Large randomised controlled trials show no benefit of high intensity renal replacement therapy compared to lower intensity regimens. Previous data suggest large variation in practice. This audit evaluated practices in relation to intensity of replacement therapy in critical care units across the Scottish National Health Service over a 28-day period. The mean delivered weight-adjusted effluent flow rates for continuous veno-venous haemofiltration were 29.1 (8.1 SD) ml kg−1 h−1 which was 89% of that prescribed. For continuous veno-venous haemodiafiltration, the mean delivered dose was 41.3 (7.9) ml kg−1 h−1 which was 88.4% of that prescribed. Of the eight patients undergoing intermittent haemodialysis, seven had daily treatments, whilst the eighth had four treatments in five days. The prescription and delivery of renal replacement therapy within Scottish critical care units are routinely performed at an intensity that is higher than necessary. Avoidance of excessive dose could provide important cost savings.


This paper has attempted to present a brief description of the production steps, from the selection and preparation of the initial feedstock to the recovery and distribution of the isotopically enriched materials. The facility suffers from the disadvantage of coping with utility and support systems that are rapidly becoming obsolescent and that the current operational level is insufficient to maintain sales inventory equilibrium. The electromagnetic isotope enrichment facility does, however, have the operational equipment and capability to almost triple the current production. This increased production can be achieved as rapidly as an expanded operational crew can be trained.


Background: Referral system is facing difficulties worldwide. In Saudi Arabia, particularly, our doctors always complain of referral system.

Objective: To measure the referral rate from primary- to secondary health-care services, evaluate secondary health-care opinion regarding referral from primary care, and measure the feedback rate from secondary health-care physicians.

Materials and Methods: A cross-sectional approach was carried out, which included currently working doctors in a governmental secondary health-care hospital who received referral from primary-care centers in Taif, in addition to a manager of each primary health care center (PHCC) inside the Taif area. Data were collected by using two forms. The first form was a questionnaire that collected data from physicians. It included personal data of the doctors and doctors' judgment regarding referral process in PHCC and what can improve the quality of referral system and make it more useful to the patients. The second form was a checklist used to collect data from managers of involved PHCC inside the Taif area.

Result: The study included 112 physicians working in secondary health-care governmental hospitals in Taif. Their age ranged between 25 and 60 years with a mean of 40.4 years and standard deviation of 9.2 years. Men represented 70.5% of them. The commonest reported reasons for referral from PHCCs were seeking specialized treatment (42.9%), more assessment of patients (40.1%), and diagnosis of difficult cases (21.4%). Almost three quarters of them (77.7%) considered referring notes to be more informative if the referring doctor was a family physician. More than half of the physicians (52.5%) reported that they never issued feedback notes to PHCCs regarding referred cases, whereas 20.8% of them reported that they always issued such notes. Older physicians (>50 years) provided feedback referral notes either always or sometimes at a significantly higher rate than younger physicians (76.5% versus 50% among those aged between 41 and 50 years and 30.8% among those aged 40 years or younger). The difference was statistically significant.

Conclusion: This study highlighted some of the inadequacies in the effectiveness of the referral system in a PHCC from the perspective of physicians working in governmental secondary-care hospitals in Taif and suggested various ways of dealing with them.


The Blizzard Challenge was started in 2005 as a way to evaluate different corpus speech synthesis techniques on a common data set. It has been noted that it is very hard to evaluate different speech synthesis techniques when different size and quality databases are used to build a voice. To remove the variable of database size and speaker quality, we proposed a common database that all participants would use. The Challenge itself is for participants to take the given database (or databases) and build a voice using their voice building software. After a short time, a set of test sentences are released that are to be synthesized by each participants' system. The synthesized utterances are collected together and a webbased listening test is set up. Two types of listening tests are carried out, a simple MOS based test, and a set of understandability tests where the listener is asked to type in what they hear. Three sets of listeners are used: speech experts (provided from the participants' groups), volunteers (collect by web advertising), and paid undergraduate native speakers. Each year the results have been presented at a workshop where participants present descriptions of their systems, and final results are given. The challenge has brought together groups from academia and industry from around the world. Both established groups, and new groups have been represented. The results have been both interesting and unexpected. But we see the Challenge as a long term evolving event. Modifications in the basic structure are being considered each year. For example: how to test if speaker identity is preserved in voice conversion based systems; how can we test multisentence synthesis; what about multi-lingual databases; and who is going to run it. No individual results will be presented in this talk, but overall trends will be given as well as discussion of future directions for Blizzard. A more detailed description of the motivation and details of the challenge is described in [Black and Tokuda 2005]. All the presentations including anonymized results are also available on line at http://festvox.org/blizzard/


Mixed and associated forms of stroke are referred to as combined. These have their features of clinical course and pathomorphology. Selected issues of pathogenesis and therapy of these disorders are discussed. Combined strokes and their sub-items, mixed and associated, are worth including into existing "Classification of cerebral vascular diseases".


Summary Al-Shaheen Field, offshore Qatar, is responsible for 45% of Qatar's crude oil production. Kharaib,the most prolific reservoir of Al-Shaheen Field, is an oil wet tight carbonate. Even after an extensive water-flooding for several years, there is substantial amounts of oil left behind owing to the highly oil-wet nature of the reservoir. Wettability altering surfactant offers a very promising EOR technique with ability of releasing the residual oil from tight oil wet pores. Three successful short surfactant injection trials have led to comprehensive planning for conducting a long term surfactant injection pilot to evaluate incremental oil gain. The pilot planning consists of three-tier approach; additional laboratory experiments, reservoir modelling and field implementation. Laboratory experiments were performed to establish surfactant formulation's stability and adsorption in presence of reservoir fluids and rock. Core floods were performed to estimate incremental recovery with different surfactant slug sizes and concentration. Core flooding results were history matched to obtain necessary parameters for field scale modelling. The candidate location was selected considering reservoir properties, operational constraints and implementation feasibility. The unique ability of this surfactant is to alter reservoir surface wettability with low adsorption on the rock surface and negligible change in interfacial tension. Core flood experiments showed significant oil recovery and field trials showed injectivity improvements which were indication of the wettability alteration to more water wet state. A long term pilot is planned to establish the surfactant EOR potential in Al-Shaheen reservoirs. Several evaluation options for the success of this pilot such as single well tracer test, inter-well tracer test, micro-pilot tests, time lapse saturation logging, and observation wells have been assessed. Reservoir modelling, logistical considerations, field applicability, drilling schedule and cost implications have been considered for determining the most optimum solution to help de-risk field scale implementation. This paper presents a phased approach to scale up an EOR project in a highly complex offshore carbonate field. A novel EOR implementation approach called S3IP (Surfactant Induced Improvement in Injectivity and Productivity) is applied which results in incremental recovery and injectivity improvement with single EOR agent. The phased approach taken, from screening the surfactants to short term injectivity trials and then continuing to a long term pilot, is unique for the offshore field and the current oil price condition. This pilot will demonstrate the ability to deliver and inject large quantity of surfactant in challenging offshore environment and to exhibit incremental recovery potential of field scale implementation.


The aim of this study was to compare the hemodynamic and recovery profiles of desflurane-remifentanil and desflurane-fentanyl in patients undergoing intracranial surgery. Adult patients with American Society of Anesthesiologist (ASA) II to III physical status who were undergoing intracranial surgery for vascular or space-occupying lesions were enrolled in a prospective randomized 2-group study. Anesthesia induction was performed by means of propofol and remifentanil or fentanyl. Anesthesia was maintained with an infusion of remifentanil at a rate of 0.25 μg/kg−1/min−1 plus 1.5% to 2% desflurane/50% N2O/50% O2 in the group administered desflurane-remifentanil (DR group) or bolus doses of fentanyl (2 μg/kg−1) plus 3% to 6% desflurane/50% N2O/50% O2 in the group administered desflurane-fentanyl (DF group). In both groups, hemodynamic variables were recorded at baseline and after anesthesia induction, tracheal intubation, head holder application, skin and dural incisions, and dural closure. At the end of the surgery, times to extubation, eye opening, following verbal commands, and side effects were recorded. After intubation and skin incision, diastolic arterial pressure, heart rate, and mean arterial pressure values were significantly higher in the DF group. Times to extubation, eye opening, and following verbal commands were significantly shorter in the DR group than in the DF group (P<0.05). Analgesic consumption and side effects were similar between the 2 groups. Remifentanil at a dose of 0.25 μg/kg−1/min−1 plus 1.5% to 2% desflurane led to rapid emergence from anesthesia, good control of hemodynamic responses, and similar side effects in patients undergoing intracranial surgery compared with giving bolus doses of fentanyl (2 μg/kg−1) plus 3% to 6% desflurane.


Water-extractable arabinoxylan (WEAX) may cause major problems during clarification processes in a brewery owing to its ability to form gel networks. However, high WEAX contents can also enhance the nutritional quality of the final product as they play an important role in the human diet. Therefore, precise quantification of WEAX is required. Current methods are very time- and resource-consuming as well as limited in the number of samples and in some cases provide low accuracy. Thus, a reproducible high-throughput method for the quantification of WEAX optimized for beer was developed, reaching recovery rates (RRs) of almost 100%. The assay is based on Douglas's colorimetric method. Hydrolysis was conducted using glacial acetic acid to induce the formation of red color complexes resulting from the interaction between pentose degradation products and phloroglucinol. The method was successfully transferred to a multi-mode microplate reader to minimize the loss of color intensity over time and to obtain a high throughput. By using 96-well plates, up to 40% of the previous analysis time could be saved, and a larger number of samples could be analyzed in one batch. The collected data determined xylose as an optimal calibration standard due to high accuracy and reproducibility. The respective AX control standards showed RR within the range of 95–105% without exception. To validate and show the ruggedness of the modified method, WEAX concentration in seven commercial German beers (e.g., lager, pilsner, wheat beer, non-alcoholic beer) was quantified. Interfering hexose sugars that lead to measurement errors when analyzing samples with high amounts of fermentable sugars (e.g., non-alcoholic beer produced by limited fermentation) were eliminated by Saccharomyces diastaticus fermentation. Further investigations were carried out by means of LC-MS in order to obtain additional information about the reddish product in the hydrolyzed samples. In this context, C16H12O6 could be identified as one of numerous condensation products, contributing to the coloring. The collected data showed the impact of diverse factors on the measured AX concentration and helped optimize the experimental procedure for a high sample throughput with precise and highly reproducible results. The proposed quantification method should be primarily used in completely fermented finished beer to emphasize the time aspect. Wort samples and non-alcoholic beer produced by limited fermentation can be also analyzed, but only after fermentation with S. diastaticus.


