This paper presents bi-directional trajectory tracking with variable block-size motion estimation for frame rate up-conversion (FRUC) based on the algorithm/architecture co-exploration (AAC) design methodology. Due to concurrent exploration in both algorithm and architecture domains, the designed system requires fewer computations and lowers hardware cost, but is capable of enhancing the accuracy of motion vectors (MVs) by allowing MV refinement from coarse-grained to fine-grained. In addition, a method that uses multiple block candidates tracked by bi-directional MVs for interpolation is also presented to improve visual quality. Benefiting from AAC, we can extract architectural information at algorithmic design phase to determine the most feasible architecture; then, the proposed algorithm can be mapped onto target platform smoothly. The proposed FRUC system, which is capable of converting the frame rate from 60 fps up to 120 fps at full HD (1920 × 1080) resolution, was successfully implemented and verified on a field-programmable gate array. This FRUC system's performance has not only been shown to surpass state-of-art alternatives in algorithmic performance, but its hardware cost is less than the comparable works described in the literature.


Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) has shown higher energy efficiency and robustness than other well known Wireless Sensor Network (WSN) protocols, making it a strong candidate for implementation in IoT scenarios. In addition, BLE is in almost every smartphone, turning it into perfect ubiquitous remote controls for smart homes, buildings or cities. In this paper we propose new operating modes for BLE to provide a much wider applicability range covering asynchronous, aperiodic and very low frequency scenarios while extending lifetime, without modification of the existing BLE specification. In order to estimate battery lifetime, we propose a coin cell battery model. We show how to efficiently adapt the protocol for different IoT scenarios based on their requirements, thus extending battery lifetime as much as possible while guaranteeing acceptable latency. Our results on two typical test-cases show that by using an optimized configuration and appropriate operating mode based on scenario requirements, lifetime can be increased up to ~2x (4.1 to 7.3 years) for a BLE master in a first case, and ~58x (3.05 months to 14.82 years) for a BLE slave in a second case. This shows BLE compatibility with a vast amount of IoT-related use cases.


Health-related quality of life is a multidimensional concept with five broad domains: opportunity/resilience, health perception, functional states, impairments/diseases, and duration of life. It addresses the tradeoff between how long and how well people live. The health-related quality of life approach has provided greater opportunity for investigation of the interrelations among oral health, health, and related outcomes. The inclusion of patient-driven measures, such as perceptions and functional status, is critical. Oral health-related quality of life measures are being developed and used in research on aging populations. Clinical measures of oral health, perceptions of general and oral well-being, and reported physical, social, and psychological functioning are independent, but correlated, components of overall oral health-related quality of life. An oral health-related quality of life approach benefits 1) clinical practitioners in selecting treatments and monitoring patient outcomes; 2) researchers in identifying determinants of health, tracking levels of health risk factors, and determining use of services in populations; and 3) policy-makers establishing program and institutional priorities, policies, and funding decisions. This overview indicates substantial value in pursuing several recommendations. A theoretical framework from which concepts, measures, and models can be derived must be developed to address oral health, oral health-related quality of life, health, and health-related quality of life. Oral health outcomes or states must be identified and classified along some continuum of impairment, function, disability, and opportunity. Indicators of appropriate concepts and domains must be adapted or established. Extended analyses on the relations among oral health, oral health-related quality of life, health, and health-related quality of life should be conducted with use of the Boston VA Normative Aging Study and other appropriate data sets.


INTRODUCTION
Endotoxin is a key driver of sepsis, which frequently causes acute kidney injury (AKI). However, endotoxins may also be found in non-bacteremic critically ill patients, likely from intestinal translocation. Preclinical models show that endotoxins can directly injure the kidneys, and in COVID-19 patients, endotoxemia correlated with AKI. We sought to determine correlations between endotoxemia and kidney and hospital outcomes in a broad group of critically ill patients.

METHODS
In this single-center, serial prospective study, 124 predominantly Caucasian adult patients were recruited within 48 h of admission to Stony Brook University Hospital Intensive Care Unit (ICU). Demographics, vital signs, laboratory data, and outcomes were collected. Circulating endotoxin was measured on days 1, 4, and 8 using the endotoxin activity assay (EAA). The association of EAA with outcomes was examined with EAA: (1) categorized as <0.6, ≥0.6, and nonresponders (NRs); and (2) used as a continuous variable.

RESULTS
Patients with EAA ≥0.6 had a higher prevalence of proteinuria, and lower arterial oxygen saturation (SaO2) to fraction of inspired oxygen (FiO2) (SaO2/FiO2) ratio versus patients with EAA <0.6. EAA levels positively correlated with serum creatinine (sCr) levels on day 1. Patients whose EAA level stayed ≥0.6 had a slower decline in sCr compared to those whose EAA started at ≥0.6 and subsequently declined. Patients with AKI stage 1 and EAA ≥0.6 on day 1 showed slower decline in sCr compared to patients with stage 1 AKI and EAA <0.6. EAA ≥0.6 and NR patients had longer hospital stay and delayed ICU discharge versus EAA <0.6.

CONCLUSIONS
High EAA levels correlated with worse kidney function and outcomes. Patients whose EAA levels fell, and those with AKI stage I and day 1 EAA <0.6 recovered more quickly compared to those with EAA ≥0.6, suggesting that removal of circulating endotoxins may be beneficial in critically ill patients.


This study proposes an adaptive non-singular integral terminal sliding mode control (ANITSMC) scheme for trajectory tracking of autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs) with dynamic uncertainties and time-varying external disturbances. The ANITSMC is first proposed for a first-order uncertain non-linear dynamic system to eliminate the singularity problem in conventional terminal sliding mode control (TSMC) and avoid the requirement of the bound information of the lumped system uncertainty. The time taken to reach the equilibrium point from any initial error is guaranteed to be finite. The proposed ANITSMC is then applied to trajectory tracking control of AUVs. It guarantees that the velocity tracking errors locally converge to zero in finite time and after that the position tracking errors locally converge to zero exponentially. The designed ANITSMC of AUVs avoids the requirement of the prior knowledge of the lumped system uncertainty bounds as opposite to the existing globally finite-time stable tracking control (GFTSTC), provides higher tracking accuracy than the existing GFTSTC and adaptive non-singular TSMC (ANTSMC) and offers faster convergence rate and better robustness against dynamic uncertainties and time-varying external disturbances than the adaptive proportional-integral sliding mode control (APISMC). Comparative simulation results are presented to validate the superiority of the ANITSMC over the APISMC.


Within a social justice ethical framework, the use of 'enforcement' measures to prevent people from engaging in 'street activities', such as begging and street drinking, can only be morally justified if such initiatives can be shown to benefit the welfare of the vulnerable 'street users' affected. It may be hypothesized that this is unlikely, and such measures are bound to be regressive in their effects, but in fact evidence from an evaluation conducted in five locations across England suggests otherwise. Drawing on a normative framework which engages with both moral and political philosophy, this paper argues that the motivations and impacts associated with enforcement are more ethically complex, and less punitive, than they may at first appear. It demonstrates that the use of enforcement measures, when accompanied by appropriate support, can in fact lead to beneficial outcomes for some individuals involved in begging or street drinking in some situations. The outcomes for other members of the street population can, however, be very negative, and are highly unpredictable, such that the use of enforcement is always a high-risk strategy, even if ethically justifiable in certain circumstances.


Pyrolysis1 biochar systems (PBS) could assist in meeting the Scottish Government's target of a 42% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2020 relative to 1990. Drawing on literature review of land use and biomass availability in Scotland at present and in the future, and using established life cycle assessment models, we find that biochar could contribute between 0.4 and 2 MtCO2 equivalent (e) abatement per year in Scotland now (2009), increasing to between 1.4 and 4.2 MtCO2e/yr by 2030 and to between 1.5 and 4.8 MtCO2e/yr by 2050. The practicalities of such biochar deployment are explored further through spatial analysis. Through multi-criteria decision analysis, various factors are weighed up and traded-off against one another to show optimum locations for pyrolysis biochar facilities. The factors considered include proximity to sources (feedstock for biochar production), sinks (for biochar application), and proximity to transport infrastructure etc. Preliminary results show that most of the potentially suitable sites are around the central belt extending into Fife.


The spontaneously metastatic murine pancreatic tumor, PAN 2, was used to evaluate established regimens of combined chemoimmunotherapy with 5-fluorouracil (5-FU) and levamisole and new protocols based on the immunomodulator, thymopoietin pentapeptide (TP-5). The combination of 5-FU and levamisole reduced the final tumor size by 32% and the mean number of lung metastases by 71%. Based on flow cytometric analysis, the combination treatment increased the percent of helper/inducer (CD4+) lymphocytes and reduced the number of effector (suppressor/cytotoxic) lymphocytes (CD8+). A second combination using 5-FU and TP-5 produced a reduction in tumor growth rate of 52%, with an 88% suppression of lung metastases with TP-5/5-FU (vs. levamisole/5-FU) treatment. The TP-5 treatment also increased splenic T-lymphocyte responsiveness to nonspecific mitogens by 2.3-fold. These results suggest a correlation between enhanced T-lymphocyte functional parameters and reduced tumor growth and metastatic spread produced by these combination therapies. Since TP-5 has been demonstrated to be a superior immunomodulator compared to levamisole, the greater therapeutic effect of TP-5 vs. levamisole further supports the postulated role of immunopotentiation in the success of combined chemoimmunotherapy.


The pinning effect plays an important role in many fluidic systems but remains poorly understood, especially at the nanoscale. In this study, we measured the contact angles of glycerol nanodroplets on three different substrates using atomic force microscopy. By comparison of the shapes of the three-dimensional images of droplets, we found that a possible origin of the long-discussed deviation of the contact angles of nanodroplets from the macroscopic value is the pinning force induced by ångström-scale surface heterogeneity. It was also revealed that the pinning forces acting on glycerol nanodroplets on a silicon dioxide surface are up to twice as large as those acting on macroscale droplets. On a substrate where the effect of pinning was strong, an unexpected irreversible change from an irregularly shaped droplet to an atomically flat liquid film occurred. This was explained by the transition of the dominant force from liquid/gas interfacial tension to an adsorption force.


