four stages for a teaching programme are outlined: general language teaching, sheltered language teaching, partial mainstream and full mainstream. The author discusses his own experience in putting these principles into practice in teaching German to beginners in two comprehensive schools and to adults working for the Ford Motor Company. The fete frangaise is a successful annual language contest for high-school pupils. The organisation of the event is described. Students compete in a wide range of activities, both academic and cultural. The former include poetry memorisation and reading, dramatic scenes and monologues, spelling bee, extemporaneous speaking, composition, and written tests. Cultural events include music, dance, costume, art and crafts. Winners receive medals or ribbons, or trophies for group events. [Scheduling, judging, registration, organisation on the day of the contest.] Fieldwork undertaken in a French village by a group of of


We explicitly tested the following predictions using Gerbillus allenbyi and G. pyramidum foraging on artificial arrays of natural seedbank on a semi-stabilized sand dune: 1. that the gerbils will forage using a quitting harvest rate rule, 2. that larger seeds are preferred due to higher encounter rates, and 3. that there are community level consequences for the annual plants as a direct result of foraging by the desert rodents. Natural seedbank, separated into two size classes, was placed in seed trays in the field at four different densities (1/16 x 1/4 ×, 1 ×, and 2 x normal). Following exposure to granivory, the remaining seeds were weighed and germinated to test for community level effects. Only the 1 x and 2 x normal density plots were heavily foraged, and at both seed sizes, which suggests that the gerbils employed a quitting harvest rate rule. In support of our second prediction, the two species of gerbils tended to consume more of the larger seeds, particularly at higher densities. The mean number and total number of plant species that germinated in plots exposed to granivores was not significantly different from unexposed samples. At the community level however, there was no net association of germinated plant species in the four treatment groups exposed to granivores, but a significant net positive association in the unexposed control seedbank. Gerbil foraging on annual plant seedbank may thus subtly change the entire community structure (from positive to neutral), although not necessarily shift the species distributions significantly. Our results corroborate other studies involving artificial food types such as millet and suggest that foraging decisions may affect the plant community.


In the GSM system, several Base Transceiver Station (BTS) are controlled by a single Base Station Controller (BSC). In this paper, the BTSs in a given BSC is referred to as a cluster.  In this paper, flowchart for clustered-based channel allocation management scheme is presented. The mechanism is meant to reduce call blocking/dropping to the barest minimum. Usually, traffic intensity value varies from one BTS to another, as it is directly proportional to the number of GSM users that make or receive calls within a particular period of time. In order to maintain a reliable GSM network that will provide minimum call blocking/dropping, the paper presents the flowchart for network resource management scheme that will adopt sharing of traffic loads among BTSs that belong to a particular network cluster. The scheme also considers the following; available channels, mobility factor, offered traffic, number of nearby BTSs, new call arrival rate, handoff call arrival rate and mean call duration. With limited available channels per BTS, instead of blocking a new call or dropping a handoff call whenever a particular BTS reaches its maximum allowable capacity, this newly proposed scheme however checks for a nearby BTS within that cluster that has free channels, and then performs a routine operation that will transfer some percentage of the traffic load to the free nearby BTS. This routine operation therefore allows the BTS to admit more calls.


Fiduciary Collateral came from the society needs about credit with ranged and un-ranged things, but still needs the thing to use in everyday's life, so there needed a Fiduciary Collateral Institution. To fulfill the needs in development economic traffic and also to guarantee the law assurance, so there stated Law No.42 / 1999 about Fiduciary Collateral. In Fiduciary Collateral Law, the position of fiduciary institution became steady. Though, fiduciary collateral institution still has weakness, where the object of fiduciary collateral still in the owner's hand, if debtor has bad intention, lack of debt which was given by the creditor wouldn't be guaranteed to be paid. In section 1 number (2), Fiduciary Collateral was a Collateral rights for un-ranged thing, whether it was real or imaginary and un-ranged thing, especially building which couldn't be loaded by burden rights in the authority of fiduciary giver. So, according to the law, fiduciary collateral outside the ranged thing also valid for un-assurance things through burden rights.
The statements of problems were : how the process of un-ranged things registration as the object of fiduciary collateral in Fiduciary Registration Office, what law problems inside the un-ranged things registration as fiduciary collateral object and how to solve the problems.
Method used was socio-juridical, the discussion based on the stated law rule, related with law theory, also seen the reality happened in society. Data used was primary data through interview and documentation, also secondary data through library study. The research aimed to find out about the process of un-ranged things registration as fiduciary object in Fiduciary Registration Office also find out about how to solve the problem.
The result showed that registration line of fiduciary collateral in Fiduciary Registration Office generally : the requester came to the cashier, corrector, numbering, recording, certification, transferring the certificate of Fiduciary Collateral Certificate to the requester. Fiduciary Collateral Requester with un-ranged object and ranged object at Fiduciary Registration Office from Registration process, cost for Fiduciary assurance, the change of Fiduciary Collateral Certificate, or the replacement of broken Fiduciary Collateral Certificate of couldn't be differ from its object, ranged or un-ranged things. For registration cost of fiduciary collateral, it fitted with the collateral value, it wouldn't considered from the object, whether it ranged or un-ranged things. The research showed that the ranged thing which listed as fiduciary collateral object in Fiduciary Collateral Office at Surabaya larger than un-ranged things listed. Ranged things mostly listed as fiduciary collateral object at Fiduciary Registration Office was vehicle like cars. Un-ranged things which listed mostly as fiduciary collateral object was building above the ground of Surabaya Government management rights.
Law problems of un-ranged things as fiduciary object was bad intention from fiduciary giver where the object wasn't given intentionally even through physical against the fiduciary giver by blocking the execution. Law problems of un-ranged things as fiduciary collateral object showed by no certification to the building as evidence of owner rights and the taking of land using permission from Regional Government of Surabaya.
If there were inhibitions in execution and problems in Police office, Fiduciary registration office was called often by the Police Office to be recorded the explanation. Fiduciary Office became mediator in mediation process between fiduciary giver and fiduciary receiver by giving explanation to each parties. According the problems of building rights, by the Letter of Directorate General Administration of Law and Human Rights Indonesia No. C.HT.01.10-22 about registration standardization procedure and bank could do law effort through civil action to state court to debtor based on wanprestasi or through arbitrage if fiduciary giver didn't have good intention to pay the debt.
The result showed that according the application of Fiduciary Law, there should be fulfilled the condition of Fiduciary collateral certificate by notary with object registration at Fiduciary Registration Office. The registration aimed to give law certainty to each parties in fiduciary collateral. Though so, it didn't guarantee that there wouldn't be problems in law application. Law certainty located on law substance, subject, law subject, and facility for law application.


This research article shows the importance of the Anothomia written by Mondino de' Liuzzi in Medical history. It was decided to consider Mondino and Dante and dissection because this enables us to draw attention to the medical profession and to raise questions related to training in health. Specifically in scientific and educational context, the centrality of body experience is essential and the primary way of learning in medical knowledge is given by the formation and shaping of a gaze on the body and the patient's experience. The anatomy lesson in particular, given that it is the first experience of body transformation seen through biomedical gaze which medical students must undergo, may be considered as food for thought to shed light on some of the issues related to action of doctors.


AbobotulinumtoxinA was approved by the US Food and Drug Administration in 2009 as the second botulinum neurotoxin type A (BoNTA) for use in facial aesthetics. This article provides an overview of abobotulinumtoxinA's applications and indications as well as safety and efficacy data. AbobotulinumtoxinA is generally well tolerated. Adverse events from abobotulinumtoxinA are similar to those reported with other BoNTA products. Clinical applications of the product are also discussed in this article. Information on handling, storage, and dosing is provided.


The Arab users face several problems when they search information in the database. Writing SQL query in their natural language is a major problem. This problem leads to a strong need for an Arabic information retrieval system that would help the Arabic user in searching for the desired information without the need to write SQL queries. So, this paper presents an Arabic Retrieval System by Native Language rather than SQL Queries which is called Arabic Query Analyzer (AQA). In the other words, an AQA basically transforms Arabic query texts into SQL commands. The developed system has been fully implemented and tested and has shown tangible performance in retrieving database information using Arabic natural language.


Self-incompatibility (SI) is the failure of a fertile plant to set seeds when fertilized with its own pollen. It is a physiological mechanism, with a genetic basis, which promotes allogamy and has drawn geneticists and plant breeders' attention. Nowadays, the research has put emphasis on the identification and understanding of the molecular and cellular processes leading to the recognition and rejection of the self-incompatible pollen, including the identification, localization and sequencing of proteins, enzymes and genes involved. There are two types of SI, gametophytic (GSI) in which the pollen specificity is determined by the S allele of the pollen grain (gametophyte) haploid genome, and sporophytic (SIS), where the pollen specificity is determined by the diploid genotype of the adult plant (sporophyte) that generated the pollen grain. SIS may be homomorphic, when there are no floral modifications related to the SI process, or heteromorphic, when floral modifications occur together with the SI process. The SI reaction may occurr from pollen germination impairing up to pollen tube breakdown. The existence of SI in economically important plants may be very important, being very positive in some cases or a burden in others, depending on the plant part harvested (vegetative or reproductive) and its mode of reproduction, sexual or asexual. SI has been employed in plant breeding for many years, but there is a gap between theoretical knowledge, such as genetic and molecular basis, and utilization in plant breeding programs.