Fifteen mesophilic bacteria with high C(x) cellulase activities were isolated and purified from a mixed-culture enriched from a flower stalks-vegetable waste co-composting system. A CMCase test showed that the enzyme activity of these isolates ranged from 7.9 to 28.0 U ml(-1). Although filter paper degrading capability was low in single culture, significant synergetic cellulose degradation were detected in four groups of mixed cultures, their degradation rates were 23.5%, 26.3%, 19.4% and 24.5%, respectively. Study of morphological and physiological characters of five predominant isolates which possess high CMCase and had positive effect on synergetic cellulose degradation in mixed culture system showed that two of them were closely related to Bacillus pasteurii and Bacillus cereus, whereas the rest belong to the genus Halobacillus, Aeromicrobium and Brevibacterium, respectively.


Money is an inextricable part of our life. People toil to earn money to purchase a house, to marry off their children, to live and to eat. So, saving is necessary to survive. To Save means to put aside a portion of income, deferring its consumption until a future date. Saving means the total accumulated amount of income that is not spent on consumption.In economics, personal saving has been defined as personal disposable income minus personal consumption expenditure. Saving may take the form of increase in bank deposits, purchase of securities, or increased cash holdings. The extent to which individuals save is affected by their preference for future over present consumption, their expectations of future income and to some extent, by the rate of interest. Saving plays a vital role in building up the household economy as well as the national economy. Savings provide the financial security to savers. Hence, attractive saving devices are very much necessary to increase and channel the savings in developing countries. India is taking much effort in inculcating the saving habit among the people.In order to mobilize savings, the Government of India is issuing saving certificates, government bonds and securities carrying high rates of interest.


The lubricant properties of LUBRITAB, a hydrogenated vegetable oil was evaluated in this study and compared to magnesium stearate, a widely used tablet lubricant, in three direct compression tablet formulations. An instrumented rotary tablet press was used to determine the unit ejection force of tablets made from the direct compression formulations. The effect of the lubricants on tablet hardness, friability, disintegration and dissolution rate were also determined. Tablets containing LUBRITAB at a concentration level of 3 - 4 (% w/w) gave values of unit ejection force comparable with those of tablets containing 2% magnesium stearate. The tablets containing LUBRITAB exhibited better physical properties than tablets containing magnesium stearate. Prolonged mixing improved the lubricating efficiency of LUBRITAB and had no deleterious effect on the disintegration of ascorbic acid tablets. LUBRITAB appears to be a good alternative to magnesium stearate in the formulations evaluated. KEYWORDS: LUBRITAB, unit ejection force, hardness, friability, disintegration time, dissolution rate, direct compression tablet formulations.


Optimization procedures are performed using RANS models due to computational wall-clock time constraints. These trends are verified against selected LES counterpart simulations. The optimization study is performed on a subsonic small-scale cavity-stabilized combustor. Steady, compressible three-dimensional simulations are performed using a multi-phase Realizable k-ε Reynolds-averaged Navier-Stokes (RANS) approach or Dynamic Kinetic Energy Subgrid-scale LES. There are nineteen geometrical input parameters and four output parameters, viz., a pattern factor proxy (maximum exit temperature), a combustion efficiency proxy (averaged exit temperature), total pressure losses (TPL), and "melting" liner area. The RANS-based optimization with initial training sample of sixty design points leads to an optimum design point that dominates the baseline design, among other designs. The non-dominated design points release 57% of the heat inside the cavity in comparison to 43% from the baseline. Dominated combustors release as low as 23% of the heat in the cavity. The optimum, a dominated and the baseline design are compared with LES counterparts. The RANS predicted trends in terms of dominated and non-dominated design points were also confirmed by LES simulations, even though the output parameters quantitative values may differ. Discrepancies between RANS and LES appear more pronounced for the optimum design. This is attributed to the fact the LES permits pressure waves to escape the domain whereas RANS can only moderate pressure-induced disturbances. By allowing boundary-induced disturbances in the LES the flow field resembles that of RANS. Therefore, it is concluded that RANS and LES follow similar total pressure loss, pattern factor, and combustion efficiency trends as function of combustor design.


With advances in computing and communication technologies in recent years, two significant trends have emerged in terms of information management: heterogeneity and distribution. Heterogeneity (herein discussed in terms of different types of data, not in terms of schematic heterogeneity) pertains to information use evolving from operational business data (e.g., accounting, payroll, and inventory) to digital assets, communications, and content (e.g., documents, intellectual property, rich media, e-mail, and Web data). Information has also become widely distributed, both in scale and ownership. To manage heterogeneity, two major classes of systems have evolved: database management systems to manage structured data, and content management systems to manage document and rich media information. In this paper, we compare and contrast these different paradigms. We believe it is imperative for any business to exploit value from all information--independent of where it resides or its form. We also identify the technical challenges and opportunities for bringing these different paradigms closer together.


Abstract Conversion of the cellular isoform of the prion protein (PrPC) into the disease-associated isoform (PrPSc) plays a key role in the development of prion diseases. Within its cellular pathway, PrPC undergoes several posttranslational modifications, i.e., the attachment of two N-linked glycans and a glycosyl phosphatidyl inositol (GPI) anchor, by which it is linked to the plasma membrane on the exterior cell surface. To study the interaction of PrPC with model membranes, we purified posttranslationally modified PrPC from transgenic Chinese hamster ovary (CHO) cells. The mono-, di- and oligomeric states of PrPC free in solution were analyzed by analytical ultracentrifugation. The interaction of PrPC with model membranes was studied using both lipid vesicles in solution and lipid bilayers bound to a chip surface. The equilibrium and mechanism of PrPC association with the model membranes were analyzed by surface plasmon resonance. Depending on the degree of saturation of binding sites, the concentration of PrPC released from the membrane into aqueous solution was estimated at between 10-9 and 10-7 M. This corresponds to a free energy of the insertion reaction of -48 kJ/mol. Consequences for the conversion of PrPC to PrPSc are discussed.


: Online shopping is a very goal-oriented activity. Consumers have a set of preferences for a product or service that is used as criteria for assessment of the available alternatives. However, crucial information about products is often available as text reviews. Finding a product with specific features is extremely time-consuming using the typical search functionality found in existing shopping sites. In this work we propose a method for the seamless integration of unstructured information from product reviews with structured product descriptions using opinion mining. We demonstrate our method through shopping for a used car based on 148240 car reviews. Evaluation results using a user study and simulations show that the technique enables customers to assess more product characteristics and potentially make better decisions.


Fair assessment and collection efficiency are two important aspects in every tax system, especially in rural areas. The objective of this work was to generate information for a fairer taxable value. A method that determines a land cadastral value index, by considering various factors related to the soils and surroundings of the site, and allows for land assessment of rural areas was developed. The method includes four parameters with relatively temporal stability, one is physical (actual productivity), and the three others are socio-economical (access, distance to markets and economical use). The method is reliable and objective, and can serve as basis for tax calculations at the district, departmental or national level. It is an objective method because it is based −within others− on soil, relief, vegetation, and human activity parameters; and because those parameters cannot be modified or influenced by landholders and fiscal policy authorities. A great variability in the studied parameters was observed in the district of Atyra. The land cadastral value index varied from 46.17 to 84.37% and reflected particularities of the land. This cadastral value can serve as the basis for determination of the land fiscal value and taxes applied to the land.


ABSTRACT The Saccharomyces cerevisiae Nhp6 protein is related to the high-mobility-group B family of architectural DNA-binding proteins that bind DNA nonspecifically but bend DNA sharply. Nhp6 is involved in transcriptional activation by both RNA polymerase II (Pol II) and Pol III. Our previous genetic studies have implicated Nhp6 in facilitating TATA-binding protein (TBP) binding to some Pol II promoters in vivo, and we have used a novel genetic screen to isolate 32 new mutations in TBP that are viable in wild-type cells but lethal in the absence of Nhp6. The TBP mutations that are lethal in the absence of Nhp6 cluster in three regions: on the upper surface of TBP that may have a regulatory role, near residues that contact Spt3, or near residues known to contact either TFIIA or Brf1 (in TFIIIB). The latter set of mutations suggests that Nhp6 becomes essential when a TBP mutant compromises its ability to interact with either TFIIA or Brf1. Importantly, the synthetic lethality for some of the TBP mutations is suppressed by a multicopy plasmid with SNR6 or by an spt3 mutation. It has been previously shown that nhp6ab mutants are defective in expressing SNR6, a Pol III-transcribed gene encoding the U6 splicing RNA. Chromatin immunoprecipitation experiments show that TBP binding to SNR6 is reduced in an nhp6ab mutant. Nhp6 interacts with Spt16/Pob3, the yeast equivalent of the FACT elongation complex, consistent with nhp6ab cells being extremely sensitive to 6-azauracil (6-AU). However, this 6-AU sensitivity can be suppressed by multicopy SNR6 or BRF1. Additionally, strains with SNR6 promoter mutations are sensitive to 6-AU, suggesting that decreased SNR6 RNA levels contribute to 6-AU sensitivity. These results challenge the widely held belief that 6-AU sensitivity results from a defect in transcriptional elongation.


