampling height affect the reported urban enhancement by up to 50%, but the overall spatial pattern remains similar. The time interval over which the afternoon data are averaged alters the calculated urban enhancement by an average of 0.4 ppm. The CO 2 observations are compared to CO 2 mole fractions simulated using a mesoscale atmospheric model and an emissions inventory for Indianapolis. The observed and modeled CO 2 enhancements are highly correlated (r 2 = 0.94), but the modeled enhancements prior to inversion average 53% of those measured at the towers. Following the inversion, the enhancements follow the observations closely, as expected. The CH 4 urban enhancement ranges from 5 ppb at the site 10 km predominantly downwind of the city (Site 13) to 21 ppb at the site near the landfill (Site 10), and for CO ranges from 6 ppb at the site 24 km downwind of the edge of the city (Site 09) to 29 ppb at the downtown site (Site 03). Overall, these observations show that a dense network of urban GHG measurements yield a detectable urban signal, well-suited as input to an urban inversion system given appropriate attention to sampling time, sampling altitude and quantification of background conditions.


Object. Adhesion of leukocytes and their migration into the periadventitial space may be critical in the pathophysiology of vasospasm following subarachnoid hemorrhage (SAH). The cell adhesion molecules involved in this process are lymphocyte function‐associated antigen‐1 (CD11a/CD18) and macrophage antigen‐1 (CD11b/CD18), which are present on neutrophils/macrophages, and intercellular adhesion molecule‐1 (CD54), which is present in endothelial cells. A humanized monoclonal antibody (mAb), Hu23F2G, targets CD11/CD18 and prevents leukocyte adhesion to endothelial cells. In this study, systemic administration of Hu23F2G prevented vasospasm in the rabbit model of SAH. Methods. Twenty-six New Zealand White rabbits were injected with autologous blood into the cisterna magna to induce SAH, after which they were randomized to receive injections of either Hu23F2G (10 animals) or a placebo at 30 minutes and 24 and 48 hours after SAH (six animals). Control animals underwent sham operations (four animals) or SAH alone (six animals). The animals were killed 72 hours after SAH, their bodies perfused and fixed, and their basilar arteries processed for morphometric analysis. Peripheral white blood cells (WBCs) were counted at 72 hours. The percentages of lumen patency were compared using the Student t-test. The presence of neutrophils and macrophages was confirmed by immunohistochemical analysis in which a rat anti‐rabbit anti-CD18 mAb and cresyl violet were used. Treatment with Hu23F2G resulted in the significant prevention of vasospasm. Animals treated with Hu23F2G had 90 � 7% lumen patency compared with 65 � 7% in the placebo group (p = 0.025). The percentage of lumen patency in the SAH-only group was 59 � 10%. The mean WBC count was 16,300 � 2710/� l in the treatment group, compared with 7000 � 386/� l in the control group (p = 0.02). Administration of Hu23F2G produced increased numbers of WBCs in 70% of the animals treated. Conclusions. This study supports the concept that leukocyte‐endothelial cell interactions play an important role in the pathophysiology of chronic vasospasm after SAH. Systemic therapy with an anti-CD11/CD18 mAb prevents vasospasm after SAH by inhibiting adhesion of neutrophils and macrophages and their migration into the periadventitial space.


Pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) is non-resectable in the majority of patients and highly resistant to chemotherapy, resulting in a poor survival. The tumor microenvironment and hypoxia are important modifiers of cancer progression in PDAC. Understanding the metabolic vulnerabilities of PDAC in the harsh tumor microenvironment may lead to novel therapeutic approaches with improved clinical efficacy. First, we found that PDAC cells showed beneficial effects of co-cultured stroma cells, but only under lipid-free serum conditions. To study the metabolic crosstalk between cancer cells and stroma in more detail, we performed an untargeted metabolomic screen of PDAC cells and fibroblasts co-cultured in normoxia and hypoxia, and performed RNA-seq profiling in parallel. We found that stromal cells are metabolically more responsive to co-culture than cancer cells. PDAC cells induce catabolic carbohydrate and protein metabolism in stromal cells, particularly in hypoxia. In contrast, 13C-based metabolic flux assays demonstrated that stromal cells display enhanced anabolic lipid metabolism in co-culture with PDAC cells. Furthermore, de novo synthesized 13C-labeled fatty acids in stromal cells were taken up by PDAC cells. In particular, PDAC cells showed extensive scavenging of lysophospholipids (lyso-PLs) from the culture medium, which was increased in co-culture under hypoxic conditions. These data were confirmed by analyzing portal vein plasma samples isolated from pancreatic cancer patients before and after surgery. In addition, we found metabolites and expression levels of metabolic enzymes from the glycerophospholipid pathway to be enriched in PDAC cells in co-culture and hypoxia. By using fibroblasts, human pancreatic stellate cells and patient-derived cancer-associated fibroblasts (CAFs), we demonstrate direct transfer of lyso-PLs from stromal to PDAC cells via lipid droplets. The transfer of lyso-PLs was abrogated by pharmacological inhibitors of autophagy, or by siRNA-mediated knockdown of autophagy genes in stromal and tumor cells. These data suggest that PDAC cells cause stroma cells to undergo autophagy, and reprogram stroma metabolism to obtain complex lipid species for their metabolic needs in the lipid-starved tumor microenvironment. Citation Format: Petrus R. De Jong, Sean-Luc Shanahan, Morgan A. Brand, Alejandro D. Campos, Anagha Srirangam, Nikolas Marino, Claudia P. Miller, Olga Zagnitko, Adam D. Richardson, David A. Scott, Brian P. James, Andrew P. Hodges, Ally Perlina, Alexey M. Eroshin, Randall French, Malene Hansen, Sally A. Litherland, Andrew M. Lowy, J. Pablo Arnoletti, Garth Powis. Pancreatic cancer cell growth requires lipids released by tumor-induced stroma autophagy [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the American Association for Cancer Research Annual Meeting 2017; 2017 Apr 1-5; Washington, DC. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2017;77(13 Suppl):Abstract nr 2967. doi:10.1158/1538-7445.AM2017-2967


