Final compression in French is examined from a theoretical perspective and illustrated with experimental data. In French, only final prosodic domains that are at least the size of a prosodic phrase (Φ-phrase) may be subject to final compression. Prosodic units that are smaller than Φ-phrases, such as prosodic words (ω-words) or syllables, cannot be compressed. Therefore, final compression is a phrasal phenomenon. This conclusion is confirmed in a comparison between sequences consisting of a noun + adjective and verb + argument on one hand, and verb + adjunct on the other. Syntactic expressions of the first kind are integrated into single Φ-phrases, and final compression does not take place. Syntactic sequences of the verb + adjunct variety, however, form separate Φ-phrases, and final compression may occur.


Exploring the Relationship of Urban Form and Mental Health in the 500 Largest Cities of the United States Daniel Sam Harrison Sustainable development efforts frequently focus on understanding and promoting the factors that influence health and wellbeing. Urban environments have received attention in recent years as spaces which can increase psychological distress. Despite hypothesized reports of urban environments being less conducive to good mental health then natural environments, few studies have investigated the effects of urban form characteristics (size, density, nuisances, transportation, and housing characteristics) and mental health measures at the city level. Using 2014 data from the 500 largest cities in the United States, this thesis evaluates the relationship between urban form and aggregate self-report scores of poor mental health. Results suggest that elements of the built environment have a direct influence on mental health status. The aim of this study is to test the association of urban form characteristics and psychological distress using a crosssectional analysis of individual health survey responses. Mental health data were collected for a study of Center for Disease Control health characteristics in the 500 largest cities in the United States. Urban form data was collected from both United States Census and GIS datasets such as the Center for Neighborhood Technology's Housing and Transportation Affordability Index (H+T Index). Linear regression analysis and factor analyses were used to estimate the relationship between psychological distress and urban form characteristics. Results suggest that urban density is negatively associated with mental health status at city level. This finding is logical and confirms earlier research. While measures of housing cost and diversity were slightly negatively associated with mental health, measures of transportation cost and employment access were slightly positively associated.


The 2007-2008 global financial and economic crisis precipitated a significant shift in the financial regulatory worldview (or paradigm) of political and central bank leaders from leading advanced and emerging states. With a common consensus on the required financial reforms, these actors moved swiftly to create a new organization. The Financial Stability Board (FSB) now stands at the centre of the global regulatory architecture, but it remains obscure, opaque, and closed to most external observers. The FSB needs to change as it matures to reflect its key role in global financial reform efforts.


Abstract The hospital competition literature shows that estimates of the effect of local market structure (concentration) on pricing (competition) are sensitive to geographic market definition. Our spatial lag model approach effects smoothing of the explanatory variables across the discrete market boundaries, resulting in robust estimates of the impact of market structure on hospital pricing, which can be used to estimate the full effect of changes in prices inclusive of spillovers that cascade through the neighboring hospital markets. The full amount, generated by the spatial multiplier effect, is a robust estimate of the impacts of market factors on hospital competition. We contrast ordinary least squares and spatial lag estimates to demonstrate the importance of robust estimation in analysis of hospital market competition. In markets where concentration is relatively high before a proposed merger, we demonstrate that Ordinary Least Squares (OLS) can lead to the wrong policy conclusion while the more conservative lag estimates do not.


The Social Sciences have long been struggling with quantitative forms of research assessment – insufficient coverage in prominent citation indices and overall lower citation counts than in STM subject areas have led to a widespread weariness regarding bibliometric evaluations among social scientists. Fueled by the rise of the social web, new hope is often placed on alternative metrics that measure the attention scholarly publications receive online, in particular on social media. But almost a decade after the coining of the term altmetrics for this new group of indicators, the uptake of the concept in the Social Sciences still seems to be low. Just like with traditional bibliometric indicators, one central problem hindering the applicability of altmetrics for the Social Sciences is the low coverage of social science publications on the respective data sources – which in the case of altmetrics are the various social media platforms on which interactions with scientific outputs can be measured. Another reason is that social scientists have strong opinions about the usefulness of metrics for research evaluation which may hinder broad acceptance of altmetrics too. We conducted qualitative interviews and online surveys with researchers to identify the concerns which inhibit the use of social media and the utilization of metrics for research evaluation in the Social Sciences. By analyzing the response data from the interviews in conjunction with the response data from the surveys, we identify the key concerns that inhibit social scientists from (1) applying social media for professional purposes and (2) making use of the wide array of metrics available. Our findings show that aspects of time consumption, privacy, dealing with information overload, and prevalent styles of communication are predominant concerns inhibiting Social Science researchers from using social media platforms for their work. Regarding indicators for research impact we identify a widespread lack of knowledge about existing metrics, their methodologies and meanings as a major hindrance for their uptake through social scientists. The results have implications for future developments of scholarly online tools and show that researchers could benefit considerably from additional formal training regarding the correct application and interpretation of metrics.


This thesis addresses the challenges with unit testing of embedded software. Embedded software uses peripheral devices that are not available during testing, which results in higher barriers to use unit testing, compared to normal software. But even with these barriers there are no problems with unit testing of embedded software. The study looks at challenges with unit testing of Energy Micros software library, and solutions to the problems with automated testing of embedded software. Use of automated testing will reduce the number of errors when code is refactored. Use of unit testing will also make it possible to take advantage of agile methods like test-driven development. The main goals for the study is to see if CMock is suitable for generation of mock modules and if testing with mock modules can reduce the number of errors in software. Unity is a test harness that supports the needed assertions for testing of embedded software. CMock is able to automatic generate mock modules, but has a few problems with inline functions and custom types, but it is possible to solve these problems. Even with these problems CMock is able to generate mock modules that is working, and supports the testing of embedded software. An experiment was performed to see if testing of embedded software with mock modules could reduce the number of errors. The result was significant and showed that the number of errors was reduced by using mock modules, compared development without testing. Observations were also done during the experiment, which found some problems with use of mock modules during testing. The experiment was done by undergraduate students in computer science. Use of unit test and mock modules as a substitute for hardware during automated testing on a native computer, it is possible to reduce the numbers of errors and refactor code without breaking the existing functionality.


Abstract This paper looks at the impact of foreign exchange rate policies on industrial growth in Nigeria between 1981 and 2016. The study employed the Vector Error Correction Model (VECM) techniques, following the results of Johansen Cointegration techniques that shows the existence of long run relationship among the variables considered. While, VECM estimates showed that money supply (monetary policy) impacted positively effects, evidence on, TAX (fiscal policy) impacted negative on industrial growth. Besides, the Exchange rate and Inflation impacted negatively on industrial growth., suggesting that the issue of stability remained a challenge unresolved by the Apex bank. The emanating policy antidotes are that there is urgent need to use proactive monetary policy through money supply to speed up the rate of industrial growth on one hand, while providing tax incentive to various industrial good that can further have enhanced the contribution of the sector to industrial growth on the other. In all, the need to align the objective of exchange rate policy with broader macroeconomic goals is necessary for effective policy transmission mechanism to speed up the rate of industrial progress in the country.


Equity crowdfunding is increasing in popularity as an alternative to traditional financing for start-ups and growth companies to raise money for their business. This study discusses how equity crowdfunding is different from traditional financing, such as angel investors and venture capitalists. We argue this difference is brought further into focus when large numbers of crowd members invest small amounts, as opposed to fewer individuals making large investments. Building on existing research on Social Identity Theory, we look at why some crowdfunding campaigns are more likely to attract these contrasting types of investment (numerous small investments or fewer large investments). A model is presenting linking different characteristics of campaigns to total investment and average investment. This proposed model will be tested using public data gathered from Crowdcube, a leading UK-based equity crowdfunding platform. This study has significant implications for fundraisers who may wish to target different types of crowds according to the nature of their business, i.e. smaller numbers of passionate investors to provide informed input or larger numbers of casual investors to help create awareness and spread positive word of mouth.


John Staddon has devoted his long and distinguished career to the study of the adaptive function and mechanisms of learning. He did his graduate work at the famous Skinner Lab at Harvard in the early 1960s (supervised by Richard Herrnstein, who did his doctoral work with B. F. Skinner), but his work can be characterized as theoretical behaviorism. Staddon, now at Duke University, believes that experimental analysis is never enough to make sense of behavior and that "theoretical imagination" is also required. Staddon's theoretical imagination has distinguished his work over the years and has influenced the field. Staddon is not afraid to deviate from the norm: when psychologists were maintaining their distance from behavioral psychology, Staddon was promoting optimality theories. Optimality theories in psychology are now commonplace. In this volume, Staddon's colleagues and former students discuss topics that have been important in his work: behavioral ability and choice, memory, time and models (the subject of his work at Harvard), and behaviorism. They also reflect on Staddon's influence on their own work and the evolution of their thinking on these topics. ContributorsGiulio Bolacchi, Daniel T. Cerutti, Mircea Ioan Chelaru, J. Mark Cleaveland, Robert H. I. Dale, Rebecca A. Dixon, Valentin Dragoi, Stephen Gray, Jennifer J. Higa, John M. Horner, Nancy K. Innis, Mandar S. Jog, Richard Keen, John E. Kello, Eric Macaux, Armando Machado, John C. Malone, Jr., Kazuchika Manabe, Susan R. Perry, Alliston K. ReidNancy K. Innis was Professor of Psychology at the University of Western Ontario. J. E. R. Staddon supervised her Ph.D. work at Duke University.