Most surgeons have been interested in especially superior and inferior transseptal approches in order to obtain excellent exposure as the key of success in mitral valve surgery for these reason these a approaches were become preferably using method. In our clinic, the cases, who were operated using classical and superior transseptal approaches through biatrial incision, were evaluated especially in terms of atrail arrhytmia in early and the late period, and residual ASD, duration of the operation, bleeding, and the results was observed to be encouraging.


The aim of the present study is to show how repetitions and recasts made by the child's interlocutors are means to teach young children culturally relevant uses of language. Two Wolof girls, ages 2 and 3, are observed in conversation and in play situations with adults (their mothers or other familiar adults) and with older children. Repetitions and recasts are very frequent, especially in adults, for the 2-year-old as well as for the 3-year-old little girls. These conversational behaviors correspond to seek-agreement strategies and contribute to emphasize key themes in the social exchange.


Physical properties of Yukwa base extruded with glutinous rice flour, rice flour, defatted soy flour, and salt using an twin-screw extruder were investigated. The ingredients were extruded at various moisture contents (16~18%), screw speeds (300 & 400 rpm) at 43.4 kg/hr feed rate. Length and specific volume of Yukwa base increased with decreasing moisture contents. Hunter's color L * values of Yukwa base was higher whereas a * and b * values were lower with increasing moisture content. Water absorption index of Yukwa base increased with increasing moisture contents. X-ray diffraction of Yukwa base showed B type moisture content of 16% and 17% while it showed A type moisture content of 18%. Degree of crystallinity and breaking strength of Yukwa base were the lowest in the moisture content of 16% while the lowest value for hardness was found in the moisture content of 16% and of 17% with screw speed 400 rpm for all samples. In the microstructure of cross section of Yukwa base, air cell size was larger and cell wall was thicker as moisture content increased. The sensory evaluation of the Yukwa base showed that color and flavor were not significantly different among samples, while taste, appearance, mouth feel, and overall preference were higher as moisture contents decreased.


Part 1 Antecedents: international investment and international trade in the product life cycle, R. Bernon the internationalization of the firm fair Swedish cases, J. Johanson and F. Wiedersheim-Paul the internationalization process of firm - a model of knowledge development and increasing foreign market commitments, J. Johanson and F. Wiedersheim-Paul a theory of international differences among exporting firms based on degree of internationalization, P.J. Buckley and M. Casson outward foreign licensing by Australian companies, L. Welch foreign direct investment by small and medium-sized enterprises - the theoretical background, P.J. Buckley are entry strategies for foreign markets changing? the case of Swedish investment in Japan as a means of ventures and global strategies, G. Hedlund and A. Kverneland. Part 2 The internationalization process: internationalization - evolution of a concept, L. Welch and R. Luostarinen a challenge to the stages theory of the internationalization process, P. Turnbull organizing the multinational firm - can the Americans learn from the Europeans?, J.M. Stopford towards a new approach of studying the internationalization process of firms, J. Strandskoy foreign direct investment as a sequential process, B. Kogut. Part 3 Organizing the multinational firm: an approach to strategic control in MNCs, C.K. Prahalad and Y. Doz multinational structural change - evolution versus reorganization, C. Bartlett emergence of new structures in Swedish multinationals, P.N. Ghauri foreign market servicing by multinationals - an integrated approach, P.J. Buckley et al. Part 4 Scandinavian applications: phsychic distance and buyer-seller interaction, L. Hallaeen and F. Wiedersheim-Paul internationalization in industrial systems - a network approach, J. Johanson and L.G. Matsson joint venture relationship between Swedish firms and developing countries - a longitudinal study, S.A. Hyder and P.N. Ghauri internationalization of management - dominance and distance, M. Forsgren and U. Holm international strategy - a study of Norwegian companies, P. Joynt.


Software often crashes despite tremendous effort on software quality assurance. Once developers receive a crash report, they need to reproduce the crash in order to understand the problem and locate the fault. However, limited information from crash reports often makes crash reproduction difficult. Many "capture-and-replay" techniques have been proposed to automatically capture program execution data from the failing code, and help developers replay the crash scenarios based on the captured data. However, such techniques often suffer from heavy overhead and introduce privacy concerns. Recently, methods such as BugRedux were proposed to generate test input that leads to crash through symbolic execution. However, such methods have inherent limitations because they rely on conventional symbolic execution techniques. In this paper, we propose a dynamic symbolic execution method called SymCon, which addresses the limitation of conventional symbolic execution by selecting functions that are hard to be resolved by a constraint solver and using their concrete runtime values to replace the symbols. We then propose SymCrash, a selective recording approach that only instruments and monitors the hard-to-solve functions. SymCrash can generate test input for crashes through SymCon. We have applied our approach to successfully reproduce 13 failures of 6 real-world programs. Our results confirm that the proposed approach is suitable for reproducing crashes, in terms of effectiveness, overhead, and privacy. It also outperforms the related methods.


For proper utilization of wind energy it is necessary to drive the wind turbine at maximum power points at all wind speeds. Speed control of rotor is done within the operating range of wind turbines for maximum power point tracking(MPPT). Controllers are used depending upon the range within which the control of rotor angular velocity is required and this range varies for various turbines. Smaller range for rotor speed control supports the economy of controllers. So, for a particular wind energy location, selection of wind turbine should be done in such a manner that it requires minimum speed control to track maximum power during wind variations. In this paper an attempt has been made to analyze the performance of wind turbines for MPPT. Simulation results using MATLAB coding are found to be effective to propose few recommendations for the selection of wind turbines suitable for MPPT.


Home Plate is a plateau in the Columbia Hills of Gusev Crater. It is a layered sequence of clastic rocks with alkali basaltic composition. Based on stratigraphy, structure, sedimentology, mineralogy, and bulk chemistry it is interpreted as pyroclastic deposit and thought to be extensively hydrothermally altered. The hydrothermal alteration is presumed to be of high and low temperature nature. In order to better understand the conditions (P,T,X) of hydrothermal alteration for the Home Plate region we have calculated the hydrothermal alteration mineralogy of Fastball, a primitive basalt from the Home Plate sequence, and compared these results to the mineralogy of the area.


An interesting issue in reading is how parafoveal information affects saccadic targeting and fixation durations. We investigated the influence of shading selected regions of text on eye movements during reading of long and short words within sentences. A target word, either four- or eight-letters long, was presented in one of four shading conditions: the whole target word shaded; the first half shaded; second half shaded; no shading. There was no evidence of a visually mediated parafoveal-on-foveal effect. Saccadic targeting was modulated by the shading on the first half of the word, such that fixations landed closer to the beginning of the word than in the other three shading conditions. Furthermore, partial word shading, resulting in visual non-uniformity of the target word, produced longer gaze durations than the other conditions. Finally, readers spent more time re-reading target words when they were partially shaded than in the other two conditions. We suggest that our effects are due to targeting of the optimal viewing location and revisits to check words that appear visually unusual. Together, the results indicate robust effects of low-level visual characteristics of the word on oculomotor decisions of where and when to move the eyes during reading.


In the context of near surface seismic imaging (a few hundreds of metres), we propose an alternative approach for inversion of surface waves in 2-D media with laterally varying velocities. It is based on Full Waveform Inversion (FWI) but using an alternative objective function formulated in the frequency–wavenumber f − k domain. The classical FWI objective function suffers from severe local minima problems in the presence of surface waves. It thus requires a very accurate initial model. The proposed objective function is similar to the one used in classical surface wave analysis. In this approach, the data are first split using sliding windows in the time–space t − x domain. For each window, the amplitude of the f − k spectrum is computed. The objective function measures the least-squares misfit between the amplitude of observed and modelled 2-D Fourier transformed data sets. We call this formulation the windowed-amplitude waveform inversion (w-AWI). The w-AWI objective function reduces some local minima problems as shown here through numerical examples. The global minimum basin is wider in the w-AWI approach than in FWI. Synthetic examples show that w-AWI may achieve convergence if the lowest data frequency content is twice higher than the one needed by FWI. For elastic inversion, w-AWI can be used to reconstruct a velocity model explaining surface waves. This surface wave inversion procedure can be used to retrieve near-surface model parameters in lateral-varying media


Nonketotic hyperglycinemia (NKH) is an autosomal recessive disorder of glycine metabolism. Defective glycine cleavage causes elevated concentrations of glycine in plasma, urine, and cerebrospinal fluid. A longitudinal study using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and single‐voxel1H magnetic resonance spectroscopy (MRS) was performed on an infant with the typical clinical picture of NKH. He was examined twice during the course of treatment with sodium benzoate and dextromethorphan. At the age of 10 months, MRI showed normal brain structure, while MRS detected a prominent glycine peak in the brain. Repeat MRS at the age of 13 months showed a small increase in glycine peak and a prominent glutamate/glutamine peak not previously detected. The MRS measurements were consistent with the slight increase in blood glycine level and the elevation in glutamine level, indicating that1H MRS can be a valuable tool in the diagnosis and monitoring of treatment effects in patients with NKH.


Stability studies, including damage stability and unsinkability of submarines, makes a source of knowledge about the behavior of the ship after the flooding of the compartments. In order to carry out research in the Naval Academy the laboratory test bed has been designed and constructed to allow the position of laboratory immersing and emerging submarine model, enabling simulation the damage of the hull of the submarine model, and thus better recognition of the phenomena occurring in the operation of the ship. Brief characterization of failure of ship and submarine accidents stressing the merits of the subject undertaken have been presented at the article. Description of the test stand for the research over stability and unsinkability of submarines and of possibilities of its usage in training of ship managing crew has been presented in the paper. Presented Preliminary results of experimental tests of immersing and emerging submarine model have been confirmed the assumption built design of the laboratory.


