The Internet augments the informational flows that organize biographies in late modernity. Sufferers of bipolar disorder (manic depression) may turn to the Internet for accessible information, to learn about others' experiences and impart their own knowledge. Personal accounts posted in the public domain become themselves part of those informational flows, and thus acquire a dual life at a boundary between private and public domains. This poses certain challenges for the investigation of computer-mediated autobiographical telling, which are identified in this paper and negotiated in an analysis of downloaded personal accounts of bipolar disorder. Two of the stories are selected for a close look. Story 1 tells about achieving long-term remission through personal resolve and psychological alternatives to medication. Story 2 tells about becoming able to talk about the illness through the achievement of a social identity as "manic depressive". The stories' similarities, differences, and comparability with the other texts are discussed with a view to theorizing how such texts position their implied author in the illness experience. Building upon Bakhtin's idea of a text's plan and its realization, a concept of "identity commitments" as textual properties is proposed. (Narrative identity, Computer-mediated communication, Bipolar disorder, Bakhtin)


The expression of adhesive pili, also known as fimbriae, is an important characteristic of pathogenic bacteria. Uropathogenic Escherichia coli contain multiple fimbrial gene clusters yet normally express only one fimbrial type at any given time. Xia et al. demonstrate that PapB, a regulator of the expression of P fimbriae, encoded by the pap gene cluster, also regulates expression of type 1 fimbriae, encoded by the fim gene cluster. The type 1 fimbriae operon is regulated by switching the orientation of the promoter for the main fim gene from the on-to-off orientation by the FimE and FimB recombinases and from the off-to-on orientation by the FimB recombinase. PapB increases the on-to-off transition by increasing FimE expression and inhibits the off-to-on transition by directly blocking the activity of the FimB recombinase at the fim switch. This cross talk between the pap and fim gene clusters provides a mechanism for expression of only a single fimbrial type. Xia, Y., Gally, D., Forsman-Semb, K., and Uhlin, B.E. (2000) Regulatory cross-talk between adhesin operons in Escherichia coli: inhibition of type 1 fimbriae expression by the PapB protein. EMBO J. 19: 1450-1457. [Abstract] [Full Text]


The ability to discriminate between different inks and to determine the length of time an ink has been on a substrate can provide important scientific evidence, especially in cases involving document fraud. Many techniques have been used to analyse inks for ink dating including chromatography and spectroscopy, but the results are unreliable as a result of factors affecting the aging process such as light. This study utilises established techniques in Forensic Document Examination, including filtered light examination but also novel techniques for ink analysis; Atmospheric Pressure Chemical Ionisation (APCI) to analyse inks and dyes with the aim of discriminating between samples based on their degradation products. APCI-MS was used for the first time to study nineteen ballpoint pens from a range of manufacturers by investigating the chemical processes that occur and the products that are formed following the deposition of ink onto a substrate and in solution. Monitoring the degradation process as an ink ages and fades enables the identification of components present in the inks. Using molecular mass data, accurate ink component identifications could be made over a period of two years on samples subjected to a range of external influences. Light, hydrogen peroxide and sodium hypochlorite bleach were used to simulate natural and deliberate fading of inks and dye solutions. Benzophenone and phenol molecules were identified as degradation products but their presence differed for each of the different conditions tested such as no phenol products when bleach was used. This novel approach to ink analysis utilises existing equipment commonly used by document examiner to analyse inks that are old or faded in some way, in order to discriminate between the inks or determine method of alteration


According to Einstein's theory of general relativity the light of an object is deflected by a mass in its foreground. The deflections can be very weak or so strong that they are visible by eye yielding strangely distorted arcs or even multiple images of the same source. Measurements of strong or weak lensing let us infer the total mass of the light-deflecting object which is an important cosmological observable. In this thesis we employ gravitational lensing to measure key cosmological observables, such as dark matter and dark energy.
Instead of observing the effects of gravitational lensing around single galaxies or galaxy clusters, the Universe itself can be used as a lens: light travelling to us through the cosmic large-scale structure is also weakly lensed by it. Measuring this effect at different cosmic times allows us to infer the evolution of structure in the cosmic web. Hence, we can study how that is affected by dark energy or massive neutrinos.
A key result of this thesis is that we find a lower amplitude for the clustering of matter at fixed matter density than that inferred from the most recent measurements of the
cosmic microwave background radiation by the Planck satellite.


A central challenge of coastal ecology is sorting out the interacting spatial and temporal components of environmental variability that combine to drive changes in phytoplankton biomass. For 2 decades, we have combined sustained observation and experimentation in South San Francisco Bay (SSFB) with numerical modeling analyses to search for general principles that define phyto- plankton population responses to physical dynamics characteristic of shallow, nutrient-rich coastal waters having complex bathymetry and influenced by tides, wind and river flow. This study is the latest contribution where we investigate light-limited phytoplankton growth using a numerical model, by modeling turbidity as a function of suspended sediment concentrations (SSC). The goal was to explore the sensitivity of estuarine phytoplankton dynamics to spatial and temporal variations in turbidity, and to synthesize outcomes of simulation experiments into a new conceptual framework for defining the combinations of physical-biological forcings that promote or preclude development of phytoplankton blooms in coastal ecosystems. The 3 main conclusions of this study are: (1) The timing of the wind with semidiurnal tides and the spring-neap cycle can significantly enhance spring- neap variability in turbidity and phytoplankton biomass; (2) Fetch is a significant factor potentially affecting phytoplankton dynamics by enhancing and/or creating spatial variability in turbidity; and (3) It is possible to parameterize the combined effect of the processes influencing turbidity —and thus affecting potential phytoplankton bloom development —with 2 indices for vertical and horizontal clearing of the water column. Our conceptual framework is built around these 2 indices, providing a means to determine under what conditions a phytoplankton bloom can occur, and whether a poten- tial bloom is only locally supported or system-wide in scale. This conceptual framework provides a tool for exploring the inherent light climate attributes of shallow estuarine ecosystems and helps determine susceptibility to the harmful effects of nutrient enrichment.


This paper uses corpus-based methods to explore how British Parliamentary arguments against LGBT equality have changed in response to decreasing social acceptability of discriminatory language against minority groups. A comparison of the language of opposition to the equalisation of the age of consent for anal sex (1998–2000) is made to the oppositional language in debates to allow same-sex marriage (2013). Keyword, collocation and concordance analyses were used to identify differences in overall argumentation strategies, assessing the extent to which previously explicit homophobic speech (e.g. homosexuality as unnatural) has been replaced by more indirect strategies (e.g. less use of personalised argumentation via the pronoun I). We argue that while homophobic language appears to be on the decrease in such contexts, there is a mismatch between words and acts, requiring analysts to acknowledge the presence of more subtle indications of homophobic discourse in the future.


One of the bedrock principles of contemporary international law is that victims of human rights violations have a right to an "effective remedy." International courts usually hold that effective remedies must at least make the victim whole, and they sometimes adopt even stronger remedial rules for particular categories of human rights violations. Moreover, courts have refused to permit departure from these rules on the basis of competing social interests. Human rights scholars have not questioned this approach, frequently pushing for even stronger judicial remedies for rights violations. Yet in many cases, strong and inflexible remedial rules can perversely undermine human rights enforcement. Institutional constraints often make it impractical or highly costly for international courts to issue remedies for the violations they recognize. Inflexible remedial rules raise the collateral costs of providing remedies and often drive courts to circumvent those costs by narrowing their substantive interpretations of rights, raising the prejudice threshold required to trigger a remedy or erecting procedural hurdles that allow them to avoid considering the claim at all. This Article illustrates these "remedial deterrence" effects primarily with examples from the procedural rights case law of the International Criminal Tribunals for Rwanda and for the former Yugoslavia - two courts that face particularly stark remedial costs. It then argues that similar dynamics are likely at other international courts, though their degree, form, and consequences will vary based on each court's particular objectives and constraints.Although some degree of remedial deterrence is inevitable and legitimate, extreme remedial-cost pressures - like those often present in international criminal proceedings - result in severe doctrinal distortions that subvert the purpose of international courts' strong remedial rules. Because victims cannot be granted lesser remedies, they often receive no remedy at all. This overkill effect is magnified because the doctrinal distortions spill over to other cases lacking similar remedial costs and to domestic courts and other actors that follow international judicial precedent, even though they do not share the same institutional constraints. To mitigate these consequences, this Article makes two sets of recommendations. First, international courts' structures and procedures should be designed to avoid excessive remedial deterrence pressures. This Article offers specific proposals for international criminal tribunals. Second, international courts should modify their approach to the effective remedy requirement, allowing some degree of equitable balancing of interests. Such an approach would promote judicial candor and enable courts to avoid untenable remedial costs without unduly distorting other doctrines.


This article reports on Web 2.0, the end of cyberspace, and the internet of things. It proposes that these concepts have synergies both with the current fashion for modifying physical objects with the features of virtual objects, as evidenced in O'Reilly's MAKE magazine and similar projects, and with the potential technologies for collective intelligence described by Bruce Sterling, Adam Greenfield, Julian Bleecker and others. It considers Alex Pang's research on the end of cyberspace and asks whether the 'new' of new media writing will have any meaning in a world that is updated by the microsecond every time there is fresh activity in the system.


