An experimental work is carried out for air-water system in 1-2 shell and tube heat exchanger with variable configuration for the passage of heating and test fluids with parallel and countercurrent flow. Two-phase parameters such as quality, LockhartMartinelli (L-M) parameter and two-phase multiplier were determined. Results showed that the heat transfer coefficient increases with quality for two-phase flow for the range of Reynolds number and quality studied. The L-M parameter is inversely proportional to quality. The two-phase multiplier shows a decreasing trend with increase in L-M parameter as reported in m literature, Salcuden et al. [1] From the correlation h = a N , the heat transfer coefficient for two-phase flow can be predicted 1 Re using the Lockhart-Martinelli parameter Quality correlation with an error of less than 12%.


Circadian rhythms of mitoses were studied in the epithelium of the cornea and esophagus of rats given hydrocortisone. The hormone was injected daily during 7 days at 4-5 p.m., i.e. at the height of the blood glucocorticoid content within the circadian rhythm. The tissues of experimental rats, manifested biphasic rhythms of mitoses as compared with monophasic rhythms seen in intact animals. The amplitude and daily average magnitudes of the mitotic index were unchanged.


Gymnema sylvestre R.Br., a pharmacologically important herb vernacularly called Gur-Mar (sugar eliminator), is widely known for its antidiabetic action. This property of the herb has been attributed to the presence of bioactive triterpene glycosides. Although some information regarding pharmacology and phytochemical profiles of the plant are available, no attempts have been made so far to decipher the biosynthetic pathway and key enzymes involved in biosynthesis of steryl glucosides. The present report deals with the identification and catalytic characterization of a glucosyltransferase, catalyzing biosynthesis of steryl glycosides. The full length cDNA (2572 bp) contained an open reading frame of 2106 nucleotides that encoded a 701 amino acid protein, falling into GT-B subfamily of glycosyltransferases. The GsSGT was expressed in Escherichia coli and biochemical characterization of the recombinant enzyme suggested its key role in the biosynthesis of steryl glucosides with catalytic preference for C-3 hydroxyl group of sterols. To our knowledge, this pertains to be the first report on cloning and biochemical characterization of a sterol metabolism gene from G. sylvestre R.Br. catalyzing glucosylation of a variety of sterols of biological origin from diverse organisms such as bacteria, fungi, and plants.


In order to elucidate the effects of nanomechanical stimulation on the regulation of cellular functions, we have been developing a cell culture microdevice integrated with piezoelectric thin film actuators. In this paper, we propose a new geometric configuration of the device to allow cell culture on a relatively flat surface and in an open space. An improved fabrication process for PZT actuators overcame a serious problem that sometimes occurred in the previous process; photoresist patterned on PZT film cannot be completely removed due to its degradation in a dry etching process. Then we demonstrate the driving performance of a fabricated prototype microdevice. Moreover, individual cells can be arranged precisely in the desired positions of the PZT actuators by a positive dielectrophoretic force at frequencies above 100 kHz with an application of an AC voltage of 20 Vpp.


The proposed Invention in Science Labs (ISL) framework conceptualizes invention within science labs through four elements representing phases of reaching inventions in a group context: Theoretical thinking: fluency, flexibility, and originality, solution, materials and context. Four phases should lead to a product that can be commercialized, while the whole process monitored through four procedures under the teacher's supervising the activities: Objectives, Procedures, Discussion, and Evaluation. The study listed the challenges faced during the implementation of ISL which can be overcome if policy makers have the awareness of using ISL in teaching, while teachers can change their approaches of instruction when they have the opportunity to practice it. Besides, the Jordanian Ministry of Education in general can conduct contests between students and schools to have more inventions which encourages using ISL framework. The study also proposed appropriate solutions for overcoming those challenges.


The commercial success and acceptability of 3D technology will critically depend on the overall visual quality of the rendered images. Therefore, view synthesis techniques like Depth Image Based Rendering (DIBR) are crucial components of the 3D system chain. In this paper, we propose a fast α-model based approach that enables high quality DIBR. Given an image and depth map, a point based representation of the scene is obtained, where each point is associated with color, transparency and depth. A low complexity method estimates these attributes, making the system suitable for deployment in consumer electronics.


Publication of King's A Solution to the Ecological Inference Problem has rekindled interest in the estimation of unknown cell values in two- and three-dimensional matrices from knowledge of the marginal sums. This paper outlines an entropy-maximizing (EM) procedure which employs more constraints than King's EI method and produces mathematical rather than statistical procedures: the estimates are maximum-likelihood values. The mathematics are outlined, and the procedure's use illustrated with a study of ticket-splitting at New Zealand's first (1996) general election using the mixed-member proportional representation system, for which official figures provide a check against the EM estimate of the number voting a straight party ticket in each constituency.


This work describes the system presented by the CoAStaL Natural Language Processing group at University of Copenhagen. The main system we present uses the same attention mechanism presented in (Yang et al., 2016). Our overall model architecture is also inspired by their hierarchical classification model and adapted to deal with classification in dialogue by encoding information at the turn level. We use different encodings for each turn to create a more expressive representation of dialogue context which is then fed into our classifier.We also define a custom preprocessing step in order to deal with language commonly used in interactions across many social media outlets. Our proposed system achieves a micro F1 score of 0.7340 on the test set and shows significant gains in performance compared to a system using dialogue level encoding.


The text of this article is organized in two parts, the first on architecture as a discipline, and the second on the architect practicing it. The two parts mirror each other. References are made to the treatise De Architectura of Vitruvius in Ancient Rome, and to several important moments of the history and theory of twentieth-century art and architecture. The notion of venustas, beauty, appears all through the text, in dotted lines, suggesting that the disappearance of this old ideal might have left room for new expressions of beauty. Is this ideal differently understood and recreated today by the architect, or are we now confronted with its absence, as if we contemplated an empty frame left after the painting has been removed?


Objective To explore the correlation between Thymic Stromal Lymphopoietin (TSLP) and the Nuclear Factor- (NF-) κB signaling pathways in bronchial epithelial cells and to clarify whether the traditional Chinese medicine formula Yi-Qi-Ping-Chuan-Fang (YQPC) reduces inflammation by inhibiting TSLP/NF-κB signaling pathways. Methods Cells were stimulated with LPS + Poly(I:C) and treated with YQPC. The expressions of TSLP and NF-κB signaling pathways related proteins P65, IκK, IκBa, P-P65, P-IκK, P-IκBa were detected. The effects of NF-κB upstream molecules, Toll-like receptors 3 and 4, myeloid differentiation primary response gene 88 (Myd88), TIR-domain-containing adapter-inducing interferon-β (TRIF), and downstream inflammatory cytokines, TNF-α, IL-1β, IL-6, and IL-8, were assessed. Results The mRNA and protein expressions of TSLP were significantly increased after LPS + Poly(I:C) stimulation, the total protein IκBa and IκK decreased (P < 0.05), and the phosphorylated protein P-P65, P-IκK, and P-IκBα increased. After YQPC treatment, the expression of TSLP, P-P65, P-IκBa, and P-IκK was significantly inhibited (P < 0.05). The activation of TLR4 and MyD88 decreased, and release of IL-1β, IL-6, IL-8, and TNF-α reduced (P < 0.05). Conclusion In summary, the expression of TSLP is activated by the NF-κB signaling pathway. YQPC alleviated inflammation by inhibiting TSLP through regulating the NF-κB activation and translocation.


It is without doubt that there are many overviews of mixed methods research in supply chain management. However, there is relatively little research and representation on the application of robust methodological approaches and techniques that take into account the dynamic nature of a multi‑embedded and specialised medicine supply chain coordination (SCC) problem. In Uganda, the distribution of artemisinin‑based combination therapies (ACTs) involves a multi‑embedded supply chain that runs across the macro, market, and micro levels of stakeholders. The multi‑embedded levels have created a coordination challenge tied to stock‑outs and unavailability of ACTs to the detriment of the patients. This study aimed to: 1) demonstrate how a mixed methods approach facilitated a better understanding of a multi‑embedded and specialised supply chain coordination problem, and 2) reveal the major factors for coordinating a multi‑embedded supply chain that can improve the availability of ACTs in the general hospitals of Uganda. An exploratory sequential mixed method approach was employed to disentangle the problem. In the first phase, focus group discussions were predominantly used to collect qualitative data, the findings of which acted as the foundation for the quantitative survey questionnaire. A Confirmatory Factor Analysis was used to determine and validate the market and macro supply chain dimensions that emerged from the survey results. The results showed that the most influential supply chain market environment dimensions that affect the availability of ACTs include information sharing with external stakeholders and supply chain interdependence. The results from the macro‑environment showed that the socio‑cultural, economic, technological, and legal dimensions influence the availability of ACTs. The contribution of this paper advances the use of mixed methods in deconstructing a complex embedded supply chain problem with implications for supply chain academics and practitioners and government bodies.


This article interprets the narratives of sex manuals produced within the Malay-Indonesian archipelago before the coming of Western colonialism and the dawn of postcolonial Islamic resurgence. In the collection of Malaysian libraries and museums, these manuscripts are largely classified as Kitab Jimak and Kitab Tib. They are all written in the Malay language with indigenous references, though the contents are likely derived from a common genre of texts transmitted from an early Arab-Islamic world and circulated within the region before the coming of European colonialism. The corpora of sexual knowledge in these texts emphasises the valorisation of sexual pleasure in conjugal relationships. Through an extensive list of prescriptions—from sexual techniques to diet, food taboos, medicine, pharmacopoeia, mantras, charms, and astrological knowledge—a near-sacral sexual experience is aspired. Couples are guided in their attainment of pleasure (nikmat) through the adherence of Islamic ethics (akhlak), rules (hukum), and etiquette (tertib). The fulfilment of women's desire in the process is central in these observances. Nevertheless, despite placing much emphasis on mutual pleasure, these texts also contain ambiguous and paradoxical pronouncements on the position of women, wavering from veneration to misogyny. The article also highlights how intertextual studies of similar texts throughout the Islamic world can be a new focus of studies on the early history of gender and sexuality in Islam.


