Background Multicomponent physical exercise programs are a viable strategy for treating physical decline resulting from the aging process in older populations and can be applied in supervised and home-based modalities. However, the magnitude of the intervention effects in terms of physical function development may vary according to the modalities application due to different supervision degrees. Objective This study aims to compare the effects of supervision in a multicomponent exercise program in different application modalities (supervised vs. home vs. supervised+home) in neuromuscular adaptations, muscle strength, gait, physical function, and quality of life, analyzing the differences between intensity, volume, and density of home and supervised sessions in community older adults. Methods This protocol is a randomized controlled clinical trial with a sample of 66 older adults divided into three groups: supervised exercise (SUP = 22), home-based exercise (HB = 22), and supervised plus home-based exercise (SUP+HB = 22). The multicomponent exercise program will last 12 weeks, three times per week, for 60 min per session and include warm-up, balance, muscle-strengthening, gait, and flexibility exercises. The study's primary outcomes will be neuromuscular function, composed of the assessment of muscle isokinetic strength, muscle architecture, and neuromuscular electrical activation. The secondary outcome will be physical function, usual and maximum gait speed with and without dual-task, and quality of life. All outcomes will be assessed at baseline and post-intervention (week 12). Conclusion This study will be the first clinical trial to examine the effects of different supervision levels on home-based exercises compared to supervised protocols. The results of this study will be essentials for planning coherent and viable home-based programs for older adults. Trial registration Brazilian Registry of Clinical Trials. Number RBR- 7MZ2KR. https://apps.who.int/trialsearch/Trial2.aspx?TrialID=RBR-7mz2kr.


Purpose: Because depth of invasion by T3 rectal cancer can vary according to the extent of mesorectal invasion, the prognosis for invasive T3 rectal cancer is reported to be very different from that for minimal invasive cancer. Recently, with more emphasis on circumferential resection margin (CRM) status, the T stage, rather than the N stage, seems to be a more valuable prognostic marker in rectal cancer. Therefore, the aim of this study is to determine the prognostic significance of the CRM in invasive T3 rectal cancer. Methods: Through reviewing 324 consecutive patients with rectal cancer who underwent a curative resection between January 1995 and December 2002 at Busan Paik hospital, 195 patients with invasive T3 rectal cancer, who had not received preoperative neoadjuvant therapy were selected. The patients were classified into a negative CRM group (negative group, n=173) or a positive CRM group (positive group, n=22), and the patients were subgrouped according to the presence of lymph-node (LN) metastasis and CRM status as negative LN and negative CRM (L−/CM−), negative LN and positive CRM (L−/CM+), positive LN and negative CRM (L+/CM−) and positive LN and positive CRM (L+/CM+). All pathological specimens were re-reviewed by a single pathologist, and the distance between the most advanced edge and the outermost aspect of the specimen was re-measured by using a microscope. Local relapse rates, disease free survival, and overall survival were compared using the Kaplan- Meier method. Multivariate analyses to identify independent prognostic factors were performed using the logistic regression model. Results: Local recurrence rates in the positive group and the negative group were 38.6% and 15.3%, respectively (P=0.004, log-rank test). The multiple logistic regression model demonstrated positive CRM (hazard ratio 4.4, P=0.0007) and N2 nodal status (hazard ratio 2.4, P=0.02) as predictors of local recurrence. In the subgroup analysis, the overall recurrence rates and survival rates were, respectively, 12.3% and 86.5% in the L−/CM− subgroup, 53.1% and 50.3% in the L−/CM+ subgroup, 52.7% and 50.0% in the L+/ CM− subgroup, and 58.7 % and 33.8% in the L+/CM+ subgroup (log rank test for trend; P=0.0001 and P=0.0001, respectively). Conclusions: In the event of predicted CRM involvement in invasive T3 rectal cancer, adjuvant therapy should be performed to improve local control. Also, larger prospective studies are needed to clarify the prognostic role of the CRM in invasive T3 rectal cancer because the number of cases in this study was small, especially in the number of CRM positive cases.


Objectives To evaluate the dynamics of effective therapy with Rituximab according to Eular criteria (DAS28) among patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) by the results of prospective four-year follow-up. Methods We observed 56 patients were under observations having definite diagnosis of RA treated with combined therapy of Methotrexate (mean dose of 13.22±0.28 mg/week) and Rituximab by a standard scheme (1000 mg intravenously in the 1st and 15th days, the course - 2 infusions, the average number of courses - 3.65±0.09). Average value of DAS28 - 5.07 [4.18; 6.14]. Determination of disease activity by DAS28 was conducted in different periods of observation: after 16,24 weeks of therapy, in 12, 24, 36 and 48 months. To evaluate the treatment efficacy, criteria EULAR (DAS28) was used. All patients were distributed in different periods of observations into two groups depending on the indicator ΔDAS28: "responders" - ΔDAS28 ≥1.2; "nonresponders" - ΔDAS28 <1.2. Results The ratio of the proportion of "responders" and "nonresponder" in different periods of follow-up was respectively: 16 weeks - 46.4% and 53.6% (p=0.44), 24 weeks - 57.1% and 42.9% (p=0.14), 12 months - 67.9% and 32.1% (p=0.001) and 24 months - 64.3% and 35.7% (p=0.02) months 36 - 64, 3% and 35.7% (p=0.02), 48 months - 51.8% and 48.2% (p=0.07). The percentage of "responders" baseline (46.4%) and in the follow-up period was 24 weeks - 57.1% (p=0.26), 12 months - 67.9% (p=0.02), 24 months - 64.3% (p=0.05) and 36 months - 64.3% (p=0.05) and 48 months - 51.8% (p=0.5). Conclusions Effectiveness of Rituximab gradually increased to the 12th months of treatment, remained stable in the range of 24-36 months of treatment and decreased to 48 months of observation. Disclosure of Interest None declared


Recurrent respiratory papillomatosis (RRP) can be difficult to manage. Symptoms are related to recurrent tracheobronchial papillomas and are usually treated with bronchoscopic removal. Other modalities are added when the papilloma burden becomes too great or recurrence is too frequent, but with limited efficacy. We report a patient with progressive RRP that had become refractory to available therapy. Because papillomas overexpress epidermal growth factor receptor, along with increased expression of cyclooxygenase-2 and prostaglandin E2, it was reasoned that a combination therapy of erlotinib and celecoxib would be effective in controlling papilloma growth. After institutional approval and informed patient consent, this combination was initiated. There was a striking improvement in the number and appearance of respiratory tract papillomas, with elimination of the need for repeated papilloma removal. Pretreatment and posttreatment images document this response, and the improvement has now been maintained for nearly 2 years with effective therapy.


Abstract:  Pattern recognition is at the heart of clinical dermatology and dermatopathology. Yet, while every practitioner of the art of dermatological diagnosis recognizes the supreme value of diagnostic cues provided by defined patterns of 'efflorescences', few contemplate on the biological basis of pattern formation in and of skin lesions. Vice versa, developmental and theoretical biologists, who would be best prepared to study skin lesion patterns, are lamentably slow to discover this field as a uniquely instructive testing ground for probing theoretical concepts on pattern generation in the human system. As a result, we have at best scraped the surface of understanding the biological basis of pattern formation of skin lesions, and widely open questions dominate over definitive answer. As a symmetry‐breaking force, pattern formation represents one of the most fundamental principles that nature enlists for system organization. Thus, the peculiar and often characteristic arrangements that skin lesions display provide a unique opportunity to reflect upon – and to experimentally dissect – the powerful organizing principles at the crossroads of developmental, skin and theoretical biology, genetics, and clinical dermatology that underlie these – increasingly less enigmatic – phenomena. The current 'Controversies' feature offers a range of different perspectives on how pattern formation of skin lesions can be approached. With this, we hope to encourage more systematic interdisciplinary research efforts geared at unraveling the many unsolved, yet utterly fascinating mysteries of dermatological pattern formation. In short: never a dull pattern!


Jitter and shimmer measurements have shown to be carriers of voice quality and prosodic information which enhance the performance of tasks like speaker recognition, diarization or automatic speech recognition (ASR). However, such features have been seldom used in the context of neural-based ASR, where spectral features often prevail. In this work, we study the effects of incorporating voice quality and pitch features altogether and separately to a Transformer-based ASR model, with the intuition that the attention mechanisms might exploit latent prosodic traits. For doing so, we propose separated convolutional front-ends for prosodic and spectral features, showing that this architectural choice yields better results than simple concatenation of such pitch and voice quality features to mel-spectrogram filterbanks. Furthermore, we find mean Word Error Rate relative reductions of up to 5.6% with the LibriSpeech benchmark. Such findings motivate further research on the application of prosody knowledge for increasing the robustness of Transformer-based ASR.