The introduction of the photonic crystal (PhC) wavelength-scale cavity as a laser cavity enables us to obtain both ultralow threshold current and operating energy. These parameters are essential when using the transmitters in chip-to-chip and on-chip interconnections. To improve the device performance, we employ an ultracompact embedded active region that we call a lambda-scale embedded active-region PhC laser or LEAP laser. We have developed an electrically driven LEAP laser, which operates under room-temperature continuous-wave conditions. To fabricate the electrically driven LEAP laser, we used Zn thermal diffusion and Si ion implantation, respectively, for p-type and n-type doping in an undoped InP layer. However, with previous fabricated devices there was a large leakage current through the substrate and the threshold current was 0.39 mA, which is larger than the expected threshold obtained by optical pumping. To reduce the leakage current, we propose using an InAlAs sacrificial laser instead of an InGaAs layer. The leakage current path through the substrate is effectively suppressed, and as a result, the threshold current is reduced to 7.8 μA, which is the lowest threshold current reported for any laser. Furthermore, the LEAP laser operates at up to 95 °C by using an InGaAlAs-based multiple quantum well structure. We also describe the dynamic characteristics of the laser. The LEAP laser exhibits a maximum 3-dB bandwidth of 16.2 GHz and the modulation current efficiency factor is 53.8 GHz/mA0.5 or 1.7 GHz/μA0.5, which is four times that of a vertical cavity surface-emitting laser. The device is directly modulated by a 12.5-Gb/s nonreturn-to-zero signal with a bias voltage of 1.6 V and a bias current of 109 μA, resulting in an energy cost of 14.0 fJ/b. This is the smallest operating energy for any laser. These results indicate that the LEAP laser is highly suitable for use as a transmitter in computercom applications.


Substantial evidence supports the increased consumption of high-quality protein to achieve optimal health outcomes. A growing body of research indicates that protein intakes well above the current Recommended Dietary Allowance help to promote healthy aging, appetite regulation, weight management, and goals aligned with athletic performance. Higher protein intakes may help prevent age-related sarcopenia, the loss of muscle mass, and strength that predisposes older adults to frailty, disability, and loss of autonomy. Higher protein diets also improve satiety and lead to greater reductions in body weight and fat mass compared with standard protein diets, and may therefore serve as a successful strategy to help prevent and/or treat obesity. Athletes can also benefit from higher protein intakes to maximize athletic performance given the critical role protein plays in stimulating muscle protein remodelling after exercise. Protein quality, per meal dose, and timing of ingestion are also important considerations. Despite persistent beliefs to the contrary, we can find no evidence-based link between higher protein diets and renal disease or adverse bone health. This brief synopsis highlights recent learnings based on presentations at the 2015 Canadian Nutrition Society conference, Advances in Protein Nutrition across the Lifespan. Current evidence indicates intakes in the range of at least 1.2 to 1.6 g/(kg·day) of high-quality protein is a more ideal target for achieving optimal health outcomes in adults.


Polystyrene−clay nanocomposites have been prepared using a bulk polymerization technique. Three new "onium" salts have been used to prepare the nanocomposites, two are functionalized ammonium salts while the third is a phosphonium salt. By TGA/FTIR, both ammonium and phosphonium treatments have been shown to degrade by a Hofmann elimination mechanism at elevated temperatures. TGA/FTIR showed that the phosphonium treatment is the most thermally stable treatment when compared to the two ammonium salts. The nanocomposites were characterized by X-ray diffraction, transmission electron microscopy, strength and elongation at break, as a measure of the mechanical properties, thermogravimetric analysis, and cone calorimetry. The onset temperature of the degradation is increased by about 50 °C and the peak heat release rate is reduced by 27−58%, depending upon the amount of clay that is present. The mass loss rates are also significantly reduced in the presence of the clay.


There is a widespread assumption among scholars and other commentators that the modern popularity of cohabitation is nothing new, but simply a reversion to older trends. Yet this is based on fundamental misunderstandings of the language used to describe relationships outside marriage and their treatment by the law. In the eighteenth century – and well into the twentieth – the term 'cohabitation' did not necessarily mean that the parties were sharing a home. Nor was there any concept of 'common-law marriage': rather than being treated as married, couples who were cohabiting risked punishment for fornication. This paper traces the way in which the law has moved from treating cohabitants as 'fornicators' to accepting them as 'family'. It provides new evidence on the extent of cohabitation in earlier centuries, identifies linguistic faux amis, and evaluates the relationship between law and practice. While the increase in cohabitation may seem to have occurred without legal encouragement, an analysis of women's magazines and newspapers suggests that the way in which the law was misunderstood was more important than what it actually was.


The irascible son of a Jewish pioneer from Czarist Russia whose business acumen built an international company renowned for the quality of its products. Samuel Bronfman's father failed as a wheat farmer and then found success selling frozen fish, firewood, and horses. At this point young Sam observed to his father, "The bar makes more profits than we do. Instead of selling horses, we should be selling the drinks." And thus began what was to become the Seagram whiskey empire. Sam's insight and timing were right as Canada, and especially the United States, were coming under the influence of the temperance movement. While legend often places Sam in the thick of Prohibition era bootlegging and rum running, in fact he built for the long term and kept his operations within both the law and its loopholes as he supplied American bootleggers. Sam demonstrated his marketing genius by insisting on quality in a business notorious for cutting corners and thereby set the standard for the industry in the decades to follow. Sam's success in penetrating the American market was such that after Prohibition his competitors lobbied the federal government for protection. While Samuel Bronfman is a classic rags to riches tale, it is also the story of a Jew who remained in many ways outside business and social establishments even after becoming internationally famous. Commuting every week between his Montreal and New York office, his was a private life centered on his family and their home in Montreal and summer places such as Tarrytown, New York. In the 1950s Sam, under instructions from his daughter Phyllis Lambert, commissioned Mies van der Rohe to design a new corporate headquarters, the Seagram buildingat 375 Park Avenue, a landmark on the New York City skyline. As a leader of the Jewish community Sam was elected president of the Canadian Jewish Congress in 1939, and went on to organize financial aid to the fledgling state of Israel, beginning decades long involvement in Jewish