The purpose of this study was to show the antidiabetic effect of ethanolic extract of Aloe vera gel in alloxan induced hyperglycaemic mice. Ethanolic extract of Aloe vera gel was orally administered for four weeks at a dose of 300mg/kg body weight. Weekly estimates of fasting blood glucose level in normal non-diabetic and alloxan induced hyperglycaemic mice were assessed. Ethanolic Aloe vera gel extract revealed no blood glucose lowering action upon non-diabetic mice. But, a significant reduction in blood glucose level (p<0.001) was seen in diabetic mice, when compared with diabetic control. Similar results were found when compared with a standard antidiabetic drug, gliclazide. To conclude, as administration of ethanolic extract of Aloe vera gel significantly reduces blood glucose level in hyperglycaemic mice, it can optimistically emerge as a new hope in the management of diabetes mellitus. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.3329/bjpp.v30i2.22680 Bangladesh J Physiol Pharmacol 2014; 30(2): 25-31


The Scottish Atlantic Iron Age is recognised as falling into four periods, the EIA, MIA, LIA I and LIA II. Least is known of the LIA I, the immediate post-broch period. Original analysis of the C-14 record confirms these divisions; they result as a combination of the effects of the Trondheim calibration curve but mainly the history of archaeological survival and previous excavation strategy. A large data base of pins and combs is examined and analysed, following on the earlier work of Stevenson (1955a), because these are some of the more ubiquitous and chronologically sensitive artefacts belonging to the LIA. This provides the basis for a reconsideration of the nature of LIA settlement throughout the Atlantic Province as a whole, more particularly in the study area of Orkney and Caithness. There are still severe problems in recognising LIA, particularly LIA I activity. This analysis forms the basis for a case study of Orkney and Caithness from around the early centuries of the first millennium BC to the eighth or ninth century AD. A scheme is suggested for the structural developments witnessed over this period, and on the basis of the general trends observed, a social interpretation is put forward. An attempt is made to apply Fields of Discourse, which is contrasted with previous work in this area, because of its sound methodological approach. Archaeological application of the technique of access analysis is described and used to investigate how the use of space structured and reproduced these changing social relations. The shift from locally based power sources to more centralised, in relation to Orkney and Caithness more distant, sources of authority is demonstrated, and related to the development of the southern Pictish kingdom. This change reflects the move from intensive to extensive sources of power. Other aspects of social reproduction are examined to see if they fit within this framework. On analogy with contemporary situations elsewhere and the evidence to hand, the means by which this power may have been exercised, specifically changing agricultural practice and land tenure, and the ideological power of Christianity are speculated upon.


In non‐randomized studies, estimation of treatment effects generally requires adjustment for imbalances in observed covariates. One such method, based on the propensity score, is useful in many applications but may be biased when the assumption of strongly ignorable treatment assignment is violated. Because it is not possible to evaluate this assumption from the data, it is advisable to assess the sensitivity of conclusions to violations of strong ignorability. Lin et al. (Biomet. 1998; 54:948–963) have implemented this idea by investigating how an unmeasured covariate may affect the conclusions of an observational study. We extend their method to assess sensitivity of the treatment hazard ratio to hidden bias under a range of covariate distributions. We derive simple formulas for approximating the true from the apparent treatment hazard ratio estimated under a specific survival model, and assess the validity of these formulas in simulation studies. We demonstrate the method in an analysis of SEER‐Medicare data on the effects of chemotherapy in elderly colon cancer patients.Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.


BACKGROUND
Tonsillectomy continues to be one of the most common surgical procedures performed in children and adults. Despite improvements in surgical and anaesthetic techniques, postoperative morbidity, mainly in the form of pain, remains a significant clinical problem. Postoperative bacterial infection of the tonsillar fossa has been proposed as an important factor causing pain and associated morbidity, and some studies have found a reduction in morbid outcomes following the administration of perioperative antibiotics.

OBJECTIVES
To determine whether perioperative antibiotics reduce pain and other morbid outcomes following tonsillectomy.

SEARCH STRATEGY
Cochrane ENT Group Trials Register, Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials (CENTRAL) (The Cochrane Library, Issue 1 2007), MEDLINE (1950 to 2007) and EMBASE (1974 to 2007) were searched. The date of the last search was March 2007.

SELECTION CRITERIA
All randomised controlled trials examining the impact of perioperative administration of systemic antibiotics on post-tonsillectomy morbidity in children or adults.

DATA COLLECTION AND ANALYSIS
Two authors independently collected data. Primary outcomes were pain, consumption of analgesia and secondary haemorrhage (defined as significant if patient re-admitted, transfused blood products or returned to theatre, and total if any documented haemorrhage). Secondary outcomes were fever, time taken to resume normal diet and activities and adverse events. Where possible, summary measures were generated using random-effects models.

MAIN RESULTS
Nine trials met the eligibility criteria. Most did not find a significant reduction in pain with antibiotics. Similarly, antibiotics were not shown to be effective in reducing the need for analgesics. Antibiotics were not associated with a reduction in significant secondary haemorrhage rates (Relative Risk (RR) 0.49, 95% CI 0.08 to 3.11, P = 0.45) or total secondary haemorrhage rates (RR 0.92, 95% CI 0.45 to 1.87, P = 0.81). With regard to secondary outcomes, antibiotics reduced the proportion of subjects with fever (RR 0.63, 95% CI 0.46 to 0.85, P = 0.002).

AUTHORS' CONCLUSIONS
The present review suggests that there is little or no evidence that antibiotics reduce the main morbid outcomes following tonsillectomy (i.e. pain, the need for analgesia or secondary haemorrhage rates). They do however appear to reduce fever. Some important methodological shortcomings exist in the included trials which are likely to have produced bias favouring antibiotics. We therefore advocate caution when prescribing antibiotics routinely to all patients undergoing tonsillectomy. Whether a subgroup of patients who might benefit from selective administration of antibiotics exists is unknown and needs to be explored in future trials.


Database administrators versed in DB2 wanting to learn more about advanced database administration activities and students wishing to gain knowledge to help them pass the DB2 9 UDB Advanced DBA certification exam will find this exhaustive reference invaluable. Written by two individuals who were part of the team that developed the certification exam, this comprehensive study guide prepares the student for challenging questions on database design; data partitioning and clustering; high availability diagnostics; performance and scalability; security and encryption; connectivity and networking; and much more. Providing sample questions in each chapter, a complete practice test modeled after the actual exam, and an extensive answer key providing full explanations for each correct answer, readers will find this to be a key resource in stimulating the learning process.


Automatic linguistic indexing of pictures is an important but highly challenging problem for researchers in computer vision and content-based image retrieval. In this paper, we introduce a statistical modeling approach to this problem. Categorized images are used to train a dictionary of hundreds of statistical models each representing a concept. Images of any given concept are regarded as instances of a stochastic process that characterizes the concept. To measure the extent of association between an image and the textual description of a concept, the likelihood of the occurrence of the image based on the characterizing stochastic process is computed. A high likelihood indicates a strong association. In our experimental implementation, we focus on a particular group of stochastic processes, that is, the two-dimensional multiresolution hidden Markov models (2D MHMMs). We implemented and tested our ALIP (Automatic Linguistic Indexing of Pictures) system on a photographic image database of 600 different concepts, each with about 40 training images. The system is evaluated quantitatively using more than 4,600 images outside the training database and compared with a random annotation scheme. Experiments have demonstrated the good accuracy of the system and its high potential in linguistic indexing of photographic images.


Troubleshooting faults or performance disruptions in today's Internet is at best frustrating. When users experience performance or connectivity problems, there is little they can do. The most common attempt to solve the problem is to reboot or call the provider's hot line. Network providers have more information to use in diagnosing problems in their networks, but their network troubleshooting is often mostly manual and ad-hoc. We argue that automatically troubleshooting network faults or performance disruptions requires monitoring capabilities deployed at end-hosts (in or close to the customer's premises). End-host monitoring is necessary to detect the problems that affect end-users. In addition, when problems happen outside the control of the network administrator or the end-user performing the troubleshooting, end-host monitoring is the only approach to identify problem location. The goal of our research is to make network troubleshooting more transparent by designing tools that require as little as possible human involvement (both end-users and administrators). This document presents our initial steps towards automatic network troubleshooting from end-hosts as well as our long-term objectives. Our main contributions are the design of more accurate and efficient end-host measurement methods. We work both on techniques to detect faults and performance disruptions, and to identify the location of the problem. For fault identification, we improve the two basic techniques using end-to-end measurements: traceroute and network tomography. First, we show that traceroute, the most widely used diagnosis tool, reports erroneous paths in the presence of routers that perform load balancing. We build Paris traceroute to correct these errors. Second, we design measurement methods for accurate fault identification using network tomography. Network tomography assumes up-to-date and correlated measurements of the status of endto-end paths and of the network topology, which are hard to get in practice. We design techniques to track correlated path reachability and network topology. Finally, we design techniques for lightweight detection of faults and performance disruptions. We minimize the overhead of active end-to-end probing for fault detection and design a tool to collect passive measurements at end-hosts.