Abstract : A comprehensive performance analysis of ejector devices, which accounts for compressibility, heterogeneous operating media, and incidental flow losses under the simplifying assumptions of one-dimensional flow conditions and complete mixing at the end of the mixing section, leads to quite lengthy relations, which in part can be solved only by iteration. This report aims at arranging these relations in a way that they can be readily handled on a programmable desk calculator. The purpose is to study ejector devices on a basis as general as possible without sacrifice in accuracy. Various mixing modes, at constant area, at constant pressure, and at a defined pressure distribution are studied. An investigation of the optimum ejector reveals that an essential factor for the lay-out is the choice of the inlet Mach number ratio of the operating media. For constant area mixing the optimum ratio falls within a range, where the mixing mode has little influence on the performance. Thus the performance of constant pressure mixing, which is in general superior to that of constant area mixing, can be approached by constant area mixing if the inlet Mach number ratio is optimized. This is very important for supersonic ejectors since they do not allow the realization of constant pressure mixing due to the inherent presence of supersonic shocks during mixing.


This chapter aims to show that extending social health insurance is a possible road to universal health coverage in Nigeria. We suggest that allowing states to set up and operate their own insurance schemes, which presents a unique opportunity to swiftly scale up prepaid coverage for Nigerians. This paper review various healthcare insurance towards achieving universal health coverage in Nigeria. The paper concluded by suggesting other insurance scheme to be covered towards achieving universal coverage.


Abstract Objectives: This review systematically examines research that investigates changes in adult attachment representations during psychological therapy. Method: Studies from two adult attachment approaches are reviewed (interview and self-report) with the aim of concluding whether psychotherapy can improve attachment representations. To guide the interpretation of findings, the methodological quality of studies is assessed. Results: The results suggest that attachment security increases following therapy, whereas attachment anxiety decreases following therapy. Findings are unclear with regard to attachment avoidance. Improvements are observed across different methodologies, patient groups, therapeutic approaches, and therapy settings. Findings also appear to be consistent across different levels of study quality. Conclusions: Overall, research supports the suggestion that attachment styles may alter during the course of psychotherapy, but further controlled trials are required to confirm this conclusion.


In this work, we present an application of the method proposed by Fraley & Raftery (2002) to obtain groups of Venezuelan counties, using the information of socio-economic variables. The variables considered in the application includes some aspects related with the families that live in counties, such as occupation of its members, education, demographic aspects and others. For the analysis, we use the first six principal components taken from a previous analysis. A classification on nine groups was obtained, and the difference between these groups was influenced by the socioeconomic status, the access to some basic services and quality of life.


In this study, we evaluated cardiac myocyte viability and function under hypothermic conditions with four types of storage solutions, saline solution, Euro-Collins solution, University of Wisconsin solution, and MCDB 107 medium. Cardiac myocytes were isolated from neonatal rat ventricles by collagenase dispersion and cultured for 4 days with MCDB 107 medium. A total of 12.5 x 10(5) myocytes per culture dish was used and the myocytes were incubated at 4 degrees C for 6, 12, 18, and 24 hours in the various storage solutions. After each incubation time, creatine kinase and lactate dehydrogenase were measured in the storage solutions. The myocytes were then incubated for 24 hours at 37 degrees C to evaluate the recovery of the myocyte beating rate. In the MCDB 107 group (n = 7), the recovery ratio of myocyte beating rate was complete by 12 hours, then decreased to 44.8% of control (beating rate before hypothermic incubation) at 24 hours. The saline, Euro-Collins, and University of Wisconsin groups (n = 7 each) had significantly lower recovery ratios than the MCDB 107 group (at 12 hours: 61.0%, 32.2%, and 48.9%; at 18 hours: 0.0%, 5.5%, and 15.1% of control, respectively). Release of creatine kinase and lactate dehydrogenase in the MCDB 107 group gradually increased and at 24 hours was 143.2 mIU/flask and 486.2 mIU/flask, respectively. However, the saline and University of Wisconsin groups had significantly increased creatine kinase and lactate dehydrogenase values at 24 hours (creatine kinase: 334.6 and 319.6 mIU/flask; lactate dehydrogenase: 821.6 and 654.4 mIU/flask, respectively). The Euro-Collins group showed the greatest increase in both markers (creatine kinase: 1587.5, lactate dehydrogenase: 2106.9 mIU/flask). In summary, saline and University of Wisconsin solutions showed a beneficial effect on recovery of myocyte viability at 12 hours compared with Euro-Collins solution, however MCDB 107 medium had the best overall protective effect on cultured myocytes. Accordingly, alternate hypothermic storage solutions, such as cell-culture medium, may have protective characteristics that are suitable for cardiac preservation.


A simple inorganic system has been developed for the sol–gel synthesis of piezoelectric PZT–glass nanocomposites. Nanocrystalline PZT are nucleated from the amorphous xerogel through controlled heat treatment at 600°C. The formation of the crystalline phase, particle size, morphology, kinetics, and mechanism of crystallization of PZT in the glass matrix have been studied using X-ray diffraction, scanning electron microscopy, and differential thermal analysis. The piezoelectric characteristics of the PZT–glass compositions have been determined, and are correlated with the microstructure and the crystalline phase of PZT.


Many questions plague graduate students as they begin the transition from doctoral student to faculty member. While current mentors (e.g., advisors and faculty members) and future colleagues are integral to the process, it is also the responsibility of the preceding wave of recent graduates to act as informal guides, assisting students through the transition in an unbiased manner. Areas of particular interest to the soon-to-be professorate include: (a) preparing for the job search and faculty interview, (b) navigating the final stages of the dissertation process, and (c) the transition from student to professor. In addition to these key factors, the individual's integration into a new (a) location, (b) program/department, and (c) institution including new ideas, ideals, and philosophies are a vital part of an individual's metamorphosis (Marino & Yost, 1998). While the former tends to be addressed through various internal channels, the latter is often overlooked until the individual joins his or her respective faculty. As such, a panel of junior faculty members with diverse backgrounds and current appointments at various 'types' of academic institutions has been assembled to share their experiences and assist (i.e., mentor) doctoral students along this journey.


Reviewing the extensive experience with bacteremia caused by enterobacteria at the Boston City Hospital, Finland and Barnes (p 1183) have concluded that a relationship between antibiotic-supplemented animal feeds and human health hazard has not been established. The impetus for this analysis stems from the recently implemented Swann report 1 in Great Britain and the recommendations by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Task Force on the Use of Antibiotics in Animal Feeds. 2 Both reports have underscored the potential human health hazard resulting from antibiotic-induced bacterial resistance in domestic animals. Historically, animal feeds supplemented with low levels of antibiotics have been used since 1949. Data have accumulated suggesting growth promotion, increased egg production and hatchability in poultry, and increased meatfeed ratios in swine, cattle, and sheep. As a result, consumption of antibiotics by farm animals rivals in tonnage and cost that by humans. Economic and environmental factors dictate rapid resolution


In the field of chemistry there has been considerable interest in discovering the reasons why many students have great difficulty in successfully developing a scientifically accepted understanding of chemical equilibrium. Research projects influenced and inspired by constructivism have been invaluable for identifying alternative conceptions that may turn into obstacles to meaningful learning of fundamental ideas regarding chemical equilibrium. Research findings provide evidence that misunderstandings of and related to chemical equilibrium are widespread at various levels of education, including prospective chemistry teachers. Language used in textbooks may give rise, or reinforce student alternative conceptions and research findings point to a direct relationship between language used in textbooks and some of the alternative conceptions students develop at various levels of school chemistry. Some of the students' alternative conceptions already identified, and available in literature, were the basis of an instrument devised to analyse chemistry textbooks used in secondary and tertiary education. This paper presents and discusses typical problematic language found in student textbooks in the light of students' current frameworks of understanding as described in literature. [Chem. Educ. Res. Pract. Eur.: 2000, 1, 227-236]


This paper concerns the questions of flexibility and rigidity of solutions to the Monge-Amp\`ere equation which arises as a natural geometrical constraint in prestrained nonlinear elasticity. In particular, we focus on anomalous i.e. "flexible" weak solutions that can be constructed through methods of convex integration \`a la Nash & Kuiper and establish the related h-principle for the Monge-Amp\`ere equation in two dimensions


BACKGROUND
Microbe-binding peptides (MBPs) are currently being investigated to address the problem of antimicrobial resistance. Strategies enhancing their antimicrobial activity have been developed, including peptide dimerization. Here, we present an alternative approach based on peptide polymerization, yielding hapten-labelled polymeric MBPs that mediate tagging of bacteria with anti- hapten antibodies, for enhanced immune recognition by host phagocytes.

METHODS
C-terminally amidated analogs of the bacterial-binding peptide IIGGR were synthesized, with or without addition of cysteine residues at both N- and C- termini. Peptides were subjected to oxidizing conditions in a dimethyl-sulfoxide/water solvent system, and polymerization was demonstrated using SDS-PAGE. Peptides were then N-terminally labelled with a trinitrophenyl (TNP) group using trinitrobenzene sulfonate (TNBS). Binding to representative bacteria was demonstrated by ELISA using anti-TNP antibodies and was quantified as half-maximal effective concentration (EC50). Minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) and concentration yielding 50% hemolysis (H50) were estimated. Neutrophil phagocytic index was determined for TNP-labelled polymeric bacterial- binding peptide (Pbac) with anti-TNP antibodies and/or serum complement.