A new, fully‐automated, closed‐chamber system was developed for measuring photosynthetic activity in aquatic plants, algae, or corals during immersion. The performance of this system, which monitors oxygen exchange, was evaluated both in the laboratory and in situ under natural conditions using the seaweed Laminaria digitata. Intact, large individuals were placed inside the chamber and kept in place by a plastic grid in a transparent Perspex dome. The grid separated the upper incubation chamber containing the alga from the detectors that were situated in the lower chamber. Oxygen was measured using a novel method based on lifetime optical fluorescence sensor technology that provides an extremely stable and precise measurement of dissolved oxygen. The circulation and homogenization of the medium between the samples and the detectors in this closed system were provided by two pumps. The medium could be renewed by another pump that opened to the external ambient seawater and controlled by a solenoid valve. All the mechanics were driven by an electronic card that allowed choice of filling time, time of measurement, and time of medium renewal. This system provides a new tool to study, in detail, the photosynthesis of whole aquatic organisms under natural field conditions during immersion, combining high time‐resolution of oxygen exchange with a long temporal scale of in situ measurements. By allowing automatic and very accurate measurements without any intervention during monitoring, this system will be useful for estimating and comparing production of primary producers or for assessing the influence of environmental factors on production.


In this study, 21,085 tweets from university students over a period of twelve weeks were analyzed. Our aim was to investigate the number and evaluative content of students' tweets related to their study, and to know whether the number of negative tweets decreases when teachers follow students on Twitter. About thirteen percent of all students' tweets relate to their study. We categorized these in student-centered (10%) or curriculum-centered (3%), and divided both categories in negative (4%) or positive (9%) tweets. Teachers became followers of their students after six weeks, which led to a significant decrease of negative curriculum-centered tweets (from 2.2 to 0.7%), although a small decrease was observed even before the intervention started. Contrary to the teachers' initial fears, it is unlikely that students 'infect' each other with negative evaluations about the curriculum, since the number of negative tweets is very low overall.


SWAP-70–like adapter of T cells (SLAT) is a novel guanine nucleotide exchange factor for Rho GTPases that is upregulated in Th2 cells, but whose physiological function is unclear. We show that SLAT–/– mice displayed a developmental defect at one of the earliest stages of thymocyte differentiation, the double-negative 1 (DN1) stage, leading to decreased peripheral T cell numbers. SLAT–/– peripheral CD4+ T cells demonstrated impaired TCR/CD28-induced proliferation and IL-2 production, which was rescued by the addition of exogenous IL-2. Importantly, SLAT–/– mice were grossly impaired in their ability to mount not only Th2, but also Th1-mediated lung inflammatory responses, as evidenced by reduced airway neutrophilia and eosinophilia, respectively. Levels of Th1 and Th2 cytokine in the lungs were also markedly reduced, paralleling the reduction in pulmonary inflammation. This defect in mounting Th1/Th2 responses, which was also evident in vitro, was traced to a severe reduction in Ca2+ mobilization from ER stores, which consequently led to defective TCR/CD28-induced translocation of nuclear factor of activated T cells 1/2 (NFATc1/2). Thus, SLAT is required for thymic DN1 cell expansion, T cell activation, and Th1 and Th2 inflammatory responses.


This thesis is an inductive study of how entrepreneurs and their collaborators use or encourage knowledge spillovers to fuel technological innovations during the emergence of a knowledge intensive industry. Drawing on theories of the entrepreneurial process, innovation during industry emergence, and knowledge spillovers, this thesis seeks to explain the process by which entrepreneurs, facing market, organizational and technological uncertainty, use their existing knowledge to procure, share and create new knowledge during the early stages of an emerging industry. The core research question is why, when and how do knowledge spillovers occur in an emerging industry?
The thesis is based on an extensive case study of the RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) industry, including both interview data and analysis of patent data. The approach of data collection, analysis and theory development follows the systematic methodology articulated by Glaser and Strauss (1967), Glaser (1992) and Strauss and Corbin (1998) for developing a grounded theory. The qualitative research
involved 57 in-depth interviews (45 interviewees) from around the world with the inventors and entrepreneurs who have shaped the emerging RFID industry.
The thesis makes a number of important contributions to existing literature.
First, it provides a comprehensive description of the emergence of the RFID industry in the United States and Europe with a focus on patent activity surrounding specific innovations and the nature of information flows between firms in the value chain.
Second, core findings are that the discovery, evaluation and
exploitation of opportunities by individuals in the RFID industry were the result of knowledge spillovers that resulted from extensive social interactions; that knowledge spillovers can be instigated by entrepreneurs or their collaborators by molding or recognizing discontentment in potential knowledge workers, a process which is described as "discontentment provocation"; and that a core generative process to the emergence of a new industry is knowledge
spillover. Contrary to existing literature, patents played a relatively insignificant role in knowledge spillovers relative to social interaction in the emerging RFID industry. Furthermore, knowledge spillovers were not geographically bound and localized within spatial proximity
to the knowledge source.
Third, the analysis of the empirical data identifies the dimensions "discontentment", "human agency" and "social interaction" as underpinning the process that fostered the generation and propagation of knowledge during the emergence of this industry. The discontentment dimension, originating from negative forces, acts as a catalyst to trigger the process of human agency, the decision to pass
on information and knowledge to another party. Human agency then leads seamlessly into social interaction, resulting in the acquisition, interpretation and/or sharing of information and knowledge.
Discontented individuals were the knowledge conduits who diffused information and knowledge to entrepreneurs and their collaborators through social interaction.
Fourth, this thesis also advances the theory of knowledge spillovers in an emerging knowledge intensive industry by expanding upon the "Entrepreneurial Motivational Model" proposed by Shane et al. (2003). It introduces the triggering events that motivate an individual to seek change prior to the discovery of an opportunity and the social exchanges which take place during different steps of the entrepreneurial process.
Overall, this study has important implications for those studying the entrepreneurial process, the emergence of new industries, and knowledge spillovers.


Introduction:
 Poor oral hygiene had been recognized as a vascular risk factor. Recently, we showed that cnm gene positive Streptococcus mutans (cnm-positive S.mutans) encoding collagen-binding protein (CBP) was associated with intracerebral hemorrhage (ICH). Deep cerebral microbleeds (CMBs), a biomarker of hemorrhagic small vessel disease, is also associated with cnm-positive S.mutans in a population cohort study.

 Hypothesis:
 In this study, we aim to ascertain the correlation in acute stroke setting and investigated whether other factors, collagen binding activities of each S.mutans strain's CBP or inflammatory markers, effects in the correlation.

