The recent demonstration of the electric field effect in graphene, a two-dimensional carbon lattice, and the measurement of its extraordinary room-temperature properties have sparked enormous interest in graphene as a material in electronics. Atomically thin and conductive, graphene has many options for integration with existing electronic devices and opportunities for the development of new devices. Graphene has a high carrier mobility and high carrier saturation velocity at room temperature, two properties which give it the potential for use in high-speed, high-frequency applications. Technologies operating at terahertz (1 1012 Hz) frequencies are becoming more numerous as an effort is made to close the so-called terahertz gap, and graphene has recently emerged as a viable terahertz material.

This thesis presents terahertz (THz) direct detectors based on antenna-coupled graphene eld effect transistors (GFETs). These GFETs were fabricated using both mechanically exfoliated graphene and graphene grown by chemical vapor deposition (CVD) and integrated with split bow-tie antennae. These direct detectors are capable of room-temperature rectification of a 0.6 THz signal and achieve maximum optical responsivities of 13.0 V/W and 9.1V/W and minimum noise equivalent power (NEP) of 530 pW/Hz0:5 and 490 pW/Hz0:5 for the CVD and exfoliated detectors, respectively. These results are a significant improvement over
previous work done with graphene direct detectors and are comparable to other established direct detector technologies. This is the first time room temperature direct detection has been demonstrated using CVD graphene, and because large-area graphene can be produced by CVD growth, scalable graphene detector production is now a possibility.


Background: This study aimed at determining the prevalence of asymptomatic cases of malaria in Puerto Lempira, the municipality with the highest morbidity in Honduras.
Methods and findings: Capillary blood was collected from 1,899 participants. All samples were analyzed through microscopy and a polymerase chain reaction (PCR) technique based on the amplification of species-specific repetitive sequences. The molecular approach was more sensitive than microscopy to detect asymptomatic infections (1.1% vs. 0.16%).
Conclusions: Although the prevalence of asymptomatic malaria was low in this population, new strategies such as active case detection and PCR-based surveys could become useful tools for countries aspiring to initiate the pre-elimination phase of malaria in the Americas.


BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE
Platelet-activating factor (PAF) is a lipid mediator involved in the pathophysiology of several allergic diseases, for example, in the amplification of mast cell (MC) activation in anaphylaxis. Rupatadine is an antihistamine with a demonstrated anti-PAF effect, although its capacity to inhibit PAF-induced MC degranulation has not been fully evaluated. Objectives: To compare the ability of rupatadine to inhibit PAF-induced MC degranulation with that of desloratadine and levocetirizine and to confirm the dual anti-H1 and anti-PAF activity of rupatadine.

METHODS
The human MC line LAD2 and primary MCs (human lung tissue MCs [hLMCs]) were used. MC mediator release was evaluated using the b-hexosaminidase and histamine release assay. The effects of rupatadine (H1 antagonist + PAF receptor antagonist), desloratadine, and levocetirizine (H1 antagonists) on LAD2 and hLMCs were compared. The PAF receptor antagonists WEB2086, BN52021, and CV6209 were also tested. PAF receptor protein expression was evaluated in both LAD2 and hLMCs.

RESULTS
CV6209 and rupatadine inhibited PAF-induced MC degranulation in both LAD2 and hLMCs. In LAD2, rupatadine (5 and 10 µM) and levocetirizine (5 µM), but not desloratadine, inhibited PAF-induced b-hexosaminidase release. Rupatadine (1-10 µM), levocetirizine (1-10 µM), and desloratadine (10 µM) inhibited PAF-induced histamine release. Rupatadine at 10 µM had an inhibitory effect on hLMC degranulation, but levocetirizine and desloratadine did not.

CONCLUSIONS
This study shows that rupatadine and, to a lesser extent, levocetirizine, but not desloratadine, inhibit PAF-induced degranulation in both LAD2 and hLMCs. These findings support the dual antihistamine and anti-PAF effect of rupatadine in allergic disorders.


INTRODUCTION
An understanding of how frequently individual fluoroquinolone (FQ) adverse events of interest (FQAEIs) occur within specific infection types is imperative to coordinate appropriate use of FQ and potential avoidance in certain disease states and/or patient populations.

OBJECTIVES
Study objectives were to i) quantify the incidence of three concerning FQAEI (i.e., adverse tendon event (TE), Clostridioides difficile infection (CDI), and aortic aneurysm/dissection (AAD)), ii) identify the patient-level factors that predict these events, and iii) develop clinical risk scores to estimate the predicted probabilities of each FQAEI based on patient-level covariates available on clinical presentation.

METHODS
A retrospective cohort study was performed among hospitalized patients with community-acquired pneumonia receiving care in the Upstate New York Veterans' Healthcare Administration from 2011-2016. The outcomes of interest for this study were the occurrence of TE, CDI, and AAD. We also evaluated a composite of these three outcomes, FQAEI.

RESULTS
The study population consisted of 1,071 patients. The overall incidence of FQAEI, TE, AAD, and CDI were 6.5%, 1.8%, 4.5%, and 0.3%, respectively. For each outcome evaluated, the probability of the event of interest was predicted by the presence of certain comorbidities, previous health care exposure, choice of specific FQ antibiotic, or therapy duration. Concomitant steroids, pneumonia in preceding 180 days, and creatinine clearance <30 mL/min predicted FQAEI.

CONCLUSIONS
Individual frequencies of three important FQAEIs were quantified and risk scores were developed to estimate the probabilities of experiencing these events to help clinicians individualize treatment decisions for patients and reduce the potential risks of select FQAEIs.


Processes in ocean physics, air-sea interaction and ocean biogeochemistry span enormous ranges in spatial and temporal scales, that is, from molecular to planetary and from seconds to millennia. Identifying and implementing sustainable human practices depend critically on our understandings of key aspects of ocean physics and ecology within these scale ranges. The set of all ocean data is distorted such that three- and four-dimensional (i.e., time-dependent) in situ data are very sparse, while observations of surface and upper ocean properties from space-borne platforms have become abundant in the past few decades. Precisions in observations of all types vary as well. In the face of these challenges, the interface between Statistics and Oceanography has proven to be a fruitful area for research and the development of useful models. With the recognition of the key importance of identifying, quantifying and managing uncertainty in data and models of ocean processes, a hierarchical perspective has become increasingly productive. As examples, we review a heterogeneous mix of studies from our own work demonstrating Bayesian hierarchical model applications in ocean physics, air-sea interaction, ocean forecasting and ocean ecosystem models. This review is by no means exhaustive and we have endeavored to identify hierarchical modeling work reported by others across the broad range of ocean-related topics reported in the statistical literature. We conclude by noting relevant ocean-statistics problems on the immediate research horizon, and some technical challenges they pose, for example, in terms of nonlinearity, dimensionality and computing.


The incidence of bacteremia and meningitis due to Streptococcus pneumoniae is highest among preschool-age children, particularly those < 2 years of age. Clinical trials of capsular polysaccharide vaccines among young children have been disappointing. Conjugation of bacterial polysaccharides to proteins can increase antibody responses following vaccination of young children. Most conjugate vaccines proposed to date have been seven-valent. To identify serotypes most commonly associated with infection in young children, we serotyped pneumococcal isolates submitted to the CDC through national surveillance from 3884 children < 6 years old with pneumococcal bacteremia (n = 3169), meningitis (n = 401), or otitis media (n = 314) from 1978 to 1994. Seven serotypes (14, 6B, 19F, 18C, 23F, 4, and 9V) accounted for 3045 (78%) isolates. A conjugate pneumococcal vaccine protecting against these seven serotypes and serologically cross-reactive serotypes could potentially prevent 86% of bacteremia, 83% of meningitis, and 65% of otitis media cases. The proportion of isolates covered by such a vaccine increased from 78% to 87% from 1978 to 1994. Of 70 isolates submitted during 1992-1994 which were nonsusceptible to penicillin (minimal inhibitory concentration [MIC] > 0.1 microgram/mL, 56 (80%) were among the seven most prevalent serotypes. All 21 isolates resistant to penicillin (MIC > or = 2.0 micrograms/mL) were among these seven serotypes.


In the present study, the antifungal and antibacterial properties of three selected plants namely Amphineuron extensus, Hedyotis diffusa and Vitex negundo used in the preparation of rice beer starter culture cakes were evaluated against Aspergillus niger, Aspergillus flavus and E. coli. A. extensus showed the highest inhibition zone against A. niger at 20% concentration whereas H. diffusa showed the lowest MIC value of 1.25%. In case of A. flavus, V. negundo showed the highest Inhibition zone at 20% concentration and all the plant extracts exhibited MIC value of 5%. A. extensus showed the highest inhibition zone against E. coli followed by V. negundo and H. diffusa at 20% concentration. A. extensus also exhibited the lowest MIC value of 1.25% against E. coli. The antioxidant capacity of the methanol extracts was also estimated using DPPH method. V. negundo has the highest antioxidant capacity in comparison to other two plant extracts. These findings suggest the potential antimicrobial and antioxidant properties of the plant extracts and also their possible contribution to the overall medicinal and therapeutic benefits of rice beer.


Abstract : A computational theory of analogical mapping is described, based on a small set of constraints. The theory is embodied in a computer simulation that is applied to several examples, including psychological data on the mapping process. (AN)


Abstract Informal (i.e., unpaid) long-term care for disabled older adults is often chronic, but it is only recently that research has considered the longitudinal implications of family caregiving. In particular, investigators have conceptualized caregiving as a "career," and within the caregiving career, a number of diverse trajectories and transitions can occur. Following a summary of these findings, this paper considers how longitudinal caregiving research can influence and potentially address key policy and practice concerns, especially in the delivery and support of community-based long-term care (CBLTC) services. It is suggested that with the refinement of the informal long-term care literature, existing policy and practice to support caregiving families can be similarly advanced.


Access closure is a key element to successful retrograde percutaneous transfemoral transcatheter aortic valve implantation. It requires large‐bore femoral arterial access (18Fr–28Fr) which most operators manage with surgical access and closure under general anesthesia. We report a case example of how, using our center's peripheral interventional experience, we have developed a simple five step technique to achieve hemostasis percutaneously. © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.