Purpose To develop an instrument to assess educational climate, a critical aspect of the medical school learning environment that previous tools have not explored in depth. Method Fifty items were written, capturing aspects of Dweck's performance–learning distinction, to distinguish students' perceptions of the educational climate as learning/mastery oriented (where the goal is growth and development) versus performance oriented (where the goal is appearance of competence). These items were included in a 2014 survey of first-, second-, and third-year students at six diverse medical schools. Students rated their preclerkship or clerkship experiences and provided demographic and other data. The final Educational Climate Inventory (ECI) was determined via exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis. Relationships between scale scores and other variables were calculated. Results Responses were received from 1,441/2,590 students (56%). The 20-item ECI resulted, with three factors: centrality of learning and mutual respect; competitiveness and stress; and passive learning and memorization. Clerkship students' ratings of their learning climate were more performance oriented than preclerkship students' ratings (P < .001). Among preclerkship students, ECI scores were more performance oriented in schools with grading versus pass–fail systems (P < .04). Students who viewed their climate as more performance oriented were less satisfied with their medical school (P < .001) and choice of medicine as a career (P < .001). Conclusions The ECI allows educators to assess students' perceptions of the learning climate. It has potential as an evaluation instrument to determine the efficacy of attempts to move health professions education toward learning and mastery.


This study investigates the influence of dialogic relationship and organizational cultures on the military-public relationship. College students (N=218) participated in a 2 x 2 (dialogic relationship: high vs. low x organizational culture: military vs. civilian) independent groups factorial quasi-experiment. To induce dialogic relationship, two versions of the U.S. Army internet webpage screenshots were created. Organizational culture was controlled by purposive sampling two groups of military and civilian subjects. The results indicate that dialogic relationship and organizational culture combine exerts an effect on the military-public relationship by increasing perceptions of control mutuality, trust, commitment and communal relationship for civilians but not the military. In addition to its theoretical contributions, the results of this study have important practical implications for the military public affairs.


The wage factor and the quality of working life needs to get the attention of the management to be able for improve the employees performance. This research aims to know the effect of wages on employees performance are  moderated by the quality of work life. The type of the data being used is the primary data in the form of a questionnaire. Sampling is done by stratified random sampling of 100 employees in a manufacturing company. Data analysis using linear regression and moderated regression analysis (MRA). The result showed a significant negative effect on the wages of employees performance. Other finding is negative effect of wages which are moderated by the quality of work life is caused by the effect of intrinsic motivation (quality of working life) is more powerful than extrinsic motivation (wages). Quality of work life is quasi moderators that weaken the wages variable. Further research is recommended to expand the research by adding independent variable that affects the performance of employees. Keywords: wages; quality of work life; employees; performance; moderated regression analysis JEL Classification: J330


BACKGROUND The relationship between high volume and improved outcomes has been described for a host of elective high-impact, low-frequency procedures, but there are little data to support such a relationship in high-impact low-frequency procedures in trauma. Using emergency department thoracotomy (EDT) as a model, we hypothesized that patients presenting to centers with higher institutional volumes of EDT would have improved survival referent to those presenting to lower volume institutions. METHODS We queried the Pennsylvania Trauma Outcomes Study registry from 2007 to 2015 for all EDTs performed at Level I and II centers identified by ICD-9 procedure codes and a location stamp indicating the emergency department. We examined patient-level risk factors for survival in univariate regression and multivariable regression models. Centers were divided into tertiles of mean annual EDT volume, and the association between mean annual EDT volume and patient survival was examined using logistic regression after controlling for patient factors. RESULTS 1,399 EDTs were performed at 28 centers. Overall survival was 6.8%. After controlling for patient age, mechanism of injury, signs of life, and injury severity, patients presenting to centers in the highest tertile of volume had significantly higher odds of survival compared with patients presenting to centers in the lowest tertile of volume (OR 4.56, 95% CI 1.43–14.50). CONCLUSIONS Patients presenting to centers with higher mean annual volume of EDTs have improved survival compared with those presenting to institutions with lower mean annual EDT volume. Efforts to understand the etiology of this finding may lead to interventions to improve outcomes at lower-volume centers. LEVEL OF EVIDENCE Prognostic/Epidemiological, level III; Therapeutic, level IV.


I have been asked to write a tribute to Owen Fennema for this issue for several reasons. Perhaps the primary reason is that I succeeded Owen as the Editor-in-Chief of IFT's peer reviewed journals, a position he held 1999–2003. Although I can document the many accomplishments Owen had as a food scientist, a consummate food science professional, an editor, and an author, I cannot separate my feelings for this man so simply. So this tribute will be both professional and personal. Every once in a while someone enters your life and completely changes it. That is what happened to me when I met Owen Fennema in January 1963. I started working for Owen in his laboratory at the Univ. of Wisconsin-Madison and continued until I emerged in 1968 as his first PhD student. From those days on, I have tried to emulate Owen in everything I did because he did it so right. I was truly honored to be nominated by Owen to succeed him as Editor-in-Chief in 2003. About the man, Owen completed his formal education with a PhD from the Univ. of Wisconsin-Madison in 1960. He was hired immediately onto the faculty and retired in 1996. He advanced through the ranks at the university rather quickly, served as the chair of the Dept. of Food Science for 3 years, and was very active within the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences and within the university. He taught food chemistry and advised about 15 to 20 undergraduate students per year. His lectures were crystal clear, like the water and ice that was the primary attention of his research. As a tribute to Owen's contributions to IFT, elsewhere in this issue Amanda Ferguson, Associate Director of IFT's peerreviewed journals, provides a listing of Owen's many contributions to IFT, including serving as its president 1982–83. From 1999 to 2003, Owen served as IFT's editor-in-chief during which there were several important advancements: accelerated processing of manuscripts that eliminated a manuscript backlog (for which many authors were very grateful); promoted the development of two additional peer-reviewed journals (Journal of Food Science Education and Comprehensive Reviews in Food Science and Food Safety); elaborated the scientific editor/associate editor model for each of the five sections of the Journal of Food Science; wrote job descriptions for positions within the publications; adopted excellence in science as the basis for publishing in the journals; and continually made the point that a professional society like IFT has the obligation to support its peer-reviewed publications. His motto seemed to be, "If it is good, sound science and meets the requirements of peer-review, then IFT has the obligation to publish it for the betterment of food science and technology." In addition, Owen transitioned the journals to electronic submission and handling, went to 9 issues published per year from 6 issues, redesigned the content of the sections of JFS, and greatly reduced the manuscript-handling timeline. Put simply, Owen transitioned IFT's journals into the 21st century and began JFS's long climb to respectability among food science scholars. His contributions to the success that IFT's journals are enjoying today cannot be underestimated. Now I need to provide a little explanation to the title, why a renaissance man. Owen was truly a worldly man as evidenced by his many contributions to international food science, not the least of which was his service to the International Union of Food Science and Technology (IUFoST) to which IFT is an adhering body. He served in various capacities in the organization, gave lectures around the world, and served as major professor to numerous international students. Perhaps most importantly, he was Editor-in-Chief of "Food Chemistry," a text/reference book with chapters authored by experts around the world, several chapters of which Owen authored. The book has been used as a textbook on every continent (except Antarctica) and been translated into several languages. As a tribute to Owen's monumental efforts to get this book into print, the book is now called "Fennema's Food Chemistry" and is in its 4th edition. During his professional life Owen developed wood working and carpentry as an avocation. This led to taking up leaded glass design and construction, an art form in which he was a truly gifted artist. Many of his works are hanging in UW-Madison buildings and in private homes of friends and acquaintances. In fact, one is hanging at IFT headquarters. How do you sum up the contributions of one man, a man of such enormous intellect, impact on his chosen field of study, intrinsic leadership, and humanitarianism? The answer is, "It is impossible." What you can do is recognize his contributions and be thankful that we had him with us, that he made our journey easier. I would be remiss if I did not use a Vince Lombardi quote to end this tribute since Owen loved the Packers. Lombardi said, "The quality of a person's life is in direct proportion to his commitment to excellence." Owen indeed was committed to excellence and his contributions were monumental. Rest in peace, dear Owen.


Individual points produced by airborne laser scanning (ALS) may have large variation in their accuracy, a fact that is often omitted in the subsequent derivation of digital terrain models. The accuracy of a single point is governed by three main factors: First, the errors due to the direct georeferencing of the laser beam; second, the measurement errors of the laser itself; third, the variation of the range-finder error due to the changing scanning geometry. The influence of the first two sources can be estimated by means of error propagation via known functional relations of georeferencing. Nevertheless, the influence of the third component is much harder to assess as it requires a-priori knowledge of the local terrain normal to compute the incident angle and the laser footprint. We propose a novel approach that analyzes the scanning geometry quantitatively by estimating the local terrain normal directly from the laser point cloud. Adding this information to the error propagation yields a final quality indicator that reflects not only the georeferencing quality but also the scanning geometry. The paper presents first results of the developed algorithm and assesses the possibilities to use such q-indicators within DTM/DSM-production. Their benefits are especially investigated for automated data classification and generation of DTM quality metadata.


Studies on self-supervised visual representation learning (SSL) improve encoder backbones to discriminate training samples without labels. While CNN encoders via SSL achieve comparable recognition performance to those via supervised learning, their network attention is under-explored for further improvement. Motivated by the transformers that explore visual attention effectively in recognition scenarios, we propose a CNN Attention REvitalization (CARE) framework to train attentive CNN encoders guided by transformers in SSL. The proposed CARE framework consists of a CNN stream (C-stream) and a transformer stream (T-stream), where each stream contains two branches. C-stream follows an existing SSL framework with two CNN encoders, two projectors, and a predictor. T-stream contains two transformers, two projectors, and a predictor. T-stream connects to CNN encoders and is in parallel to the remaining C-Stream. During training, we perform SSL in both streams simultaneously and use the T-stream output to supervise C-stream. The features from CNN encoders are modulated in T-stream for visual attention enhancement and become suitable for the SSL scenario. We use these modulated features to supervise C-stream for learning attentive CNN encoders. To this end, we revitalize CNN attention by using transformers as guidance. Experiments on several standard visual recognition benchmarks, including image classification, object detection, and semantic segmentation, show that the proposed CARE framework improves CNN encoder backbones to the state-of-the-art performance.