Background Development of white spot lesions around orthodontic fixed orthodontic appliances is a common finding, especially in patients with poor oral hygiene. One of the conservative interventions for regression of these lesions is using chemical solutions. The current study aimed to compare the effectiveness of fluoride and amorphous calcium phosphate (ACP) on microhardness improvement of affected enamel. Material and Methods Forty-five intact human incisor teeth were selected and randomly divided into 3 groups of 15. Fluoride group, ACP group and artificial saliva group (control group). Inducing of white spot lesion was done by PH-cycling model. Samples of the first and second group were submerged into 0.05% fluoride and 0.05% ACP solutions respectively for one minute a day. The rest of the time, all specimens were put in artificial saliva, which was incubated in 37 °c temperature. Microhardness of specimens was assessed by Vickers microhardness test in three stages: 1: Baseline microhardness assessment that was done before induction of white spot lesion, 2: Secondary microhardness assessment that was done after induction, 3: Final microhardness assessment that was done after chemical treatment. The SPSS 11.5 software was used for statistical analysis and p< 0.05 was considered as significant. Results Microhardness of specimens in the fluoride and ACP groups had significantly improved after the treatment (between secondary assessment and final assessment). In the control group, no significant improvements were observed. In final assessment, there were significant differences between the ACP and control groups, but no significant differences were found neither between the fluoride and ACP, nor the Fluoride and control groups. Conclusions According to the current study, both 0.05% ACP and 0.05% fluoride solutions enhanced enamel micro-hardness in treatment of white spot lesion. Key words:Microhardness, amorphous calcium phosphate, fluoride, white spot lesion.


Rationale: The mechanism of sudden cardiac death in COVID-19 can be multifactorial. Cardiac hypersensitivity to 5-ASA therapy leading to myocarditis has been reported in some cases. Cytokine storm syndrome and idiosyncratic reaction with mesalazine use may lead to sudden cardiac death in COVID-19. Use of immunosuppressants in hospitalized COVID-19 patients should be continued with caution, especially in patients with inflammatory bowel disease. Patient's concern: A 75-year-old man who was tested positive for SARS-CoV-2 was admitted with a history of shortness of breath for the last two days. He was a known case of Crohn's disease treated with mesalazine. Diagnosis: COVID-19 pneumonia with underlying Crohn's disease leading to sudden cardiac death. Intervention: Remdesivir, antibiotics, steroids, low molecular weight heparin, tablet zinc, tab vitamin C, and other supportive treatment were started. Because of increased inflammatory markers, itolizumab was given to the patient on the 2nd day. Outcome: On the 5th day of the intensive care unit, the patient complained of sudden chest pain with respiratory distress leading to bradycardia and asystole and could not be resuscitated. Lessons: Causes for sudden cardiac death in COVID-19 pneumonia patients with Crohn's disease is multifactorial. Although mesalazine may be a safe and effective drug in the management of inflammatory bowel disease, it can induce sytokine strom syndrome and idiosyncratic reactions that could be one of the reasons of sudden cardic death. Therefore, we should be aware of its serious and potentially life-threatening complications, especially in COVID-19 infected patients.


Study of visual evoked potentials by contrast stimuli (VEPL) and by luminance stimuli (VEPC) in 28 subjects aged between 65 and 95 years (mean age: 81.8 years). Changes related to aging in regard to VEP involve: an increase of latencies of VEPL affecting the early components and an increase in the maximum amplitude of VEPL. The course of EP as age progresses introduces a difference in topographical organisation with a deterioration of responses in the left occipital regions and a change in potentials recorded at the vertex. Aging would appear to cause more marked inter-individual differences which could have clinical implications by making it possible to demonstrate individual differences in the biological processes of aging.


Wasserstein distance (WD) and the associated optimal transport plan have been proven useful in many applications where probability measures are at stake. In this paper, we propose a new proxy of the squared WD, coined min-SWGG, that is based on the transport map induced by an optimal one-dimensional projection of the two input distributions. We draw connections between min-SWGG and Wasserstein generalized geodesics in which the pivot measure is supported on a line. We notably provide a new closed form for the exact Wasserstein distance in the particular case of one of the distributions supported on a line allowing us to derive a fast computational scheme that is amenable to gradient descent optimization. We show that min-SWGG is an upper bound of WD and that it has a complexity similar to as Sliced-Wasserstein, with the additional feature of providing an associated transport plan. We also investigate some theoretical properties such as metricity, weak convergence, computational and topological properties. Empirical evidences support the benefits of min-SWGG in various contexts, from gradient flows, shape matching and image colorization, among others.


Abstract The medicalisation of deaf people has prevented the establishment of the profession of Deaf interpreters, and placed them always in the position of the client. If we are to come away from this hegemonic stigma, only then can Deaf people be seen equally as the client or the service provider. Sign language interpreting services have long since been restricted to interpreting between one spoken and one sign language but the increase in movement within Europe developed a demand for interpreters with the ability to work with other sign languages and international sign. This paper will explore the dynamics and the ongoing progress we are seeing between Deaf and hearing interpreters, and how Deaf interpreters are often better placed to interpret within immigration, tourism, business, international relations and entertainment. If NASLIs within Europe do not commit themselves to the professionalisation and inclusion of Deaf interpreters, they will further deny Deaf people of movement through Europe and the ability to interact at an international level.


ABSTRACT Extracellular polymeric substances (EPS) were quantified in flocculent and aerobic granular sludge developed in two sequencing batch reactors with the same shear force but different settling times. Several EPS extraction methods were compared to investigate how different methods affect EPS chemical characterization, and fluorescent stains were used to visualize EPS in intact samples and 20-μm cryosections. Reactor 1 (operated with a 10-min settle) enriched predominantly flocculent sludge with a sludge volume index (SVI) of 120 ± 12 ml g−1, and reactor 2 (2-min settle time) formed compact aerobic granules with an SVI of 50 ± 2 ml g−1. EPS extraction by using a cation-exchange resin showed that proteins were more dominant than polysaccharides in all samples, and the protein content was 50% more in granular EPS than flocculent EPS. NaOH and heat extraction produced a higher protein and polysaccharide content from cell lysis. In situ EPS staining of granules showed that cells and polysaccharides were localized to the outer edge of granules, whereas the center was comprised mostly of proteins. These observations confirm the chemical extraction data and indicate that granule formation and stability are dependent on a noncellular, protein core. The comparison of EPS methods explains how significant cell lysis and contamination by dead biomass leads to different and opposing conclusions.


Individual trees, not forests, respond to climate. Such an individual‐scale approach has seldom been used to retrospectively track the radial growth responses of trees to climate in dendrochronology. The aim of this study was to adopt this individual view to retrospectively assess tree sensitivity to climate warming, and to evaluate and compare the potential drivers of tree growth responses to climate acting at species, site and individual scales. Following a dendroecological framework, we sampled a network of 29 Pinus uncinata forests in NE Spain and obtained tree‐ring widths series from 642 trees. Individual features as northness, elevation, slope, basal area, sapwood area, tree height and tree age were used to evaluate the potential drivers of tree growth responses to climate. The analysed data set includes diverse ecological and biogeographical conditions. The tree growth responses to climate were assessed by relating growth indices to climatic variables using linear‐mixed effects models. Maximum November temperatures during the year prior to tree‐ring formation enhanced P. uncinata growth mainly in mid‐elevation sites, whereas at higher elevations growth was more dependent on the positive effect of warmer minimum May temperatures during the year of tree‐ring formation. Current June precipitation was the positive main climatic driver of growth in sites prone to water deficit such as the southernmost limit of the species distribution area or very steep sites. Elevation was the main factor controlling how much growth variability is explained by climate at the site and tree scales. Climate warming was more intense during the early 20th century, when the importance of elevation as an indirect modulator of growth declined as compared with the late 20th century. Synthesis. The individual‐scale approach taken in this study allowed detecting that trees growing at southern and low‐elevation sites were the most negatively affected by warm and dry summer conditions. Our results emphasize that both (i) an individual‐scale approach to quantify tree growth responses to climate and (ii) a detailed evaluation of the potential biotic and abiotic drivers of those individual responses are necessary to understand climate sensitivity of trees.


In a low-voltage microgrid, due to the effect of mainly resistive line impedance, the conventional P/w and Q/E droop control is subject to the coupling and dynamic instability of the real and reactive power control. To address this problem, a novel virtual impedance composed of virtual negative resistor (VNR) and virtual inductor is employed to control the interfaced inverters in this study. The virtual resistance is controlled to be negative to counteract the effect of the line resistance thus ensuring a mainly inductive system impedance. However, it is found in this study that, the grid-connected inverter system may present non-fundamental instability if the line resistance drifts to be smaller than the value of VNR with the basic VNR method. To produce a more stable system when the line parameter drifts, an improved VNR form based on a proportional-resonant structure is proposed. Moreover, an interesting conclusion is obtained that, if the PI voltage regulator and the basic VNR are used, the grid-connected inverter becomes critical stable when the virtual resistance is exactly equal to the line resistance. Experimental results of a low-voltage microgrid consisting of two 6-kW inverters are given to validate the control strategy.


We report the discovery of rapid periodic signals in the light curves of two cataclysmic variables with prominent white dwarf components in their spectra, SDSS J1457+51 and BW Sculptoris. These stars therefore appear to be new members of the GW Librae class of variable stars, in which the fast periodic (and non-commensurate with the orbital period) signals are believed to arise from non-radial pulsations in the underlying white dwarf. The power spectra of both stars show complex signals with primary periods near 10 and 20 min, respectively. These signals change in frequency by a few per cent on a time-scale of weeks or less, and probably contain an internal fine structure unresolved by our observations. We also detect double-humped waves signifying the underlying orbital periods, near 78 min for both stars.