Objective: This research was conducted to screen inhibition of HIV-1 reverse transcriptase activity of selected Indonesia medicinal plants and to isolate HIV-1 reverse transcriptase inhibitor from Erythrina variegata leaves. Method: Screening inhibition of HIV-1 RT activity of selected Indonesia medicinal plants and isolated compounds were performed using HIV-1 RT colorimetric assay. The isolation of HIV-1 reverse transcriptase inhibitor was conducted using chromatography technique. The isolated compound was determined based on the data of UV, IR spectrophotometry, MS, 1D and 2D NMR spectroscopy. Results: Beside that, in vitro study of the leaves methanolic extract exhibited inhibition against HIV-1 RT activity with percent inhibition of 97.64% at concentration of 5 mg/mL. Ethyl acetate fraction from the extract showed the strongest HIV-1 RT inbitory activity with IC 50 of 429.28 μg/mL. Isolation the HIV-1 RT inhibitor from the fraction give compound 1. Conclusion: Erythryna variegata leave extract exhibited potent inhibition on HIV-1 RT activity. The isolated compound from the leaves was determined as apigenin-7-O-β-D-glucopyranoside and demonstrated HIV-1 RT inhibitory activity with the IC 50 value of 100.59 μg/mL. Key words: Erythrina variegata , Flavonoid, HIV-1 RT, in vitro .


Claims calculated to defend the shareholder franchise are often riveted by fears of insufficient accountability including those related to the fiduciary obligations of loyalty, good faith and care. Fretfulness about the shareholder franchise requires positioning along a continuum between accountability and authority as part of the interplay between Blasius and Unocal. The real question is whether Blasius adds anything in the context of a takeover battle despite the questionable claim that outside of contest for control, Blasius supplies an independent standard of review that properly constrains directorial discretion. It has been suggested that the application of Blasius alongside Unocal is functionally unhelpful and unnecessary. If correct, then the relationship between Blasius and Unocal/Unitrin doctrines is a fruitful subject for some doctrinal pruning. Although the case-law indicates that the board can neither completely block shareholders from receiving tender offers, nor halt all proxy contests, the compelling justification criterion, recently revitalized by MM Companies, Inc. v. Liquid Audio, Inc., raises questions pertaining to whether, and to what extent, Delaware courts will also apply the stringent Blasius standard of review where the actual ability to obtain control is not thwarted but where the challenged action merely dilutes the "substantial presence" of an insurgent on that board. It is possible that allowing the dilution of the influence of a potentially hostile bidder is consistent with the assumption that directors should retain discretionary control of a hierarchy that comes in the corporate form. By contrast, Liquid Audio, apparently, presents a model of when the compelling justification standard of Blasius must be applied within Unocal's requirement that any defensive measure be proportionate and reasonable in relation to the threat posed. The case implicates two contrasting conceptions of corporate governance: (A) that the power of managing the corporate enterprise is vested in the shareholders' duly elected board representatives; and (B) that shareholders as principals are not simply captives of the business judgment of directors who purportedly act as their agents; hence, authority remains firmly in the hands of stockholders. Additionally, this case involves another crucial tension in corporate governance today: the tension between deference to directors' decisions and the scope of judicial review. I apply director primacy analysis to criticize the courts and the predisposition of commentators to favor shareholder governance by exposing their opinions to the implications derived from the two principal alternative approaches to corporate governance - authority and accountability. Favoring the authority model that inevitably promotes director primacy, I contend shareholder choice may have little independent normative significance and that the appropriate, but necessarily limited, question is whether a board's decision foreclosing shareholder choice was based on proper or improper motives. In other words, did the board exercise its prerogative in ways that suggest that the transaction was driven by management self-interest? Or on the other hand, was the board properly motivated in its justifiable exercise of its discretion?


A series of fused nicotinonitrile derivatives was synthesized by reaction of 2,6-dioxonicotinonitrile derivative 1 with different electrophilic reagents. Reaction of pyridone 1 with benzyledine derivative 2, 3 and 7 afforded pyrano[2,3-b] pyridine 4 and 11 derivatives, respectively. Upon reaction of pyridone 1 with α,β-unsaturated carbonyl compounds and benzoyl isothiocyanate gave the corresponding pyridine derivatives 11-13 and 16, respectively, Morevere sulfurization and selenation of pyridone 1 with sulfur and selenium in the presence of triethyl amine afforded the fused pyridine 14 and 15, respectively. The structure of the new synthesized compounds was elucidated by IR, NMR and elemental analysis. Some of new synthesized pyridines were screnned for anticancer activity.


Reductive acetylation of the lipoyl domain (E2plip) of the dihydrolipoyl acetyltransferase component of the pyruvate dehydrogenase multienzyme complex of Escherichia coli is catalysed specifically by its partner pyruvate decarboxylase (E1p), and no productive interaction occurs with the analogous 2-oxoglutarate decarboxylase (E1o) of the 2-oxoglutarate dehydrogenase complex. Residues in the lipoyl-lysine beta-turn region of the unlipoylated E2plip domain (E2plip(apo)) undergo significant changes in both chemical shift and transverse relaxation time (T(2)) in the presence of E1p but not E1o. Residue Gly11, in a prominent surface loop between beta-strands 1 and 2 in the E2plip domain, was also observed to undergo a significant change in chemical shift. Addition of pyruvate to the mixture of E2plip(apo) and E1p caused larger changes in chemical shift and the appearance of multiple cross-peaks for certain residues, suggesting that the domain was experiencing more than one type of interaction. Residues in both beta-strands 4 and 5, together with those in the prominent surface loop and the following beta-strand 2, appeared to be interacting with E1p, as did a small patch of residues centred around Glu31. The values of T(2) across the polypeptide chain backbone were also lower than in the presence of E1p alone, suggesting that E2plip(apo) binds more tightly after the addition of pyruvate. The lipoylated domain (E2plip(holo)) also exhibited significant changes in chemical shift and decreases in the overall T(2) relaxation times in the presence of E1p, the residues principally affected being restricted to the half of the domain that contains the lipoyl-lysine (Lys41) residue. In addition, small chemical shift changes and a general drop in T(2) times in the presence of E1o were observed, indicating that E2plip(holo) can interact, weakly but non-productively, with E1o. It is evident that recognition of the protein domain is the ultimate determinant of whether reductive acetylation of the lipoyl group occurs, and that this is ensured by a mosaic of interactions with the Elp.


Abstract. Anthropogenic methane emissions originate from a large
number of relatively small point sources. The planned GHGSat satellite fleet
aims to quantify emissions from individual point sources by measuring methane
column plumes over selected ∼10×10 km2 domains with
≤50×50 m2 pixel resolution and 1 %–5 %
measurement precision. Here we develop algorithms for retrieving point source
rates from such measurements. We simulate a large ensemble of instantaneous
methane column plumes at 50×50 m2 pixel resolution for a range
of atmospheric conditions using the Weather Research and Forecasting model
(WRF) in large eddy simulation (LES) mode and adding instrument noise. We
show that standard methods to infer source rates by Gaussian plume inversion
or source pixel mass balance are prone to large errors because the turbulence
cannot be properly parameterized on the small scale of instantaneous methane
plumes. The integrated mass enhancement (IME) method, which relates total
plume mass to source rate, and the cross-sectional flux method, which infers
source rate from fluxes across plume transects, are better adapted to the
problem. We show that the IME method with local measurements of
the 10 m wind speed can infer source rates with an error of
0.07–0.17 t h-1+5 %–12 % depending on instrument precision
(1 %–5 %). The cross-sectional flux method has slightly larger
errors (0.07–0.26 t h-1+8 %–12 %) but a simpler physical
basis. For comparison, point sources larger than 0.3 t h−1 contribute
more than 75 % of methane emissions reported to the US Greenhouse Gas
Reporting Program. Additional error applies if local wind speed measurements
are not available and may dominate the overall error at low wind speeds. Low
winds are beneficial for source detection but detrimental for source
quantification.


Multisystem proteinopathy (MSP) is a pleiotropic group of inherited disorders that cause neurodegeneration, myopathy, and bone disease, and share common pathophysiology. Originally referred to as inclusion body myopathy associated with Paget disease of bone and frontotemporal dementia (IBMPFD), attributed to mutations in the gene encoding valosin‐containing protein (VCP), it has more recently been discovered that there are several other genes responsible for similar clinical and pathological phenotypes with muscle, brain, nerve, and bone involvement, in various combinations. These include heterogeneous nuclear ribonucleoprotein A2B1 and A1 (hnRNPA2B1, hnRNPA1), sequestosome 1 (SQSTM1), matrin 3 (MATR3), T‐cell restricted intracellular antigen 1 (TIA1), and optineurin (OPTN), all of which share disruption of RNA stress granule function and autophagic degradation. This review will discuss each of the genes implicated in MSP, exploring the molecular pathogenesis, clinical features, current standards of care, and future directions for this diverse yet mechanistically linked spectrum of disorders.


Most Web and legacy paper-based documents are available in human comprehensible text form, not readily accessible to or understood by computer programs. Here, we investigate an approach to amalgamate XML technology with programming languages for representational purposes that can enhance traceability, thereby facilitating semiautomatic extraction and update. Specifically, we propose a modular technique to embed machine-processable semantics into a text document with tabular data via annotations, resulting sometimes in ill-formed XML fragments, and evaluate this technique vis a vis document querying, manipulation, and integration. The ultimate aim is to be able to author and extract human-readable and machine-comprehensible parts of a document hand in hand and keep them side by side.