Located in the Asian-Pacific region, Australia is a unique example an English speaking country which has progressive language policies to promote Asian languages, Chinese in particular. History has witnessed three stages of development of Chinese language teaching. In the first stage, Chinese language learning was initiated and organised by local Chinese community schools featured with different curricula decided by various sub-groups. Secondly, the Australian government's multicultural and language policies have further promoted and supported Chinese language learning in community schools. Finally, the Chinese language teaching has expanded to the mainstream schools on the basis of state-based curricula. A national unified curriculum is being developed in order to meet the needs of the fast growing number of learners of Chinese in schools all over the nation. The research described in this chapter on Chinese language teaching in community schools and mainstream schools is based on a policy study of Australia and a case study through qualitative investigations at three universities in the state of New South Wales. The research has revealed some pedagogical problems of Chinese language teaching in the social and cultural context of Australia and provided some suggestions to improve the current performance of Chinese language teaching and learning.


The aim of this study is to examine the issues and discourses - from written, documented sources - of 'foreign women migrants' in Cyprus. The study is a literature review discussing similarities and differences on the issues of foreign women immigrants in terms of regulations, stories and perceptions. The issue of labour exploitation is examined around three groups of women: domestic workers, sex workers and refugee women. Results suggest that the existing studies on migrant women workers on both sides of the island lack gender sensitivity and are generally limited to official reports, rather than the realities of the lives of women explored from feminist and gender studies' perspective. The results of the study have important implications for academic institutions, researchers, government representatives, and journalists. This study provides an explanatory framework through which to examine and give meaning to the situation of migrant women in Cyprus who are recruited and subsequently exploited in low paying and low status jobs in the two dominant Cypriot communities in Cyprus.


Delinquents are embedded in a network of relationships. Social ties among delinquents are modeled by means of a graph where delinquents compete for a booty and benefit from local interactions with their neighbors. Each delinquent decides in a non-cooperative way how much delinquency effort he will exert. Using the network model developed by Ballester et al. (2006), we characterize the Nash equilibrium and derive an optimal enforcement policy, called the key-player policy, which targets the delinquent who, once removed, leads to the highest aggregate delinquency reduction. We then extend our characterization of optimal single player network removal for delinquency reduction, the key player, to optimal group removal, the key group. We also characterize and derive a policy that targets links rather than players. Finally, we endogenize the network connecting delinquents by allowing players to join the labor market instead of committing delinquent offenses. The key-player policy turns out to be much more complex since it depends on wages and on the structure of the network.


PURPOSE
Living, genetically unrelated donor renal transplantation (LURT) is being performed with increasing frequency. We evaluated our single center experience with LURT and compared this to a cohort of living related donor renal transplants (LRT) to evaluate the short-term success of LURT at our center.

MATERIALS AND METHODS
We identified 99 consecutive patients who underwent LURT at our center and had at least 1 year of followup data. A control cohort of 99 patients who underwent LRT at our center matched for age, number of transplants and date of transplant was also identified. One-year graft and patient survival, and serum creatinine levels at 1, 3, 6 and 12 months were compared between the groups. Our data were compared with national and international data.

RESULTS
At our center 1-year graft survival was 95% in the LURT and LRT cohorts. One-year LURT patient survival was 99% compared with 97% in the LRT group and the serum creatinine levels were not significantly different.

CONCLUSIONS
Patients undergoing LURT at our center have excellent 1-year graft and patient survival compared with LRT performed at our center, and national and international LURT. Genetically unrelated kidney donors should continue to be used to expand the kidney donor pool.


Background Knee osteoarthritis (OA) is a major cause of pain and functional limitation in older adults, yet longer-term studies of medical treatment of OA are limited. Objective To evaluate the efficacy and safety of glucosamine and chondroitin sulphate (CS), alone or in combination, as well as celecoxib and placebo on painful knee OA over 2 years. Methods A 24-month, double-blind, placebo-controlled study, conducted at nine sites in the US ancillary to the Glucosamine/chondroitin Arthritis Intervention Trial, enrolled 662 patients with knee OA who satisfied radiographic criteria (Kellgren/Lawrence grade 2 or 3 changes and baseline joint space width of at least 2 mm). This subset continued to receive their randomised treatment: glucosamine 500 mg three times daily, CS 400 mg three times daily, the combination of glucosamine and CS, celecoxib 200 mg daily, or placebo over 24 months. The primary outcome was a 20% reduction in Western Ontario and McMaster University Osteoarthritis Index (WOMAC) pain over 24 months. Secondary outcomes included an Outcome Measures in Rheumatology/Osteoarthritis Research Society International response and change from baseline in WOMAC pain and function. Results Compared with placebo, the odds of achieving a 20% reduction in WOMAC pain were celecoxib: 1.21, glucosamine: 1.16, combination glucosamine/CS: 0.83 and CS alone: 0.69, and were not statistically significant. Conclusions Over 2 years, no treatment achieved a clinically important difference in WOMAC pain or function as compared with placebo. However, glucosamine and celecoxib showed beneficial but not significant trends. Adverse reactions were similar among treatment groups and serious adverse events were rare for all treatments.


Objective: To determine the prevalence of hepatitis B virus (HBV) genotypic resistance to lamivudine, identify risk factors associated with lamivudine resistance, and characterize the pattern of HBV polymerase mutations in patients co-infected with HIV. Design: Retrospective cross-sectional study. Methods: Thirty-three chronic HBV-infected patients were identified from a cohort of 1719 HIV-infected individuals. Patient information was collected from case records, HBV DNA was measured on stored serum by polymerase chain reaction, and positive samples underwent sequencing of HBV polymerase, basal core promoter and precore regions. Results: Three groups of patients were identified: group 1 were viraemic in the absence of lamivudine-resistance mutations, group 2 were viraemic in association with lamivudine-resistance mutations, and group 3 were not viraemic. Group 2 patients with lamivudine-resistant mutations had significantly higher HBV-DNA viral loads but did not differ in duration of lamivudine therapy, HBV genotype, HIV viral load or CD4 cell count compared with patients with wild-type HBV. Group 2 individuals also demonstrated significantly higher serum alanine aminotransferase (ALT) levels than group 1, who were higher than group 3. Unique mutations were detected in HBV polymerase, including rtV173L plus rtL180M plus rtM204V, which occurred in three patients. This virus has the in-vitro characteristics of a 'vaccine escape' mutant of HBV. Conclusion: Genotypic HBV lamivudine resistance was found in 39% of HIV–HBV co-infected individuals treated with lamivudine as part of highly active antiretroviral therapy. These patients exhibited significantly elevated HBV viral loads and serum ALT, and three were infected with a lamivudine-resistant HBV strain that was potentially transmissible to HBV-vaccinated individuals.


The edge computing paradigm brings cloud capabilities close to the clients. Leveraging the edge's capabilities can improve video streaming services by employing the storage capacity and processing power at the edge for caching and transcoding tasks, respectively, resulting in video streaming services with higher quality and lower latency. In this paper, we propose CD-LwTE, a <inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">${C}$ </tex-math></inline-formula>ost- and <inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">${D}$ </tex-math></inline-formula>elay-aware <inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">${L}$ </tex-math></inline-formula>ight-<inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">${w}$ </tex-math></inline-formula>eight <inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">${T}$ </tex-math></inline-formula>ranscoding approach at the <inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">${E}$ </tex-math></inline-formula>dge, in the context of HTTP Adaptive Streaming (HAS). The encoding of a video segment requires computationally intensive search processes. The main idea of CD-LwTE is to store the optimal search results as metadata for each bitrate of video segments and reuse it at the edge servers to reduce the required time and computational resources for transcoding. Aiming at minimizing the cost and delay of Video-on-Demand (VoD) services, we formulate the problem of selecting an optimal policy for serving segment requests at the edge server, including (<inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">${i}$ </tex-math></inline-formula>) storing at the edge server, (ii) transcoding from a higher bitrate at the edge server, and (iii) fetching from the origin or a CDN server, as a Binary Linear Programming (BLP) model. As a result, CD-LwTE stores the popular video segments at the edge and serves the unpopular ones by transcoding using metadata or fetching from the origin/CDN server. In this way, in addition to the significant reduction in bandwidth and storage costs, the transcoding time of a requested segment is remarkably decreased by utilizing its corresponding metadata. Moreover, we prove the proposed BLP model is an NP-hard problem and propose two heuristic algorithms to mitigate the time complexity of CD-LwTE. We investigate the performance of CD-LwTE in comprehensive scenarios with various video contents, encoding software, encoding settings, and available resources at the edge. The experimental results show that our approach (<inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">${i}$ </tex-math></inline-formula>) reduces the transcoding time by up to 97%, (ii) decreases the streaming cost, including storage, computation, and bandwidth costs, by up to 75%, and (iii) reduces delay by up to 48% compared to state-of-the-art approaches.