Designers are trained to think in new terms and along divergent lines—they explore creative ways to challenge common assumptions. Collaboration with designers offers organizations the opportunity to adopt more flexible, creative ways of innovating. This article looks at the role of the designer as analog to that of a jester, who has a unique status relative to his (or her) superior, including the ability to playfully encourage self-reflection and propose novel directions for change. We present findings from three case studies to support an analysis of the designer's role in innovation processes as that of a jester. The designer as jester model includes creatively contending with resistance to new methods from established cultures inside organizations. Designers' ability to deftly demonstrate their innovation competence as they shift between tasks garners them the privileged position of the jester, including an ability to speak freely and question prevailing innovation assumptions in ways that lead to creative change.


We describe the inspiration for this series of articles and articulate several themes that run throughout the four articles that follow. Particular ethical challenges in community-based mental health research are identified, as is the tension between existing ethical codes and policies and the requirements of more collaborative, community-based research. We edited this special series with an eye toward promoting greater discussion of ethical issues in this realm and the eventual development and promotion of guidelines for ethical decision-making in community-based research.


The present-day web can be broken into smaller pieces that slowly but surely will be transformed into semantic web pieces. This paper describes an approach for eliciting ontology components by using specific-domain maps. The knowledge contained in a particular domain, any kind of digital archive, is portrayed by assembling and displaying its ontology components. The novelty of our approach is to offer clustering and visualization features not present in other techniques helping in the semi-automatic construction of ontologies by identifying components from digital archives. We describe here a case study that applies our approach on an academic domain. The specific-domain maps generated are presented and a conceptualized ontology created with the ontology components is introduced. Further processing may be carried out on the extracted knowledge to be embedded on the semantic web pages for software agents to use. The ultimate kind of semantic web software applications that we will be seeing are intelligent software agents searching the web to infer and extract new knowledge from the digital archives.


Recent investigations concerning the significance of porphyrins in erythrocytes indicate a need for a rapid quantitative assay, easily adaptable to routine clinical use. To fill this need, we have developed a simplified procedure for the measurement of porphyrins (essentially protoporphyrin) in whole blood. Blood is stirred with acetone—ethyl acetate and the porphyrins are extracted with formic acid—ether. The porphyrins are then extracted into HCl and measured spectrophotometrically at three wavelengths, a procedure that allows a corrected absorbance to be calculated, to minimize error caused by interfering substances. The assay requires little apparatus, is simple and dependable, and the results correlate well with those obtained by use of a more complex conventional procedure.


Provides comprehensive overviews of current controversies in the field of urological and genital cancer. Among the featured treatment is coverage of the dramatic changes that curative chemotherapy has provided in testis cancer. Additional discussions focus on the latest research developments in bladder cancer, new methods of hormone treatment and improved surgical techniques for radical prostatectomy, and the advent of genetically engineered cytokines for renal cell cancer which has sparked interest in new approaches to immunotherapy. Includes 44 black and white illustrations.


In this paper, we advocate identifying the colonizing logics of race in criminological analysis, in recognition of their enduring postcolonial presence in societies like the United Kingdom. Our argument unfolds through the life stories narrated by three men entangled by colonial remnants of power(lessness), subservience, and criminalization. For Cairo (black) and Rafan (Asian), their subalternity is exposed through their vulnerability to racialized stereotypes which have a foundation in colonial histories. Both young minority ethnic men are also situated in a transnational, glocalized frame in which their racialized and gendered identities prescribed the nature of their belonging to a British nation-state irrevocably connected to the Empire. Our reflections on a third narrative interview of Barry reveal the dividends of whiteness, simultaneously occluded, disavowed, and yet wilfully upheld, but in a competitive and exclusive form of belonging. In the articulation and analysis of these stories of crime and order, we mine styles of reasoning from postcolonial theory, sociology, history, and philosophy to embolden a postcolonial criminology.


Chronic lung diseases are a leading cause of morbidity and mortality across the globe, encompassing a diverse range of conditions from infections with pathogenic microorganisms to underlying genetic disorders. The respiratory tract represents an active interface with the external environment having the primary immune function of resisting pathogen intrusion and maintaining homeostasis in response to the myriad of stimuli encountered within its microenvironment. To perform these vital functions and prevent lung disorders, a chemical and biological cross-talk occurs in the complex milieu of the lung that mediates and regulates the numerous cellular processes contributing to lung health. In this review, we will focus on the role of cross-talk in chronic lung infections, and discuss how different cell types and signaling pathways contribute to the chronicity of infection(s) and prevent effective immune clearance of pathogens. In the lung microenvironment, pathogens have developed the capacity to evade mucosal immunity using different mechanisms or virulence factors, leading to colonization and infection of the host; such mechanisms include the release of soluble and volatile factors, as well as contact dependent (juxtracrine) interactions. We explore the diverse modes of communication between the host and pathogen in the lung tissue milieu in the context of chronic lung infections. Lastly, we review current methods and approaches used to model and study these host-pathogen interactions in vitro, and the role of these technological platforms in advancing our knowledge about chronic lung diseases.


Colonization carried out by the Dutch government and its influence on Dutch government policy in the implementation of education in Aceh which was only attended by descendants of the nobility, reaped the enthusiasm of Daud Beureueh to carry out education with the Madrasah model in which he taught exact sciences and also religious education for all. Acehnese children without exception, at the beginning of the 20th century and in 1939 Daud Beureuh Initiated the concept of the Madrasah Curriculum in Aceh where the Aceh Dayah - Dayah adopted the Madrasah education curriculum system, in 1939 Daud Beureueh was elected chairman of the Aceh Ulama Association (PUSA), Daud Beureuh through PUSA formed the alignment of the Madrasa curriculum in Aceh and the School for prospective madrasa teachers, the Normal Islam Institute (NII). This study used descriptive qualitative method.


Transcriptional dysregulation has long been recognized as central to the pathogenesis of Huntington's disease (HD). MicroRNAs (miRNAs) represent a major system of post-transcriptional regulation, by either preventing translational initiation or by targeting transcripts for storage or for degradation. Using next-generation miRNA sequencing in prefrontal cortex (Brodmann Area 9) of twelve HD and nine controls, we identified five miRNAs (miR-10b-5p, miR-196a-5p, miR-196b-5p, miR-615-3p and miR-1247-5p) up-regulated in HD at genome-wide significance (FDR q-value<0.05). Three of these, miR-196a-5p, miR-196b-5p and miR-615-3p, were expressed at near zero levels in control brains. Expression was verified for all five miRNAs using reverse transcription quantitative PCR and all but miR-1247-5p were replicated in an independent sample (8HD/8C). Ectopic miR-10b-5p expression in PC12 HTT-Q73 cells increased survival by MTT assay and cell viability staining suggesting increased expression may be a protective response. All of the miRNAs but miR-1247-5p are located in intergenic regions of Hox clusters. Total mRNA sequencing in the same samples identified fifteen of 55 genes within the Hox cluster gene regions as differentially expressed in HD, and the Hox genes immediately adjacent to the four Hox cluster miRNAs as up-regulated. Pathway analysis of mRNA targets of these miRNAs implicated functions for neuronal differentiation, neurite outgrowth, cell death and survival. In regression models among the HD brains, huntingtin CAG repeat size, onset age and age at death were independently found to be inversely related to miR-10b-5p levels. CAG repeat size and onset age were independently inversely related to miR-196a-5p, onset age was inversely related to miR-196b-5p and age at death was inversely related to miR-615-3p expression. These results suggest these Hox-related miRNAs may be involved in neuroprotective response in HD. Recently, miRNAs have shown promise as biomarkers for human diseases and given their relationship to disease expression, these miRNAs are biomarker candidates in HD.


Background The pathophysiology of rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is currently viewed as a process that starts with a pathologic activation of the immune system that eventually leads to the clinical manifestation of the disease. Systemic autoimmunity has been defined as one of the specific phases preceding the development of RA.(1) Different risk factors may be relevant for each specific phase in RA disease development. Objectives To analyse putative environmental, genetic and demographic risk factors associated with the development of systemic autoimmunity associated with RA in individuals genetically at risk. Methods This is a prospective cohort study of individuals genetically at risk of developing RA, namely first degree relatives (FDRs) of patients with known active RA. Only individuals without clinical evidence of RA were enrolled, and then followed-up yearly to detect the development of active arthritis. We included in this analysis only individuals with available anti-CCP status (anti-CCP 2.0 or anti-CCP 3.1). We pooled individuals from two separate cohorts, one from Switzerland (N=682) and one from France (N=148). We used logistic regression to analyse univariate and multivariate associations between a positive anti-CCP status and putative risk factors. Results A total of 830 FDRs of RA patients are presented, of which 41 (5%) were anti-CCP positive. FDRs had a mean age of 46 years, 79% female, 61% shared epitope positive, and 24% had a history of at least one episode of swollen joint, either at inclusion or during follow-up. In univariate analysis, a positive anti-CCP status was significantly associated with heavy tobacco smoke (>10 pack-years, Odds Ratio (OR): 2.8, p=0.02), loss of teeth (OR: 1.07, p=0.001), the presence of a swollen (OR: 2.5, p=0.04) or a tender joint (OR: 2.1, p=0.03). In multivariate adjusted analysis, only loss of teeth (OR: 1.06, p=0.005), heavy tobacco smoke (OR: 2.6, p=0.039) and the history of a swollen joints (OR: 1.16, p=0.002) were independently associated with anti-CCP positivity. Furthermore, male sex trended to be protective (OR: 0.39, p=0.089) and the effect of obesity on anti-CCP development tended to differ by sex. In males obesity was associated with an increased risk, while in women obesity was associated with a decreased risk (OR: 4.86 vs. OR: 0.18, p=0.075). No association between anti-CCP and the presence of the shared epitope, alcohol consumption or various joint symptoms was found, which may be explained by limited statistical power. Conclusions In individuals genetically at risk for RA, the development of anti-CCP antibodies was associated with tooth loss, tobacco smoke and the occurrence of a swollen joint. Taken together, these results suggest similar risk factors for the production of anti-CCP antibodies and the development of classifiable RA, suggesting that the occurrence of anti-CCP antibodies is a valid intermediate marker of RA development. References Gerlag DM et al. Ann Rheum Dis 2012. Acknowledgements All investigators and participants within the "SCREEN-RA" and the "Campagne des 100'000" studies. Disclosure of Interest : None declared DOI 10.1136/annrheumdis-2014-eular.5178