We present techniques for analyzing score matrices of unit tests outcomes from snapshots of CS2 student code throughout the development cycle. This analysis includes a technique for estimating the number of fundamentally different features in the unit tests, as well as a survey of which algorithms can best match human intuition when grouping tests into related clusters. Unlike previous investigations into topic clustering of score matrices, we successfully identify algorithms that perform with good accuracy on this task. We also discuss the data gathered by the Marmoset system, which has been used to collect over 100,000 snapshots of student programs and associated test results.


The effect of hypericum extract LI 160 on the stimulated cytokine expression was investigated in vitro in a whole blood culture system. Blood samples were taken from five healthy volunteers and four depressive patients. The release of interleukin-6 (IL-6), interleukin-1ß (IL-1ß) and tumor necrosis factor-α (TNF-α) was measured quantitatively after an incubation time of 24 hours on microtiter plates. A massive suppression of the interleukin-6 release was found for PHA-stimulated hypericum extract. Possible relations to the antidepressive effects of hypericum extract are discussed.


In this technical note we investigate the reachability and observability properties of a network system, running a Laplacian based average consensus algorithm, when the communication graph is a path or a cycle. Specifically, we provide necessary and sufficient conditions, based on simple rules from number theory, to characterize all and only the nodes from which the network system is reachable (respectively observable). Interesting immediate corollaries of our results are: i) a path graph is reachable (observable) from any single node if and only if the number of nodes of the graph is a power of two,n = 2i ; i ∈N and ii) a cycle is reachable (observable) from any pair of nodes if and only if n is a prime number. For any set of control (observation) nodes, we provide a closed form expression for the (unreachable) unobservable eigenvalues and for the eigenvectors of the (unreachable) unobservable subsystem.


This paper deals with the consensus problem of multi-agent systems with second-order dynamics. The objective is to design algorithms such that all agents will have same positions and velocities. First, a reference model based consensus algorithm is proposed. It is proved that the consensus can be achieved if the communication graph has a spanning tree. Different from most of the consensus algorithms proposed in the literature, the parameters of the control laws are different among agents. Therefore, each agent can design its control law independently. Secondly, it gives a consensus algorithm for the case that the velocities of the agents are not available. Thirdly, the effectiveness of the input delay and the communication delay is considered. It shows that consensus can be achieved if the input delay of every agent is smaller than a bound related to parameters in its control law. Finally, some numerical examples are given to illustrate the proposed results.


Introduction: A newly identified viral infection, a global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019, that began in Wuhan, China, and spread around the world, causing an epidemic of pneumonia (COVlD-19), has infected millions of population, causing social anxiety and panic amongst healthcare professionals and the general public. This study aimed to measure the dentists' anxiety and apprehension of being infected while operating during the latest coronavirus disease (COVlD-19) epidemic through a web-based questionnaire. Materials and Methods: An online survey was used to perform a cross-sectional analysis. The well-constructed questionnaire, which consisted of closed-ended questions, was prepared and submitted to dentists of India. A total of 396 people from all over India took part in the survey. Results: The debilitating consequences of COVlD-19 caused anxiety and fear in a total of 55.8% of general dental practitioners in India. There were 373 dentists (94.2%) who were mindful of recent developments in care procedures. The majority of dentists, 316 (79.8%), are fearful of contracting COVID-19 from a patient or co-worker, and 309 (78%) dentists are nervous when treating a patient with COVID-19. Conclusion: Indian dentists revealed good information regarding COVID-19. However, dentists were comprehensive about the extra precautionary measures that protect them about the virus. A considerable percentage of dentists reflected their anxiety and worries about dental profession due to which they have either changed their services to comply with the rules or shut down their practices for an indefinite time.


Author(s): Shao, Yue | Advisor(s): Shi, Frank G. | Abstract: The packaging materials are critical for optoelectronic device packaging in terms of optical and thermal performance. Continuous innovation and improvement of packaging materials have been introduced to improve the overall efficiency of LEDs, but there are still some critical issues need to be addressed for their application in general lighting and LCD backlight displays. In this work, dual-functional silicone-filler composites are investigated and introduced to LEDs and LCD backlight units to enhance their optical and thermal management. In the first part of this work, we optimized the reflectance of polymer-filler reflectors by controlling filler particle size, filler volume fraction and thickness of reflectors. A simple analytical model was developed to investigate the critical parameters of inorganic fillers required to obtain the highest reflectance, which is expected to accelerate the design and optimization of polymer-filler composite reflectors. Our results demonstrate for the first time that for inorganic fillers, the effect of filler size on reflectance is non-monotonic, and a critical filler size ranging from one submicron to several microns provides the maximum reflectance. The existence of a critical thickness at which the optical reflectance of a polymer-filler composite reaches its maximum value is demonstrated. In the second part of this work, the apparent radiation cooling effect of silicone-based composite coatings was investigated for its dependence on coating thickness and filler size. It is established, contrary to prior reports, that the effective passive radiation cooling does not exhibit a significant filler size dependence. We found the apparent cooling effect is filler type dependent and the optimal thickness is around 70 µm regardless of filler type. In the third part of this work, dual-functional polymer-filler composites with high optical diffusive reflectance and passive cooling ability is investigated for optoelectronic device applications. It was demonstrated the addition of inorganic fillers to a volume fraction higher than 0.2 can effectively improve the apparent cooling effect and light reflectance of silicone composites. The new materials we developed can be used as diffuse reflector to provide better overall optical aesthetics for displays. Meanwhile, it can be used as passive cooling coatings in advanced general LED lighting, LCD display backlighting, solar cells and other energy related applications.


Hybridization of DNA probes immobilized on a solid support is a key process for DNA biosensors and microarrays. Although the surface environment is known to influence the kinetics of DNA hybridization, so far it has not been possible to quantitatively predict how hybridization kinetics is influenced by the complex interactions of the surface environment. Using spatial statistical analysis of probes and hybridized target molecules on a few electrochemical DNA (E-DNA) sensors, functioning through hybridization-induced conformational change of redox-tagged hairpin probes, we developed a phenomenological model that describes how the hybridization rates for single probe molecules are determined by the local environment. The predicted single-molecule rate constants, upon incorporation into numerical simulation, reproduced the overall kinetics of E-DNA sensor surfaces at different probe densities and different degree of probe clustering. Our study showed that the nanoscale spatial organization is a major factor behind the counter-intuitive trends in hybridization kinetics. It also highlights the importance of models that can account for heterogeneity in surface hybridization. The molecular level understanding of hybridization at surfaces and accurate prediction of hybridization kinetics may lead to new opportunities in development of more sensitive and reproducible DNA biosensors and microarrays.


Objective: the aim of the present study was to present a tutorial for planning and performing randomized clinical trials. Materials and methods: an online search was performed on MEDLINE via PubMed. The following search strategy was used: "randomized controlled trial"[Publication Type] OR "randomized controlled trials as topic"[MeSH Terms] OR "randomized controlled trial"[All Fields]. A hand search was also performed. Results: the present tutorial presents and discusses topics of utmost importance for randomized clinical trials studies, as follows: importance of randomized clinical trials, methodological items (focused question, registration of the study protocol, eligibility criteria, outcomes of interest, data collection and data analysis, risk of bias), and methodological quality. The study design of randomized clinical trials features the lowest risk of bias to assess healthcare interventions. Conclusions: this tutorial offers a concise and practical description of important items regarding randomized clinical trials, which can be used by clinicians and researchers to better understand, plan, and perform randomized clinical trials.


The purpose of this research is to demonstrate the importance and the influence of 3vs3 small-sided games (SSGs) for improving different technical abilities in soccer game. The research was held for 12 weeks, 36 workouts 30min/session on a group of 24 young soccer players (age=8.6±0.2), divided in experimental and control groups. For the experimental group we applied a program of SSG -3vs3 - 4 small soccer gates and for the control group we follow the standard training. They were assesed in pre-test and post-test by using video registration and by counting the scored goals, demarcation, passes and dribligs. The program applied for the experimental group demonstrated the efficiency of it, all the technical abilities have improved.


The study of ancient structures composed of stone arches and vaults requires the use of specific techniques of analysis endowed with powerful procedures for the modelling of geometry, the simulation of the mechanical response of the various materials (including ashlar blocks and masonry, backings and fills) and the simulation of the possible agents (gravity, wind, earthquake, settlements) which may affect the structure or may have affected it through history. More specifically, those techniques must be able to reproduce the actual conditions of thrust equilibrium between the large number of curved, linear or two-dimensional members involved. The validity of several modelling techniques with a very different level of sophistication is studied through their use in the study of a particular Gothic construction: Barcelona Cathedral. The various techniques used were developed at the School of Civil Engineering of the Technical University of Catalonia and have already been used in the analysis of a set of historical constructions, including the Basilica of San Marco (Onate et al., 1997) and the Crypt of the Colonia Guell (Roca, 1997). The present study of Barcelona Cathedral, now under development, is thus not only aimed at gaining a better understanding of various aspects of the resistance of Gothic constructions (and the southern and Catalan Gothic, in particular) but also at appraising the possibilities and limitations of various analytical techniques.