RESULTS
Polydisperse Pbac was synthesized. EC50 was lower for Pbac than for the corresponding monomeric form (Mbac), for both Staphylococcus aureus ATCC 29213 and Escherichia coli ATCC 25922. MIC and H50 were >250µg/mL for both Pbac and Mbac. A complement-independent increase in neutrophil phagocytic index was observed for E. coli treated with TNP-labelled Pbac in conjunction with anti-TNP antibodies.

CONCLUSION
Our data suggest that hapten-labelled polymeric bacterial-binding peptides may easily be produced from even crude synthetic oligopeptide precursors, and that such bacterial-binding peptides in conjunction with cognate anti-hapten antibodies can enhance immune recognition of bacteria by host phagocytes.


This article examines the use of David Hume's political writing by the extra-parliamentary opposition writers of the 1760s and early 1770s. The disturbances surrounding the publication of North Briton 45 and Wilkes's abortive attempts to become MP for Middlesex attracted a level of public support which was remarkable for its size, social diversity and ideological coherence. Hume, as is well known, reacted angrily to this growth in popular politics, condemning both the "mobs" that swept through London in the latter part of the decade and the Ministry's failure to deal with them. However, while Hume may have been highly critical of the Wilkites, the Wilkites frequently used ideas and quotations from the Scotsman's work in their anti-Ministerial polemics. My discussion traces the various ways in which Hume was employed in Wilkite political discourse, and aims to establish the significance of these appropriations for our understanding both of Hume's later life and of the radical politics of the period.


Activation of neurons in the ventrolateral region of the periaqueductal gray (vlPAG) can elicit a decrease in renal sympathetic nerve activity and blood pressure. The present study investigated whether the vlPAG-evoked sympathoinhibitory response depends on neurons in the caudal midline medulla (CMM). In pentobarbital-anesthetized rats, activation of neurons in the vlPAG evoked a decrease in renal sympathetic nerve activity to 29.4 +/- 4.8% below baseline levels and arterial blood pressure fell 8.9 +/- 1.6 mmHg (n = 20). Microinjection of the GABA agonist muscimol into sympathoinhibitory regions of the CMM significantly attenuated the vlPAG-evoked sympathoinhibition to 17.9 +/- 4.1% below baseline and the depressor response to 4.3 +/- 1.2 mmHg. At 65% (13/20) of the sites examined, the vlPAG-evoked sympathoinhibition was responsive to CMM muscimol microinjection and attenuated from 34.2% to 11.5%, with the depressor response reduced from 14.8 to 3 mmHg. Microinjection of muscimol at the remaining 35% of the CMM sympathoinhibitory sites was ineffective on the vlPAG-evoked sympathoinhibition and depressor response. These data indicate that sympathoinhibitory and hypotensive responses elicited by activation of neurons in the vlPAG can be mediated by neurons in the sympathoinhibitory region of the CMM. The finding that the vlPAG-evoked response is not affected by muscimol at all CMM sympathoinhibitory sites also suggests that sympathoinhibitory sites in the CMM are not homogeneous and can mediate functionally different responses.


Introduction: Fetal cardiac arrhythmia includes tachyarrhythmias, bradyarrhythmias, and ectopia. The study aimed to examine the findings of fetal cardiac arrhythmia echocardiography. Method: In a cross-sectional study, the fetal echocardiography was performed by a pediatric cardiac cardiologist for pregnant women with fetal cardiac arrhythmia referred to the pediatric cardiac clinic in Sari (north of Iran) at 2013. Results of echocardiography, mother's age, number of pregnancy, family history of heart disease were recorded and statistically analyzed. Results: 60 pregnant women were included in the study. 6 mothers were less than 21 years, 51 mothers between 21 and 35 years and 3 mothers were over 35 years old. Arrhythmias include: premature atrial contractions (PAC) in 45 patients, supraventricular tachycardia (SVT) in 7 patients, bradycardia in 5 patients and flutter in 3 patients. Echocardiography was abnormal in 6 patients including hydrops in 4 patients and Transposition of the great arteries (TGA) in 2 patients. No significant difference was observed between mothers' age, gestational age and family history of heart disease in those who had normal Echography and patients who had abnormal Echography (P> 0.05). Number of pregnancy has a significant but weak relation with abnormal echography (r: 0.347, P = 0.004). Also, a significant weak relation was observed between arrhythmia and results of echocardiography (r: 0.325, P <0.0003). Conclusion: More parity and presence of arrhythmia such as SVT or bradycardia is more associated with the results of abnormal echocardiography in pregnant women.


Multiple-breath washout (MBW) tests, with end-expiratory lung volume at functional residual capacity (FRC) and 90% O(2), 5% He, and 5% SF(6) as an inspired gas mixture, were performed in healthy volunteers in supine and prone postures. The semilog plot of MBW N(2) concentrations was evaluated in terms of its curvilinearity. The MBW N(2) normalized slope analysis yielded indexes of acinar and conductive ventilation heterogeneity (Verbanck S, Schuermans D, Van Muylem A, Paiva M, Noppen M, and Vincken W. J App Physiol 83: 1907-1916, 1997). Also, the difference between SF(6) and He normalized phase III slopes was computed in the first MBW expiration. Only MBW tests with similar FRC in the prone and supine postures (P > 0.1; n = 8) were considered. Prone and supine postures did not reveal any significant differences in curvilinearity, N(2) normalized slope-derived indexes of conductive or acinar ventilation heterogeneity, nor SF(6)-He normalized phase III slope difference in the first MBW expiration (P > 0.1 for all). The absence of significant changes in any of the MBW indexes suggests that ventilation heterogeneity is similar in the supine and prone postures of normal subjects breathing near FRC.


This study investigates the adoption of innovative Motor and Cognitive Dual-Task (MCDT) based on the combination of increasing motor and cognitive tasks to discern between subjects with Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI) and Cognitively Normal Adults (CNA). We aim to adopt new MCDT protocols and to compare their performance against the gold standard (a walking based MCDT, called GAIT). 27 older adults have been assessed through a customized wearable system during 4 MCDTs. We developed as many pooled indices (PIs), based on MCDTs perfomance, demographic data, and clinical scores. We use these parameters as regressors in 4 different logistic regression models. The regression models that encompassed features from innovative MCDT overcame the gold standard classification performance. In particular, models based on the heel tapping and the alternate heel-toe tapping reach the best outputs, namely +8% of accuracy if compared to the gold standard (a walking task). The use of logistic regression models based on MCDT PI have been effective in discerning between CNA vs MCI. Our results suggest that the gold standard MCDT may represents a too demanding exercise to highlight differences between CNA and MCI. It seems that MCDT based on an intermediate level of motor difficulty could represent the sweet spot for the identification of MCI against CNA. Clinical relevance- The combination of innovative digital devices and innovative approach on data analysis (PIs) opened a new scenarios to the early detection and prediction of dementia. Their use would standardize the assessment procedure, lightening the physician from the burden of cumbersome testing sessions. This study suggests that a broader framework for MCDT, which should encompass an ampler selection of motor tasks with different possibilities in terms of difficulties levels, could provide clinicians with a new appropriate set of tools for the early detection of dementia.


In two experiments, 90 1- to 3-year-olds were trained in a new nonverbal task to touch a video screen that displayed a unique target resembling a popular television character. The target appeared among varying numbers of distractors that resembled another familiar television character and was either a uniquely colored shape (the feature search task) or a unique color-shape combination (the conjunction search task). Each correct response triggered a sound and produced four animated objects on the screen. Irrespective of age and experimental design (between-subjects or within-subjects), children's reaction time (RT) patterns resembled those obtained from adults in corresponding search tasks: The RT slope for feature search was flat and independent of distractor number, whereas the RT slope for conjunction search increased linearly with distractor number. These results extend visual search effects found with adults to infants and very young children and suggest that the basic perceptual processes underlying visual search are qualitatively invariant over ontogeny.


We assess the on-orbit performance of the flare event trigger for the Hinode EUV Imaging Spectrometer. Our goal is to understand the time-delay between the occurrence of a flare, as defined by a prompt rise in soft X-ray emission, and the initiation of the response observing study. Wide (266 ″ ) slit patrol images in the He II 256.32 Å spectral line are used for flare hunting, and a reponse is triggered when a pre-defined intensity threshold is reached. We use a sample of 13 > M-class flares that succesfully triggered a response, and compare the timings with soft X-ray data from GOES, and hard X-ray data from RHESSI and Fermi. Excluding complex events that are difficult to interpret, the mean on orbit response time for our sample is 2 min 10 s, with an uncertainty of 84 s. These results may be useful for planning autonomous operations for future missions, and give some guidance as to how improvements could be made to capture the important impulsive phase of flares.


Over the years, magnetic resonance (MR) imaging has become a fundamental part of the diagnostic process in hospitals worldwide. While the underlying physics dates back more than 60 years with the development of nuclear magnetic resonance, methods that aim to accurately measure the multitude of parameters governing the signal formation are still a topic of active research and developments today. The main aim of this work is to explore the possibilities of developing quantification techniques based on a particular type of MR acquisitions: balanced Steady-State Free Precession (bSSFP). The first chapter briefly introduces the most relevant basic concepts of MR physics that will serve as foundation for the development of the methods presented thereafter. In the second chapter, a new method using multiple bSSFP scans is presented that aim to achieve motion insensitive three-dimensional quantification of relaxation times and thereby improve a recently published technique based on unbalanced gradient echo acquisitions. The method is then evaluated both in phantoms and in vivo studies at 3T and the results discussed. These include an interesting bias of the method that might provide useful insights into the underlying tissue micro-structure. One the major challenges with bSSFP imaging is the presence of dark regions inside the images, which are due to inhomogeneities in the main magnetic field. In the third chapter, a new approach to address those issues is proposed, termed trueCISS, which combines fast imaging using sparse sampling with compressed sensing reconstructions and multi-parametric fitting, which ultimately allows the synthesis of artefact-free images. Evaluation of the new method is done at 3T for the human brain. Finally, an extension of the trueCISS technique is presented in chapter four, where the process used to model the data to the signal equation is replaced by a novel algorithm based on configuration theory, which is essentially a representation of the signal formation processes in the Fourier domain. The improved trueCISS imaging method is then successfully evaluated with measurements at ultra high field strengths such as 7T and 9.4T which demonstrate the advantages of the new approach.