This paper outlines a novel approach to an integrated 1D to 3D characterization and geomodeling of Vugular pore systems (VPS) in carbonate reservoirs. The study focused on capturing the various scales of the VPS and how they related to the 3D architecture.
 An integrated approach for detecting, characterizing and modeling the multi-scale VPS has been employed by utilizing multi-disciplinary datasets, that span from 3D seismic volumes, borehole images, production data to petrographic analyses. These datasets were analyzed and corroborated in the 1D, 2D and 3D domains to validate and define the occurrence and architecture of the VPS within the reservoir. Eventually, a 3D geo-cellular model of the VPS is constructed by honoring diagenetic proxies and experiments, VPS flags, fluid flow behavior and seismic attributes geobodies.
 VPS are observed at nearly all scales of datasets (i.e. geoscience and reservoir engineering data). They also occur at different scales of pore size ranging from millimeters to multi-meters. Many of them are even beyond the resolution of conventional whole core and basic well logs. A complete set of static and dynamic data allows a classification of the VPS into several classes based on their size, intensity and effect on reservoir properties and flow rates. Diagenetic proxies, well-based experimental variogram analyses and seismic-based geobody extraction further confirmed their architecture and distribution within 3D space. Their ramified patterns within the proximity of structural crestal areas tie quite consistently with well and seismic data. This architecture is further supported by possible hydro-dynamic corrosive fluid behavior that potentially had longer residence time in the crestal areas during late burial diagenesis stages.
 A modeling-while-interpreting workflow is also configured to model the VPS in 3D interactively and confirm the VPS occurrence on a well-by-well basis. This method is applied directly to the 3D full-field model and is linked to an interpretation platform. This unique approach contributes to the reduction of ambiguity in subsurface data and analysis.


The current intellectual and social interest in neuroscience invites Christian educators to engage this complex and sometimes disparate field for the sake of transformative teaching and learning. Recognizing that neuroscientists differ over the nature of transformation—as educators differ on a definition of transformative learning—should not detract from neuroscience's contribution to transformative teaching within Christian education. This article contributes to the conversation by charting a "neurological" approach to resources for transformative teaching and learning. The article maps the field of transformative learning, provides neuroscience insights that support transformative teaching through cognitive, emotional and social domains of neuroscience, and discusses approaches to neuroscience that explain the very processes of transformation within Christian education.


There is no convincing evidence indicating that future ground motion in at least two-thirds of Istanbul, Turkey, shall be less demanding than the ground motions that devastated the city of Düzce, Turkey, in 1999. Comparison of vulnerability indices calibrated for Turkish construction indicates that the structures of the buildings in Istanbul are no better than the structures of buildings in Düzce. On the basis of these arguments, we project that a future earthquake near Istanbul may cause severe damage or collapse approximately quarter of a million buildings. Leaving the vulnerable buildings as they are and organizing for emergency response is not an option for Istanbul.


The DC transport properties of and microwave absorption (at 41 GHz) in a bulk ceramic sample and a film (220 nm thick) of La0.5Sr0.5CoO3-δ are measured. The bulk sample was cut from a target from which the film was also produced, by pulsed-laser deposition. It is found that the temperature behaviours of the DC resistivity and magnetoresistance (MR) of the bulk sample are quite different from those of the film. This is attributed to oxygen depletion of the film as compared with the target. Below the Curie temperature TC, the film behaves like a highly inhomogeneous system of weakly connected ferromagnetic grains (or clusters). The microwave study provides further data on the inhomogeneity of the samples. It is found that the surface layer of the bulk sample has very low conductivity compared with the bulk. This can be explained by the oxygen depletion of the surface layer. The most important feature of doped cobaltates revealed in this study is the following: the microwave conductivity, which should be related mainly to the conductivity within the poorly connected grains, increases by an order of magnitude at the transition to the ferromagnetic state. The increase is much greater than that found in the reported DC measurements on doped cobaltates of the highest crystal perfection. The microwave effect found is attributed to an inherent magnetically inhomogeneous state of the doped cobaltates. On the basis of the results obtained, it can be suggested that the rather low MR in the doped cobaltates as compared with that of the manganites is attributable to their more inhomogeneous magnetic state.


ABSTRACT Background: Efforts to deal with Diabetes Mellitus (DM) disease require support from various parties, especially the community and family apart from the sufferer himself. The community in an effort to reduce the risk of DM disease, among others, by providing knowledge and understanding to families and sufferers directly, including empowering the community. This study was carried out by empowering health cadres by training in knowledge and skills in medical examinations, starting from checking blood pressure, anthropometry, and blood sugar. This study aimed to analyze the effect of community empowerment on the implementation of DM management. Subjects and Method: This was an experimental study with a control group design. This study was carried out in Malangsuko Village, West Java. Total of 30 cadres were divided into 15 cadres in the control group and 15 cadres in the treatment group. The independent variable was community empowerment. The dependent variable was the implementation of DM management. Data were collected using questionnaire and observation sheet skills results. Data were analyzed using Wilcoxon test. Results: After a post test, a total of 73% cadres had moderate knowledge and 80% had low skill in control group, while in intervention group, 73.3% cadres had good knowledge and 100% had good skill. Conclusion: The empowerment of health cadres in Malangsuko Village is effective because it has a positive impact on knowledge and skills in early detection of DM disease. Keywords: community empowerment, diabetes mellitus management Correspondence: Tavip Dwi Wahyuni. School of Health Polytechnics, Malang, East Java. Email: firstname.lastname@example.com DOI: https://doi.org/10.26911/the7thicph.04.11


Elliptic partial differential equations (PDEs) frequently arise in continuum descriptions of physical processes relevant to science and engineering. Multilevel preconditioners represent a family of scalable techniques for solving discrete PDEs of this type and thus are the method of choice for high-resolution simulations. The scalability and time-to-solution of massively parallel multilevel preconditioners can be adversely affected by using a coarse-level solver with sub-optimal algorithmic complexity. To maintain scalability, agglomeration techniques applied to the coarse level have been shown to be necessary. In this work, we present a new software component introduced within the Portable Extensible Toolkit for Scientific computation (PETSc) which permits agglomeration. We provide an overview of the design and implementation of this functionality, together with several use cases highlighting the benefits of agglomeration. Lastly, we demonstrate via numerical experiments employing geometric multigrid with structured meshes, the flexibility and performance gains possible using our MPI-rank agglomeration implementation.


Starting from the current debate regarding the aim of religious education, the article states this aim in terms of religious identity formation. With the help of Ricoeur's narrative approach to identity formation, the process of religious identity formation is, first of all, described as a hermeneutic task. Next, the process of religious identity formation is described as an educational task. The authors posit that the formation of a religious identity calls for a specific educational approach: i.e., action learning. Subsequently, the value of this specific educational approach is demonstrated by using it to re-evaluate the effects of a religious education curriculum concerning the problem of theodicy. The analysis shows that the limited effects of this curriculum are due to a predominance of guided learning as opposed to action learning. This finding supports the main thesis of this article, that the formation of a religious identity calls for action learning as an alternative to guided learning.


Replication-coupled (RC) nucleosome assembly is an essential process in eukaryotic cells in order to maintain chromatin structure during DNA replication. The deposition of newly synthesized H3/H4 histones during DNA replication is facilitated by specialized histone chaperones. Although the contribution of these histone chaperones to genomic stability has been thoroughly investigated, their effect on replisome progression is much less understood. By exploiting a time-lapse microscopy system for monitoring DNA replication in individual live cells, we examined how mutations in key histone chaperones including CAC1, RTT106, RTT109 and ASF1, affect replication fork progression. Our experiments revealed that mutations in CAC1 or RTT106 that directly deposit histones on the DNA, slowdown replication fork progression. In contrast, analysis of cells mutated in the intermediary ASF1 or RTT109 histone chaperones revealed that replisome progression is not affected. We found that mutations in histone chaperones including ASF1 and RTT109 lead to extended G2/M duration, elevated number of RPA foci and in some cases, increased spontaneous mutation rate. Our research suggests that histone chaperones have distinct roles in enabling high replisome progression and maintaining genome stability during cell cycle progression. Author Summary Histone chaperones (HC) play key roles in maintaining the chromatin structure during DNA replication in eukaryotic cells. Despite extensive studies on HCs, little is known regarding their importance for replication fork progression during S-phase. Here, we utilized a live-cell imaging approach to measure the progression rates of single replication forks in individual yeast cells mutated in key histone chaperones. Using this approach, we show that mutations in CAC1 or RTT106 HCs that directly deposit histones on the DNA lead to slowdown of replication fork progression. In contrast, mutations in ASF1 or RTT109 HCs that transfers H3/H4 to CAC1 or RTT106, do not affect replisome progression but lead to post replication defects. Our results reveal distinct functions of HCs in replication fork progression and maintaining genome stability.


The early described procedure for quantitative determination of oxacillin with the spectrophotometric method was used for the assay oxacillin tablets, capsules and injection preparations. It was shown that the excipients used in tablets and capsules did not interfere with oxacillin determination. The reproducibility of the method is +/- 1.5--2 per cent. The results of oxacillin determination with the new method and the currently used methods were compared.