In addition, BW Sculptoris shows a transient but powerful signal with a period near 87 min, a quiescent superhump. The ∼11 per cent excess over the orbital period is difficult to understand, and may arise from an eccentric instability near the 2:1 resonance in the accretion disc.


The C5 complement protein is a potent inflammatory mediator that has been implicated in the pathogenesis of both stroke and neurodegenerative disease. Microvascular failure is proposed as a potential mechanism of injury. Along these lines, this investigation examines the role of C5 in the setting of chronic cerebral hypoperfusion. Following experimental bilateral carotid artery stenosis, C5 protein deposition increases in the corpus callosum over thirty days (p<0.05). The time course is temporally consistent with the appearance of white matter injury. Concurrently, systemic serum C5 levels do not appear to differ between bilateral carotid artery stenosis and sham-operated mice, implicating a local cerebral process. Following bilateral carotid artery stenosis, C5 deficient mice demonstrate decreased white matter ischemia in the corpus callosum when compared to C5 sufficient controls (p<0.05). Further, the C5 deficient mice exhibit fewer reactive astrocytes and microglia (p<0.01). This study reveals that the C5 complement protein may play a critical role in mediating white matter injury through inflammation in the setting of chronic cerebral hypoperfusion.


A novel aluminum phosphinate—aluminum methylcyclohexylphosphinate (Al(MHP))—was synthesized by reacting n‐butyl methylphosphonite with cyclohexene, followed by reacting with anhydrous AlCl3. The products were characterized with gas chromatography, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, hydrogen nuclear magnetic resonance, phosphorus nuclear magnetic resonance, X‐ray fluorescent spectroscopy, and thermogravimetric (TG) analyses. After blending with epoxy resin (EP), flame retardancy was estimated with the use of limited oxygen index (LOI) and UL‐94 test, and thermal stability was investigated using TG analysis. The morphologies and composition of the char obtained after being heated at 300 °C for 20 min followed by 500 °C for 3 min in the muffle furnace were characterized by scanning electron microscopy (SEM) with energy‐dispersive X‐ray (EDX) analysis. Results showed that Al(MHP) is an efficient flame retardant for EP, and Al(MHP)/EP can pass UL‐94V‐0 rating with an LOI of 28.8% by adding 15 wt.% of Al(MHP). TG results showed that the presence of Al(MHP) in EP increases the char yield and depresses the thermal decomposition. SEM‐EDX analysis showed that the char obtained at 300 °C is coherent and consists of P‐rich components; at higher temperature (500 °C), the char becomes tiny and loose and phosphorus element is released into gas. Compared with neat EP, composites have lower water absorption. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.


Mark Douglas, who has led FMC's agriculture business for nearly 10 years, will become the company's CEO on June 1. Current CEO Pierre Brondeau will become board chairman. The choice of Douglas reflects FMC's shift from being a purveyor of chemicals, food ingredients, and pesticides to an agriculture-focused firm. The change was capped by a 2017 deal in which FMC swapped its health and nutrition segment for DuPont's crop protection business. Before joining FMC, Douglas was at Dow Advanced Materials.


There is a growing demand for high mobility and ultrafast internet/data services which drives the motivation for free space optical (FSO) communications for high speed trains. Here we present an FSO link for the ground-to-train communications, which consists of optical transceivers positioned alongside the track and on the roof of the train. When the train moves at a high speed, the airwave induced turbulence degrades the FSO link performance. In this paper the effect of turbulence is experimentally investigated and compared with the case of no turbulence.


New biomechanical models of the left ventricle, as well as recent technological breakthroughs, allowed a wider use of pressure/volume loop in the assessment of mechano-energetic properties of the left ventricle. The most widely used parameter derived from the pressure/volume loop is end-systolic elastance, which reflects the left ventricular contractility. Additionally, pressure/volume loop has been proved to be useful in the assessment of left ventricular diastolic function. More complex parameters of left ventricular mechanisms, such as stroke work and potential energy, can be studied by plotting pressure/volume loop and lines depicting end-systolic and end-diastolic pressure/volume relations. Similarly, the ratio of the area contained in the pressure/volume loop, that is stroke work, and the level of myocardial oxygen consumption can be used in the assessment of the efficiency by which the left ventricle converts chemical energy into mechanical energy. In conclusion, the use of pressure/volume loop and its relationship to myocardial oxygen consumption can be very effective in the analysis of cardiovascular performance in various settings.


In developing its chemical information system, Chemical Abstracts Service (CAS) has built files which require hundreds of millions of bytes of storage and in which data elements may range in length from zero in one instance to several hundred bytes in another. To cope with this size and variability, CAS has developed an internal standardized storage format and has implemented it on the IBM System/360. This format, which is called Standard File Format (SFF), accommodates a mix of fixed-and variable-length data elements and permits the addition and deletion of data elements without affecting the program code. Symbolic addressing of data elements is achieved through the use of a directory within each record in the file. Implementation of standardized files has permitted the CAS system to operate with greater generality and flexibility.


Traditional supervised denoisers are trained using pairs of noisy input and clean target images. They learn to predict a central tendency of the posterior distribution over possible clean images. When, e.g., trained with the popular quadratic loss function, the network's output will correspond to the minimum mean square error (MMSE) estimate. Unsupervised denoisers based on Variational AutoEncoders (VAEs) have succeeded in achieving state-of-the-art results while requiring only unpaired noisy data as training input. In contrast to the traditional supervised approach, unsupervised denoisers do not directly produce a single prediction, such as the MMSE estimate, but allow us to draw samples from the posterior distribution of clean solutions corresponding to the noisy input. To approximate the MMSE estimate during inference, unsupervised methods have to create and draw a large number of samples - a computationally expensive process - rendering the approach inapplicable in many situations. Here, we present an alternative approach that trains a deterministic network alongside the VAE to directly predict a central tendency. Our method achieves results that surpass the results achieved by the unsupervised method at a fraction of the computational cost.


This thesis explores the films of post-war Japanese director Suzuki Seijun (1923-), who has yet to be the subject of an extended study in the English language. The thesis aims to provide a close textual analysis of several of Suzuki's films, with an emphasis on his crime and gangster films of the 1960s. At the same time, it aims to discuss and determine the significance of these films, and the consistent stylistic features that emerge from them, in multiple historical, ideological, and theoretical contexts. For example, while the thesis emphasises the importance of Suzuki's films to formal and ideological developments in Japanese cinema from 1950s to the present day, it also claims significance to these films in reference to major issues in contemporary film theory, such as modernity, genre, masculinity, identification, reflexivity, violence, spectatorship, and masochism.

The thesis begins by claiming that a 'differential aesthetic' is evident in Suzuki's films, defined by a variety of textual features such as editing discontinuities, non-diegetic colours, graphics, and theatrical effects, repetitive structures of narration, and inter-textual references. Such features were highly unconventional, and in many cases deemed unacceptable, in the context of Japanese studio genre production in the 1960s. The rest of the thesis proposes to fully explore this 'Suzuki difference' in a variety of historical and theoretical contexts. I have chosen the concept of negativity and the 'negative aesthetic' to unify the thesis as a whole, arguing that the Suzuki aesthetic is not merely differential, but attempts a negation of formal and ideological conventions of studio filmmaking for the purpose of a wide-ranging, satirical critique of post-war Japanese culture. In several respects, the negative aesthetic links Suzuki to global tendencies in the transformation of cinematic form and narration in the 1960s, and his films can contribute to an understanding of these transitions.


The speed of modern processors has remained constant over the last few years but the integration capacity continues to follow Moore's law and thus, to be scalable, applications must be parallelized. In addition to the main CPU, almost every computer is equipped with a Graphics Processors Unit (GPU) which is in essence a specialized parallel processor. This paper explore how performance of speech recognition systems can be enhanced by using the A* algorithm which allows better parallelization over the Viterbi algorithm and a GPU for the acoustic computations in large vocabulary applications. First experiments with a "unigram approximation" heuristic resulted in approximatively 8.7 times less states being explored compared to our classical Viterbi decoder. The multi-thread implementation of the A* decoder combined with GPU for acoustic computation led to a speed-up factor of 5.2 over its sequential counterpart and an improvement of 5% absolute of the accuracy over the sequential Viterbi search at real-time.


The aim of this study was to investigate the effects of three different methods of anesthesia on patients with human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infection, which could lead to an improvement in postoperative outcomes in these patients. A total of 90 patients undergoing an operation while being treated for an HIV infection were included in this study. Patients were divided into three groups (N = 30/group) based on the type of anesthesia administered: general anesthesia, local anesthesia, and combined spinal epidural anesthesia (CSEA). The effects of local infiltration of anesthesia and peripheral nerve block local anesthesia were examined in the local anesthesia group. The CSEA group examined the effects of spinal anesthesia in HIV-infected patients. We compared the vital signs of the three groups during the preoperative period, at incision, and during the postoperative recovery period. The CSEA group had a significantly higher mean preoperative CD4(+) T lymphocyte count compared with the general anesthesia and local anesthesia groups (P < 0.05). We found that the three kinds of anesthesia methods administered to HIV-infected patients could be used with considerable safety and can be selected according to the clinical need and type of surgical procedure.


Response surface methodology (RSM) was used to optimize sporulation medium components for improving spores concentration in I. lacteus fermentation broth. Five factors of sporulation medium components, glucose (X1), peptone (X2), yeast extract (X3) MgSO4·7H2O (X4) and VB1 (X5), were chosen to optimize through a five-level, five-factor central composite design (CCD) base on single factor experiments. The concentration of medium components which influenced the sporulation of I. lacteus was further optimized using RSM. The results show that The medium that consists of 4.15 g/L peptone, 2.04 g/L yeast extract, 5.10 g/L glucose, 0.17 g/L MgSO4·7H2O and 0.03 g/L VB1 enhance spores concentration significantly . The final spores concentration (2.19×105 /mL) by using the optimized medium was about five times higher than normal medium.