We present a method for automatically labelling all faces in video archives, such as TV broadcasts, by combining multiple evidence sources and multiple modalities (visual and audio). We target the problem of ever-growing online video archives, where an effective, scalable indexing solution cannot require a user to provide manual annotation or supervision. To this end, we make three key contributions: (1) We provide a novel, simple, method for determining if a person is famous or not using image-search engines. In turn this enables a face-identity model to be built reliably and robustly, and used for high precision automatic labelling; (2) We show that even for less-famous people, image-search engines can then be used for corroborative evidence to accurately label faces that are named in the scene or the speech; (3) Finally, we quantitatively demonstrate the benefits of our approach on different video domains and test settings, such as TV shows and news broadcasts. Our method works across three disparate datasets without any explicit domain adaptation, and sets new state-of-the-art results on all the public benchmarks.


As the leading cause of cancer death worldwide, lung cancer has the highest incidence and mortality among 27 kinds of cancers (Ferlay et al., 2010). And non small lung cancer (NSCLC) has a proportion of 80%-85% in all lung cancers (Stinchcombe et al., 2009; Yu Z et al., 2014). In the firstand second-line treatment of non small lung cancer, chemotherapy is one of the common methods using chemotherapeutics drugs, such as pemetrexed and docetaxel (Bareschino et al., 2011; Gettinger et al., 2011). Pemetrexed (Alimta®) is an antifolate agent with a structure containing a core group of pyrrolo pyrimidine and inhibits the key enzymes (thymidylate synthase, dihydrofolate reductase and glycinamide ribonucleotide formyltransferase) which are necessary for the synthesis of folic acid, thereby can block biological resynthesis process of thymine nucleotides and purine nucleotides. Pemetrexed is firstly used for treatment of malignant pleural mesothelioma combined with cisplatin. On August 19, 2004, FDA gave official approval for pemetrexed for injection in treatment with local advanced or metastatic non small lung cancer (Cohen et al., 2005). And up to now, pemetrexed has demonstrated antitumor activity


Renal cell carcinoma (RCC), the most common type of kidney cancer, is increasing in incidence and is the most lethal genitourinary cancer. Due to the increasing use of abdominal imaging, incidentally detected, asymptomatic small renal masses (SRMs), most of which are RCC, have become the most common presentation of kidney cancer. Most RCC SRMs initially grow slowly or not at all, but others progress to advanced and metastatic cancer. Several diagnostic and prognostic genomic, transcriptomic and proteomic studies have been completed in RCC, however signatures for SRM progression have not been identified. In the absence of useful factors to distinguish those tumors requiring treatment for progression from those that can be managed by active surveillance alone, most SRMs are treated as RCC with surgery. Currently, the only prognostic factor at diagnosis is tumor size. Tumor growth rate also appears to identify potential progressive tumours. Identifying signatures for progression and the utilization of needle biopsies will be important for SRM patients and will guide therapy.


The engineering design process is a core piece of engineering education. Students are typically introduced to the process during their first semester of school and are taught many methods to improving their own design process. Several models have been introduced by professional teams, researchers, and students, each having its own particular use and qualities. A review of such models was conducted grading each of their qualities on a scale. Overall scores showed that some sort of interactive and iterative web is the best design process to use. However, other models brought forth important pieces or different perspectives that can be integrated into other designs.


Aim: Platelet Rich Plasma (PRP) is a method used in dentistry and aesthetic applications in order to accelerate tissue healing. The purpose of this study is to assess the effect of PRP on accelerating wound healing and the contribution of microneedling application, i.e. multiple injection during PRP, and the volume effect of the PRP material to healing. Materials and Methods: In the study, 16 5-month-old male white New Zealand rabbits with an average weight of 2.7-3.0 kg were used. The four wounds were made on the back of each rabbit, and PRP, Normal saline(NS), microneedling(MN), and Sham procedures applied. Eight rabbits were sacrificed by taking their tissues for histological assessment at the end of 14 days. Epithelization, VEGF expression, angiogenesis, inflammatory cell, fibroblast, reticular fiber, and collagen parameters were evaluated. Eight rabbits were followed up for macroscopic healing. Result: The PRP procedure decreased the healing duration and wound area compared to other procedures(p<0.05). The NS procedure decreased the healing duration compared to the Sham procedure and provided a significant decrease in wound area compared to the MN and Sham procedures(p<0.05). Although the MN procedure decreased the wound area compared the Sham procedure, this difference was not statistically significant(p>0.05). PRP procedure increased staining scores and densities of epithelization, VEGF expression, angiogenesis compared to Sham procedure(p<0.05). PRP procedure increased staining score of collagen compared to Sham and NS procedures and staining density of collagen compared to other procedures(p<0.05). MN procedure decreased staining density of inflammatory cell compared to Sham procedure(p<0.05). Conclusion: The evaluation of simultaneous microneedling and PRP procedure on the 14th day of wound healing did not provide more positive synergistic effects on healing. In order to reduce the volume effect of the PRP amount given, the amount of PRP applied at each point should be as low as possible


Phosphorylation of Rad51/Rad52 by CDK1 regulates cell cycle–specific activation of homologous recombination. Homologous recombination is exquisitely activated only during specific cell phases. In the G1 phase, homologous recombination activity is completely suppressed. According to previous reports, the activation of homologous recombination during specific cell phases depends on the kinase activity of cyclin-dependent kinase 1 (CDK1). However, the precise regulatory mechanism and target substrates of CDK1 for this regulation have not been completely determined. Here, we report that the budding yeast CDK1, Cdc28, phosphorylates the major homologous recombination regulators Rad51 and Rad52. This phosphorylation occurs in the G2/M phase by Cdc28 in combination with G2/M phase cyclins. Nonphosphorylatable mutations in Rad51 and Rad52 impair the DNA binding affinity of Rad51 and the affinity between Rad52 rings that leads to their interaction. Collectively, our data provide detailed insights into the regulatory mechanism of cell cycle–dependent homologous recombination activation in eukaryotic cells.


Revising the way we organize the teaching activities is never an easy task even under normal circumstances, and when the state of emergency and the use of digital technology are added to the mix, the situation becomes even more complicated. During this process, it is easy to forget that although the content of teaching remains the same, the ways of delivering that content will change. Accustomed to synchronous, direct communication in a traditional classroom, we are now faced with asynchronous channels and a modular approach to teaching with the help of digital tools that are (un)known to us and which, despite their apparent value, present barriers to teaching and learning for various reasons such as Internet access, digital skills, adequate equipment, and economic and social status. Despite the development of digital technology and the exponential growth of digital applications and tools that have paved the way for online education worldwide in recent years, our emergency response to the pandemic indicates the lack of readiness of educational institutions for this type of change. Therefore, the paper examines how university teachers perceive the emergency remote teaching imposed on them from March to September 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The research problem of this study concerns the affective attitudes of the lecturers at the University of Priština in Kosovska Mitrovica towards emergency remote teaching. Namely, the authors are set with the task of investigating how teachers perceive the new reality and how they have managed to acclimate to emergency remote teaching. For the purposes of this study, three major schools at the University were selected: the Faculty of Philosophy, the Faculty of Arts, and the Faculty of Medicine. The three schools represent the bulk of the University academic offer: sciences, humanities, and arts. The data is compiled by means of a survey, while the respondents are selected by the convenience sampling technique. The aim of the study is to present the analysis of the data obtained in order to develop a future training programme for university lecturers in principles and practices of the distance education and to improve the emergency response of the higher education institutions as a whole.


Nanoparticles can acquire a biomolecular corona with a species-specific biological identity. However, "non-self" incompatibility of recipient biological systems is often not considered, especially when rodents are used as a model organism. Using zebrafish embryos as an in vivo model, here we unravelled the passage of intravenously injected SiO2 nanoparticles with a corona pre-formed of non-self proteins. Rapid sequestration and endolysosomal acidification of nanoparticles with the pre-formed corona were observed in scavenger endothelial cells within minutes after injection. This led to loss of blood vessel integrity and inflammatory activation of macrophages over the course of several hours. As unmodified nanoparticles or the equivalent dose of non-self proteins alone failed to induce the observed pathophysiology, this signifies how the corona enriched with a differential repertoire of proteins can determine the fate of the nanoparticles in vivo. Our findings indicate a potential pitfall in the use of mismatched species combinations during development of biomolecule-inspired nanomedicines.


This article invites scholars of race and migration to look at the visual arts more closely within the framework of comparative race theory. We argue that within a neoliberal multicultural context, the marketing of art relies on the commodification and circulation of racial categories, which are reproduced and distributed as globalized racial knowledge. This knowledge is mediated by the racial logic of neoliberal multiculturalism. Specifically, we look at the ways in which the global art market functions as a set of racialized and commodified power relations confronting the "migrant" artist within an orientalizing curatorial framework.


These authors examined the relationship between clinically significant symptom change in attentionspecific hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and reliable changes in multiple domains of functioning in children participating in the multimodal treatment study of children with ADHD. Children with significant positive change in symptoms were significantly more likely than children without such change to have reliable change across five functional domains. However, depending on the measure of functioning, 14% to 52% of children who did not achieve clinically significant change in symptoms showed reliable improvement in functional domains as well. The authors suggest their results have implication for the definition and measurement of clinically significant change in child treatment outcome studies.