Objective The authors aimed to explore the relationship between the expression/polymorphisms of TLR-9 and susceptibility to colon cancer development in the Saudi Arabian population. Methods In total, blood samples from 115 patients with colon cancer and 102 participants without colon cancer were analyzed in this study. Three single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) were selected from the TLR-9 gene, including two sites within the TLR-9 gene's promoter region (rs352144 and rs187084) and one site in a TLR-9 intron region (rs5743839). Odds ratios (ORs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) were computed from logistic regression models after adjusting for age, gender, and tumor localization. To investigate the differential expression of TLR-9 in colon cancer, TLR-9 expression was evaluated using quantitative real-time reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction on 40 matched normal and colon tissues. Results The authors found that TLR-9 expression was decreased in colon cancer tissues as compared with that in normal tissues. Moreover, significant associations between the TLR-9 rs187084 SNP and colon cancer risk were observed in female patients only. In rs187084, the T allele had a significantly lower frequency (2.8 times) in female cancer patients than in controls (0.27 vs 0.41). The TLR-9 rs352139 and rs352144 SNPs were significantly associated with colon cancer development when the tumor was located in the rectal area. Conclusion The findings support the hypothesis that TLR-9 has an anticancer role in colon cancer development. Furthermore, genetic variation may influence colon cancer development, and SNPs in TLR-9 could serve as biomarkers for decision making in the treatment of females with rectal cancer.


1. Electrophysiological techniques were used to characterize responses of afferent fibers in pelvic nerve of adult, virgin female rats to mechanical or chemical stimulation of internal reproductive organs and to mechanical stimulation of other pelvic organs. 2. In an in vivo barbiturate-anesthetized preparation, pelvic nerve afferent fibers responded to a wide variety of mechanical stimulation applied to restricted regions of the vaginal canal, caudal uterus (body and cervix), bladder, ureter, colon, or anus. 3. Single-fiber mechanoreceptive fields were invariably confined to a single organ. Notably, responses could be evoked not only by gentle stimulation of the unit's receptive field directly on the organ itself, but also by stimulating the field indirectly with intense stimulation through the appropriate part of a contiguous organ. This innervation feature is consistent with the separability of pelvic organ functions under innocuous conditions but their confusion under noxious ones. 4. Receptive fields on the reproductive organs extended from the caudal edge of the vagina to the uterine body (including the cervix) but were most often located in the fornix (vaginocervical junction). Most units had no or low levels of spontaneous activity. Their responses to mechanical stimuli were usually slowly or moderately adapting and time-locked to the stimulus. 5. Fibers with vaginal receptive fields (including the fornix) responded best either to vaginal distension with a balloon or, more often, to a probe moving along the internal vaginal surface in a direction toward the cervix. They were observed most frequently during the proestrus stage of the rat's estrous cycle. These fibers, therefore, seem particularly suited for relaying information about stimuli that occur during mating. 6. Fibers with receptive fields on the uterine cervix and body responded best to static pressure and were observed less frequently than those with vaginal fields, regardless of estrous stage. They were, however, sensitized by hypoxia. In addition, irritation of the uterus increased the probability of observing them. These fibers, therefore, may exert their primary function during reproductive conditions different from those of virgin rats, such as parturition. 7. Response activity of most of the mechanoreceptive afferent fibers supplying reproductive organs increased as the stimulus intensity increased into the noxious range; i.e., into a range in which the stimulus momentarily produced ischemia at the stimulus site. In addition, in an in vitro preparation, pelvic nerve fibers responded in a dose-dependent manner to injections through the uterine artery of bradykinin (BRAD) as well as to other algesic chemicals, 5-hydroxytryptamine (5-HT) and KCl.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 400 WORDS)


A sore throat is pain or irritation in the throat. It is usually caused by acute pharyngitis (inflammation of the pharynx). Although it can also appear as a result of trauma, diphtheria or other conditions. Post (Post Operative Sore Throat) is a common complaint in patients undergoing general anaesthesia following orotracheal intubation, with reported incidence of 21-65%. POST ranks among the most frequent subjective complaint after tracheal intubation under general anaesthesia. Post operative sore throat, cough and hoarseness of voice though minor sequel, but they may cause significant post operative morbidity and patient dissatisfaction. Various pharmacological and non-pharmacological trials have been used for attenuating POST with no single proven modality in modern medicine. Keeping this in mind, a thorough study was planned to search out for an ideal Ayurvedic preparation for the management of Post Operative Sore Throat due to tracheal intubation under general anaesthesia. As Haritaki has anti-inflammatory and anti-septic properties and Madhu has anti microbial and wound healing properties, A planned study was done on "Haritaki Kashaya and Madhu as Kawala" to evaluate its importance in treating post operative sore throat caused by tracheal intubation and the results were compared with the patients receiving normal saline gargles. Total effect of drug was evaluated on the basis of signs and symptoms relieved after completion of the trial. The data obtained in clinical study before and after the trial was expressed in terms of Mean, Standard Deviation (SD±) and Standard Error (SE±). Group-II (trial group) revealed better results than Group-I (control group) over total criteria of assessment. The trial drug was found to be efficient to relieve the symptoms like coughing, pain in throat and post operative sore throat in the patients who undergo orotracheal intubation after general anaesthesia


This paper presents techniques for the design and implementation of domain specific languages. Our techniques are based on higher-order attribute grammars. Formal languages are specified in the classical attribute formalism and domain specific languages are embedded in the specification via higher-order attributes. We present a domain specific language for pretty-printing and we show how such language can be easily embedded in the specification of a powerful spreadsheet-like tool. From such specification an incremental implementation is automatically derived and the first results are presented.


Abstract Effectively addressing public health crises requires dynamic and nimble interdisciplinary collaborations across the translational spectrum, from bench to clinic to community. The Clinical and Translational Science Award (CTSA) Program hubs are uniquely suited to facilitate interdisciplinary collaborations across universities and academic medical centers. This paper describes the activities at the Columbia University CTSA Program hub to address a current public health crisis, the opioid epidemic. Columbia's CTSA Program hub led a three-phase approach, based on the Conceptual Model of Transdisciplinary Scientific Collaboration as described by Stokols et al.: (1) a university-wide planning and brainstorming phase to identify key leaders across many domains who are influential in addressing the opioid epidemic, (2) a campus-wide and community outreach to identify all interested parties, and (3) ongoing targeted support for collaboration development. Preliminary metrics of success are interdisciplinary collaborations and grant funding. We describe recent examples of how interdisciplinary collaboration, academic-community partnership, and pilot funding contributed to the development and funding of innovative interdisciplinary research, including the New York site of the HEALing Communities initiative. The processes are now being used to support interdisciplinary approaches for other translational public health issues.


Diel patterns of dissolved free amino acid (DFAA) concentration and microheterotrophic utilization were examined in the spring and fall of 1981 in euphotic waters from the base of the mixed layer off the southern California coast. The average depths of the isotherms sampled were 19.2 m for spring and 9.0 m for fall. Total DFAA levels were generally higher in the spring than in the fall, 18 to 66 nM and 14 to 20 nM, respectively. Two daily concentration maxima and minima were observed for total DFAAs as well as for most individual DFAAs. Maxima were usually measured in the mid-dark period and in the early afternoon; minima were typically observed in early morning and late afternoon. Bacterial cell numbers reached maximal values near midnight in both seasons. These increases coincided with one of the total DFAA maxima. The second total DFAA maximum occurred in early to midafternoon, during the time of maximum photosynthetic carbon production and rapid dissolved amino acid utilization. Microbial metabolism (incorporation plus respiration) of selected 3H-amino acids was 2.7 to 4.1 times greater during the daylight hours. DFAA turnover times, based on these metabolic measurements, ranged between 11 and 36 h for the amino acids tested, and rates were 1.7 to 3.7 times faster in the daylight hours than at night. DFAA distributions were related to primary production and chlorophyll a concentrations. Amino acids were estimated to represent 9 to 45% of the total phytoplankton exudate. Microheterotrophic utilization or production of total protein amino acids was estimated as 3.6 μg of C liter−1 day−1 in spring and 1.9 μg of C liter−1 day−1 in the fall. Assimilation efficiency for dissolved amino acids averaged 65% for marine microheterotrophs.


A receptive endometrial environment requires adequate immunological tolerance to protect the implanting embryo from maternal immune rejection. Studies in mice implicate CD4+CD25+ T-regulatory (Treg) cells as essential mediators of immune tolerance in pregnancy. The aim of this study was to evaluate the link between Treg cells and fertility in women. Expression of Foxp3, a master regulator of Treg cell differentiation, was quantified in endometrial tissue from women experiencing primary unexplained infertility and normal fertile women. Endometrial biopsies were collected during the mid-secretory phase of the menstrual cycle from women meeting rigorously defined criteria for unexplained infertility after experiencing repeated failed cycles of IVF treatment (infertile, n = 10), or women classified as proven fertile (control, n = 12). Expression of Foxp3 mRNA was reduced approximately two-fold in the tissue of infertile women. In contrast, mRNAs encoding T cell transcription factors T-bet and GATA3, associated with differentiation of Th1 and Th2 CD4+ T cells respectively, were unchanged. Treg cell differentiation is controlled by TGFbeta, but the relative abundance in endometrial tissue of TGFbeta1, TGFbeta2, TGFbeta3 mRNAs was not changed in infertile women. Cytokines influencing Th1 and Th2 cell differentiation, including IFNgamma, IL-2, IL-4, IL-5, IL-10 and IL-12p40, as well as dendritic cell-regulating cytokines IL-1alpha, IL-1beta, IL-6, LIF, GM-CSF and TNFalpha were also expressed similarly regardless of fertility status. The finding of reduced endometrial Foxp3 implicates impaired differentiation of uterine T cells into the Treg phenotype as a key determinant of fertility in women. The factors underpinning this aberration in the immune response remain to be identified.