The behavior of ozone micro bubble cleaning system was investigated to evaluate the solution as a new method of solar cell wafer cleaning in comparison with former conventional RCA cleaning. We have developed the ozone dissolution system in the ozonated water for more efficient cleaning conditions. The optimized cleaning conditions for solar cell wafer process were 10 ppm of ozone concentration and 12 minutes in cleaning periods, respectively. We have confirmed the cleaning reliability and cell efficiencies after ozone micro bubble cleaning. Using this new cleaning technology, it was possible to obtain higher efficiency, higher productivity, and fast tact time for applying cleaning in the fields on bare ingot wafer, LED wafers as well as the solar cell wafer.


With the ongoing progress in information technology, the need for an accurate personal identification system based on recognizing biological characteristics is increasing demand for this type of security technology, rather than conventional systems that use ID cards or pin numbers. Of all physical features, the face is the most familiar and recognizable, and using it for identification purposes avoids the need for physical contact, thereby also avoiding potential psychological or physical resistance, such as that encountered when trying to obtain fingerprints for example. Face recognition has been studied since the 1970s, with extensive research into and development of the digital processing of facial images. A range of software is already on the market. As a simple and compact recognition system that satisfies the required performance levels, we have implemented a hybrid system based on the optical recognition principle, using a Fourier transform lens. In contrast to digital recognition, optical analog operations process two-dimensional images instantaneously in parallel using a lens-based Fourier transform function (Kodate Hashimoto, & Thapliya, 1999). In the 1960s, two methods were proposed; the VanderLugt Correlator proposed by VanderLugt ((a)Watanabe & Kodate, 2005), and the joint transform correlator (JTC) ( Kodate Inaba & Watanabe, 2002) by Weaver and Goodman. The optical correlator by the Institut national d'Optique in Canada gained the New Product Award at the 1999 Conference on lasers and Electro-optics and the Quantum Electronics and Laser Science Conference. In Japan the conventional JTC was practically implemented by the Hamamatsu Photonics Company for fingerprint image processing. The process speed of optical correlators has steadily improved, however, operational speed, practicality and recognition rate were not fully tested against the fast-improving digitized system. Against this background, the present group of authors has proposed a new scheme using a multi-beam, multi-channel parallel joint transform correlator (PJTC) as a means of making better use of spatial parallelism through the use of a diffraction-type multi-level zone-plate array (MLZP array) to extend a single channel JTC ((b)Watanabe & Kodate , 2005). Watanabe & Kodate , 2003). Features of the proposed system include extreme robustness, high recognition precision by its pre-processing and high reproducibility by its post-process. The compact and mobile versions are now assembled and named COPaC. Specifications: 20x24x43 cm 3.6 kg, analysis time of 6.6 faces/s ( Kodate Inaba& Watanabe, 2002).


Objective(s): In this study, for the first time, MF59 adjuvant was used to develop a cholesteryl ester transfer protein (CETP) vaccine. The efficacy of the vaccine was compared with the efficacy of CETP vaccine formulated with Alum/CpG, the formulation that its immunogenicity has been already demonstrated in rabbit and mice. Materials and Methods: Tetanus toxoid- CETP peptide (TT-CETP) was mixed with Alum/CpG or MF59-like and administered subcutaneously for total five times in rabbit model of atherosclerosis. Anti-TT-CETP specific antibody, CETP activity in sera and mRNA level of cytokine IL-4 and IFN-γ in peripheral mononuclear cells were determined. Therapeutic response was also examined by tracking serum lipoprotein levels and pathologic observation of atherosclerotic lesions at aortic site. Results: More anti-TT-CETP antibody was found in Alum/CpG vaccinated rabbits compared to buffer (P<0.001). Antibody induced by MF59-like formulation was not significantly higher than buffer. CETP activity and lipoprotein levels were not significantly different between vaccinated and control rabbits. The mRNA level of IL-4 was significantly lower than buffer while, IFN-γ gene expression was significantly higher in both vaccinated groups. Atherosclerosis thickness grade of aorta was dramatically lower than buffer (P<0.01) in both vaccinated groups. Conclusion: It is concluded that MF59-adjuvanted CETP vaccine showed anti-atherosclerosis properties, but the protective effect could not be directly attributed to the immune response induced by anti TT-CETP antibody and CETP inhibition. Further studies are needed to explain the anti-atherosclerosis properties of MF59 in the presence of TT-CETP peptide.


Recently, a series of studies have tried to extract interactions between input variables modeled by a DNN and define such interactions as concepts encoded by the DNN. However, strictly speaking, there still lacks a solid guarantee whether such interactions indeed represent meaningful concepts. Therefore, in this paper, we examine the trustworthiness of interaction concepts from four perspectives. Extensive empirical studies have verified that a well-trained DNN usually encodes sparse, transferable, and discriminative concepts, which is partially aligned with human intuition.


Advances in semiconductor technology enable larger processor design spaces, leading to increasingly complex systems. At an initial stage, designers must evaluate many architecture design points to achieve a suitable design. Currently, most architecture exploration is performed using cycle accurate simulators. Although accurate, these tools are slow, thus limiting a comprehensive design search. The vast design space of today's complex processors and time to market economic pressures motivate the need for faster architectural evaluation methods. This paper presents a superscalar processor performance model that enables rapid exploration of the architecture design space for superscalar processors. It supplements current design tools by quickly identifying promising areas for more thorough and time consuming exploration with traditional tools. The model estimates the instruction throughput of a superscalar processor based on early architectural design parameters and application properties. It has been validated with the SimpleScalar out-of-order simulator. The core of the model, which executes 1.6 million times faster, produces instruction throughput estimates that are with within 5.5 percent of the corresponding SimpleScalar values.


The provision of long-distance travel time information has been a major factor facilitating the intel- ligent transportation system to become more successful. Previous studies have pointed out that non-recurrent con- gestion is the major cause of freeway delay. The long travel distance complicates the characteristics of traffic flow. Hence, how to improve the prediction capability of long- distance travel time in the case of non-recurrent congestion is an important issue that must be overcome in the field of travel time prediction. This study constructs the travel time prediction model for a segment of 36.1 kms (including eight interchanges) in the National Freeway No. 1, Taiwan, by using the multilayer perceptron. To improve the pre- diction capability of the model in the case of non-recurrent congestion, this study collects data of average spot speed and heavy vehicle volume gathered by dual-loop vehicle detectors, in addition to rainfall and temporal feature. Furthermore, the historical travel time inferred from the original data of electronic toll collection (ETC) system is also used as the input variable, and the actual travel time inferred from ETC is used as the training target to establish a robust prediction model. As suggested by the results of 168 experimental combinations, the most appropriate pre- diction model established in this study is a highly accurate forecasting model with MAPE of 6.47 %.


This paper outlines the debates concerning the increasing popularity of the Public-Private-Partnership (PPPs) option as a viable strategy in a variety of both developed and developing countries. The essence of this contribution argues for a proper understanding of what PPPs are, what they can do, what their limitations are and what preconditions could help in their implementation. The broad theme of the paper concludes that, even though they may pay an integral developmental role, under certain circumstances and in certain sectors, one outht to be sanguine about these possibilities. To have any chance of success, PPPs require a new (and not necessarily diminished) set of responsibilities regarding the role of the State.


The rationale for the use of ketamine anaesthesia in patients with juvenile chronic polyarthritis is presented. The method was used successfully in 70 patients. There were no deaths but one refused to have ketamine again.


The dynamic development of transport recorded in recent decades is an important factor in the economic development of the world on the one hand, and on the other hand, it is a significant source of nuisance and environmental problems. The adverse impact of transport can be felt both in the natural environment and in society, where the dynamic development of this sector has enabled significant civilization development, with the effects varying depending on the level of economic development, the degree of advancement and the use of various transport sectors, geographical location (including climate), and also the sensitivity of the elements of the environment. Considering contemporary transport hazards, it is important to prevent them from occurring, and when that is not possible – limiting their impact on the environment and reducing the scale and extent of negative impacts.
In the paper the environmental and social nuisance of transport of goods loaded in semi-trailers was analyzed. The transport of semi-trailers using intermodal wagons pulled by the diesel locomotive in accordance with the assumptions adopted in the railway with the maximum length of train composition was, inter alia, taken into account. The ecological aspects focused on such harmful compounds as: carbon monoxide, hydrocarbons and nitrogen oxides.


Microphysical and dynamical features of volcanic ash clouds can be quantitatively monitored by using ground-based microwave weather radars. These systems can provide data for determining the ash volume, total mass, and height of eruption clouds. In order to demonstrate the unique potential of this microwave active remote-sensing technique, the case study of the eruption of Augustine Volcano in Alaska in January 2006 is described and analyzed. Volume scan data, acquired by a NEXRAD WSR-88D S-band ground-based weather radar, are processed to automatically classify and estimate eruptive cloud particle concentration. The numerical results of the coupled model Z-reflectivity from Active Tracer High resolution Atmospheric Model (ATHAM), including particle aggregation processes and simulation of radar reflectivity from the ATHAM microphysical model, are exploited to train the inversion algorithm. The volcanic ash radar retrieval based on the ATHAM algorithm is a physical-statistical approach based on the backscattering microphysical model of volcanic cloud particles (hydrometeors, ash, and aggregates), used within a Bayesian classification and optimal regression algorithm. A sensitivity analysis is carried out to evaluate the overall error budget. The evolution of the Augustine eruption is discussed in terms of radar measurements and products, pointing out the unique features, the current limitations, and future improvements of radar remote sensing of volcanic plumes.