ABSTRACT This research study utilized bibliometric methods to analyze publication rates among female and male lead authors in six prominent, peer-reviewed journals in Educational Technology (ET) fields over the past 12 years. The aim of the inquiry was to determine if differences or trends exist in the number of articles published by each gender. Data analysis revealed notable differences in publication rates between genders, and key findings indicate that while women overall published less than half of the articles from all journals sampled, two journals with a focus on primary and secondary (P-12) educational contexts have consistently published more articles written by female lead authors than male authors. The findings of this study hold practical relevance in terms of addressing the (in)visibility of female scholars in ET fields and may be used to promote discussions and actions related to the intersections between gender, equity, and the culture of scholarly publishing.


Recommender system is one of the most promising techniques with widest application in solving the problem of information overload. Aimed at providing better performance personalized recommendation, this paper improves a new hybrid recommender method based on social trust relationship and benchmark information filtering algorithm. Epinions and Friendfeed show that the hybrid trust method has better performance with high accuracy. Moreover, trust relationship has positive effect on the personalized recommendation performance.


Teacher-made exams, Cyber accessibility, Exam reliability, Teacher made tests/exams, Assessment. Abstract: This study aims at determining the cyber accessibility of teacher-made exams by analyzing the teachers', students', and parents' views on this subject. To fulfill this purpose, 60 exam papers in 4 different courses, including Turkish, Mathematics, Science, Social Studies/Atatürk's Principles and Revolutions, were examined through the technique of document analysis. Also, nine teachers, nine students, and nine parents were interviewed through semi-structured interview forms. According to the results, the level of cyber accessibility of secondary school teacher-made exams were; 87% for Turkish, 51% for mathematics, 99% for Science, and 88% for Social Studies/Atatürk's Principles and Revolutions courses. The highest level of cyber accessibility was found in multiple-choice and openended questions for Turkish courses, true-false questions for mathematics courses, open-ended, true-false, matching, and gap-filling questions for the Science courses and open-ended questions for Social Studies/Atatürk's Principles and Revolutions courses. Students and parents stated that they make use of cyber accessible websites while preparing for teacher-made exams. On the other hand, teachers indicated that they perceived themselves incompetent in assessment and evaluation.


Objectives: The management of dysphagia requires a multidisciplinary approach, especially in large-scale hospitals. We introduce a novel protocol using a Wi-Fi–based flexible endoscopic evaluation of swallowing (FEES) system and aim to verify its effectiveness in evaluation and rehabilitation of inpatients with dysphagia. Method: We conducted novel Wi-Fi–based FEES at the bedside using 3 iPads as monitors and recorders. Functional outcomes of swallowing in 2 different hospitals for acute care with conventional wired or wireless FEES were compared retrospectively. Results: Using the wireless system, we could visit more patients in a short period of time. Furthermore, a large multidisciplinary team was able to be present at the bedside, which made it easy to hold discussions and rapidly devise appropriate rehabilitation strategies. Aspiration pneumonia recurred in a few cases following our intervention with wireless FEES. Functional oral intake score was significantly increased following the intervention. Moreover, the number of deaths during hospitalization using wireless FEES evaluation was lower than those observed using the conventional system. Conclusion: Wi-Fi–based wireless FEES system, the first of its kind, allowed our multidisciplinary team to easily and effectively assess inpatients with dysphagia by facilitating simple examinations and intensive transprofessional discussions for patient rehabilitation.


Waste water from different industries is one of the major environmental concerns in present scenario. Textile industry uses many kinds of synthetic dyes as Azo, anthraquinne, polycyclic compounds and triphenylmethane and among them Azo dyes is most commonly preferable. Azo dyes cause serious environmental issue because these dyes are obstinate to biodegradation. Textile industries discharge large amounts of dyes about 10-200 mg/L and 10-20% of the dye along with organic and inorganic accessory chemicals because the uptake of these dyes by fabrics is very poor. Industrial effluents containing about 5-10% of dyestuffs, which is usually discharge into water bodies. This highly colored textile wastewater severely affects photosynthesis in plant. It also has an impact on aquatic life due to low light penetration and oxygen consumption. So, this textile wastewater must be treated before their discharge. Physical or chemical methods are costly, energy consuming, low efficient to environment and generate secondary sludge. Thus biological degradation most preferable for textile dyes degradation will be eco-friendly, do not generate secondary sludge and cost effective method. Fungi especially white rot fungi (WRF), produces Proxidases (Lignin peroxidase, LiP and Manganese peroxidase, MnP) and Phenol oxidase (Laccase) can be used for bioremediation of Azo dyes. In this article, decolorization and biodegradation of Azo dyes, abilities of WRF are reviewed.


TRIAL DESIGN: To compare the difference in pain score during flexible cystoscopy between patients undergoing the procedure with plain lubricating gel only and plain gel with diclofenac suppository in a randomized control trial. METHODS: A total of 60 male patients with an indication of flexible cystoscopy were enrolled in a prospective, randomized controlled study. Patients were randomized in two groups. In group "A", patients received diclofenac suppository one hour prior to the procedure while group "B" did not receive diclofenac suppository. Both groups received 10 ml of intra-urethral plain gel for lubrication during flexible cystoscopy. Pain score was recorded immediately after the procedure using the visual analogue scale (VAS). Pre- and post-procedure pulse rate and systolic blood pressure was also recorded. Statistical analyses were performed using chi-square test and student t-test. Regression analysis was performed to address the confounding variables. RESULTS: Both groups were comparable for variables including age, duration of procedure, level of operating surgeon and indication of procedure. Most common indication for flexible cystoscopy was removal of double J stent. There was a statistically significant difference in the mean pain score between two groups ( p = 0.012). The difference in post-procedure mean pulse rate in the two groups was statistically significant ( p= 0.01) however there was no difference observed in mean post procedure systolic blood pressure. Regression analysis showed that none of the confounding variables were significantly affecting pain perception. CONCLUSIONS: Intra rectal diclofenac suppository is simple and effective pre-emptive analgesia. We recommend its routine use during flexible cystoscopy for better pain control.


Objective: This study compares prenatal ultrasound findings and autopsy findings in fetuses and infants with gastroschisis and omphalocele.Design: Criteria for inclusion in the study were an autopsy of fetuses/infants with gastroschisis or omphalocele performed between January 1985 and December 2009 and a prenatal ultrasound examination performed at the National Center for Fetal Medicine (NCFM) at St. Olavs Hospital, Trondheim University Hospital. Results from the ultrasound and autopsy examinations were organized into five categories depending on the degree of agreement, and date from the three time periods (1985-1994, 1995-2004 and 2005 -2009) were compared.Results: There were 11 fetuses with gastroschisis and 70 fetuses with omphalocele. There was only one fetus with gastroschisis that was not detected at the prenatal ultrasound examination. In ten of the eleven cases there was full agreement between prenatal ultrasound and autopsy findings. Two fetuses with omphalocele were not diagnosed at prenatal ultrasoundexaminations. Four (15%) cases had major autopsy findings not detected prenatally. The main diagnosis (category 1 and 2) was correct in 64/70 (91%) cases, with the two last periods having the main diagnosis correct in 96 % and 95 % compared to 85 % in the first period. The number of cases with major and minor autopsy findings not detected by ultrasound was reduced from 48 % during the first period to 21 % in the two next periods. Full agreement occurred in 46/70 (66 %). Successful karyotyping was performed in 62/70 cases and abnormal karyotype was present in 43/62 (69 %). Trisomy 18 was most frequent with 37/43 (86%) cases.Conclusion: This study shows that the correlation of prenatal ultrasound diagnosis and post mortem examination is good and has improved over time with an increased number of cases in the category «full agreement» during the two last periods.


The purpose of this paper is to document the scope and correlates of past 6-month victimization among American Indian (AI) and Alaska Native (AN) youth. Types of victimization under investigation included sexual assault, dating violence, bullying, sharing of nude photos, sexual harassment, homophobic teasing, and racism. Participants were 400 AI and AN youth in grades 7–10 who completed a survey in school. Results documented concerning rates of all forms of victimization among AI and AN youth during the past 6 months. Although most forms of victimization were related, bullying (at school and electronically), racism, and sexual harassment occurred more often than sexual assault and dating violence. Older youth, girls, and sexual minorities were more likely to report some forms of violence than younger youth, boys, and heterosexual youth respectively. Compared to nonvictims, victim status was consistently related to depressive symptoms, suicidal ideation, and alcohol use and was less consistently correlated with feelings of school mattering. Evidence-based, culturally grounded prevention and response efforts are needed for AI and AN youth, as well as broader initiatives that seek to reduce health disparities among AI and AN youth.


Desktop applications have their own benefits due to which they have the tendency to outperform web applications which are dependent upon a Web Browser which acts as the client interface. Browsers are many in number and vary from one another. They also keep getting upgraded as result of which one browser exists in many versions with varying feature and characteristics. At times, certain web applications may not be allowed to run on a particular web browser due to lack of compatibility or absence of specific version. One possible solution to this problem is development of Desktop Applications and in order to achieve this, a commonly used framework is the Electron Framework.


PURPOSE
The purpose of the present study was to develop an accurate and sensitive migration assay to compare the migratory capabilities of retinal pigment epithelial (RPE) cells, retinal glial (RG) cells, and fibroblasts (the cell types crucial in epiretinal membrane [ERM] formation) under identical microenvironmental conditions and thus to identify potential target areas in ERM management.

METHODS
Cultured bovine RPE and RG cells and scleral fibroblasts (SFs) in both single and mixed cell type populations were induced to migrate in modified 48-well Boyden chambers. The labels used to distinguish between the cell types were latex microspheres and carmine particles. The chemoattractants used were fibronectin and PDGF, both of which are associated with epiretinal membrane development.

RESULTS
When migrating independently, all three cell types showed a positive response to fibronectin at an optimal concentration of 10 microg/mL. The RG cells migrated in a significantly greater number than the RPE cells (P < 0.05), but the differences in number of migrating cells between RG cells and SFs and RPE cells and SFs were not significant. When the cells were labeled and migrating together, it became clear that the RG cells consistently migrated in a higher number than the SFs (P <or= 0.001) and both the SFs and RG cells showed a greater migratory response than the RPE cells (P <or= 0.01).