Background: In clinical practice it is a common challenge to correctly classify disease against normal cases and to identify disease subtypes. In complex diseases such as cancer where patterns are heterogeneous, highly complex interaction of pathways are involved, and continuous multi-level genomic changes occur, this is a challenging task. Using genomics data, analyzed by un-supervised and supervised machine learning tools, we demonstrate the ability to quantitatively and accurately describe a patient9s tumor. Design: We used Level III RNASeq gene expression data from 20531 genes in 889 tumor samples of RCC across three subtypes - clear cell renal cell carcinoma (CCRCC), papillary renal cell carcinoma (PRCC), chromophobe carcinoma (ChRCC) and 129 normal samples from the Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA). We developed a computational framework for feature (gene/transcript) selection and subtype predictive model construction. This framework relies on a well-known "random forest" (RF) method with iterative feature selection and 10-fold cross-validation. We performed a series of (1) tumor vs normal tissue experiments for each subtype; (2) pairwise subtype comparison, and finally (3) all three subtypes comparison and predictive genes identification. Results: In each computational run our method detected 2054 (10%) top varying genes, and estimated the predictive power of each of the selected genes using RF. On average this method demonstrated 93-97% accuracy. We identified genes known to play a role in renal cell carcinoma for example, CA9, LOX, SFRP1, SLC4A1, CDKN2A, KISS1R, EGF and others. In addition, our analysis uncovered genes that may represent characteristic patterns for subtyping and differentiation from normal renal tissue cells, for example TCF21, IRX1, STC2, UMOD, AQP2, ANGPTL4, BSND and FABP7, genes not previously associated with renal cell carcinoma. In three different experiments we differentiated each of the three subtypes from normal tissue, and performed enrichment analysis for the top most significant genes in each case. We observed that both CCRCC and PRCC have genes involved in the "glycosaminoglycan biosynthesis - heparan sulfate" (HS6ST2, HS6ST3) and "riboflavin metabolism" (ACPP) pathways. Whereas ChRCC is more strongly associated with the "glycosphingolipid biosynthesis - lacto and neolacto series" pathway (B3GNT3, FUT6) and have five genes (B3GNT3, CYP2B6, CYP2J2, FUT6, UGT2A3) involved in other metabolic pathways. Changes in glycosaminoglycan and glycolipid were also previously reported for associations with RCC. Conclusions: We demonstrate the effectiveness of a computational framework and predictive power of gene expression data for tumor subtyping in RCC. Our framework is generic and can be applied in combination with other types of data such as different modalities of genomic data (copy number variations, methylation) as well as clinical data. Citation Format: Konstantin Volyanskyy, Yong Mao, Yee Him Cheung, Balaji Santhanam, Vlado Menkovski, Zharko Aleksovski, Minghao Zhong, John T. Fallon, Nevenka Dimitrova. Normal versus tumor and subtype prediction in renal cell carcinoma TCGA data sets. [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the 107th Annual Meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research; 2016 Apr 16-20; New Orleans, LA. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2016;76(14 Suppl):Abstract nr 3651.


To obtain information about the functional importance of amino acids required for effective erythropoietin (EPO) mimetic action, the conserved residues of a peptide mimetic of EPO, recently discovered by phage display, were subjected to an alanine replacement strategy. Further, to identify a minimal mimetic peptide sequence, a series of truncation peptides has been generated. One EPO mimetic peptide sequence, EMP1, was targeted and more than 25 derivatives of this sequence were evaluated for their ability to compete with [125I]EPO for receptor binding and for their ability to support the proliferation of two EPO-responsive cell lines. Two hydrophobic amino acids, Tyr4 and Trp13, appear essential for mimetic action, and aromatic residues appear to be important at these sites. These findings are consistent with the previously reported X-ray crystal structure of EMP1 complexed with the extracellular domain of the EPO receptor (EPO binding protein; EBP). In our efforts to define the structural elements required for EPO mimetic action, a 13 amino acid peptide was identified which possesses mimetic properties and contains a minimal agonist epitope. The ability of this peptide to effectively serve as a mimetic capable of the induction of EPO-responsive cell proliferation appears to reside within a single residue, equivalent to position Tyr4 of EMP1, when present in a sequence that includes the cyclic core peptide structure. Although these peptides are less potent than EPO, they should serve as an excellent starting point for the design of compounds with EPO mimetic activity.


Recently, Conorfamide-Sr3 (CNF-Sr3) was isolated from the venom of Conus spurius and was demonstrated to have an inhibitory concentration-dependent effect on the Shaker K+ channel. The voltage-gated potassium channels play critical functions on cellular signaling, from the regeneration of action potentials in neurons to the regulation of insulin secretion in pancreatic cells, among others. In mammals, there are at least 40 genes encoding voltage-gated K+ channels and the process of expression of some of them may include alternative splicing. Given the enormous variety of these channels and the proven use of conotoxins as tools to distinguish different ligand- and voltage-gated ion channels, in this work, we explored the possible effect of CNF-Sr3 on four human voltage-gated K+ channel subtypes homologous to the Shaker channel. CNF-Sr3 showed a 10 times higher affinity for the Kv1.6 subtype with respect to Kv1.3 (IC50 = 2.7 and 24 μM, respectively) and no significant effect on Kv1.4 and Kv1.5 at 10 µM. Thus, CNF-Sr3 might become a novel molecular probe to study diverse aspects of human Kv1.3 and Kv1.6 channels.


CONTEXT
Spontaneous hypoglycemia has been reported in patients after total pancreatectomy (TP) and islet autotransplantation (IAT) with maintained insulin independence. Details surrounding these events have not been well described.

OBJECTIVE
The objective of the study was to determine the frequency and characteristics of spontaneous hypoglycemia in patients undergoing TP-IAT and/or to ascertain predictive or protective factors of its development.

DESIGN
This was an observational cohort study in 40 patients who underwent TP-IAT from August 2008 to May 2014, with a median follow-up of 34 months.

SETTING
The study was conducted at a single institution (Cleveland Clinic).

PATIENTS
Patients included recipients of TP-IAT.

INTERVENTION
The intervention included small, frequent meals in those patients who developed spontaneous hypoglycemia.

MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES
Incidence of spontaneous hypoglycemia development, characteristics of the patients developing hypoglycemia, and their response to small, frequent meals were measured.

RESULTS
Six of 12 patients, who maintained insulin independence, developed spontaneous hypoglycemia. The episodes could be fasting, postprandial, and/or exercise associated, with the frequency ranging from two to three times daily to once every 1-2 weeks. All patients experienced at least one episode that required external assistance, glucagon administration, and/or emergent medical attention. Patients who developed hypoglycemia had a lower median age and tended to have a lower median islet equivalent/kg body weight but a higher median total islet equivalent, body mass index, and homeostatic model assessment for insulin resistance score. All patients who received small, frequent meal intervention had improvement in severity and/or frequency of the hypoglycemic episodes.

CONCLUSIONS
Spontaneous hypoglycemia is prevalent after TP-IAT. Although the underlying pathophysiology responsible for these hypoglycemia events remains to be elucidated, small, frequent meal intervention is helpful in ameliorating this condition.


We consider the problem of finding optimal strategies that maximize the average growth rate of multiplicative stochastic processes. For a geometric Brownian motion, the problem is solved through the so-called Kelly criterion, according to which the optimal growth rate is achieved by investing a constant given fraction of resources at any step of the dynamics. We generalize these finding to the case of dynamical equations with finite carrying capacity, which can find applications in biology, mathematical ecology, and finance. We formulate the problem in terms of a stochastic process with multiplicative noise and a nonlinear drift term that is determined by the specific functional form of carrying capacity. We solve the stochastic equation for two classes of carrying capacity functions (power laws and logarithmic), and in both cases we compute the optimal trajectories of the control parameter. We further test the validity of our analytical results using numerical simulations.


The Class Action Fairness Act of 2005 (CAFA) is the most significant change in class action practice since the federal class action rule (Rule 23) was amended in 1966. It is primarily a jurisdictional act, accomplishing the transfer to federal courts of most multistate class actions. It accords federal-court original jurisdiction on a minimal diversity basis (which can easily be satisfied in multistate class actions) when the aggregate amount in controversy is $5 million. It also permits removal by any defendant if suit has been filed in a state court. It represents years of lobbying by business interests and was particularly directed at plaintiff forum-shopping in target venue state courts for multistate class actions. Whether it goes too far in depriving state courts of jurisdiction over large areas of class actions that are arguably local in character was much debated. CAFA also imposes restrictions on settlements and attorneys' fees which are partly duplicative of requirements already in Rule 23 and therefore relatively inconsequential, except for a burdensome and ill-defined requirement that government officials be notified before any class settlement can be approved. CAFA will have considerable impact on how attorneys structure and conduct class actions. It contains some limited exceptions intended to preserve state court jurisdiction over cases which primarily involve the forum state's citizens. The home state exception applies when 2/3 or more of the plaintiff class and the primary defendants are citizens of the forum state. The local controversy exception is a variation, relaxing the requirement that all primary defendants be from the forum state. It applies if 2/3 of the plaintiff class and at least one defendant from whom significant relief is sought (and whose conduct forms a significant basis for the claims) is a citizen of the forum state. The largely untested terms of the exceptions and examples are discussed. It seems likely that CAFA will result in a reduction in the number of multistate class actions. If plaintiffs' attorneys are intent on staying in state courts they may try to structure class actions to comply with one of the exceptions. However, that is not possible if a primary defendant is an out-of-state corporation (unless the limited circumstances of the local controversy exception are met). Thus the federal courts may be the only game in town for class actions against out-of-state defendants. The federal circuits differ as to their receptivity to class actions, and certification of multistate class actions is extremely difficult in some circuits. In addition, if the laws of a number of states have to be applied in a multistate class action, plaintiffs may not be able to meet the predominance of common questions requirement for a class action. Thus the manner in which the various federal district and circuit courts deal with the choice-of-law issue will be determinative of whether very many multistate class actions can survive. The demise of most multistate class actions could undermine efficiency and uniformity of result - for example, when multiple state-only class actions have to be filed in different federal courts around the country against the same defendant based on the same product defect, business practice, or environmental condition. Defendants may see advantages in not having to defend against a single massive multistate class action, but when eyeing the possibility of settlement, they typically favor the preclusive effect of a global multistate settlement. How the federal courts react to plaintiff pressures to certify multistate class actions versus countervailing defendant objections based on strict choice-of-law standards will have to be played out in the future.


A new, rapid, sensitive and selective method for the spectrophotometric determination of xipamide in pure and dosage forms is proposed. The method is based on the reaction ofxipamide with Fe(III), Cu(II), La(III), UO2(II), Th(IV) and ZrO(II) ions to form stable coloredcomplexes. The formed complexes have maximum absorbance at 500, 390, 335, 445, 325 and 333 nm for Fe(III), Cu(II), La(III), UO2(II), Th(IV) and ZrO(II), respectively. Optimumconditions for determination, stoichometry and stability of the formed complexes have beendetermined. Beer's law is obeyed up to concentration range 54.64-1995.75 mg ml-1 of xipamide with apparent molar absorptivities ranging from 0.43 x 103-7.20 x 103 l mol-1 cm-1. The proposed method has been applied successfully for the determination of xipamide in pure form and representative pharmaceutical formulations with high precession and good accuracy.