 Methods:
 We enrolled 99 acute stroke patients between February and August 2014. S.mutans was isolated from saliva, and cnm-gene was screened using PCR technique and collagen binding activities was evaluated using type I collagen assay. CMBs were evaluated on T2* gradient-recalled echo MRI.

 Result:
 67 subjects with ischemic stroke, 5 with transient ischemic attack, and 27 with ICH were included. The presence of cnm-positive S. mutans was significantly associated with ICH [odds ratio vs. ischemic stroke, 3.8; 95% CI, 1.06-13.8], increased number of deep CMBs [median (IQR), 3 (2-9) vs. 0 (0-1), p=0.0002], and fibrinogen [361 (336-459) vs. 320 (274-365) mg/dl, p=0.01]. The relative ratio for number of deep CMBs, cnm-positive S.mutans was 2.2 [95%CI 1.1-4.7] after adjustment of age, sex, systolic blood pressure and creatinine clearance. In subjects positive for S. mutans, collagen binding activity was positively correlated with the number of deep CMBs [γ=0.054; R2, 0.405; p<0.0001].

 Conclusions:
 In acute stroke setting, we ascertained that cnm-positive S.mutans is independently associated with deep CMBs and ICH, and inflammation may have a mechanistic link.


This paper examines the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) of 2017, the largest tax overhaul since 1986. The new tax law makes substantial changes to the rates and bases of both the individual and corporate income taxes, cutting the corporate income tax rate to 21 percent, redesigning international tax rules, and providing a deduction for pass-through income. TCJA will stimulate the economy in the near term. Most models indicate that the long-term impact on GDP will be small. The impact will be smaller on GNP than on GDP because the law will generate net capital inflows from abroad that have to be repaid in the future. The new law will reduce federal revenues by significant amounts, even after allowing for the modest impact on economic growth. It will make the distribution of after-tax income more unequal, raise federal debt, and impose burdens on future generations. When it is ultimately financed with spending cuts or other tax increases, as it must be in the long run, TCJA will, under the most plausible scenarios, end up making most households worse off than if TCJA had not been enacted. The new law simplifies taxes in some ways but creates new complexity and compliance issues in others. It will raise health care premiums and reduce health insurance coverage and will have adverse effects on charitable contributions and some state and local governments. Looking forward, the ultimate effects of TCJA will depend on the currently uncertain responses of other countries, the Federal Reserve Board, and future Congresses, among others.


Objective: To determine the association of serum osteoprotegerin (OPG) with the severity of chronic liver disease in female patients. Methods: This case-control study was conducted in Madina Teaching Hospital from 2019-2020.An institutional review board of University Medical and Dental College, The University of Faisalabad gave the approval to conduct the study. Only female patients of age group 40 to 60 years having CLD were included in this study. Total 80 participants were enrolled after fulfilling the inclusion and exclusion criteria. Serum OPG levels were measured by enzyme linked immunosorbant assay (ELISA) supplied by ELAB Sciences, USA. The severity of disease was assessed by Child-Pugh classification. Results: OPG levels were significantly different between the three Child-Pugh classes. OPG levels were significantly high in class C indicating increased level of this cytokine in CLD as compared to class A (p = <0.05). There was a positive association of OPG with splenomegaly (OR = 2.10, p = <0.001), hepatomegaly (OR = 4.41, (p = <0.05), skin pigmentation (OR = 2.06, p = <0.05), malena (OR = 1.87, p = <0.05) and prolonged bleeding (OR = 1.86, p = <0.05). Conclusion: The levels of serum Osteoprotegerin is increased in severe form of chronic liver disease (Class C) of Child-Pughs classification as compared to mild (Class A) and moderate (Class B) forms of Child-Pughs classification.


When a camera is used to provide the navigational parameters in autonomous vehicle operations, it is subjected to unexpected movements or vibrations of the mounting platform. This paper presents a framework for analyzing the effect of uncontrollable camera movements on the navigational parameters, in particular on the range and-heading angle in vision-based vehicle tracking. The noise introduced by the platform movements is modeled in two ways: camera noise approach and image noise approach. The parameter space of the camera is divided into a controllable subspace consisting of its height and depression angle, and an uncontrollable subspace consisting of the tracked object coordinates and rotation angle errors. A consistent detectable region is then obtained such that the tracked object is always seen by the camera. Based on this region, a reliable region consisting of no singularity points is established so that the range error does not become infinity. The optimum parameters of the controllable subspace with respect to the uncontrollable subspace are found by employing two estimation schemes: (a) the mini-max estimator to provide the worst case effect, and (b) the minimum-mean-square estimator to provide the average or overall effect. From the results obtained, it is shown how an optimum imaging geometry of a monocular vision-based tracking system can be designed in order to satisfy prescribed levels of range and heading angle errors. >


Abstract The recruitment and retention of faculty and students of color is a long-standing challenge in academic programs focusing on leisure studies, parks, recreation, and tourism. However, when confronting the predominantly white composition of educational programs, many evade or, at most, acknowledge the situation as a "deficit." Few offer specific strategies for reversing this pattern, if that is the desired outcome. The purpose of this essay is to extend the discourse beyond traditional diversity initiatives by undertaking a field-wide initiative focused on the disparities in faculty and student representation. First, the essay examines systems that have created and supported the persistence of "white" as privileged in academia. Next, a summary and critique of institutional faculty demographic data over the 5-year period from 2006–2011 from four diverse institutions are presented. This analysis illustrates patterns that have resulted in presumably less than desirable numbers of faculty and students of color. Concrete suggestions for recruiting, retaining, and promoting people of color in academic leisure studies programs are included. Increasingly, today's students are attracted to academic programs in which they will be exposed to faculty representing the diversity they will encounter as professionals. This essay offers a call to bridge the perceived gap between practitioners and academia by recommending systemic changes informed by the lived experiences of communities of color that are effectively served by various leisure service providers.