This paper describes the Duluth systems that participated in Task 14 of SemEval 2016, Semantic Taxonomy Enrichment. There were three related systems in the formal evaluation which are discussed here, along with numerous post--evaluation runs. All of these systems identified synonyms between WordNet and other dictionaries by measuring the gloss overlaps between them. These systems perform better than the random baseline and one post--evaluation variation was within a respectable margin of the median result attained by all participating systems.


The traditional teaching model of English linguistics does not apply to the current college English major in China. Against the background, teachers should create the suitable ones in their context. Therefore, under the guidance of action research, it is suggested that an empirical study should be conducted in order to investigate the feasibility of using flipped classroom model in teaching English linguistics courses with a view to constructing its flipped classroom model and exploring the validity of corresponding teaching strategies. Findings of this study show that applying flipped classroom model helps to promote students' learning abilities and comprehensive quality and improving teaching effects as well. This is to recommend that modern teaching methods characterized by information technology require teachers' growth in a professional way.


Aim: Bone-borne rapid maxillary expander (RME) is one of the latest expander designs being used for skeletal expansion by applying forces through palatal mini-screws. The purpose of this retrospective study was to evaluate soft tissue facial changes following RME using 3D stereophotogrammetry. Materials and Methods: A total of 15 subjects (6 males and 9 females) with a mean age of 12.1±1.4 years who underwent upper arch expansion using bone-borne RME as a component of their orthodontic therapy were recruited in this retrospective study. 3D facial images (3dMD Ltd, Atlanta, Ga) generating 3D soft tissue meshes before expansion (T0), immediately after expansion (T1), and after a 3-month retention phase (T2) were used to capture facial scans of 15 subjects. Based on twenty-three landmarks, 10 linear measurements were made from each of 3D images. Comparisons of measurements at 3 different times were evaluated with one-way Repeated Measures Analysis of Variance (p < 0.05). Results: Statistically significant changes were observed in the mouth (chr-chl) and nasal (alr-all) width in T0-T1 and T0-T2. No significant differences were found in the upper and lower face heights, total face height, upper and lower lip heights, upper and lower vermillion heights and intercanthal width. Conclusion: Significant increases in mouth and nose width were obtained by bone-borne RME. These changes remained stable for 3 months. 3D stereophotogrammetric facial imaging method is an easy and non-invasive method that can be used to analyze the changes of facial soft tissues after RME treatment.


This dissertation addresses the syntactic analysis of the (English) tough construction (TC), a syntactic construction in which (typically) adjectival predicates in the semantic class of 'tough' and 'easy' may participate: (i) John is tough/easy/impossible/a cinch to please e In this construction, the matrix subject is coreferent with the understood (nonovert) object of the embedded infinitival, as the non-TC paraphrase in (ii) shows: (ii) It is tough/easy/impossible/a cinch to please John A theoretically and empirically adequate analysis of such constructions has long proved elusive in generative syntactic frameworks: on the one hand due to apparent incompatibility with the theoretical principles of Case-theory, theta-theory,
and movement constraints, on the other due to a range of largely contradictory empirical facts suggesting that TCs involve both NP-movement ('A-movement') and wh-movement ('A-bar-movement'). The very fact that within previous Principles
and Parameters models TCs have proved "in principle unexplainable" (Holmberg, 2001:839) appears detrimental to the credibility of such syntactic frameworks. I attempt to fill this previously conspicuous 'gap' in the empirical adequacy of Principles and Parameters syntax, arguing that recent revisions to the minimalist framework (particularly Chomsky 2000; 2001a) should inspire a rethinking of TCs,
thus lending further support to the current minimalist framework and the manner in which core theoretical principles are reworked therein. Chapter 2 provides a range of evidence to support the claim that the lexical argument structure of 'tough'-class predicates is identical in both TC and non-TC configurations. Chapter 3 briefly introduces crucial additions to the recent minimalist
framework concerning agreement, movement and feature-checking. Chapter 4 details the various problems encountered by the most common analyses of TCs within generative syntax, and the reasons why each is incompatible with a specific set of basic theoretical assumptions. Drawing on this, chapter 5 outlines an analysis of TCs consistent with these assumptions as stated in the current framework, based on an innovative approach to the syntax of null wh-operators. Chapter 6
explores some consequences of extending this analysis to provide an account for a set of constructions apparently related to TCs.


We consider the problem of joint channel assignment and power allocation in underlaid cellular vehicular-to-everything (C-V2X) systems where multiple vehicle-to-network (V2N) uplinks share the time-frequency resources with multiple vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) platoons that enable groups of connected and autonomous vehicles to travel closely together. Due to the nature of high user mobility in vehicular environment, traditional centralized optimization approach relying on global channel information might not be viable in C-V2X systems with large number of users. Utilizing a multi-agent reinforcement learning (RL) approach, we propose a distributed resource allocation (RA) algorithm to overcome this challenge. Specifically, we model the RA problem as a multi-agent system. Based solely on the local channel information, each platoon leader, acting as an agent, collectively interacts with each other and accordingly selects the optimal combination of sub-band and power level to transmit its signals. Toward this end, we utilize the double deep Q-learning algorithm to jointly train the agents under the objectives of simultaneously maximizing the sum-rate of V2N links and satisfying the packet delivery probability of each V2V link in a desired latency limitation. Simulation results show that our proposed RL-based algorithm provides a close performance compared to that of the well-known exhaustive search algorithm.


We illustrate how employing Graphics Processing Units (GPU) can speed-up intensive image processing operations. In particular, we demonstrate the use of the NVIDIA CUDA architecture to implement a color digital binary halftoning algorithm based on Direct Binary Search (DBS). Halftoning a color image is more computationally expensive than the single color case as there is a need to minimize dot interaction between different color planes as well. We propose processing all color planes in parallel. In addition we employ processing several non-overlapping neighborhoods in parallel, by utilizing the GPU's parallel architecture, to further improve the computational efficiency. This parallel approach allows us to use a large neighborhood and filter size, to achieve the highest halftone quality, while having minimal impact on performance.


This paper explores the necessary and sufficient conditions of good Corporate Governance practices for high risk disclosure by firms in their Corporate Governance Annual Report. Additionally, we explore whether those recipes have changed during the financial crisis. With a sample of 271 Spanish listed companies, we applied fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis to a database of financial and non-financial data. We report that Board of Directors independence, size, level of activity and gender diversity, CEO duality, Audit Committee independence, being audited by the Big Four auditing firms and the presence of institutional investors are associated with high risk disclosure. The conditions included in almost every combination are the presence of institutional investors and being audited by the Big Four. We found similar combinations for 2006 and 2012, while the analysis for 2009 showed the lowest number of causal configurations.


【Background】Previous studies showed that some coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19) patients might have some degree of liver biochemical abnormalities. However, no data on the stratified analysis and change patterns of alanine aminotransferase (ALT), aspartate aminotransferase (AST) and total bilirubin(TBil) have been reported.【Methods】We performed a single-center, retrospective study. 105 hospitalized COVID-19 adults in Beijing Ditan Hospital fromJan.12,2020 to Mar.17,2020 were enrolled. Then we observed the characteristics and change patterns of ALT, AST, or TBil in the patients.【Results】Ages of patients ranged 18-92 years old, with a median age of 43.4 years for mild ill group and 58.2 years for severe ill group (p < 0.001). The patients were hospitalized for a median of 22 days. 89 patients underwent abdominal ultrasound scans for fatty liver, with an overall proportion approximately 41.6%. 17 (16.2%) patients had abnormally elevated levelsALT. ALT and AST abnormalities occurred in 48.0% of severe ill group patients, compared to 13.9% of mild ill group. 19 (18.1%) patients showed ALT, AST and TBil levels≥2×ULN. 9 patients showed any index≥3×ULN. ALT, AST, and TBil levels≥2×ULN were observed in only 1 critically ill patient. All patients could be divided into 4 kinds of patterns based on the ALT index of baseline and hospitalization: Continuous normal (64.7%), normal and then abnormal(19.0%), abnormal and then normal(8.6%),continuous abnormal(7.6%).【Conclusion】Although elevated liver function indexes are common in patients with COVID-19 infection, most non-severe ill patients only show mild abnormalities or transient increases.


Starting out from a rereading of Marcel Mauss's groundbreaking study "The Gift" (1924) and its successive reworkings by Levi-Strauss and Bourdieu, and drawing on fieldwork from Africa, this paper proposes another interpretation of the phenomenon of gift-giving as a central modality for the circulation of goods and wealth in community-based societies. Hitherto, most explanations have retained a theoretical core according to which any "generous" exchange – being subject to the obligation to give, to receive and ultimately to reciprocate the gift – could only be governed by a non-economic logic (or, at least, one that negates its utilitarian dimension): a logic that symbolizes and reproduces social bonds, signs of power and prestige, and the relationship between men and their gods. Here, the analysis picks up the problem by taking a simple observation: community-based societies are mutual funds. The exchange of gift and deferred counter-gift are the functional equivalent of modern systems of insurance, social security and mutual credit schemes. They are thus subject to a logic of debt, which derives its strength from its economic utility and from the constraining power of the moral obligation of reciprocity that binds together creditors and debtors (all of whom are keenly aware of their personal interests!). The community is therefore a debt market, regulated by the constant flow of their transactions. Today, however, rising inequalities are causing that market to dry up. The time has come for the predatory state and its oligarchies to pay their debts toward the poor, whose community-based systems of solidarity can no longer provide them with effective protection.