This study was to investigated optimum preparation conditions for Gugija·Heukimja jook by response surface methodo- logy (RSM). The important materials used for the Gugija·Heukimja product were Lycium chinese, Seasamum indicum L., Ziziphus jujuba Mill. and rice. Moisture content, crude protein, crude fat, crude ash and crude fiber content were 15.62, 16.60, 13.62, 4.93 and 11.17% for Lycium chinese, 3.62, 20.94, 43.56, 5.67 and 10.72% for Seasamum indicum L., 24.12, 5.38, 0.73, 2.30 and 1.25% for Ziziphus jujuba Mill., and 12.36, 6.98, 0.46, 0.43 and 0.41% for rice, respectively. Optimal extraction conditions of brix, color, pH and total acidity in the materials for Gugija·Heukimja jook were temperature 80℃, water volume 850 mL and extraction time of 63 min. The spreadability of jook with Lycium chinese and Ziziphus jujuba Mill. extracts was the highest when black sesame was 12 g pH was the lowest when black sesame was 9 g. PH showed a significant difference when the added black sesame ratio changed. The 'value L' of chromaticity was lower with an increase of the black sesame ratio, 'value a' was higher with an increase of the black sesame ratio, 'value b' was lower with an increase of the black sesame ratio. Brix was lower when black sesame in jook was added. Total acidity was highest (7.27%) when black sesame was 12 g. The degree of gelatinization tended to be lower with additional black sesame. Higher scores of sensory evaluation were found for the product containing 9 g black sesame with Lycii furctus and Ziziphus jujuba Mill. extracts ompared to the other samples with 3 and 6g. No significant difference in taste occurred for Gugija·Heukimja jook prepared with over 9 g black sesame, while a great difference showed in color, pH and total acid. Therefore, the Gugija·Heukimja jook prepared under the optimal conditions of 9 g black sesame with Lycium chinese and Ziziphus jujuba Mill. extracts exhibited higher qualities. Gugija·Heukimja jook can use the easier for Yacksun jook. It is expected to become functional in the product's development.


Geostatistics combined with GIS was applied to assess the spatial distribution of nematode trophic groups following two contrasting soil uses in the black soil region of Northeast China. Two plots, one with fallow for 12 years and the other cultivated, were marked on regular square grids with 2-m spacing. Soil samples were collected from each sampling point, nematodes were extracted from these samples and classified into four trophic groups: bacterivores, fungivores, plant parasites, and omnivores/predators. The numbers of total nematodes and trophic groups analyzed had normal distributions on both fallow and cultivated plots. The absolute abundances of total nematodes and trophic groups were observed to be much more homogeneous on cultivated plot than on fallow one. Geostatistical analysis showed that the densities of total nematodes and trophic groups on both fallow and cultivated plots exhibited spatial dependence at the sampled scale and their experimental semivariograms were adjusted to a spherical or exponential model, except those of bacterivores and fungivores on cultivated plot. The spatial distribution of nematode trophic groups was found to be different for the two land uses, indicating that cultivation changed the native condition for soil nematode activities.


To sustain their proliferation, cancer cells overcome negative-acting signals that restrain their growth and promote senescence and cell death. Renalase (RNLS) is a secreted flavoprotein that functions as a survival factor after ischemic and toxic injury, signaling through the plasma calcium channel PMCA4b to activate the PI3K/AKT and MAPK pathways. We show that RNLS expression is increased markedly in primary melanomas and CD163(+) tumor-associated macrophages (TAM). In clinical specimens, RNLS expression in the tumor correlated inversely with disease-specific survival, suggesting a pathogenic role for RNLS. Attenuation of RNLS by RNAi, blocking antibodies, or an RNLS-derived inhibitory peptide decreased melanoma cell survival, and anti-RNLS therapy blocked tumor growth in vivo in murine xenograft assays. Mechanistic investigations showed that increased apoptosis in tumor cells was temporally related to p38 MAPK-mediated Bax activation and that increased cell growth arrest was associated with elevated expression of the cell-cycle inhibitor p21. Overall, our results established a role for the secreted flavoprotein RNLS in promoting melanoma cell growth and CD163(+) TAM in the tumor microenvironment, with potential therapeutic implications for the management of melanoma. Cancer Res; 76(13); 3884-94. ©2016 AACR.


To the Editor.— In 1944, Krabbe and Bartels described a disorder called "multiple circumscribed lipomatosis" characterized by the development of symmetrical lipomas in the arms, upper part of the chest, pelvis, and buttocks.1This disease usually manifests itself around the age of 30 years and is not apparently hereditary or familial.2Krabbe's disease has a slow, progressive, and painless course, and may be associated with anomalies of the skin, as pigmented nevi or fibromas, and also with diverse malformations and mental disturbances.3These associations favor including Krabbe's lipomatosis within the large group of phakomatoses.4Nevertheless, general somatic, including endocrine and neurologic examination, usually shows nothing remarkable.5 We describe a patient with Krabbe's disease in whom radiologic studies, including a computed tomographic (CT) scan, showed multiple hypothalamic calcifications. Report of a Case.— A 27-year-old woman was seen after intracranial calcifications had been found in plain roentgenograms


In 1993 the National Science Foundation and The Whitaker Foundation jointly supported an experimental initiative entitled `Cost Effective Health Care Technologies'. The broad goal of the 1993 program was to `promote innovative multidisciplinary research that can contribute to the containment or reduction of health costs without compromising the quality, effectiveness or accessibility of the health care system'. Proposals were required to contain a section which `describes as quantitatively as possible' the expected impact of the research results on the cost- effectiveness goal of the program--a new parameter for research methodologies. Twelve projects in the categories of Information and Systems, Medical Devices, and Biomaterials were funded. A modified program, `Cost Reducing Health Care Technologies', is planned for Fiscal Year 1995. Insights gained in the planning, conduct, and follow-up review of the 1993 experimental biomedical engineering research grant program provide useful background information on `The Role of Technology in the Cost of Health Care'. The desirability is indicated for engineers to participate in the development of a credible and robust technology assessment process at the basic and applied research stages of health care technology development.


CHITIN NANOCRYSTAL STABILIZED EMULSIONS: STABILITY, INTERACTIONS WITH BETA-LACTOGLOBULIN, DIGESTION BEHAVIOR AND CYTOTOXICITY Chandni Chandran Advisor University of Guelph,2015 Dr Loong Tak Lim Solid particle stabilized emulsions have gained attention due to their surfactant free nature and high stability. However, insights on the interactions between solid particles stabilizing emulsions and surface active species found in food are important in formulation and use of such emulsions in real food applications. The properties of chitin nanocrystal (ChN) stabilized emulsions in the presence of beta-lactoglobulin (β-Lg), a commonly used emulsifier protein were studied as a function of pH. SDS-PAGE established that the protein co-existed with ChN at the interface. In vitro digestion studies demonstrated that, addition of β-Lg did not alter the rate of lipolysis observed with ChN stabilized emulsions. Electrophoresis on digestion end products also showed evidence for some protection offered by ChN to β-Lg at the interface against proteolysis. The results of cytotoxicity studies using Caco-2 cells, indicate that ChN dispersions do not have a detrimental effect on the proliferation of cells.


This randomized controlled study is a preliminary investigation on the effects of Child-Parent Relationship Therapy (CPRT) with 61 adoptive parents. The participants in this study identified themselves as the following: 54 European American, 3 Black American, 3 Hispanic/Latino, and 1 individual who chose not to indicate ethnicity. The study included 23 couples and 15 individual mothers. The CPRT is a structured, time limited approach that trains caregivers to be an active participant as a therapeutic change agent in their child's life. Results from a two (group) by two (measures) split plot ANOVA indicated that adoptive parents who participated in 10 weeks of CPRT reported statistically significant decreases in child behavior problems and parent child-relationship stress. Statistically significant increases in parent empathy were also reported by raters blinded to the study. CPRT demonstrated a medium to large treatment effect on reducing children's behavior problems and parent-child relationship stress. In addition, CPRT demonstrated a large treatment effect on increasing parental empathy. The results of the study provide preliminary support for CPRT as a responsive intervention for adoptive parents and their children.


The article deals with the Lithuanian-American political scholar Vytautas Kavolis's approach to the metaphysical foundations of liberalism. It is argued that the scholar's position in regard to this question has changed as time passed. Until the 1970s, Kavolis defended the position that pure (philosophical) liberalism does not presuppose any a priori metaphysics. It doesn't dictate to its partisans in a normative way what they have to think about God, to accept His existence or not, or how they ought to treat reality as a whole. According to Kavolis, pure liberalism is neutral with regard to God and reality as a whole. It is an empty form in the metaphysical sense. The right to fill up an empty form with a metaphysical content is delegated to an individual in pure liberalism. From the 1970s, Kavolis took a much more moderate position regarding the metaphysical foundations of liberalism. In his view, pure liberalism is founded on some metaphysical presuppositions – namely, the metaphysical conception of order. Inquiring Kavolis' approach to the metaphysical foundations of liberalism, wide attention is paid to its context of origin as well.


The authors develop a theory of how management can develop and promote the learning capabilities of targeted customer–supplier relationships. The theory suggests that a supplier and a customer can improve their joint learning activities by facilitating information exchange, developing common learning arenas, and updating their behavior accordingly. The authors suggest that learning within a customer–supplier relationship cannot be mandated by either organization, but rather learning depends on both parties' willingness to cooperate in joint learning activities. Management can promote relationship learning by cultivating a collaborative culture, formulating specific objectives for joint learning activities, and developing relational trust. However, as relational trust develops, the effectiveness of learning is reduced as a result of "hidden costs" of trust. The authors use data from 315 dyads to test the theory empirically, and they find that the learning capability of a relationship has a strong, positive effect on performance. Their results also provide insight into how to address the hidden costs of trust.