Hemostasis disorders are typically classified as either hemorrhagic or thrombotic. Irrespective of the nature and underlying causes, the diagnostic approach to patients with hemostasis disturbances is multifaceted and involves accurate collection of clinical history taking and physical examination, as also combined with results of an appropriate number and type of laboratory investigations, which can be arbitrarily classified as first-line (i.e., screening), second-line (i.e., for the etiological diagnosis) and third-line (i.e., for biochemical or even molecular characterization) analyses. This possible classification actually mirrors that of laboratory services, which are now increasingly organized in "spoke" (i.e., peripheral), "hub" (i.e., core) and reference facilities. Albeit many supranational initiatives are underway to improve quality throughout the total hemostasis testing process, several important issues still plague this important branch of laboratory medicine, including the relatively modest knowledge that many laboratory professionals have of hemostasis in health and disease, the unacceptable heterogeneity of available diagnostic algorithms for both diagnosis and therapeutic management of hemostatic diseases, the inaccurate definition of reference ranges, the identification and communication of critical values, as well as the still unsatisfactory harmonization of many preanalytical, analytical and postanalytical procedures.


CO2 is co-exhaled with aerosols containing SARS-CoV-2 by COVID-19-infected people and can be used as a proxy of SARS-CoV-2 concentrations indoors. Indoor CO2 measurements by low-cost sensors hold promise for mass monitoring of indoor aerosol transmission risk for COVID-19 and other respiratory diseases. We derive analytical expressions of CO2-based risk proxies and apply them to various typical indoor environments. The relative infection risk in a given environment scales with excess CO2 level, and thus, keeping CO2 as low as feasible in a space allows optimization of the protection provided by ventilation. We show that the CO2 level corresponding to a given absolute infection risk varies by >2 orders of magnitude for different environments and activities. Although large uncertainties, mainly from virus exhalation rates, are still associated with infection risk estimates, our study provides more specific and practical recommendations for low-cost CO2-based indoor infection risk monitoring.


Quantum control is concerned with active manipulation of physical and chemical processes on the atomic and molecular scale. This work presents a perspective of progress in the field of control over quantum phenomena, tracing the evolution of theoretical concepts and experimental methods from early developments to the most recent advances. Among numerous theoretical insights and technological improvements that produced the present state-of-the-art in quantum control, there have been several breakthroughs of foremost importance. On the technology side, the current experimental successes would be impossible without the development of intense femtosecond laser sources and pulse shapers. On the theory side, the two most critical insights were (i) realizing that ultrafast atomic and molecular dynamics can be controlled via manipulation of quantum interferences and (ii) understanding that optimally shaped ultrafast laser pulses are the most effective means for producing the desired quantum interference patterns in the controlled system. Finally, these theoretical and experimental advances were brought together by the crucial concept of adaptive feedback control (AFC), which is a laboratory procedure employing measurement-driven, closed-loop optimization to identify the best shapes of femtosecond laser control pulses for steering quantum dynamics towards the desired objective. Optimization in AFC experiments is guided by a learning algorithm, with stochastic methods proving to be especially effective. AFC of quantum phenomena has found numerous applications in many areas of the physical and chemical sciences, and this paper reviews the extensive experiments. Other subjects discussed include quantum optimal control theory, quantum control landscapes, the role of theoretical control designs in experimental realizations and real-time quantum feedback control. The paper concludes with a perspective of open research directions that are likely to attract significant attention in the future.


In support of the High Average Power Laser (HAPL) project the Electra Laser, a KrF Gas Laser system is being developed at NRL. The laser uses high voltage (500 - 800 keV), high current (100 - 500 kA), short pulse (100 - 600 ns) electron beams to pump the 0.14 MPa (20 psi) pressurized KrF gas cell, which is separated from the vacuum region by a 25 μm-thick stainless steel foil, the Hibachi Foil. The foil is made of SUS304, operates between 180 °C and 450 °C, and has typical dimensions of about 0.3 m × 1.0 m. The laser pulses at up to 5 Hz, and the foil is subjected to repetitive thermal and mechanical stresses. In typical experiments, the foil lasts 1000 - 20,000 shots before suffering a catastrophic failure. In an attempt to improve foil performance a variety of design modifications are being considered along with changes in foil material. Earlier Hibachi foil designs used flat foils resting on 0.3 m long square water-cooled supporting ribs (1 cm wide). There is a 3.4 cm gap between ribs. Advanced Hibachi foil concepts are under development using a scalloped foil design. In this paper we report on the comparative thermo-mechanical analysis between flat and scalloped foil geometries. It is demonstrated that the scalloped design reduces stresses to within yield limits of the stainless steel material.


We describe two dynein heavy chain (DHC)-like polypeptides (DHCs 2 and 3) that are distinct from the heavy chain of conventional cytoplasmic dynein (DHC1) but are expressed in a variety of mammalian cells that lack axonemes. DHC2 is a distant member of the "cytoplasmic" branch of the dynein phylogenetic tree, while DHC3 shares more sequence similarity with dynein-like polypeptides that have been thought to be axonemal. Each cytoplasmic dynein is associated with distinct cellular organelles. DHC2 is localized predominantly to the Golgi apparatus. Moreover, the Golgi disperses upon microinjection of antibodies to DHC2, suggesting that this motor is involved in establishing proper Golgi organization. DCH3 is associated with as yet unidentified structures that may represent transport intermediates between two or more cytoplasmic compartments. Apparently, specific cytoplasmic dyneins, like individual members of the kinesin superfamily, play unique roles in the traffic of cytomembranes.


Back ground: Juvenile nasopharyngeal angiofibroma is highly vascular tumor affecting predominantly young males. It arises from the nasopharynx. There are many procedures for treating such vascular tumor; midface degloving is one of surgical modalities of treatment. Objective: Evaluation of outcome of 10 patients with juvenile nasopharyngeal angiofibroma treated by midface degloving approach, regarding complications, blood loss and rate of recurrence. Design: A cross sectional study. Setting: Department of Otolaryngology & Head and Neck Surgery, Ghazi Al-Hariri Surgical Specialties Hospital, Medical City Complex, Baghdad. Patients and Method: This study included 10 consecutive case series of juvenile nasopharyngeal angiofibroma over a period of 3 years from 2010-2013. All patients were admitted to our ENT department. Detailed history, clinical examination and relevant investigations were done. Imaging including contrast-enhanced CT scan with MRI was done to all cases. All the patients had undergone surgical excision through midface degloving approach. Patients were regularly followed-up for any recurrence and complications for 3 years period. Results: All patients were males and the average age at the diagnosis was 18.2 years (range 12-27 years). Nasal obstruction and recurrent epistaxis were the presenting complaints in all cases. None of the tumors were embolized prior to surgery. The overall recurrence was 10%. Majority of our patients had stage I, II, III (according to Fisch classification). Conclusion: Juvenile nasopharyngeal angiofibroma is a highly vascular tumor of adolescent boys can be surgically excised through midface degloving approach that permit removal of tumor in toto by dissection in sub-periosteal plane and drilling the nests of tumor in basi-sphenoid and medial pterygoid plate which is mandatory to excise any residual disease and prevent recurrence of tumor.


The language of co-creation has become popular with policy makers, researchers and consultants wanting to support evidence-based change. However, there is little agreement about what features a research or consultancy project must have for peers to recognise the project as co-creative,
 and therefore for it to contribute to the growing body of practice and theory under that heading. This means that scholars and practitioners do not have a shared basis for critical reflection, improving practice and debating ethics, legitimacy and quality. While seeking to avoid any premature
 defining of orthodoxy, this article offers a framework to support researchers and practitioners in discussing the boundaries and the features that are beginning to characterise a particular discourse, such as the one that is unfolding around the concept of co-creation. The paper is the outcome
 of an online and face-to-face dialogue among an international group of scholars. The dialogue draws on Critical Systems Heuristics' (Ulrich, 1994) questions concerning motivation (revealing assumptions about its purpose and value), power (interrogating assumptions about who has control
 and is therefore able to define success), knowledge (surfacing assumptions about experience and expertise) and legitimacy (disclosing moral assumptions). The paper ends by suggesting important areas for further exploration to contribute to the emerging discourse of co-creation in ways that
 support critical reflection, improved practice, and provide a basis for debating ethics and quality.


Workers recognized and appreciated overtly by the management
perceive themselves as valued employees. In contrast, employees that are not
rewarded or not recognized perceive themselves as either un-valued or undervalued.
On the other hand, valued employees feel devalued when they are
subjected to situations that symbolize that the organization is ignoring their
contributions, commitment and competence.
This qualitative case study seeks to understand the experiences of six
devalued managers of one Malaysian organization. They were transferred to a
new post that commands reduced positional power, reduced influence and
carries lower job scope and responsibilities when compared to the previous
post. Data was collected through a series of in-depth interviews. Findings were extracted through grounded theory analysis techniques of open coding,
constant comparison, storyline, memos and diagrams.
The findings produced a three-phase process of workplace devaluation.
"Agitation," the first phase, was a period of suspense, anxiety, uncertainty and
hope for the individuals. "Assimilation," the second phase, was a period of
intense internal self-struggle for the individuals. They experienced states of
conflict, denial and rationalization. In "Acknowledgment," the third phase, the
individuals either passively accept (acknowledge) their situation or act to
redress their condition.


Section 402 of the Clean Water Act (CWA) requires the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to develop National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permits for waste discharges to the marine environment from offshore oil and gas operations. Section 403 requires EPA to develop an ocean discharge criteria evaluation (ODCE) and make specific findings before issuing these permits. Finally, Section 309 of the Clean Air Act (CAA) requires that EPA determine whether proposed major Federal actions are acceptable in terms of public health, welfare, and environmental quality. EPA's implementation of these related mandates has uncovered significant gaps in the data available to support the development of ODCEs. These data gaps could impair EPA's ability to develop technically sound NDPES permits for development and production phase discharges for Arctic areas. Most of the burden for filling these data gaps, and thus avoiding delays in OCS hydrocarbon production, rests with the Minerals Management Service (MMS) and industry.