This paper discusses three aspects of genetic conservation relating to fishery management and fish culture, namely (1) the goal for conservation (what to conserve), (2) a guideline for assessing acceptable levels of gene flow among populations. and (3) the effect on the genetically effective population size resulting from stock enhancement. Goal for conservation: The goal for genetic conservation is to maintain genetic variability between and within populations. It has been suggested recently, as an alternative to that goal, that in the context of fisheries management conservation should strive at maintaining the variance or the distribution of fitness. The characteristics of this model are discussed from the perspective of population genetics. It is concluded that although the fitness approach may appear attractive it is not compatible with the more general objective of maintaining genetic diversity between and within populations. Acceptable levels of gene, flow: A tension exists between the need for protection of natural fish populations and the rapidly expanding levels of aquaculture causing increased migration into those populations. Guidelines are needed for assessing levels of introgression that are acceptable in the context of genetic conservation. To avoid unrealistically restrictive recommendations it is suggested that acceptable levels of introgression are related to those occurring naturally. It is argued that assessments of acceptable levels of introgression should be made on the basis of spontaneously occurring gene flow estimated from genetic data using parameters such as Fst or similar ones. Stock enhancement and effective size: In the context of genetic conservation previously published recommendations on stocking have focussed on the need to identify the genetic structure within the region in question to ensure that the appropriate population is targeted for propagation and release. There is, however, an additional aspect that appears to have been largely unrecognized: the reduction of the genetically effective size of the total population that may result from breeding-release programmes aimed at supporting wild stocks. The details of this problem are introduced and discussed.


Input-buffered switches with virtual output queueing require crossbar switch matrix scheduling algorithms. Existing scheduling algorithms are non-deterministic and are based on parallel and iterative request-grant-accept arbitration schemes. This presents challenges to flow-level scheduling for guaranteed throughput and bounded delay services and also to scalability. In this paper, the parallel-polled virtual output queued (PP-VOQ) switch is presented. Using parallel token passing, the PP-VOQ switch has deterministic and bounded scheduling delay and is implementable for 16 or 32 ports of 10-Gigabit Ethernet. The PP-VOQ switch is shown, via simulation, to perform very similar to an iSLIP switch. The PP-VOQ switch is extended to a "cube switch" design that decouples input port VOQ selection from output port selection to reduce the scheduling delay and improve scalability. This decoupled parallel polling is very scalable and is shown to result in better performance than an iSLIP switch.


Abstract To date, the large majority of studies evaluating growth hormone (GH) response to acute physical exercise has been performed involving gross muscle groups. To the best of our knowledge, none has evaluated the effects of a respiratory muscle endurance training (RMET) on hormonal secretions, particularly on GH release, though some respiratory devices have been widely used in athletes to train respiratory muscles and to improve cardiopulmonary function and physical performance. 8 healthy men underwent an incremental progressive RMET protocol of 11 daily sessions, obtained through the use of a specifically designed respiratory device (Spiro Tiger®). The 12th session of RMET (15 min duration: 1 min at a respiration rate of 28 acts/min, 5 min at 32 acts/min, 5 min at 34 acts/min, 4 min at 36 acts/min) was associated with blood samplings for determination of GH, cortisol, ghrelin, glucose, and lactate (LA) levels. GH and cortisol responses significantly increased after a 15-minute RMET session, which, in contrast, inhibited ghrelin secretion. There was a minimal, though significant, increase in LA levels with a significant elevation in glycemia. A 15-minute RMET session, administered after a 11-days incremental progressive RMET protocol, was capable of stimulating GH and cortisol release and suppressing ghrelin secretion. Optimization of incremental progressive RMET protocols would be important to maximize the positive chronic effects of this intervention on somatotropic function and muscle performance.


Continuous Speech Recognition Technology implementation is expensive, and the failure of leading companies in this niche can hamper usefulness. C-SRT, if deployed and used with speech macros, experiences vastly improved implementations and drastically reduces medical transcription costs.A speech macro is a short phrase that is automatically translated into a block of text or a graphic display. A more powerful form of speech macro can bring up predefined templates and insert spoken text into the proper position automatically, based on its interpretation. Cases from the author's consulting experiences and from medical journals emphasize the need for speech macros from a cost-benefit standpoint. A prototype program is introduced that facilitates the process of creating macros. The need for macro management software is reconciled with current research on speech recognition and technology adoption. A planned experiment is discussed.


ABSTRACT The growing number of undecided voters has attracted a lot of interest due to its important role in determining election results. Many studies have addressed the media consumption of undecideds but few have examined the role of undecideds' attitudes towards the media institution. This paper is innovative in its attempt to address the issue of the role of media trust in undecided versus decided voters' media engagement, based on a survey (N = 1427) followed by a multivariate analysis during the Israeli April 2019 elections campaign. The analysis revealed that although decided voters have more doubt in the accuracy of the news media, they still consume more news from more diverse sources, highlighting decideds as more critical and simultaneously more informed than undecideds. A parallel experiment (N = 121) identified that undecideds tended to rank a fake news item shared by one of their Facebook friends as credible significantly more often than decideds, demonstrating undecideds' lower critical ability to identify misinformation. The present study highlights the under-explored roles of undecideds (mis)trust of the news media and high susceptibility to believe fake news items, thus adding new evidence to the notion that elections are often won by the least informed and least critical citizens. We discuss the grim implications of our findings to current literature.


Social competence is a concept that has been defined and measured in many ways. Odom and McConnell (1985) proposed a performance-based assessment of social competence that involved significant social agents in children's environments to make judgments about the competence of the children's social behavior. This study constructed and initially evaluated such an approach for assessing social competence of young children with disabilities. A multimethod assessment of children's social competence (i.e., direct observation, observer impressions, teacher rating, peer ratings) was conducted with 222 preschool children with and without disabilities. Principal component analysis yielded four factors, the first of which accounted for the largest percentage of variance and may be the better global assessment of social competence. Results of this investigation are discussed conceptually with respect to the adequacy of multiple-measure performance-based approaches and empirically with regard to the possibility of using these measures to evaluate factors affecting the development of social competence in early childhood special education.


In response to the clear and persistent trends the elimination of cancer-related health disparities among racial/ethnic minorities has been a national public health priority. For the first time Healthy People 2020, the nation9s roadmap for improving the health of Americans, also includes sexual minorities as population of priority. Although precise data on cancer rates among lesbians are lacking, evidence suggests that sexual minority status may contribute to excess risk for the development of certain types of cancers, including breast cancer, anal cancer, lung cancer and cancers associated with HIV/AIDS. The causes of these disparities are complex and likely influenced by the same factors that drive cancer disparity rates among African American and other underserved populations. These factors include poor continuity of care; socioeconomic factors, such as lack of adequate insurance coverage; medical mistrust; cultural and emotional factor; and providers9 unintentional bias and inadequate cultural competency. The purpose of this presentation is to discuss risk factors for cancer disparities among LGBT individuals and to describe existing cancer risk reduction interventions targeted toward this community. Citation Format: Alicia K. Matthews. Cancer and the LGBT community. [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the Ninth AACR Conference on the Science of Cancer Health Disparities in Racial/Ethnic Minorities and the Medically Underserved; 2016 Sep 25-28; Fort Lauderdale, FL. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Epidemiol Biomarkers Prev 2017;26(2 Suppl):Abstract nr IA21.


Producing environmentally benign products has now become one of the key challenges of companies across the globe. It can be achieved by utilizing the ecodesign tools in product development process for reducing the environmental impact of products during the design stage itself. Although, the ecodesign tools are available in abundance but there is a lack of studies that can help companies to identify suitable tools. A novel approach has been developed in this study which assists companies to identify and adopt effective ecodesign tools. In this study, three companies related to different product categories are included for testing the proposed approach. Results show that 'Ecodesign Checklist,' 'Material, Energy, Toxicity (MET) Matrix' and 'Life Cycle Design Strategy (LiDS) Wheel' are the three most effective ecodesign tools among the tested tools. Also, it is realized that if these three ecodesign tools are customized and integrated together in a specific sequence then it can be used by the designers, especially novice designers, as an ecodesign methodology. This methodology has the potential to guide designers in the form of a step by step approach during environmentally conscious product development.


This research examines optimal operation of microgrid systems. Microgrids are disaggregated from main transmission grid. Microgrids are able to integrate distributed renewable energy, take advantage of waste heat, provide higher power reliability, reduce electricity transmission loss, and decrease greenhouse gas emissions. The study considers solar power, wind power, biomass power, gas turbine, fuel cell generators, power storage, heat storage device, electricity demand, and heat demand in microgrid system. In the paper, an optimization model of the microgrid system is proposed and the optimal operating strategy of the system is presented. A case study of optimization model is analyzed in a microgrid system by Institute of Nuclear Energy Research (INER) in Taiwan. Additionally, the impact of power demand and battery capacity in microgrid system is measured.