"Chihuly's originality lies in his refusal to believe that there are fixed rules that must be adhered to," wrote the late Henry Geldzahler, former curator of contemporary art of New York's Metropolitan Museum, in his essay for 'Chihuly Form From Fire'. Accompanying the artist's travelling retrospective, the 144-page book documents 10 of Chihuly's rule-breaking series from the Baskets, begun in the late 1970s, through the Pilchuck Stumps of 1992. Painter and art critic Walter Darby Bannard introduces the volume, which is more inclusive than a typical exhibition catalogue, with a personal response to Chihuly and his glass. Seventy-five full-colour reproductions and commentary on the individual series by the artist and noted authorities provide a visual and verbal overview of the artist's career. 'Chihuly Form From Fire' offers a definitive look at 'Chihuly As of 1993', as Geldzahler titled his provocative essay in which he asserts that Chihuly "does go over the top at times."


Sentiment classification concerns the use of automatic methods for predicting the orientation of subjective content on text documents, with applications on a number of areas including recommender and advertising systems, customer intelligence and information retrieval. SentiWordNet is an opinion lexicon derived from the WordNet database where each term is associated with numerical scores indicating positive and negative sentiment information. This research presents the results of applying the SentiWordNet lexical resource to the problem of automatic sentiment classification of film reviews. Our approach comprises counting positive and negative term scores to determine sentiment orientation, and an improvement is presented by building a data set of relevant features using SentiWordNet as source, and applied to a machine learning classifier. We find that results obtained with SentiWordNet are in line with similar approaches using manual lexicons seen in the literature. In addition, our feature set approach yielded improvements over the baseline term counting method. The results indicate SentiWordNet could be used as an important resource for sentiment classification tasks. Additional considerations are made on possible further improvements to the method and its use in conjunction with other techniques.


In an increasingly competitive market there is a keen interest among retailers to understand as much as possible about consumer behaviour. Advances in technology have presented retail marketers with many new research tools with which to monitor such behaviour. Alongside such advances in technology, however, have come accusations that some aspects of marketing and marketing research raise ethical issues. Those engaged in the use of new marketing and research methods therefore need to be aware of any potential public concerns and be seen to adhere rigorously to ethical practice. This paper examines the growing use of video surveillance within retail stores. The technique offers an objective and accurate research tool for retailers to monitor consumer behaviour. However, along with increasing use comes the potential danger of abuse, and the paper finds that few guidelines exist to assist retailers or researchers in managing this type of research.


In conventional water treatment stations, the filter cleaning is performed with the use of filtered water. To save water and obtain higher production, the use of polystyrene (PS) beads has been proposed as a granular filter element because it is a granular element with a low specific mass. By being lightweight, this material requires a lower water velocity during backwash. The PS beads were applied in a descending rapid filter and compared to a conventional sand and anthracite filter, and its hydraulic performance was evaluated during the backwash with air and water interspersed. Although it presents a high fluidity, with lower rates (compared to conventional filters) of backwash, this fact does not necessarily represent an economy of backwash water, because it requires more time for cleaning. It was also observed that there is an optimal value for the removal of particles collected during the filtration without loss of material.


Animals do have culture, maintains this delightfully illustrated and provocative book, which cites a number of fascinating instances of animal communication and learning. John Bonner traces the origins of culture back to the early biological evolution of animals and provides examples of five categories of behavior leading to nonhuman culture: physical dexterity, relations with other species, auditory communication within a species, geographic locations, and inventions or innovations. Defining culture as the transmission of information by behavioral rather than genetical means, he demonstrates the continuum between the traits we find in animals and those we often consider uniquely human.


A new method (Computerized LAyout Solutions using Simulated annealing —CLASS) that considers the inter-cell and intra-cell layout problems in a cellular manufacturing environment is presented. It addresses the relative placement of equidimensional manufacturing entities within a discrete solution space in an attempt to minimize the total material flow (cost) between these entities. An approach to accommodate the relative sizes of the entities is also presented. The method is based on simulated annealing, which has been successfully applied for the solution of combinatorial problems. A major advantage of this technique is the insensitivity of the final solution to the initial conditions. In addition, some important practical issues such as intra-cell layout of machines in predetermined configurations (e.g., row-wise or circular arrangements), have been addressed. Several comparisons were made with some of the existing approaches for facility layout, such as CRAFT, HC63-66, etc., that yielded results of equ...


This report is part of a broader OECD study into Future Global Shocks, examples of which could include a further failure of the global financial system and large-scale pandemics. The authors have concluded that very few single cyber-related events have the capacity to cause a global shock. Governments nevertheless need to make detailed preparations to withstand and recover from a wide range of unwanted cyber events, both accidental and deliberate. There are significant and growing risks of localised misery and loss as a result of compromise of computer and telecommunications services. In addition, reliable Internet and other computer facilities are essential in recovering from most other large-scale disasters.


The scaling out of Housing First (HF) programs was examined in six Canadian communities, in which a multi-component HF training and technical assistance (TTA) was provided. Three research questions were addressed: (a) What were the outcomes of the TTA in terms of the development of new, sustained, or enhanced programs, and fidelity to the HF model? (b) How did the TTA contribute to implementation and fidelity? and (c) What contextual factors facilitated or challenged implementation and fidelity? A total of 14 new HF programs were created, and nine HF programs were sustained or enhanced. Fidelity assessments for 10 HF programs revealed an average score of 3.3/4, which compares favorably with other HF programs during early implementation. The TTA influenced fidelity by addressing misconceptions about the model, encouraging team-based practice, and facilitating case-based dialogue on site specific implementation challenges. The findings were discussed in terms of the importance of TTA for enhancing the capacities of the HF service delivery system-practitioners, teams, and communities-while respecting complex community contexts, including differences in policy climate across sites. Policy climate surrounding accessibility of housing subsidies, and use of Assertive Community Treatment teams (vs. Intensive Case Management) were two key implementation issues.


PURPOSE
Provide evidence- and expert-based recommendations for optimal use of imaging in advanced prostate cancer. Due to increases in research and utilization of novel imaging for advanced prostate cancer, this guideline is intended to outline techniques available and provide recommendations on appropriate use of imaging for specified patient subgroups.