CONCLUSIONS
The mixed cell migration (MCM) test system is a simple and useful assay to distinguish between the migratory responses of different cell types in the same microenvironment. It has highlighted the pronounced migratory response of RG cells to standard chemoattractants and has cast some level of doubt that, in comparative migratory terms, RPE cells are particularly good responders.


Abstract Spectacular developments in relativistic quantum theory and computational algorithms in the last two decades allowed for accurate predictions of properties of the heaviest elements and their experimental behaviour. The most recent works in this area of investigations are overviewed. Preference is given to those related to experimental research. The role of relativistic effects is elucidated.


Adversarial training (AT) is widely considered the state-of-the-art technique for improving the robustness of deep neural networks (DNNs) against adversarial examples (AE). Nevertheless, recent studies have revealed that adversarially trained models are prone to unfairness problems, restricting their applicability. In this paper, we empirically observe that this limitation may be attributed to serious adversarial confidence overfitting, i.e., certain adversarial examples with overconfidence. To alleviate this problem, we propose HAM, a straightforward yet effective framework via adaptive Hard Adversarial example Mining.HAM concentrates on mining hard adversarial examples while discarding the easy ones in an adaptive fashion. Specifically, HAM identifies hard AEs in terms of their step sizes needed to cross the decision boundary when calculating loss value. Besides, an early-dropping mechanism is incorporated to discard the easy examples at the initial stages of AE generation, resulting in efficient AT. Extensive experimental results on CIFAR-10, SVHN, and Imagenette demonstrate that HAM achieves significant improvement in robust fairness while reducing computational cost compared to several state-of-the-art adversarial training methods. The code will be made publicly available.


Motivated by the increasing number of older people-many with chronic illnesses-and the lack of support for them, the John A. Hartford Foundation (JAHF) made improving the care of older adults one of its two priorities in 1983 and its sole priority in 1994. To accomplish this, the foundation adopted a two-part strategy: first, create a field of professionals capable of caring for an aging population, and second, test models of care for older adults. The JAHF steadfastly pursued that strategy until 2013, when it adopted an approach focused on advancing age-friendly health systems. Geriatrics is now a recognized medical, nursing, and social work specialty, although low reimbursement, the stigma associated with caring for older people, and low prestige discourage students from entering it. Foundation-funded models of care have proven viable, and one of them-palliative care-has been widely adopted. The JAHF focused on an important social need for more than three decades, and this targeted and consistent effort has magnified its impact.


Fixed and flexible exchange rates each have advantages, and a country has the right to choose the regime suited to its circumstances. Nevertheless, several arguments support the view that the de facto dollar peg may now have outlived its usefulness for China. (i) Although foreign exchange reserves are a useful shield against currency crises, by now China's current level is fully adequate, and US treasury securities do not pay a high return. (ii) It may become increasingly difficult to sterilize the inflow over time. (iii) Although external balance could be achieved by expenditure reduction, e.g. by raising interest rates, the existence of two policy goals (external balance and internal balance) in general requires the use of two independent policy instruments (e.g. the real exchange rate and the interest rate). (iv) A large economy like China can achieve adjustment in the real exchange rate via flexibility in the nominal exchange rate more easily than via price flexibility. (v) The experience of other emerging markets points toward exiting from a peg when times are good and the currency is strong, rather than waiting until times are bad and the currency is under attack. (vi) From a longer-run perspective, prices of goods and services in China are low--not just low relative to the US (0.23), but also low by the standards of a Balassa--Samuelson relationship estimated across countries (which predicts 0.36). In this specific sense, the yuan was undervalued by ∼35 percent in 2000, and is by at least as much as that today. The study finds that, typically across countries, such gaps are corrected halfway, on average, over the subsequent decade. These six arguments for increased exchange rate flexibility need not imply a free float. China is a good counter-example to the popular "corners hypothesis" prohibition on intermediate exchange rate regimes. However, the specific changes announced by the Chinese authorities in July 2005 have not yet resulted in a de facto abandonment of the dollar peg (JEL classification: F41). Copyright 2006, Oxford University Press.


High-resolution multipath parameter estimates can be obtained through various deconvolution procedures, all of which-in the limit-rely on some form of inverse filtering. Although deconvolution in a multipath environment free from Doppler is well understood and well documented, this is not true for the case when motion of the multipath components relative to the receiver imposes a Doppler shift on the transmitted probing signal. This paper describes the effect of Doppler on a broad class of deconvolution methods by studying the effect of Doppler on the output of an inverse filter. It is shown that in the presence of Doppler, the deconvolution outputs are comprised chiefly of two signal-related functions, one of which may be designed in such a way as to be free from the range-Doppler coupling effects inherent in correlation processing. Knowledge of these two functions provides insight into the signal design issues relevant to deconvolution-based multipath parameter estimation systems and is useful in designing appropriate constraints and post-processing algorithms that may lead to an accurate extraction of the Doppler and delay parameters of the multipath channel. These results are applied to two known deconvolution methods: the method of projection onto convex sets (POCS) and the method of least squares (LS).


The styloid process of the temporal bone has a variable length as demonstrated in studies conducted with different technique: three-dimensional computed tomography or dental panoramic three-dimensional scanning. Data on the osteometric values of the styloid process is scanty with significant length differences existing between the studies attributed to different races or ethnicities.The abnormal length can be in some cases accompanied by a set of symptoms, characterized by neck pain, dysphagia, headache, sore throat, ear pain, mandible dysfunction clinically framed in Eagle's syndrome. We present an osteometric study on the length of the styloid process of a collection of dried skulls belonging to the museum of Anatomy "Leonetto Comparini " at the University of Siena. All skulls came from the local psychiatric hospital. For measurement we employed a digital caliper . The data were analyzed through a free statistical software (Salstat 2) . Average and standard deviation (sd), were calculated. Univariate analysis of the length of the styloid process gave the following results: average: 27 mm ; sd : 7 mm ; normal range : average +/- 2 sd : 41-13 mm. The longest styloid process was 52 mm and the shortest had a length of 0.5 mm .In one case we discovered a skull with stylohyoid calcified ligament on one side . The styloid process was long 50 mm on the right and 70 mm on the left where is the tip calcified .An abnormal long styloid process>41 mm is present in 6% of items in our biometric study . The abnormal variations in length are put in relation to the possible anatomical change of the muscular and ligamentous structures of the styloid process by drawings of a case with a marked elongation of the styloid process.The shortening of the stylomandibular ligament that we suppose considering the distance from the angle of mandible of the tip and the possible change in direction could cause difficult in the protrusion of mandible and in mastication. The shortening of stylohyoid ligaments and muscles, could cause difficult in movement of os hyoid and in raising or lowering of larynge during swallowing.


In this paper, we propose the temporal logic HyperPCTL$^*$ that extends PCTL$^*$ and HyperPCTL to reason about probabilistic hyperproperties. It allows expressing probabilistic hyperproperties with nested temporal and probability operators. We show that HyperPCTL can express important probabilistic information-flow security policies. Furthermore, for the first time, we investigate statistical model checking (SMC) algorithms for HyperPCTL$^*$ specifications in discrete-time Markov chains (DTMC). To this end, we first study SMC for HyperPCTL$^*$ specifications with non-nested probability operators for a desired confidence or significance level. Unlike existing SMC algorithms which are based on sequential probability ratio tests (SPRT), we use the Clopper-Pearson confidence interval to avoid the need of a priori knowledge on the indifference margin. Then, we extend the proposed SMC algorithms to HyperPCTL$^*$ specifications with multiple probability operators that are nested in different ways. Finally, we evaluate the proposed algorithms on two examples, dining cryptographers and probabilistic causation.


Background: Applying structural models is important to chemistry education at the upper secondary level, but it is considered one of the most difficult topics to learn. Purpose: This study analyses to what extent in designed lessons students learned to apply structural models in explaining the properties and behaviours of various materials. Sample: An experimental group is 27 Finnish upper secondary school students and control group included 18 students from the same school. Design and methods: In quasi-experimental setting, students were guided through predict, observe, explain activities in four practical work situations. It was intended that the structural models would encourage students to learn how to identify and apply appropriate models when predicting and explaining situations. The lessons, organised over a one-week period, began with a teacher's demonstration and continued with student experiments in which they described the properties and behaviours of six household products representing three different materials. Results: Most students in the experimental group learned to apply the models correctly, as demonstrated by post-test scores that were significantly higher than pre-test scores. The control group showed no significant difference between pre- and post-test scores. Conclusions: The findings indicate that the intervention where students engage in predict, observe, explain activities while several materials and models are confronted at the same time, had a positive effect on learning outcomes.


Recently, natural products have been evaluated as sources of antimicrobial agents with efficacies against a variety of microorganisms. This study described the phytochemical screening and the antifungal activity of Anvillea radiata. Phytochemical analysis revealed the presence of some chemical groups such as Volatile oils, Fatty acids, Tannins, Flavonoids, Anthracenosides, Emodols, Saponins, Free quinones, Anthraquinones, Alkaloids, Sterols and triterpenes. The antifungal activity of flavonoid extracts and cell-wall polysaccharide extracts derived from the flower and leaves of A. radiata were tested against plant pathogenic fungi Fusarium oxysporum f. sp. albedinis (Foa) (causing vascular wilt of date palm) by agar well diffusion method. The results indicate that flavonoid extracts had the strongest inhibitory effects on spore germination and on soil population density of Foa. Highly methylated pectins (HMP) from flowers produce the greatest inhibitory effect on mycelial growth. The sporulation was strongly inhibited using cellulose-based agar of leaves. Thus, it can be concluded that the use of A. radiata extracts could be considered as an antifungal available to develop novel types of natural fungicides and to control several plant pathogenic fungi.