Oral tolerance is the physiologic mechanism that prevents hypersensitivity to food proteins and probably to commensal bacteria. It has also attracted attention as a means of administering therapy for autoimmune and inflammatory diseases. Although evidence indicates that both clonal inactivation and active regulatory mechanisms may play a role and that the induction of these may be determined selectively by the feeding regimen used to induce tolerance, the exact mechanisms of oral tolerance remain unclear. Here, we discuss recent evidence that fed antigens are presented to CD4(+) T cells by antigen-presenting cells (APCs) that lack costimulatory activity, resulting in partial activation of T cells followed by a state of unresponsiveness. This seems to occur in many tissues of the immune system but may be particularly important in the draining mesenteric lymph node. Resting dendritic cells may be the predominant population of APCs involved in oral tolerance, and conditions that activate dendritic cells allow the induction of productive immunity. Conventionally, presentation of antigen in the absence of costimulation is thought to induce T-cell anergy, but evidence now indicates that anergic T cells can also act as regulatory cells via the production of inhibitory mediators or via cognate interactions with APCs and other T cells. We discuss how an ability to deactivate APCs may explain bystander suppressor activity in oral tolerance, and we consider how the production of transforming growth factor-beta or interleukin-10 by Th3 or T regulatory 1 cells may contribute to tolerance in vivo. We speculate that both the production of inhibitory mediators and the delivery of suppression via cognate interactions may be properties of otherwise "anergic" T cells.


SARS-CoV-2 infections present a tremendous threat to public health. Safe and efficacious vaccines are the most effective means in preventing the infections. A variety of vaccines have demonstrated excellent efficacy and safety around the globe. Yet, development of alternative forms of vaccines remains beneficial, particularly those with simpler production processes, less stringent storage conditions, and the capability of being used in heterologous prime/boost regimens which have shown improved efficacy against many diseases. Here we reported a novel DNA vaccine comprised of the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein fused with CD40 ligand (CD40L) serving as both a targeting ligand and molecular adjuvant. A single intramuscular injection in Syrian hamsters induced significant neutralizing antibodies 3-weeks after vaccination, with a boost substantially improving immune responses. Moreover, the vaccine also reduced weight loss and suppressed viral replication in the lungs and nasal turbinates of challenged animals. Finally, the incorporation of CD40L into the DNA vaccine was shown to reduce lung pathology more effectively than the DNA vaccine devoid of CD40L. These results collectively indicate that this DNA vaccine candidate could be further explored because of its efficacy and known safety profile.


During medical studies, young doctors have grown accustomed to both provide and receive feedback, and they also expect to receive it. Supervisors, on the other hand, have traditionally seldom received training in constructive provision of feedback. Constructive feedback to employees is also part of high-quality management. Feedback is most commonly directed to a concrete task and its realization in relation to the goals. To create good atmosphere it is helpful that the feedback provider pays attention to at least one well-conducted task or part of a task.


DETERMINATION OF ETHYL-GLUCURONIDE AND ETHYL-SULFATE IN BLOOD BY UPLC-MS/MS: CLINICAL APPLICATION IN TRAUMA VICTIMS. We developed a UPLC-MS/MS method for the quantification of the ethanol metabolites ethyl-glucuronide (EtG) and ethyl-sulfate (EtS) in blood samples. Sample preparation was a protein precipitation with acetonitrile 0.1% formic acid containing internal standards (IS) 0.5 µg mL-1 EtG-D5 and EtS-D5. Chromatographic separation was performed in a fluoro-phenyl column, mobile phases were 0.1% formic acid in water (A) and acetonitrile (B) in gradient elution from 5% B to 70% B, with 10 min run time. Ionization was performed with electrospray source at 550 °C in negative mode, quantification mass transitions of m/z EtG 221- 75, EtS 125- 80.1, EtS-D5 130- 79.9, and EtG-D5 226- 75.1. The method was linear from 0.1 to 18 µg mL-1 for EtG and 0.02 to 6 µg mL-1 for EtS, specific, with no interfering peaks during the blank samples analyses. The method was precise and accurate, the matrix effect was compensated with the IS (-12% a + 6.1%). EtG and EtS were analyzed in 28 blood samples from trauma patients with positive alcoholaemia. The concentrations of EtG and EtS ranged from 0.25 to 14.11 µg mL-1 and 0.13 to 5.53 µg mL-1, with high correlation with ethanol concentrations, r=0.739 and r=0.817 (p <0,001), respectively


Lymph oedema have to be treated in the same way that complications of chronic venous deficiency of the lower limbs are usually treated. Isolated or linked, these two pathological conditions call for the same therapeutic method: reduction; if lymphostatic phenomena persist, it is then necessary to have recourse to lymphatic drainage and/or to compression; surgical treatment must continue to be regarded as exceptional.


The naturally occurring allilochemics play a promising role in insect control by deterring insect feeding by their effects as insect growth regulators, as antihormones or as insecticides. Effect of Acorus calamus rhizome extracts on reproductive ability i.e. fecundity was reduced at more than 42.158 %. There is reduction in hatching percentage also. It may be due to reduced juvenile hormone titre which resulted inhibition of egg development. It changes the hormone pool hence disturbs the egg maturation process. It indicates that Acorus calamus rhizome extract would make a substantial contribution to the recent efforts towards a safer and more effective pest control programme.


ABSTRACT Licensing assessments, such as the UK Membership of the Royal College of General Practitioners (MRCGP), need to do more than ensure minimal levels of competence have been achieved. They should aid the development of lifelong learning skills. The summative components of the assessment create large amounts of data, which are reduced to binary pass-fail decisions ignoring the candidates very different profiles of strengths and weakness. Learners are largely unreceptive to feedback after summative assessments. Workplace-based assessments have not produced the learning benefits that were intended. The current assessment culture is rooted in behaviourist traditions, which focus on simple rewards and punishments. This fails to support ongoing learning. A more constructivist approach is needed to support receptivity to feedback and learning. An 'assessment for learning' culture could be developed by adopting programmatic assessment, as successfully implemented elsewhere. This article argues that the current UK MRCGP assessment could be adapted in line with the principles of programmatic assessment. Changing the assessment culture will be hard, because of fixed beliefs in summative assessment, but it is vital to help develop lifelong learning skills.


A 7-year-old boy with hereditary recurrent brachial neuropathy is described and the disease is traced through three generations. The disease is thought to be transmitted by an autosomal dominant gene. There is a wide spectrum of severity of attacks which have a tendency to recur at long intervals to appear during pregnancy or parturition. A troublesome but generally benign course can be predicted. There is no evidence at this time to believe that treatment other than supportive care has any real value.


The field of immunohistochemistry comprises histological methods enabling detection of tissue antigens via specific antibodies. Although all these techniques take an advantage of a large specificity of antibody to a particular tissue antigen there are many different approaches for enhancement and visualization of the signal. The aim of the present review article was to briefly outline the historical milestones that made the rapid progress of this discipline possible and give a comprehensive survey of immunohistochemical methods applicable to biomedical research. The survey starts with a description of the direct immunohistochemical method and then pays attention to a huge number of indirect methods. For better explanation of principles of individual techniques, the text is accompanied with graphical schemes. The highest attention is given to immunohistochemical methods that are most generally used, i.e. enzyme anti-enzyme complex methods (e.g. Peroxidase Anti-Peroxidase/PAP/ or Alkaline Phosphatase Anti-Alkaline Phosphatase /APAAP/) and methods based on avidin-biotin interactions (Bridged Avidin-Biotin/BRAB/, Avidin-Biotin Complex /ABC/, Labelled Avidin-Biotin/LAB/). Nevertheless, the principles of other immunohistochemical methods like two- or three-step indirect immunohistochemical methods, methods based on protein A-antibody interaction and Hapten Antibody Anti-Hapten method (HAAH), are also thoroughly characterized. Usefulness of each method for a specific utilization, its advantages and disadvantages are mentioned and compared with the latest immunohistochemical techniques, like Multi-Layered Peroxidase-Labelled Antibody (MLP) and water soluble polymer conjugates, e.g. Enhanced Polymer One-Step staining (EPOS) or EnVision. The last paragraphs are devoted to immunohistochemical amplification systems (Catalyzed Signal Amplification/CSA/ and label anti-label) that dramatically increase sensitivity of detection systems and enable to compare sensitivity of immunohistochemical methods with the most sensitive methods of molecular biologists.


Designing efficient and stable non-precious metal catalysts remains a significant challenge for formaldehyde (HCHO) oxidation, which is an expected way to replace the employment of noble-metal catalysts. Herein, a series of atomically dispersed Co catalysts are optimized by evaporating nitrogen atoms and exploring their HCHO oxidation catalytic performance. The results show that the prepared temperature can effectively control the coordination regulation of the Co atomic site, which in turn affects the catalytic oxidation activity. Our best catalyst, the Co-N/C prepared at 1000 °C, exhibits superior activity with 92.8% of conversion at room temperature at a gas hourly space velocity (GHSV) of 72,000 mL·g-1·h-1. Extensive characterizations combined with theoretical calculations reveal that the high catalytic activity is attributed to the low-coordinated center, which can be tailored by pyrolysis temperature. This work provides an innovative strategy for catalyst design in the catalytic oxidation reaction.