High strength aluminium alloys are widely used in the civil and military aerospace industry due to their low weight and high mechanical properties, achieved by selected alloying elements and heat treatments. The resulting multiphase alloy system, a solid solution of alloying elements in the aluminium matrix and a variety of second phase material, requires specific anticorrosion measures in order to prevent localized corrosion, which is promoted by microgalvanic coupling between the different metallographic phases. Traditionally, the anticorrosion performances are achieved by chromic acid anodizing (CAA), followed by painting. However, environmental issues and associated costs for the disposal of chromate wastes, require the development of new approaches for anodizing of aluminium alloys. In this work, the potential for tailoring the porous anodic film morphology through the film thickness by controlled variations of the anodizing potential is inspected. The procedure developed is, in principle, applicable to any aluminium alloy in any anodizing electrolyte and results in the generation of innovative graded porous anodic film morphologies which promise improvement of anticorrosion properties and replacement of CAA .


Background. Little is known about how patients served by safety-net hospitals utilize and respond to hospital quality data. Objective. To understand how vulnerable, lower income patients make health care decisions and define quality of care and whether hospital quality data factor into such decisions and definitions. Methods. Mixed quantitative and qualitative methods were used to gather primary data from patients at an urban, tertiary-care safety-net hospital. The study hospital is a member of the first public hospital system to voluntarily post hospital quality data online for public access. Patients were recruited from outpatient and inpatient clinics. Surveys were used to collect data on participants' sociodemographic characteristics, health literacy, health care experiences, and satisfaction variables. Focus groups were used to explore a representative sample of 24 patients' health care decision making and views of quality. Data from focus group transcripts were iteratively coded and analyzed by the authors. Results. Focus group participants were similar to the broader diverse, low-income clinic population. Participants reported exercising choice in making decisions about where to seek health care. Multiple sources influenced decision-making processes including participants' own beliefs and values, social influences, and prior experiences. Hospital quality data were notably absent as a source of influence in health care decision making for this population largely because participants were unaware of its existence. Participants' views of hospital quality were influenced by the quality and efficiency of services provided (with an emphasis on the doctor-patient relationship) and patient centeredness. When presented with it, patients appreciated the hospital quality data and, with guidance, were interested in incorporating it into health care decision making. Conclusions. Results suggest directions for optimizing the presentation, content, and availability of hospital quality data. Future research will explore how similar populations form and make choices based on presentation of hospital quality data.


The corporate opportunities doctrine ("COD") regulates when and whether a corporate officer or director may appropriate new business prospects for her own account without first offering them to the firm. The doctrine -- a subspecies of the fiduciary duty of loyalty -- has been a mainstay of corporations law in most states for well over a century. At the same time, however, the COD has always been murky in application and is currently in a state of considerable disarray. In this Article, Professor Eric Talley attempts to chart a course out of this doctrinal quagmire by offering a contractarian account of the COD as a default mechanism for allocating intrafirm property rights between shareholders and fiduciaries. Within such a framework, Professor Talley develops a model of fiduciaries' incentive structures under various legal regimes. He then demonstrates that both the reach and the consequences of an "optimal" legal rule depend crucially on the information structure that governs the underlying agency relationship. When relevant information available to shareholders and fiduciaries is complete and symmetric, the optimal rule allocates each new project to whoever is the lowest cost producer. When corporate fiduciaries possess private, unverifiable knowledge about new projects, however, the optimal COD has a strict-liability flavor, imposing damages that need not correspond to either the corporation's losses or the fiduciary's gains. Consequently, such a doctrine will frequently overdeter fiduciaries from appropriating certain projects and may underdeter appropriation of others. This observation suggests (among other things) that coherence in the COD would be greatly improved if courts paid more attention to information structure than is currently the norm.


OBJECTIVE
To report on functional outcomes of clients with traumatic brain injury (TBI) admitted to a sub-acute rehabilitation hospital and rehabilitation facility in Japan.

PARTICIPANTS
The subjects included 300 adults with TBI who underwent a rehabilitation in-patient program at the hospital at the Kanagawa Rehabilitation Center.

METHODS
Individual and group programs were designed for TBI clients using an interdisciplinary teamwork model including supported employment. All clients were evaluated by the Barthel Index, WAIS-R, and social outcome.

RESULTS
Overall, at discharge from the hospital, 46.4% of 300 clients were placed in gainful employment or returned to the school they had attended previously.

CONCLUSIONS
Despite a high prevalence of cognitive and behavioral disorders after moderate-to-severe TBI, long-term functional improvement is likely to occur in clients with TBI. Greater gains in both physical and cognitive functions are made through a multidisciplinary, wide-ranging, comprehensive approach to rehabilitation.


In conflating opposing meanings of the term "ritual," arising from historical Western cultural conflicts regarding church and state, this target article begs fundamental questions. Its appeals to cognitive science concepts such as "working memory" are poorly informed and obfuscate what could have been a far more penetrating and less biased discussion of stereotyped human action.


Recently, there has been significant research focus on Peer-to-Peer (P2P) Massively Multiplayer Online Games (MMOGs). A number of architectures have been presented in the literature to implement the P2P approach. One aspect that has not received sufficient attention in these architectures is state persistency in P2P MMOGs. This survey presents an overview of the current challenges present in P2P MMOGs, followed by an overview of classic state consistency models used in C/S MMOGs. The survey then classifies the state persistency techniques currently used in P2P MMOGs into super peer storage, overlay storage, hybrid storage, and distance-based storage. Key characteristics, namely scalability, fairness, reliability, responsiveness, and security are then defined. Each state persistency technique is evaluated according to these characteristics and recommendations are then made of possible future areas of research into the different storage types.


We suggest that supercontinuum can be used for absorption spectroscopy to observe the exciton levels of a semiconductor nano-structure. Exciton absorption spectrum of a GaAs/AlGaAs quantum well was observed using supercontinuum generated by a microstructrured fiber pumped by a femtosecond (fs) pulsed laser. Significantly narrower peaks were observed in the absorption spectrum from 11 K up to room temperature than photoluminescence (PL) spectrum peaks. Because supercontinuum is coherent light and can readily provide high enough intensity, this method can provide a coherent ultra-broad band light source to identify exciton levels in semiconductors, and be applicable to coherent nonlinear spectroscopy such as electromagnetically induced transparency (EIT), lasing without inversion (LWI) and coherent photon control in semiconductor quantum structures.


During the 1990s, Asian pop artists began entering the mainstream of the British music industry for the first time. Bands such as Black Star Liner, Cornershop, Fun Da Mental and Voodoo Queens, led those within and without the industry to start asking questions such as what did it mean to be Asian? How did the bands' Asian background affect their music? What did their music say about Asians in Britain? In this book, Rehan Hyder draws on in-depth interviews with musicians from these bands and with critics and record producers, to examine the pressures associated with making music as a young Asian in today's multi-ethnic Britain.

As the book reveals, these musicians wish to convey an authentic sense of creativity in their music, while at the same time wanting to assert a positive ethnic identity. Hyder explores these two impulses against the backdrop of a music industry and a society at large that hold a range of confining stereotypes about what it means to be Asian. The experiences of these bands add considerably to the wider debate about the nature of identity in the contemporary world.


Nigeria as a nation has made progress with economic reforms that are delivering strong economic fundamentals. The macroeconomic policies undertaken by the government to strengthened financial institutions is slow and uneven, is undertaking reforms to transform the economy structurally. The reform has been supported by revenue from high oil prices, has led to significantly improved macroeconomic outcomes, including weaker inflation and strong GDP growth. Real GDP growth rose from 7.0% in 2009 to an estimated 8.1% in 2010 and further rise in the future. Not considering the pro developments and improvement of the Nigerian economy, the economy is still confronted by many serious con challenges. Structural imbalance and lack of diversification, infrastructure, lack of strategic management and enforcement of policies, instability of power supply with the economy excessively dependent on oil is preventing the domestic economy from reaching its climax. High youth unemployment, poor infrastructure facilities and widespread insecurity are the key challenges the government will have to take on.


The following guide is designed to provide the reader with infomation about resources that detail the historical evolution of Seton Hall University.


Post-starburst (E+A or k+a) spectra, characterized by their exceptionally strong Balmer lines in absorption and the lack of emission lines, belong to galaxies in which the star formation (SF) activity ended abruptly sometime during the past Gyr. We perform a spectral analysis of galaxies in clusters, groups, poor groups, and the field at z = 0.4–0.8 based on the ESO Distant Cluster Survey. We find that the incidence of k+a galaxies at these redshifts depends strongly on environment. K+a's reside preferentially in clusters and, unexpectedly, in a subset of the σ = 200–400 km s−1 groups, those that have a low fraction of O ii emitters. In these environments, 20%–30% of the star-forming galaxies have had their SF activity recently truncated. In contrast, there are proportionally fewer k+a galaxies in the field, the poor groups, and groups with a high O ii fraction. An important result is that the incidence of k+a galaxies correlates with the cluster velocity dispersion: more massive clusters have higher proportions of k+a's. Spectra of dusty starburst candidates, with strong Balmer absorption and emission lines, present a very different environmental dependence from k+a's. They are numerous in all environments at z = 0.4–0.8, but they are especially numerous in all types of groups, favoring the hypothesis of triggering by a merger. We present the morphological type, stellar mass, luminosity, mass-to-light ratio, local galaxy density, and clustercentric distance distributions of galaxies of different spectral types. These properties are consistent with previous suggestions that cluster k+a galaxies are observed in a transition phase, at the moment they are rather massive S0 and Sa galaxies, evolving from star-forming, recently infallen later types to passively evolving cluster early-type galaxies. The correlation between k+a fraction and cluster velocity dispersion supports the hypothesis that k+a galaxies in clusters originate from processes related to the intracluster medium, while several possibilities are discussed for the origin of the puzzling k+a frequency in low-O ii groups.