This systematic review evaluates the effects of heat treatments in de novo, residual and recurrent giant cell tumors of bone (GCTB). Studies were eligible for inclusion if one of the following treatments was administered: radiofrequency ablation (RFA), microwave ablation, argon cauterization, electrocauterization and hot liquid treatment. The primary outcome was recurrence. Secondary outcomes were complications, pain, function, and quality of life. Recurrence rates for microwave ablation as an adjuvant to intralesional curettage were 0%, 4% and 10% (3 retrospective single-group studies); for argon cauterization 4%, 8% and 26% (3 cohort studies); electrocauterization 0% to 33% (8 cohort studies); and hot liquid 9.5% and 24% (2 cohort studies). Follow-up was generally ≥24 months. Data on pain, function and quality of life were scarce. Complications included infection and secondary osteoarthritis. Current evidence does not demonstrate or exclude an effect of heat treatments on recurrence in GCTB. Further research should objectify if (subgroups of) patients benefit from these treatments.


In Saccharomyces cerevisiae, many amino acid biosynthetic pathways are coregulated by a complex general control system: starvation for a single amino acid results in the derepression of amino acid biosynthetic genes in multiple pathways. Derepression of these genes is mediated by positive (GCN) and negative (GCD) regulatory genes. In this paper we describe the isolation and characterization of a previously unreported negative regulatory gene, GCD3. A gcd3 mutation is recessive to wild type, confers resistance to multiple amino acid analogs, and results in overproduction and partially constitutive elevation of mRNA levels for amino acid biosynthetic genes. Furthermore, a gcd3 mutation can overcome the derepression-deficient phenotype of mutations in the positive regulatory GCN1, GCN2, and GCN3 genes. However, the gcd3 mutation cannot overcome the derepression-deficient phenotype of a gcn4 mutation, suggesting that GCD3 acts as a negative regulator of the important GCN4 gene. Northern blot analysis confirmed this conclusion, in that the steady-state levels of GCN4 mRNA are greatly increased in a gcd3 mutant. Thus, the negative regulatory gene GCD3 plays a central role in derepression of amino acid biosynthetic genes.


Alginate-stabilized silver nanocubes are synthesized via a reduction method and are characterized by UV-Vis and fluorescence spectroscopies, SEM, AFM and HRTEM analyses. A silver nanocubes (Ag NCbs) based sensor for detecting Hg2+ ions in aqueous solution has been developed using Rh6G as an external spectroscopic probe. Using this system, Hg2+ ions (as low as 1×10(-10) mol L(-1)) are recognized in aqueous media via a colorimetric method with very high selectivity and sensitivity over other metal ions namely Fe2+, Zn2+, Pb2+, Cu2+, Sn2+, Cd2+, Ni2+, and Co2+.


In this paper reliability model of the converter valves in VSC-HVDC system is analyzed. The internal structure and functions of converter valve are presented. Taking the StakPak IGBT from ABB Semiconductors for example, the mathematical reliability model for converter valve and its sub-module is established. By means of calculation and analysis, the reliability indices of converter valve under various voltage classes and redundancy designs are obtained, and then optimal redundant scheme is chosen.


Voice Assistants (VAs) like Amazon Echo and Apple Siri are an increasingly popular way of interacting with a range of applications. VAs are also currently gaining traction in the HCI community. Yet, and despite a growing ageing population, work on VAs with older people is scant. In this CUI 2019 provocative paper we aim to encourage research on VAs with and for older people (aged 65+). We outline several important open issues to address when researching this population, such as perceptions and barriers to VAs use, aspects of Conversational User Experience tied to VAs response design, and anthropomorphic design. We also raise some 'provocative' and yet-to-be-addressed research questions, hoping to operationalize the issues discussed and spark debate and discussion about them during and after CUI 2019.


Eccrine hidradenocarcinoma is a rare adnexal neoplasm arising from the eccrine sweat glands of the skin. Surgery and radiotherapy are the mainstay of treatment, and chemotherapy is reserved for unresectable or metastatic lesions. We present the case of a 60-year-old man, referred for treatment of an unresectable basal cell carcinoma of the scalp. He started Vismodegib in January of 2017 but progressed after three months. A new biopsy showed a poorly differentiated carcinoma. The patient started carboplatin/paclitaxel with a major response, enabling surgery in December of 2017. Pathology concluded on a hidradenocarcinoma, R1, and radiotherapy was not possible due to local infection. Four months later, he underwent radiotherapy due to local recurrence, and restarted carboplatin/paclitaxel, but with progressive disease. An exploratory surgery in October of 2018 revealed unresectable disease. Restaging showed lung metastasis and second-line chemotherapy was proposed. However, due to continued clinical deterioration, the patient died in February of 2019.


Gramsci belonged in a tradition which stemmed from Antonio Labriola, not from Croce and idealist philosophy. This tradition saw Marxism as a philosophy of praxis, a new and original philosophy distinct from both idealism and materialism. Gramsci took his lead from Labriola but also further expanded upon the latter's approach by seeking the fundamental concepts of the new philosophy in the Theses on Feuerbach. In particular, Gramsci recovered both the concept of praxis and the concept of human nature from the Theses. With the concept of human nature, he expanded even upon Marx's formulation, by including the individual within it in a way that lays the foundation for modern social sciences based on the notion of the individual, which was, in Gramsci's case, a socially-rich notion.


Drilling and sampling in flowing artesian aquifers is significantly more complex than in unconfined aquifers, especially in settings such as dam sites and hazardous waste sites where flow of water from the aquifer can cause safety or contamination problems. Successful drilling in flowing artesian conditions requires four items: properly weighted drilling fluid, inflatable packers, surface casing cemented in place, and driven casing. The primary control used to counteract the upward flow of water and thus prevent flow at the surface is drilling fluid of sufficient density. If the borehole begins to flow during drilling, the other three items are necessary to regain control of the flow. The packer can be used to stop the flow so that drilling fluid can be replaced under no-flow conditions. The surface and driven casings prevent erosion of the borehole walls if artesian flow occurs, and provide secondary locations for installation of a packer.

When a boring has been drilled to the desired depth, monitoring well materials may be placed in the hole. These materials consist of a well screen, an inflatable packer, and riser pipe. The well materials are lowered through the drilling fluid into the boring, and a packer attached to the well riser pipe is inflated against the confining bed above the aquifer. Drilling fluid is flushed from above the packer with clean water, which is subsequently displaced with cement grout using a tremie pipe. After the grout has hardened, the drilling fluid can be flushed from inside the well riser and screen. The well can be developed by surging, followed by a period of free flow to remove drilling fluid from the aquifer.

These techniques were used to successfully install a number of monitoring wells at a site in a river valley underlain by interbedded clay tills and outwash sand deposits of glacial origin. The deeper sand deposits were confined aquifers, with the clay tills acting as confining beds. Once the clay till was penetrated during drilling, flowing artesian conditions would have occurred unless proper drilling techniques were used. Soil sampling and installation of monitoring well materials would not have been possible under flowing conditions, necessitating the special procedures and equipment for drilling, sampling, and well installation.


The capabilities approach offers a valuable analytical lens for exploring the challenge and complexity of intercultural dialogue in contemporary settings. The central tenets of the approach, developed by Amartya Sen and Martha Nussbaum, involve a set of humanistic goals including the recognition that development is a process whereby people's freedoms are expanded, and in so doing, increasing the capabilities of individuals to lead valuable lives. How the construct of capabilities can be seen to work in practice is demonstrated here through a description and presentation of findings from an insider-practitioner case study concerning the teaching and learning of English to Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) in higher education and based on a critical cosmopolitan pedagogical approach. Evidence from the study indicates that cosmopolitan citizenship learning has a valued place in an ESOL multicultural classroom in which intercultural dialogue is fostered. A proposal is made to use the capabilities approach as a normative framework for social justice in the field of foreign language and intercultural education.


[structure] A formal total synthesis of the natural product dysidiolide is described. Starting from a Diels-Alder reaction between an enoate and a Rawal diene, the cyclohexenone 4 was synthesized. A subsequent stereospecific methyl cuprate addition established the desired trans configuration in the cyclohexane 3. Wacker oxidation of the pentenyl side chain to the diketone 17 followed by an intramolecular aldol condensation led to the bicyclic enone 2, a key intermediate in a recently reported synthesis of dysidiolide.


Currently there is a misalignment between the European Union Water Framework Directive (EU WFD) and the United Kingdom Climate Change Act (UK CCA). This paper explores the tensions and complexities experienced by water companies in England and Wales as they attempt to meet the contradictory legislative requirements. A simple model is used to explore the effect of increasing effluent quality on power consumption and hence carbon emissions. Further data are collected through interviews and textual analysis to dissect opinions and views on the dilemma facing the water industry. In addition to complexities within the EU WFD and UK CCA, water companies are restricted by the regulatory framework of the UK water industry and additional policies and directives. Through this research, numerous suggestions offered by key stakeholders in the industry are explored. Among the proposed solutions is process optimisation of aeration, during activated sludge treatment. This does not require additional changes to legislation and may form one of the principle solutions because it is able to reduce emissions immediately. However, recent research has shown that aeration optimisation may cause increased emissions of the greenhouse gas nitrous oxide. This must be taken into account when finding the optimal solution.


OBJECTIVES
To determine if nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs provide adequate pain control for patients having laparoscopic hernia repair and to compare the effectiveness of ketorolac tromethamine with ibuprofen in reducing postoperative laparoscopic hernia pain.

DESIGN AND SETTING
Prospective double-blind randomized study at a 100-bed community hospital.

PATIENTS
Seventy patients ranging in age from 16 to 83 years scheduled for elective laparoscopic inguinal hernia repair.

INTERVENTIONS
Patients undergoing laparoscopic hernia repair were enrolled in a double-blind randomized study to compare the 2 treatments. Group 1 received a placebo capsule 1 hour before surgery and ketorolac tromethamine, 60 mg intravenously, at the time of trocar insertion. Group 2 received ibuprofen, 800 mg an hour before surgery, and isotonic sodium chloride solution, 2 mL intravenously, at the time of trocar insertion. In addition, all patients received local infiltration of 30 mL of bupivacaine hydrochloride into their trocar sites. All patients were discharged within 5 hours of the operation and were instructed to take 400 mg of ibuprofen orally every 4 hours for 24 hours whether or not they were experiencing pain. A 24-hour supply of ibuprofen was provided to all study patients. Pain was assessed using the Visual Analog Pain Scale with a maximum pain rating of 100. Assessments were done at the time of and 18 hours after discharge.