As the infectedmedia debates in Austria and Germany on the Czech Republic-sobligation to compensate the Sudetengerman community in connectionwith the European Union-s enlargement have shown, is theissue of ethnic German expellees and refugees from Central andEastern Europe and their rights still casting a shadow over therelations between Germany and Austria and their Eastern neighbors.This paper suggests that German expellee communities, whosepolitical goals during a long time were supported by the logics ofthe Cold War, saw the fall of the Iron Curtain as a window ofopportunity to promote old irredentist claims on Poland, the CzechRepublic and other Central and Eastern European countries. Thefocus of this paper will be put on the mechanisms ofre-constructing, -inventing- and reproducing theSudeten German, Silesian and other expellee and refugee communitiesin the German states and Austria since WW II, especially during thelast decades. The paper shows that German expellee communities notonly reconstructed themselves after World War II, but managed totie new generations - without collective traumaticexperiences of their own - to memories and concepts of animagined diasporic German refugee community. In fact, severalexpellee communities transplanted, re-constructed and re-inventedtheir former German ethno-regional identity into a new German andorAustrian regional context and, thus, avoided assimilation in theirnew homelands, where they became integrated parts of an ethnicmajority.The development of these ethno-regional communities willbe analyzed with regard to processes of class and genderformations. Furthermore, the studied ethno-regionalistcommunities- role during the still on-going process of theEuropean Union-s enlargement will be discussed. It will beargued that the construction of a culturalized-European- identity within the European Union, the riseof a new regionalism in Western Europe and the parallel process ofthe enlargement of the EU have promoted the goa


Gender differences and microbiota are gaining increasing attention. This study aimed to assess gender differences in gastric bacterial microbiota between subjects with healthy stomachs and those with autoimmune atrophic gastritis. This was a post hoc analysis of 52 subjects undergoing gastroscopy for dyspepsia (57.7% healthy stomach, 42.3% autoimmune atrophic gastritis). Gastric biopsies were obtained for histopathology and genomic DNA extraction. Gastric microbiota were assessed by sequencing the hypervariable regions of the 16SrRNA gene. The bacterial profile at the phylum level was reported as being in relative abundance expressed as 16SrRNA OTUs (>0.5%) and biodiversity calculated as Shannon-diversity index-H. All data were stratified for the female and male gender. Results showed that women with healthy stomachs had a higher gastric bacterial abundance and less microbial diversity compared to men. Likely due to hypochlorhydria and the non-acid intragastric environment, autoimmune atrophic gastritis seems to reset gender differences in gastric bacterial abundance and reduce biodiversity in males, showing a greater extent of dysbiosis in terms of reduced biodiversity in men. Differences between gender on taxa frequency at the phylum and genus level in healthy subjects and autoimmune atrophic gastritis were observed. The impact of these findings on the gender-specific natural history of autoimmune atrophic gastritis remains to be elucidated; in any case, gender differences should deserve attention in gastric microbiota studies.


Recently, metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) have been widely employed as a sacrificial template for the construction of nanostructured materials for a range of applications including energy storage. Herein, we report a facile mixed-ligand strategy for the synthesis of a Cu-MOF, [Cu3(Azopy)3(BTTC)3(H2O)3·2H2O]n (where BTTC = 1,2,4,5-benzenetetracarboxylic acid and Azopy = 4,4'-azopyridine), via a slow-diffusion method at room temperature. X-ray analysis authenticates the two-dimensional (2D)-layered framework of Cu-MOF. Topologically, this 2D-layered structure is assigned as a 4-connected unimodal net with sql topology. Further, nanostructured CuO is obtained via a simple precipitation method by employing Cu-MOF as a precursor. After analysis of their physicochemical properties through various techniques, both materials are used as surface modifiers of glassy carbon electrodes for a comparative electrochemical study. The results reveal a superior charge storage performance of CuO (244.2 F g-1 at a current density of 0.8 A g-1) with a high rate capability compared to Cu-MOF. This observation paves the pathway for the strategic design of high-performing supercapacitor electrode materials.


Abstract The nomenclatural history of the small Antillean species that now goes by the name Audubon's Shearwater Puffinus lherminieri is briefly summarized. The type material of Puffinus lherminieri Lesson, 1839, supposed to be in a museum in Rochefort, France, could not be located and is presumed lost. The stated type locality "ad ripas Antillarum" is so general as to encompass almost the entire breeding range of the species, which is widely distributed in the Antillean region and has been regarded as showing variation meriting subspecific designation. Although the type locality was apparently legitimately restricted to Guadeloupe in 1948 or earlier, it was elsewhere erroneously restricted to "Straits of Florida" from 1931 to 1998 and up to the present. To resolve these numerous conflicts and uncertainties, a neotype collected in Saint Barthélemy, once administratively part of Guadeloupe, is here designated.


Abstract : Durra is a language designed to support PMS-level programming . PMS stands for Processor Memory Switch, the name of the highest level in the hierarchy of digital systems. An application or PMS-level program is written in Durra as a set of task descriptions and type declarations that prescribes a way to manage the resources of a heterogeneous machine network. The application describes the tasks to be instantiated and executed as concurrent processes, the types of data to be exchanged by the processes, and the intermediate queues required to store the data as they move from producer to consumer processes. A runtime environment for Durra has been operational for some time. There are two major problems with this initial implementation: it makes no significant attempt to tune the performance of the system, and reliability has not been designed into the system. This report describes a new design for the Durra runtime environment that addresses these two issues. The new runtime environment consists of two major components: a local executive which runs on every processor and is responsible for process and queue management, and a global executive which runs replicated on several processors and is responsible for configuration management and reliability services.


We consider a quasistatic unilateral contact problem with finite penetration between an elastic body and an obstacle, say a foundation. The constitutive law is assumed to be nonlinear and the contact is modelled with normal compliance associated to a version of Coulomb's law of dry friction. Under a smallness assumption on the contact functions, we establish the existence of a weak solution to the problem. The proofs are based on arguments of time-dicretization, compactness and lower semicontinuity.


UNLABELLED
The aim of the study was the quantitative and qualitative assessment of the pathological reflux episodes present in laryngological diseases in relation to GERD. These findings allowed for outlining the relationship between the reported subjective ailments and the disturbances of function and acidic refluxes diagnosed in pH-metric measurements. The study included 40 patients (23 women, 17 men) with clinical laryngological symptoms of GERD (aged 19-63 years, median 42.2): chronic persistent cough, laryngitis, pharyngitis, ulceration of vocal cords, hacking. The patients underwent laryngological check-up (direct laryngoscopy), gastroscopy, 24-hour pH-metry and manometry of the oesophagus. The analysis of the subjective symptoms reported by the patients was done according to the DeMeester's and Likert's scale. The 24-hour abdominal pH-metry was carried out with the use of microDigitrappr MARK III (Synecpol) pH-meter and antymon probe with the reference epidermal electrode. The manometric analysis of the pressure in lower oesophagal sphincter (LES) and the antral function was done with the use of Köenisberg probe integrated with microDigitrapper.

RESULTS
In 80% of the patients we observed the presence of pathological acid refluxes and so called high pharyngeal refluxes (the total number of reflux episodes--91 +/- 8.2, the number of reflux episodes lasting longer than 5 minutes--19.6 +/- 4.6, "fraction time" the percentage of pH < 4.0-7.1 +/- 2.9). In this group of patients chronic laryngitis was observed in 50% of cases, chronic hacking--in 31%, persistent pain in the pharynx--in 28.1%, strong cough--in 59.4%. In 18.7% of the patients with the pathological recurrent reflux of gastro-intestinal content to the oesophagus we observed inflammatory changes of various extent in gastroscopy. We found a strong causal relationship between cough and hacking and the pathological GERD (time interval 5 min, Wiener's indicator SI > or = 75%).

CONCLUSIONS
1. The achieved results confirm the significant role of pathological GERDS in the pathogenesis of many laryngological symptoms. 2. On the basis of the achieved data it seems purposeful that the diagnosis should be much more detailed with the use of 24-hour gastroesophageal pH-metry in the patients with persistent laryngological (mainly cough and hacking) symptoms, especially in case of the patients in whom the reported symptoms are not relieved after routine laryngological treatment. 3. Our findings create the possibility for the modification of the so far diagnostic and therapeutical procedures in this group of patients and the relief of the reported subjective ailments.


In recent years, the world has witnessed drastic change in modes of computing used in different application domains. The computing varies from confined biological sensing to controlling large cities using smart IoTs solutions. Consequently, footprint of devices is increasing at a higher speed. Therefore, for such huge footprint of computing devices it is of the leading importance to diminish the new challenges associated with the devices. Particularly, it demands for comprehensive and futuristic approaches for handling device identification and other related issues. Unfortunately, importance and necessity of public IP address for every device on the planet has not been understood well yet and taken for granted. However, current IPv4 solutions for device identification and management does not seem fit to address problems of this growing global IoT device space. Consequently, there is a dire need for IPv6. At its core, IPv6 is a recognized protocol established since the preceding era. IPv6 upholds the capabilities required for enhancements of network identification, management and data transfer related matters. In this connection, the fundamental objective of this study is to identify key challenges in emergence of devices with a specific and focused approach on IPv6. Moreover, the study shall provide comprehensive analytical overview of IPv4 and IPv6. Furthermore, study shall propose routing advancements required for switching from IPv4 to IPv6 along with backward compatibility.


Qualitative and quantitative estimates of the temperature fields and level of the residual thermal stresses (RTS) in a steel substrate and hard-alloy coating obtained by electropulse technology (EPT) are presented. The estimation was carried out using the finite element method (FEM) and universal COMSOL Multiphysics® software to simulate applied problems. The results of the simulation showed that the higher the rate of mechanical loading, the smaller the depth of heat penetration into the substrate, the residual thermal stresses being localized in the zone of thermal influence near the interaction surface. At the same time, a thin layer of steel cannot cause considerable stresses in the bulk of the hard alloy. The stresses in the steel layer reach the yield point and the layer deforms without formation of large tensile stresses in the hard alloy. A criterion has been obtained that makes it possible to reveal the range of coating application parameters in which the impact of the steel substrate on the formation of residual thermal macro-stresses in the bulk of the hard-alloy coating is minimum. Electropulse equipment has been developed for application of the hard alloy coatings. Standard x-ray sin 2 Ψ-method (rotation method) is used for experimental evaluation of the macrostresses in the zone of the steel contact with the coating. Studies have shown that both radial and axial stresses are compressive; the maximum absolute values of the stress are observed in the radial direction in the outer layers of the coating, while the axial stresses relax near the free surface. Radial stresses in the outer layers of the coating reach a value of -210 MPa, and axial -110 MPa. The stresses in the coating layers contacting with steel are also characterized by rather high values, of the order of -160 ... -170 MPa. A high level of stress is attributed to the fact that the coating is formed under external pressure. At the same time the compressive stresses are favorable for a hard alloy, since it exhibits high values of the ultimate compression strength.