: Working platforms are temporary structures that provide a suitable foundation for heavy construction plant, working machines (e.g. piling rig and cranes) and temporary construction elements (e.g. temporary lifting bridge or staging areas). Working platforms can be greatly improved by including high strength geosynthetics. This paper will describe some design consideration for these types of foundation structures which have a critical safety role in the construction industry. Some successful case histories will be presented at the end of the paper. Those case histories will present the soundness of this design method which is now well known around Europe, North America, and Asia.


We study the ground-state properties of two-dimensional quantum spin systems having the valence-bond-solid (VBS) type ground states. The `product-of-tensors' form of the ground-state wavefunction of the system is utilized to associate it with an equivalent classical lattice statistical model which can be treated by the transfer-matrix method. For diagonalization of the transfer matrix, we employ the product-wavefunction renormalization group method, which is a variant of the density-matrix renormalization group method. We obtain the correlation length and the sublattice magnetization accurately. For the anisotropically `deformed' S = 3/2 VBS model on the honeycomb lattice, we find that the correlation length as a function of the deformation parameter behaves very much as that in the S = 3/2 VBS chain.


Allograft is the current gold standard for treating critical-sized bone defects. However, allograft healing is usually compromised partially due to poor host-mediated vascularization. In the efforts towards developing new methods to enhance allograft healing, a non-terminal technique for monitoring the vascularization is needed in pre-clinical mouse models. In this study, we developed a non-invasive instrument based on spatial frequency domain imaging (SFDI) for longitudinal monitoring of the mouse femoral graft healing. SFDI technique provided total hemoglobin concentration (THC) and oxygen saturation (StO2) of the graft and the surrounding soft tissues. SFDI measurements were performed from 1 day before to 44 days after graft transplantation. Autograft, another type of bone graft with higher vascularization potential was also measured as a comparison to allograft. For both grafts, the overall temporal changes of the measured THC agreed with the physiological expectations of vascularization timeline during bone healing. A significantly greater increase in THC was observed in the autograft group compared to the allograft group, which agreed with the expectation that allografts have more compromised vascularization.


Graph theory in general and Tutte polynomials in particular, are implemented for analyzing the chemical structure of the
benzodiazepines. Similarity analysis are used with the Tutte polynomials for finding other molecules that are similar to
the benzodiazepines and therefore that might show similar psycho-active actions for medical purpose, in order to evade
the drawbacks associated to the benzodiazepines based medicine. For each type of benzodiazepines, Tutte polynomials
are computed and some numeric characteristics are obtained, such as the number of spanning trees and the number of
spanning forests. Computations are done using the computer algebra Maple's GraphTheory package. The obtained
analytical results are of great importance in pharmaceutical engineering. As a future research line, the usage of the
chemistry computational program named Spartan, will be used to extent and compare it with the obtained results from
the Tutte polynomials of benzodiazepines.


To evaluate the incidence and stage at which p53 alterations occur in human pancreatic carcinogenesis, we examined primary and metastatic carcinomas, carcinoma in situ, and hyperplastic lesions with and without atypia for p53 protein overexpression by immunohistochemical procedure. Overexpression of p53 was observed in 40% (10/25) of primary tumors, 29% (2/7) of metastatic tumors, 36% (5/14) of carcinoma in situ, and 35% (6/17) of hyperplastic lesions. These results suggest that p53 protein overexpression is not only a common genetic alteration but also occurs very early in the development of these tumors. It is suggested that p53 overexpression can be used as a marker to identify precursor lesions that have increased potential to develop into malignant tumors.


Resistance may be classified as active (or competitive) (due to excess amount of a factor) vs passive (or non-competitive) (due to a deficiency of a factor). Passive resistance may be important in human solid tumors. In passive resistance, the dose-response curve may be shallow, or may flatten at a relatively low dose. We hypothesized that, if passive resistance were important, it might be advantageous to use low doses of multiple concurrent chemotherapy agents with differing mechanisms of action, rather than using high doses of 2 or 3 drugs. We combined single day cisplatin 60 mg/m2, cyclophosphamide 250 mg/m2, epirubicin 40 mg/m2, paclitaxel 60 mg/m2, and vinblastine 2.5 mg/m2, with 5 days of 5-fluorouracil 200 mg/m2, folinic acid 20 mg/m2 and dexamethasone 4 mg orally q.i.d. every 3 weeks. In later cohorts, doses were escalated, and tamoxifen and verapamil were added. Twenty-three patients were entered. ECOG performance status was 1 in 15 patients and 2 in 8. Number of prior chemotherapy regimens was 0 in 4 patients, 1 in 4, 2 in 8, 3 in 4, 4 in 2, and 7 in 1. Sixteen patients had prior radiotherapy, and 3 had no prior therapy. Myelosuppression and febrile neutropenia were frequent, and 4 heavily pretreated patients died of pneumonia contracted while neutropenic. Diarrhea, nausea and vomiting, and fatigue were also prominent. Among 9 patients with non-small cell lung cancer, one had a partial remission, 4 had stable disease (including 3 with minor objective responses). Two additional non-small cell lung cancer patients also had objective tumor regression, but were coded as failures, since one had tumor progression in <6 weeks and the other died of respiratory failure (thought to be due to severe mucous plugging) one week after his first course of treatment. Among 14 patients with other tumor types, there was one partial response (esophageal carcinoma), 6 patients with stable disease for >6 weeks (including minor responses in one patient each with adenocarcinomas of kidney and breast), and 7 failures (including one patient with adenocarcinoma unknown primary who had minor tumor regression lasting 4 weeks). Despite the unacceptably high toxic death rate, median survival time was 24 weeks (range, 1 week to >104 weeks). This regimen is toxic, but survival duration is longer than would be expected in this heavily pre-treated population. Doses recommended for further study are those used in the first treatment cohort (as described above). Since myelosuppression is the major toxic effect, hemopoietic growth factors might prove helpful with this regimen.


Hardware duplication techniques are widely used for concurrent error detection in dependable systems to ensure high availability and data integrity. These techniques are vulnerable to common-mode failures (CMFs). Use of duplex systems with diverse implementations of the two modules has been proposed in the past for protection against CMFs. In this paper, we define a category of faults, called non-self-testable faults that undermine the data integrity of dependable systems. These faults produce identical errors at the outputs of the two modules of a duplex system and can potentially be caused by CMFs. The main contributions of this paper are: (1) techniques that identify non-self-testable faults in duplex systems, and (2) design methods that reduce the number of non-self-testable faults by test point insertion. We show that our algorithm for identifying non-self-testable faults runs orders of magnitude faster than exact techniques with minimal loss of accuracy. Also, there is a significant reduction in the number of test points required for duplex systems with diverse implementations compared to duplex systems with identical implementations. Thus, we can detect common-mode failures in diverse duplex systems using very few test points. These results are especially useful for systems with user-programmable logic elements that enhance the practicality of using diverse designs in duplex systems.


This introduction to the special issue places the 2022 Italian general election within the recent electoral history of Italy and the broader European context. Following the same multidimensional structure adopted for this collection of articles, here we address general questions regarding the significance of the last election, its dynamics, and implications. Firstly, to what extent did it represent a change compared to previous Italian elections? Secondly, can Italy still be regarded as an anomaly in the European context? Have the 2022 results widened or narrowed the political gap between the country and its neighbours? By providing a longitudinal and cross-sectional overview, our aim is to suggest some interpretative keys, which, in conjunction with the rich data presented and discussed by the authors of each article, may enable readers to draw general lessons about recent developments in Italian and European politics. Our overall argument is that, while clearly significant in its political implications – producing the most ideologically right-wing government in republican history led by the first female prime minister –, the 2022 general election did not represent a radical change from previous Italian elections. Instead, it marked a further step in the emergence of a 'new political normal' characterised by volatility, fragmentation, mainstreaming of populist ideas and actors, polarisation and the reframing of socio-economic and socio-cultural cleavages. Additionally, while Italy can be regarded as the most advanced manifestation of these transformations, we observe similar shifts in most Western European countries, indicating that their seemingly unshakable stability is now in question.


PurposeSimultaneous hydrofracturing of multiple perforation clusters in vertical wells has been applied in the stimulation of hydrocarbon resources reservoirs. This technology is significantly impeded due to the challenges in its application to the multilayered reservoirs that comprise multiple interlayers. One of the challenges is the accurate understanding and characterization of propagation and deflection of the multiple hydraulic fractures between reservoirs and embedded interlayers.Design/methodology/approachNumerical models of the tight multilayered reservoirs containing multiple interlayers were established to study hydrofracturing of multiple perforation clusters and its influencing factors on unstable propagation and deflection of hydraulic fractures. Brittle and plastic multilayered reservoirs fully considering the influences of different in situ stress ratio and physical attributes for reservoir and interlayer strata on propagations of hydraulic fractures were investigated. The combined finite element–discrete element method and mesh refinement strategy were adopted to guarantee the accuracy of stress solutions and reliability of fracture path in computation.FindingsResults show that the shear stress fields between adjacent multiple hydraulic fractures are superposed to cause fractures deflection. Stress shadows induce the shielding effects of hydraulic fractures and inhibit fractures growth to emerge unstable propagation behaviors, and a main single fracture and several minor fractures develop. As the in situ stress ratio increases, hydraulic fractures more easily deflect toward the direction of maximum in situ stress, and stress shadow and mutual interaction effects between them are intensified. Compared to brittle reservoir, plastic-enhanced reservoir may limit fracture growth and cannot form long fracture length; nevertheless, plastic properties of reservoir are prone to induce more microseismic events with larger magnitude.Originality/valueThe obtained fracturing behaviors and mechanisms based on engineering-scale multilayered reservoir may provide effective schemes for controlling and estimating the unstable propagation of multiple hydraulic fractures.