The Internet of Things (IoT) enabled through sensor-rich environments and smart devices allows us to collect and exchange vast quantities of data. The advent of new markets, such as the smart home sector, and movements, such as the quantified self, indicate the IoT's huge economic and social impact. With the increased availability of IoT services, it becomes important to enable users with intuitive mechanisms for accessing the gathered data. In this work, we present findings from an exploratory design case study, in which we deployed a low-res lighting display in three family households to visualize domestic energy performance data. Our study showed that the standalone lighting display was preferred over a commercially available web-based application. Further, we found that in two of the three households those participants, who did not use the mobile application before, became the main user of the display and actively engaged with the visualized data. The paper concludes with design implications for pervasive displays connected as ambient gateways to smart devices.


Duncan, MJ and Oxford, SW. The effect of caffeine ingestion on mood state and bench press performance to failure. J Strength Cond Res 25(1): 178-185, 2011-Research has suggested that caffeine enhances aerobic performance. The evidence for high-intensity, short-term exercise, particularly resistance exercise is mixed and has not fully examined the psychological changes that occur after this mode of exercise with caffeine ingestion. This study examined the effect of caffeine (5 mg·kg−1) vs. placebo on bench press exercise to failure and the mood state response pre to postexercise. Thirteen moderately trained men (22.7 ± 6.0 years) completed 2 laboratory visits, after determination of 1 repetition maximum (1RM) on the bench press, where they performed bench press repetitions to failure at a load of 60% 1RM. Mood state was assessed 60 minutes pre and immediately post-substance ingestion. Borg's rating of perceived exertion (RPE) and peak blood lactate (PBla) were assessed after each test, and peak heart rate (PHR) was determined using heart rate telemetry. Participants completed significantly more repetitions to failure (p = 0.031) and lifted significantly greater weight (p = 0.027) in the caffeine condition compared to the placebo condition. The PHR (p = 0.0001) and PBla (p = 0.002) were higher after caffeine ingestion. The RPE was not different across conditions (p = 0.082). Mood state scores for vigor were greater (p = 0.001) and fatigue scores lower (p = 0.04) in the presence of caffeine. Fatigue scores were greater postexercise (p = 0.001) compared to scores pre exercise across conditions. Caffeine ingestion enhances performance in short-term, resistance exercise to failure and may favorably change the mood state response to exercise compared to a placebo.


In the past two years, the US has unilaterally adopted two, very controversial transparency initiatives: •FATCA - Imposes a 30% withholding tax on a foreign financial institution (FFI) that desires to access the US financial market unless the FFI agrees to report information about its US customers. •Schedule UTP - Requires large corporations to disclose uncertain tax positions (UTPs) for which a tax reserve has been recorded in audited financial statements. While a senior US government tax official, the author was heavily involved in developing both FATCA and Schedule UTP. The primary purpose of this article is to discuss certain of the global considerations of these two ground-breaking initiatives. For example: Does the US need multilateral action to accomplish its goals with respect to either FATCA or Schedule UTP, and if so, what form might such action take? The paper concludes the following: •The US likely needs multilateral action to successfully implement FATCA, but it does not for Schedule UTP. •Foreign countries would benefit greatly from using the US's leverage to effectively force financial institutions to join a multilateral FATCA system. The US would benefit from reducing the number of viable investment options available to US tax cheats. •A successful multilateral FATCA system could incorporate multiple design features. For example, it could accommodate both a reporting and withholding model. However, if this option is selected, a "punitive withholding model" should be adopted that has a relatively high tax rate and applies to both investment income and new money. The failure to apply withholding tax to new money is a major deficiency of the recent withholding agreements between Switzerland and the UK/Germany. •Schedule UTP requires a corporation to link a tax reserve with a specific tax issue. If tax reserves are recorded on an aggregate basis, the link between a tax reserve and a specific tax issue may be more difficult to establish. This issue had been resolved by FIN 48 in US GAAP, but it still exists for IFRS. Fortunately, there is a solution.


Background With the increasing number of elderly, especially in recent decades, transfer to nursing homes and the number of centers has also increased but experiences and problems of elders in these centers is less considered. So, the goal of this study is to explore the Elderly peoples' experiences of nursing homes. Methods The current research was performed using a phenomenological approach in 2016. Participation in the study is comprised of the elderly residents in a nursing home in Bam city who were selected based on an objective-oriented approach. The sampling was done until data saturation. Data collection methods were observation and an unstructured and in-depth interview. Data were analyzed using seven-stage Colaizzi process. Results In total, fifteen 68 – 82 years old people participated in our study and 52 primary and conceptual codes that were eventually categorized in five main themes (sense of rejection, sense of daily routine, impaired of communications, sense of hardship and mental obsession) and ten sub-themes emerged. Conclusion Overall, most of the elders were not satisfied with the conditions. It seems that helpful, community and family education to acculturate respect for the elderly in the community, teach proper coping strategies, use the elderly's experiences, and consultation with them could be a way to maintain a sense of usefulness, independence and to prevent them from sensing monotonous and routine rhythm of life.


Abstract. We present a new data set of annual historical (1750–2014) anthropogenic chemically reactive gases (CO, CH4, NH3, NOx, SO2, NMVOCs), carbonaceous aerosols (black carbon – BC, and organic carbon – OC), and CO2 developed with the Community Emissions Data System (CEDS). We improve upon existing inventories with a more consistent and reproducible methodology applied to all emission species, updated emission factors, and recent estimates through 2014. The data system relies on existing energy consumption data sets and regional and country-specific inventories to produce trends over recent decades. All emission species are consistently estimated using the same activity data over all time periods. Emissions are provided on an annual basis at the level of country and sector and gridded with monthly seasonality. These estimates are comparable to, but generally slightly higher than, existing global inventories. Emissions over the most recent years are more uncertain, particularly in low- and middle-income regions where country-specific emission inventories are less available. Future work will involve refining and updating these emission estimates, estimating emissions' uncertainty, and publication of the system as open-source software.


This Note focuses on the preemptive effect of section 301 of the Labor Management Relations Act (LMRA) in the suit against the National Hockey League (NHL) by the Estate of former NHL player Derek Boogaard. The Note will contrast Boogaard v. National Hockey League, in which section 301 preempted the Estate's negligence claims, with several National Football League (NFL) cases. Boogaard will also be contrasted with In re National Hockey League Players' Concussion Injury Litigation, a similar case brought by a class of NHL players in which the court declared that section 301 did not preempt claims for negligence at the motion to dismiss stage. The following analysis of section 301 preemption and Boogaard will reveal inequities and flaws inherent in section 301 preemption that should be removed by Congress. It also analyzes avenues future litigants may pursue to circumvent section 301 preemption altogether. First, this Note will discuss Derek Boogaard's career as an NHL enforcer. Then, it will explain the history of the LMRA and section 301 preemption. A synopsis of relevant NFL cases will follow and provide examples of when section 301 has, and has not, preempted negligence claims brought by former players. Next, the Note will analyze Boogaard and contrast its outcome with the aforementioned NFL cases. An analysis of Concussion Injury will follow that discusses why its outcome differed from Boogaard. Finally, this Note will argue that the preemptive effect of section 301 did not serve its intended purpose in Boogaard and that Congress should place restrictions in its application—such as extending the statute of limitations period—and show how future NHL players can apply lessons learned from Boogaard and Concussion Injury to circumvent section 301 preemption in state-law tort claims.


The photo and thermal cis/trans isomerization reactions are studied for 1-methyl-4-(4aminostyryl)pyridinium iodide, Cy, which is prepared in the trans form. In a basic solution the trans form, Cytr, cannot isomerise directly to the cis form. Its protonated form, CytrH, is active and reacts photochemically from trans to cis configuration, CycH. The quantum yields Фtc and Фct are determined in water. Deprotonation process of CycH yields the cis isomer, Cyc, which can thermally back to the stable trans form. The rate constants and the activated parameters of the thermal reaction are determined. Due to irreversibility of the thermal reaction, a complete molecular reaction cycle is performed in one direction. To get more information on the spectral characteristics of protonated form, the photochromic of the title compound is studied in different fourteen solvents. The linear relationships between absorption energy with hydrogen bond acceptor ability of the solvents and fluorescence energy of CyH with free energy for transferring the proton to the solvent, DGt were determined.


We have known since the late 1980s that the function of classical major histocompatibility complex (MHC) class I molecules is to bind peptides and display them at the cell surface to cytotoxic T cells. Recognition by these sentinels of the immune system can lead to the destruction of the presenting cell, thus protecting the host from pathogens and cancer. Classical MHC class I molecules (MHC I hereafter) are co-dominantly expressed, polygenic, and exceptionally polymorphic and have significant sequence diversity. Thus, in most species, there are many different MHC I allotypes expressed, each with different peptide-binding specificity, which can have a dramatic effect on disease outcome. Although MHC allotypes vary in their primary sequence, they share common tertiary and quaternary structures. Here, we review the evidence that, despite this commonality, polymorphic amino acid differences between allotypes alter the ability of MHC I molecules to change shape (that is, their conformational plasticity). We discuss how the peptide loading co-factor tapasin might modify this plasticity to augment peptide loading. Lastly, we consider recent findings concerning the functions of the non-classical MHC I molecule HLA-E as well as the tapasin-related protein TAPBPR (transporter associated with antigen presentation binding protein-related), which has been shown to act as a second quality-control stage in MHC I antigen presentation.