The Blue Hills Complex, which lies south of the Boston Basin in eastern Massachusetts, is composed of Cambrian sedimentary rocks and Late Ordovician alkalic plutonic and volcanic rocks. On the north, the Complex is separated by a fault from the Boston Bay Group, which very recently has been shown to be late Precambrian. On the south, the Complex is overlain unconformably by the Pennsyvanian rocks of the Norfolk Basin. The bedding and volcanic flow structures of the Cambrian, Ordovician, and Pennsylvanian rocks are essentially parallel and dip steeply south. I believe that the Blue Hills Complex is a Late Ordovician cauldron subsidence that was tilted during the Alleghenian Orogeny and was thrust northward over the Boston Bay Group.


The carbon-13 spin-spin relaxation times of fluorine-containing ionomers are measured and motional correlation times τ_o and τ_d are calculated by using VJGM model . The results show that the motions of polymer main chain in ionomers become more difficult with increasing of ionization degree and contents of functional group, and depend on the fine structures and stability of ionic microdomains.


— In this study, we propose the method estimating collaborative state by the similarity of motion characteristics and emotion characteristics changes. The group learning based on collaboration among students are introduced in many university classes. However, it may not function as a group and teachers evaluate only result of group learning. Our method focusses on similarity of motion and emotion characteristics change. The change points are extracted from these time series data by applying singular spectrum transformation (SST). In addition, the similarity points of change extracted by comparing the change points among students. The collaborative states are estimated in a certain period from the number of similarity points of change using machine learning. The experimental result indicates this method can identify between non-collaborative state and collaborative state. The method facilitates teachers to evaluate and guide the groups.


After fertilization in Xenopus laevis, inositol 1,4,5-trisphosphate (IP3) mass increased from 53 to 261 fmol/cell and returned to near basal by 10 min after insemination. IP3 was also elevated over control egg levels during first mitosis and first cleavage. Because IP3 levels and the fertilization calcium wave decline at about the same time and because calcium ionophore or pricking the egg increased IP3, the fertilization calcium wave may be due to calcium-induced IP3 production. In addition, the onset of sperm motility was associated with an increase, whereas the acrosomal reaction was accompanied by a decrease in IP3 mass. Combining our published data with this report, the first chronology of the levels of IP3 from the induction of meiosis (maturation) through fertilization and cleavage in one cellular system is summarized. These data suggest an in vivo dose response for IP3 and calcium release. A small (17 fmol/cell) IP3 change during the induction of meiosis may not be associated with a calcium change. Larger IP3 changes at cleavage (40 fmol/cell) and mitosis (125 fmol/cell) are associated with localized small calcium increases, whereas the largest IP3 change (208 fmol/cell) is associated with the large calcium increase at fertilization.


In order to estimate the impact of a community programme of training in cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR), we reviewed all adult deaths in the city of Cardiff (population 292,600) during a 13-week period. Of 701 deaths, 70 were cases of fatal out-of-hospital cardiac arrest due to heart disease, for whom it was felt that CPR might have been of value. Only 34 (48.6%) deaths were witnessed, and in 22 of them the witness did not start CPR. In the majority of cases the ambulance service was not summoned immediately. We calculate that a community CPR training programme may, at best, reduce the community cardiac mortality rate by 7.5%, ie saving between 24 and 56 lives per 100,000 adult population per year; but more realistically, such a programme can only achieve a reduction of 0.4%, ie saving up to six lives per 100,000 per year. Although community CPR training programmes are likely to lead to only a modest reduction in community cardiac mortality rates, because countrywide there are many deaths, the total of lives saved would be significant. Implementation of such programmes should be carefully evaluated.


Caffeine is a naturally occurring chemical stimulant found in leaves, seeds and fruits of numerous plant species of groups of nitrogenous organic compound of the alkaloid group called trimethylxanthine. Energy drinks are non-alcoholic beverage that contain high level of substances capable of exciting any bodily functions and tends to stimulate the brain and the central nervous system. The aim and objective of the research is to determine the caffeine content and concentration of caffeine of five (5) different beverages (energy drink) sold in Ekwulobia in Aguata local Government Area. The caffeine content in the drink by name predator, fearless, bullet, climax and power horse were determined. The result showed the level of caffeine in the respective energy drink brand as 0.721mg/L for predator (PRE 101), 0.545mg/L for fearless ( FEA 102), 0.275 mg/L for bullet (BUL 103), 0.305 mg/L for climax (CLI 104) and 1.135 mg/L power horse (POW 105). The result showed that the caffeine content in the energy drink samples were significantly lower than the authorized level of (32mg/100L) recommended by World Health Organization which means that the energy drink analyzed are safe for consumption.
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: This paper focuses on maintenance management of critical equipment of a New Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) plant. The challenges associated with the risk of failure affect the operational conditions of the plant equipment, and also the recommendations by the original equipment manufacturer (OEM) to maintain critical system is a difficult task. In this paper a case study of a new gas turbine design within an LNG plant is considered. The maintenance cost, operation and availability are some of the most important concerns to the gas turbine operators. Majority of the gas turbine maintenance are related to the replacement and repair of hot section static parts. A review of the operating and maintenance practices for heavy-duty gas turbines and others critical equipment, with emphasis placed on the types of inspections and factors that influence maintenance schedules is presented. The Reliability Centred Maintenance (RCM) modeling and criticality analysis approach is used to analyse historical failure and maintenance data. To compliment the accuracy of data information careful consultation with the operators is conducted and we test the goodness of fit of using a Weibull model for the analysis. A maintenance optimisation model is discussed and an attempt is made to model the failure pattern to determine and recommend cost effective maintenance management schedule for the gas turbine dry gas seal.


This quasi-experimental study investigated the application of visual literacy skills in the form of parametric modeling software in relation to traditional forms of sketching. The study included two groups of high school technical design students. The control and experimental groups involved in the study consisted of two randomly selected groups of students. The participants were exposed to eight weeks of technical drawing and parametric modeling instruction prior to the start of the study. The potential applications of emerging technologies for the purpose of integrating visual literacy into the curriculum are not fully understood. Society is moving towards a more immediate form of communication (Galante, 2011). Visual forms of communication are becoming more prevalent methods for sending and receiving information. Research suggests that visual literacy skills have a correlation to the ability to problem solve, which ultimately can be beneficial to student learning (Matusitz, 2005). The application of visual literacy skills through the use of parametric modeling software may provide students with better learning experiences in visualization, conceptualization, and communication of images that will allow them to become better problem-solvers. Through this study, the researcher focused on the relationships between the independent and dependent variables in order to perform a statistical analysis of the data. The participants of the study were presented with a pre-test, a treatment, and a post-test relating to visual literacy. The treatment was presented to the participants in the form of a technical design problem that required the participants to apply problem-solving skills in order to devise a solution through the use of either traditional forms of sketching or through the use of parametric modeling. Data were collected and recorded in order to assess the outcome and effects of the variable. Visual Literacy in the Problem-Based Curriculum iii Although the research suggests that there is a correlation between visual literacy skills and the ability to solve problems, this particular study failed to show this correlation. Struggling learners showed no improvement in visualization skills after using parametric modeling software. The two methods used to create the technical design problem showed no statistical significance between the success of the design and the method that was used to create the design. No statistical differences were found between the visualization skills of any of the participants regardless of the methods used in the study. In addition, gender seemed not to be a significant factor in the study when comparing the visualization skills of the participants. There are recommendations, based on the results of this study, for future investigation in this area. Increasing the duration of the study over the course of a school term, could produce different results that were difficult to determine by the limited time constraints of this particular study. Other testing methods could be investigated for future studies that could produce additional information that was not produced in this study. Limiting the prior knowledge of the participants could also produce different results in the outcome of visualization skills. Investigating specific demographics that were not included in this study would also be of interest to be the academic community. Visual Literacy in the Problem-Based Curriculum iv Table of


Having for the past twelve months been closely associated with the surgical work at the First Reserve Hospital in the City of Manila, it has occurred to me that it might be of interest to the members of the Manila Medical Society should the results of this year's experience in surgery be presented to them, covering, as it does, a wide range of surgical conditions. Moreover, I am induced to select the above as the title of my paper by reason of the erroneous views prevailing in certain quarters, both in this archipelago and in the United States, as to the results of surgical work in the Philippine Islands. I shall first give a tabulated list of the various operations performed by the surgeons on duty at the First Reserve Hospital since Jan. 1, 1903, and then adduce certain conclusions, which would seem justified by the results. The operations enumerated


Intrapleural injections of 20 mg of various mineral fibres were made to rats. Three types of fibres (chrysotile, crocidolite and glass fibres) were untreated; other chrysotile fibres were leached to different degrees. The results show that chrysotile is the most toxic of the three: animals died sooner and presented mesotheliomas earlier. With increased leaching, toxicity and carcinogenic effect decreased. Crocidolite is less toxic than untreated chrysotile but later produces as many mesotheliomas; with glass fibres, some mesotheliomas are observed. Small groups of animals were exposed to two types of irradiation before intrapleural injection of 2 mg of chrysotile. Whole-body irradiation was delivered to a third group of animals which were given asbestos-contaminated food. The paper analyses the synergistic action of these two insults.


Computer-aided diagnosis (CAD), a vibrant medical imaging research field, is expanding quickly. Because errors in medical diagnostic systems might lead to seriously misleading medical treatments, major efforts have been made in recent years to improve computer-aided diagnostics applications. The use of machine learning in computer-aided diagnosis is crucial. A simple equation may result in a false indication of items like organs. Therefore, learning from examples is a vital component of pattern recognition. Pattern recognition and machine learning in the biomedical area promise to increase the precision of disease detection and diagnosis. They also support the decision-making process's objectivity. Machine learning provides a practical method for creating elegant and autonomous algorithms to analyze high-dimensional and multimodal bio-medical data. This review article examines machine-learning algorithms for detecting diseases, including hepatitis, diabetes, liver disease, dengue fever, and heart disease. It draws attention to the collection of machine learning techniques and algorithms employed in studying conditions and the ensuing decision-making process.