INTRODUCTION Tobacco use is a major global public health challenge. It is a risk factor for most leading causes of death, and its health impacts span from conception to adulthood. This study aims to analyse tobacco use data from the 2013 Nigerian Demographic and Health Survey (NDHS), assessing the prevalence, pattern, and socio-demographic correlates of tobacco use among Nigerians aged 15-49 years. METHODS A secondary data analysis involving 2013 NDHS was done. Data on 17 322 respondents were extracted from 36 800 participants. This number represents respondents with complete data on outcome variables of interest. Primary Sampling Unit defined on the basis of Enumeration Areas from the 2006 census was used. Head of selected household, all men and women aged 15-49 were studied. Data was collected using questionnaires. A chi-squared test and a binary logistic regression model were used in the analysis. RESULTS Generally, 6.6% of the respondents smoked cigarettes, 1.7% used snuff, 0.4% smoked pipe, and 0.2% chewed tobacco. Based on gender, 6.6% males and 6.3% females smoked cigarettes, 0.3% males and 0.4% females smoked cigarettes as well as used snuff. Predictors of cigarette use included being in age group 25-34 years (AOR 5.8; 95% CI 4.6-7.2), being ≥35 years (AOR 4.1; 95% CI 4.1-6.8), having attained primary education (AOR 1.4; 95% CI 1.2-1.8), living in north region (AOR 1.3; 95% CI 1.1-1.5), as well as being a Moslem (AOR 0.6; 95% CI 0.5-0.7). CONCLUSIONS A minor proportion of both genders uses tobacco with the commonest form being cigarettes. The commonest combination was cigarettes and snuff, even on stratification by gender. The identified predictors were age in categories, educational level and religion.


Some studies of how human activities can affect wild free-ranging animals may be considered to have potential negative outcomes too severe to be ethically studied. This creates a societal dilemma involving choices between continuing risky activities with high uncertainty about their potential effects on wildlife, often with considerable associated precaution or undertaking focused research to reduce uncertainty, but with some risk of harm from either strong response leading to potential stranding or direct physical injury from sound exposure. Recent and ongoing field experiments have measured the conditions in which wild cetaceans respond to military sonar, and provided insight into the nature of responses. Here mitigation measures are reported for one of the first such experiments designed to measure fine-scale behavioural responses to controlled exposures of midfrequency (3–4 kHz) active sonar. The objective was to do so without causing the kinds of physical harm that have been previously observed (e.g. stranding events) and that motivated the study. A critical goal of this experimental study was to identify a response that was safe but that could be used as an indicator of the probability of risk from more extreme or sustained exposure from real military operations. A monitoring and mitigation protocol was developed using a feedback control procedure for real-time mitigation of potential harm. Experimental protocols were modulated relative to indicators of potential risk with the explicit objective of detecting potentially harmful consequences of sound exposure and taking appropriate corrective action. Three categories of mitigation methods were developed and integrated within the experimental protocol incorporating designed, engineered, and operational mitigation measures. Controlled exposure experiments involving free-ranging animals were conducted without any evident harm to the experimental subjects, while successfully eliciting behavioural responses that provided meaningful results to inform management decisions. This approach demonstrates the importance of careful design of protocols in exposure-response experiments, particularly in pioneering studies assessing response where both the potential for harm and level of uncertainty may be high.


Authors Dina H. Kandil, MD* Department of Pathology, University of Vermont, Burlington, Vermont Philip A. Branton, MD Department of Pathology, Inova Fairfax Hospital, Fairfax, Virginia Anthony Montag, MD Department of Pathology, University of Chicago Medical Center, Chicago, Illinois Esther Oliva, MD Department of Pathology, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, Massachusetts Christopher N. Otis, MD Department of Pathology, Baystate Medical Center (Tufts University School of Medicine), Springfield, Massachusetts Kumarasen Cooper, MBChB, DPhil† Department of Pathology, Fletcher Allen Health Care, University of Vermont College of Medicine, Burlington, Vermont For the Members of the Cancer Committee, College of American Pathologists


The contribution of the two particles Fock states for the production of a heavy quark in proton-pion and photon-pion collisions is studied. It is shown that the effect depends strongly on the produced heavy quark mass, and the choice of the factorization scale.


The possible variants of change of order and technique of calculation of the plan of trains formation are considered with transition to the firm diagram of their traffic under condition of providing with the authentic information about the system state and the regulation of loading means.


Background: Although many single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) of mtDNA h ave been found to be associated with type 2 diabetes mellitus, the results of studies using different population samples and different methods are mixed. Therefore, we conducted a genetic association study of mtDNA SNPs and type 2 diabetes mellitus in a Korean sample and compared our results with those of studies co nducted in other human populations. Methods: A total of 298 blood samples from 147 type 2 diabetic patients and 151 normal controls were surveyed for SNPs via PCR directed sequencing. Sequencing analy ses were performed using the SeqMan module of the DNASTAR program. The identified SNPs were compared to previously reported SNP lists on NCBI and V-mitoSNP. Results: A total of 24 SNPs were identified in the MT-RNR2, MR-TL1 and MT-ND1 mtDNA genes in Korean type 2 diabetes mellitus patients and normal controls. The SNPs identified in the Korean sample were not closely associated with the type 2 diabetes mellitus phenotype, a significantly different result from those previously observed in European, Chinese and Japanese samples. Additionally, a haplotype and prevalence analysis could not detect any differences between the type 2 diabetes mellitus patients and normal controls. Conclusion: The 24 mtDNA SNPs were not associ ated with type 2 diabetes mellitus risk in our Korean sample. The results of the present study support the possibilit y that mtDNA SNPs have a differential effect on the risk of type 2 diabetes mellitus according to geographical origin. (Korean Diabetes J 33:382-391, 2009)


Advances in nanotechnology have provided powerful and efficient tools in the development of cancer diagnosis and therapy. There are numerous nanocarriers that are currently approved for clinical use in cancer therapy. In recent years, biodegradable polymer nanoparticles have attracted a considerable attention for their ability to function as a possible carrier for target-specific delivery of various drugs, genes, proteins, peptides, vaccines, and other biomolecules in humans without much toxicity. This review will specifically focus on the recent advances in polymer-based nanocarriers for various drugs and small silencing RNA's loading and delivery to treat different types of cancer.


The Duolbasgaissa Formation, Lower Cambrian, of northern Norway consists of 550 m of mineralogically and texturally mature sandstones with subordinate siltstones, mudstones and conglomerates. Four facies are defined on the basis of grain size, bed thickness and sedimentary structures. Facies 1–3 consist of a variety of erosively-based, cross-stratified and parallel-stratified sandstones interbedded with siltstone and mudstone. Many of these sandstones show evidence of deposition from waning currents. Facies 4 consists of trough cross-bedded sandstones with sets up to 4 m thick. Symmetrical ripples and bioturbation are ubiquitous. Bipolar palaeocurrent distributions are common to all facies and one mode is usually strongly dominant.

Lateral facies variations and sedimentary structures suggest that deposition took place in a tide-dominated, offshore, shallow marine environment in which maximum sediment transport probably occurred when storm generated waves enhanced tidal currents.

The four facies are thought to represent the deposits of various parts of tidal sediment transport paths such as exist in modern seas around Great Britain. Small scale coarsening upward sequences may represent the superposition of facies independently of changing water depth. Lack of information prevents a detailed palaeogeographic reconstruction. It is suggested that sand body shape is not accurately predictable.


A reliable and sensitive ELISA for cAMP in human plasma and urine is described, using a monoclonal antibody and a 96 well microtiter plate. Succinyl cAMP is conjugated to human serum albumin and adsorbed to the ELISA plate, giving an immobilized antigen approach which simplifies subsequent assay procedures. As low as 1.56 fmol/well of both plasma and urinary cAMP is measurable. Recoveries of added cAMP in plasma and urine were from 99% to 109%. Intra-assay coefficients of variation were less than 6.1% for plasma and 7.0% for urine samples. Inter-assay coefficients of variation for plasma and urine samples were less than 8.9% and 9.5%, respectively. There was a good correlation between the values obtained by ELISA and radioimmunoassay (RIA) (plasma: r = 0.94, n = 66; urine: r = 0.98, n = 64; nephrogenous cAMP: r = 0.96, n = 51).


In this paper we propose a method to obtain global explanations for trained black-box classifiers by sampling their decision function to learn alternative interpretable models. The envisaged approach provides a unified solution to approximate non-linear decision boundaries with simpler classifiers while retaining the original classification accuracy. We use a private residential mortgage default dataset as a use case to illustrate the feasibility of this approach to ensure the decomposability of attributes during pre-processing.


Vinyl bromide was used as a model for bromine-containing flame retardants in developing methodology for localizing flame retardants either on the surface of the filament, uniformly throughout it, or predominantly at the core. Scanning electron microscope x-ray microprobe techniques were used in the verification of the location of the flame retardant in the filament. The flame retardance efficiency of PVBr was then correlated with its location in the filament. Grafting other bromine-containing flame retardants showed a wide range of efficiencies which depended not only upon the location of the graft within the filament but also upon the structure of the compound. For the various bromine homopolymer grafts, the apparent thermal stability of the graft and its flame retardance efficiency may be simply related to the alpha aliphatic hydrogen-to-bromine ratio. The lower this ratio is, the higher the efficiency. VBr copolymers and terpolymers showed wider variation in flame retardance efficiencies. This is attributed to large variations in melt viscosity of the different grafted materials. The grafts showed only small changes in their melting points and minimal changes in tenacity and stiffness. However, grafting induced large increases in the elongation.


A practical method utilising three-dimensional image pattern matching is proposed which, in principle, is capable of unambiguous determination of the types and positions of atoms in small molecules from defocus series collected at only a few different angular orientations of the molecule. Numerical tests of the method are presented using multislice calculations of defocus series of small biological molecules. The proposed technique can in future gain from Bayesian or machine-learning approaches and is likely to be useful in cryogenic electron microscopy.