Introduction

Radiopharmaceuticals are not commonly used in ophthalmologist hands, but occasionally used for head and neck cancers [1], especially over the southeastern Asia [2]. With close proximity between the eyes and the sinuses, ophthalmologists sometimes encounter these oncological patients with ocular complaints secondary to orbital invasion of tumor [3]. Here, we outline an ophthalmologist encounter with clinical radiation hazard from such, and patient's problem with after-life cremation.


Abstract. We examine the co-variations of tropospheric water vapor, its isotopic composition and cloud types and relate these distributions to tropospheric mixing and distillation models using satellite observations from the Aura Tropospheric Emission Spectrometer (TES) over the summertime tropical ocean. Interpretation of these process distributions must take into account the sensitivity of the TES isotope and water vapor measurements to variations in cloud, water, and temperature amount. Consequently, comparisons are made between cloud-types based on the International Satellite Cloud Climatology Project (ISSCP) classification; these are clear sky, non-precipitating (e.g., cumulus), boundary layer (e.g., stratocumulus), and precipitating clouds (e.g. regions of deep convection). In general, we find that the free tropospheric vapor over tropical oceans does not strictly follow a Rayleigh model in which air parcels become dry and isotopically depleted through condensation. Instead, mixing processes related to convection as well as subsidence, and re-evaporation of rainfall associated with organized deep convection all play significant roles in controlling the water vapor distribution. The relative role of these moisture processes are examined for different tropical oceanic regions.


Thanks to its flexibility and power to handle even complex geometric relations, 3D geometric modeling with nonlinear constraints is an attractive extension of traditional shape editing approaches. However, existing approaches to analyze and solve constraint systems usually fail to meet the two main challenges of an interactive 3D modeling system: For each atomic editing operation, it is crucial to adjust as few auxiliary vertices as possible in order to not destroy the user's earlier editing effort. Furthermore, the whole constraint resolution pipeline is required to run in real‐time to enable a fluent, interactive workflow. To address both issues, we propose a novel constraint analysis and solution scheme based on a key observation: While the computation of actual vertex positions requires nonlinear techniques, under few simplifying assumptions the determination of the minimal set of to‐be‐updated vertices can be performed on a linearization of the constraint functions. Posing the constraint analysis phase as the solution of an under‐determined linear system with as few non‐zero elements as possible enables us to exploit an efficient strategy for the Cardinality Minimization problem known from the field of Compressed Sensing, resulting in an algorithm capable of handling hundreds of vertices and constraints in real‐time. We demonstrate at the example of an image‐based modeling system for architectural models that this approach performs very well in practical applications.


The concept of 'era' and the study of the transition between eras have surfaced in organizational research across a various range of theories and topics. However, conceptual and methodological limitations have left unexplored the entrenchment between the holistic process of change and the socio-psychological patterns underlying the passage between an ending era and an upcoming one. In this essay, I develop a model that conceptualizes the end of an organizational era as the interplay between the epistemological elements of Memory and Perception and the ontological element of Reality. I review three cases, built from three novels, which take distinct conceptual patterns to explore how the connections between Memory, Perception and Reality help define and interpret organizational eras. Building on these three cases, I discuss the ways organizational scholars can disentangle the conceptual and practical issues associated with the change of an era, and ultimately learn how to organize and manage this change. KEYWORDS: Era; Memory; Perception; Reality; Organizational change; Organization theory.


This paper describes the implementation of a specific, community-based, multi-family group (MFG) intervention strategy (Families and Schools Together [FAST] babies) aimed at improving the outcomes for infants of teenage mothers in 11 Canadian communities. The aims of this social work group intervention were (1) to engage the teenage mothers into a socially inclusive experience that might challenge the social disapproval they often experience, (2) to enhance the mother–infant bond, while increasing feelings of parental efficacy, and (3) to enhance the social context of the teenage mother by reducing stress, social isolation and intergenerational family conflict. Groups were co-led by teams of service users (a young mother, a grandmother of the baby of a teenage mother and a father of the baby of a teenage mother) collaborating with multi-agency professionals (health visitors and social workers). Teams that reflected the ethnic diversity of the participating family members were trained to facilitate eight weekly group meetings. They showed respect for the young women's 'voice', and supported her 'choice' to prioritize motherhood as her defining identity. The meetings comprised a range of activities, including crafts and singing, discussion of 'conflict scenarios' in cross-familial, cross-generational groups, infant massage delivered to babies by the young mothers, grandmother support groups, and a shared community meal. Where necessary, teams made referrals for specialist help. One hundred twenty-eight young mothers came once to 17 groups, and 90% graduated having attended a minimum of six sessions. Evaluation data from mothers and grandmothers showed positive change when comparing pre and post, based on standardized questionnaires. One-tailed, paired t-tests showed statistically significant increases in parental self-efficacy for the teenage mothers, improved parent–child bonds, reductions in stress and family conflict, and increases in social support. Given that rates of teenage pregnancy in the UK are among the highest in Europe, this paper concludes with a discussion of the feasibility and possible merits of introducing FAST babies to England.


Using a retirement arrangement does not necessarily mean that people retire fulltime. The phenomenon of bridge employment, already studied in the US, becomes increasingly popular among older adults in the Netherlands. The question is to what extent bridge employment can be beneficial for well-being of older adults during the retirement process, especially for older workers who are confronted with involuntary retirement. It is often noted that involuntary retirement is detrimental for well-being. However, it can be presumed that having a bridge job after this negative event can buffer the negative consequences for well-being. Multilevel longitudinal random intercept models and fixed effects models on the 'NIDI Work and Retirement Panel' data show that well-being is lower for people who experienced their retirement as forced. However, forced retirees who regained control over the retirement process by taking a bridge job do not seem to have lower levels of well-being compared to workers still in their main career job. KEYWORDS: subjective well-being ▪ bridge employment ▪ involuntary retirement ▪ multilevel longitudinal models


A well established dynamic model describing the impact of oligopolistic interaction on a renewable resource is revisited here to illustrate its dual interpretation as a waste removal differential game. The regulatory implications are illustrated by assuming that the public agency may control market price and possibly also access to the commons. Two different formulations of the managerial or CSR objective are envisaged, based on a combination of profits and either output or the individual share of the waste stock. It is shown that if the representative firm's objective includes the residual waste stock, there exists a unique regulated price driving to zero the steady state stock itself. Hence, the present analysis delivers some useful indications concerning an appropriate definition of the CSR objective firms should adopt.


A joint German-Russian project (Polygons in tundra wetlands: state and dynamics under climate variability in Polar Regions) started in 2010 and aims on investigating polygonal tundra wetlands in a gradient transect comprising three representative sites across the northeast Siberian lowlands of the lower Indigirka River (70 °N, 147 °E) and the lower (68 °N; 161 °E) and the middle (67 °N; 153 °E) Kolyma river. The study sites cover large gradients in terms of July temperature and precipitation, are accessible without expensive logistics and are situated close to meteorological stations.
Using an interdisciplinary approach, modern, sub-recent, and fossil environments will be characterized and compared in order to understand temporal and spatial polygonal dynamics in relation to climate change.


Electrical conductivity was monitored continuously in the Gornera, which drains the 83% glacierised basin of area 82 km2 containing Gornergletscher, Pennine Alps, Switzerland, during the summer months, in order to provide an indication of meltwater solute content during each of the four years 1979, 1983, 1987 and 1998. Discharge was also recorded between 1970 and 1999. Solute flux, calculated as the product of electrical conductivity and discharge, was used to assess how the year-to-year variability of discharge influences solute transport. Total May through September discharge of the Gornera was in the range -39.1% (1978) to +38.9% (1994) of the 1970-1999 period mean of 118.75�106 m3. The range of variability of July through September electrical conductivity was between -25.0% and +29.1% of the mean of 19.6 �S cm-1 for the four study years. The intra-annual range of total July through September solute flux in the Gornera extended from -22.4% (in 1987, during which, of the four years, discharge for the three months was greatest) to +12.4% (in 1979, when discharge was the lowest) of the four study year means, which represents an average cationic load of ~25�106 eq. Variability of total solute flux (cv=0.142) was greater than that of total discharge (cv=0.127) in the three month period over the four years. Considerable intra-annual variability of total discharge over the three decades suggests that the total annual solute flux also fluctuated significantly from year to year.


We uncover a new channel for spillovers of funding dry-ups. The 2016 US money market fund (MMF) reform exogenously reduced unsecured MMF funding for some banks. We use novel data to trace those banks to a platform for corporate deposit funding. We show that intensified competition for corporate deposits spilled the funding squeeze over to other banks with no MMF exposure. These banks paid more for deposits, and their pool of funding providers deteriorated. Moreover, their lending volumes and margins declined, and their stocks underperformed. Our results suggest that banks' competitiveness in funding markets affect their competitiveness in lending markets.