This policy note summarizes the results of technical assistance offered in support of the Government of Romania (GOR) in its implementation of regional development programming for European Union (EU) accession. Three important questions confront Romania's policy makers: (i) how to operationalize regional and local development, given the context of EU structural funds; (ii) how to develop effective mechanisms for multi-level planning and resource allocation to filter resources (EU net transfers) to the regional and local levels where they will be most useful; and (iii) how to build on the successful experiences of the EU-15 and of projects supported by the World Bank and other donors that use bottom-up planning and implementation processes to develop effective local projects. This note looks at some answers to these questions as well as at the issues surrounding possible integration of the Regional Operations Programme (ROP) with other relevant EU operational programs, notably environment and rural development. Finally, this report aims to help inform the World Bank on how best to design future regional and rural development support programs, given the new context of EU funding.


Geometric relational embeddings map relational data as geometric objects that combine vector information suitable for machine learning and structured/relational information for structured/relational reasoning, typically in low dimensions. Their preservation of relational structures and their appealing properties and interpretability have led to their uptake for tasks such as knowledge graph completion, ontology and hierarchy reasoning, logical query answering, and hierarchical multi-label classification. We survey methods that underly geometric relational embeddings and categorize them based on (i) the embedding geometries that are used to represent the data; and (ii) the relational reasoning tasks that they aim to improve. We identify the desired properties (i.e., inductive biases) of each kind of embedding and discuss some potential future work.


Photorespiration has been shown to be essential for all oxygenic phototrophs in the present-day oxygen-containing atmosphere. The strong similarity of the photorespiratory cycle in cyanobacteria and plants led to the hypothesis that oxygenic photosynthesis and photorespiration co-evolved in cyanobacteria, and then entered the eukaryotic algal lineages up to land plants via endosymbiosis. However, the evolutionary origin of the photorespiratory enzyme glycolate oxidase (GOX) is controversial, which challenges the common origin hypothesis. Here, we tested this hypothesis using phylogenetic and biochemical approaches with broad taxon sampling. Phylogenetic analysis supported the view that a cyanobacterial GOX-like protein of the 2-hydroxy-acid oxidase family most likely served as an ancestor for GOX in all eukaryotes. Furthermore, our results strongly indicate that GOX was recruited to the photorespiratory metabolism at the origin of Archaeplastida, because we verified that Glaucophyta, Rhodophyta, and Streptophyta all express GOX enzymes with preference for the substrate glycolate. Moreover, an "ancestral" protein synthetically derived from the node separating all prokaryotic from eukaryotic GOX-like proteins also preferred glycolate over l-lactate. These results support the notion that a cyanobacterial ancestral protein laid the foundation for the evolution of photorespiratory GOX enzymes in modern eukaryotic phototrophs.


Local approach has been used to compute a) Jinitiation and JR curves at different temperatures and b) fracture toughness transition curves for German Reactor Pressure Vessel Steel 22NiMoCr37. Ductile fracture has been analyzed using Gurson material constitutive model and probability of cleavage failure is calculated using Beremin's model. A variation of Gurson parameter q2 near crack tip region as a function of charpy energy is suggested to obtain Jinitiation as well as complete JR curve accurately at different metal temperatures.Copyright © 2004 by ASME


The SPICA (SPace Infrared Telescope for Cosmology & Astrophysics) project is a next-generation infrared space telescope optimized for midand far-infrared observation with a cryogenically cooled 3m-class telescope. It will achieve the high resolution as well as the unprecedented sensitivity from mid to far-infrared range. The FPC (Focal Plane Camera) proposed by KASI as an international collaboration is a near-infrared instrument. The FPC-S and FPC-G are responsible for the scientific observation in the near-infrared and the fine guiding, respectively. The FPC-G will significantly reduce pointing error down to below 0.075 arcsec through the observation of guiding stars in the focal plane. We analyzed the pointing requirement from the focal plane instruments as well as the error factors affecting the pointing stability. We also obtained the expected performance in operation modes. We concluded that the FPC-G can achieve the pointing stability below 0.075 arcsec which is the requirement from the focal plane instruments.


Samarawardana P, Dehn DL, Singh M, Franquemont D, Thompson C, Gaido L, TorkkoKC,HomerP,Burke S,TitmusMA,NayiV, ShroyerKR. p16 Is Superior toHigh-RiskHumanPapillomavirusTestinginCervicalCytologyfor thePredictionof Underlying High-Grade Dysplasia. Cancer Cytopathology. 2010;118:146-56. AIS was defined incorrectly in this article. It should have been defined as adenocarcinoma in situ. The authors regret this error.


Pro-'workfare' governments justify their policies by claiming 'workfare' helps enhance selfesteem and promote the dignity of unemployed recipients. On the other hand, welfare activists argue that 'workfare' suppresses the dignity of unemployed persons. This book examines the concept of human dignity in this context and attempts to clarify its meaning. For the first time, it formulates a framework for evaluating the dignity of welfare recipients; uses this framework to explore the dignity of unemployed persons in four different welfare systems: UK, Sweden, China and Hong Kong and compares the conditions of human dignity in each case and identifies factors which enhance or suppress it. Human dignity and welfare systems is important reading for students and academics in the fields of social policy, social work, philosophy and politics. It is also a useful reference text for politicians, welfare administrators and activists.... Download ebook, read file pdf Human dignity and welfare systems


Due to rapid increase in industrialisation, exponential growth of internal combustion engines, continuous deteriorating environment have paved the way to make renewable energy resources more attractive. The most feasible way to meet this growing demand is by utilizing alternative fuels such as Jatropha which have been considered as a prospective feedstock for biodiesel production in a number of hot and humid climatic countries. It has approximately same combustion characteristics and heat value as diesel fuel and has proved better environmental friendliness as compared to diesel and gasoline. Jatropha curcas is a drought resistant perennial, growing well even in poor soil conditions. It is easy to establish, grows relatively quickly and survives, producing seeds for 50 years containing oil up to 37%. During present study, efforts have been made to study the suitability of Jatropha plantation in Rajasthan with respect to its climate suitability, financial viability and possible employment. Study is also aimed to calculate the possible replacement of diesel fuel by Jatropha seed oil if suitable waste land of 0.66 M ha in six districts of Rajasthan state which are most suitable for Jatropha plantation is used. It has been concluded that around 20.53 Lac people can be given employment for Jatropha plantation under Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MNREGA) which aims at enhancing the livelihood security of people in rural areas by guaranteeing hundred days job.


Researcher/participant matching has been used in nursing research as a strategy for the development of culturally competent knowledge. In this manuscript, the complexities inherent in matching in nursing research are discussed. In raising and discussing issues and questions related to matching, we argue that although matching may be one of the strategies used to generate culturally competent knowledge, it is frequently too complex for operationalization. Therefore, we propose that researchers reflect on questions related to their knowledge of culture, their cultural sensitivity, and the nature of collaboration during every phase of the research. Reflecting on and responding to these questions in every research project may facilitate the development of more culturally competent knowledge.


A community bank in Nigeria is a self-sustaining financial institution owned and managed within a community to provide financial services to that community. The National Board for Community Banks (NBCB) processes applications for the establishment of community banks. The first community bank commenced operation in December 1990. Since then, NBCB has issued provisional licenses to over 1,366 community banks across the country. This paper therefore, assesses the role played by these community banks towards rural development in Nigeria. Capital adequacy, asset quality, earning strength, management competence, and liquidity sufficiency of the banks were basically the key instruments used in measuring the performance of the community banks used in the sample. It was found that although community banks faced a lot of problems, especially, in terms of over concentration of credits and sub standard asset base, they contribute immensely to rural development in Nigeria. Community banks have much development potential, and, while the Scheme 'has had mixed achievements', the growth of non-banking facilities, and increased collaboration with self-help groups or NGOs, should lead to greater success. It is the recommendation of the paper that, more is needed in the area of creating awareness of the existence of these banks. The Nigerian Deposit Insurance Corporation (NDIC) cover to pay Depositors a maximum refund of N30,000 incase of distress or bank failure as against N50,000 for conventional banks should be raised and the 500,000 matching grant of the NBCB is grossly inadequate considering the lots of achievements needed from these banks. Raising the insurance cover to N100,000 and the matching grant to 1 million could go along way in enhancing the development of community banks in Nigeria.


HIV-1 integrase (IN), which has no cellular counterpart, has been intensely studied over the past 15 years and has been fully validated as a therapeutic target with the first FDA approved IN inhibitor raltegravir. The quinolone acid GS-9137 (elvitegravir), which most probably will became the next candidate of IN inhibitors, is in the process of enrolling patients in the phase III clinical trials. This review focuses on small-molecules of quinolone acid derivatives, which have the similar pharmacophore of β-diketoacids, as integrase inhibitors with antiviral activity.


Daqu is the starter of Baijiu, it provides the microbes and enzymes necessary for fermentation. Studies have already established carbohydrate metabolism as the primary functional module in Daqu fermentation. The present study investigated the changes in microbial functions and the relationship between carbohydrate metabolism-related functional genes and extracellular enzyme activity during the Daqu fermentation. Amplicon sequencing identified 38 bacterial and 10 fungal phyla in Daqu samples, while shotgun metagenomic sequencing classified and annotated 40.66% of the individual features, of which 40.48% were prokaryotes. KEGG annotation showed that the pathways related to metabolites were less in the early fermentation stage, but higher in the middle and late stages. The functional genes related to pyruvate metabolism, glyoxylate and dicarboxylate metabolism, and propanoate metabolism were relatively high in the early and late stages of fermentation, while that for start and cross metabolism was relatively low. The study also found that amino sugar and nucleoside sugar metabolism were dominant in the middle stage of fermentation. Finally, the correlation network analysis showed that amylase activity positively correlated with many carbon metabolism-related pathways, while liquefaction activity negatively correlated with these pathways. In conclusion, the present study provides a theoretical basis for improving and stabilizing the quality of Daqu.


