Background—Characteristics and outcomes of patients with heart failure and reduced ejection fraction receiving care at Veterans Affairs (VA) versus non-VA hospitals have not been previously reported. Methods and Results—In the randomized controlled Beta-blocker Evaluation of Survival Trial (BEST; 1995-1999), of the 2707 (bucindolol=1353; placebo=1354) patients with heart failure and left ventricular ejection fraction ⩽35%, 918 received care at VA hospitals, of which 98% (n=898) were male. Of the 1789 receiving care at non-VA hospitals, 68% (n=1216) were male. Our analyses were restricted to these 2114 male patients. VA patients were older with higher symptom and comorbidity burdens. There was no significant between-group difference in unadjusted primary end point of 2-year all-cause mortality (35% VA versus 32% non-VA; hazard ratio associated with VA hospitals, 1.09; 95% confidence interval, 0.94–1.26), which remained unchanged after adjustment for age and race (hazard ratio, 1.00; 95% confidence interval, 0.86–1.16) or multivariable adjustment, including cardiovascular morbidities (hazard ratio, 0.94; 95% confidence interval, 0.80–1.10). There was no between-group difference in cause-specific mortalities or hospitalizations. Chronic kidney disease, pulmonary edema, left ventricular ejection fraction <20%, and peripheral arterial disease were significant predictors of mortality for both groups. African America race, New York Heart Association class IV symptoms, atrial fibrillation, and right ventricular ejection fraction <20% were associated with higher mortality among non-VA hospital patients only; however, these differences from VA patients were not significant. Conclusions—Patients with heart failure and reduced ejection fraction receiving care at VA hospitals were older and sicker; yet their risk of mortality and hospitalization was similar to younger and healthier patients receiving care at non-VA hospitals. Clinical Trial Registration—URL: http://www.clinicaltrials.gov. Unique identifier: NCT00000560.


Purpose: Gemtuzumab ozogamicin (GO), a calicheamicin-conjugated mAb against CD33, has been used in the treatment of acute myeloid leukemia (AML). We evaluated the impact of the addition of GO to standard chemotherapy and hematopoietic stem cell transplant (HCT) in patients with FLT3/ITD. Experimental Design: We analyzed children with FLT3/ITD–positive AML (n = 183) treated on two consecutive Children's Oncology Group AML trials (NCT00070174 and NCT00372593). Outcomes were assessed for FLT3/ITD patients receiving standard chemotherapy with or without GO (GO vs. No-GO, respectively), and the impact of consolidation HCT for high-risk FLT3/ITD patients [high FLT3/ITD allelic ratio (ITD-AR)]. Results: For all FLT3/ITD patients, complete remission (CR) rates for the GO versus No-GO cohorts were identical (64% vs. 64%; P = 0.98). Relapse rate (RR) after initial CR was 37% for GO recipients versus 59% for No-GO recipients (P = 0.02), disease-free survival (DFS) was similar (47% vs. 41%; P = 0.45), with higher treatment-related mortality (TRM) in GO recipients (16% vs. 0%; P = 0.008). Among high-risk FLT3/ITD patients with high ITD-AR, those who received HCT in first CR with prior exposure to GO had a significant reduction in RR (15% vs. 53%; P = 0.007), with a corresponding DFS of 65% versus 40% (P = 0.08), and higher TRM (19% vs. 7%; P = 0.08). Conclusions: CD33 targeting with HCT consolidation may be an important therapeutic strategy in high-risk FLT3/ITD AML and its efficacy and associated toxicity warrant further investigation. Clin Cancer Res; 22(8); 1951–7. ©2015 AACR.


For many years, the Shroud of Turin has been famous for images of a body and face which many believe were formed during The Resurrection. More recently, however, claims have been made that the Shroud also contains evidence of other objects, and these claims have been used to support the view that the Shroud is the burial cloth of Jesus. However, these claims are based on marks that are barely visible and the psychological processes known to be involved in perceiving objects under data-limited conditions have been largely ignored. Here, we consider these processes and assess the claims that objects can be seen on the Shroud. We conclude that the viewing conditions provided by images of the Shroud are likely to lead to the illusory perception of objects, and knowing the psychological processes underlying these perceptions is crucial for accurately determining the provenance of the Shroud and other material artefacts.


This paper revisits two classical distributed problems in anonymous networks, namely spanning tree construction and topology recognition, from the point of view of graph covering theory. For both problems, we characterize necessary and sufficient conditions on the communication graph in terms of directed symmetric coverings. These characterizations answer a long-standing open question posed by Yamashita and Kameda [YK96], and shed new light on the connection between coverings and the concepts of views and quotient graphs developed by the same authors. Characterizing conditions in terms of coverings is significant because it connects the field with a vast body of classical literature in graph theory and algebraic topology. In particular, it gives access to powerful tools such as Reidemeister's theorem and Mazurkiewicz's algorithm. Combined together, these tools allow us to present elegant proofs of otherwise intricate results, and their constructive nature makes them effectively usable in the algorithms. This paper also gives us the opportunity to present the field of covering theory in a pedagogical way, with a focus on the two aforementioned tools, whose potential impact on the study of anonymous networks goes beyond the specific problems we considered in this work.


This paper addresses various aspects of optimal phasor measurement unit (PMU) placement problem. We propose a procedure for multistaging of PMU placement in a given time horizon using an integer linear programming (ILP) framework. Hitherto, modeling of zero injection constraints had been a challenge due to the intrinsic nonlinearity associated with it. We show that zero injection constraints can also be modeled as linear constraints in an ILP framework. Minimum PMU placement problem has multiple solutions. We propose two indices, viz, BOI and SORI, to further rank these multiple solutions, where BOI is bus observability index giving a measure of number of PMUs observing a given bus and SORI is system observability redundancy index giving sum of all BOI for a system. Results on IEEE 118 bus system have been presented. Results indicate that: (1) optimal phasing of PMUs can be computed efficiently; (2) proposed method of modeling zero injection constraints improve computational performance; and (3) BOI and SORI help in improving the quality of PMU placement.


Objective The aim of the prospective New-RV study was to evaluate a parameter for non-invasive quantification of right ventricular (RV) dysfunction in patients with precapillary pulmonary hypertension (PH) that yields prognostic information and is applicable in daily clinical routine. Methods Sixty-five consecutive patients with precapillary PH under guideline conform therapy (43 women, 22 men) underwent clinical assessment, serological testing, as well as a comprehensive transthoracic echocardiography including strain imaging and a detailed assessment of RV haemodynamics. Results The mean follow-up time was 844 days. Sixteen patients died during clinical follow-up. Right ventricular myo-mechanical index (RV-MMI) was calculated by right atrial size, mean RV pressure gradient and strain imaging of the RV free wall, and was measurable in all examinations. RV-MMI was tested for its diagnostic accuracy (sensitivity of 88% and specificity of 73% for an optimal cut-off value of ≤0.31 mm Hg*%; area under the curve=0.85), as well as its predictive value (HR=3.3, 95% CI 1.6 to 7.0, p<0.001), and was compared in detail with established parameters. RV-MMI and N-terminal pro-brain natriuretic peptide (NTproBNP)were independent predictors of survival (HR=2.9, 95% CI 1.4 to 6.2, p=0.006; and HR=2.6, 95% CI 1.5 to 4.6, p=0.001, respectively). Conclusion In a cohort of patients with precapillary PH, the RV-MMI differentiates the outcome of patients better than other available non-invasive parameters of RV function by preload and afterload adjusted quantification. Trial registration number NCT01230294.


A rocketing demand for cars and heavy duty freight vehicles as well as the related infrastructure and an increasing number of traffic accidents determine the need for road upgrading and necessitate the search for new solutions for the sake of improvement of the requirements pertaining to the design of longitudinal road profile. The immediate objective is to improve the traffic quality to make the roads safer and more comfortable to use. The needs of the society, convenience and comfort on roads, not to mention traffic and environmental safety, are the most significant for the road design and subsequent construction processes in the developed countries of Western Europe, the USA and Canada. These countries-specific road design rules focus on smooth, harmonious and comfortable design of any route and present the requirements on how to achieve the said smoothness and comfort. To the opinion of the authors of the present article, the Lithuanian and Belarus road design rules fail to include certain topical requirements to be posed for longitudinal road profile design in regard to road smoothness and traffic quality. The authors of the article tackle the problems associated with the longitudinal profile of the road in terms of the road smoothness, safety, convenience and comfort, viz., traffic quality on the roads of Lithuania and Belarus. As a result, some solutions of the road longitudinal profile design (i.e. the design line) are analyzed and proposed herein for potential improvement of traffic quality on the roads of the said countries.


Allergy was probably rare at the beginning of this century, but its prevalence in developed countries has now risen to true epidemic proportions. There has been about a doubling of children with allergic rhinitis in the past twenty years. This increase can only be due to a factor in the environment, and the identification of these factors should be a research priority in order to reverse the trend and to make atopy a preventable disease. Air pollution is unlikely to be a major contributor, while more attention is turning towards the influence of living conditions, hygiene, family size, vaccinations, infections and use of antibiotics. An explanation in immunologic terms is found in the need for external input in the maturation of our immune system, especially the need for local triggering in the respiratory and alimentary tract. This seems to be required to reverse the dominance of allergy-promoting Th2 cytokine patterns at birth into a balanced equilibrium between Th1 and Th2 cell responses upon antigenic triggering. On the basis of these epidemiologic and immunologic data, guidelines are emerging for allergy prevention.