Open-ended semirigid coaxial cable is characterized for use as a coupling element for the measurement of high-power microwaves. There are many high-power microwave experiments where a high vacuum must be maintained, and yet it is necessary to measure the power and frequency of the microwave energy in a cavity or waveguide. Semirigid coaxial cable which is left open-ended and inserted no more than fresh with the inner waveguide wall is a convenient way to couple out a known sample of the power. The cable is inserted into the waveguide in a direction parallel to the electric field. The coupling value is expressed in terms of an area multiplier which is applied to the area of the end of the center conductor. The induced charge Q on the center conductor is then determined from Q =/rarr over D· and/n·(effective area), and the coupled power is calculated from P = ( omega Q)/ sup 2//(2Z/sub 0/). For a flush mounted Z/sub 0/=50-Omega with PTFE dielectric, the area multiplier is shown to be 3.846 theoretically and 3.77 experimentally. The area multiplier is also determined for various withdrawal depths of the coax into the waveguide wall.


The aim of the study is to recover and detect the neglected hidden mirror neurons in the neuronal spikes recordings. The investigation and the detection of the hidden neurons were conducted using the standard and ensemble and complex Empirical Mode Decomposition (EMD). The extension to the field of complex numbers C is particularly important for the analysis of phase-dependent neuronal study. This allows us to combine the data driven nature of EMD with the power of complex algebra to model amplitude-phase relationships of the neurons. The analysis shows that the extensions of EMD to the recordings are magnificent. Simulations on trains of spiking neurons support the analysis.


We present a novel computational framework for density control in high-dimensional state spaces. The considered dynamical system consists of a large number of indistinguishable agents whose behaviors can be collectively modeled as a time-evolving probability distribution. The goal is to steer the agents from an initial distribution to reach (or approximate) a given target distribution within a fixed time horizon at minimum cost. To tackle this problem, we propose to model the drift as a nonlinear reduced-order model, such as a deep network, and enforce the matching to the target distribution at terminal time either strictly or approximately using the Wasserstein metric. The resulting saddle-point problem can be solved by an effective numerical algorithm that leverages the excellent representation power of deep networks and fast automatic differentiation for this challenging high-dimensional control problem. A variety of numerical experiments were conducted to demonstrate the performance of our method.


The essays in this volume explore themes long seen as central to the history of late medieval England and Europe. They examine the strength of opposition to Henry IV's usurpation, the nature and extent of the lollards' resistance to orthodox religion, and the contrasting causes of violence and disorder in the remote border regions at opposite ends of the country, in Cornwall and in the north-west. Subversion of its authority might be counteracted by a regime which recognized the importance of pageantry to bolster its public profile, while a complex weave of patronage, private interest and dedicated service enabled the Exchequer to function through periods of financial crisis. Relations between the Crown and urban centres, potentially a cause of tension, were eased by an emerging body of professional urban law-officers prepared to act as intermediaries. Contributors are: Peter Booth, Clive Burgess, Keith Dockray, Alastair Dunn, Peter W. Fleming, Ian Forrest, David Grummitt, Hannes Kleineke, J. L. Laynsmith, James Lee, Frank D. Millard, James Ross, and Simon Walker.


This paper describes current work on framing the model predictive control (MPC) of cyber-physical systems as synthesis from signal temporal logic (STL) specifications. We provide a case study using a simplified power grid model with uncertain demand and generation; the model-predictive control problem here is that of the ancillary service power flow from the buildings. We show how various relevant constraints can be captured using STL formulas, and incorporated into an MPC framework. We also provide preliminary simulation results to illustrate the promise of the proposed approach.


ABSTRACT Introduction There have been many recent advances in the treatment of type 1 diabetes (T1D) including in insulin formulations, continuous glucose monitoring (CGM) technology and automated insulin delivery. However, long-term optimal glycemic control is still only achieved in a minority. Areas covered Adjunct therapy – the use of therapeutic agents other than insulin – is one strategy aimed at improving outcomes. An ideal adjunct agent would improve glycemic control, reduce weight (or weight gain), reduce insulin requirement and prevent complications (e.g. cardiorenal) without increasing hypoglycemia. The amylin analogue pramlintide has been licensed in the USA, while the sodium glucose co-transporter-2 inhibitor (SGLT2i) dapagliflozin, was briefly (2019 − 2021) licensed for type 1 diabetes in Europe and the UK. However, other agents from the type 2 diabetes (T2D) arena including metformin, other SGLT2is, glucagon-like peptide-1 receptor agonists (GLP-1RA) and dipeptidyl peptidase-IV (DPP-4) inhibitors have been investigated. Expert opinion As evidence emerges for cardiorenal protection by SGLT2is and GLP-1RAs in T2D, it has become increasingly important to know whether people with T1D can also benefit. Here, we review recent trials of adjunct agents in T1D and discuss the efficacy and safety of these agents (alone and in combination) in an era in which continuous glucose monitoring is becoming standard of care.


Cultured alveolar macrophages infected with parainfluenza 1 (Sendai) virus were treated with specific antiviral immune serum and their phagocytic activity for opsonized erythrocytes (EA), Candida krusei, and Staphylococcus epidermidis quantitated. Membrane Fc receptor and candida binding activity were unaffected by the viral infection. In contrast, the virus infection decreased the phagocytic ingestion of EA. The addition of immune serum induced new phagocytic defects in that the treatment of virus-infected macrophages decreased the binding of EA and candida and reduced the ingestion of the yeast and the staphylococci. In addition, treatment with immune serum also enhanced the phagocytic defects induced by the virus infection alone, further reducing the binding and ingestion of EA. Neither virus infection nor treatment with immune serum affected the intracellular killing of S. epidermidis. These data demonstrated that virus infection of alveolar macrophages in vitro induce phagocytic defects that are accentuated by the treatment of the macrophages with antiviral antibody.


AIM
To examine by means of immunohistochemistry the expression of the tumor suppressing gene p53 and gene p21 in cells of malignant melanoma of the uvea from formalin-paraffin material from patients, who were during the period 2000 - 2006 surgically treated due to malignant melanoma of the uvea at the Department of Ophthalmology in the University Hospital in Brno (Brunn), Czech Republic, E.U., and to correlate the results of the immunohistochemical detection with clinical signs of the tumor of each patient.

METHODS
Twenty-nine malignant melanomas of the uvea were examined by means of monoclonal antibody DO-1 (Novocastra company) and all 29 samples of malignant melanoma of the uvea were immunohistochemically examined for the p21 gene expression by means of the monoclonal antibody SX 118 (DAKO company). We evaluated the percentage of positive nuclei and the intensity of the staining in immunohistochemically detected p53 and p21 genes expression.

RESULTS
Results suitable for evaluation we obtained in 28 samples of malignant melanomas, one sample was not suitable for evaluation due to extremely high presence of melanin pigment. In 3 patients, weak nuclear p53 gene expression was detected in 5-15% of cells, in 1 patient, the very weak intensity of staining in 5-15% of cells was found. In three patients, in 5-15% of cells, weak expression of p21 gene, and in one patient, very weak expression of p21 gene in 5-15% of cells (in all 4 cases, the p53 expression was established) were found. In one of those 4 patients with p53 gene expression it was the malignant melanoma of the iris, in one of them it was malignant melanoma of the ciliary body, and in 2 of them it was malignant melanoma of the choroid.

CONCLUSION
The expression of the p53 gene and the expression of the gene p21 were established in 4 out of 28 patients (14.3%). From the above-mentioned results we can assume that stabilizing mutations of p53 gene are rare in the melanoma of the uvea. The proved expression p53 in 4 patients is probably result of the expression of the standard (wild-type) p53 gene, especially according to the ability to induce the expression of p21 gene. In our group, there were not proved marked nuclear accumulation of p53, which would suggest the presence of p53 gene mutation.


This study focuses on investigating the relationship between personality and leadership supports the claim that individual differences may be the predictors of leadership effectiveness in contemporary organizations. Extended studies stress that 'Big-Five 'personality dimensions are related to leadership criteria and further identified introversion-extroversion as a key element of an individual personality. In general, the main differences between effective and less effective leaders are that, effective leaders make positive differences to themselves from their personality traits and the relationship building with followers. However, relatively few studies have tested how and why introvert and extrovert leaders' personality traits relate to follower behaviors. In addition, if so; the mechanisms through which a leader's personality traits relate to follower behaviors. Accordingly, the aims of the present study are to examine whether the introverted and extroverted personality traits of leaders affect the organizational citizenship behavior (OCB) of followers and to examine the role of leader-member relationship as a moderator, in social exchange process. To advance the understanding of these, simple regression analysis and regression analysis with moderator effects were performed to test hypotheses with a sample size of 46 introvert managers and 50 extrovert managers as leaders and 92 and 100 subordinates as their followers respectively from IT industry in Sri Lanka. The study found that there is a positive direct effect of introverted personality traits of leaders and no negative direct effect of extroverted personality traits of leaders on organizational citizenship behavior of followers. Yet, leader-member relationship moderates the positive and negative relationships between introverted, extroverted personality traits of leaders and organizational citizenship behavior of followers. Present study makes several theoretical contributions to path-goal theory of leadership with the support from theory of trait leadership and big five model. Further, managerial contributions of the present study make IT firms successful through better selection of leaders based on personality traits which facilitates organizational citizenship behavior.KeywordsIntroverted personality traits, extroverted personality traits, OCB, Leader-member relationship, IT industry in Sri Lanka


University technology transfer is a collaborative effort between academia and industry involving knowledge sharing and learning. Working closely with their university partners affords biotechnology firms the opportunity to successfully develop licensed inventions and gain access to novel scientific and technological discoveries. These factors may enhance a firm's entrepreneurial orientation by supporting innovative, proactive, and risk-taking behaviors. This study investigates whether university technology transfer characteristics such as the transfer process, transfer modes (formal and informal), and transfer terms influence entrepreneurial orientation. Using survey data from biotechnology firms that develop human health therapies, the findings suggest that the transfer process and informal technology transfer promote a firm's ability to act entrepreneurially. Exclusive licensing terms, on the other hand, have a negative influence, and formal technology transfer does not significantly contribute to a firm's entrepreneurial disposition.