METHODS
An Expert Panel was convened with members from ASCO and the Society of Abdominal Radiology, American College of Radiology, Society of Nuclear Medicine and Molecular Imaging, American Urological Association, American Society for Radiation Oncology, and Society of Urologic Oncology to conduct a systematic review of the literature and develop an evidence-based guideline on the optimal use of imaging for advanced prostate cancer. Representative index cases of various prostate cancer disease states are presented, including suspected high-risk disease, newly diagnosed treatment-naïve metastatic disease, suspected recurrent disease after local treatment, and progressive disease while undergoing systemic treatment. A systematic review of the literature from 2013 to August 2018 identified fully published English-language systematic reviews with or without meta-analyses, reports of rigorously conducted phase III randomized controlled trials that compared ≥ 2 imaging modalities, and noncomparative studies that reported on the efficacy of a single imaging modality.

RESULTS
A total of 35 studies met inclusion criteria and form the evidence base, including 17 systematic reviews with or without meta-analysis and 18 primary research articles.

RECOMMENDATIONS
One or more of these imaging modalities should be used for patients with advanced prostate cancer: conventional imaging (defined as computed tomography [CT], bone scan, and/or prostate magnetic resonance imaging [MRI]) and/or next-generation imaging (NGI), positron emission tomography [PET], PET/CT, PET/MRI, or whole-body MRI) according to the clinical scenario.


Hydraulic flocculators are principally characterized by their volume (which determines the time of flocculation) and the water level difference between inlet and outlet (which determines the average energy dissipation). Within these constraints, however, the designer has many degrees of freedom, such as the average water depth, the number and spacing of baffles, the length of the gap at the baffle ends, and the degree to which adjoining baffles overlap. In an earlier paper (Haarhoff 1998), these variables were systematically reduced to a number of critical ratios, and a comprehensive mathematical framework was presented whereby hydraulic flocculators can be designed once these ratios are fixed. In this paper, these ratios are further investigated by computational fluid dynamics (CFD) to find their optimal values. The validity of CFD modelling is first verified by comparing experimentally measured velocities in two flocculators against modelled velocities for similar hydraulic conditions. CFD is then used to systematically optimize the three critical design ratios for flocculator design. The optimal ratios are considered to be those that cause the least deviation from the average G -value; addressing the concern that there may be large G -value differences at different points in the flocculator.


Based on observations of the early Universe, we know that shortly after the Big Bang, the Universe was composed almost entirely of neutral hydrogen and neutral helium. However, observations of nearby quasars suggest that the gas between galaxies today is neutral to less than one part in 10^4. Thus, it must be the case that some process occurred that stripped the electrons from almost all atoms in the intergalactic medium. Understanding the timing and nature of this process, dubbed ``reionization'', is one of the great outstanding problems in astrophysics and cosmology today. In this thesis, we develop several methods for utilizing existing and future measurements in order to make progress toward this end. We begin by proposing two novel approaches for searching for signatures of underlying neutral hydrogen in the Lya and Lyb forest of distant quasars. We show that, if the Universe is >5% neutral at z ~ 5.5, then damping-wing absorption from neutral hydrogen and absorption from primordial deuterium should leave observable imprints in the Lya and Lyb forest, respectively. Furthermore, the presence of neutral islands should qualitatively alter the size distribution of absorbed regions. We continue by discussing the ability for the intergalactic medium to retain a thermal memory of the reionization process at redshifts z ~ 5, which in turn affects the small-scale structure in the Lya forest. Motivated by this, we model the temperature of the intergalactic medium after reionization and develop a temperature measurement technique that should be able to distinguish between scenarios where reionization ends at z ~ 6 and at z ~ 10. Lastly, we turn our attention to 21-cm observations during reionization. We demonstrate that, while precise mapping of 21-cm emission from neutral hydrogen should be infeasible by first and second generation interferometers, it may be possible to make crude maps of the reionization process and identify individual ionized regions. This would provide us with direct confirmation that we are observing reionization and provide information regarding its timing and the nature of the ionizing sources. Degree Type Dissertation Degree Name Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) Graduate Group Physics & Astronomy First Advisor Adam Lidz


Research for this paper was carried out in the context of the SECURE project (Security of Energy Considering its Uncertainties, Risks and Economic Implications), funded by the European Commission under the Seventh Framework Programme. The project aims to develop appropriate tools for evaluating the vulnerability of the EU to the different energy supply risks, and for promoting the optimisation of EU energy insecurity mitigation strategies, including investment, demand side management and dialogue with producing countries. This paper considers geopolitical threats to oil and the functioning of the international oil market.


Arsenic has been used as an effective chemotherapy agent for some human cancers, such as acute promyelocytic leukemia. In this study, we found that arsenic induces activation of c-Jun NH2-terminal kinases (JNKs) at a similar dose range for induction of apoptosis in JB6 cells. In addition, we found that arsenic did not induce p53-dependent transactivation. Similarly, there was no difference in apoptosis induction between cells with p531/1 or p53 2/2. In contrast, arsenic-induced apoptosis was almost totally blocked by expression of a dominant-negative mutant of JNK1. These results suggest that the activation of JNKs is involved in arsenic-induced apoptosis of JB6 cells. Taken together with previous findings that p53 mutations are involved in ;50% of all human cancers and nearly all chemotherapeutic agents kill cancer cells mainly by apoptotic induction, we suggest that arsenic may be a useful agent for the treatment of cancers with p53 mutation.


In this paper, we discuss potential developments of the world natural gas industry at the horizon of 2030. We use the World Gas Model (WGM), a dynamic, strategic representation of world natural gas production, trade, and consumption between 2005 and 2030. We specify a "base case" which defines the business-as-usual assumptions based on forecasts of the world energy markets. We then analyze the sensitivity of the world natural gas system with scenarios: i) the emergence of large volumes of unconventional North American natural gas reserves, such as shale gas; ii) on the contrary, tightly constrained reserves of conventional natural gas reserves in the world; and iii) the impact of CO2-constraints and the emergence of a competing environmental friendly "backstop technology". Regional scenarios that have a global impact are: iv) the full halt of Russian and Caspian natural gas exports to Western Europe; v) sharply constrained production and export activities in the Arab Gulf; vi) heavily increasing demand for natural gas in China and India; and finally vii) constraints on liquefied natural gas (LNG) infrastructure development on the US Pacific Coast. Our results show considerable changes in production, consumption, traded volumes, and prices between the scenarios. Investments in pipelines, LNG terminals and storage are also affected. However, overall the world natural gas industry is resilient to local disturbances and can compensate local supply disruptions with natural gas from other sources. Long-term supply security does not seem to be at risk.