In the classical firing squad problem, an unknown number of nodes represented by identical finite state machines is arranged on a line and in each time unit each node may change its state according to its neighbors' states. Initially all nodes are passive, except one specific node located at an end of the line, which issues a fire command. This command needs to be propagated to all other nodes, so that eventually all nodes simultaneously enter some designated ``firing" state.

A natural extension of the firing squad problem, introduced in this paper, allows each node to postpone its participation in the squad for an arbitrary time, possibly forever, and firing is allowed only after all nodes decided to participate. This variant is highly relevant in the context of decentralized distributed computing, where processes have to coordinate for initiating various tasks simultaneously.

The main goal of this paper is to study the above variant of the firing squad problem under the assumptions that the nodes are infinite state machines, and that the inter-node communication links can be changed arbitrarily in each time unit, i.e., are defined by a dynamic graph. In this setting, we study the following fundamental question: what connectivity requirements enable a solution to the firing squad problem?
Our main result is an exact characterization of the dynamic graphs for which the firing squad problem can be solved. When restricted to static directed graphs, this characterization implies that the problem can be solved if and only if the graph is strongly connected. We also discuss how information on the number of nodes or on the diameter of the network, and the use of randomization, can improve the solutions to the problem.


Background and Aim: One consequence of aging is decline of executive functions. Different, factors such as exercise, have effects on executive function. The aim of tthe present study was to answer the question whether the individuals who are consistently engaged in occupations of sport and reading have better executive functions. Materials and Methods: The current retrospective study was performed on 100 participants aged between 50-95 years old. Cluster layer sampling was conducted in four districts of Tehran. Initially, participants were included in four groups of only reading, only sports, both, and none according to demographic questionnaire. Next, they performed three tests of Stroop, Tower of London, and Wisconsin for evaluating the executive functions. To examine the difference between the average scores of executive functions in the four groups, one-way analysis of variance and to examine the difference between groups, paired t-test with Bonferroni correction were run. Results: The results of the present study showed that there is a significant difference between people who have no continuous occupations (sports and reading) from adolescence to the present and the other three groups in executive function tests. But no significant difference was observed between the other groups. Conclusion: People who are doing one of the occupations of sport, reading, or both have better executive functions compared with those who do not do any of these occupations. It seems that early enagagement in sport and reading in younger years and continuing it until aging could prevent a sharp drop in executive functions in aging. But further longitudinal studies are needed to investigate this theory.


Finding the most probable assignment (MAP) in a general graphical model is known to be NP hard but good approximations have been attained with max-product belief propagation (BP) and its variants. In particular, it is known that using BP on a single-cycle graph or tree reweighted BP on an arbitrary graph will give the MAP solution if the beliefs have no ties. In this paper we extend the setting under which BP can be used to provably extract the MAP. We define Convex BP as BP algorithms based on a convex free energy approximation and show that this class includes ordinary BP with single-cycle, tree reweighted BP and many other BP variants. We show that when there are no ties, fixed-points of convex max-product BP will provably give the MAP solution. We also show that convex sum-product BP at sufficiently small temperatures can be used to solve linear programs that arise from relaxing the MAP problem. Finally, we derive a novel condition that allows us to derive the MAP solution even if some of the convex BP beliefs have ties. In experiments, we show that our theorems allow us to find the MAP in many real-world instances of graphical models where exact inference using junction-tree is impossible.


The general concept of communication for development is that it explores the use of communication – both as a tool and as a way of expressing processes of social change. Art can be regarded as a way of communication, and to use the arts in the field of communication for development is not new. Art as a force in social change has a long history. The purpose of this thesis is to take a closer look at the art project To Reveal, Remember and Expose and make an exploration of how or if an art project can facilitate new awareness, primarily around memories, heritage, identity and social change among project participants and city inhabitants encountered by the project. The objectives of this thesis are to investigate the following questions: What kind of awareness will the participants get out of the project? Can the project create a new awareness in terms of memory and heritage? How does the project connect and relate to culture, identity and city space? Communication theory, concepts of culture and representation, identity and space in the form of private and public space are presented. Performance art and theory, art intervention, sitespecific art and tactical media are elaborated upon. The primary methodology used is participatory observation, which has been applied on the planning, actions and discussions of the project. An interview with the artist behind the project and a structural content analysis of texts written by the students that participated in the art project will complement the participatory observation. The analysis of the project showed that the project could create awareness among its participants, especially about people, time and space. The actions also gave some insight and awareness concerning memories and heritage of some objects and places. The project connected and related to culture, identity and space in different ways. There were similarities to tactical media as it create situations were criticality could occur, but it was hard to see a whole picture of the outcome as it was not possible to know what the "audience" thought. All topics are relevant in communication and development and social change, but the thesis was not able to show that the project could give access to ways of expressing processes of social change. For further research it is of relevance to consider the magnitude of social change an art project can bring, and take into consideration that social change usually take time and is hard to find in a short period of time. Table of Contents 1 INTRODUCTION ....................................................................................................................................... 1 2 PURPOSE AND OBJECTIVES .................................................................................................................. 3 3 BACKGROUND ........................................................................................................................................... 4 3.1 CULTURE AND DEVELOPMENT .............................................................................................................................. 4 3.1.1 Cultural heritage ............................................................................................................................................. 4 220.127.116.11 Memory and heritage .............................................................................................................................................................. 5 3.2 SOCIAL CHANGE ....................................................................................................................................................... 7 3.2.1 Art and social change .................................................................................................................................... 7 3.2.2 Art and social change in India ................................................................................................................... 9 18.104.22.168 Art in Bangalore ..................................................................................................................................................................... 10 3.3 MEMORIES OF MODERNITY ................................................................................................................................ 10 3.3.1 To Reveal, Remember and Expose ........................................................................................................ 11 4 FRAMEWORK AND THEORY ............................................................................................................. 12 4.1 COMMUNICATION THEORY ................................................................................................................................. 12 4.2 CULTURE AND REPRESENTATION ...................................................................................................................... 12 4.2.1 Identity .............................................................................................................................................................. 14 4.2.2 Space .................................................................................................................................................................. 15 188.8.131.52 Private and public space ..................................................................................................................................................... 15 4.3 PERFORMANCE ART AND THEORY ..................................................................................................................... 16 4.3.1 Art intervention ............................................................................................................................................ 16 4.3.2 Site specific art .............................................................................................................................................. 17 4.4 TACTICAL MEDIA .................................................................................................................................................. 18 5 METHODOLOGY AND APPLIANCE ................................................................................................... 20 5.1 PARTICIPATORY OBSERVATION ......................................................................................................................... 20 5.2 INTERVIEW ............................................................................................................................................................ 22 5.3 CONTENT ANALYSIS ............................................................................................................................................. 23 5.4 OBSTACLES AND CONSIDERATIONS ................................................................................................................... 25 5.5 RESEARCHER PERSPECTIVE ................................................................................................................................ 27 6 OBSERVATION AND ANALYSIS ......................................................................................................... 28 6.1 PARTICIPATING AND OBSERVING THE PROJECT .............................................................................................. 28 6.1.1 Jan 14: The pre-‐meeting ............................................................................................................................ 28 6.1.2 Jan 15: Setting the scene ........................................................................................................................... 29 6.1.3 Jan 16: In Old Yelahanka ........................................................................................................................... 30 6.1.4 Jan 17: Jayamahal main road and forward ...................................................................................... 31 6.2 ANALYZING THE PROJECT ................................................................................................................................... 33 6.2.1 Participants and awareness .................................................................................................................... 34 6.2.2 Memory and heritage ................................................................................................................................. 35 6.2.3 Culture, identity and space ...................................................................................................................... 36 6.2.4 Connecting to tactical media and social change ............................................................................ 39 7 CONCLUSION .......................................................................................................................................... 42 8 REFERENCES .......................................................................................................................................... 44


Abstract We provide quantitative predictions of first-order supply and demand shocks for the US economy associated with the COVID-19 pandemic at the level of individual occupations and industries. To analyse the supply shock, we classify industries as essential or non-essential and construct a Remote Labour Index, which measures the ability of different occupations to work from home. Demand shocks are based on a study of the likely effect of a severe influenza epidemic developed by the US Congressional Budget Office. Compared to the pre-COVID period, these shocks would threaten around 20 per cent of the US economy's GDP, jeopardize 23 per cent of jobs, and reduce total wage income by 16 per cent. At the industry level, sectors such as transport are likely to be output-constrained by demand shocks, while sectors relating to manufacturing, mining, and services are more likely to be constrained by supply shocks. Entertainment, restaurants, and tourism face large supply and demand shocks. At the occupation level, we show that high-wage occupations are relatively immune from adverse supply- and demand-side shocks, while low-wage occupations are much more vulnerable. We should emphasize that our results are only first-order shocks—we expect them to be substantially amplified by feedback effects in the production network.