This article studies how the experiences of former women political prisoners in the New Order era of Indonesia have been recollected to reproduce identity. In 1979, these women were returned to their community after a rehabilitation period of nearly 10 years. The public, which could not accept their past, attached a lingering stigma to them and continually rejected them. This article attempts to uncover the process of memory articulation and the context in which these women sought to reproduce their identity through Dialita (Di Atas Lima Puluh Tahun, Above 50 Years Old), a choir group consisting of former women political prisoners and their relatives. Dialita positioned itself as a medium for cultural reconciliation that aimed to alter public perception of the women's identity and reposition them in the country's collective memory. This is how the politics of memory work in Indonesian society, where the government has the power to decide which memories should be remembered and which should be forgotten. Dialita brought almost forgotten songs back to life because its members were not allowed to write songs while being imprisoned at correctional facilities in Bukit Duri, Plantungan, Salemba and Ambarawa. Interviews and textual interpretation have allowed us to delve deeper into the lives of these former women political prisoners, who were positioned as the main actors of a past historical event and encouraged to articulate their memories by reproducing songs as a part of their identity reproduction. The articulation process and the re-interpretation of the past helped the women shape their sense of self and, more importantly, to alter the way the public remembers the events of 1965.


The new 3D standard CityGML has been attracting a lot of attention in the last few years. Many characteristics of the XML-based format make it suitable for storage and exchange of virtual 3D city models. It provides possibilities to store semantic and geometric information and has the potential to incorporate topological models. A large number of CityGML models are already available in different parts of the world. However, still the creation of a 3D model according to conceptual schema of CityGML remains a challenge. In this paper we present a modeling software Toposcopy, which allows for creating 3D models and exporting them in CityGML format. Toposcopy follows basically a close-range photogrammetric approach to re-constructs 3D models with the help of 2D map and terrestrial geo-referenced images. The approach uses perspective projection to link points on the photos with the corresponding points on the 2D map. A soon as the 3D model is re-constructed, it can be organised according to CityGML spatial schema. Toposcopy appeared to be a handy tool to produce CityGML in LOD 1, 2 and 3. The process of modeling is relatively fast, since various parametric shapes can be applied for a large number of houses. Import and export routines are written, that allows visualizing spatial designs in a 3D topographic data-set. The developed software was tested in several projects. The paper will present the software, the performed tests and will discuss challenges in creating of CityGML features. The paper concludes with suggestions for improving CityGML.


Purpose Atherosclerosis is still a global public problem with increasing incidence rate and mortality. It has been found that gender factors play an important role in the progression of atherosclerosis. However, few people explore gender related atherosclerosis at the level of genes and immune cells. The purpose of this study was to determine genetic and immune cell differences between male and female samples. Patients and Methods This study aims to identify differential genes between male and female samples in the GSE43292 dataset. The focus will be on identifying immune-related genes (IRGs) among these differentially expressed genes. Subsequently, Gene Ontology (GO) and Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG) analysis will be employed to explore the enrichment of IRGs in biological processes, molecular functions, cellular components, and pathways. Furthermore, a protein-protein interaction (PPI) network for the IRGs will be constructed using Cytoscape software. To estimate the degree of immune cell infiltration, single-sample gene set enrichment analysis (ssGSEA) will be conducted. Moreover, the identified IRGs will be validated using GSE28829 dataset. Finally, we validated in atherosclerotic mice. Results Seven IRGs (CCL13, IL1RN, FPR2, S100A8, CCL19, CXCL1, CXCL8) were identified as being overexpressed in male atherosclerosis. GO and KEGG analysis revealed that these IRGs are primarily enriched in inflammatory response pathways, cytokine signaling pathways, and cytokine- cytokine receptor interactions. Notably, when compared to females, there was a significant infiltration of immune cells in male specimens. Importantly, all seven IRGs demonstrated high diagnostic value in GSE28829 dataset. The use of animal samples supports our results. Conclusion This study demonstrates the effectiveness of seven IRGs and reveal sex differences in atherosclerosis. Notably, there is a significant presence of immune cells within the atherosclerotic plaque of men compared to women. These findings have potential implications for the development of personalized treatment approaches targeting gender-related atherosclerosis.


This study investigated how airline stock prices respond to fuel price shocks using the asymmetric Glosten-Jagannathan-Runkle GARCH (GJR-GARCH (1,1)) model. Six airlines were selected, based on their service regions: American Airlines, Delta Air Lines, and United Airlines are larger international carriers that use various types of aircraft in their fleets and provide services in major continents, whereas Southwest Airlines, JetBlue Airways, and US Airways emphasize domestic market services and primarily use single-aisle aircraft. West Texas Intermediate Crude Oil (WTI) prices were adopted as the index of fuel prices. Based on our empirical results, a fuel price shock triggered fluctuations in airline stock returns. Moreover, American Airlines, Delta Air Lines, United, Airlines and US Airways experienced statistically significant negative relationships between their stock returns and fuel price shocks. Also, fuel price shocks significantly impacted airline stock returns during periods in which fuel prices increased but did not correlate with them during those in which such prices fell


The present paper investigates drugs and polymers intended for the impregnation of textile carriers intended for use as wound covers. Their suitability was evaluated on the basis of the evaluation of the antimicrobial efficacy of a combination of trimetoprim and sulfadimidine with the local anaesthetics carbizocaine and lidocaine, and the immunomodulating substance fungal glucan. A greater inhibitory effect on the growth of microorganisms was shown by a combination of antimicrobial substances with carbizocaine. In the study of liberation of chlorohexidine from hydrophilic macromolecular dispersions its bond to glucan was confirmed. Dispersions of Natrosol proved to be more advantageous; chlorohexidine as well as local anaesthetics were released from them more rapidly than from methylcellulose gels. The dispersions under study are of a non-Newton character with pseudoplastic flow, glucan-containing gels are thixotropic.


A thorough review of the literature for adults with ADHD was carried out and generally the outlook was discouraging. It was clear that childhood ADHD posed a risk for adverse outcome, including a continuation of core cognitive and behavioural deficits. However, a shortage of data about adults was revealed as most studies in the literature examine the disorder in childhood and follow them up only into adolescence. Issues of comorbidity and precise neuropsychological deficits in adulthood were unknown. It was hypothesised that clinically referred adults with ADHD would present with academic underachievement, poor occupational adjustment, antisocial and criminal behaviour, poor social interaction and relationship difficulties. It was hypothesised that they would have comorbid personality disorder, make a greater number of errors on cognitive measures of attention and impulsiveness, and overestimate on a time estimation task. These hypotheses were examined in a clinically referred sample of (1) ADHD adults, comparing them with (2) a matched clinically referred control group and (3) a matched community control group. Generally the hypotheses were supported and the pattern of results emphasised the developmental nature of the disorder. The ADHD group was significantly more impaired than the normal control group on all measures. The ADHD group was more impaired than the clinic control group on childhood measures of academic underachievement, antisocial and criminal behaviour. There was a suggestion that antisocial personality problems were present in adulthood. Cognitive testing clearly differentiated the ADHD group from the control groups, they made more error scores and were more impaired in their perception of time. Adult diagnosis was validated by relating a behavioural diagnosis of ADHD in adulthood and predicting this to their cognitive deficits. The long-term consequence of ADHD is a source of concern, particularly considering that it is largely understood to be a problem of childhood and not commonly recognised or accepted by clinicians as a disorder of adulthood. The implications of the results for research and clinical practice are discussed in the conclusion.


BACKGROUND
Low levels of 6-sulfatoxymelatonin, the primary urinary metabolite of melatonin, have been linked to cancer and cardiometabolic outcomes in White and female populations.

METHODS
We examined the association between adulthood adiposity and 6-sulfatoxymelatonin levels in a racially and ethnically diverse population. Our study included 4,078 men in the Multiethnic Cohort with adiposity measurements at enrollment (1993-1996) and biomarkers measured in urines collected in 1995 and 2005. Multivariable linear regression models were used to estimate the percent change in 6-sulfatoxymelatonin levels and 95% confidence intervals. Associations were examined separately by racial/ethnic group.

RESULTS
The prevalence of obesity varied by race and ethnicity, from 10% for Japanese American men to 34% for Native Hawaiian men. Compared to men with normal body mass index (BMI), men who were overweight (-7.8%, 95% CI: -11.9, -3.5%) and obese (-18.1%, 95% CI: -23.2, -12.6%) had significantly lower 6-sulfatoxymelatonin levels adjusting for potential confounding factors. Increasing weight gain in adulthood was also associated with lower 6-sulfatoxymelatonin (p for trend, <0.0001). The inverse associations for BMI and weight change were qualitatively similar across racial and ethnic groups.

CONCLUSIONS
Obesity is inversely associated with melatonin in a racially diverse population. This finding is relevant given higher rates of obesity among Black, Native Hawaiian, and Latino men, as well as potential racial and ethnic differences in circadian function.

IMPACT
Melatonin may be a relevant biomarker among obesity-associated malignancies, and could shed light on a potential mechanism of cancer disparities.