MAIN OUTCOME MEASURE
Postoperative pain 18 and 24 hours after discharge was assessed using a standardized questionnaire in a telephone interview by a registered nurse from the Outpatient Surgical Unit.

RESULTS
There was no significant difference in the level of pain experienced by 35 patients who received ketorolac intravenously and 35 who received ibuprofen orally. There was no significant difference between the 2 treatment groups in the amount of pain experienced at discharge and 18 hours after discharge.

CONCLUSIONS
Pain relief from ibuprofen, 800 mg, administered orally an hour before laparoscopic hernia repair was not statistically different from that obtained with intravenous ketorolac, 60 mg, administered intraoperatively when comparing the hospital discharge pain score and the mean and highest pain scores 18 hours after discharge. Ibuprofen offers equivalent pain control at a lower cost and reduced potential for adverse drug events compared with intravenous ketorolac in patients having laparoscopic hernia repair. No patient required narcotic supplementation, and pain control was judged satisfactory by all the patients.


Introduction Recently, organisations as well as academics have increasingly become aware of the need for organisations to co-operate in knowledge networks with partnering organisations that can also be seen as competitors. It is not longer just co-operation that can improve a firm's global competitiveness, but firms will actually meet their competitors in such cooperations. Organisations need to collaborate in order to improve their innovative and learning capabilities (Powell ea, 1996). Knowledge sharing or learning how to improve has evolved into one the most important reasons for networking (Kogut, 1988; Mowery ea, 1996; Kraatz, 1998; Chesbrough, 2003; Lee and Cole, 2003). In particular, because firm-specific capabilities are often based on tacit knowledge, networks have advantages. In networks, professionals are able to work together, so that they can see, access, and experience the knowledge of the others. An additional argument for learning in networks where professionals meet the people within context of the other organisations, is that knowledge is considered situated and can best be 'captured' and used within that (meaningful) context (Lave & Wenger, 1991). Thus, organisations feel a strong need for co-operation in networks, in order to have access to knowledge, as well as be able to internalise this tacit and situated knowledge.


The earthquake and the resulting tsunami on December 26, 2004, damaged the freshwater supply system in the coastal areas of northern Sumatra. In response to this natural disaster, the German-Indonesian HELicopter Project ACEH was initiated to assist the Indonesian government in its effort to plan and realize a sustainable reconstruction of community infrastructure by providing geophysical and hydrogeological data to serve as a basis for spatial planning. After two successful airborne geophysical surveys funded by the Federal Institute for Geosciences and Natural Resources of Germany, conducted on the north coast near the city of Banda Aceh and along the west coast between the towns of Calang and Meulaboh, Coca-Cola Foundation Indonesia funded an additional survey on the northeast coast around the town of Sigli. Helicopter-borne electromagnetics (HEM) revealed shallow freshwater resources up to several kilometers inland. Along the coast, however, the investigation depth of the HEM system was constrained due to near-surface saltwater. Here, ground-based transient electromagnetics was utilized on several profiles close to the town of Sigli, revealing deep coastal freshwater resources. The combination of airborne and ground-based electromagnetic techniques has proven to be highly effective to estimate the freshwater potential of the Sigli marshlands. Numerous sites for planned water wells could be identified as promising freshwater sources and approximate drilling depths provided.


It has been suggested that in vitro studies of the rescue effect of CFTR modulator drugs in nasal epithelial cultures derived from people with cystic fibrosis have the potential to predict clinical responses to the same drugs. Hence, there is an interest in evaluating different methods for measuring in vitro modulator responses in patient-derived nasal cultures. Commonly, the functional response to CFTR modulator combinations in these cultures is assessed by bioelectric measurements, using the Ussing chamber. While this method is highly informative, it is time-consuming. A fluorescence-based, multi-transwell method for assaying regulated apical chloride conductance (Fl-ACC) promises to provide a complementary approach to theratyping in patient-derived nasal cultures. In the present work, we compared Ussing chamber measurements and fluorescence-based measurements of CFTR-mediated apical conductance in matching, fully differentiated nasal cultures derived from CF patients, homozygous for F508del (n = 31) or W1282X (n = 3), or heterozygous for Class III mutations G551D or G178R (n = 5). These cultures were obtained through a bioresource called the Cystic Fibrosis Canada-Sick Kids Program in Individual CF Therapy (CFIT). We found that the Fl-ACC method was effective in detecting positive responses to interventions for all genotypes. There was a correlation between patient-specific drug responses measured in cultures harbouring F508del, as measured using the Ussing chamber technique and the fluorescence-based assay (Fl-ACC). Finally, the fluorescence-based assay has the potential for greater sensitivity for detecting responses to pharmacological rescue strategies targeting W1282X.


We describe a simulation algorithm for the dynamics of elastic membrane sheets over long length and time scales. Our model includes implicit hydrodynamic coupling between membrane and surrounding solvent and allows for arbitrary external forces acting on the membrane surface. In particular, the methodology is well suited to studying membranes in interaction with cytoskeletal filaments. We present results for the thermal undulations of a lipid bilayer attached to a regular network of spectrin filaments as a model for the red blood cell membrane. The dynamic fluctuations of the bilayer over the spectrin network are quantified and used to predict the macroscopic diffusion constant of band 3 on the surface of the red blood cell. We find that thermal undulations likely play a role in the mobility of band 3 in the plane of the erythrocyte membrane.


In view of the applications of artificial neural networks in economic and financial forecasting, a stochastic time strength function is introduced in the backpropagation neural networkmodel to predict the fluctuations of stock price changes. In thismodel, stochastic time strength function gives a weight for each historical datum and makes the model have the effect of random movement, and then we investigate and forecast the behavior of volatility degrees of returns for the Chinese stock market indexes and some global market indexes. The empirical research is performed in testing the prediction effect of SSE, SZSE, HSI, DJIA, IXIC, and S&P 500 with different selected volatility degrees in the established model.


The issue of gender mainstreaming has become a major concern over the past years in Sudan, where the country is weak in strategies, policies and legal frameworks that support the women's rights. Despite that, woman plays a key role in rural areas that depend on non-wood forest products (NWFPs) through responsibilities in decision making, meetings, extension, motivation and outlook within the milieu of natural resources. The objective of this study was to examine the role of women in rural areas in forest management. Data were collected, using semi-structured interviews of household heads, in twenty-two villages. The sample size was three hundred households, distributed among the administrative units of Rashad Locality, South Kordofan State, according to the principle of population proportional to size. Data were summarized using descriptive statistics and cross tabulation. The results are presented in form of percentages, frequencies, tables and pie charts. They revealed a highly significant influence of women's on forest harvesting and processing. More than 58 % of the women were involved in both activities compared with 29% and 12.5% of men in te two activities, respectively. Meanwhile, the majority of them are subsistence poor farmers who suffer scarcity of food supplies and health care. Therefore, they count on NWFPs which provide them with critical subsistence in addition to job opportunity, especially during the dry season when other alternatives are not available. The study recommended more emphasis be laid on the potential role of NWFPs and on the ability of women to participate in public forum and contribute to both rural development and objectives of biodiversity conservation.


Photochemical reactions are remarkable for their ability to easily assemble cyclobutanes and other strained ring systems that are difficult to construct using other conventional synthetic methods. We have previously shown that Ru(bpy)(3)(2+) is an efficient photocatalyst that promotes the [2+2] cycloadditions of electron-deficient olefins with visible light. Here, we show that Ru(bpy)(3)(2+) is also an effective photocatalyst for the [2+2] cycloaddition of electron-rich olefins. This transformation is enabled by the versatile photoelectrochemical properties of Ru(bpy)(3)(2+), which enables either one-electron reduction or one-electron oxidation of interesting organic substrates under appropriate conditions.


The PYTHIA program can be used to generate high-energy-physics `events', i.e. sets of outgoing particles produced in the interactions between two incoming particles. The objective is to provide as accurate as possible a representation of event properties in a wide range of reactions, with emphasis on those where strong interactions play a role, directly or indirectly, and therefore multihadronic final states are produced. The physics is then not understood well enough to give an exact description; instead the program has to be based on a combination of analytical results and various QCD-based models. This physics input is summarized here, for areas such as hard subprocesses, initial- and final-state parton showers, beam remnants and underlying events, fragmentation and decays, and much more. Furthermore, extensive information is provided on all program elements: subroutines and functions, switches and parameters, and particle and process data. This should allow the user to tailor the generation task to the topics of interest. The information in this edition of the manual refers to PYTHIA version 6.200, of 31 August 2001. The official reference to the latest published version is T. Sj\"ostrand, P. Ed\'en, C. Friberg, L. L\"onnblad, G. Miu, S. Mrenna and E. Norrbin, Computer Physics Commun. 135 (2001) 238.


During two consecutive calendar years, a series of 403 babies receiving routine well-baby care were followed and records kept of all symptoms and illness occurring during their first 2 years of life.
 Gastrointestinal disorders and eczematous rash were the symptoms most frequently encountered which appeared to be due to allergy. Many minor digestive, skin and respiratory symptoms were recorded which did not prove to be allergic manifestations during the 2 years of observations.
 Colic was present in 52 well babies, of whom 2 were sensitive to milk.
 The incidence of allergy to cow's milk in this series of infants was 4 in 403 or 1%.
 Scratch tests were negative in 66 of 72 well babies tested, and no strongly positive reactions were observed. The allergens used were cow's milk, bovine lactalbumin, casein and egg. No correlation could be made between skin tests and clinical symptoms.
 Three infants showed a few scattered eosinophils in the stool smear, among 156 from whom stool smears were made. These babies had colic but no symptoms suggestive of allergy later.