Keywords: research, quantitative, entrepreneurship, technology


Flax ( Linum usitatissimum L.) is the third largest natural fiber crop and one of the five major oil crops in the world. Flax can be used as model plant for the bast fiber plants because of its small size and self pollination characters. Development of highly polymorphic co-dominant markers will be important for the molecular and genomic research in flax. Two microsatellite-enriched flax genomic libraries were constructed for trinucleotide TTC and ATC motifs. A total of 206 new microsatellite-containing sequences were identified and classified. Thirty eight polymorphic microsatellite markers were characterized and evaluated in eight cultivars from different countries and regions. These loci produced 2 to 12 alleles per locus with an average of 3.395. The observed and expected heterozygosities ranged from 0.000 to 1.000 (mean 0.257) and from 0.125 to 0.950 (mean 0.516), respectively. The mean polymorphic information content (PIC) value over 38 loci was 0.429, with 13 loci having PIC greater than 0.5. These novel polymorphic microsatellite loci will be useful in genetic linkage map construction, germplasm classification and identification, gene identification and QTL mapping, and marker-assisted selection in breeding of L. usitatissimum .


It is beyond the scope of the present work to examine the environmental degradation caused by the salt industry. Still, it does mention in passing the pollution caused by the large herds of buffalo, fumes from the wells, and the ruination of agricultural land saturated with brine. Zelin has given us an incredibly deep and wide-angled look into the business aspects of an essentially Chinese industry. The correctives she present should steer us to further investigations about the role of lineage, guanxi, and state in the commercial and industrial development of modern China.


Background: The authors' center uses a nonnarcotic postoperative regimen following craniosynostosis corrections. Despite opioid avoidance, the authors noted that some children still experienced nausea and vomiting following the oral administration of either acetaminophen or ibuprofen. This study sought to evaluate whether intravenous administration of these medications might reduce nausea and vomiting rates. Methods: A total of 50 children undergoing craniosynostosis corrections were prospectively randomized to a control group given only oral ibuprofen (10 mg/kg) and acetaminophen (15 mg/kg), or a treatment group given only intravenous ketorolac (0.5 mg/kg) and acetaminophen (15 mg/kg). All patients were assessed for postoperative nausea and vomiting by a blinded research nurse. Results: Twenty-eight patients randomized to the oral control group, and 22 to the intravenous treatment group. No statistically significant differences were identified between groups, including: age, weight, sex, before history of severe postoperative nausea and vomiting, or procedure. With similar anesthesia times there was significantly more vomiting episodes in the oral group (71% versus 41%). Using a multivariate logistic regression, controlling for age, weight and procedure, the odds ratio for vomiting in the oral control versus intravenous experimental groups was 3.61 (95% CI 1.11–1.76; P = 0.033), and for postoperative nausea was 14.0 (95% CI 1.40–71.69, P = 0.010). Conclusions: The authors found a significant reduction in nausea and vomiting among children randomized to receive intravenous medications. In addition, the intravenous delivery of medications has the theoretical advantage of insuring an effective full dose delivery. Based on these findings, our standard process is to preferentially manage all children following craniosynostosis corrections with intravenous nonnarcotics.


Applying a symmetric bulk bipartition to one-dimensional Affleck-Kennedy-Lieb-Tasaki valence bond solid (VBS) states for the integer spin-S Haldane gapped phase, we can create an array of fractionalized spin-S/2 edge states with the super unit cell $l$ in the reduced bulk system, and the topological properties encoded in the VBS wave functions can be revealed. The entanglement Hamiltonian (EH) with $l=even$ corresponds to the quantum antiferromagnetic Heisenberg spin-S/2 model. For the even integer spins, the EH still describes the Haldane gapped phase. For the odd integer spins, however, the EH just corresponds to the quantum antiferromagnetic Heisenberg half-odd integer spin model with spinon excitations, characterizing the critical point separating the topological Haldane phase from the trivial gapped phase. Our results thus demonstrate that the topological bulk property not only determines its fractionalized edge states, but also the quantum criticality associated with the topological phase, where the elementary excitations are precisely those fractionalized edge degrees of freedom confined in the bulk of the topological phase.


INTRODUCTION
Door-to-balloon (DTB) time is critical to ST elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI) patients' survival. Although DTB time is reduced with direct cardiovascular laboratory (CVL) activation by emergency physicians, concerns regarding false-positive activation remain. We evaluate false-positive rates before and after direct CVL activation and factors associated with false-positive activations.

MATERIALS AND METHODS
This is a retrospective single centre study of all emergency CVL activation 3 years before and after introduction of direct activation in July 2007. False-positive activation is defined as either: 1) absence of culprit vessel with coronary artery thrombus or ulceration, or 2) presence of chronic total occlusion of culprit vessel, with no cardiac biomarker elevations and no regional wall abnormalities. All false-positive cases were verified by reviewing their coronary angiograms and patient records.

RESULTS
A total of 1809 subjects were recruited; 84 (4.64%) identified as false-positives. Incidence of false-positive before and after direct activation was 4.1% and 5.1% respectively, which was not significant (P = 0.315). In multivariate logistic regression analysis, factors associated with false-positive were: female (odds ratio (OR): 2.104 [1.247-3.548], P = 0.005), absence of chest pain (OR: 5.369 [3.024-9.531], P <0.0001) and presence of only left bundle branch block (LBBB) as indication for activation (OR: 65.691 [19.870-217.179], P <0.0001).

CONCLUSION
Improvement in DTB time with direct CVL activation by emergency physicians is not associated with increased false-positive activations. Factors associated with false-positive, especially lack of chest pain or LBBB, can be taken into account to optimise STEMI management.


Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) provides asymptotically consistent estimates of intractable posterior expectations as the number of iterations tends to infinity. However, in large data applications, MCMC can be computationally expensive per iteration. This has catalyzed interest in approximating MCMC in a manner that improves computational speed per iteration but does not produce asymptotically consistent estimates. In this article, we propose estimators based on couplings of Markov chains to assess the quality of such asymptotically biased sampling methods. The estimators give empirical upper bounds of the Wasserstein distance between the limiting distribution of the asymptotically biased sampling method and the original target distribution of interest. We establish theoretical guarantees for our upper bounds and show that our estimators can remain effective in high dimensions. We apply our quality measures to stochastic gradient MCMC, variational Bayes, and Laplace approximations for tall data and to approximate MCMC for Bayesian logistic regression in 4500 dimensions and Bayesian linear regression in 50000 dimensions.


RoamX provides support for the user-controlled management of a distributed X desktop, potentially spanning multiple administrative domains. Instead of terminating X-based applications and restarting them manually elsewhere, applications can be suspended and restored selectively on different machines while preserving their context and state. The migration of the GUI is accomplished by an extended version of xmove, a pseudoserver for X window movement, developed originally by Solomita et al. (1994) at the University of Columbia. RoamX applies CORBA, Jini and JavaCards together in its infrastructure, three sophisticated, supplementary, but rather distinct technologies. This paper describes the implementation, deployment, and experiences gained throughout the development of RoamX.


Information needs are naturally represented as questions. Automatic Natural-Language Question Answering (NLQA) has only recently become a practical task on a larger scale and without domain constraints.
This paper gives a brief introduction to the field, its history and the impact of systematic evaluation competitions.
It is then demonstrated that an NLQA system for English can be built and evaluated in a very short time using off-the-shelf parsers and thesauri. The system is based on Robust Minimal Recursion Semantics (RMRS) and is portable with respect to the parser used as a frontend. It applies atomic term unification supported by question classification and WordNet lookup for semantic similarity matching of parsed question representation and free text.


Construction-related soil disturbance (e.g., road construction, trenching, land stripping, earthmoving, and blasting) is a significant source of fugitive (airborne) dust in the atmosphere. Fugitive dust is a primary cause of decreased air quality and may carry airborne pathogens. We use Landsat Thematic Mapper (TM) remote-sensing data spanning 1994 through 2009 over southern Arizona to identify source areas of construction-related activity likely to produce fugitive dust. We correlate temporal changes in the mid-infrared spectral response to dust sources from local construction. Image differencing of the TM band 5 (mid-infrared), with a change threshold of ±5 SD of the mean, suitably estimates the location and area affected by construction-related soil disturbance. Estimated dust-producing surface area ranges from 10.0 (1996–1997) to 28.3 km2 (2004–2005), or 0.16–0.44% of the Pima County study area. Our methods aim to automate monitoring of fugitive dust sources by environmental and health agencies and to provide inputs to dust transport, air quality, and climate models.