This paper describes a study which examines how people interpret the safe sex messages presented in posters distributed throughout Australian airports as part of the government's Travel Safe AIDS awareness campaign. The subjects who participated in the study were all under 25 years old, one of the target groups for the particular campaign. The group was made up of 20 native speakers of English and 20 non-native speakers of English. Both groups of readers largely recognized the intended messages of the texts and, in many cases, learnt something new from them. This was particularly the case with the non-native speakers of English. The paper cautions, however, on drawing the conclusion from the study that all readers will necessarily enter into the intended reading position of the texts, and respond positively to them.


Sea surface temperatures (SST) from planktic foraminiferal assemblages and alkenones were reconstructed to compare interglacial climate dynamics of MIS 11 and the Holocene using meridional North-Atlantic transect of five sites: ODP 958 (off NW Africa), ODP 975 (western Mediterranean Sea), M23414 (subpolar NE Atlantic), MD992277 (Polar NE Atlantic) and M23063 (Polar NE Atlantic). SST reconstructions were supported by benthic and planktic O- and C-isotope records and, at subpolar and polar sites, by IRD content. In addition, foraminiferal abundances of certain environmental indicators were analyzed.According to our reconstruction quite different SST pattern in the North Atlantic existed during MIS 11 when compared to the Holocene. Averaged temperature results indicate that off Africa and in the Mediterranean sea SST were 1 °C to 2°C higher during MIS 11 than during the Holocene. By contrary, in the Nordic seas planktic foraminiferal abundances reveal much less intensive warm water advection into the region during the earlier period. Alkenone SSTs here, however, have comparable values during MIS 11 and the Holocene. The contradiction between alkenone and foraminiferal data in the Nordic seas might be explained by the different depth habitats of the organisms: coccolithophorides inhabit the uppermost 10 m depth layer and respond strongly to surface stratification while planktic foraminifera live deeper. By analogy with modern polar environments we consider that in the Nordic seas foraminiferal abundances better represent actual Atlantic water masses below the surface layer. In the subpolar NE Atlantic both SST sets exhibit close values during MIS 11 and the Holocene.


Stellar evolution codes play a major role in present-day astrophysics, yet they share common simplifications related to the outer layers of stars. We seek to improve on this by the use of results from realistic and highly detailed 3D hydrodynamics simulations of stellar convection. We implement a temperature stratification extracted directly from the 3D simulations into two stellar evolution codes to replace the simplified atmosphere normally used. Our implementation also contains a non-constant mixing-length parameter, which varies as a function of the stellar surface gravity and temperature -- also derived from the 3D simulations. We give a detailed account of our fully consistent implementation and compare to earlier works, and also provide a freely available MESA-module. The evolution of low-mass stars with different masses is investigated, and we present for the first time an asteroseismic analysis of a standard solar model utilising calibrated convection and temperature stratification from 3D simulations. We show that the inclusion of 3D results have an almost insignificant impact on the evolution and structure of stellar models -- the largest effect are changes in effective temperature of order 30 K seen in the pre-main sequence and in the red-giant branch. However, this work provides the first step for producing self-consistent evolutionary calculations using fully incorporated 3D atmospheres from on-the-fly interpolation in grids of simulations.


Even though it is well accepted that the Earth's surface topography has been affected by mantle-convection induced dynamic topography, its magnitude and time-dependence remain controversial. The dynamic influence to topographic change along continental margins is particularly difficult to unravel, because their stratigraphic record is dominated by tectonic subsidence caused by rifting. We follow a three-fold approach to estimate dynamic topographic change along passive margins based on a set of seven global mantle convection models. We first demonstrate that a geodynamic forward model that includes adiabatic and viscous heating in addition to internal heating from radiogenic sources, and a mantle viscosity profile with a gradual increase in viscosity below the mantle transition zone, provides a greatly improved match to the spectral range of residual topography end-members as compared with previous models at very long wavelengths (spherical degrees 2-3). We then combine global sea level estimates with predicted surface dynamic topography to evaluate the match between predicted continental flooding patterns and published paleo-coastlines by comparing predicted versus geologically reconstructed land fractions and spatial overlaps of flooded regions for individual continents since 140 Ma. Modelled versus geologically reconstructed land fractions match within 10% for most models, and the spatial overlaps of inundated regions are mostly between 85% and 100% for the Cenozoic, dropping to about 75-100% in the Cretaceous. Regions that have been strongly affected by mantle plumes are generally not captured well in our models, as plumes are suppressed in most of them, and our models with dynamically evolving plumes do not replicate the location and timing of observed plume products. We categorise the evolution of modelled dynamic topography in both continental interiors and along passive margins using cluster analysis to investigate how clusters of similar dynamic topography time series are distributed spatially. A subdivision of four clusters is found to best reveal end-members of dynamic topography evolution along passive margins and their hinterlands, differentiating topographic stability, longterm pronounced subsidence, initial stability over a dynamic high followed by moderate subsidence and regions that are relatively proximal to subduction zones with varied dynamic topography histories. Along passive continental margins the most commonly observed process is a gradual motion from dynamic highs towards lows during the fragmentation of Pangea, reflecting the location of many passive margins now over slabs sinking in the lower mantle. Our best-fit model results in up to 500 (± 150) m of total dynamic subsidence of continental interiors while along passive margins the maximum predicted dynamic topographic change over 140 million years is about 350 (± 150) m of subsidence. Models with plumes exhibit clusters of transient passive margin uplift of about 200 ± 200 m, but are mainly characterised by long-term subsidence of up to 400 m. The good overall match between predicted dynamic topography to geologically mapped paleocoastlines makes a convincing case that mantle-driven topographic change is a critical component of relative sea level change, and indeed the main driving force for generating the observed geometries and timings of large-scale continental inundation through time. Disciplines Medicine and Health Sciences | Social and Behavioral Sciences Publication Details Muller, R. D., Hassan, R., Gurnis, M., Flament, N. & Williams, S. E. (2018). Dynamic topography of passive continental margins and their hinterlands since the Cretaceous. Gondwana Research, 53 225-251. This journal article is available at Research Online: http://ro.uow.edu.au/smhpapers/5131


IIASA celebrated its twentieth anniversary on May 12-13 with its fourth general conference, IIASA '92: An International Conference on the Challenges to Systems Analysis in the Nineties and Beyond. The conference focused on the relations between environment and development and on studies that integrate the methods and findings of several disciplines. The role of systems analysis, a method especially suited to taking account of the linkages between phenomena and of the hierarchical organization of the natural and social world, was also assessed, taking account of the implications this has for IIASA's research approach and activities.

No phrase that has come out of a conference has had more resonance than "sustainability." It was well chosen, with a suitable measure of ambiguity yet specific enough to ring a bell in most people's minds. In the one word it could claim to summarize the vast literature that took off from Rachel Carson and the Club of Rome. It is positive, where "limits" is for many unacceptably negative. It goes well in combination with other desirable entities, as in "sustainable growth." This latter enables it to appeal to the poor who look to growth, as well as to those better off who focus on the damage that growth causes to the natural environment. To hear "sustainable growth" is reassuring, for it seems to tell us that, in Harvey Brooks' expression, "economic development and protection of the environment are not necessarily in conflict with each other."

Environmental study requires the contributions of a number of disciplines, and its models bring together variables not ordinarily associated with one another. In these regards it exemplifies the ideas of systems analysis. But there are other fields that also bring out those ideas. The pension problem that will soon face every country as it develops, just as it now faces the industrial countries; uncertainty is universal whenever models are used to illuminate the long-term future; every model faces questions of identification, in its attempt to infer the underlying structure that generates the observed data; that the several world models now extant reach such different conclusions throws light on the difficulty of identification and on the uncertainties of world modeling.

We believe that the papers contained in the first volume, "Science and Sustainability: Selected Papers on IIASA's 20th Anniversary" (IIASA, 1992) dealing with these themes, along with the comments on the papers and the reports of the discussion groups contained in this volume, will at least help clarify difficulties that will always be with us in science as they are in policy making.


Medication use is a complex process involving different types of health care personnel. This study investigated and compared mandatory medication content in the curricula of six types of health care personnel with patient contact. Using content analysis, three independent raters analysed the mandatory medication content for physicians, pharmacists, pharmaconomists, nurses, health care assistants and support workers in the Capital Region of Denmark. Three dimensions were analysed as follows: communication with patients about medication, medication use or pharmacology and medication formulation and production. ECTS credits were totalled for courses analysed to have high or medium content, and inter‐rater reliability was tested with Fleiss' kappa. The total mandatory medication content for pharmacists was 197.0 ECTS, physicians 136.0 ECTS, pharmaconomists 123.3 ECTS, nurses 52.0 ECTS, health care assistants 17.8 ECTS and support workers 0.0 ECTS. Communication with patients about medication was included to the greatest extent in the educations of pharmaconomists (112.0 ECTS), pharmacists (37.5 ECTS) and physicians (25.0 ECTS). Knowledge about medication use and pharmacology was taught primarily to pharmacists (146.5 ECTS), physicians (123.6 ECTS) and pharmaconomists (89.8 ECTS) and to a lesser extent nurses (52.0 ECTS), health care assistants (17.8 ECTS) and support workers (0.0 ECTS). Medication formulation and production were taught only to pharmacists (93.0 ECTS) and pharmaconomists (25.1 ECTS). Mapping the basic competencies about medication taught to each of the six health care personnel types can lead to a better understanding of how they can complement each other in patient care. The study points to weaknesses in medication curriculum content for health care personnel with the most patient contact.