Ocean radar backscatter in the presence of large waves is investigated using data acquired with the Jet Propulsion Laboratory NUSCAT radar at Ku band for horizontal and vertical polarizations and the University of Massachusetts C-SCAT radar at C band for vertical polarization during the Surface Wave Dynamics Experiment. Off-nadir backscatter data of ocean surfaces were obtained in the presence of large waves with significant wave height up to 5.6 m. In moderate-wind cases, effects of large waves are not detectable within the measurement uncertainty and no noticeable correlation between backscatter coefficients and wave height is found. Under high-wave light-wind conditions, backscatter is enhanced significantly at large incidence angles,with a weaker effect at small incidence angles. Backscatter coefficients in the wind speed range under consideration are compared with SASS-II (Ku band), CMOD3-H1 (C band), and Plant's model results which confirm the experimental observations. Variations of the friction velocity, which can give rise to the observed backscatter behaviors in the presence of large waves, are presented. >


Although the formulas of tachyon inflation correspond to those of the inflation driven by the ordinary scalar field, there is obvious difference between them, which can not be neglected. We calculate the scalar and tensor perturbation of the string theory inspired tachyon inflation, which has been widely studied recently. We also show, through the Hamilton-Jacobi approach, that the the rolling tachyon can essentially produce enough inflation. An exact solution with the inverse squared potential of tachyon field has been proposed and its power spectra has been analyzed. PACS numbers: 98.80.Cq, 98.80.Hw, 11.25.Sq


Stasis of venous blood triggers deep vein thrombosis by activating coagulation, yet its effects on the fibrinolytic system are not fully understood. We examined the relationship between stasis, fibrinolysis and the development of experimental venous thrombosis. Effects of stasis-induced deep vein thrombosis and fibrinolysis on thrombosis were examined by inferior vena cava ligation in congenic mice with and without α2-antiplasmin (α2AP), the primary inhibitor of plasmin. Venous thrombus weights were measured and thrombus composition was determined by Martius scarlet blue and immunofluorescence staining. Venous thrombi from α2AP+/+ mice contained plasminogen activators, plasminogen activator inhibitor-1, plasminogen, and α2AP, which changed with thrombus age. Normal, α2AP+/+ mice developed large, occlusive thrombi within 5 h after ligation; thrombi were even larger in plasminogen-deficient (Pg-/-) mice (P< .001). No significant thrombus formation was seen in α2AP-/- mice (P< .0001) or in α2AP+/+ mice treated with an α2AP-inactivating antibody (P< .001). Venous stasis activated fibrinolysis, measured by D-dimer levels, in α2AP-/- mice vs α2AP+/+ mice (P< .05). Inhibition of fibrinolysis by the indirect plasmin inhibitor epsilon-aminocaproic acid or by α2AP restored thrombosis in α2AP-/- mice. In addition to its effects on acute thrombosis, thrombus formation was also markedly suppressed in α2AP-/- mice vs. α2AP+/+ mice (P< .0001) 1, 7 and 14 days after ligation. We conclude that experimental venous stasis activates the fibrinolytic system to block the development of venous thrombosis. Suppression of fibrinolysis by α2AP appears essential for stasis-induced thrombus development, which suggests that targeting α2AP may prove useful for preventing venous thrombosis.


Business continuity planning is an important element of business continuity management and is regarded as a fundamental step towards reducing the negative impacts of business disruptions caused by internal and external hazardous events. Many businesses are not prepared for such events, and very few studies have tried to examine and model the factors that contribute to business continuity management planning by various companies. In this paper we propose and develop a feed-forward neural network for modelling businesses continuity planning by businesses based on a dataset of 283 businesses operating in the Greater Toronto Area in Ontario, Canada. The fully connected neural network applied was trained on 65 % of the dataset records using different subsets of input variables. In order to preserve the generalization ability of the trained network, 15 % of the dataset records were used as a validation set for early stopping during the network's training process. Prediction capability of the trained networks was evaluated on 20 % and never-seen records of the dataset. The classification ability of the networks was then analysed using receiver operating characteristic and detection error trade-off curves, where the results obtained were promising. The equal error rate for the best models was 12 %, which reflects a very good accuracy of these models in predicting the existence of business continuity planning for a generic company. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.


The species of egg parasitoid in rice bug is necessary to know to be used as biological agent in the field. The research aimed to determine spesies of parasitoid, diversity index, parasitization level and parasitoid mortality which found in rice bug eggs in rice fields in West Sumatra. Purposive random sampling was used in this research for determining the sampling locations. Collecting eggs sampling was conducted for 1 km along transect line in sampling location. The collected eggs of 12 sampling locations then observed and identified in Laboratory of Insect Bioecology, Faculty of Agriculture, Andalas University. The result showed that the kind of egg parasitoid  found in the field were Hadronotus leptocorisae  and  Ooencyrtus malayensis with each parasitization level were 22.3 ± 11.1 %  and 4.2 ± 5.3 %, each the mortality were 57.8 ± 26.4% and 30.6 ± 37%, the diversity of egg parasitoid was low with the index 0.3858 Based on Shannon-Wienner.


. A single-server queueing system is considered with refusal of a general type. Stationary probabilities are found and the central limit theorem is established for the sojourn time.


The aim of the research was to examine Lithuanian learners' conscious and subconscious preference for one of the two major varieties of the English language: British and American. Three aspects – spelling, the choice of lexical items, and prepositions – were selected for the study. The data on these aspects as well as on Lithuanian learners' overt preference and explicit choice of the variety were obtained from a questionnaire completed by 124 students of all the study programmes at the Institute of Foreign Languages. Since spelling is believed to be the most indicative of varietal differences, it was seen as the key aspect of the present research. Six systemic spelling groups were analysed in five corpora of Lithuanian learners' English: AFK1, LICLE-VU, LICLE-VDU, CALE-SUM-LIT and CALE-RPA-LIT. The questionnaire- and corpora-based research revealed an insignificant preference of British English norms. The overtly expressed preference for British English correlates with the year of study. This finding is consistent with the studies that reported on direct correlation between the language level and the preference for British English. The questionnaire revealed the tendency to use British English even when it was not the students' choice. The conflicting results of the students' ideas of which variety they use and real usage are indicative of the lack of learners' awareness concerning varietal differences. This can also be supported by the fact that there was not a single respondent whose use of the norms characteristic of one variety was consistent. The corpora-derived data highlighted possible institutionally-induced differences since LICLE-VU and LICLE-VDU revealed the opposite tendencies, the former favouring British, while the latter – American spelling. The analysis of separate spelling groups, however, indicated inconsistent choice of varietal norms among them. The scope of the present research was limited in terms of the number of respondents and the size of the questionnaire. The results, therefore, should be treated as tentative and should be tested on a larger sample of respondents.


ObjectivesThe aim of this study was to compare the prognostic utility of a staging system using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) with the seventh American Joint Committee on Cancer (AJCC) staging system in patients with hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) who underwent hepatic resection. Materials and MethodsA total of 175 consecutive patients with HCC who underwent curative hepatic resection after MRI between January 2000 and December 2007 were analyzed. In lieu of microvascular invasion, which is used by the AJCC staging system, we devised an MRI staging system in which a size criterion of 2 cm was used to differentiate between tumor stages 1 and 2. All patients were retrospectively staged using the seventh AJCC staging system and the preoperative MRI staging system. Differences in disease-free and overall survival rates between different stages by the MRI and AJCC staging systems were analyzed using the Kaplan-Meier method with log-rank testing. The predictive accuracy of the 2 staging systems was directly compared using the time-dependent receiver operating characteristic curve analysis. ResultsMedian follow-up period was 222.9 weeks. During the follow-up period, 74 (42.3%) patients experienced tumor recurrence and 22 (12.6%) died. The median disease-free survival and overall survival were 131.1 and 222.9 weeks, respectively. Both staging systems were excellent for the prediction of disease-free survival across different tumor stages but failed to predict overall survival differences between stages 1 and 2. For disease-free and overall survivals, the time-dependent receiver operating characteristic curve analysis revealed no significant differences in predictive accuracy between the 2 staging systems. ConclusionA preoperative MRI staging system using a size threshold instead of microvascular invasion may predict the prognosis of HCC patients undergoing hepatic resection as accurately as the seventh AJCC tumor-node-metastasis staging system.


Block copolymer micelles have demonstrated great promise in the solubilization of hydrophobic drugs, but an understanding of the blood stability of the drug-laden micelles is needed for therapeutic advancement of micelle technologies. Following intravenous administration, mPEG-CL and mPEG-LA micelles have demonstrated quick release of their cargo and disassembly in blood, but the prevailing mechanisms of micelle disruption and key biomacromolecules driving this disruption have yet to be elucidated. Although protein interactions with solid polymeric nanoparticles have been characterized, not much is known regarding protein interactions with dynamic block copolymer micelles. Herein, we characterize the interaction of bovine and human serum albumins (BSA and HSA) with polymeric micelles, mPEG-CL and mPEG-LA, using protein fluorescence, isothermal titration calorimetry (ITC), and circular dichroism (CD) spectroscopy. We find that BSA and HSA have interactions with mPEG-CL, while only HSA is observed to weakly interact with mPEG-LA. Protein fluorescence suggests that binding of HSA to mPEG-CL and mPEG-LA is driven by electrostatic interactions. ITC suggests an interaction between serum albumin and mPEG-CL block copolymers driven by hydrogen bonding and electrostatic interactions in physiological MOPS-buffered saline, while mPEG-LA has no measurable interaction with either of the serum albumins. CD spectroscopy demonstrates that the protein secondary structure is intact in both proteins in the presence of mPEG-CL and mPEG-LA. Overall, BSA is not always predictive of polymeric interactions with HSA. Understanding of interactions between serum proteins and block copolymer micelles and the exact mechanisms of destabilization will direct the rational design of block copolymer systems for improving blood stability.


Abstract Not much is known about the past activities of blind biwa players from Kyushu. During the twentieth century a number of researchers and folklorists, such as Tanabe Hisao, Kimura Yūshō, Kimura Rirō, Nomura (Ga) Machiko, Narita Mamoru, Hyōdō Hiromi and Hugh de Ferranti, collected data on blind biwa players in various regions of Kyushu, made recordings of their performances and conducted detailed research on the history and nature of their tradition. However, despite these efforts to document and publicize the tradition of blind biwa players and its representatives and their repertory, it ended around the end of the twentieth century. The most extensively documented individual was Yamashika Yoshiyuki 山鹿良之 (1901–1996), one of the last representatives of the tradition of blind biwa players, who was known among researchers and folklorists for his skill in performing and an abundant repertory that included rites and a great many tales. Yamashika was born in 1901 in a farmer family in Ōhara of Tamana District, the present-day Kobaru of Nankan, Kumamoto Prefecture. Yamashika lost the sight in his left eye at the age of four. At the age of twenty-two Yamashika apprenticed with a biwa player named Ezaki Shotarō 江崎初太郎 from Amakusa. From his teacher Yamashika learned such tales as Miyako Gassen Chikushi Kudari 都合戦筑紫下り, Kikuchi Kuzure 菊池くづれ, Kugami Gassen くがみ合戦, Owari Sōdō 尾張騒動, Sumidagawa 隅田川 and Mochi Gassen 餅合戦. After three years Yamashika returned home. He was not capable of doing much farm work because his eyesight had deteriorated further by then. Yamashika decided to become a professional biwa player and dedicate his life to storytelling. However, in order to do so he had to increase the number of pieces in his repertory. For about a year Yamashika followed a performer named Mori Yoichi 森与一. Yamashika learned from him such tales as Ichi no Tani 一の谷, Ko-Atsumori 小敦盛, Azekakehime あぜかけ姫, Shuntokumaru 俊徳丸 and Oguri Hangan 小栗判官. Yamashika learned hashira-date 柱立て, which is performed during the Watamashi わたまし, from a performer named Kyōbutsu 教仏, and sanjū-butsu (or sanjū hotoke) 三十仏 from Sakamoto Saichi 坂本さいち. Yamashika kept learning stories and pieces for ritual performances from other biwa players and ritualists throughout his early performing life. From around 1970, he became one of the most popular biwa players from Kyushu due to his many public performances organized by local and central organizations, and publications that elucidated some aspects of the performer's life and the tradition he represented and practiced throughout his life. The translation of one ritual piece from his repertory, Watamashi わたまし, is presented in this paper.