Objective To identify the molecular signaling pathways underlying sudden unexpected death in epilepsy (SUDEP) and high-risk SUDEP compared to control patients with epilepsy. Methods For proteomics analyses, we evaluated the hippocampus and frontal cortex from microdissected postmortem brain tissue of 12 patients with SUDEP and 14 with non-SUDEP epilepsy. For transcriptomics analyses, we evaluated hippocampus and temporal cortex surgical brain tissue from patients with mesial temporal lobe epilepsy: 6 low-risk and 8 high-risk SUDEP as determined by a short (<50 seconds) or prolonged (≥50 seconds) postictal generalized EEG suppression (PGES) that may indicate severely depressed brain activity impairing respiration, arousal, and protective reflexes. Results In autopsy hippocampus and cortex, we observed no proteomic differences between patients with SUDEP and those with non-SUDEP epilepsy, contrasting with our previously reported robust differences between epilepsy and controls without epilepsy. Transcriptomics in hippocampus and cortex from patients with surgical epilepsy segregated by PGES identified 55 differentially expressed genes (37 protein-coding, 15 long noncoding RNAs, 3 pending) in hippocampus. Conclusion The SUDEP proteome and high-risk SUDEP transcriptome were similar to those in other patients with epilepsy in hippocampus and cortex, consistent with diverse epilepsy syndromes and comorbid conditions associated with SUDEP. Studies with larger cohorts and different epilepsy syndromes, as well as additional anatomic regions, may identify molecular mechanisms of SUDEP.


New apatite fission-track analyses from NW Britain indicate that a maximum of 2.5 km of erosion has occurred there during the Cenozoic, similar to values for SE Greenland and the east Greenland coast north of Scoresby Sund. The erosion may have been facilitated by magmatic underplating during break-up. However, at Kangerdlugssuaq, East Greenland, 4–6 km of erosion is measured since 45 Ma. Lower–mid-Eocene marine sedimentary rocks overlying the lavas on the Blosseville Coast indicate that magmatic underplating on the central Greenland coast substantially post-dated flood volcanism and break-up, behaviour not predicted by simple plume-rift models. Subsidence reconstructions of the Hebrides Shelf, and the east and west Greenland coasts, show that rapid, dynamic uplift was effectively synchronous at 63 Ma and preceded volcanism by <1.6 million years. The magnitude of uplift on the Hebrides Shelf (c. 400 m) is compatible with a mantle temperature anomaly of c. 100°C. These data suggest very rapid lateral flow of the impacting Iceland plume head. The predicted crossing of the plume by the east Greenland coast in the mid–late Eocene would account for post-rift magmatic underplating and dynamic support on the Greenland but not the European side of the North Atlantic basin.


Seahorses (Teleostei: Syngnathidae) are subjects of worldwide demand for medicinal use, as curios, and as live ornamental aquarium fish. Aquaculture has the potential to replace or at least supplement potentially unsustainable wild exploitation as the supply source of seahorses. The primary aim of the research within this thesis was to determine techniques for improving the technical and economic feasibility for commercially culturing the big-bellied seahorse Hippocampus abdominalis in New Zealand. In a preliminary investigation, the breeding of wild H. abdominalis in captivity and rearing of juveniles was examined, as difficulties have been encountered with these in historical attempts at culturing H. abdominalis. Breeding was found to be facilitated by providing tanks with a water height of 1 m. This depth of water allowed females to transfer their eggs to male seahorses during the vertical rising stage of mating. Growth rates of progeny to sexual maturity were reasonable with seahorses reaching an average 11 cm in standard length (SL) at one year of age, but high juvenile mortality was observed in the first few months of age, with an average 10.6% of juveniles surviving to one year. Further on-growing of these first generation progeny to seven years of age (average of 27 cm SL for both sexes) demonstrated the robustness of the species in captivity and potential to supply large seahorses to the medicinal trade where large size is desirable. To improve juvenile survival and growth, the effects of initial tank colour, lighting arrangement and stocking density on early juveniles were tested. Juveniles at one week of age were found to have higher attack rate and capture success on Artemia nauplii in clear jars than those contained in white- or black-wrapped jars, but this effect of tank colour had less affect on one month-old juveniles. Juveniles were also found to suffer fewer incidences of air bubble ingestion in side-illuminated tanks due to positively phototactic prey (Artemia) being drawn away from the water surface. The rearing of juveniles from birth to two months of age in glass aquaria with side-illumination and tank surfaces blacked-out above the waterline resulted in survival rates of >80% due to increased feeding efficiency and reduced risk of air bubble ingestion. Juvenile growth and survival at stocking densities of 1, 2 and 5 juveniles l-1 demonstrated that increasing stocking density resulted in reduced growth and survival, due to the greater occurrence of juveniles grasping and wrestling each other with their prehensile tails. Producing live foods for fish is a significant cost in finfish culture. This has led to concerted efforts to develop appropriate artificial or inert diets to reduce culture costs. To determine whether juvenile seahorses could be weaned from live food to inert diets, two inert diets (Golden Pearls and frozen copepods) were tested. It was demonstrated that one and two month-old juvenile H. abdominalis could ingest and survive on these inert foods. Co-feeding the inert diets with live Artemia improved feeding on the inert foods. However, growth and survival rates of juveniles on the inert diets were inferior to those fed only on live enriched Artemia. Cultured live foods such as Artemia are often enriched with various enrichment media to boost their nutritional value. However, enrichment media can vary in their nutritional value relative to the final target organisms they are being fed to, as well as their relative cost-effectiveness. Therefore, the effect of different Artemia enrichments on the growth and survival of H. abdominalis and their relative cost-effectiveness was tested using three commercial enrichment products (Super Selco®, DHA Protein Selco® and Algamac-3050®) and a low-cost Artemia on-growing diet (EPABSF/Spirulina platensis). On a cost/benefit basis, EPABSF/S. platensis worked out to be the most cost- effective for H. abdominalis, with comparable growth rates to seahorses fed Artemia enriched with DHA Protein Selco® and Algamac-3050®. Juvenile growth rates were poorest on Artemia enriched with Super Selco®. Feeding seahorses frozen mysid shrimp may help reduce culture costs and also increase cultured seahorse marketability to the aquarium trade, but their efficacy in seahorse culture is largely untested. Frozen mysids (Amblyops kempi) were shown to be an acceptable alternative to live enriched Artemia for H. abdominalis, providing comparable rates of seahorse growth and survival. When daily rations of frozen mysids at 5%, 10%, 15% and 20% wet body weight (wbw) were tested there was no growth advantage to feeding seahorses more than 5% wbw per day in terms of increase in seahorse length. There was a wet weight gain and Condition Factor (CF) advantage associated with increasing feed ration >10%. Feed conversion ratios (FCR) became less efficient as feed ration increased based on the total amount of mysids offered to seahorses, with increasing food wastage. However, when actual mysid consumption was taken into account there were no significant differences in FCR between rations. The natural diet and male reproductive output of H. abdominalis in Wellington Harbour was examined for use as aquaculture benchmarks. Natural diet consisted mainly of epibenthic and epifaunal crustaceans (e.g. amphipods, mysid shrimp and caridean shrimp). There were no sex-related differences in diet although there were some size- related differences with smaller seahorses consuming more amphipods. Some of the prey species eaten by wild H. abdominalis may show potential as cultured foods. Wild males produced an average of 271 juveniles per brood, with brood size increasing with parent male size. Comparison of wild reproductive output data with those of cultured male H. abdominalis revealed that cultured male output was approximately 27% lower than that of wild males. However, there were no differences in the quality (size and weight) of the juveniles produced by wild and cultured male H. abdominalis. It is suggested that cultured female reproductive output is the primary determinant in lower cultured male seahorse reproductive output. The research within this thesis has contributed to improving the technical and economic feasibility for commercially culturing the big-bellied seahorse Hippocampus abdominalis.


The kereru (Hemiphaga novaeseelandiae) is a large fruit pigeon that in New Zealand is an important seed disperser for native plant species. However, little is known about recent changes in kereru densities and how these changes might affect seed dispersal services. We used long-term kereru counts and seedfall trap data from Pelorus in Marlborough to measure trends in bird abundance and seed dispersal. Using monthly kereru counts from 1983–1989 and 2002–2006, we found that counts significantly decreased between the two decades. Most of this decline was driven by changes in the seasonal abundance of kereru: a pronounced late-winter/spring peak in numbers in the 1980s had almost vanished by the 2000s. The late-winter/spring increase in kereru in the 1980s was probably driven by kereru moving into the area to feed on lowland foliage. Therefore, the reduction of late-winter/spring kereru in the 2000s could be driven by either a change in regional movement patterns or an authentic decline in the kereru population. Seedfall data for six fleshy-fruited trees (tawa Beilschmiedia tawa, miro Prumnopitys ferruginea, matai Prumnopitys taxifolia, hinau Elaeocarpus dentatus, rimu Dacrydium cupressinum, and kahikatea Dacrycarpus dacrydioides) from 1986–1990 and 2004–2010 allowed estimation of the percentage of each fruit crop handled by frugivores (an index of dispersal quantity). We found that the percentage of seeds handled by frugivores was higher in the 2000s than in the 1980s for tawa, and lower for matai. Seed handling rates were unchanged between the two decades for miro, hinau, rimu, and kahikatea. Over this time period there was no overall worsening in dispersal quantity between the two decades, probably because kereru numbers did not change significantly during the autumn fruiting season, and because other birds could be important dispersers for smaller-seeded species.


We propose a method of using off-resonant light scattering to measure the temperature of fermionic atoms tightly confined in a two-dimensional optical-lattice potential. We show that fluctuations of the intensity in the far-field diffraction pattern arising from thermal correlations of the atoms can be accurately detected above the shot noise by collecting photons scattered in a forward direction, with the diffraction maxima blocked. The sensitivity of this method of thermometry is enhanced by an additional harmonic trapping potential.