The U.S. Geological Survey National Crustal Model (NCM) is being developed to include spatially varying estimates of site response in seismic hazard assessments. Primary outputs of the NCM are continuous velocity and density profiles from the Earth's surface to the mantle transition zone at 410-kilometer (km) depth for each location on a 1-km grid across the conterminous United States. Datasets used to produce the NCM may have a resolution of better than 1 km near the Earth's surface in some regions, but, with increasing depth, NCM resolution decreases to tens to hundreds of kilometers in the mantle. Basic subsurface information is provided by the NCM geologic framework, thermal model, and petrologic and mineral physics database. In this report, the velocities and densities that can be extracted from the NCM are calibrated through the development of a porosity model based on Biot-Gassmann theory and more than 2,000 compressionaland (or) shear-wave velocity profiles less than 10 km deep from across the conterminous United States and southwestern Canada. Sediment and rock porosities are derived from shear-wave velocity and are found to depend on effective pressure, rock type, and age (for sedimentary and extrusive volcanic deposits). Porosity-effective pressure functions are then estimated for each rock type (and age for sedimentary and extrusive volcanic deposits). Unconsolidated sediments are found to have higher porosities than consolidated units, which have higher porosities than unweathered igneous units; young sedimentary units (for example, Quaternary age units) tend to have higher porosities than older sedimentary units (for example, pre-Cenozoic age units); porosity decreases with increasing effective pressure; and porosities can decrease quickly through the weathered layer of intrusive rocks. Comparing two Los Angeles area velocity models and the U.S. Geological Survey Bay Area velocity model with the NCM, the NCM does a better job on average of reproducing observed shear-wave velocities below 1 km per second because it has less bias and uncertainty. Approaching and above 1 km per second, the NCM tends to underpredict observed shear-wave velocity. Whereas several factors could contribute to this, the primary factor is probably bias in the NCM geologic framework. For example, the NCM will predict lower velocities in places where the depth to bedrock and basement appear shallower in the measured velocity profiles than specified in the NCM geologic framework. With regard to observed compressional-wave velocity and density, the NCM has significantly less bias than California models for the former, especially below 2 km per second, and all models tend to overpredict density for densities less than about 2,200 kilograms per cubic meter.


The core strategies of the U.S. War on Drugs are eradication, interdiction and incarceration. After a 40-year and trillion-dollar effort, illicit drugs remain available to meet a remarkably stable demand. Drawing on decades of government-gathered and publicly available data, William Martin, director of the Drug Policy Program, and contributing expert Jerry Epstein contend that U.S. drug policy is premised on incorrect assumptions, aims at the wrong targets and can never succeed. But because these data run counter to a century of anti-drug propaganda, they play only a small role in public policy, mass-media presentation and popular perception. In this policy report, Martin and Epstein call for a reexamination of the data and sweeping revision of existing strategies. They urge formation of a politically independent national scientific commission, its members chosen by the National Academy of Sciences, in consultation with the NIH and the Department of Health and Human Services, to facilitate open examination and honest consideration of alternatives to current failed or flawed policies.


The Matagami mining camp in the northern Abitibi greenstone belt of Canada contains 19 known Archean volcanogenic massive sulfide (VMS) deposits, 11 of which have collectively produced 46.5 Mt of zinc-rich ore to date. The VMS deposits occur in three NW-SE– to WNW-ESE–oriented trends called the north flank, the south flank, and the west camp, which are composed of a felsic to mafic volcanic sequence cut by mafic to intermediate, synvolcanic sills and dikes. In order to clarify stratigraphic relationships between the south flank and the west camp, and to constrain the temporal evolution of volcanic activity, six new high-precision U-Pb zircon ages have been obtained. These data show that the total duration of felsic volcanism in the south flank was no more than 2.5 m.y., with the rhyolites extruded in the following order: Watson Rhyolite (2725.9 ± 0.8 Ma), Bracemac Rhyolite (2725.8 ± 0.7 Ma), Dumagami Rhyolite at the Perseverance Mine (2725.4 ± 0.7 Ma), and Dumagami Rhyolite in the Orchan West VMS deposit area (2724.9 ± 0.7 Ma). A hiatus in effusive volcanism is represented by the Key Tuffite, an important marker horizon in the camp. The hiatus probably lasted on the order of 0.5 m.y. Significantly, the rhyolite from the footwall of the Caber VMS deposit in the west camp has an age of 2725.9 ± 1.2 Ma, identical to that of the Watson Rhyolite on the south flank.


Documentary film can encompass anything from Robert Flaherty's pioneering ethnography Nanook of the North to Michael Moore's anti-Iraq War polemic Fahrenheit 9/11, from Dziga Vertov's artful Soviet propaganda piece Man with a Movie Camera to Luc Jacquet's heart-tugging wildlife epic March of the Penguins. In this concise, crisply written guide, Patricia Aufderheide takes readers along the diverse paths of documentary history and charts the lively, often fierce debates among filmmakers and scholars about the best ways to represent reality and to tell the truths worth telling. Beginning with an overview of the central issues of documentary filmmaking-its definitions and purposes, its forms and founders-Aufderheide focuses on several of its key subgenres, including public affairs films, government propaganda (particularly the works produced during World War II), historical documentaries, and nature films. Her thematic approach allows readers to enter the subject matter through the kinds of films that first attracted them to documentaries, and it permits her to make connections between eras, as well as revealing the ongoing nature of documentary's core controversies involving objectivity, advocacy, and bias. Interwoven throughout are discussions of the ethical and practical considerations that arise with every aspect of documentary production. A particularly useful feature of the book is an appended list of "100 great documentaries" that anyone with a serious interest in the genre should see. Drawing on the author's four decades of experience as a film scholar and critic, this book is the perfect introduction not just for teachers and students but also for all thoughtful filmgoers and for those who aspire to make documentaries themselves. ABOUT THE SERIES: The Very Short Introductions series from Oxford University Press contains hundreds of titles in almost every subject area. These pocket-sized books are the perfect way to get ahead in a new subject quickly. Our expert authors combine facts, analysis, perspective, new ideas, and enthusiasm to make interesting and challenging topics highly readable.


Purpose. To perform a structured review of the psychometric properties specific to the stroke population of the Assessment of Life Habits (LIFE-H). This tool measures quality of social participation, an important but under-evaluated aspect of stroke recovery. Method. A structured review of publications at MEDLINE; Embase, CINAHL, and the Cochrane Library using the following terms: LIFE-H, life habits, psychometric properties, measurement properties, reliability, repeatability, validity, responsiveness, appropriateness, ceiling effects, and floor effects. Results. Eleven studies were identified specific to stroke. Test–retest reliability was excellent (Intraclass correlation coefficients [ICCs] ranging from 0.80 to 0.95). Inter-rater reliability ranged from adequate to excellent (r = 0.64–0.91) as well as agreement between responses of clients with stroke and their proxies (ICC ranging from 0.73 to 0.82). Convergent validity was adequate to excellent (r = 0.57–0.91) between the LIFE-H and two measures of functional independence. Two studies, one using patients and one using caregivers, suggest the LIFE-H is able to detect change over time. Conclusions. The LIFE-H is a psychometrically sound measure of quality of social participation for use in post-stroke assessment and is responsive to change.


An experimental method, using simultaneous vertical and slant observations, has been derived for estimating the effective shell height for electron content measurement by GPS reception. At a latitude of approximately 53° north, Lancashire is well placed as an observing site since GPS satellite orbits are inclined at 55° to the Earth's equatorial plane and, as a result, many GPS tracks pass almost directly overhead, giving true zenithal measurements. This paper focuses on the question of oblique‐to‐zenithal correction and related matters. In particular, plasmaspheric effective height and satellite bias corrections are determined by measuring the total electron content (TEC) from pairs of satellites to a single ground station, each pair giving simultaneous observations of oblique and zenithal TEC. Additional bias corrections are determined by extracting the TEC using pairs of satellites with the same elevation at the same time. The Chapman Production Function Model and the Sheffield University Plasmasphere and Ionosphere Model are both used to determine a theoretical value for the plasmaspheric effective height. The results indicate that the plasmaspheric effective height used in the oblique‐to‐zenithal thin shell conversion is considerably greater than the commonly adopted value of 350 km. It is suggested, on the basis of all the available evidence, that a value between 600 and 1200 km is preferred. Assuming a lower value could produce an error of 15 to 30% or more in the electron content.


An attempt to further understand the processes of auto-ignition, combustion and ultimately emission formation for a common rail diesel injection system, has lead to an investigation into the effects in-cylinder density and fuel injection pressure have on liquid penetration, vapour formation and auto-ignition delay. Although several correlations for diesel spray penetration at different operating conditions have been presented in the literature, to date the findings are in-conclusive with only limited investigation into the operating envelope expected in present and future high speed direct injection diesel engines.
The present paper describes how two high-speed video cameras were utilised to achieved pseudo 3-dimensional imaging of the spray (backlit) and of auto-ignition sites (flame lumines-cence). It also describes how Schlieren imaging enabled vapour phase analysis. Data have been gathered for in-cylinder densities in the range 10 to 50 kg.m-3 and injection pressures be-tween 60 and 160 MPa. New correlations have been established for the penetration of both the liquid and vapour phases of a high-pressure diesel spray injected from a modern VCO nozzle common rail system. By increasing injection pressures and using small injector orifice sizes, it is thought that the injected diesel droplets reduce in size and penetrate further, hence increas-ing air utilisation, thus leading to faster evaporation rates and reduced ignition delay. An ex-perimental correlation for auto-ignition delay against in-cylinder density has been presented, suggesting that as the charge density increases, penetration is reduced but auto-ignition delay is reduced, indicating more favourable conditions for ignition.