Investigations were conducted in 1969 and 1970 to determine the influence of ultra-high inoculation rates of a single Rhizobium japonicum strain on recovery from soybean (Glycine max (L.) Merr.) nodules. Biological seed yield, nodule mass, seed oil, and protein also were studied. Bacterial suspensions containing up to 1.2 × 10¹² rhizobia per cm of row were banded in contact with the seed during planting. A rapid agglutination test was used to distinguish R. japonicum serogroups in homogenized nodule suspensions. Strains 138 and 126 were used as the inoculum in 1969 and 1970, respectively. Control plot rhizosphere R. japonicum population was between 30,000 and 300,000 per g of oven-dried soil. The predominant naturalized serogroups in these plots were 123 and c-1(138) in 1969 and 1970, respectively, despite a distance of only 300 m between test areas. Strain 138 recovery percentage in 1969 increased from 18% in the uninoculated plots to 60% in plots receiving 15 billion rhizobia per cm of row. Similar significant shifts occurred in 1970. The data indicate that it is possible to evoke shifts with at least two serogroups. If superior strains are developed in the future, this technique would be one way to establish them rapidly. Nodulation, plant growth characteristics, seed yield, and oil and protein content were not influenced by the inoculum rates with one exception. Biological yield was significantly increased in ]970 at the highest inoculum rate. The reason for this observation is not readily apparent.


In a previous study ten women with hyperprolactinemia and amenorrhea had significantly higher Symptom Questionnaire scores for depression, hostility and anxiety than patients with amenorrhea only and a matched nonpatient employees group. The hyperprolactinemic patients and employees were compared with ten women on their seventh day after childbirth who had been matched for sociodemographic variables and had similar prolactin levels. Hostility was significantly higher in postpartum patients than employees and did not differ significantly from that of women with hyperprolactinemic amenorrhea. Postpartum hyperprolactinemic women did not differ significantly from the employees for anxiety and depression, which was significantly lower than in the amenorrheic patients. In several mammals aggression occurs concurrently with lactation. The studies in humans suggest an association of high prolactin levels with hostility.


The purpose of the study was to carry out a comparative analysis of the possibility of detecting early signs of articular changes in the temporomandibular joint with cone-beam computed tomography and ultrasound. Materials and methods. 20 patients with complaints of temporomandibular joint (16 women and 4 men) were examined who stated that the first symptoms associated with the joint appeared from 6 months to 1 year. Examination of patients with temporomandibular joint pathology included consultation of the patient by a dentist with the involvement of radiation research methods. During the examination by dentist, the odontogenic nature of the temporomandibular joint disorders was excluded or confirmed. Cone-beam computed tomography and ultrasound of the temporomandibular joint were performed in all patients according to standard methods. The comparative analysis was carried out on the basis of clinical examples with the conclusions of a specialist doctor in the field of radiation diagnostics and radiation therapy. Results and discussion. Pathology of the temporomandibular joint due to morphological and functional changes occurs in 40-75% of adult and occupies the third place in the list of the main nosological forms of dental diseases. At the same time, it is known that the use of radiation methods for diagnostics of surgical pathology in maxillofacial area of odontogenic and non-odontogenic etiology in the Republic of Belarus is provided by clinical protocols. A comparative analysis of the conclusion of patients who underwent cone-beam computed tomography and ultrasound of the temporomandibular joints allows us to conclude that ultrasound examination allows us to state early changes occurring in the temporomandibular joint. Therefore, the possibility of early diagnosis contributes to the appointment of an adequate and rational complex of therapeutic and rehabilitation measures which is important for stopping the progress of pathological changes. Also with the help of ultrasound, it is possible to establish signs of the development of various forms of osteoarthritis which are not detected on the cone-beam computed tomography at the initial stages of development. In addition, ultrasound allows to visualize changes occurring in soft tissues such as the articular disc which is not available for cone-beam computed tomography. Conclusion. The obtained results allow us to recommend ultrasound examination of the temporomandibular joint as a screening method and a method of the first level of examination in order to detect pathological changes from both bone and soft tissue structures of the joint as early as possible


Eclampsia is responsible for 34% of maternal mortality in Pakistani tertiary care hospitals among women admitted for delivery. Objective: To evaluate risk factors associated with eclampsia patients as well as the perinatal maternal effects in patients. Methods: Overall, 250 patients were involved in this research who were diagnosed with eclampsia. The data were collected from the medical records of the patients. The medical records contained information related to the patient's pregnancy history, characteristics, medical history, obstetric history, information related to admission to the hospital, maternal outcomes, and treatment provided at the hospital. For statistical analysis, SPSS version 21.0 was used. Results: There were 21689 women who gave birth in the hospital during the research process and 250 patients (1.15%) were diagnosed with eclampsia out of which 4 women died and had a case fatality rate of 1.6 %. The major risk factors associated were young age, already existing medical conditions, education level being low, low antenatal attendance, and nulliparity. HELLP syndrome was the most common consequence with a percentage of 15.6. All patients were provided with medication of magnesium sulfate. However, there was an absence of parenteral antihypertensive therapy. A total of 46 women (18.4 %) gave birth through vaginal delivery. Conclusions: According to our �ndings, eclampsia is still a key risk to maternal survival. Poor socioeconomic status, lack of education, and inadequate antenatal care were found as major risk factors.


Malaysia is currently experiencing an epidemiologic and demographic transition. Rapid
urbanization and vast changes in lifestyles among the population has led to widespread
cardiovascular disease (CVD) outcomes. Also, until now, the most prevalent
cardiovascular risk factor has remained unknown among the Malaysian population. This
study aimed to identify the most significant cardiovascular risk factor among multiethnic
adults in Dengkil, Selangor. A case-control retrospective study comparing past exposure
(retrospective) between the case (total cholesterol (TC) ≥ 5.18 mmol/L) and control
groups (TC < 5.18 mmol/L) on CVD risk via guided questionnaire comprised of
International Physical Activity Questionnaire (IPAQ), Food Frequency Questionnaire
(FFQ), Depression, Anxiety and Stress Scales (DASS)-21 and SF-12 was carried out
among 180 respondents aged 20 to 56 years in Dengkil, Selangor. In the present study,
purposive and consecutive sampling were both applied to recruit respondents and also
considering ethnic as a factor; thus, quota sampling was also conducted. The data were
analyzed using Mann-Whitney, Kruskal-Wallis, Chi-Square, Independent Samples t-test
and multiple logistic regression tests. The findings indicated there were no significant
differences (p > 0.05) regarding all the risk factors between the case and control groups
except for personal medical history (p < 0.05). Chinese possessed the highest number of
significant risk and protective factors. Lastly, the quality of life of Malay controls was
higher than that of cases in terms of Physical Component Summary (PCS). Generally, all
the risk factors were independent in terms of total cholesterol status, except for personal
medical history. The significance of risk factors and protective factors varies according to
ethnicity.


In this study, a simple configuration, based on high-index dielectric nanoparticles (NPs) and plasmonic nanostructures, is employed for the nanofocusing of submicron-short-range surface plasmon polaritons (SPPs). The excited SPPs are locally bound and focused at the interface between the dielectric NPs and the underlying metallic nanostructures, thereby greatly enhancing the local electromagnetic field. Taking advantage of the surface properties of the dielectric NPs, this system performs various functions. For example, the nanofocusing of submicron-short-range SPPs is used to enhance the Raman signals of gas molecules adsorbed on the dielectric NPs. In addition, the presence of the local strong electromagnetic field accelerates the rates of interfacial reactions on the surfaces of the dielectric NPs. Therefore, the proposed nanofocusing configuration can both promote and probe interfacial reactions simultaneously. Herein, the promotion and probing of the desorption of EtOH vapor are described, as well as the photodegradation of methylene blue. Moreover, the nanofocusing of SPPs is demonstrated on an aluminum surface in both the visible and UV regimes, a process that has not been achieved using conventional tapered waveguide nanofocusing structures. Therefore, the nanofocusing of submicron-short-range SPPs by dielectric NPs on plasmonic nanostructures is not limited to low-loss noble metals. Accordingly, this system has potential for use in light management and on-chip green devices and sensors.


An algorithm to assess transversal cracks in composite structures based on natural frequency changes due to damage is proposed. The damage assessment is performed in two steps; first the crack location is found, and afterwards an evaluation of its severity is performed. The technique is based on a mathematical relation that provides the exact solution for the frequency changes of bending vibration modes, considering two terms. The first term is related to the strain energy stored in the beam, while the second term considers the increase of flexibility due to damage. Thus, it is possible to separate the problems of localization and severity assessment, which makes the localization process independent of the beams cross-section shape and boundary conditions. In fact, the process consists of comparing vectors representing the measured frequency shifts with patterns constructed using the mode shape curvatures of the undamaged beam. Once the damage is localized, the evaluation of its severity is made taking into account the global rigidity reduction. The damage identification algorithm was validated by experiments performed on numerous sandwich panel specimens.


The results of monitoring of the persistent organic pollutant benzopyrene in soils of different functional areas of Moscow are presented. The highest concentrations of benzopyrene were found in the soils of the residential area and near the MKAD. The coefficients of the pollutant concentrations were calculated (K c), also the categorization of soils in terms of risk to the public were held.


This article focuses on the developing of a Portable Voltage Regulator for Low Voltage Networks (PVRLVN), for single phase, two phases and three phases networks, which envisages meeting the regulations, given that the time established by the regulatory standards is a factor that limits the planning and the execution of corrective actions. The first PVRLVN was developed inside a Research & Development Project financed by AES Eletropaulo, an energy distribution company with more than 5.8 million customers in the greatest city of Brazil. This PVRLVN, with 30 kVA nominal demand, 115V + 115V, 60 Hz and with the portability to be installed on a pole near customers with voltage problems, was developed, designed and tested in a laboratory and also in a real grid to be a temporary equipment that would adjust the voltage of the grid continuously to the right level until a definitive solution be done by the utility, avoiding penalties. The developed regulators were installed in several different locations in actual network of the AES Eletropaulo and AES Sul, both Brazilian local distribution companies. (4 pages)


The value of flexibility in operations for hydroelectric power plants is apparent from their investment in multiple generators to allow variable intensity of operation. This flexibility supports rapid response to outside factors that impact their performance. It follows that hydroelectricity generation often competes for water flow with downstream water demands including irrigation, urban water use, or ecosystem services. Each of these follows stochastic process that implies asynchronous demand for water flow. The associated management problem is of interest encompassing multiple switching and motivating other extensions. This paper considers the dynamic stochastic problem of water allocation for hydroelectric generation and downstream use. Our main contribution is to present a novel numerical solution to this problem. Moreover, the method allows generalization not previously possible including: (i) multiple dynamic stochastic processes with jump diffusions, (ii) the number of contingent decisions with reversibility, and (iii) characterization of risk and uncertainty including dynamic constraints.