Electricity market signals are deemed efficient to allocate resources at the transmission system level, yet they may not always sufficiently represent the local network status of the distribution system. Furthermore, high penetration levels of Plug-in Electric Vehicles (PEV) potentially cause network reinforcement, which would have an impact on investment, operation and maintenance costs. While long run marginal cost pricing for computing node dependent network Use-of-System (UoS) tariffs has been proposed for integrating distributed generation, it remains unexplored in the context of PEV charging. Hence, this paper formulates the PEV energy retail problem with interactions in day-ahead and balancing markets from the aggregator's perspective, taking into account location dependent network UoS tariffs in the form of capacity prices for active power. While the retail tariff for the final customer is supposed fixed in the medium term, these capacity prices are accounted as costs to the aggregator. By aligning the PEV charging schedule, in time and location, to the network signals, the aggregator can hence further minimize its perceived costs. Applied to a medium voltage system with urban characteristics and spatial PEV mobility, profit optimal charging schedules for the aggregator are found. The result analysis and concluding remarks focus on the relevance of including node dependent network UoS tariffs.


The size and duration of the U.S. bilateral trade deficit with Japan has raised concern from both politicians and the general public. This paper seeks to investigate the behavior of this deficit by conducting stationarity tests on the deficit and tests for long-run relationships between U.S. exports to and imports f rom Japan. We show that, if an endogenously searched break is pro p e r l y accounted for, exports and imports are cointegrated with a coefficient of one, and the deficit appears to be stationary. Thus, in contrast to the public's percep tion, we conclude that the U.S.-Japan trade deficit may not be "too large." (JEL Classifications: F14, C22)


An experimental validation of high data rate communication for a time reversal (TR) ultra wide-band (UWB) communication system is performed using binary pulse amplitude modulation (BPAM) in two different dense multipath propagation channels for different data rates (15.62 Mbps ? R b ? 1 ? Gbps). From the measured received signals, signal, interference and noise contributions are separated. At very high data rates, interference has the most dominant contribution of all. Furthermore, without any processing and equalisation at the receiver, bit error rate (BER) performance is compared for different R b . It is shown that for R b ? 125 ? Mbps, TR system gives a good BER performance. Finally, the authors introduce a modified TR scheme in which total bandwidth of the TR system is divided into N sub-bands contributing equal power in the power spectral density (PSD). This technique enables a flat PSD of the TR transmitted signal, reduces inter symbol interference (ISI) and therefore improves the BER performance of the system.


In this paper, I apply the recent nonparametric multi-sector production-frontier methodology of Walheer (2016), tailored to analyse the economic growth and convergence of countries taking the sector heterogeneity and interdependence into account, to the European countries from 1995 to 2014. Thanks to a simple rewriting of his initial model, I also provide results at the sector level, which was not possible with the initial version of the methodology. My results confirm the non-neutrality of technological change and highlight that human capital accumulation plays the biggest role in the increase of labour productivity. Technological change and capital accumulation also play an important, if smaller, role in the increase of output-labour productivity. My results also confirm the presence of heterogeneity between sectors in Europe, which supports the use of multi-sector analysis. Finally, my results confirm the presence of two groups, in terms of labour productivity, within the European counties: Eastern and Central European countries and the EU12. These two groups diverge over time. The results are not affected by robustness checks.


The lower limit of the saturation current of a p-n junction diode is determined from first principles. It turns out to be about 15 orders of magnitude smaller than the saturation current of commercially available diodes. An inevitable series resistance is also determined.


This chapter is about the personal, or periphrastic, passive construction. Irish supports three variants of the personal passive construction (i.e. perfective, progressive, prospective) each of which involves the auxiliary verb (one of two forms of the verb 'to be' found in Irish) in a periphrastic form.


Diabetes peripheral neuropathy (DPN) is commonly asymptomatic in the early stage. However, once symptoms and obvious defects appear, recovery is not possible. Diagnosis of neuropathy is based on physical examinations, questionnaires, nerve conduction studies, skin biopsies, and so on. However, the diagnosis of DPN is still challenging, and early diagnosis and immediate intervention are very important for prevention of the development and progression of diabetic neuropathy. The advantages of MRI in the diagnosis of DPN are obvious: the peripheral nerve imaging is clear, the lesions can be found intuitively, and the quantitative evaluation of the lesions is the basis for the diagnosis, classification, and follow-up of DPN. With the development of magnetic resonance technology, more and more studies have been conducted on detection of DPN. This article reviews the research field of MRI in DPN.


A 32kb memory is presented with an Ultra Low Voltage optimized 10 transistors bitcell designed to withstand an extended voltage range from 1.2V down to 0.35V, achieving 1.77pJ low energy access. A validation circuit was fabricated in 65nm CMOS and exhibits wafer level yield above 95% at 0.4V, 1MHz. Packaged parts show 0.32V minimum voltage at 490kHz and up to 17X energy gain per operation. The memory terrestrial radiation Soft Error Rate was characterized with no multibit errors reported, enabling future medical appplications radiation reliability through bit-interleaving combined with error correcting code.


Abstract Dark-brownish, euhedral crystals of an "allanite-like" mineral occur in a hematite-impregnated Mn-silicate rock at Kesebol, Västra Götaland, Sweden, associated with gasparite-(Ce), chernovite- (Y), rhodonite, andradite, manganoan calcite, and quartz. A structural study was carried out on single crystals-untreated, heated in air, and heated under inert atmosphere-combined with Mössbauer spectroscopy and TEM investigation. In all the untreated crystals the mean  distance indicates that Me²⁺(Me = Mn, Fe) prevails at this site ( in the range 2.169-2.180 Å), in contrast with chemical data obtained by EPMA that yield a simplified formula Ca(REE³⁺ ⅔ ⃞ ⅓)Me3 ³⁺(SiO4)(Si2O7) O(OH), when normalized to Si = 3.00 apfu. Moreover, when a crystal is heated in air, all geometrical and structural variations indicate the development of an oxidation-dehydrogenation reaction, thus confirming that M3 is occupied by divalent cations before heating. The corresponding dehydrogenation is confirmed by a dramatic lengthening of the donor-acceptor distance. A crystal was annealed under inert atmosphere to verify possible effects of radiation damage on the polyhedral volumes. After prolonged annealing at 700 °C, a slight decrease of the unit-cell parameters is observed, suggesting restoring of crystallinity from a "partially metamict" state. Nonetheless, even in the annealed crystal, the  distance is still consistent with a dominance of divalent cations at the M3 site. For all the examined crystals, structural data point to an octahedral cation population as follows: M1 = (Me³⁺, Al); M2 = (Al, Me³⁺); M3 = (Me²⁺, Me³⁺). This assumption is also in agreement with the Mössbauer spectrum, which was fitted to two Lorentzian quadrupole doublets for Fe³⁺ and one for Fe²⁺. Values of the isomer shifts (0.36 and 0.37 mm/s for Fe³⁺; 1.11 mm/s for Fe²⁺) and the quadrupole splitting (1.96 and 1.02 for Fe³⁺; 1.90 for Fe²⁺) show that Fe²⁺ (~12% of the total iron) is located in M3, while Fe³⁺ occupies M1 and, to lesser extent, M2. TEM-EDS investigations have revealed chemical heterogeneities related to different degree of radiation damage. In particular, areas showing poor crystallinity are relatively enriched in Si and O with respect to the highly crystalline areas, thus suggesting that EPMA chemical data are biased by the presence of metamict areas enriched in SiO2 and likely in H2O. EPMA data were therefore corrected for the excess of silica. The cation population after correction is in keeping with the structural and spectroscopic data. Disregarding minor substitutions, the ideal chemical formula for the epidote-group mineral from Kesebol is CaREEFe³⁺AlMn²⁺(Si2O7)(SiO4)O(OH), which is related to ferriallanite-(Ce) by the substitutional vector M3(Mn²⁺) → M3(Fe²⁺).


5,10,15,20-Tetrakis(4-amidinolphenyl)porphyrin, its Zn complex and amidinolphenyl bispophyrin interacting with calf thymus DNA were investigated by fluorescence emission spectra and fluorescence life time measurements were also shown. The binding modes of these compounds were recorded and lifetimes of luminescence were measured as a function of the nature to understand the interaction with DNA. The results suggest those amidinoporphyrins are promising new photodynamic therapeutic agents.


Although DNA conformation plays an integral role in all genetic processes from transcription to chromosome segregation, there is as yet no tractable method for capturing the in vivo conformation of a chromosome at high resolution. Labeling and fluorescently imaging thousands of loci along the chromosome would readily yield a conformation if each locus could be uniquely distinguished in the image, but this would unrealistically require thousands of distinguishable labels and a tedious experimental process. Here we present a computational method for extracting conformations when the total number of labels far exceeds the number of distinguishable labels. We evaluate our technique using simulated conformations with lengths ranging from 10 to 100 kilobases, and discuss the prospects for an experiment.


Simultaneous liver grafting in the Lewis (RT11)-to-DA (RT1a) rat strain combination protects small intestinal grafts from rejection. The present study examined host immune responses after combined small bowel/liver transplantation (SBL) in this model. Orthotopic liver transplantation and heterotopic small intestinal transplantation were performed simultaneously and compared with isolated small bowel allografts (SBA) and isolated small bowel isografts (SBI). All rats were sacrificed on postoperative day (POD) 7 or 14 for immunological and histological studies. The mean time to rejection of the SBA was 6.6±0.3 days. Incontrast, there was no clinical or histological evidence of intestinal rejection in SBL recipients during the 14 days of follow-up. The SBL recipients showed clinical and histological evidence of graft-versushost disease (GVHD). Lmphocyte proliferation and IL-2 production in response to donor antigens were suppressed after SBL transplantation compared with the SBA or the SBI controls (P<0.05). Cell-mediated cytotoxicity and lymphocytotoxic antibody production against donor cells were also significantly inhibited in the SBL recipients compared with the SBA control group (P<0.05). We conclude that SBL transplantation in the Lewis-toDA rat strain combination: (1) suppresses host alloimmune responses, (2) prevents early intestinal rejection, and (3) favors the development of GVHD.


Analog-to-digital converters (ADCs) are an indispensable part of the digital age we are living in, as they form the interface between physical reality and virtual reality. Higher ADC energy efficiency is the dominant focus of ADC design research due to the high impact of ADC energy consumption to total energy consumption of the systems they are employed in. The energy consumption of an ADC increases with its resolution within a given signal bandwidth, which makes the efficiency of high-resolution ADCs even more important. Although the average energy efficiency of ADCs improved orders of magnitude in the last two decades, the high energy consumption of high-resolution ADCs was still restrictive for a large range of applications. This thesis investigates how the zoom ADC architecture can achieve both high resolution and high energy efficiency.