Abstract The history of sport and physical education (PE) for people with physical disabilities is dominated by an ideological discourse that, through the process of omission, argues that the developments in the field are Western in origin. In this article, we examine how Taiwan independently developed a new medium of sport and PE for individuals disabled by the epidemics of poliomyelitis during the mid-twentieth century. We first studied the period of Taiwanese history from the end of the Japanese occupation of Taiwan in 1945 until 1971. To explore this transformation, we engaged with Foucauldian genealogy to study the epidemics between the 1940s and the 1960s in Taiwan, when the number of children having physical paralysis increased dramatically. The high number of people infected with poliomyelitis turned it into a significant social problem that warranted being addressed by the government. Some of the children with physical disabilities were placed in institutions, and sport and PE were a part of their daily routine. Physical rehabilitation was extensively conducted through sport and PE and was administered on people with physical disabilities in institutions. By encouraging sport and PE for the disabled, the rehabilitative movement's ultimate goal was to restore the functions of impaired bodies and efface the disabled in the society.


This contribution assesses the roles and functions of leaders, pioneers and followers in multi-level and polycentric climate governance. While leaders usually actively seek to attract followers, this is not normally the case for pioneers. We address the following core research questions: (1) Who can be a leader/pioneer?; (2) Why do actors become leaders/pioneers?; (3) How do leaders/pioneers act?; and, (4) How do leaders/pioneers attract followers? In doing so we differentiate between structural, entrepreneurial, cognitive and exemplary leadership and assess the dynamics between leaders/pioneers and followers in climate governance. State-centred, multilevel governance and polycentric governance concepts place different emphasis on the roles played by different types of leadership/pionieership in climate governance. We argue that climate leaders and pioneers can use different types of leadership and often must act (either simultaneously or sequentially) at different levels of climate governance to achieve their ambitions.


A 2.5-dimensional PSTD algorithm has been developed which can be used to solve Maxwell's equations efficiently. The code has been verified by the analytical results and the conventional FDTD method. It is also shown that the 2.5D PSTD algorithm is more efficient than the FDTD method. Particularly, the 2.5D PSTD method can be used to model very large objects because it needs a grid density of only 2 cell//spl lambda//sub min/. The dispersion curve of an open dielectric waveguide is obtained by using the 2.5D PSTD algorithm.


This paper investigates the "expectations" aspect of service quality in the health care industry. Specifically, an examination is made of the importance of various hospital characteristics to consumers, the dimensionality of service quality, and the relative importance of these dimensions across demographic groups. The results suggest that the competency and the behavior of physicians are the most important characteristics in the minds of consumers. Moreover, it was found that hospitals are evaluated along: (1) interpersonal, (2) amenities, (3) capabilities, and (4) accessibility dimensions. These findings are consistent with previous research in this regard. Additionally, significant differences in the importance of these factors were found across respondent gender, age, income, and education.


This study was performed on the blood samples of 7 Brown cows collected during the estrus, metestrus, diestrus and proestrus phases of the estrous cycle. We investigated whether or not there was a difference between these stages of the cycle with regard to hematologic parameters. Mean hematologic parameters determined during the period of the estrous cycles were found to be within the normal range. This study has shown that the erythrocyte count, total leukocyte count, hematocrit, hemoglobin, mean corpuscular hemoglobin of erythrocyte, mean corpuscular hemoglobin concentration of erythrocyte and mean corpuscular volume of erythrocyte parameters undergo no changes between the cycle periods. In conclusion, no significant differences in hematologic parameters were observed in the various stages of the estrus cycle.


Lung cancer is the most common type of cancer in the U.S., with 5 yr. survival rates of 18% and 6% for non-small cell lung carcinoma (NSCLC) and small cell lung carcinoma (SCLC) patients, respectively. In spite of success with targeted therapies for 15-20% of patients with NSCLCs, the success is generally short-lived as the tumors become resistant to treatment. In contrast to NSCLC, no successful targeted therapies have been identified in SCLC. Further understanding of the regulatory cell signaling networks for SCLCs, may enable the discovery of new actionable lung cancer drivers. Posttranslational modifications (PTMs), including phosphorylation, acetylation and methylation, act alone and in combination to regulate protein function, cellular behavior and epigenetics. All three types of PTMs are deregulated in various cancers. In this study we developed a highly quantitative MS/MS approach combining TMT labeling with a number of motif and site-specific antibodies to identify deregulated signaling pathways between tumor and normal specimens. PTM-specific antibodies were used to enrich modified peptides followed by 6-plex TMT mass-spec analyses to quantitatively measure over 15,300 differentially phosphorylated, acetylated, and methylated sites on over 4,600 proteins from 17 SCLC patient tissues and 5 para-normals. Understanding cell-signaling networks at the intersection of multiple pathways and protein modification systems in SCLC lung cancers leads to the identification of new druggable disease drivers. Citation Format: Klarisa Rikova, Ben Hall, Tyler Levy, Anthony Possemato, Mike Aguiar, Sean Beausoleil, Jian Min Ren, Kimberly Lee Lee, Scott Lonning, Michael Comb. Proteomic analysis identifies multi-dimensional deregulated signaling pathways in SCLC lung cancer. [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the 107th Annual Meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research; 2016 Apr 16-20; New Orleans, LA. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2016;76(14 Suppl):Abstract nr LB-067.


The objective of this study is to investigate the relationships of enhancing audit management competency on sustainable audit success via the mediating influences of audit value awareness, audit professional proficiency, and efficient audit report. Comprehensive audit professionalism, audit learning commitment, and regulations practice force have become the antecedents of enhancement audit management competency. Also, audit system efficiency is the moderating variable of the relationship between enhancement audit management competency mediating variables. The hypotheses test the variables. Testing data was collected from 328 governmental auditors from the Office of Auditor General of Thailand (OAG). A questionnaire was analyzed by using the Ordinary Least Squares (OLS) regression analysis employed to examine all hypotheses, which indicated that most of variables from enhancing audit management competency were positively significant, and were related to factors relevant to audit value awareness, audit professional proficiency, efficient audit report and sustainable audit success. Specifically, evidence was found that audit value awareness had a positive significance in relationship to audit professional proficiency.
 Further, audit professional proficiency also had a positive significance toward efficient audit report. Moreover, comprehensive audit adroitness, audit learning commitment and regulations practice force had a positive effect on enhancing audit management competency. Additionally, audit system efficiency showed partially positive, supporting effects on enhancing audit management competency-mediating variables. The results provide the benefits for increasing auditors' awareness as well as to improve and enhance audit management competency in accordance with environmental change in order to achieve auditor professionalism in the future.


An elastin‐derived peptide with an average molecular mass of 25 kDa was shown to induce monocyte chemotaxis at the optimal concentration of 10‐1 μg/ml. Homologous deactivation test showed that monocytes exposed to the elastin‐derived peptide at 10‐1 μg/ml lost their chemotactic responsiveness when reexposed to the same stimulus. In conjunction with chemotactic response to the elastin‐derived peptide, intracellular guanosine 3′, 5′‐monophosphate (cGMP) levels were enhanced but intracellular adenosine 3′, 5′‐monophosphate (cAMP) levels were not. The monocyte migration induced by the elastin‐derived peptide was inhibited by cGMP dependent protein kinase (PKG) inhibitor, but not by cAMP dependent protein kinase inhibitor and protein kinase C inhibitor. These results suggest that the elastin‐derived peptide induces monocyte chemotaxis by increasing the level of cGMP, followed by activating PKG.


Lumbosacropelvic pseudarthrosis after long spinal fusions for treatment of adult degenerative scoliosis remains a challenging condition. Moreover, although pelvic fixation with iliac screws is widely used in deformity surgery to provide a biomechanically strong distal anchor for long thoracolumbar constructs, there are very few options available after failed pelvic fixation with iliac screws. The authors conducted a retrospective review of the surgical charts and imaging findings of patients subjected to revision surgery for lumbosacropelvic pseudarthrosis from August 2011 to August 2012. This review identified 5 patients in whom a salvage technique combining both S-1 and S-2 sacral alar-iliac (SAI) screws had been performed. In this technical note, the authors present a detailed anatomical discussion and an appraisal of the sequential intraoperative steps of this new technique involving a combination of S-1 and S-2 SAI screws. The discussion is illustrated with a surgical case in which this technique was used to treat a patient with pseudarthrosis that had developed after fixation with classic iliac screws. In conclusion, although S-2 SAI screws have previously been reported as an interesting alternative to classic iliac wing screws, this report is the first on the use of combined S-1 and S-2 SAI screws for pelvic fixation as a salvage technique for lumbosacropelvic instability. According to the reported experience, this technique provides a biomechanically robust construct for definitive pelvic fixation during revision surgeries in the challenging scenarios of pseudarthrosis and instability of the lumbosacropelvic region.


This correspondence motivates simple and accurate evaluation of the error probability of multiantenna multiple-input-multiple-output (MIMO) systems using optimum linear combining (OLC). Using both the first- and second-order statistics of the eigenvalues involved, we propose an Order-2 approximation approach (i.e., Gamma-approximation), which approximates the related eigenvalues as independent gamma-distributed random variables. Our analysis shows that the proposed Order-2 approximation results in simple formulas that are convenient to evaluate. The performance examples show that the error probability evaluated using the derived formulas is accurate and usually indistinguishable from that obtained by simulations.


The telecommunications operations support systems supply chain must address many stakeholders: R&D, product and requirements management, purchasing, systems integration, systems administration and users. While the management of next generation networks and services poses significant technical challenges, the present supply chain, market configuration, and business practices of the OSS community are an obstacle to rapid innovation. Forums for open development could potentially provide a medium to shorten this supply chain for the deployment of workable systems. This paper discusses the potential benefits and barriers to the open development of OSS for the telecommunications industry. It proposes the use of action research to execute a feasibility study into the open development of OSS software solutions within an industry wide open OSS project.