Abstract: A cross-sectional survey of schistosomiasis, intestinal helminthic infections and the snail intermediate hosts of schistosomiasis was conducted in Delo Awraja, Bale Administrative Region, South Ethiopia. Of 15 accessible communities studied, the prevalence of intestinal schistosomiasis exceeded 5% in five of them, reaching 48% in Meda. No S. haematobium infection was found except two imported cases diagnosed at Melkaaman at a temporary shelter for refugees returning from Somalia. Uninfected snail hosts of S. mansoni were collected from few water bodies. Other intestinal helminth parasites were also highly prevalent and widespread, the dominant ones being Ascaris lumbricoides, hookworm species and Trichuris trichiura, infection rates reaching 84%, 67% and 64% respectively in some communities located at altitudes of 1500-1600 m.a.s.l. The apprehension that schistosomiasis may further spread with future development plans and the need for initiation of surveillance and/or control programmes for schistosomiasis in particular and intestinal helminthic infections in general are discussed. [Ethiop. J. Health Dev. 1997;11(3):183188]


A low-power forwarded-clock I/O transceiver architecture is presented that employs a high degree of output/input multiplexing, supply-voltage scaling with data rate, and low-voltage circuit techniques to enable low-power operation. The transmitter utilizes a 4:1 output multiplexing voltage-mode driver along with 4-phase clocking that is efficiently generated from a passive poly-phase filter. The output driver voltage swing is accurately controlled from 100–200 <formula formulatype="inline"><tex Notation="TeX">${\rm mV}_{\rm ppd}$</tex></formula> using a low-voltage pseudo-differential regulator that employs a partial negative-resistance load for improved low frequency gain. 1:8 input de-multiplexing is performed at the receiver equalizer output with 8 parallel input samplers clocked from an 8-phase injection-locked oscillator that provides more than 1UI de-skew range. In the transmitter clocking circuitry, per-phase duty-cycle and phase-spacing adjustment is implemented to allow adequate timing margins at low operating voltages. Fabricated in a general purpose 65 nm CMOS process, the transceiver achieves 4.8–8 Gb/s at 0.47–0.66 pJ/b energy efficiency for <formula formulatype="inline"><tex Notation="TeX">${\rm V}_{\rm DD}=0.6$</tex></formula>–0.8 V.


Knowledge Management Systems (KMS) are important tools by which organizations can better use information and, more importantly, manage knowledge. Unlike other strategies, knowledge management (KM) is difficult to define because it encompasses a range of concepts, management tasks, technologies, and organizational practices, all of which come under the umbrella of the information management. Semantic approaches allow easier and more efficient training, maintenance, and support knowledge. Current ICT markets are dominated by relational databases and document-centric information technologies, procedural algorithmic programming paradigms, and stack architecture. A key driver of global economic growth in the coming decade is the build-out of broadband telecommunications and the deployment of intelligent services bundling. This paper introduces the main characteristics of an Intelligent Knowledge Management System as a multi-agent system used in a Learning Control Problem (IKMSLCP). We describe an intelligent KM framework, allowing the observer (a human agent) to learn from experience


Perception is a process of activities based on one's observations of an object that is observed in the form of responses delivered in oral or written form and can affect the value of an object being observed. Student perception is very important to be known in an assessment. The problem in this study is how students 'perceptions of the 360 Degree Virtual Tour-based Historical Learning about the cultural heritage area of the Kapitan and Al-Munawar villages in Palembang especially the Vocational High School of the Teachers' Association of the Republic of Indonesia 1 Palembang. The purpose of this study was to determine and students' perceptions of 360-degree virtual tour-based history learning about the cultural heritage areas of Kapitan and Al-Munawar villages in Palembang City. The research method used in this research is a descriptive qualitative method. Data collection techniques through interviews, observation, documentation and questionnaires. The Analysis Data Technique uses qualitative descriptive analysis.
From the results of this study obtained data on student perceptions with an average percentage of 87%, seen from the three indicators namely receiving, understanding and assessing or responding to show that students' perceptions of choosing to agree and strongly agree with the excellent category. Thus, the mobile-based history learning model can improve the quality of learning more effectively and easily accepted by students in order to achieve better and more optimal learning outcomes.
Int. J. Soc. Sc. Manage. Vol. 7, Issue-3: 105-112


In this paper data are presented about malposition of teeth in 5-, 11-, 17- and 23-year-olds in the time period between 1987-1999. Furthermore, results are shown of a longitudinal study in youngsters 11-17-years of age of whom some were and others were not treated orthodontically. Between 1987 and 1999, the percentage of youngsters who received orthodontic treatment increased from 23% to 40%. In the same time period the percentage of youngsters 17- and 23-year-olds with a malposition of teeth decreased. In youngsters involved in the longitudinal study and treated orthodontically, a strong improvement of the tooth position was found between the age of 11 and 17. Such an improvement did not appear in the non-treated group. The outcomes are considered as an indication that orthodontic treatments have positive effects on individual and on population level.


OBJECTIVES
We characterized the diet and foraging ecology of the black-and-white ruffed lemur (Varecia variegata), a specialized frugivore, and investigated behavioral strategies exhibited in response to seasonal changes in resource availability.

MATERIALS AND METHODS
Behavioral data were collected from the same two adjacent communities across 29 months during two observation periods (2007-2008; 2017-2018) in Mangevo, a primary rainforest habitat in southeastern Madagascar. To analyze feeding in the context of energy maximization versus time minimization strategies, we used nonparametric tests to compare plant part constituents, dietary diversity, activity budgets, and canopy strata use between fruit-abundant versus fruit-lean seasons.

RESULTS
Individuals dedicated ~30% of their time to feeding year-round, mostly in the middle canopy (11-20 m). Animals fed primarily on fruits (74% of diet), but frugivory decreased and folivory increased markedly during fruit-lean seasons. Abundant season dietary diversity (98 taxa, H' = 0.71-1.37) was greater than lean season diversity (70 taxa, H' = 0.56-1.06), which coincided with less traveling, more resting, and higher canopy use-though interannual variation was observed.

CONCLUSIONS
Herein, we describe behavioral and dietary patterns that are concordant with a time minimizing behavioral strategy. Black-and-white ruffed lemur diets comprised lower taxonomic diversity, fewer fruits, and more leaves during fruit-lean months. Further, shifts toward less travel, more resting, and greater use of higher canopy levels during this time were most likely for thermoregulatory benefits.


This article discusses the issue of theoretical background of capacity of new load handling tools of continuous loaders for organic fertilizers on the basis of kinematic analysis of their motion. Loader efficiency is estimated by a set of performances the main of which is loading capacity. The loading capacity is determined by design and kinematic parameters of tools. Theoretical determination of capacity is an important scientific task, its solution would permit to substantiate loader parameters for predetermined operation conditions. Kinematic analysis of spiral, vane, shredding screw load handling tools is performed. Capacity of shredding tools is determined as a function of design and operation parameters as well as physicochemical properties of organic fertilizers. The obtained equations take into account motion pattern of tools, kinematic and design parameters as well as physicochemical properties of manure. The capacity depends quadratically on tool diameter. Dependence on other parameters is in fact directly proportional. The influence of tool angular velocity and its forward velocity is related with trigonometric functions of rotation angles during separation and gripping of organic fertilizers.


BACKGROUND: To describe health behavior of students about diet, alcohol and tobacco, dental-oral hygiene, leisure time activities and interpersonal relations. METHODS: 942 Students have been carried out. Children come from six schools of the town of Parla (in the south of Madrid). They are from 9 to 14 years old. The instruments have been made for this study, helping by teachers of EGB. RESULTS: 50% of the students doesn't eat any food at 12 o'clock, after drinking a glass of milk only at breakfast (8 o'clock). 10% never eats greens. 37% of the children in the upper level drinks alcohol sometimes and, in the same level, 12% smokes sometimes. Around 25% of children brush their teeth three times in the day. The students watch television three hours and half, means, in the day. The communication with the teacher is evaluated from "not too bad" to "bad" by 70% of the students of upper level. 42% and 39.4% of the children talks about abortion and contraceptives, respectively, with nobody. CONCLUSIONS: In general, girls have better habits than boys. Only exercise is more prevalent in the boys than in the girls. Language: es


This special issue focuses on recent advances in understanding pathogenesis and altered physiology of sepsis on cellular and molecular basis. It is recognized that remarkable advances have been made in understanding the basic cellular and molecular mechanisms of multiple organ dysfunction associated with sepsis. The rationale for therapeutic targets in sepsis has arisen from the concept of pathogenesis. Although a lot of clinical trials have been conducted, a small number of treatment or management protocols have been proven to be effective in severe sepsis. Although critical questions remain unanswered, these new insights into sepsis-associated mechanisms are likely to lead to effective treatment approaches that ultimately improve clinical outcome.


Using the combined resolving power of the Hubble Space Telescope and gravitational lensing, we resolve star-forming structures in a galaxy on scales much smaller than the usual kiloparsec diffraction limit of HST. SGAS J111020.0+645950.8 is a clumpy, star-forming galaxy lensed by the galaxy cluster SDSS J1110+6459 at , with a total magnification across the entire arc. We use a hybrid parametric/non-parametric strong lensing mass model to compute the deflection and magnification of this giant arc, reconstruct the light distribution of the lensed galaxy in the source plane, and resolve the star formation into two dozen clumps. We develop a forward-modeling technique to model each clump in the source plane. We ray-trace the model to the image plane, convolve with the instrumental point-spread function (PSF), and compare with the GALFIT model of the clumps in the image plane, which decomposes clump structure from more extended emission. This technique has the advantage, over ray-tracing, of accounting for the asymmetric lensing shear of the galaxy in the image plane and the instrument PSF. At this resolution, we can begin to study star formation on a clump-by-clump basis, toward the goal of understanding feedback mechanisms and the buildup of exponential disks at high redshift.


Hypersaline environments pose a number of ecological and metabolic challenges to the organisms that live in them. Primary producers, such as halotolerant species of the green microalgal genus Dunaliella, are no exception. In this paper we focus on the problems posed to the acquisition and metabolism of inorganic nutrients and on the consequences of exposure to high light and UV radiation. We show that not only does growth in high salinity environments have repercussions on the flow of carbon into osmolytes such as glycerol, it also affects speciation of inorganic carbon and the uptake of inorganic ions by the cells. The strategies that Dunaliella adopt to optimize resource utilization and the interactions among metabolic pathways are also discussed.