PORPOSE: To assess the value of endovascular packing of intracranial bifurcation aneurysms with commercially available coils. METHODS: Carotid bifurcation aneurysms were surgically created in 12 New Zealand rabbits with subsequent assessment of the extent of aneurysm ablation following endovascular packing with polyester fiber-coated platinum coils. RESOLTS: Follow-up angiograms obtained from 29 to 1 08 days postprocedures showed various degrees of aneurysm ablation. Complete obliteration of aneurysm dome occurred in seven out of eight rabbits, while ablation of aneurysm neck was successful in only one out of eight. No spontaneous thrombosis was observed in seven control animals over a 3-month period. Coils of various configurations used in this experiment all maintained stable intraaneurysmal position. Histologic examination of treated aneurysms consistently demonstrated extensive proliferation of spindle cells on the coil surface and in interstices between coils with channels lined by cells resembling endothelial cells. Organized thrombus was not a prominent feature. CONCLOSION: Endovascular packing of human bifurca tion aneurysms with current commercially available polyester fiber-coated platinum coils may not result in complete obliteration of the aneurysm with reendothelialization occurring across the aneurysm neck.


While there is a great deal of anecdotal evidence on the economic effects of adverse health shocks, there is relatively little hard empirical evidence. The author builds on recent empirical work to explore in the context of postreform Vietnam two related issues: (1) how far household income and medical care spending responds to health shocks, and (2) how far household consumption is protected against health shocks. The results suggest that adverse health shocks - captured by negative changes in body mass index (BMI) - are associated with reductions in earned income. This appears to be only partly - if at all - due to a reverse feedback from income changes to BMI changes. By contrast, there is a hint - the relevant coefficient is not significant - that adverse BMI shocks may result in increases in unearned income. This may reflect additional gifts, remittances, and so on, from family and friends following the health shock. Medical spending is found to increase following an adverse health shock, but not among those with health insurance. The impact for the uninsured is large, equal in absolute size to the income loss associated with a BMI shock. The lack of impact for the insured points to complete insurance against the medical care costs associated with health shocks, and is consistent with the very generous coverage of Vietnam's health insurance program in this period. The question arises: have Vietnamese households been able to hold their food and nonfood consumption constant in the face of these income reductions and extra medical care outlays? The results suggest not. For the sample as a whole, both food and nonfood consumption are found to be responsive to health shocks, indicating an inability to smooth nonmedical consumption in the face of health shocks. Further analysis reveals some interesting differences across different groups within the sample. Households with insurance come no closer to smoothing nonmedical consumption than uninsured households. Furthermore, and somewhat counterintuitively, better-off households - including insured households - fare worse than poorer households in smoothing their nonmedical consumption in the face of health shocks, despite the fact that in the case of insured households there are no medical bills associated with an adverse health event. Why the poor rely on dissaving and borrowing to such an extent, and do not apparently reduce their food and nonfood consumption following an adverse health shock while the better-off do, may be because the levels of food and nonfood consumption of the poor are simply too low relative to basic needs to enable them to cut back in the face of an adverse BMI shock.


The detection of viruses is of interest for a number of fields including biomedicine, environmental science, and biosecurity. Of particular interest are methods that do not require expensive equipment or trained personnel, especially if the results can be read by the naked eye. A new "double imprinting" method was developed whereby a virus-bioimprinted hydrogel is further micromolded into a diffraction grating sensor by using imprint-lithography techniques to give a "Molecularly Imprinted Polymer Gel Laser Diffraction Sensor" (MIP-GLaDiS). A simple laser transmission apparatus was used to measure diffraction, and the system can read by the naked eye to detect the Apple Stem Pitting Virus (ASPV) at concentrations as low as 10 ng mL(-1), thus setting the limit of detection of these hydrogels as low as other antigen-binding methods such as ELISA or fluorescence-tag systems.


The biological visual system possesses the ability to compute layered surface representations, in which one surface is represented as being viewed through another. This ability is remarkable because, in scenes involving transparency, the link between surface topology and image topology is greatly complicated by the collapse of the photometric contributions of two distinct surfaces onto image intensity. Previous analysis of transparency has focused largely on the role of different kinds of junctions. Although junctions are important, they are not sufficient to predict layered surface structure. We present an algorithm that propagates local junction information by searching for chains of polarity-preserving junctions with consistent 'sidedness', and then propagates the transparency labeling into interior regions. The algorithm outputs a layered representation specifying: (i) the distinct surfaces, (ii) their depth ordering, and (iii) their surface attributes. We demonstrate the results of the algorithm on a number of images - both synthetic and real. We end by considering implications for related domains, such as shading.


Proceedings: AACR 101st Annual Meeting 2010‐‐ Apr 17‐21, 2010; Washington, DC

We analyzed the association between meat intake, heterocyclic amines and bladder cancer (BC) risk using data collected in a large case-control study. The study included 884 histologically confirmed BC cases and 878 healthy controls matched to cases by age (± 5 years), gender and ethnicity. Epidemiologic and dietary data were collected using structured questionnaires via an in-person interview. Dietary intake was reported on the National Cancer Institute- Block 135-item food frequency questionnaire (FFQ). Multivariate unconditional logistic regression was used to estimate odds ratios (ORs) and the 95% confidence intervals (95% CI). Compared to those in the lowest quartile of total red meat intake, the ORs for the second, third and fourth quartiles of total red meat intake were 1.04 (95% CI: 0.78-1.39), 1.58 (95% CI: 1.19-2.10), and 1.49 (95% CI:1.21-1.99), respectively (P-for trend =0.001). Higher intakes of beef steaks, pork chops and bacon were each associated with increased BC risk in a dose-response pattern. For example, the ORs for the second, third and fourth quartiles of beef steak intake were 1.04 (95% CI: 0.78-1.39), 1.19 (95% CI: 0.89-1.57), and 1.54 (95% CI: 1.17-2.04), respectively (P-for trend =0.001). In addition, high intake of fried chicken and fried fish also conferred significantly increased risk. When assessed in doneness level, compared to the rare done level, intakes of red meat with medium done and well done level were associated with 1.46- fold (95% CI: 1.13-1.89) and 1.94-fold (95% CI: 1.52-2.49) increased risk (P for trend<0.001). Intakes of heterocyclic amine (HCA) were available in a subset of 177 cases and 306 controls. Compared to the first quartile (the lowest quartile of intake), the ORs for the second, third, and fourth quartiles were 1.18 (95% CI: 0.63-2.23), 1.64 (95% CI: 0.89-3.00), and 2.58 (95% CI: 1.43-4.66), respectively (P for trend<0.001). We further assessed joint effects of red meat and genetic variants in the pathways relevant to HCA metabolism. We found that the risk associated with high red meat intake was most significant among subjects carrying high number of unfavorable genotypes in the pathway. Compared with subjects in the lowest quartile of red meat intake and who carried low number of unfavorable genotypes (less than 6), subjects carrying seven or more unfavorable genotypes and whose red meat intake was in the highest quartile were at 4.74-fold increased risk (95% CI=2.78-8.10; P<0.001). These results strongly support that red meat intake and genetic variants in the HCA metabolic pathways jointly influence bladder cancer susceptibility.