Stable isotope ratios offer an effective natural tracer for energy and nutrient flows studies in ecosystems. The stable isotope method is based on the fact that certain isotopes fractionate in predictable ways as elements travel through the food web (Fry, 1991). The nitrogen isotope relative abundance (&948;15N) is used to determine feeding and other trophic relationships among animals and plants, once there is significant change of &948;15N values between organism and diet (about 2 to 4 extperthousand ). Since there is consistent enrichment through the food web, 15N isotopes can be used to evaluate a consumer's trophic level (Deniro & Epstein, 1981). The &948;13C values are used to determine the sources of energy, because the 13C content of an organism reflects the 13C contents of its diet with little or no change. In numerous studies on food web relationships, the relative ratios of &948;13C and &948;15N have been used as indicators of food source to resolve ambiguities in sources of energy and energy flows (Fry, 1991; Creach et al., 997). Furthermore, when combined with gut contents data, stable isotopes are an important tool in assessing the potential role of unidentifiable, undetectable or unquantifiable prey items in the diets of consumers (Johannsson et al., 001), as well as the origins of organic matter found in digestive tracts and the role played by bacteria in the diet of macro consumers (Creach et al., 997). Once carbon is fixed by a producer the ratio of 13C to 12C remains relatively constant as it passes through the food chain (enrichment of about 0.8 to 1 extperthousand per trophic level). Thus, when there are relatively few, isotopically distinct, source groups, it is often possible to determine the primary producer carbon source(s) (as well as if it is terrestrial or aquatic) of an animal directly from its carbon isotope ratio (Forsberg et al., 993). Therefore, stable isotope analysis can provide an estimation of the mean level of autochthonous and allochthonous sources of organic carbon actually assimilated by a given species. OBJECTIVES


My purpose in this article is to discuss – in the light of the current debates on globalization – some possible implications of the peripheral position of the region where I live – The Azores, Portugal – for curriculum construction. Considering that curriculum construction in Portugal has been traditionally very centralized but the regional government of the Azores has recently started to design a regional curriculum, I shall discuss two alternative scenarios for its construction. One of the scenarios is based on a categorical approach to difference – a kind of approach that has prevailed among many curricular initiatives whose guiding principles emerge, to some extent, from a commitment to the advocacy of certain minorities. The other scenario is based on a non-categorical approach to difference, inspired by the "grammar of difference" proposed by Nicholas Burbules. I will argue that the latter kind of approach is, in principle, more respectful of every kind of difference operating in school and, therefore, more likely to accommodate differences that result from the specific characteristics of the Azores without treating them in ways that might isolate the regional curriculum, that is, jeopardize its openness to cosmopolitan views of knowledge.


We aimed to determine whether nitroparacetamol (NO-paracetamol) and paracetamol exhibit cardioprotective effects. Myocardial infarction (MI) was induced in rats, and drug treatment was started 1 wk before surgery. Mortality rate and infarct size at 2 days after MI were compared. Treatment groups included vehicle (saline), paracetamol (5 mg x kg(-1) x day(-1)) and NO-paracetamol (15 mg x kg(-1) x day(-1)). Mortality rates for vehicle (n = 80), paracetamol (n = 79), and NO-paracetamol (n = 76) groups were 37.5%, 21.5%, and 26.3%, respectively. Infarct size for the vehicle group was 44.8% (+/-6.1%) of the left ventricle (LV). For the paracetamol and NO-paracetamol groups, infarct size was 31.3% (+/-5.6%) and 30.7% (+/-8.1%) of the LV, respectively. Both paracetamol- and NO-paracetamol-treated groups showed increased activities of catalase and SOD compared with the vehicle group. They could attenuate endothelial, inducible, and neuronal nitric oxide synthase and cyclooxygenase-1 and -2 gene expression after MI. The observation indicates the potential clinical significance of the cardioprotective effects of these drugs.


Background: It is well established that ultraviolet radiation is related to non-melanoma skin cancer (NMSC) in Caucasians. Considering that patients with vitiligo have often no protective pigment in sun-exposed depigmented/white skin together with severe oxidative stress due to accumulation of millimolar epidermal hydrogen peroxide (H2O2), it would be expected that these patients develop a higher risk for early photodamage and NMSC. However, scattered reports on low patient numbers documented no increased risk for sun-induced skin cancers in this disease. Objective: The aim of this study was to validate the possible photodamage and the development of epidermal neoplasia in a randomly selected larger patient group with emphasis on each patient's sun sensitivity and the history of solar habits. Furthermore we wished to compare histological signs for epidermal photodamage in a random representative patient group (mean age >30 years) and age-matched healthy controls. Methods: One hundred and thirty-six randomly selected patients (females n = 93; males n = 43; mean age 42.4 years, range 14–70 years) were included in this study. To assess signs of photodamage and skin cancer, all patients underwent a thorough full-body examination by Wood's light and dermatoscopy. In order to learn about each patient's individual sun sensitivity and solar habits, a direct questionnaire was used. In addition full skin punch biopsies of sun-exposed depigmented/pigmented skin were taken under local anaesthesia and evaluated by light microscopy. Results: There was no evidence for sun-related damage in the entire patient group, despite a significant number of positive cases with a history of sunburns in early childhood and continuous accumulation of epidermal H2O2. Histological examination of the epidermis showed no signs of increased photo-ageing and confirmed the absence of apoptosis in these patients. Furthermore surprisingly there was no increased risk for photosensitivity disorders, i.e. polymorphous light reaction, solar urticaria and acute actinic dermatitis. Conclusion: The results of this study confirm in a large group of patients with vitiligo the absence of an expected high risk for sun-induced damage and skin cancer. Based on these results together with a recent report on increased functional wild-type p53 expression in these patients we would like to propose that in vitiligo there may be a direct association between this important tumour suppressor and the absence of photodamage and NMSC.


In the last decade, the young adult genre subset of speculative fiction has experienced growth in both publication and popularity. As the breadth of the genre has increased, more multicultural authors and characters have come to light in these types of books, utilizing the genre to focus on social and political issues related to diversity. This paper will focus on three such novels: Shadows Cast by Stars by Katherine Knutsson, Orleans by Sherri L. Smith, and House of the Scorpion by Nancy Farmer. These three texts focus on different ethnic groups within North America and issues of discrimination through racialization within those communities. All three texts imagine a dystopian future in which identity is biologically coded into human bodies, and that identity determines the usefulness and fate of those bodies. I argue that, through the dystopias each novel creates, the texts provide a critique of the dehumanization of peoples through race and its association with blood and genetics. The characters in each text confront this dehumanization by refuting the social identity ascribed to them and reclaiming their own individual identity through experience and communal interaction.


Advances in medical technology have allowed for customized prognosis, diagnosis, and personalized treatment regimens that utilize multiple heterogeneous data sources. Multiple kernel learning (MKL) is well suited for integration of multiple high throughput data sources, however, there are currently no implementations of MKL in R. In this paper, we give some background material for support vector machine (SVM) and introduce an R package, RMKL, which provides R and C++ code to implement several MKL algorithms for classification and regression problems. The provided implementations of MKL are compared using benchmark data and TCGA ovarian cancer. We demonstrate that combining multiple data sources can lead to a better classification scheme than simply using a single data source.


Epidural corticosteroid injection is a commonly used approach for managing back pain of several etiologies. The risk of clinical complications from systemic absorption is felt to be rare. Ritonavir is a protease inhibitor whose potent cytochrome P450 3A4 inhibition is exploited for pharmacologic boosting in human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infection. It has been associated with systemic hypercortisolism when used in combination with nasal and inhaled corticosteroids. This is a case series describing 2 patients with HIV on ritonavir-containing regimens who developed iatrogenic hypercortisolism following epidural injection of triamcinolone acetonide. The 2 patients developed cushingoid symptoms, with detectable serum triamcinolone acetonide levels weeks after their epidural injections. Their symptoms took several weeks to resolve, in one case necessitating a change to an HIV regimen that did not contain ritonavir. Iatrogenic hypercortisolism is a rarely reported, but potentially devastating complication of injectable corticosteroids. Individuals receiving ritonavir-based therapy appear to be at increased risk for this process due to pharmacologic boosting of the corticosteroid. The preponderance of reported cases of iatrogenic hypercortisolism following injectable corticosteroids has involved triamcinolone acetonide, which may be due to the relatively rapid absorption characteristics and high serum levels of this compound compared with other preparations. For individuals on ritonavir-containing HIV therapy, we recommend close coordination with the involved HIV clinicians prior to use of injectable corticosteroids, and avoidance of injections with triamcinolone acetonide whenever possible. Choosing an alternative corticosteroid preparation to triamcinolone acetonide may reduce the risk of systemic absorption, though more research is needed to confirm this hypothesis.


The film cooling effectiveness distribution and its uniformity downstream of a row of film cooling holes on a flat plate are investigated by pressure sensitive paint (PSP) under different density ratios. Several hole geometries are studied, including streamwise cylindrical holes, compound-angled cylindrical holes, streamwise fan-shape holes, compound-angled fan-shape holes, and double-jet film-cooling (DJFC) holes. All of them have an inclination angle (θ) of 35 deg. The compound angle (β) is 45 deg. The fan-shape holes have a 10 deg expansion in the spanwise direction. For a fair comparison, the pitch is kept as 4d for the cylindrical and the fan-shape holes, and 8d for the DJFC holes. The uniformity of effectiveness distribution is described by a new parameter (Lateral-Uniformity, LU) defined in this paper. The effects of density ratios (DR = 1.0, 1.5 and 2.5) on the film-cooling effectiveness and its uniformity are focused. Differences among geometries and effects of blowing ratios (M = 0.5, 1.0, 1.5, and 2.0) are also considered. The results show that at higher density ratios, the lateral spread of the discrete-hole geometries (i.e., the cylindrical and the fan-shape holes) is enhanced, while the DJFC holes is more advantageous in film-cooling effectiveness. Mostly, a higher lateral-uniformity is obtained at DR = 2.5 due to better coolant coverage and enhanced lateral spread, but the effects of the density ratio on the lateral-uniformity are not monotonic in some cases. Utilizing the compound angle configuration leads to an increased lateral-uniformity due to a stronger spanwise motion of the jet. Generally, with a higher blowing ratio, the lateral-uniformity of the discrete-hole geometries decreases due to narrower traces, while that of the DJFC holes increases due to a stronger spanwise movement.