Is the state really necessary? Social norms scholars have long argued that, in the absence of a strong central government, local communities can fashion orderly rules to distribute property entitlements and regulate their enforcement. At its core, this Article argues that while the legal scholarship has fully explored the benefits of social norms, academics have yet to flesh out the drawbacks of governance systems based on private ordering principles. Specifically, scholars have overlooked the presence and subsequent costs of violence that arise in the absence of centralized enforcement mechanisms. My argument has two pieces. To start, I demonstrate that property scholarship has ignored the amount of actual violence that occurs in systems of private ordering. I then highlight some of the costs of this hidden violence, for both individuals and communities. To make these points I reexamine the three canonical examples of "successful" private ordering regimes — the California Gold Rush, the Maine lobstermen, and the cattle ranchers of the American West. In each instance my research shows that violence is a more pervasive menace than the legal literature has indicated. And, ultimately, the presence of intimate physical violence not only imposes autonomy costs on the individuals ensconced in systems regulated by private ordering, it also calls into question the overall efficiency of social norms.


This paper provides a unified theoretical and empirical analysis of three longstanding explanations for the consistent loss of support for the President's party in midterm Congressional elections: (1) a Presidential penalty, defined as a preference for supporting the opposition during midterm years, (2) a surge and decline in voter turnout, and (3) a reversion to the mean in voter ideology. To quantify the contribution of each of these factors, we build an econometric model in which voters jointly choose whether or not to participate and which party to support in both House and Presidential elections. Estimated using ANES data from both Presidential and midterm years, the model can fully explain the observed midterm gaps, and counterfactual simulations demonstrate that each factor makes a sizable contribution towards the midterm gap, with the Presidential penalty playing the largest role.


Smooth functions on graphs have wide applications in manifold and semi-supervised learning. In this paper, we study a bandit problem where the payoffs of arms are smooth on a graph. This framework is suitable for solving online learning problems that involve graphs, such as contentbased recommendation. In this problem, each item we can recommend is a node and its expected rating is similar to its neighbors. The goal is to recommend items that have high expected ratings. We aim for the algorithms where the cumulative regret with respect to the optimal policy would not scale poorly with the number of nodes. In particular, we introduce the notion of an effective dimension, which is small in real-world graphs, and propose two algorithms for solving our problem that scale linearly and sublinearly in this dimension. Our experiments on real-world content recommendation problem show that a good estimator of user preferences for thousands of items can be learned from just tens of nodes evaluations.


On all tenable theories about the nature of law, there is a place for the following story. We do not agree about what we ought to do, but we do agree that we need to settle the matter. So we designate a person or group of people to decide what norm or norms should govern us with respect to the matters in dispute.That person might be a chief executive; that group might be a legislature or a constitutional convention. Regardless, their job in all cases is to come up with norms in order to settle what is to be done in some domain of social life.Now, after this person or group has decided on the appropriate norms to govern the matter, they then must communicate to the rest of us what those norms are. For their job was not merely to settle the matter among themselves. It was to settle the matter for all of us. So they are faced with the following task: they must express the norms they have chosen in such a way that the rest of us understand what those norms are. Because we cannot ascertain the norms they have in mind through telepathy, they must communicate them by means of symbols — orally, using sounds; in writing, using marks; through semaphore, using flags; by smoke signals, etc. The job of the rest of us — the interpreters — is to discover what norms the group or person we tasked with choosing the norms actually chose.


Abstract Introduction The data of the Turkish Esophageal Atresia Registry (TEAR) was evaluated to define the outcome of very low birth weight (VLBW) and low BW (LWB) infants with esophageal atresia (EA). Materials and Methods The data registered by 24 centers between 2014 and 2018 were evaluated for demographic features, prenatal findings, associated anomalies, surgical treatment, and outcome. Patients were enrolled in three groups according to their BWs (VLBW <1,500 g), LWB = 1,500–2,500 g), and normal BW (NBW; >2,500 g). Results Among the 389 cases, there were 37 patients (9.5%) in the VLBW group, 165 patients (42.4%) in the LBW group, and 187 patients (48.1%) in the NBW group. Prenatal diagnosis rates were similar among the three groups (29.7, 34.5, and 24.6%, respectively). The standard primary anastomosis was achieved at a significantly higher rate in NWB cases than in the other groups (p < 0.05). In patients with tracheoesophageal fistula (TEF), patients of the NBW group had significantly higher rates of full oral feedings, when compared with VLBW and LBW cases (p < 0.05). At the end of the first year, when we evaluate all patients, the number of cases with fistula recanalization and esophageal anastomotic strictures (AS) requiring esophageal dilatation was similar among the groups. The weight and height measurements at 6 months and 1 year of age of the survivors were similar in all the groups. The overall mortality rate was significantly higher in the VLBW and LBW groups, when compared with the NBW patients, even in patients with tension-free anastomosis (p < 0.05). The incidence of the associated anomalies was 90.6% in cases with mortality, which was significantly higher than in survivors (59.6%; p < 0.05). According to Spitz's classification, the survival rate was 87.1% in class I, 55.3% in class II, and 16.7% in class III. The most common causes of mortality were associated with cardiovascular diseases, pneumonia, and sepsis. Conclusion The national data of TEAR demonstrates that the developmental and feeding parameters are better in NBW patients. Although VLBW patients have higher risk of developing fistula canalization than the LBW and NBW groups, long-term complications, such as anastomotic strictures, weight, and height values, after 1 year are similar in both groups. According to our results, associated anomalies and LBWs are still significant risk factors for mortality in cases with EA.


This paper is a summary of a 2011 academic study commissioned by the New South Wales Government (Game Council) investigating the possible legalizing of firearm sound moderators for hunting and shooting. The study examined the pragmatic advantages and disadvantages of this product in the event it could be made available to the general public. Advantages of de-criminalisation include; hearing-loss prevention, increased accuracy, reduced recoil, reduced stock disturbance, reduced noise pollution, increased safety and an increase in the potential for humane culling. Disadvantages include cost, a deleterious shift in the firearm's centre of gravity, and the potential of criminal and civil misuse. While based largely on secondary data, the investigation found no obvious link between sound moderators and their use in petty or organized criminal activity. Further, and based upon a review of other legislative regimes where moderator use is legally permitted, the authors conclude that the benefits pertaining to moderator use by civilian shooting communities points to a need for a more informed debate on legislative change within Australia. While the author's note the logical consequence of such findings should be a move towards de-criminalisation in Australia they also appreciate that entrenched attitudes relating to firearms, both as a product and consumer lifestyle, will likely result in impassioned minority resistance to any change in the status quo. A comparison between Australia and New Zealand vis-à-vis public access to sound moderators highlights not only the opposite ends of the continuum adopted by two similar countries, but also the arbitrary nature of how attitudes influence product acceptability and availability.


The paper compares casino service quality evaluations, customer satisfaction and loyalty between casino members and nonmembers, and investigates the relationships among these variables. In particular, the study examines a mediation relationship by proposing that customer satisfaction intervenes between casino service quality and customer loyalty. The investigation is undertaken at six Macau casinos that provide membership to customers. The results show that customers without holding any membership have higher evaluations of casino service quality; nevertheless, casino members tend to choose the casino which they hold membership with as their first choice. The mediation testing indicates that including customer satisfaction in the model increases the variance in customer loyalty only in the case of casino members. Finally, each casino service quality dimension has different effect on gambler satisfaction and loyalty. The research yields insights into customer loyalty research. Strategic implications are provided for the literature as well as casino practitioners.


Regularity is a key element of maintenance drug treatment; compliance is crucial for treatment success. Once- or twice-daily intake of a drug is always easier to comply with than regimens requiring more frequent dosing. Bronchodilating treatment was used as an example to illustrate how sustained duration of effect can be achieved by two different approaches: oral administration of the terbutaline prodrug bambuterol and inhalation of formoterol. Bioanalytical methods were employed to monitor the kinetic fate of bambuterol and formoterol in plasma, urine, or faeces. Generated terbutaline in plasma was used as a marker of effect for bambuterol. Established clinical laboratory tests were used to assess local and systemic effects of inhaled formoterol compared with salbutamol. Recommended doses of bambuterol, 10-20 mg once daily in adults, normally produced plasma concentrations of the active moiety terbutaline within therapeutically relevant limits. Dose proportionality for terbutaline makes dosing with bambuterol predictable. Compared with adults, children should be given higher doses than indicated by their lower body weight. Pharmacokinetic analysis indicated that absorption of bambuterol was slow and multi-phasic and that slow biotransformation to terbutaline occurred both presystemically and systemically. Systemically circulating formoterol was rapidly eliminated, the inactive (S;S)-formoterol more rapidly than the active (R;R)-formoterol. An inactive phenol glucuronide was the main metabolite, and a previously unknown sulphate metabolite was discovered. Duration of systemically mediated cardiovascular or metabolic side-effects of inhaled formoterol seemed not to differ from those of an inhaled systemically equieffective dose of salbutamol. There was a trend suggesting that the magnitude of systemic side-effects may be less pronounced after inhalation of formoterol compared with a locally equieffective dose of inhaled salbutamol. Both approaches to sustaining stimulation of beta2-adrenoceptors have their pros and cons. Bambuterol can be dosed orally once daily, but full effect is reached slowly. The effect of formoterol is reached within a few minutes, but administration must occur via the lungs, often twice daily. Both treatments, however, give 24-h symptom relief during regular treatment.