It is a common belief that a family is the best environment for childcare. If a home, however, becomes a threatening environment for the child and remaining there may lead to disorders, it is necessary to change the environment. Most frequently, Family Courts decide to place children in residential care facilities, which take over functions of a family. This entails the problem of social orphanhood and searching for ways to compensate for care. In this article, the author outlines the issue of social orphanhood and its consequences. She draws attention to difficulties experienced by children who have been deprived of a permanent emotional bond. Also, one of the possible ways of supporting these children through establishing a relationship with a "positive adult figure" is analysed. The role of a befriended family seems of particular importance here.


To reduce the unemployment rate, Indonesia has focused since 2007 on the development of Vocational Education and Training (VET). VET is one of solutions that would enhance human resources quality in Indonesia, which has 262 million people. However, the number of unemployed graduates from vocational education is still high until 2019. It means there is something wrong in Indonesia's current VET system. Meanwhile in Germany, VET is a pillar of national education which is based on a dual system. This system is successful in Germany. As one of the biggest donor countries in promoting VET, Germany tries to introduce a dual education system through bilateral relations with developing countries such as Indonesia. Indonesia seems to need to try to develop VET base on dual education system through cooperation with Germany. Thus, the research question of this article is "why does Indonesia need to make a co-operation with Germany in developing VET based on a dual education system?' To answer the research question, this paper uses qualitative method which results in the following conclusion: Cooperation with Germany would open the opportunity for abundant human resources in Indonesia to fulfill a huge labor demand in Germany particularly and Europe in general. Moreover, the cooperation makes Indonesia gain support in developing the VET system in this country and get transfer of knowledge and technology from Germany as a developed country


Background: The main aim of the study was extract the health utility value of coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19) disease.Methods: In a cross-sectional study in Iran, 320 randomly selected treated patients from COVID-19 is studied. To collect the required data, we applied a questionnaire that included socio-demographic factors, clinical characteristics, and questions on the patients' Health-Related Quality of Life (HRQoL). Time trade-off (TTO) approach is used to measure the lost HRQoL attributed to COVID-19. Besides, we applied a two-limit Tobit regression model to determine the effects of the socio-demographic factors on the patients' health utility and used the visual analogue scale approach to estimate the perceived total current health status.Results: The overall mean (SE) and median (IQR) of the health utility values were 0.863 (0.01) and 0.909 (0.21), respectively. This values for those who were willing to trade time in exchange for perfect health estimated at 0.793 (0.01) and 0.848 (0.17), respectively. The lowest amount of utility value were belonged to the elderly (mean (SE) = 0.742 (0.04); median (IQR) = 0.765 (0.42)) and those lived in rural (mean (SE)) = 0.804 (0.03); median (IQR) = 0.877 (0.30)). The univariate analysis shows that age, location living, and household size factors have a statistically significant effect on the health utility. The regression model's findings indicate that the participants' age and hospitalization status were the key determinants of COVID-19 health utility value.Conclusion: COVID-19 is associated with a substantial and measurable diminution in HRQoL. This diminution in HRQoL can be directly compared with that induced by systemic health states.


Study Design. In vitro investigation of vertebral endplate chondrocyte apoptosis. Objectives. To determine whether Fas antibody caused apoptosis in endplate chondrocytes, and whether insulin-like growth factor-1 (IGF-1) inhibited this effect. Integrin-ā1 and focal adhesion kinase (FAK) expression in conjunction with apoptosis was also investigated. Summary of Background Data. Binding of Fas antibody to Fas mimics Fas-FasL ligation, which causes apoptosis. IGF-1 has been shown to have anti-apoptotic effects. Materials and Methods. Rat cervical endplate chondrocytes were cultured and treated with Fas antibody, with or without IGF-1. Cellular morphology was examined by microscopy. Apoptotic changes were evaluated by transmission electron microscopy, TUNEL staining, and immunostaining. Apoptosis-induced changes in the expression of integrin-ā1 chain and FAK were also investigated. Results. Endplate chondrocytes were able to be cultured; a chondrocytic phenotype was maintained. Fas antibody induced apoptosis in endplate chondrocytes; this was confirmed by TUNEL staining. Bcl-2 expression was decreased by Fas antibody, while Bax expression increased. Integrin-ā1 and FAK expression was decreased by Fas antibody. IGF-1 treatment inhibited these Fas antibody-induced changes. Conclusions. Fas antibody induces apoptosis and decreases Integrin-ā1 and FAK expression in cultured endplate chondrocytes; IGF-1 is protective against these changes.


A fully automated procedure is presented for kinetic determinations and for use of the AutoAnalyzer in their study; serum lactic dehydrogenase has been used to illustrate such an application. The LDH-catalyzed oxidation of L-lactate by NAD in separate, unequal timedelay coils is determined by measuring the natural fluorescence of reduced coenzyme. The normal range for LDH activity by this method was 63-169 U/liter at 37#{176}C.


Studies were carried out on the effect of plant growth regulators on bollworm infestation and plant growth of cotton under field conditions. New cotton variety (CRIS-134) was sown in randomized block design with seven treatments including control (check) and was replicated three times on May 22, 2004. Mepiquate chloride, Acetyl salicylic acid and Naphthalene acetic acid (plant growth regulators) were applied on 10 th , 25 th August and 9 th September 2004.The results indicated that there was no significant effect of either removal of leaves and fruiting bodies of cotton plant and application of plant growth regulators on cotton plant height but significantly effect on volume of bolls and yield in comparison to control. Moreover, application of hormones significantly delayed the maturity of cotton. There was also significant effect of application of plant growth regulators on bollworm infestation compared with control treatments.


HIV-1 envelope (Env) glycoprotein is a trimer of heterodimer of gp120 and gp41, and derives from a trimeric glycoprotein precursor, gp160. Gp120 contains five conserved regions that are interspersed with 5 variable loop regions (V1–V5). Env variations in variable loop length and amino acid composition may associate with virus pathogenesis, virus sensitivity to neutralizing antibodies (nAbs) and disease progression. To investigate the role of each variable loop in Env function, we generated a panel of JRFL gp160 loop deletion mutants and examined the effects of each loop deletion on Env expression, Env cell surface display and Env-mediated virus entry into permissive cells. We found that deletion of V1 and V2 (ΔV1V2), or loop D (ΔlpD) abolished virus entry, the same effect as deletion of V3 (ΔV3), while deletion of V3 crown (ΔV3C) significantly enhanced virus assembly and entry. We further found that deletion of V4 (ΔV4) or V5 (ΔV5), or replacement of V4 or V5 with flexible linkers of the same lengths knocked out the receptor and coreceptor binding sites in gp120, but significantly enhanced the exposure of the N-trimer structure and the membrane proximal external region (MPER) in gp41. Although deletion of V4 or V5 did not affect Env expression, they negatively affected Env cell surface display, leading to the failure in virus assembly and subsequent entry. Taken together, we found that Env variable loops were indispensable for Env structural integrity and virus entry. Our findings may have implications for development of HIV-1 vaccine immunogens and therapeutics.


Ethernet is the most widely used network and many analytical models were developed to predict its capacity. Usually in these models assumptions like infinite population, no back-off algorithm and slotted channel are made. By comparing two models (one slotted and the other non-slotted) with reported measurements, we showed the optimistic estimate of the channel capacity of the slotted model is not due to slotting the channel as believed in the literature but due to other assumptions. Finally, the effect of difference between IEEE 802.3 and Ethernet DIX version 1 regarding preamble sending (IEEE 802.3 completes sending the preamble and then sends the jam signal while Ethernet DIX version 1 aborts sending the preamble and sends the jam signal immediately) on degrading the channel capacity was analyzed.


In our recent work on concatenative speech synthesis, we have devised an efficient, graph-based search to perform unit selection given symbolic information. By encapsulating concatenation and substitution costs defined at the class level, the graph expands only linearly with respect to corpus size. To date, these costs were manually tuned over pre-specified classes, which was a knowledgeintensive engineering process. In this research paper, we turn to information-theoretic metrics for automatically learning the costs from data. These costs can be analyzed in a minimum description length (MDL) framework. The performance of these automatically determined weights is compared against that of manually tuned weights in a perceptual evaluation.


This study investigates the relationship between tax payment and governance among firms listed on the Sao Paulo Stock Exchange (BM&FBovespa). To determine whether there is a correlation between corporate governance and payment of taxes, it is evaluated the allocation of the added value generated by the firms between 2005 and 2009, using a sample of companies ranked as among Brazil's 500 largest public companies according to the magazine Exame Melhores e Maiores that also have Statements of Value Added (SVAs). The results indicate that firms listed for trading in special segments of the BM&FBovespa requiring higher governance levels allocate a lower percentage of their added value to pay taxes in comparison with other listed companies. This study can contribute to new research into the theme of corporate governance and taxation, such as to evaluate the relation between governance and taxation in specific economic sectors or whether or not firms with good governance are more likely to receive tax incentives. Overall, the results add insight into one way that governance can help improve firm performance and
increase shareholder value.