Citation Format: {Authors}. {Abstract title} [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the 101st Annual Meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research; 2010 Apr 17-21; Washington, DC. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2010;70(8 Suppl):Abstract nr 2825.


How can we increase economic well-being and expand trade, while promoting the optimal use of the world's energy resources and protecting and preserving our shared environment? The challenge is daunting and complex. This volume of presentations and discussions from a conference on the intersection of trade, energy and the environment addresses the international or cross-border problems that arise at this intersection, the current international regulatory framework and how this framework could be improved.Institutionally, as WTO Director-General Pascal Lamy phrased it, the "core question" is "whether we need a new, more comprehensive global governance in energy" and if so, "what the form and content of such governance should be and in what institutional setting" and "what would be the WTO role in this new energy governance?"With climate change imperatives imposing different costs on carbon emissions in different countries, and trade in energy-intensive products representing a substantial part of global trade flows, trade is destined to become the "interface" between potentially otherwise disconnected national climate change regimes.One of the conference's conclusions was that the current WTO rule book offers a surprisingly large array of solutions to relatively novel energy and environment problems such as energy transit questions, import restrictions on renewable energy or subsidy disciplines applied to both fossil fuels and alternative energy. Even if these rules were not written with energy in mind, they can be applied in this new light. The big question in this respect is whether such "evolutionary interpretation" can be left in the hands of the WTO dispute settlement system (and, in particular, its seven member Appellate Body), or if it would be better handled through a political renegotiation of the agreements or explicit new rules on energy (as occurred in the EC).


In 2002 and 2003, the George W. Bush Administration stressed that Iraq posed a danger to the safety and security of the United States through the fear that Iraq was developing an arsenal of chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons. The United States and its allies subsequently invaded Iraq in March 2003 and this conflict, commonly referred to as the "Iraq War," continues into its sixth year (Wong, 2008). The United States has incurred massive human and financial expenditures through its involvement in Iraq. It is estimated that total spending on the Iraq war will cost the United States up to $3 trillion to fund current military operations along with the expenses of paying the long-term disability costs of injured military personnel, death benefits sent to the families of those killed in Iraq, and interest fees paid by the United States Treasury to borrow money to fund current expenditures (Bilmes & Stiglitz, 2008). More importantly, as of October 4, 2008, a total of 4,169 United States military service members have lost their lives in this conflict (U.S. Department of Defense, 2008). Further, the organization "Iraq Body Count" estimates that through mid October 2008, 88,373 to 96,466 Iraq citizens have been killed since the March 2003 invasion (Iraq Body Count, 2008). The American public as well as rehabilitation professionals are increasingly developing awareness of these realities. In addition to television programs, newspaper stories, and radio shows, an especially effective source of awareness are first-hand accounts of the horrors and aftermaths of combat chronicled in such books as In An Instant: A Family's Journey of Love and Healing (Woodruff & Woodruff, 2007) and Rule Number Two." Lessons I Learned in a Combat Hospital (Kraft, 2007). Such accounts educate readers that those who are fighting in Iraq face the significant potential of incurring a chronic disability or illness. Two of the most common chronic conditions now experienced are traumatic brain injury (TBI) and posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). TBI and PTSD are commonly referred to as the "signature" injuries of military personnel serving in the Iraq War (Fairweather & Garcia, 2007). The need to develop and facilitate specialized care and rehabilitative services for veterans impacted by this modern disability is of paramount importance. An estimated 22% of all Operation Iraqi and Enduring Freedom (OIF/OEF) combat injuries involve some form of brain damage (Summerall, 2008). Also, the California Community Foundation (2008) estimates one in five service members who engaged in OIF/OEF military operations develop PTSD or major depression. The unique nature of how military personnel incur combatrelated injuries presents the emergence of a new disability for rehabilitation counselors and other health professionals to confront. Many combat-injured military personnel are returning from the Iraqi conflict with the simultaneous onset of both TBI and PTSD. Volatile combat conditions, which frequently entail the infliction of blast-related polytrauma, increase military personnel's likelihood to experience both conditions (Kennedy et al., 2007). Living with both disabilities presents a unique array of challenges that is distinct from singularly living with either TBI or PTSD. The purpose of this article is to help prepare rehabilitation counselors and other professionals to address the unique needs of this emerging client population for vocational rehabilitation, independent living, and family support. Specifically, we will provide (a) an overview of the injury sequelae of TBI and PTSD, (b) the challenges in living with TBI combined with PTSD, and (c) available interventions and support services. An Overview of the Injury Sequelae of TBI and PTSD With over 1.6 million military personnel deployed in coordination with Operations Iraqi and Enduring Freedom (California Community Foundation, 2008), and close to 30,000 troops wounded in action (Defense Link, 2008) the need for optimal, specialized rehabilitation services for veterans impacted by the combination of TBI and PTSD is imperative. …


Montelukast is a leukotriene receptor antagonist that is used to treat allergy and asthma. It acts as a cysteinyl leukotriene receptor antagonist that blocks the action of leukotrienes and decreases inflammation. This agent is generally well tolerated in clinical practice. Although montelukast is generally considered as a safe drug, it can cause a few adverse drug reactions. In this case study, a rare side effect of montelukast that has been reported only twice before is presented. The importance of this case report is that the youngest patient who had ecchymosis due to the use of montelukast treatment is reported