Sciatic nerves of 15 rabbits were crushed by Halsted straight mosquito hemostat with 8-11 Newton force for 60 seconds on a point 5 mm above the knee joint, and then the rabbits were equally divided into three groups. The acupuncture group was treated by electroacupuncture on Huan Tiao and Wei Zhong points (25 minutes/day) for 7 days. The medicine group was treated with intramuscular administration of dicofenac sodium (15 mg) daily for 7 days. The control group was not treated. After treatment, the distal parts of crushed nerve were examined under light microscope, the densities of normal myelinated fibers in 0.126 mm2 were counted, and the diameters of 20 normal myelinated fibers were measured for each animal. The results showed that the mean densities were 176.2 +/- 5.953 in the acupuncture group, 118.2 +/- 10.878 in the medicine group and 101.4 +/- 8.548 in the control group. The mean values were significantly different between the acupuncture and medicine groups (p < 0.01) and highly significant difference between the acupuncture and control groups (p < 0.001); but there was no significant difference between the medicine and control groups (p > 0.05). There are more small myelinated fibers (0-9 microm) in the acupuncture group than in the medicine and control groups (p = 0.0028). The results revealed and confirmed that acupuncture promotes nerve regeneration; diclofenac sodium did not show such an effect. The present study demonstrates the positive effect of acupuncture on regeneration of a crushed sciatic nerve in the rabbits. And acupuncture is a better treatment for regeneration of crushed nerve than diclofenac sodium.


This research explores the relationship between perceptions of pain and illness and the social characteristics of the individual, with a focus on the role of gender. It emphasizes the meaning and understanding of the phenomenon of pain, which as an area of research has been neglected by medical sociology. A survey of sociological, medical, psychological, anthropological and literary perspectives on pain reveals a consensus that pain is a 'subjective' phenomenon, and that there are therefore limitations in applying 'objective' measurements. Recent developments in the sociology of health and illness, particularly in the area of emotions, offer potential theoretical and methodological frameworks and these are explored. To try to broaden the definition of pain beyond the traditional biomedical approach a multi-method form of enquiry was adopted. A self-completion questionnaire examining health beliefs, and experiences of illness and pain during the life-cycle, was administered to a random sample of 107 men and women attending a GP practice in North West London. Significant gender differences were found with respect to the role of the emotions and social expectations of coping ability. These themes formed the basis of the second stage of fieldwork, in which a sub-sample of 21 men and women participated in a semi-structured in-depth interview, including the use of visual imagery. This explored definitions and experiences of pain. Responses were taperecorded and transcribed. Analysis of both the transcripts and the material relating to the use of visual imagery revealed complex and abstract conceptualisations of pain, related to the social context of the individual. Expenences of pain were found to incorporate feelings and vulnerabilities, and existential and religious beliefs as well nociceptive or sensory components. The attribution to women of superior capacities in coping with pain were phenomenologically linked to female biological and reproductive functioning, but also seen to be underpinned by gendered socialization and role-expectations.


A 73-year-old woman had dyspnea associated with gradually increasing pulmonary collapse. Despite intensive investigation, the diagnosis was only reached at autopsy 18 months later, when histologic examination of the lungs showed changes of both fibrosing alveolitis and alveolar cell carcinoma.


We propose a "phase diagram" for particulate systems with purely repulsive contact forces, such as granular media and colloids. We characterize two classes of behavior as a function of the input kinetic energy per degree of freedom T_{0} and packing fraction deviation from jamming onset Δϕ=ϕ-ϕ_{J} using simulations of frictionless disks. Isocoordinated solids (ICS) exist above jamming; they possess an average contact number equal to the isostatic value z_{iso}. ICS display "strict" harmonic response, where the density of vibrational modes from the Fourier transform of the velocity autocorrelation function is a set of sharp peaks at eigenfrequencies ω_{k}{d} of the dynamical matrix. In contrast, hypocoordinated solids (HCS) occur above and below jamming and possess fluctuating networks of interparticle contacts but do not undergo cage-breaking particle rearrangements. The density of vibrational frequencies for the HCS is not a collection of sharp peaks at ω_{k}{d}, but it does possess a common form over a range of Δϕ and T_{0}.


Despite male breast cancer is rare in occurrence, it is a serious problem. In 2012, 130 men in Ukraine got breast cancer that constituted 0.74% from all patients with mentioned pathology detected in the course of year. Every year in Ukraine approximately 100 men die from breast cancer. Still many aspects of male breast cancer remain unstudied. It occurs since information about mentioned disease is mainly based on retrospective analysis of small groups. Treatment of men, who got breast cancer, is based on knowledge, which has been obtained in treatment of women with this pathology. This article is based on the results of analysis of 168 cases of breast cancer in men, who have been examined and treated in the period from 1956 to 2012. In paper the peculiarities of clinical manifestations of male breast cancer have been determined, the optimal volume of diagnostic procedures in men with suspicion of breast cancer has been established, the mammographic signs have been detected and the possible histological variants of disease have been determined, clinical course peculiarities of male breast cancer have been defined, the most essential factors of prognosis of the disease have been fixed. Furthermore, in article optimal volume of surgical treatment of male breast cancer has been substantiated, the role and place of radiotherapy in treatment of this pathology has been determined. It has been proved that adjuvant polychemotherapy should be applied to the patients with male breast cancer independently from stage of process. Also optimal schemes of this kind of treatment have been determined. The efficacy of hormonal therapy with antiestrogen in patients with positive receptors of steroid hormones and at presence of unfavorable prognostic factors of disease has been demonstrated. The inefficiency of orchiectomy as one of the widespread kinds of hormonal therapy of male breast cancer has been defined.


Abstract Potentiometric selectivity coefficients, KA,Bpot, have been collected for ionophore-based ion-selective electrodes (ISEs) for organic ions reported during 1988-1998. In addition to the actual numerical values of KA,Bpot together with the methods and conditions for their determination, response slopes, linear ranges, chemical compositions, and ionophore structures for the ISE membranes are tabulated.


Mitochondrion, the powerhouse of the cells, has emerged as one of the unorthodox targets in anticancer therapy due to its involvement in several cellular functions. However, the development of small molecules for selective mitochondrial damage in cancer cells remained limited and less explored. To address this, in our work, we have synthesized a natural product inspired cyanine-based 3-methoxy pyrrole small molecule library by a concise strategy. This strategy involves Vilsmeier and Pd(0) catalyzed Suzuki cross-coupling reactions as key steps. The screening of the library members in HeLa cervical cancer cells revealed two new molecules that localized into subcellular mitochondria and damaged them. These small molecules perturbed antiapoptotic (Bcl-2/Bcl-xl) and pro-apoptotic (Bax) proteins to produce reactive oxygen species (ROS). Molecular docking studies showed that both molecules bind more tightly with the BH3 domain of Bcl-2 proteins compared to obatoclax (a pan-Bcl-2 inhibitor). These novel small molecules arrested the cell cycle in the G0/G1 phase, cleaved caspase-3/9, and finally prompted late apoptosis. This small molecule-mediated mitochondrial damage induced remarkably high cervical cancer cell death. These unique small molecules can be further explored as chemical biology tools and next-generation organelle-targeted anticancer therapy.


At first sight the two themes of this year's People and Computers volumes seem to send conflicting messages. On the one hand, "Happy 21st" suggests that British HCI as a discipline has much to celebrate, having grown from its inception at the 1985 conference at the University of East Anglia, through infancy (where it made quite a lot of noise) and its terrible teens (struggling for substantive and methodological independence from its parents), and maturing into an autonomous discipline, ready to make its own way in the world. On the other hand, "HCI...but not as we know it", darkly hints that British HCI may not be the same creature that saw the light 21 years ago; that it has, perhaps, been led astray or become possessed by an alien force.

Rather than the negative connation of alien possession, however, the "HCI...but not as we know it" theme might better be taken to reflect how British HCI has not merely matured into adulthood but is now an evolving life-form that is adapting to meet the many emerging research challenges within the contemporary landscape of interaction design. Central amongst the changing contexts of current HCI research are the realms of mobile, virtual and everyday interaction that are far removed from the focus on static, desktop-based interaction that prevailed at the inaugural conference. The theme of that conference was "Designing the Interface", and the resulting proceedings volume, edited by Peter Johnson and Stephen Cook [3], was dominated by papers focusing on formalising methods, models and guidelines for the design and evaluation of usable interfaces in workplace and office situations, with the main concern being the support for effective task completion by adult professional computer users. Of course, the 1985 conference came before the Internet as we know it. There did exist a form of Internet, but interaction was limited to text-based commands and simple messages, and there was only a small cabal of dedicated users based in research establishments around the world. And there were no multimedia systems or mobile phones. So it is hardly surprising that the 23 full papers selected for this year's conference are so different in their sheer breadth of focus and concern from those published in the 1985 proceedings.

People and Computers XXI fully reflects the changing terrain of contemporary HCI, with researchers examining contexts as diverse as the social world of Blogs, the creative world of Digital Live Art, and the virtual world of Second Life®. Moreover, although there are papers that examine adult users in work-based contexts, these papers are equally balanced by those that address more diverse user groups (e.g., children, families, artists, and performers) in contexts far outside the workplace (e.g., in the street, at home, in school, on the stage, or within the urban transport system). We have clustered our papers within this volume into eight sections that capture effectively the evolving nature of HCI research.