The input-queued switch with service class priority is becoming an attractive solution for high-bandwidth ATM switches. In previous related work (see Motoyama, S. et al., IEEE Comm. Letters, vol.3, no.12, p.323-5, 1999), it has been proved that throughput achieves almost 100% for up to 92% of the offered load when random access buffers and a round robin scheduling algorithm are used. However, this is only a theoretical result: the round robin scheduling algorithm is too complex to implement in hardware. We introduce a modification through a scheduling algorithm called iterative longest port first with throughput maximization (iLPFwTM) which is proposed to overcome the complexity of the previous solution regarding its hardware implementation at high speed. A performance analysis is carried out by simulation and the results show a better performance in comparison with the recent ATM input-queued switch with round robin schedulers and service class priority. It means that the ATM input-queued switch with iLPFwTM scheduler and service class priority is proved to be more attractive for high-bandwidth ATM switch implementation than the solution based on a round robin scheduling algorithm.


In this paper the influence of information about high level features of Human Visual System (HVS) on objective quality assessment is studied. This was done by extending the existing full-reference objective image quality metric – FSIM – where the different importance of certain areas of image is considered using Phase Congruency (PC) algorithm. Here, the estimation of Region of Interest (ROI) based on this algorithm is complemented by Fixation Density Maps (FDM) containing the information about high level features of HVS. Use of another low level features based algorithm (Phase Spectrum of Fourier Transform) was also considered and compared to the PC algorithm. The performance was evaluated qualitatively on images reconstructed according to ROI and quantitatively on images from LIVE database. The correlation between subjective and objective tests was calculated using Pearson's Correlation Coefficient and Spearman's Rank Order Coefficient. The statistical significance of the difference between correlation coefficients was assessed by Fisher r-to-z transformation. The performance of the metric was also compared to other state-of-the-art image quality metrics (SSIM, MS-SSIM, and FSIM).


A novel form of DNA polymerase I (deoxynucleosidetriphosphate:DNA deoxynucleotidyltransferase, DNA nucleotidyltransferase, EC 22.214.171.124) activity has been isolated from Escherichia coli cells that had been activated for expression of the DNA damage-inducible genes. Induction was by treatment of normal cells or cells carrying the spr-51 and tif-1 mutations with nalidixic acid. This activity, DNA polymerase I, seems to be a form of DNA polymerase I because it is insensitive to N-ethylmaleimide, is inhibited by antibody to DNA polymerase I, and does not appear in a polA1 strain. DNA polymerase I activity sediments through sucrose gradients as a broad peak with s20.w = 6.6--10.5, compared with an s20,w = 4.8--5.5 for DNA polymerase I. The fidelity during polymerization reactions of DNA polymerase I is relatively low with a variety of synthetic templates and deoxynucleoside triphosphates, although the enzyme appears to have a normal level of 3' greater than 5' exonuclease. Polymerase I has properties that might implicate it in some form of mutagenic DNA repair.


The present study aimed to evaluate the effect of L-carnitine and Yeast chromium supplementation on the productive performance of Pekin and Sudani duckling breeds. A total number of 450 both unsexed Pekin and Sudani ducklings (225 per each breed) one-day-old were investigated in the current study. The experimental period lasted 12 weeks of age. Experimental ducklings were randomly divided into the 5 equal treatments with 90 ducklings (45 number from both Pekin and Sudani ducklings per each). Each experimental treatment was randomly divided into 3 equal replicates of 30 ducklings (15 ducklings in each breed). The five experimental treatments were as follows: the first treatment was the control with basal diets, treatments 2 and 3 received basal diets supplemented with 300 and 450 mg/kg diet L-carnitine (LC), respectively, while treatments 4 and 5 received basal diets supplemented with 400 and 600 μg/kg diets Yeast chromium (Cr), respectively. The results indicated that growing duckling fed diets supplemented with LC and Cr were significantly improved in live body weight, body weight gain, feed intake, and feed conversion ratio. The relative weight of carcass quality and weight of lymphoid organs significantly increased with supplemented diets. Therefore, both duckling breeds fed on diets supplemented with 450 mg LC/kg resulted in better performance without any adverse effect on carcass quality as well as economic efficiency.


Extraintestinal Clostridium difficile is rare. A 74-year-old man with a history of ulcerative colitis presented after a fall. Trauma work-up showed liver cirrhosis. Two days later he developed abdominal pain, distension, diarrhoea and leucocytosis. Stool tested positive for C. difficile. CT abdomen showed pancolitis with toxic megacolon. Total abdominal colectomy and ileostomy with a rectal stump was performed. He was discharged, but was readmitted with sepsis. CT abdomen showed a 10.4×7.2 cm fluid collection in the pelvis. C. difficile stool was negative. CT-guided abscess drainage grew C. difficile. Barium enema was negative for communication from the rectal stump to the abscess. The patient was treated with metronidazole for 2 weeks. In summary, extraintestinal C. difficile can develop from recent antibiotics use, gastrointestinal surgery and microperforations from toxic megacolon. We recommend abscess drainage, concomitant treatment with metronidazole and or vancomycin, and reimaging of abscess location 2–4 weeks after cessation of antibiotics.


OBJECTIVE: To provide an overview of the role of amylin, as well as that of pramlintide, a synthetic analog of amylin, in maintaining glucose homeostasis; and discuss the pharmacology, pharmacokinetics, efficacy, adverse effects, and role of pramlintide in the control of postprandial hyperglycemia. DATA SOURCES: The data presented in this review were obtained from published literature, abstracts presented at scientific meetings, and information on file with the manufacturer. MEDLINE searches (1986–March 2003) using the search terms pramlintide and amylin were conducted to identify clinical trials and review articles. Additionally, the bibliographies of the identified articles were reviewed. DATA SYNTHESIS: Clinical trials have demonstrated that amylin in combination with insulin controls postprandial glucose levels by decreasing food intake, slowing gastric emptying, and suppressing glucagon secretion. Clinical trials also showed significant decreases in mean plasma glucose levels and glycosylated hemoglobin, as well as the added benefits of weight loss and reduction in insulin doses. The most commonly reported adverse effects associated with pramlintide in clinical trials were gastrointestinal complaints and hypoglycemia, which occurred most frequently during initiation of therapy. CONCLUSIONS: The administration of insulin alone often does not result in optimal metabolic control. The treatment of amylin deficiency, in addition to insulin deficiency, may be warranted in order to obtain glucose homeostasis. The role of pramlintide, an amylin analog, will become clearer as more clinical data become available.


Imidacloprid represents the Australian sugar industry's best canegrub-management tool, but it has been detected in many water bodies, including groundwater, creeks, rivers and marine environments, posing a potential risk to the health of the Great Barrier Reef. In ratoon cane, it is commonly applied in liquid form with coulters within the cane row. Imidacloprid product labels state that, when applied in ratoons, the product must be placed at 100–125 mm depth and the slot must be covered; however, it is not uncommon to observe application equipment that does not maintain the desired depth or fails to close the slot appropriately. To investigate the best application methods to reduce imidacloprid runoff, two rainfall-simulation trials were established in the Burdekin and in the Wet Tropics to assess the impact of depth and slot coverage on imidacloprid runoff when the liquid formulation is applied with a stool-splitter tine implement. An additional runoff trial under overhead irrigation was set up in the Wet Tropics to test the efficacy of the StoolZippaTM to close the slot and reduce imidacloprid runoff losses when the product is applied at the correct depth of 100 mm. Results from the rainfall-simulation trials showed higher imidacloprid concentration in runoff from a shallow application at 50 mm compared to the recommended minimum 100 mm application depth. A press wheel reduced the imidacloprid concentration to nil when the product was applied at the correct depth of 100 mm; however, it slightly increased the concentration in the case of the shallow application. In the overhead-irrigation trial, the StoolZippaTM increased the imidacloprid concentrations in runoff versus the slot left open, but these concentrations were still extremely low and not of environmental concern. These trials indicate that ensuring the product is consistently applied at 100 mm depth is the best way to reduce imidacloprid loss via runoff when the product is applied with a stool-splitter tine implement. As trials were only conducted in loam soils at two locations, further trials are recommended over a range of soil types and geographic locations.


Prostate growth curves were estimated from serial prostate-specific antigen (PSA) measurements on frozen sera in three groups of men: (a) 16 men with no prostatic disease by urological history and examination; (b) 20 men with a histological diagnosis of benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH) who had undergone simple prostatectomy; and (c) 18 men with a histological diagnosis of prostate cancer. The median number of repeated PSA measurements over an 8- to 26-yr period prior to histological diagnosis or exclusion of prostate disease was eight and 11 for noncancer and cancer subjects, respectively. Predicted rates of change in PSA (PSA velocity) were linear and curvilinear for control and BPH subjects, respectively. Subjects with cancer demonstrated both a linear and an exponential phase of PSA velocity. Based on time to double PSA, we estimated the epithelial doubling time for men without prostate disease to range from 54 +/- 13 yr at age 40 to 84 +/- 13 yr at age 70. For men with BPH, doubling times ranged from 2 +/- 13 yr at age 40 to 17 +/- 5 yr at age 85. Subjects with local/regional and advanced/metastatic cancer had similar PSA doubling times of 2.4 +/- 0.6 yr and 1.8 +/- 0.2 yr, respectively. These data are consistent with what is known about prostatic growth with age in men without prostate disease and BPH, and the kinetics of prostate cancer growth. Estimates of prostatic growth rate from changes in PSA may be useful clinically in management of men with prostate disease.