With the control of the vectorial and transfusional routes of infection with Trypanosoma cruzi, congenital transmission has become an important source of new cases. This study evaluated the efficacy of trypanocidal therapy to prevent congenital Chagas disease and compared the clinical and serological evolution between treated and untreated infected mothers. We conducted a multicenter, observational study on a cohort of mothers infected with T. cruzi, with and without trypanocidal treatment before pregnancy. Their children were studied to detect congenital infection. Among 354 "chronically infected mother-biological child" pairs, 132 were treated women and 222 were untreated women. Among the children born to untreated women, we detected 34 infected with T. cruzi (15.3%), whose only antecedent was maternal infection. Among the 132 children of previously treated women, no infection with T. cruzi was found (0.0%) (p<0.05). Among 117 mothers with clinical and serological follow up, 71 had been treated and 46 were untreated. The women were grouped into three groups. Group A: 25 treated before 15 years of age; Group B: 46 treated at 15 or more years of age; Group C: untreated, average age of 29.2±6.2 years at study entry. Follow-up for Groups A, B and C was 16.3±5.8, 17.5±9.2 and 18.6±8.6 years respectively. Negative seroconversion: Group A, 64.0% (16/25); Group B, 32.6% (15/46); Group C, no seronegativity was observed. Clinical electrocardiographic alterations compatible with chagasic cardiomyopathy: Group A 0.0% (0/25); B 2.2% (1/46) and C 15.2% (7/46). The trypanocidal treatment of women with chronic Chagas infection was effective in preventing the congenital transmission of Trypanosoma cruzi to their children; it had also a protective effect on the women's clinical evolution and deparasitation could be demonstrated in many treated women after over 10 years of follow up.


Reliability modeling of combined hardware and software systems is in many ways analogous to reliability modeling of purely hardware systems. Reliability block diagrams of system elements are developed and employed. Individual hardware platforms and the software assigned to those platforms are independent of other hardware/software platforms. Reliability block diagrams that accurately portray the interrelationship between the hardware platforms and the software executing on the platforms are developed and used in estimating reliability metrics. For complex structures, state diagrams are developed to accurately portray the unique interrelationships of the structure being modeled. This section provides the techniques applicable to the reliability modeling of combined hardware and software systems. For series systems, the process is straightforward. For complex, redundant, repairable systems, an abbreviated overview of the system modeling process is provided. Because these complex models are unique to the system being modeled, detailed procedures for developing these complex models cannot be provided. The overview provided is used to help the analyst identify those system properties which are unique to redundant combined hardware and software systems. The majority of this section is dedicated to describing the development of software failure rates that are a composite of the multiple processes that may be executing during any time period. 5.1 Basic Reliability Model. A basic reliability model for a hardware/software system can be prepared. However, the result is two reliability models; one for the software and one for the hardware elements of the system. The basic hardware reliability model consists of all hardware elements of the system in series so that the overall logistics support requirements for spares, maintenance personnel, training, etc., can be readily assessed based on the failure rates of the equipment. Individual software components (CSUs) as a rule do not fail independently and are not subject to wear out. Software components fail in association with the operational profile and must be modeled that way. Also, software components are not replaced independently like hardware units because they do not wear out and the unit itself is not independent. For hardware/software systems, the results of the basic software reliability model can be used to estimate the number and types of equipment that must be supplied when a software maintenance facility is required as a part of the contractual effort. 5.2 Mission Reliability Model. The mission reliability model is used to support allocations of system requirements to individual hardware and software elements and to support …


In extending our studies of the characteristics and properties of the homologous immunity to P. vivax acquired as a result of recovery from a naturally induced (sporozoites from mosquitoes) infection, it appeared desirable to ascertain whether this defensive mechanism, which is characteristically directed against the trophozoites, is also operative against sporozoites.
We have previously (1) shown that homologous immunity is not perfect, in that it cannot prevent reinvasion by the parasites with their subsequent reproduction, although limiting their effective multiplication so they rarely, if ever, attain a density sufficient to produce more than a slight clinical attack.
Our early experiments on immunity (2) dealt with the reinoculation, by natural means, of patients who had recovered from naturally induced attacks, while other experiments later conducted along similar lines, have all shown that the immunity arising from a naturally induced attack does not prevent appreciable although subclinical increase in the density of trophozoites following natural reinoculation.


This study investigates the consequences of two alternative legal systems on e-commerce security in terms of the burden of proof. The paper analyzes corollaries of the two alternative e-commerce regulations by comparing the profits of e-commerce firms and their optimal levels of investment in security. We find, based on our analytical models, that in a market in which the efficiency of the security investment is high, a legal framework that imposes the burden of proof on the firm enables firms to achieve higher profits than a legal framework that places the onus on the customer in equilibrium. In addition, we find that, depending on the range in efficiency of security investments of a market, the e-commerce law that imposes the burden of proof on the firm can lead firms to be more profitable, even when the firms invest less in security in equilibrium, compared with firms under the law that imposes the burden of proof on the customer.


Abstract This paper characterizes Contrastive Focus Fronting (CFF) in European Portuguese, distinguishing it from Topicalization and Evaluative exclamatives on the basis of syntactic and interpretational tests illustrated with empirical evidence from intuition/introspective judgments and different types of written sources. It reveals that the lack of consensus among speakers regarding CFF is a consequence of the fact that Contemporary European Portuguese includes two grammars with CFF. One grammar is less restrictive regarding the array of constituents that can be fronted. The other grammar only allows fronting of deictics or constituents containing them. In this more restrictive variant, CFF structures are comparable to other grammatical structures of European Portuguese, which have in common the fact that word order alternations may be limited to deictic elements. Finally, this study identifies the relevant semantic features to tease apart CFF, Topicalization and Evaluative exclamatives. CFF involves fronting of constituents with the features [D-linked]/[deictic] and [evaluative]. Topicalization structures and Evaluative exclamatives do not associate the two types of features: topicalized constituents are [D-linked]; the fronted constituent in Evaluative exclamatives bears the feature [evaluative].


Many models employed to solve problems in quantum mechanics, such as electronic structure calculations, result in both linear and nonlinear eigenproblems. Solutions to the nonlinear problems, such as the Self-Consistent Field method, typically involve iterative schemes requiring the solution of a large symmetric linear eigenproblem during each iteration. This paper evaluates the performance of various popular and new parallel symmetric linear eigensolvers applied to such eigenproblems in electronic structure calculations on the IBM distributed memory supercomputer at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Results using established routines from ScaLAPACK and vendor optimized packages are presented, as well as from three recently developed parallel eigensolvers, two implementations of the Multiple Relatively Robust Representations algorithm and the block divide-andconquer algorithm. This paper updates an earlier version of this work reported in University of Tennessee Technical Report UT-CS-05-560 by Ward, Bai & Pratt in 2005 [33].


Living organisms live in an environment in interaction with each other. As people are in a constant conflict with their environment, it leads to various problems in the environment. In order to solve these problems, it is essential to educate individuals. This can only be possible through effective environmental education. This study is to put forward the environmental education and sensitivity of the administrators and teachers that play a key role in education. Research's scale consisted of two parts, the first part of the scale is the personal information and in the second section there are 60 expressions about cognition, environmentally conscious, affective and psycho-motor sub-dimensions. The data obtained from the scale coded and analysed using SPSS package program. Opinions on whether there is a significant difference between the α = 0.05 significance level was tested.


Remote visualization service is an indispensable part for super computing center and network computing services. We present a web-based remote visualization system architecture - ScVisGrid. It provides a web-based interface for end users to access visualization resources in SCCAS by launching visualization tasks in interactive mode. With component-based visualization framework, the existing standalone software or new functions could be easily and flexibly integrated into remote visualization system, which makes the system convenient, flexible and scalable. Two application examples are also provided to demonstrate the usefulness of the system.


Floating describes the act of staff moving from one unit to another based on the needs of the patients in a hospital. Many staff who float to different units express negative feelings, including anxiety and lack in self-efficacy. However, floating is both an economical and efficient method to use staff across the hospital, especially with current staffing shortages in the United States. This study investigated how the use of mobile performance support devices may help reduce anxiety and increase self-efficacy for those staff who float to different units. with access to multiple resources available on the mobile device, Bandura's social learning theory and self-efficacy concept set the framework through modeling, observing, and imitating others in order to reproduce certain behaviors and tasks and believe in one's capability to perform. a quantitative study incorporating the retrospective pretest-posttest design was conducted using the population of float staff, including both nurses and respiratory therapists, from Children's Medical Center of Dallas. Both the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory and General Self-Efficacy Scale, along with a basic demographic tool, were used to explore anxiety and self-efficacy in relation to the usage of mobile performance support devices. Findings can be used to impact the negative feelings of staff towards the idea of floating.


There is an increasing interest in industrial and security applications and the establishment of wireless communication operating at frequencies of up to 0.30 THz. Soft tissue has a high coefficient of absorption at 0.30 THz and this limits effective penetration of the energy to a depth of 0.2 to 0.4 mm. The capacity of 0.30 THz radiation to access the deeper parts of the ear by diffusing through the ear canal and exposing the tympanic membrane (ear drum) to the radiation has not been studied. Simulations show that, with excitation parallel to the ear canal, the average power flux density within the central tympanic membrane region is 97% of the incident excitation. The structures of the outer ear are highly protective; less than 0.4% of the power flux density is directed at 45° from the parallel reached the same region. Given the sensitivity of the tympanic membrane to mechanical change, in-vivo assessment of the penetration of 0.3 THz into the ear canal is warranted to assess the suitability of the present radiation safety limits and to inform 0.3 THz emitting device deign.