AYUSH system is based on traditional health practices. The traditional Healthcare system of the country provides lifestyle advocacies to boost immunity which helps the prevention of various kind infectious diseases. Recently, the outbreak of corona virus has been noticed which mainly involve Respiratory system. Ayurveda, being the science of life, propagates the gifts of nature in maintaining healthy and happy living. Ayurveda's extensive knowledge base on preventive care, derives from the concepts of "Dinacharya" daily regimes and "Ritucharya" seasonal regimes to maintain healthy life. In Homoeopathy the choice of the medicine is fundamentally based on the principle that the medicine must have the capability of producing most similar symptom of the diseases to be cure in healthy persons. Today whole world faces corona virus problem. Corona virus comprises of a large family of viruses that are common in human beings as well animals (camels, cattle, cats, and bats). The novel Corona virus disease (COVID-19) has been spreading at a rapid rate across the world, which made World health organization (WHO) to declare it as a pandemic disease. A lot is still unknown about this virus. Signs and symptoms of corona virus disease 2019 (COVID-19) may appear two to 14 days after exposure. The virus spreads by respiratory droplets released when someone with the virus coughs, sneezes or talks. It can also spread if a person touches a surface with the virus on it and then touches his or her mouth, nose or eyes. Today the only or basic prevention from this disease is "stay home", "wash your hands often with soap and water for at least 20 seconds" and "cover your face with a cloth face covering in public spaces." Some of the important preventive measure is uses by government of india is Aarogya Setu app and Lockdown condition in country. As we all know there is no vaccine or medicine available against corona virus. So, prevention and good immunity is necessary for everyone because it is spread human to human. In Rajasthan, a combination of anti-malaria, anti-Swine flu and anti-HIV drugs resulted into recovery. For boosting immunity daily practice of Yogasana, Pranayama and meditation for at least 30 minutes and some diet plan are advised by Ministry of AYUSH (#YOGAatHome #StayHome #StaySafe). Some enthusiastic slogans, poems, songs, videos, images, drawings are circulating on internet to showing unity by people towards nation and against corona.


The study of the adaptability of alien plant species is very important. According to this characteristic there is possible to forecast their further spreading in the secondary distribution range. This is especially relevant for the species having already "escaped" from cultivation and started actively invading the natural communities. Well known that the structure of the leaf blade reflects the adaptability of the species. The purpose of this study is to compare the stomatal structure of cultivated Solidago L. species to assess their adaptive capacity. Alien specimens from the collection of Padova botanical garden (Italy): S. altissima L., S. caesia L., S. canadensis L., S. graminifolia(L.) Salisb., S. juncea Aiton, S. latifolia L., S. lepida DC., S. rugosa Mill., S. sempervirens L., S. serotinoides Á. Löve & D. Löve (= S. gigantea var. leiophylla Fernald), S. uliginosa Nutt. were the objects of the study. The stomata were characterized by 21 quantitative characteristics. Various strategies were being implemented to increase the total transpiration area of plants: increasing the size of stomata; increasing the number of stomata; increasing the area of the leaf blade; increasing the number of leaves on the shoot; increasing the number of the shoots. In terms of the relative transpiration area index (Iot, %), the species are divided into three groups with a high (25–50), medium (15–25) and low (<15) Iot. Our article is considered as a basis for monitoring the dissemination of alien species. The high value of Iot indicates the greater adaptiveness of alien species and can be used to predict the further expansion of their secondary distribution range and increase the chances of transforming into an invasive taxon.


Toxoplasma gondii parasite is one of the world's most common parasites which is an intracellular parasite. The aim of this work is to investigate the effect of nitrofurantoin given at a dose of 100mg/kg(2mg for each mouse) , spiramycin given at a dose of 200mg/k.g (4mg for each mouse) and a combination of both(4 days post infection for 2 weeks) on the brain cyst count of infected mice (54 laboratory-bred Swiss albino mice). Mice were contaminated for 10 cysts for Toxoplasma gondii (ME 49 strain). Five aggregations for mice were utilized within those study,three bunches for them accepted medicines and the different two were ordinary Furthermore contaminated non treated aggregations. One bunch approached with spiramycin,other approached for nitrofurantoin, and the final one approached for the blending for both. The mice were sacrified then afterward 8 weeks. The blending for both pills made 4 days post spoiling for two weeks brought about critical diminishment in the mind growth check (78) with diminishment rate( 85. 2% ) contrasted with different gatherings. This goal that nitrofurantoin Might be an satisfactory antitoxoplasmic medication regardless same time its mix with spiramycin provided for those best result.


HIV/AIDS has emerged as a major bane of sustainable development in Africa. In addition to hindering further development, it is indeed turning back the hands of the clock. HIV/AIDS is, for Africa, much more than another medical problem as it creates hunger, illiteracy, and poverty and constitutes a security risk. These factors in turn augur well for further spread of HIV/AIDS and other diseases. Nigeria, the most populous country in Africa, bears 10% of the African burden of 28 million out of about 37 million people living with HIV/AIDS worldwide. A growing concern is the disproportionate increase in the number of women living with HIV/AIDS in Africa. This paper critically examines factors that promote the vulnerability of women to HIV infection under the patriarchal system in Africa, with a focus on Nigeria.
Key WordS:Human rights, HIV/AIDS, patriarchy.
[Nig. Jnl Health & Biomedical Sciences Vol.2(1) 2003: 1-6]


There are several studies about arthroscopic repair techniques for the lesion of the anterior talofibular ligament. However, the research concentrating on the avulsion of the talar insertion of the anterior talofibular ligament is very rare. Among 122 patients who suffered from recurrent ankle sprain and underwent arthroscopic anterior talofibular ligament repair from October 2016 to January 2019 in our hospital, 11 patients with an avulsion of the talar insertion of this ligament were diagnosed and then treated with the arthroscopic suture-bridge repair technique in the present study. The clinical outcomes were assessed using the Karlsson-Peterson score, Ankle and hindfoot score by American Orthopedic of Foot and Ankle Society, Sefton articular stability scale and Visual Analogue Scale. The complications were recorded at the time of observation. The median value of the follow-up time was 30 (range 18-36) months. At the final follow-up, the median value of the Karlsson-Peterson score, American Orthopedic of Foot and Ankle Society ankle-hindfoot score, and Visual Analogue Scale score was 90, 90, 1, respectively. Based on the Sefton stability scale, 10 cases were in the excellent or good category. No wound infections and no neurovascular injuries were encountered, also no case required revision surgery. Only 1 patient complained about mild local irritation at the knotless anchor site. The arthroscopic suture-bridge technique could be suitable for treatment of an avulsion of the talar insertion of the anterior talofibular ligament due to satisfactory activity recovery and few complications.


Isoquinoline is a recalcitrant pollution of PAHs (polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons) in coking wastewater processing system, the content of which has a direct impact on the effect of biochemical treatment and the quality of recycling water. This study focuses on the decreasing of isoquinoline content in coking wastewater. The Y-4 strain, isolated and screened from the long-term polluted sludge of the coking plant, was an acidophilic bacterium using isoquinoline as sole carbon source and energy source. The limit concentration of Y-4 on degradation of isoquinoline is 1000 mg/L. The Y-4 strain could remove 500 mg/L isoquinoline completely only within 36–40 h. While the Y-4 strain can degrade other PAHs well.


This dissertation posits, theoretically and empirically, that Agency Theory personal and organizational assumptions explain more fully and realistically than any other management theory the relationship in a business triad: Client-Headhunter-Candidate. Moreover, the dissertation develops research on the Executive Search Processes using third parties. This study identifies some situations in this triad relationship that may compromise the whole executive search process. The triad relationship is analyzed in dyads using the headhunter as a hinge between the two other parties. The central hypothesis is that Agency Theory presents more solid arguments and assumptions aligned with real-world situations than other management theories. This argument allows researchers to understand failures in the executive search process, creating the possibility of streamlining processes. The central hypothesis is reviewed and tested in few stages: first, by theoretical and context reviews on the triad relationship, and then in the dyad, headhunter-client. Furthermore, it tests in part the hypothesis in the dyad headhunter-candidate with data analyses derived from a survey among 202 candidates who have been contacted by headhunters. This dissertation provides contributions to management theory development with regard to the usage for Agency Theory on triads scenarios. This research presents the best explanation for a particular business triad like the client-headhunter-candidate triad. This thesis also provides contributions in the field of Human Resources Management. Another important contribution this study provides relates to the practitioners in the executive search profession and the individuals who use them as an outlet to develop their careers.


The author briefly describes endovascular surgical methods; some of them were developed and used in clinical practice for the treatment of portal hypertension, liver cirrhosis and tumors, renal and bladder cancer. Besides, priority methods of endoscopic surgery employed in the treatment of peptic ulcer, are described.


The possible late maternal effect on biochemical homeostasis of acute administration of ethanol during the preimplantation period was studied on pregnant albino female rats (Wistar strain). Females were injected i.v. with a 33.16% (v/v) solution of ethanol (4.80 ml/kg body weight) on day 2 and 4 of pregnancy, the animals being sacrificed on day 20. The effects on hepatic DNA biosynthesis and on some serum metabolites (proteins, lipids and some non-protein nitrogen compounds) were determined in the treated and in an untreated control group. In the treated group a non-significant increase of hepatic DNA concentration was found. Homeostasis changes of serum proteins involved: a slight increase of total serum protein content, hypoalbuminemia and hyperglobulinemia (non-significant values). Lipid metabolites showed also non-significant changes: increase of total lipids and decrease of cholesterol. Uric acid and urea (non-protein metabolites) concentration was increased. This increase, in spite of its significance level, must be taken into account and may be due to the presence of dead fetuses and to the consecutive renal lesions.