The effects of anisotropy on the reflection of SH-waves (horizontally polarized shear waves) from a transition layer are studied. The transition layer is sand-wiched between two isotropic homogeneous half-spaces and is constituted by a medium which is both anisotropic and inhomogeneous. The SH-wave potentials are obtained for an anisotropic inhomogeneous medium in which both the anisotropy factor (ratio of the horizontal rigidity to the vertical rigidity) and vertical velocity vary with depth. An expression for the reflection coefficient of SH waves is obtained when the material mentioned above forms a finite transition zone between two isotropic homogeneous half-spaces. For further generalization, a second-order discontinuity along with the first-order on eis being assumed in the material properties, at the boundaries of the transition layer. The mathematical and numerical analyses show that the anisotropy factor, found at the top of the transition layer (N0/M0) produces considerable effect on the reflection coefficient for an obliquely incident SH wave. It has been noted that the greater the thickness of the transition layer, the greater is the dependence of the reflection coefficient upon the value of the anisotropy (N0/M0). The minima and maxima of the reflection of seismic energy are found dependent on the value of anisotropy. For greater values of the anisotropy, these maxima and minima shift toward the lower values of the wavelength of the propagating wave (or toward the higher values of the thickness of the transition layer). In fact, the values of the reflection coefficient at which these maxima and minima of seismic energy occur are found greater for the higher values of anisotropy. The effects of anisotropy are found more pronounced for the larger angles of incidence. This remains so until the angle of refraction becomes imaginary. However, no effects of the anistropy factor are found on the reflection coefficients for a normally incident wave. The results, mentioned above, are therefore discussed only for the obliquely incident wave. A geophysically interesting situation has been chosen for studying, quantitatively, the effects of the anisotropy factor on the reflection of SH waves.


N6-methyladenosine (m6A) is the most abundant eukaryote mRNA modification, modulated by regulators known as epigenetic writers, erasers and readers, which are known to serve crucial roles in mRNA metabolism. However, the role of m6A during B-cell development and B-cell tumorigenesis remains poorly understood. By analyzing the gene expression profile of 123 mantle cell lymphoma cases from the Gene Expression Omnibus database, the present study demonstrated that one-half of the m6A regulators were able to predict patient survival in mantle cell lymphoma, notably the m6A.index. The expression levels of the m6A regulators were regarded as good classifiers in mantle cell lymphoma. The m6A.index-low mantle cell lymphoma type exhibited a poor patient survival and lower mRNA levels from the total transcriptome. The m6A regulators may be associated with the cell division and the RNA metabolic pathways, which may result in poor survival of patients with mantle cell lymphoma.


Objective. Within the frame of a randomized clinical trial to examine whether training of general practitioners (the intervention group) in intensive lifestyle modification and pharmacological treatment of patients with type 2 diabetes has a spillover effect on individuals with impaired fasting glycaemia (IFG) or impaired glucose tolerance (IGT). Design. A high-risk screening study for type 2 diabetes with an intervention programme, where general practices were randomized to provide standard treatment versus intensive lifestyle modification and pharmacological treatment to newly diagnosed diabetic patients. Setting. General practices in Denmark. Subjects. Of 1821 individuals identified with IFG or IGT, results from oral glucose tolerance tests after one and three years were available in 1510 individuals. Main outcome measures. Progression rates from IFG and IGT to diabetes and effect of intervention were estimated in a regression model using interval censoring. Results. A total of 442 persons developed diabetes. There was no significant overall effect of intervention on progression rates. For risk factors, no difference in rate of change was found between randomization groups, but a difference was found between general practices within the same randomization groups. Conclusion. General practitioners identify a high number of incident diabetes cases in individuals with IFG or IGT found by high-risk screening. Intervention at the general practitioner's level in intensive treatment type 2 diabetes does not have a significant spillover effect reducing the risk of diabetes from pre-diabetic conditions. This could indicate that intervention strategies should be specifically targeted at individuals with IFG or IGT, either by training general practitioners or directly at the individual level.


This study assessed the possibility of using polymethylhydrosiloxane (PMHS)-treated fly ash cenospheres (FCS) for formulating a thermally insulating and thermal shock (TS)-resistant cementitious blend with calcium aluminate cement. To prevent FCS degradation in an alkaline cement environment at high temperatures, the cenospheres were pre-treated with sodium metasilicate to form silanol and aluminol groups on their surface. These groups participated in a dehydrogenation reaction with the functional ≡Si–H groups within PMHS with the formation of siloxane oxygen-linked M-FCS (M: Al or Si). At high hydrothermal temperatures of 175 and 250 °C, some Si–O–Si and SiCH3 bonds ruptured, causing depolymerization of the polymer at the FCS surface and hydroxylation of the raptured sites with the formation of silanol groups. Repolymerization through self-condensation between the silanol groups followed, resulting in the transformation of siloxane to low crosslinked silicon-like polymer as a repolymerization-induced product (RIP) without carbon. The RIP provided adequate protection of FCS from pozzolanic reactions (PR), which was confirmed by the decline in zeolites as the products of PR of FCS. Cements with PMHS-treated FCS withstood both hydrothermal and thermal temperature of 250 °C in TS tests, and they also showed improved compressive strength, toughness, and water repellency as well as decreased thermal conductivity. The lubricating properties of PMHS increased the fluidity of lightweight slurries.


Introduction
KCNJ11 gene activating mutations play a major role in the development of neonatal diabetes mellitus (NDM). KCNJ 11 gene encodes the Kir 6.2 subunit of ATP- sensitive potassium channel which is a critical regulator of pancreatic beta-cell insulin secretion.

Aim
To study KCNJ11 gene mutations in infants with NDM and the effect of sulfonylurea treatment on the glycemic control in patients with KCNJ11 gene mutation.

Subjects and methods
Thirty infants with NDM were screened for KCNJ11 gene mutations by DNA sequencing, insulin therapy was replaced by sulfonylurea treatment in patients with mutations.

Results
R201C heterozygous mutation was found in one patient who was successfully shifted from insulin therapy to sulfonylurea treatment, while E23k, I337V, and S385C polymorphisms were detected in 14 patients.

Conclusion
Screening for KCNJ 11 gene mutations could lead to identification of patients with mutations who can be successfully shifted from insulin therapy to sulfonylurea treatment improving their quality of life.


Purpose
The purpose of this study is to analyze the interaction between the enablers and barriers to successful project control system (PCS) implementation in petroleum and chemical projects and to provide a knowledge-based foundation for the evaluation of the dominant factors of PCS success.

Design/methodology/approach
An integrated approach of interpretive structural modeling (ISM) and cross-impact matrix multiplication applied to classification (Matrice d'Impacts Croisés Multiplication Appliquée à un Classement) were used. An expert group of industry professionals and academics was consulted at the initial stage as an input for the ISM methodology to explore the contextual relationships among the critical factors to PCS implementation in petroleum and chemical projects.

Findings
This study identifies three dominants enablers of PCS success: the technical skills of the project controller; explicitly defined roles of project team members; and an accurate work breakdown structure. Additionally, six dominant barriers to successful PCS implementation have been identified: lack of standard processes, vague contract deliverables, unclear project goals, unclear project milestones, disparate control system between owner and contractor and lack of information communication. Organizations in the petroleum and chemical sectors should put more effort into the development of these factors to optimize the implementation of PCS.

Research limitations/implications
A limitation of this current study is its focus on the petroleum and chemical sectors in Saudi Arabia. It is expected that the findings will have wider applicability, but further studies in different sectors and geographic regions should be undertaken to validate this assumption. In this study, a second validation expert group was used to ensure the reliability of the results as much as was possible. However, further studies could be completed to evaluate alternate classification schemes and to test the robustness of the expert consensus and techniques reported, in this study, including an increased number of experts.

Practical implications
The present study makes some practical contributions to the project delivery process. It provides different project stakeholders with a better understanding of the factors that improve PCS outcomes and helps project owners and contractors to evaluate the PCS used by both parties to understand how they might be aligned for successful project execution.

Originality/value
The successful implementation of PCS is a key contributor to the total project delivery process. Although there is growing attention on PCS as a critical project management tool in petroleum and chemical projects, the literature in project management shows that PCS implementation has not been taken up as much as originally anticipated. This paper will address this gap by focusing on improving the take-up of strategical PCS implementation through the identification of six dominant enablers and nine dominant barriers as driver factors of success.


Background: Little is known on factors determining infection of tropical plants by fungal pathogens, although multiple studies on model species show that light conditions affect the two major hormones that control resistance in plants to enemies. This is the first study using a natural population of a wild tropical plant to relate light conditions to resistance hormones and, the beneficial and detrimental interactions with insects and fungi. Hypothesis: Light conditions affect the endogenous levels of resistance hormones and thereby cause quantitative shifts among herbivores and nectrotrophic, biotrophic and endophytic fungi. Studied species: The tropical vine Syngonium podophyllum . Study site: Los Tuxtlas tropical rain forest, Mexico. Methods: We used GC-MS to quantify the concentration of the two resistance hormones in intact leaves and natural levels of herbivory and fungal disease in S . podophyllum plants growing naturally in the full sun or in the shade. Results: The proportion of leaves damaged by herbivores or infected by hemibiotrophic or necrotrophic pathogens was higher in shade than under full-light conditions. Damage caused by biotrophic pathogens was frequently observed in sun but not in shade. Levels of both hormones in phenotypically healthy leaves were higher in sun than in shade. Conclusions: (i) light has an effect on concentrations of plant resistance hormones in nature; (ii) these differences have consequences for fungi and animals that naturally interact with the plant, and (iii) the described effect can represent a physiological mechanism via which an abiotic factor affects the members of the guilds at higher trophic levels.


The choice of cable placement and routing for a cable-driven serial manipulator has profound effects on the operational workspace of the mechanism. Poor choices in cable attachment can hamper or preclude the ability of the mechanism to perform a desired task, while a clever configuration might allow for an expanded workspace and kinematic redundancies, providing additional capability and flexibility.This paper outlines a methodology to identify and analyze optimal cable configurations for a serial manipulator which maximize operational workspace subject to mechanism design and configuration constraints. This process is first described in general terms for a generic 2-link robot and then applied to an illustrative example of a cable-driven robot leg. The methodology is used to determine the placement and routing of the cables to achieve the desired range of motion, as well as highlight the critical parameters within the cable configuration and identify possible areas of improvement in the overall robot design.Copyright © 2013 by ASME