1. The effects of relative humidity (rh=40% to 70%) at high ambient temperature (T a ) on the performance of laying hens at different ages (8 to 10 months, Trial 1; and 16 to 18 months, Trial 2) was evaluated. Laying hens were exposed to 25°C (control) for 3 weeks and thereafter acclimated for 1 week to 35°C and 4 different rh. 2. Body weight declined significantly in young and older hens exposed to 60% or 70% and 70% rh, respectively. Food intake declined with increasing T a , except in the case of older hens exposed to 60% rh, for which it remained relatively constant. Water consumption, however, increased with increasing T a but the increase was significant in young hens exposed to 70% rh only. 3. Egg production was not affected by the changes in T a . However, a decrease in egg production was observed in older hens exposed to 60% rh. 4. Egg weight (EW), shell weight (SW) and shell thickness (ST) were significantly reduced by exposure to elevated T a , whereas % breakage significantly increased. In young hens, a response to rh was exhibited in ST which was significantly higher in hens exposed to the low rh (40% to 45%) than in those exposed to the highest rh (70% to 75%). 5. It can be concluded that T a is the main environmental factor affecting young and older laying hens while the effect of rh is minor.


We live in a world where we consider a woman an equal personality to the man, but to what extent it is followed is unknown. Women suffer due to a lack of emotional or financial support. Nevertheless, after bearing all the sufferings, reaching their goals is the real woman empowerment. In this paper, we have highlighted the relevance of women entrepreneurs in the context of India and deduced how women could be empowered through entrepreneurship. For this, women's difficulties in bringing out their efforts and awareness about the government's policies in promoting women's entrepreneurship were studied. A questionnaire was formulated, and 200 women in the age group 16-25 years were surveyed. The data collected through our questionnaire was exhaustively cleaned and thoroughly analyzed to state the conclusion of our findings.


Acute leukemias are a type of clonal proliferative malignancies that affect all ages with a predominance of ALL in children and AML in adults. Left untreated they are lethal and require rapid medical management. Not only it imposes high health risks through complications such as infections, but the treatment itself is also a source of potential risks. Acute leukemias require intense medical observation and care. Current treatment consists of a combination of chemotherapeutic agents, stem cell transplantation and supportive care. Recent research offers a better understanding of the pathogenesis of these diseases and provide an advancement in the field of targeted therapeutic agents.


The present study was conducted in Delanta (Ethiopia) to document the use and management of wild edible plants (WEPs) and to assess the impacts of the 1984/85 resettlement program on these resources and associated indigenous knowledge (IK). Data were collected from 72 informants in six study sites through semi-structured interviews, guided field walk, simulation and group discussion, and analyzed using standard ethnobotanical tools including abundance score, ranking and comparison. In total, 49 WEPs including nutraceutical species belonging to 40 genera and 29 families were documented. Herbs accounted for 50.9% of the total species and fruits took the lead. The majority of the WEPs were used for other purposes. Multiple use analysis showed that fodder (51.2%) and fuel woods (44.2%) were the most frequently mentioned uses. The resettlement program had both positive and negative impacts on rehabilitation and retention IK. More of the plant knowledge was held by permanent residents than that of returnees. The findings inform that efforts need to be directed for in situ conservation of the multipurpose and threatened plants species. Keywords : Delanta, indigenous knowledge, resettlement, wild edible plants Cite this Article Meragiaw M, Asfaw Z, Argaw M. Indigenous knowledge (IK) of wild edible plants (WEPs) and impacts of resettlement in Delanta, Northern Ethiopia. Research and Reviews: Journal of Herbal Sciences. 2015; 4(3): 8–26p.


When the disks of a star and of a planet overlap as a consequence of the orbital motion, the total light coming from the system dims. If an instrument is sensitive enough to detect this flux variation, important parameters of the planetary system can be derived from the observed light curve. In this paper I show under which conditions the transits can be detected given the sensitivity of SAFARI.


Some recently emerged food scandals happened in Indonesia such as the uses of formalin, borax and Rhodamin B in some traditional fresh food products have jeopardised the consumers trust in food products in general. Currently, the Indonesian consumers demand for consuming high quality and high safety food products. Although in the past the government and food authority have seriously taken several different improvement measurements for ameliorating food quality standard, however due to the complex market structures, apparently, this measurement did not yet achieved an optimal result. Moreover, due to limited capacity possessed by the food authority, the enforcement of regulation is mainly directed to the medium to big food manufactures. Significant quality and safety measurement programme supposed to be applied for small, moving or home made food producers such as street food producers and small restaurant called "warung" or family-based food producers are still absent. Unfortunately, these sectors carry a high risk for mal-practicing the food quality and safety standard. Moreover, since these producers contribute roughly by more than 20 % of the total national food consumption, especially in urban cities and they can be considered as important food supply chains for adult and children, therefore, we argue, that it is now obviously relevant to start thinking on the future improvement possibilities can be done for these sectors. Therefore, this paper aims (a) to identify the problematical issues concerned with street food vendors and small/family-based food producers and (b) to propose a plausible food quality and safety improvement relevant for these sectors. In a nutshell, this paper suggests that consistently performed programs such as identification/registration, certification (from government and independent institutions), training/education for vendors, controlling measurement, education and control of controllers, modification of eating culture of the consumers, further improvement on the consumers' awareness on food quality and active participation of the consumers and market competitiveness can be considered as some important measurements that can be applied for this sector. The international codes of hygienic practices for the preparation and sales of street foods can be used as basic models for developing the Indonesian guideline.


Exposure to organochlorine pesticides was studied in a group of mother–infant pairs living in a rural area where agriculture is the main economic activity. Fumigation in this zone is performed with airplanes, thus affecting the inhabited areas around them, including schools. Heparinized venous blood of mothers and umbilical cords was used to evaluate the olive tail moment in the comet assay, and micronuclei, chromatin buds, and nucleoplasmic bridges in peripheral blood lymphocytes. Cord blood samples were taken at the moment of birth only from natural and normal parturitions. Determinations of hexachlorobenzene, aldrin, heptachlor epoxide, oxichlordane, t and c‐chlordane, cis‐nonachlor, mirex, alpha and beta‐endosulfan, alpha, beta and gamma hexachlorocyclohexane, and p'p'‐DDT, p'p'‐DDE were conducted to establish the differential distribution of the toxicants between compartments, i.e., mother and umbilical cord. Significantly higher pesticide levels were found in umbilical cord plasma than in mothers' plasma for almost all compounds tested, except DDE and oxychlordane. Significantly higher olive tail moments were found in umbilical cords than in mothers, whereas micronuclei frequencies were higher in mothers than in umbilical cords. However, neither the levels of micronuclei nor the olive tail moment were correlated with pesticide levels. Given that no other exposure to toxic compounds has been identified in this region, the lack of correlation between genotoxicity biomarkers and pesticide levels may be due to the variability of the exposure and to endogenous processes related to lipid mobility during pregnancy, the metabolism of the compounds, and individual susceptibilities. Environ. Mol. Mutagen., 2013. © 2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.


Tyres have an important role in landing gear systems upon aircraft landing and taxing on the ground. The performances of an aircraft tyre under varied load conditions are vital requirements for aircraft safety certification. This paper describes the development of a detailed finite element (FE) model of an aircraft test tyre in order to investigate its performance and assess its safety criteria. The work follows the findings from previous researches [1] [2] [3] [4] and focuses on the aircraft tyre safety assessment under various loading scenarios that were not yet studied. Initially, tyre inflation and static load simulations have been analyzed based on a full-scaled 3D detail LS-Dyna® FE model, replicating the actual geometry and the correlated material properties from industrial experimental data. The dynamic simulations that aim to duplicate tyre load upon aircraft landing scenarios have also been analyzed. Following the comments from aircraft tyre industrial data and guidelines[5] [6], the dynamic simulations have covered the tyre loading scenario from on-road taxing, normal (soft) landing, hard landing to crash landing under different aircraft landing weights. The stresses on tyre/wheel contact areas and on bead cords have been chosen as the safety criteria. The simulation results, analysis and comments have been discussed in great details. The modelling and simulations described in this paper aim to demonstrate the effective use of FE models for aircraft safety assessment, by studying the criteria of the tyre for load cases corresponding with testing and operational scenarios. The development of such predictive model would allow the manufacturers to assess tyre availability during the design process, and also add to the general drive towards the use of more virtual prototypes in an area traditionally reliant on experimental testing.


Despite widespread traditional usage of Eryngium species in Anatolia (Turkey), only a limited number of scientific studies exists on E. kotschyi, an endemic species. Previously, extracts from E. campestre and E. kotschyi were reported to have significant anti-inflammatory effects in vivo. This study aimed to investigate the in vitro antiinflammatory, antioxidant, urease inhibitory activities of ethanol extracts of E. kotschyi and E. campestre var. virens roots as well as distilled water and ethanol extracts of E. kotschyi aerial parts. The NO and cytokine inhibitory effects were evaluated by Griess and ELISA assays. The antioxidant activities were tested on DPPH•, ABTS•+ and CUPRAC assays. The EtOH extract of E. kotschyi roots (EKr EtOH) and aerial parts (EKae EtOH) inhibited 50.08% and 41.52% of NO production at 100 μg/ml, respectively. The EtOH extract of the roots of E. campestre var. virens (ECr EtOH) and EKr EtOH provided 36.22% and 65.23% IL-6 inhibition and 44.24% and 56.84% IL-1α inhibition at 100 μg/ml. EKae EtOH exerted highest antioxidant activity on ABTS•+ (2.4±0.0005 μM trolox/mg extract) and CUPRAC (0.97±0.07 mM trolox/mg extract). This extract was also found the richest among all in terms of phenolics content (6.1±0.001 mg/GAE/g extract). EKr EtOH and ECr EtOH exhibited strongest DPPH• (IC50 = 1.132±0.057 mg/ml) radical scavenging and ferric reducing/antioxidant power (0.36±0.005 mM Fe2+/mg extract) activity respectively. The extracts exerted low urease inhibitory activity. Consequently, the results of this study might contribute to the elucidation of the mechanism of in vivo anti-inflammatory activity of the extracts.