This textbook originated in my research Reconfigurable Rectangular to Polar Converter using Linear Convergence for Multiband and Multimode Wireless Communications submitted at the Panjab University, Chandigarh (India). The book covers the transitional area between low frequency and high frequency wireless circuits. Specifically, it introduces the fundamental physical principles related to the operation of a typical wireless radio communication system. The intended audience for this book are, primarily, senior engineering students preparing for research in wireless communication systems. At the same time, my hope is that graduate engineering students will find this book a useful reference for some of the topics that have been only touched upon in the previous stages of their education, or are explained from a different point of view. Finally, the research students may find this book a handy source for the quick answers that are routinely omitted from most textbooks. For their knowledge, a detailed study of designing wireless transmitter architectures using MATLAB/Simulink and System Generator software, synthesis with ISE 10.1 software and implementation on Virtex-2 Xilinx FPGA is given.


Kaposi´s sarcoma is a tumor characterized by purple or brownish lesions affecting the skin. It is most commonly associated with human herpes virus type 8 (HHV-8) infection and may be secondary to malignant hemopathy, including lymphomas. We here report a new case of a very rare combination: Kaposi´s disease-multiple myeloma. The study involved Mr. aged 67 years, treated for Kaposi´s disease in the Department of Dermatology. Serological test for HHV-8 was positive; it was associated with stage I multiple myeloma IgG Lambda with a poor prognosis. We here report this 21st case of Kaposi-Kahler in order to highlight Kaposi-human herpes 8 virus variant involved in the pathophysiology of multiple myeloma. More studies are needed in order to establish this exceptional link.


This paper deals with historical development of industrial Tribology in India. The Indian industry is facing tough challenges from various others countries in different areas. Environmental challenges, government pressure to improve efficiencies, urgent technological advancement requirement, emission cut from tribological and lubricating systems. A brief review of industrial development in India is outlined in this paper. Green Tribology and its benefit are also discussed in this paper. Industrial development is viewed and it is related with different organization. It is concluded that a new contract need to be worked out between industry and academic which guarantees development of new and fundamental knowledge while ensuring solution of technological problem which provides competitive edge to industry.


Background Bladder cancer (BC) is a highly heterogeneous disease, which makes the prognostic prediction challenging. Ferroptosis is related to a variety of biological pathways, including those involved in the metabolism of amino acids, lipids, and iron. However, the prognostic value of ferroptosis-related genes in BC remains to be further elucidated. Methods In this study, the mRNA expression profiles and corresponding clinical data of BC patients were downloaded from public databases. The least absolute shrinkage and selection operator (LASSO) Cox regression model was utilized to construct a multigene signature and validated it. Results Our results showed 12 differentially expressed genes (DEGs) were correlated with overall survival (OS) in the univariate Cox regression analysis (all adjusted P< 0.05). A 9-gene signature was constructed to stratify patients into two risk groups. Patients in the high-risk group showed significantly reduced OS compared with patients in the low-risk group (P < 0.001). The risk score was an independent predictor for OS in multivariate Cox regression analyses (HR> 1, P< 0.01). Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve analysis confirmed the signature's predictive capacity. Functional analysis revealed that immune-related pathways were enriched, and immune status were different between two risk groups, especially in humoral immune response process. Conclusion In conclusion, a novel ferroptosis-related gene signature can be used for prognostic prediction in BC. Targeting ferroptosis may be a therapeutic alternative for BC.


OBJECTIVE
to describe the profile of recreational adult soccer players who lived in the Brazilian capitals in the period from 2011 to 2015.

METHODS
descriptive study with a sample of adults interviewed by the Surveillance System for Risk and Protective Factors for Chronic Diseases by Telephone Survey - VIGITEL (2011 to 2015).

RESULTS
11.812 adults (11.375 men and 437 women) pointed to soccer as their main leisure physical exercise, with higher prevalence in the North region (32%) and lower in the South region (10%) of the country; the average reduction of soccer players 3.4% for every 5 years over age (95%CI 2.9;4.1); from 2011 to 2015, there was decrease in the number of soccer players, -1.4% per year (95%CI -0,7;2,2).

CONCLUSION
the practice of soccer was predominantly male, presented an inverse relationship with the increase of age, more prevalent in the Northern region and less prevalent in the Southern region.


Increasingly stringent throughput and latency requirements in datacenter networks demand fast and accurate congestion control. We observe that the reaction time and accuracy of existing datacenter congestion control schemes are inherently limited. They either rely only on explicit feedback about the network state (e.g., queue lengths in DCTCP) or only on variations of state (e.g., RTT gradient in TIMELY). To overcome these limitations, we propose a novel congestion control algorithm, P OWER TCP, which achieves much more fine-grained congestion control by adapting to the bandwidth-window product (henceforth called power). P OWER TCP leverages in-band network telemetry to react to changes in the network instantaneously without loss of throughput and while keeping queues short. Due to its fast reaction time, our algorithm is particularly well-suited for dynamic network environments and bursty traffic patterns. We show analytically and empirically that P OWER TCP can significantly outperform the state-of-the-art in both traditional datacenter topologies and emerging reconfigurable datacenters where frequent bandwidth changes make congestion control challenging. In traditional datacenter networks, P OWER TCP reduces tail flow completion times of short flows by 80% compared to DCQCN and TIMELY, and by 33% compared to HPCC even at 60% network load. In reconfigurable datacenters, P OWER TCP achieves 85% circuit utilization without incurring additional latency and cuts tail latency by at least 2x compared to existing approaches.


Introduction: Dysmenorrhea, as one of the most common gynecologic problems in women, is characterized by pain in the lower abdomen, which disrupts normal life. The aim of this study was to investigate the effects of Pilates training on the severity and duration of dysmenorrheal pain and duration of bleeding in young girls. Methods: Thirty young girls with the mean age of 22.21 ± 1.71 years, body mass index (BMI) of 23.89 ± 1.41 kg/m2 and fatigue score of 29.22 ± 3.71 were selected and randomly divided into two groups of Pilates training (n = 15) and control group (n = 15). At 24 hours before and 48 hours after the last exercise session, weight, BMI, fat percentage, severity and duration of dysmenorrheal pain and duration of bleeding were evaluated using McGill Pain Questionnaire and pain numerical rating scale. The experimental group performed the Pilates training protocol for eight weeks (three sessions per week). To analyze the data, independent t-test and Levene's test were run in SPSS, version 16. The significance level was set at P-value less than 0.05. Results: Weight, body fat percentage and BMI were not significantly different before and after eight weeks of Pilates training (P=0.06). In addition, there was no significant difference in the control group in this regard during this period (P=0.20). After eight weeks of Pilates training, a significant decrease in pain intensity scale was noted. After eight weeks of Pilates training, there was a significant difference in the intensity of pain (P=0.001) and duration of dysmenorrhea (P=0.019) between the training and control groups, but the duration of bleeding did not show a significant difference (P=0.893). Conclusion: The results of this study indicated that eight weeks of Pilates training could be useful in reducing pain intensity and duration of dysmenorrheal pain, while not affecting the duration of bleeding.


This paper introduces a notation for business process modelling and shows how it can be used for static verication of business processes under the assumption of single instance executions. Our approach is based on formalizing business process models as o wnomial expressions [4]) and evaluating them over boolean relations. Its main advantage is simplicity: it is based on evaluating algebraic expressions to boolean relations. But it is also more restrictive then other approaches because, basically, it can only indicate those input patterns that provided to a process can cause it to enter an innite loop without escape or a resource starvation. Nevertheless, this is useful within a tool to check processes, in order to point out problems as early as possible, before running any dynamic simulation.


Seeds of Nigella sativa (black cumin/kalonji) used in pickles as spice, have also been traditionally used in treatment of many diseases including diabetes and hypertension. Among many activities exhibited by N. sativa and its constituents in animal experiments, antidiabetic property is most important. Thymoquinone (TQ), a volatile oil, is one of its active constituents but antidiabetic activity has also been shown by its aqueous extract and defatted extract. N. sativa may be beneficial in diabetic individuals and those with glucose intolerance as it reduces appetite, glucose absorption in intestine, hepatic gluconeogenesis, blood glucose level, cholesterol, triglycerides, body weight and simulates glucose induced secretion of insulin from beta-cells in pancreas; improves glucose tolerance as efficiently as metformin; yet it has not shown significant adverse effects and has very low toxicity. In streptozotocin (STZ) induced diabetic rats it causes gradual partial regeneration of pancreatic beta-cells, increases the lowered serum insulin concentrations and decreases the elevated serum glucose. N. sativa has antioxidant activity and protective role of TQ against development of type I diabetes may be via NO inhibitory pathway. It also exerts an insulin-sensitizing action in hepatocytes. Seeds of N. sativa have been safely consumed by human patients in many clinical trials which however were not aimed to assess its antidiabetic activity. In future clinical studies may show potential of N. sativa , its constituents or their s ynthetic analogues, in prevention and control of diabetes. J Endocrinol Metab. 2011;1(1):1-8 doi: https://doi.org/10.4021/jem12e


Iraq's health minister, Dr Khudair Abbas, is determined to transform Iraq's health services even though it leaves him exposed to danger

Iraq's interim health minister, Dr Khudair Abbas—like any other Iraqi working closely with the US led Coalition Provisional Authority—is a natural target for attacks.

Far from the east London suburbs, where the 54 year old worked as a general and orthopaedic surgeon until he was appointed to Iraq's ministerial council in September, his four mile journey to work in Baghdad is a reminder that he can never feel safe.

"There are guards at home. I travel to the ministry in a convoy, taking different routes and different timing," Dr Abbas said in an interview in Geneva, where he was attending the World Health Assembly. "Constant awareness of security has become part of my life," he added.

Dr Abbas was born and raised in the southern city of Basra. He qualified at the University of Baghdad in 1972 and came to Britain in 1979, where he became a fierce opponent of the Iraq-Iran war, which led to his 23 years' exile.