Geospatial information systems (GIS) provide a central infrastructure for computer supported crisis management in terms of database, analytical models and visualisation tools, but the user interfaces of such systems are still hard to use, and do not address the special needs of crisis managers who often work in teams and make judgements and decisions under stress. This paper articulates the overall challenges for effective GIS interfaces to support crisis management in three dimensions: immediacy, relevance and sharing. These three requirements are addressed by an integrated approach, taking a human-GIS interaction perspective. To demonstrate the feasibility of this approach, we cite our prototype system, DAVE_G (Dialogue-Assisted Visual Environment for Geoinformaton), as an example. DAVE_G uses a large screen display to create a shared workspace among team members, and allows risk managers to interact with a GIS through natural multimodal (speech/gesture) dialogues.


Hie focus of educational reform in recent years has shifted to the restructuring of schools. Many reformers have defined restructuring in terms of the decentralization of power within schools (Elmore et ah, 1990). Yet, there is little research to suggest how such decentralization will affect teachers and improve schools. Given this scarcity, the purpose of this study was to explore the relationships between the degree of centralized decision-making which exists in a school, teachers' cognitive and affective work-alienation, and multiple indices of school effectiveness. Such relationships were examined within the context of Seeman's (1972) framework of social change as applied to schools. Viewing teacher work-alienation as a mediator of the relationship between school centralization and effectiveness, five hypotheses were constructed and tested. Sixty schools from a mixed set of districts in a southeastern state were selected for study. Survey data were collected from teachers in this sample; each school made available the appropriate effectiveness data. Using schools as the unit of analysis, the following results were obtained: 1) a significant, positive correlation was found to exist between centralization and both measures of work-alienation; 2) relationships between work-alienation and the various effectiveness indices were mixed in both direction and magnitude; 3) relationships between centralization and the effectiveness indices were likewise mixed in direction and magnitude; and 4) when the effects of alienation were statistically controlled, the magnitude of the relationship between centralization and effectiveness was considerably reduced. These results suggest that Seeman's framework is formulated at a level of abstraction that does not easily fit schools as organizations. The framework fails to account for the mixed results obtained between centralization and the various indices of effectiveness. Given this inconsistency, it would appear that the concept of school effectiveness stands in need of further clarification. Development of a taxonomy which considers the various levels and nuances of school effectiveness is needed to guide future research. In addition, it would appear that work-alienation docs mediate the relationship between school centralization and effectiveness. Such findings call into question the appropriateness of the tight-ship metaphor as a descriptor of the effective school.


The basis of mixing ventilation is the airflow supply to the room by means of jets initiatedfrom the ventilation diffusers. To avoid the draught problem, the design of mixing ventilationmakes uses the throw term, which is defined as the distance to the supply air terminal inwhich the jet centreline mean velocity is decreased to a given value. Traditionally, the throw ismeasured by the supply air device manufacturer. The throw is applied by designers to estimatethe velocity levels in the occupied zone. A standard for determining the throw is the CENstandard CEN/TC156/WG4 N86 "Draft Standard. Air terminal Devices. AerodynamicsTesting And Rating For Mixed Flow Application".The measurement of the throw is very time consuming even with the free jets and theinfluence of the room (the effect of confinement) is not considered. The objective of thepresent study is to give a basis for modifying the existing design and testing method used topredict the velocities in the occupied zone during the design process. A new method whichmay probably be more easier than the existing methods and at the same time give a betterprecision by including the confinement effect.In this thesis two methodological systems of experiment and numerical simulations have beenused. The numerical predictions are used in comparison with the measurements. Thereasonable agreement of the above mentioned methods is implemented to numerical study ofthe other room configurations which are not experimentally studied. This examining methodallows the possibility of studying a lot of configurations and in this manner generalising of theresults. Although the experimental part was made for both model-scale and full-scale testrooms, a large amount of data was obtained for a new test room whose dimension aresystematically varied. All of studies have been made for the isothermal case and themeasurements of velocities and pressures conducted along the room perimeters. The effect ofshort and deep rooms on the properties of the jet ( velocities, pressure, integral scale, jetmomentum, the rate of spreading of jet and turbulence intensities) have been carried out.Some old and recent investigations have been examined. Specially the concept of correlationsfrom open to closed rooms is criticised. It is also shown that the flow field in a confined roomis affected by many other factors than the Reynolds number. The surface pressure on theperimeters was used to calculate the reaction forces at the corners which causes recirculatingbubbles at corners. A study of the turbulent axisymmetric jet which is the basic element inturbulent shear flows and some restrictions of the traditional measurement techniques at theregion of interest in ventilation applications are discussed. The jet momentum is measured byweighing on a balance. Also a study of jets which collide with a wall , that is impinging jet,the effect of walls and confinement on the jet momentum have experimentally andnumerically been carried out. A new momentum balance model was developed for both thefree jet and confined one. An empirical relation has been found for estimation of the room'srotation centre which is used for validation of CFD results.Finally, it is found that the jets in a ventilated room which are a combination of free jet, walljet and impinging jet differ from the traditional wall jets. The rate of spreading of the jet andthe maximum velocity decay in a ventilated room are also different depending on the roomsize and its confinement.


Urban stream restoration projects have been undertaken to improve physical, chemical, and biological integrity, but there has been little assessment of the effectiveness of these projects in restoring ecological function. I looked at the effect of restoration on improving water quality, periphyton, nutrient uptake, and macroinvertebrate communities compared to unrestored streams. When there was a restoration effect, I compared three types of restoration structures (riffle, cross vane, and step pool) in the restored streams to unrestored streams. Two years after restoration, restored streams did have a more oxygen rich environment. The structures provided hard substrate for algal growth which positively affected nutrient uptake length. There was also a strong trend toward faster uptake velocity and greater uptake rate in restored streams. There was a trend indicating riffles were more beneficial than cross vanes and step pools. The trend suggested that riffles allowed for more mean algal growth and had better water quality ratings. Despite the benefits of the restoration, there was little improvement in biotic integrity based on the North Carolina Biotic Index.


A new methodology is proposed to estimate theortical prices of financial contingent-claims whose values are dependent on some other underlying financial assets. In the literature the preferred choice of estimator is usually maximum likelihood (ML). ML has strong asymptotic justification but is not necessarily the best method in finite samples. The present paper proposes instead a simulation-based method that improves the finite sample performance of the ML estimator while maintaining its good asymptotic properties. The methods are implemented and evaluated here in the Black-Scholes option pricing model and in the Vasicek bond pricing model, but have wider applicability. Monte Carlo studies show that the proposed procedures achieve bias reductions over ML estimation in pricing contingent claims. The bias reductions are sometimes accompanied by reductions in variance, leading to significant overall gains in mean squared estimation error. Empirical applications to US treasury bills highlight the differences between the bond prices implied by the simulation-based approach and those delivered by ML. Some consequences for the statistical testing of contingent-claim pricing models are discussed.


In real life, Mitchell Stevens is a professor in bustling New York. But for a year and a half, he worked in the admissions office of a bucolic New England college that is known for its high academic standards, beautiful campus, and social conscience. Ambitious high schoolers and savvy guidance counsellors know that admission here is highly competitive. But creating classes, Stevens finds, is a lot more complicated than most people imagine.Admissions officers love students but they work for the good of the school. They must bring each class in "on budget", burnish the statistics so crucial to institutional prestige, and take care of their colleagues in the athletic department and the development office. Stevens shows that the job cannot be done without "systematic preferencing", and racial affirmative action is the least of it. Kids have an edge if their parents can pay full tuition, if they attend high schools with exotic zip codes, if they are athletes - especially football players - and even if they are popular.With novelistic flair, sensitivity to history, and a keen eye for telling detail, Stevens explains how elite colleges and universities have assumed their central role in the production of the nation's most privileged classes. "Creating a Class" makes clear that, for better or worse, these schools now define the standards of youthful accomplishment in American culture more generally.


The focus of this paper is to study the performance of the quantize-and-forward (QF) scheme over a half-duplex relay channel that is slowly fading, with the assumption that the channel state information (CSI) is available only at the receiver side. In order to do so, three steps are taken. The first step is to characterize the achievable rate of the QF scheme over a discrete memoryless half-duplex relay channel. Then, the achievable rate over a corresponding additive white Gaussian noise channel is obtained (the specific assumption regarding the CSI in this paper makes this step nontrivial). With the results from the first two steps, performance measures such as outage probability, expected rate, and diversity-multiplexing tradeoff (DMT) over slow fading channels are evaluated. It is shown that the QF scheme can significantly outperform the compress-and-forward scheme at finite signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) and it can achieve the optimal DMT at asymptotically high SNR. Moreover, it is shown that simple feedback from the destination node to the relay node can further improve the performance of the QF scheme.


'Sensors' is the first self-contained series to deal with the whole area of sensors. It describes general aspects, technical and physical fundamentals, construction, function, applications and developments of the various types of sensors. This is the second of two volumes focusing on chemical and biochemical sensors. It includes a detailed description of biosensors which often make use of transducer properties of the basic sensors and usually have additional biological components. This volume provides a unique overview of the applications, the possibilities and limitations of sensors in comparison with conventional instrumentation in analytical chemistry. Specific facettes of applications are presented by specialists from different fields including environmental, biotechnological, medical, or chemical process control. This book is an indispensable reference work for both specialits and newcomers, researchers and developers.