Chiral N,N'-dioxide-In(OTf)3 complexes were developed as efficient catalysts to catalyze the vinylogous Mukaiyama aldol reaction of the silyl dienol ester with aldehydes. The corresponding δ-hydroxy-α,β-unsaturated esters were obtained in up to 99% yield and 98% ee. Moreover, the obtained (R)-3v can be easily transformed to natural bioactive products.


When simulating mixed-signal systems, designers are often dissatisfied either with performance or accuracy. A state-space based precomputation method for analog circuits at electrical level allows for a considerably faster simulation than with SPICE-like simulators. Utilizing an automatically generated SystemC interface, our simulation kernel analyzes mixed analog/digital circuits where the digital components are described on a higher level of abstraction than the analog parts. Results show a speedup of up to two orders of magnitude compared to mixed-signal simulation using ModelSim coupled with Saber or HSpice.


Studies in epidemiology and social sciences are often longitudinal and outcome measures are frequently obtained by questionnaires in ordinal scales. To understand the relationship between explanatory variables and outcome measures, generalized estimating equations can be applied to provide a population-averaged interpretation and address the correlation between outcome measures. It can be performed by di(cid:27)erent software packages, but a motivating example showed di(cid:27)erences in the output. This paper investigated the performance of GEE in R (version 3.0.2), SAS (version 9.4), and SPSS (version 22.0.0) using simulated data under default settings. Multivariate logistic distributions were used in the simulation to generate correlated ordinal data. The simulation study demonstrated substantial bias in the parameter estimates and numerical issues for data sets with relative small number of subjects. The unstructured working association matrix requires larger numbers of subjects than the independence and exchangeable working association matrices to reduce the bias and diminish numerical issues. The coverage probabilities of the con(cid:28)dence intervals for (cid:28)xed parameters were satisfactory for the independence and exchangeable working association matrix, but they were frequently liberal for the unstructured option. Based on the performance and the available options, SPSS and multgee, and repolr in R all perform quite well for relatively large sample sizes (e.g. 300 subjects), but multgee seems to do a little better than SPSS and repolr in most settings.


This course guide will help you identify BCHS Library resources specific to evidence-based nursing and will orient you to the resources you will be using to complete course assignments.


The objective of this paper is to examine antecedents of mobile banking adoption behavior. The role of national culture, socio-demographics, consumer-behavioral-specific characters and mobile phone specifics were examined. The authors develop hypotheses based on the earlier literature and test them on a data collected from 3582 bank customers in Finland and Portugal. The results show that individualism, long term orientation, and masculinity are the significant determinants of national culture in mobile banking adoption. In addition, gender, previous mobile service experience, type of mobile device, and country have a significant effect.


Abstract In this article we highlight the contribution of molecular biology and lignin genetic engineering toward a better understanding of lignin biosynthesis and spatio-temporal deposition of lignin. Specific examples from the literature and from our laboratory will serve to underline the chemical flexibility of lignins, the complexity of the regulatory circuits involved in their synthesis, and the specific behavior of different cell types within the xylem. We will also focus on strategies aiming to reduce the lignin content or to modify the lignin composition of plants and present their impact on plant development. We will show that the ectopic expression of a specific transgene may have a different impact, depending on the genetic background, and that plants with a severe reduction in lignin content may undergo normal development. Lignification is currently benefiting enormously from recent developments in molecular biology and transgenesis, and the progress made opens the way for future developments to study how the walls of lignified plant cells are built and organized.


Comparative Analysis of Anti-essentialist and The aim of this article is to assess critically and compare Morris Weitz's anti- essentialist theory of art to George Dickie's institutional one. The comparison is based on a so-called Auschwitz incydent . The article shows both differences and similarities in described theories. The scope of interest is limited to the XXth Century art, since works from this period question traditionally understood meaning of art. In the article are also briefly mentioned other concepts of art (e.g. Clive Bell's) and the idea of artworld proposed by Arthur C. Danto, which served later as basis for other theories. The article shows that the two described theories are rather complementary than contradictory to each other.


Preprint of paper published in: Models in Software Engineering, Lecture Notes in Computer Science 5421, 2009; doi:10.1007/978-3-642-01648-6_8 Model-driven development has become an important engineering paradigm. It is said to have many advantages over traditional approaches, such as reuse or quality improvement, also for embedded systems. Along a similar line of argumentation, component-based software engineering is advocated. In order to investigate these claims, the MARMOT method was applied to develop several variants of a small micro-controller-based automotive subsystem. Several key figures, like model size and development effort were measured and compared with figures coming from two mainstream methods: the Unified Process and Agile Development. The analysis reveals that model-driven, component-oriented development performs well and leads to maintainable systems and a higher-than-normal reuse rate.


Ischemia induces the production of angiogenic cytokines and the homing of bone-marrow-derived angiogenic cells (BMDACs), but these adaptive responses become impaired with aging because of reduced expression of hypoxia-inducible factor (HIF)-1α. In this study, we analyzed the effect of augmenting HIF-1α levels in ischemic limb by intramuscular injection of AdCA5, an adenovirus encoding a constitutively active form of HIF-1α, and intravenous administration of BMDACs that were cultured in the presence of the prolyl-4-hydroxylase inhibitor dimethyloxalylglycine (DMOG) to induce HIF-1 expression. The combined therapy increased perfusion, motor function, and limb salvage in old mice subjected to femoral artery ligation. Homing of BMDACs to the ischemic limb was dramatically enhanced by intramuscular AdCA5 administration. DMOG treatment of BMDACs increased cell surface expression of β2 integrins, which mediated increased adherence of BMDACs to endothelial cells. The effect of DMOG was abolished by coadministration of the HIF-1 inhibitor digoxin or by preincubation with a β2 integrin-blocking antibody. Transduction of BMDACs with lentivirus LvCA5 induced effects similar to DMOG treatment. Thus, HIF-1α gene therapy increases homing of BMDACs to ischemic muscle, whereas HIF-1 induction in BMDACs enhances their adhesion to vascular endothelium, leading to synergistic effects of combined therapy on tissue perfusion.


The chapter presented the evolution of Corporate Social Responsibility and Sustainability concepts and frameworks developed in order to integrate them into management (norms, certifications, indicators, standards, reports and indexes). Then it presents 3 case studies of successful companies that are benchmarking references in CSR - Sustainability strategies and practices and how they achieved their results. The first one is Natura, from cosmetic sector, recognized for its pioneering role in socio-environmental activities and investments in product innovation, in particular the Ekos' line that extracts raw materials from Amazon rainforest, while preserves it. The other two belong to agrobusiness sector. One is Native, brand of the Balbo Organization (1946), a traditional family for the sugar and ethanol sector. It had changed its operational processes and launched the Native brand for organic sugar. Today is a reference for the organic market, operating in 70 countries, being the world's largest producer of organic sugar and alcohol. The other one is BSBIOS, a vertical company of agroenergy. Founded in 2005, today is the largest national producer of biodiesel to national and international market. They all attend to sustainability model, but it is embedded in different ways into their corporate strategy.


Core promoters mediate transcription initiation by the integration of diverse regulatory signals encoded in the proximal promoter and enhancers. It has been suggested that genes under simple regulation may have low-complexity permissive promoters. For these genes, the core promoter may serve as the principal regulatory element; however, the mechanism by which this occurs is unclear. We report here a periodic poly-thymine motif, which we term T-blocks, enriched in occurrences within core promoter forward strands in Caenorhabditis elegans. An increasing number of T-blocks on either strand is associated with increasing nucleosome eviction. Strikingly, only forward strand T-blocks are correlated with expression levels, whereby genes with ≥6 T-blocks have fivefold higher expression levels than genes with ≤3 T-blocks. We further demonstrate that differences in T-block numbers between strains predictably affect expression levels of orthologs. Highly expressed genes and genes in operons tend to have a large number of T-blocks, as well as the previously characterized SL1 motif involved in trans-splicing. The presence of T-blocks thus correlates with low nucleosome occupancy and the precision of a trans-splicing motif, suggesting its role at both the DNA and RNA levels. Collectively, our results suggest that core promoters may tune gene expression levels through the occurrences of T-blocks, independently of the spatio-temporal regulation mediated by the proximal promoter.


Mutations in connexin50 (Cx50) cause dominant cataracts in both humans and mice. The exact mechanisms by which mutations cause these variable phenotypes are poorly understood. We have examined the functional properties of gap junctions made by three Cx50 mutations, V44E, D47N, and V79L, expressed in mammalian cell lines. V44E trafficked to the plasma membrane properly and formed gap junctional plaques. However, the mutant did not form functional gap junctions when expressed alone, or with wild-type (WT) Cx46 and Cx50, indicating that V44E is a dominant negative inhibitor of WT connexin function. In contrast, D47N subunits did not localize to junctional plaques or form functional homotypic gap junctions; however, mixed expression of D47N and WT subunits of either Cx50 or Cx46 resulted in functional intercellular channels, with high levels of coupling. Single-channel studies indicated that D47N formed heteromeric channels with WT Cx46 with unique properties. Unlike either V44E or D47N, V79L formed functional homotypic intercellular channels. However, the mutation caused an alteration in voltage gating and a dramatic reduction in the single-channel open probability, resulting in much lower levels of conductance in cells expressing V79L alone, or together with WT connexin subunits. Thus, each mutation produced distinct changes in the properties of junctional coupling. V44E failed to form intercellular channels in any configuration, D47N formed only heteromeric channels with WT connexins, and V79L formed homotypic and heteromeric channels with altered properties. These results suggest that unique interactions between mutant and wild-type lens connexins might underlie the development of various cataract phenotypes in humans.


A comprehensive review of paleoenvironmental data provides the basis for evaluating natural climate variability in southwestern British Columbia. Key indicators of past changes include paleolimnological, paleobotanical, glaciological and dendroclimatological evidence. Lacustrine sediments record the rapid transition from a glacial to an interglacial climate 12,500 to 9000 14 C yr BP. Peak summer temperatures (about 3°C warmer than present) and minimum precipitation were recorded ca. 9000 to 7000 14 C yr BP, but were likely accompanied by winter temperatures colder than today. Mid–Holocene cooling appears to have occurred sooner on the coast of British Columbia (~5000 14 C yr BP) than in the southern interior where summer temperatures gradually declined ca. 7000 to 3000 14 C yr BP, as wetter conditions and a stronger Aleutian low developed. Many glacial advances have been recorded in the past 3500 years, with most glacial maxima dating to the mid 19th century. A general glacial retreat has accompanied recent warming.


The Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS, formerly the Soil Conservation Service, SCS) unit hydrograph (UH) is one of the most commonly used synthetic UH methods for hydrologic modeling and engineering design all over the world. However, previous studies have shown that the application of the NRCS UH method for some ungauged watersheds in the state of Indiana produced unrealistic flood predictions for both the peak discharge and the time to peak. The objective of this work is to customize the NRCS UH by analyzing the role of its two key parameters, namely, the peak rate factor (PRF) and the lag time, in creating the runoff hydrograph. Based on 120 rainfall-runoff events collected from 30 small watersheds in Indiana over the past two decades, the observed UHs are derived and the corresponding PRF and lag time are extracted. The observed UHs in Indiana show that the mean value of PRF is 371, which is lower than the standard PRF of 484, and the NRCS lag time equation tends to underestimate the "true" lag time. Moreover, a multiple linear regression method, especially the stepwise selection technique, is employed to relate the NRCS UH parameters to the most appropriate geomorphic attributes extracted from the study watersheds. Both the statewide and regional regression models show that the main channel slope is a major factor in determining the PRF and lag time. A customized Indiana unit hydrograph, referred as Finley UH to honor David Finley who inspired this study, is derived with updated parameters and the Gamma function. Validation results show that the Finley UH provides more reliable and accurate predictions in terms of the peak discharge and the time to peak than the original NRCS UH for the watersheds in Indiana.


An important class of mobile manipulation problems are "move-to-grasp" problems where a mobile robot must navigate to and pick up an object. One of the distinguishing features of this class of tasks is its coarse-to-fine structure. Near the beginning of the task, the robot can only sense the target object coarsely or indirectly and make gross motion toward the object. However, after the robot has located and approached the object, the robot must finely control its grasping contacts using precise visual and haptic feedback. This paper proposes that move-to-grasp problems are naturally solved by a sequence of controllers that iteratively refines what ultimately becomes the final solution. This paper introduces the notion of a refining sequence of controllers and defines it in terms of controller goal regions and domains of attraction. Refining sequences are shown to be more robust than other types of controller sequences. In addition, a procedure for converting a refining sequence into an equivalent "parallelized" controller is proposed. Executing this parallelized controller confers all the advantages of iteratively executing the controllers sequentially. The approach is demonstrated in a move-to-grasp task where Robonaut, the NASA/JSC dexterous humanoid, is mounted on a mobile base and navigates to and picks up a geological sample box


Hyperhidrosis, the term used to describe excessive perspiration due to overactive sweat glands, is a fairly common and troublesome condition that may cause great emotional and social distress and embarrassment, especially to teenagers.


Abstract: The South African Weather Service is mandated to issue warnings of hazardous weather events, including those related to heavy precipitation, in order to safeguard life and property. Flooding and flash flood events are common in South Africa. Frequent updates and real-time availability of precipitation data are crucial to support hydrometeorological warning services. Satellite rainfall estimation provides a very important data source for flash flood guidance systems as well as nowcasting of precipitation events for the data sparse regions of the African continent. Although low earth orbiting satellites with microwave instruments provide good quality rainfall estimates, their temporal and spatial resolution are not adequate for time-critical services. Precipitation estimation using geostationary satellites is less accurate, but provides excellent spatial coverage, is updated frequently and is available in real-time. This study compares different ways to use and combine satellite precipitation estimates and numerical weather prediction model fields over the South African domain in order to determine the optimal estimate of precipitation, which can also be applied in real-time to support flash flood guidance.


Aluminium-doped zinc oxide (AZO) is a potential low-cost alternative to indium tin oxide (ITO) for application in optoelectronic devices as a transparent conducting thin film. Typically, AZO thin films are deposited using expensive, high vacuum equipment with high energy cost and materials wastage. In this study, slot-die coating was used as an inexpensive alternative to vacuum deposition to form AZO nanoparticle thin films under ambient laboratory conditions. The films were characterised structurally, optically and electrically and compared with a commercially obtained AZO film fabricated using physical vapour deposition (PVD). Structural characterisation of the nanoparticle film shows uniform coverage across the substrate with increased crystal quality following annealing in Ar up to 500 $$^{\circ }$$ ∘ C. The optical properties of the nanoparticle film exhibit a wider band gap than the PVD film, while the high density of grain boundary defects between the nanoparticles inhibits sheet conductivity. Graphical abstract


We have analyzed the behavior of the flow between a slider bearing and a hard-drive magnetic disk under two types of surface roughness. For both cases the length scale of the roughness along the surface is small as compared to the scale of the slider, so that a homogenization of the governing equations was performed.

For the case of longitudinal roughness, we derived a one-dimensional lubrication-type equation for the leading behavior of the pressure in the direction parallel to the velocity of the disk. The coefficients of the equation are determined by solving linear elliptic equations on a domain bounded by the gap height in the vertical direction and the period of the roughness in the span-wise direction.

For the case of transverse roughness the unsteady lubrication equations were reduced, following a multiple scale homogenization analysis, to a steady equation for the leading behavior of the pressure in the gap. The reduced equation involves certain averages of the gap height, but retains the same form of the usual steady, compressible lubrication equations.

Numerical calculations were performed for both cases, and the solution for the case of transverse roughness was shown be in excellent agreement with a corresponding numerical calculation of the original unsteady equations.


Buckling of a beam-column under axial loads at the ends is considered as a three-dimensional stability problem. Displacement and stress fields are written in terms of Neuber-Papkovich potentials. These are then approximated to forms containing one more higher-order term than those corresponding to the Euler-Bernoulli equations. These expressions yield a modified formula for the bending moment. The energy method applied to the equations yield a modified form of Euler critical load and Shanley tangent modulus formula. The effect of the second-order modification is to decrease the critical load. For mild steel this decrease exceeds 5 percent for the slenderness ratio less than 25.


The article analyzes some aspects of quality control and efficiency of electronic educational and methodological complexes of educational disciplines usage in the educational process. Analysis of the implementation of e-learning and of user work allows to build a model of student's work, identify the disadvantages of both organizational and technological plan and take timely steps to eliminate them. The solution to this problem should include a comprehensive approach to ensure an objective result. Google Analytics tools, Moodle Learning Management System (LMS) tools, the teacher's surveys to monitor the quality of e-learning in an institution proves its efficiency and allows to see the full advantages and disadvantages of ongoing e-learning in an institution, plan and implement further development and improving e-learning. The analysis of the effectiveness of e-courses usage should be carried out in a comprehensive manner, using the monitoring tools of the educational process adopted in the educational institution. Such as surveys for teachers and students, analysis of success, etc. The specifics of e-learning, the Moodle LMS tools and third-party services for collecting statistics and analyzing user activity in the LMS should be taken into account.


According to the development of the real fractional differential and its applications in the modern signal processing, the authors extend it to quaternion body and put forward a new concept: quaternion fractional differential (QFD), and apply it to edge detection of colour image. This method is called edge detection based on QFD. Simulation experiments indicate that this method has special advantages. Furthermore, the authors give an indicator to evaluate the effectiveness of different edge filters. Comparing with Sobel and mix edges of real fractional differential to every channels of colour image, they discover that QFD has fewer false negatives in the textured regions and is also better at detecting edges that are partially defined by texture, which means the authors can obtain much better results in the interesting regions using QFD and is more consistent with the characteristics of human visual system.


MaxStream is a federated stream processing system that seamlessly integrates multiple autonomous and heterogeneous Stream Processing Engines (SPEs) and databases. In this paper, we propose to demonstrate the key features of MaxStream using two application scenarios, namely the Sales Map & Spikes business monitoring scenario and the Linear Road Benchmark, each with a different set of requirements. More specifically, we will show how the MaxStream Federator can translate and forward the application queries to two different commercial SPEs (Coral8 and StreamBase), as well as how it does so under various persistency requirements.


The geographical analysis of the main data on the HIV1 epidemic in Central Africa shows a frontline which has not moved significantly since 1985. The absence of a progressive increase between the countries, demonstrating a discontinuity in space, combined with the observed human and physical continuity within the areas, raises several questions. Are the low-rate areas facing only a simple delay in the diffusion, or is there a real difference between the epidemiological patterns of HIV1 in the two areas? The last hypothesis would impose a revision of the concept of an homogeneous pattern in the epidemiology of HIV1 in Africa. The need for further research is emphasized with the aim of precisely targeting preventive intervention.


Two linear tetranuclear lanthanide complexes of general formula [Ln(4)(L)(2)(C(6)H(5)COO)(12)(MeOH)(4)], where HL = 2,6-bis((furan-2-ylmethylimino)methyl)-4-methylphenol, () and Ln(III) = Dy(III) (1) and Gd(III) (2), have been synthesized and characterized. The crystal structural analysis demonstrates that two Schiff-base ligands inhibit the growth of benzoate bridged 1D chains, leading to the isolation of discrete tetranuclear complexes due to their steric hindrances. Every Ln(III) ion is coordinated by eight donor atoms in a distorted bicapped trigonal-prismatic arrangement. Alternating current (ac) susceptibility measurements of complex 1 reveal a frequency- and temperature-dependent out-of-phase signal under zero dc field, typical of single-molecule magnet (SMM) behaviour with an anisotropic barrier Δ(eff) = 17.2 K.