In 1990, he became a fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons, Edinburgh, and took up a surgeon's …


The application of Artificial Intelligence (AI) methods in the petroleum industry gain traction in recent years. In this paper, Deep Reinforcement Learning (RL) by pixel data is used to maximize the Net Present Value (NPV) of waterflooding by changing the water injection rate. This work is the first step towards showing that learning from pixel information offers many benefits, for example, understanding the reservoir's physics directly by measuring changes in pressure and saturation distribution without taking into consideration reservoir petrophysical property and the total amount of wells with corresponding locations.
 The optimization is tested on the 2D model, which is a vertical section of the SPE 10 model. It has been shown that RL is able to optimize waterflooding in a 2D compressible reservoir with the 2-phase flow (oil-water) by means of pixel data. In the first few thousands of updates, optimization remains in the baseline NPV since it takes more time to converge from raw pixel data than to use classical well production/injection rate information.
 The reservoir NPV increased by 15 percent as a result of optimization, where the optimum scenario results in less watercut and more stable production. Additionally, we evaluated the impact of choosing the action set for optimization and examined two cases where water injection well can change injection pressure with a step of 200 psi and 600 psi. The results show that in the second case, AI optimization is exploiting the limitation of the reservoir simulator and tries to imitate a cycled injection regime, which results in a 7% higher NPV than the first case.


The article analyzes social and economic features, employment, well-being and housing conditions of the Azerbaijani migrants who came to Russia in 2014-2017. The empirical basis of the study is the data of a Russian nationwide survey of migrants. The survey was conducted by the National Research University Higher School of Economics and the Centre for Inter-Ethnic Studies in 19 subjects of the Russian Federation. A total of 8,577 respondents were interviewed; 4.5% of them were Azerbaijanis (388 respondents).  To assess the integration resources of the Azerbaijani migrants the author examines their status as compared to other migrants and the local population. The study reveals that, unlike Central Asian ethnic groups, Azerbaijanis have more favorable positions in all spheres of social life, and it proves their high integration potential especially in a demanding Russian society. This in turn decreases the importance of their cultural distinctiveness and facilitates further integration and immersion in the local communities.
Acknowledgment. The study was part of the projects carried out by the Centre for Inter-Ethnic Studies of the Institute of Sociology (Russian Academy of Sciences).


Mitochondrial dysfunction is considered to be a major cause of primary mitochondrial myopathy in children and adults, as reduced mitochondrial respiration and morphological changes such as ragged red fibers (RRFs) are observed in muscle biopsies. However, it is also possible to hypothesize the role of mitochondrial dysfunction in aging muscle or in secondary mitochondrial dysfunctions. The recognition of true histological patterns of mitochondrial myopathy can avoid unnecessary genetic investigations. The aim of our study was to develop and validate machine-learning methods for RRF detection in light microscopy images of skeletal muscle tissue. We used image sets of 489 color images captured from representative areas of Gomori's trichrome-stained tissue retrieved from light microscopy images at a 20× magnification. We compared the performance of random forest, gradient boosting machine, and support vector machine classifiers. Our results suggested that the advent of scanning technologies, combined with the development of machine-learning models for image classification, make neuromuscular disorders' automated diagnostic systems a concrete possibility.


Sediment transport in oscillatory boundary layers is a process that drives coastal geomorphological change. Most formulae for bed–load transport in nearshore regions subsume the smallest–scale physics of the phenomena by parametrizing interactions amongst particles. In contrast, we directly simulate granular physics in the wave–bottom boundary layer using a discrete–element model comprised of a three–dimensional particle phase coupled to a one–dimensional fluid phase via Newton's third law through forces of buoyancy, drag and added mass. The particulate sediment phase is modelled using discrete particles formed to approximate natural grains by overlapping two spheres. Both the size of each sphere and the degree of overlap can be varied for these composite particles to generate a range of non–spherical grains. Simulations of particles having a range of shapes showed that the critical angle—the angle at which a grain pile will fail when tilted slowly from rest—increases from approximately 26° for spherical particles to nearly 39° for highly non–spherical composite particles having a dumbbell shape. Simulations of oscillatory sheet flow were conducted using composite particles with an angle of repose of approximately 33° and a Corey shape factor greater than about 0.8, similar to the properties of beach sand. The results from the sheet–flow simulations with composite particles agreed more closely with laboratory measurements than similar simulations conducted using spherical particles. The findings suggest that particle shape may be an important factor for determining bed–load flux, particularly for larger bed slopes.


The Landry-Guillain-Barré Strohl Syndrome (LGBS) or Guillain-Barré syndrome (GBS) is an acute, frequently severe, potentially fatal, and fulminant polyradiculopathy. It is an autoimmune illness, which usually occurs as a sequela of certain known infections. In this case report, we are discussing the case of a 12-year-old girl who was managed in the ICU for LGBS successfully and recovered promptly. This case highlights the importance of timely administration of intravenous immunoglobulin (IVIG) therapy, which resulted in prompt recovery, reduced duration of ICU stay, and morbidity.


Mid-air haptic feedback technology produces tactile sensations that are felt without the need for physical interactions. However, mid-air haptic experiences need to be congruent with visual cues to reflect user expectations. To overcome this, we investigate how to visually present properties of objects, so that what one feels is a more accurate prediction of what one sees. Specifically, this paper investigates the relationship between 8 visual parameters of a point-cloud representation of a surface (particle color, size, distribution, etc.) and 4 mid-air haptic spatial modulation frequencies (20, 40, 60 and 80 Hz). Our results and analysis reveal a statistical significance between low and high-frequency modulations and particle density, particle bumpiness (depth) and particle arrangement (randomness).


Mohsinally, Tasneem M. Ph.D., Purdue University, May 2015. An Investigation into the Phenomenological Relation between Solar Activity and Nuclear Beta-Decay Rates. Major Professor: Ephraim Fischbach. We investigate experimental evidence for time-varying nuclear decay rates, in contrast to the widely-accepted view that nuclear decaying isotopes disintegrate at a constant rate unaffected by external conditions. We study several past cases of radioactive isotopes exhibiting annual periodicities in their decay rates, presumably related to the annual variation in Earth-Sun distance. Following recent indications of shorter-lived anomalies in Mn decay rates concomitant with an X-class flare in 2006, we attempt to design and develop a series of unique signal detection algorithms to identify regions of anomalous activity in a nuclear decay signal. With stringent threshold cut-offs and filtering processes, these regions are isolated as exhibiting statistically significant deviations from an expected exponential decay model. The isolated decay flags are compared to daily distributions of multiple solar indices associated with heightened flare activity. We present the findings from a 2 year period of data collection on Mn . Of the several computational checks performed to verify the validity of these results, none were able to produce values as good as those generated from the actual decay measurements.


Luminescence thermometry is one of the most promising techniques of temperature sensing which provides fast and accurate readout in the non-contact regime. It has been shown that among six classes of thermometers, the most reliable are the ones whose operation is based on the kinetics of an excited level. In this work, we report luminescent thermometers based on the rise and decay times of Mn3+ and Mn4+ emission in co-doped nanocrystals. In order to understand the impact of the crystallographic structure on the relative sensitivities, five different hosts, namely Gd3Al5O12, Gd3Ga5O12, Lu3Al5O12, YAlO3 and Y3Al5O12 co-doped with manganese ions were considered in the analysis. Straightforward correlation between the obtained values of the decay time τ1 of the 2E excited state of Mn4+, the relative sensitivities of the rise time- and decay time-based luminescent thermometers and the average M–O (R−5) distances were found and discussed in terms of crystal field strength effects. The present study enables knowledgeable and intentional design of highly sensitive luminescent thermometers based on the kinetics of excited states.


The recycling of e-waste materials potentially contaminates the environment with heavy metals. Analysing the exact contents of heavy metal in e-waste products is germane for the routine monitoring, risk assessment and regulation of the environment. Therefore, the efficiency of three methods of digestion was evaluated for Cd, Fe, Pb, Cr and Zn by AAS in surface dust from an e-waste recycling site and to recommend the most efficient digestion method. The digestion methods were aqua regia, dry ashing followed by aqua regia and nitric acid digestion followed by extraction with HCl. Analysis of variance, Student's t-test and F-test were performed separately for the indoor, outdoor and control dust samples analytical result. Analytical results indicated that the nitric acid digestion followed by extraction with HCl was the most efficient in recovering Pb and Fe based on recovery efficiency. Aqua regia was found to be an alternative method for recovering Pb and Fe based on cost and time effectiveness. Aqua regia was the most efficient in recovering Zn while aqua regia and nitric acid digestion followed by extraction with HCl were satisfactory for the recovery of Cd. Dry ashing followed by aqua regia was found unsuitable for the analysis of these metals in the samples because it recovers relatively little heavy metals and more analysis time. [Ehi-Eromosele Cyril Osereme, Adaramodu Adebayo Abraham, Anake Winifred Uduak, Ajanaku Christina, Edobor-Osoh Abiola. Comparison of Three Methods of Digestion for Trace Metal Analysis in Surface Dust Collected From an E-waste Recycling Site. Nat Sci 2012;10(10):42-47]. (ISSN: 1545-0740). http://www.sciencepub.net/nature. 7


In nature, most of the systems are nonlinear. But, most of them are thought as linear and the control structures are realized with linear approach. Because, linear control methods are so strong to define the stability of the systems. However, linear control gives poor results in large operation range and the effects of hard nonlinearities cannot be derived from linear methods. Furthermore, designing linear controller, there must not be uncertainties on the parameters of system model because this causes performance degradation or instability. For that reasons, the nonlinear control are chosen. Nonlinear control methods also provide simplicity of the controller (Slotine & Li, 1991).


Energy saving technologies in the railway vehicle traction field can be mainly categorized into two domains: reducing loss and increasing the regenerative energy. Energy saving technologies for the traction equipment by the use of power converters with less loss and high‐efficiency permanent magnet synchronous motors are introduced. The regenerative brake related technologies are also presented as another measure to save the energy, including the improvement of the regenerative brake control and application of energy storage devices. It is concluded that the benefit of the energy saving technology is not only the energy saving itself but also downsizing traction equipments and reducing the maintenance work in the electrical railway system. Copyright © 2010 Institute of Electrical Engineers of Japan. Published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.