The goal of this paper is to make clear cut reasoning for the ambiguous evidence in favour of the Environmental Kuznets Curve (EKC) hypothesis. The EKC for CO2 might be flawed with some sort of misconceptions thus providing misleading guidelines for policy makers. The main contribution of this paper (but not unique) is to provide original explanations to dismiss the EKC according to economic concepts. Thus it goes beyond the usual justification based mainly on inadequate use of econometric techniques. Actually, the controversy in the EKC literature may partially be the result of some kind of "monetary illusion" regarding the usual figures for carbon intensity trends. We may summarize the main policy implication of this paper as follows. Neglecting the EKC on CO2 suggests significant distributional consequences from any climate change policy that eventually put at risk any international climate change agreement.


SINCE the advent of cardiac surgery, considerable work has appeared on acid-base and electrolyte balance in the postoperative period, but relatively little of it has concerned calcium. We recently observed a case of rapid myocardial calcification after cardiac surgery and present it as an unusual addition to the existing literature on abnormal myocardial calcification. Report of a Case An eight-year-old boy entered the hospital in June, 1962, for investigation of a cardiac murmur. Two years previously cardiac surgeons at another institution had repaired uneventfully a coarctation of the aorta and a patent ductus arteriosus. The boy's physician, however, discovered a new murmur shortly before the current admission. Past medical history, family history, and review of systems were not contributory. Physical examination showed a well-developed but slender, 50 lb (22.8 kg), child in no distress. The blood pressure was 85/58 mm Hg in the right arm and 98/60 mm Hg in


AbstractA meta-analysis was performed to assess the diagnostic value of gastrin-17 (G-17) for the early detection of chronic atrophic gastritis (CAG).An extensive literature search was performed, with the aim of selecting publications that reported the accuracy of G-17 in predicting CAG, in the following databases: PubMed, Science Direct, Web of Science, Chinese Biological Medicine, Chinese National Knowledge Infrastructure, Wanfang, and VIP. To assess the diagnostic value of G-17, the following statistics were estimated and described: sensitivity, specificity, diagnostic odds ratios (DOR), summary receiver operating characteristic curves, area under the curve (AUC), and 95% confidence intervals (CIs).Thirteen studies that met the inclusion criteria were included in this meta-analysis, comprising 894 patients and 1950 controls. The pooled sensitivity and specificity of these studies were 0.48 (95% CI: 0.45–0.51) and 0.79 (95% CI: 0.77–0.81), respectively. The DOR was 5.93 (95% CI: 2.93–11.99), and the AUC was 0.82.G-17 may have potential diagnostic value because it has good specificity and a moderate DOR and AUC for CAG. However, more studies are needed to improve the sensitivity of this diagnostic tool in the future.


The organization of two linked chicken myosin heavy-chain (MHC) genes is described. Using probes derived from the 3' and 5' ends of the genes, chromosome walks were carried out, resulting in the isolation of a clone which encompassed the 5' end of one MHC gene and the 3' end of a different MHC gene. Further analysis showed that both genes (each approximately 25 kbp in length) are oriented head to tail and are separated by an intergenic region of 7.5 kbp. Despite extensive homologies, a transcript-specific probe for each of the genes could be prepared from the 5' untranslated regions. These probes were used to determine the transcriptional pattern for each of the genes. The data show that the gene located at the 5' end of the linkage pair is expressed during the neonatal stages of development, while the gene located at the 3' end of the pair is expressed predominantly during the embryonic stages of development.


Cereal crops as a basic food for humans, little is used as a grain, but with milling they are processed in the milling products: flour, meal, flakes and bran. Determining the content of some ingredients, such as protein, ash, wet gluten, fat, etc. in food products is important because they are present in the raw materials and final products. The importance of knowing the physical and chemical properties of wheat and flour is due to the determination of quality and kind of flour which is produced after milling process. The aim of this research is to examine the influence of Fe-EDTA fertilizers through soil, foliar and soil +foliar application on some physical and chemical properties of bio-fortification soft wheat and flour of the varieties ,,Treska ,, During the investigation we determined the highest ash content in the seed obtained with soil + foliar application of iron, while in the flour was measured the highest ash content by soil application of iron. We concluded that the supplement iron in soil increase the percentage of protein in the grain and flour. We found that soil + foliar application of iron leads to a significant increase of % fat and wet gluten in grain and flour compared to soil or foliar application of chelating fertilizers. It might be concluded that the agronomic bio-fortification with Fe-EDTA soil + foliar application and Fe-EDTA soil leads to improved examined physical - chemical properties of wheat and flour.
Keywords: Fe-EDTA soil + foliar, physicalchemical properties, wheat and flour.
DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.7251/JEPM1709033M


The Probe Vehicle Information system is as system that collects information from cars equipped with sensors. Usually, various information is collected and transferred to a server, at frequent intervals. The information includes when and where the information was collected, which could lead to privacy problems. One way to solve these problems, is to use cryptographic anonymous authentication protocols. However, although the computational and network resource on cars are limited, anonymous authentication protocols tend to consume both heavily. In this article, we propose a new protocol using the combination cryptographic anonymous authentication and symmetric-key cryptographic authentication. This protocol can protect the users¿ privacy, while is efficient enough to be used for probe vehicle information systems. We also have conducted an experiment on a simulator with 5,000 virtual cars, and showed that this protocol is efficient enough for real use.


This study explored foreign tourists' authenticity perception on a Korea traditional village and its relationship with the tourists' travel experience. Data were collected from 400 foreign tourists who visited Seoul Buckchon Korean Village on August 2010. An exploratory factor analysis on 12 items of authenticity perception suggested three dimensions of authenticly perception: 'objective authenticity, existential authenticity and constructive authenticity'. In addition, a cluster analysis yielded two groups of authenticly perception groups(i.e., a low authenticity perception group and high authenticly perception group). Results showed that there were significant statistical differences between the high authenticity-perception group and the low-authenticity perception in the four dimensions of tourism experience dimensions(i.e., escape/immersion, experience, edutainment, the sense of ties). Results also indicated a significant statistical differences between the two groups in the socio-demographic characteristics. Limitation and future research directions were discussed.


With limited recording apertures, finite-frequency source functions, and irregular subsurface illuminations, traditional imaging methods have been insufficient to produce satisfactory reflectivity images with high resolution and amplitude fidelity. This is because most traditional imaging approaches are commonly formulated as the adjoint instead of the inverse operator with respect to the forward-modeling operator. In addition, intrinsic attenuation introduces amplitude loss and phase dispersion during wave propagation. Without considering these effects, migrated images might be kinematically and dynamically incorrect. We have developed a viscoacoustic least-squares reverse time migration (LSRTM) method based on a time-domain complex-valued wave equation. According to the Born approximation, we first linearized the viscoacoustic wave equation and derived a demigration operator. Then, using the complex-valued Lagrange multiplier method, we derived the adjoint viscoacoustic wave equation and corresponding sensitivity kernel. With the forward and adjoint operators, a linear inverse problem is formulated to estimate the subsurface reflectivity model. A total-variation regularization scheme is introduced to enhance the robustness of our viscoacoustic LSRTM, and a diagonal Hessian is used as the preconditioner to accelerate the convergence. Three synthetic examples are used to demonstrate that our approach enables us to compensate attenuation effects, improve imaging resolution, and enhance amplitude fidelity in comparison with the adjoint imaging method.


The dynamics of biochemical reaction networks are considered to be responsible for biological functions in living systems. Since real networks are immense and complicated, it is difficult to determine which reactions can cause a significant change of dynamical behaviors, namely, bifurcations. Also to what extent numerical results of network systems depend on the chosen kinetic rate parameters is not known. In this paper, an analytical setting that splits the information of the dynamics into the network structure and reaction kinetics is introduced. This setting possesses a factorization structure for some class of network systems which allows one to determine which subnetworks are responsible for the occurrence of a bifurcation. Subsequently, the bifurcation criteria are reformulated in a manner that allows the efficient determination of relevant reactions for bifurcations.


The author is a leading Australian media artist who has been experimenting with audio online since the mid 1990s. Initially working with Flash for delivery of his audio works in a bandwidth-restricted environment, he began exploring the compositional potentials of the software. He has worked with randomized audio and recently video and has used generative techniques (random number generation, permu- tative structures, and graphics and sound interaction) to produce aleatoric music graphics and text. The article outlines the author's experiences in these areas.


English, as a communication tool, plays an extremely significant role in cross-cultural communication. While it is true that language users can mean exactly what they mean in their utterances, it is also true that they can have their utterances mean much more than what they say. Speakers of English speak indirectly, and using conversational implicatures is a way to be indirect. And as sentences often express messages above and beyond their literal meanings, it is not surprising that pragmatic errors are found in language learning process of EFL learners' communication. Therefore, this study aims at investigating the factors beyond misunderstanding or understanding of English conversational implicatures among Yemeni EFL university learners. It follows an empirical analytical-descriptive method consisting of a test and an interview. Randomly, 50% of the study population was selected as the study sample. They were 62 Yemeni EFL university learners. A multiple-choice discourse completion test ( MCDCT ) and a semi structure interview were used for collecting the study data. The test contained eleven types of conversational implicature The collected data was analyzed quantitatively and qualitatively. The results reveal that different factors caused misinterpretation of conversational implicatures among Yemeni EFL learners. However, the differences in socio-cultural knowledge and indirectness are instrumental in the misunderstanding of conversational contexts in the study. While the familiarity of some conversational implicatures and formulaic pattern of others pose no challenge for the study subjects to interpret some of the test conversational implicatures. The study test conversational implicatures that are formulaic or familiar to the subjects are easy to grasp. Therefore, this study provides some recommendations that are expected to enable EFL university learners to develop their pragmatic competence regarding English conversational implicature and suggests a reconsideration of the existing methodologies on teaching English as a foreign language. Hence, this would ease the concern of EFL students about English conversational implicature, build up their confidence and enhance language learning.