Background – One of economic indicators of a country is the capital market. Liquid capital market can attract investors, both foreign and domestic investors, to invest their ownership in that country, which in turn can improve the country's economic growth. Aim – This research aims to examine the influence foreign ownership on stock market liquidity in Indonesia. Design / methodology / approach – This research splits foreign ownership into two groups, the first one is foreign ownership by financial institutions, and the second one is foreign ownership by non-financial corporations. The type of data used is panel data using fixed effect model (FEM). The technique for examining the influence of foreign ownership on liquidity used multiple regression analysis. Findings – The result found that foreign ownership by financial institutions and non-financial corporations negatively affect liquidity.  The study also found a positively non-linear effect between foreign ownership by financial institutions to liquidity and a negatively non-linear effect between foreign ownership by non-financial institutions to liquidity. Research implication – This research can assist investors in determining investment in the Indonesian capital market by pay attention to variables such as foreign ownership, return, turnover, market capitalization and standard deviation. Limitation – The research period was short, which was only 21 months due to limited data and the research period that has passed too long, that is January 2012 to September 2013.


In the early stages of biofilm accumulation, the electric charge of the dental enamel and pellicle surfaces is known to be involved. We therefore investigated the relationship between oral hygiene and intraoral electric potential (IoP) in 45 male participants using a double-blind study. IoP, but not body surface electric potential, was loosely correlated with oral hygiene condition (Oral Hygiene Index; OHI). IoP was also loosely correlated with smartphone use; however, there was no significant correlation between smartphone use and OHI. IoP elevation might be caused by OHI elevation resulting from biofilm formation as an internal factor, with smartphone use as an external factor. This in vitro study revealed the generating capacity of Streptococcus mutans accompanied by biofilm accumulation using a microbial fuel cell. These results suggest that IoP elevation is caused by biofilm accumulation induced by power generation of oral bacteria, resulting in elevation of OHI.


Aim: To study association between anthropometric parameters and intelligence in preschool children from Rural KONKAN.Method: Children between 3 to7 years of age were examined for anthropometry, dietary recall and Intelligence (Intelligent Quotient-IQ) assessment from rural anganwadis. IQ test was performed by clinical psychologist using Binet-Kamat test of intelligence (version 4). Nutritional information was collected from 24- hour dietary recall and food diversity. Results: Results were interpreted using Prorated IQ We studied 159 (82 boys, 78 girls) out of which 15 (9.6%) had higher IQ. 25 (15.8%) were born LBW. Anthropometry classification showed that 61 (38.4%) were stunted and 25(15.7%) were wasted. According to IOTF, 72 (46%) were thin, 83(52%) were normal and 3 (2%) were overweight. we found that there is no significant difference in IQ with respect to anthropometric parameters, birth weight and nutritional status. Conclusion: We could not find any association of anthropometric parameters with IQ inspite of high prevalence of malnutrition. Brain is vital organ which can be protected by redistribution of blood flow at the cost of other organs like liver and abdominal viscera, which are the markers for future risk of diabetes. There is need to improve nutritional status. New update of IQ test is much needed as the current test is more than 50 years old and does not take into account the social, cultural transition over last 2 decades.


Low frequency noise has been characterized and identified for the first time in a graded-channel MOS (GCMOS) technology designed for low-power low-cost RFICs. The noise was found to be composed of bias dependent generation-recombination (G/R) and random-telegraph-signal (RTS) noise and a bias independent 1/f noise component. G/R and RTS noise has been attributed to single trapping centers in the gate oxide of small area devices. As the gate area increases, the assemblage of large numbers of trapping event distributed uniformly in either energy or spatial location leads to the "pure" 1/f noise observed in large area devices. The results presented in this paper on the area dependence and bias dependence of the low frequency noise gives strong support for the McWhorter's surface number fluctuations model governing the noise characteristics in these devices and thus the 1/f noise can be predicted and modeled for circuit applications using the GCMOS technology.


Despite its title, Invisible Cities (1972) is the most visible book by Italo Calvino. Calvino included visibility in his literary testament, Six Memos for the Next Millennium, as one of the fundamental values of literary creation. He often emphasized the significance of visibility in his writings and pointed out its close connection with exactitude, another value that he felt important for the next millennium. Translated into Polish by Alina Kreisberg, the book was first published in 1975 and republished in 2005 and 2013. The translator, who considers the book a record of an inner journey "around one's head", openly admits to having modified various details of Calvino's images, recognizing that certain terms would sound too exotic, encyclopaedic and elitist in Polish. Her translations of architectural and art historical terms are particularly noteworthy, leading sometimes to a change in the style of buildings evoked by Calvino's text. The translator's decisions make the images of Invisible Cities even more surrealistic


The phenomenon of road rage has attracted much media attention since the mid-1990s, but little research has been conducted into how motorists have incorporated the concept into their experiences and understandings of driving. This article reports the findings from a qualitative study on road rage, which used in-depth interviews with 77 people living in Sydney to investigate the meanings given to road rage and aggressive driving. The research showed that driving was a potent source of autonomy, pleasure and self-expression among motorists, meanings that were often frustrated by the travails of negotiating the road system. The concept of road rage had become integrated into the interviewees' accounts of driving, and they were uniformly condemning of it. Road rage was represented as a response to the stresses of urban living, not only driving in a crowded road system but also the pressures exerted by such factors as a competitive work environment and lack of time. A strong gender and social class difference was noted in the ways in which the interviewees described their emotional responses to driving frustrations. The findings revealed that the expression of anger in road rage is negatively conceptualized because of the challenges it poses to the idea of the 'civilized' body/self, but also that such expression is seen as understandable in the context of an urban environment replete with stress.


An aeroelastic model is introduced to analyze blade dynamics and design control strategy of blade vibration suppression. The model is a typical pitch and plunge system coupled with Beddoes-Leishman dynamic stall model, which describes unsteady flow over the spinning blade. The nonlinear B-L model is linearized for control design and stability analysis purpose. And the linearization is also validated by comparison of linear B-L model with nonlinear one, showing good agreement. The robustness and effectiveness of Adaptive Controller are shown by simulation tests with a wide range of aerodynamic loads, to guarantee the efficiency of wind power generation. In addition, stability of the controller is proven by the given Adaptive Stability Theorem, which is also demonstrated numerically by certain cases.


We introduce a new plan repair method for problems cast as Mixed Integer Programs. In order to tackle the inherent complexity of these NP-hard problems, our approach relies on the use of Supervised Learning method for the offline construction of a predictor which takes the problem's parameters as input and infers values for the discrete optimization variables. This way, the online resolution time of the plan repair problem can be greatly decreased by avoiding a large part of the combinatorial search among discrete variables. This contribution was motivated by the large-scale problem of intra-daily recourse strategy computation in electrical power systems. We report and discuss results on this benchmark, illustrating the different aspects and mechanisms of this new approach which provided close-to-optimal solutions in only a fraction of the computational time necessary for existing solvers.


This thesis provides a systematic analysis of Regulations for the Administration of the
Recovery and disposal of Waste Electrical and Electronic products (RAW, often referred to as
"China WEEE Directive") that came into force in China on 1 January 2011 and finds out how
well RAW and its (likely) implementation will address the weaknesses and concerns raised
from past policies and practices for management of WEEE (waste electrical and electronic
equipment) in China. With this purpose, an analytical framework is constructed containing the
main components in the upstream, midstream, downstream and overall stream of electronics
based on their flow in China. The analytical framework is used to systematically examine the
shortcomings of the earlier WEEE policies in China, the characteristics and breakthroughs of
RAW as well as the concerns and challenges for its implementation. Through literature review
and interviews with experts, the overall picture of the earlier WEEE policies is mapped out
and the progress and achievements of the earlier WEEE policies during the last decade are
discussed. The review of RAW highlights some breakthroughs of WEEE legislation in China
and indicates how RAW tries to avoid the shortcomings of the earlier policies. Stakeholders'
reflections on RAW and the latest picture of WEEE management in China are presented
based on a series of interviews and a community survey, in addition to literature review.
Various concerns are found from different stakeholders and it becomes apparent that the core
challenge for the implementation of RAW is the development of the WEEE collection
network. Finally, several suggestions are provided for further consideration on the
implementation of RAW.


Abstract Rationale: Castleman disease (CD) is a rare lymphoproliferative disease with a poorly understood etiology. The occurrence of CD in the abdominal cavity is very rare, especially in the retroperitoneal peripancreatic region. Patient concerns: A 33-year-old woman was referred to our department on March 1, 2018 for a detailed physical examination due to retroperitoneal peripancreatic lymph node enlargement over 15 days. Diagnosis: Enhanced magnetic resonance imaging of the epigastrium showed the mass with abundant blood supply is located between the liver and the stomach in the upper margin of the pancreas. Postoperative pathological examination revealed CD, type of unicentric Castleman disease. Interventions: We performed an open surgery on this patient and completely removed the mass. There was no postoperative radiochemotherapy. Outcomes: The patient was followed-up for more than 12 months after the operation and showed good recovery. Lessons: CD is a rare disorder that is hard to diagnose early and complete resection of the tumor is still the most effective treatment.


The input referred offset voltage occurring in the full latch V/sub DD/ biased sense amplifier has been analyzed extensively. The process variations in the matched nMOS and pMOS transistors have been accounted by /spl plusmn/2.5% variation in V/sub T/ and /spl plusmn/5% variation in /spl beta/, from typical values. Effect of various design parameters on the sense amplifier offset has been studied and reported. It has been shown that the rise time of the sense amplifier enable signal (SAEN) has a profound effect on the offset voltage. The slower transition of SAEN signal is proposed to result in high speed as well as low-power consumption in SRAM application. An analytical model has been derived for simplified latch to model the effect of rise time of SAEN signal on offset voltage.


OBJECTIVE
To establish a model of long-term free drinking mouse by feeding mice with alcohol to simulate the state of human voluntary long-term drinking, and on this basis, to further discuss the evaluation criteria of long-term free drinking mice model in sports, anxiety and cognitive behavior.

METHODS
Forty six-week-old SPF C57BL/6 male mouse were randomly divided into two groups: Long-term free drinking group (n=20) and normal control group (n=20). The two groups were given solid feed normally. The long-term free drinking group was free to take 10% alcohol and water every day, while the normal drinking group only took water every day. The mice were fed for 7 months, and were evaluated by a series of behavioral methods, including Rota-rod test, balance beam test, open filed test, the elevated plus maze, two-box social behavior, new object recognition, Y maze and water maze.

RESULTS
With the increase of drinking days, the mice showed significant alcohol addiction in the alcohol preference test. With the increase of alcohol intake, the mice in the long-term free choice drinking group had slightly shiny fur and reduced diet. Compared with the control group, the weight gain began to slow down from the third month, and the weight decreased significantly by the sixth and seventh months (P=0.006, P < 0.001). The mice showed reduced balance locomotion ability (P=0.003, P=0.001) in the rotary bar and balance beam test. In the open field and elevated cross test, the mice had obvious anxiety-like behavior (P < 0.001). The mice showed decreased social ability in the two boxes of social behavior (P < 0.016). In the experiment of new object recognition and Y maze, the exploration of new object decreased (P=0.018, P=0.040). In the water maze, cognitive functions, such as learning and spatial memory were reduced (P < 0.001).

CONCLUSION
The successful establishment of the long-term free drinking mouse model is more convenient for us to carry out further research on the neural mechanism of alcohol addiction, and lays an experimental foundation for exploring the neural mechanism of alcohol addiction and related new targets.


Between 1981-84 the 1st survey (EMIS) took place in 2 rural communities in Senegal: Fissel and Thienaba in the Thies Region. The survey aimed to measure levels of infant mortality (IMR) for those under 2 and to study the determinants of mortality. The survey was done in 2 phases: 1) follow-up of all live births for 1 year in the selected sites and 2) 8 follow-up stages of infants for 28 months. Since the majority of women delivered at home the following strategies were instituted to register all newborns: 1) registration of all pregnant women in the survey; 2) assignment of permanent observers in all villages to register all births and deaths. Certificates were developed for these purposes; and 3) re-designing the survey zones into sub-zones. To verify that the survey had not omitted anyone checks were made on civil registrations and a census was taken followed by individual questionnaires issued to all women in reproductive ages. Results were IMR of 113/1000 for ages 0-1; 180/1000 for those ages 0-2. In 1986 the IMR was estimated at 91/1000 for the country and 102/1000 for the rural areas. For Thienaba the IMR was 99/1000 and 149/1000 for those under 2. Fissel the IMR was 127/1000 and 199/1000 for those under 2. The discrepancies are due to the lack of trained personnel. Out of a total of 3056 women 62% had made a prenatal visit; however 72% of women in Thienaba as against 48% in Fissel had 1 prenatal visit. 16% of women delivered in health centers. In Thienaba there was greater coverage for vaccination (44% for tuberculosis and 34% against measles) than in Fissel (35% for tuberculosis and 19% against measles). Infectious and parasitic diseases were the most common reasons for infant mortality; 29% was caused by malaria and 18% by diarrhea.


Three dimensional imaging of the liver is focused on the spatial visualization of focal lesions in relation to vascular landmarks to support surgical decision making. Additionally the volume estimation of metastases or liver segments is considered in the patient's oncologic follow-up and the planning of the surgical approach. Spiral-CT is destined for 3D imaging, as it represents a standardized, minor invasive, time and cost saving method. Current developments of 3D sonography of the liver are reported. While a special application of 3D imaging, i.e. CT angiography (CTA), replaces preoperative arterial angiography in liver transplantation candidates the diagnostic gold standard for lesion detection still remains by reason of missing algorithms the interpretation of a 2D data set. Validation of 3D versus 2D imaging of the liver demands controlled trials to evaluate the diagnostic potential, time and cost savings of dedicated acquisition techniques, postprocessing algorithms and display modalities.


Relevance. Further to the postindustrial transition and the Forth Industrial revolution challenges operating nowadays in the world the Russian federation leaders task the nation to provide intensive innovation development of the economy and society with the effective administration of the process. The fulfillment requires toapply to such a praxis in the developed economies with the advanced manufacturing. Research object. The paper provides the analysis of the innovative activity indicators systems of the three developed economies leading in the world for a long time in manufacturing as well as in the novelties production and commercialization spheres, i.e. USA, Japan and Germany. Herewith the main principles of the systems' formulation, bases to select their particular indicators has been determined, the element composition analyzed and their structures compared. Methods. To solve the task various research instruments have been applied: the system analysis, the content analysis, the comparative one and others. The institutional and evolutional theories and the modern political-economic approaches constituted the methodological basis of the research. Results. The operation of the research facilitated the determination of the perspective approaches to form the systems of innovation activity indicators there to be applied and?\?or adapted in Russia and the recommendation to make use of these. The comparative analysis realized manifested different variants of the system' structures with such bases and facilitated the elaboration their typology further to the modes of the indicators' grouping, their factors of influence and the presence?\?absence of the synthesizing indicator. The conclusions served for the recommendations to use some principles and methods of the foreign systems of innovation activity indicators' constitution. Prospects. The immediate perspective of the research realized if the practical application of the deductions made, the theoretical conceptualization of the results obtained and the determination of the opportunities the systems to refine further on.


Background Enteric fever is a serious public health problem in Pakistan, where multidrug-resistant salmonellosis causes enteric fever with increased morbidity and mortality. Costly parenteral therapy and lack of an established safety profile for the use of quinolones in children necessitate evaluation of an oral treatment option. This study is meant to assess the efficacy, safety, and cost effectiveness of an oral third-generation cephalosporin (cefixime) in the treatment of multidrug-resistant enteric fever. Methods Between November 1993 and October 1994, 85 patients, 15 years of age or less, with culture-proven enteric fever were randomly assigned to two groups. Group A (n=41) received cefixime at a dosage of 10 mg/kg to 12 mg/kg per day in two divided doses. Group B (n = 44) received chloramphenicol at a dosage of 100 mg/kg daily in four divided doses. Both groups were treated for 2 weeks Results In group A, 95% (39/41) of the patients receiving cefixime responded favorably, whereas in group B, 30% (14/45) responded to chloramphenicol. The 31 patients not cured in group B were then successfully treated with cefixime. Overall, cefixime was well tolerated. Subsequent antibiogram data showed an overall multidrug-resistance rate of 78% (66/85). Conclusions Cefixime is a safe, effective, and cheaper oral option for the treatment of multidrug-resistant enteric fever. Further studies are needed, however, to validate this observation.


Abstract The amount of non-cellulosic glucans in Eucalyptus globulus wood (approx. 4.5%) was assessed by extraction of sawdust with a 0.5 M NaOH solution at 90–120°C and the structural features were elucidated in a glucan-enriched polysaccharide fraction isolated by hot water extraction (120°C, 2 h). Isolated soluble glucans were characterized by wet chemistry methods and a set of 1D and 2D NMR techniques. The major proportion of glucans consisted of amylose (20%) and amylopectin (80%), although a small proportion of β-(1→3)-glucan (<0.2% on wood weight) was also detected. Although glucans are easily removed in the initial phase of kraft pulping, notable amounts were found in unbleached pulp and it was supposed that in the final stage of kraft pulping a fraction of α-glucan is precipitated onto the fiber surface and contributes to the pulp yield.


Mentored undergraduate research has been identified as a high-impact practice that enhances teaching and learning in higher education. It is reported to influence students' academic, affective, and behavioral outcomes. However, there is only an emerging literature related to student outcomes associated with identity development, specifically students' personal and professional identities. This integrative literature review examines the intersections and interrelationship across mentoring, undergraduate research, and student identity development. Its results uncover the complexity of the constructs, and their dynamic interrelationship, especially when viewed through the lenses of the sociocultural perspective grounded in the notion of mediated action. Two assumptions undergird this perspective: first, that all investigation takes place at the intersection of these constructs with mediated action, not individuals in isolation, as a unit of analysis; and, second, that any study of identity must focus on an understanding of identity as multiple, dynamic, and situated in personal and cultural contexts (institutional, disciplinary, and external community culture and values). Thus, the sociocultural perspective and its underlying assumptions shape the proposed research agenda. This research agenda has the potential to advance current knowledge related to mentored undergraduate research and the confluence of elements that contribute to student personal and cultural identities (academic, disciplinary, and professional). Findings from this work will inform our understanding of learning and knowledge construction in sociocultural context, and the trajectory of identity development of students engaged in high-impact learning experiences.


The views on the histogenesis of experimental heart tumours in rats are controversal. Up to now electron microscopic investigations on early tumour stages are lacking. In this study ultrastructural findings of 4 early stages of heart neoplasms in the left ventricle of BD-IX rats are reported. Material and methods. BD-IX rats received repeated intravenous injections of methylnitrosourea in a dosage of 20 mg/kg body weight. After averagely 9 months the animals were killed by ether anesthesia. Sections of the heart were fixed in solution according to Karlsson and Schultz (1965). In order to discover early stages of tumours light microscopic examinations were carried out on heart sections. Afterwards the small tumour-containing tissue samples were postfixed in 1% OsO4, embedded in durcupan, and double contrasted with uranyl acetate and lead citrate. Results. Light microscopy (semithin sections): Beneath an endothelium-like cell layer an area of parallel to each other arranged spindle-shaped tumour cells with usually hyperchromatic nuclei was found. Some cells were larger and contained pale nuclei. Electron microscopy: The spindle-shaped neoplastic cells with irregular nuclei are loosely arranged. Most of the cells were surrounded by a basement membrane. In the extracellular space abundant thin cell processes and collagen fibers were demonstrable. The tumours contained characteristic bundles of cell processes as well as single processes which enveloped a virtual point of the space. Some large and widely undifferentiated tumour cells had stump-like thick processes. In the area of trabecular muscle neoplastic cells of an apparently mesenchymal origin were present. The ultrastructural findings are discussed regarding the histogenesis of the small heart tumours in the rats. They probably developed from neoplastic Schwann cells but an additional mesenchymal component seems to be engaged. Further studies are necessary to clarify the significance of both components and their relations in the experimental heart tumours.