The present paper deals with the development and validation of multi media dissolution of Memantine HCl tablets by precolumn derivatization by Phenoxy acetyl chloride (PAC) and Amantadine HCl, used as derivatizing agent and internal standard respectively. Memantine base was extracted from aqueous medium by basic toluene and added suitable volume of 0.15% v/v PAC solution in toluene. The solution was kept for five minutes for completion of the reaction and stopped the reaction by an organic solvent. The chromatographic was achieved by injecting 20 micro liter of derivatized mixture in HPLC column Inertsil ODS 3V [250*4.6] 5 micron. The mobile phase has 15% of 3% w/v ammonium acetate solution in methanol and the flow rate was maintained 1.5mL/minutes. Amantadine HCl was used as an internal standard, the Amantadine and Memantine peaks were eluted at the retention time of about 5.3 and 8.2 respectively. The volume, concentration and time have been optimized for derivatizing reagent and the key functional group has been assayed by Quantitative IR spectrum. After developed and validated method was used for multimedia dissolution profile was performed for 0.1N Hydrochloric acid, 0.1N Hydrochloric acid with 2% sodium chloride, pH 4.5 acetate buffer, pH 6.8 phosphate buffer and pH 7.2 phosphate buffer. Dissolution was performed 900mL of each media, Basket and 100rpm.


The study is a modest attempt to elicit attention of Nigeria public service on the need to leverage on the emerging technologies to serve the public better. Emerging technologies, brought by the increased study of science and technology via software and hardware experimentation have reduced the burden and the debilitating effects of trial and error in public service delivery in the world, especially towards the end of 20th century to date. The study further highlighted on strategic advantage of total switch to e-governance .Being a qualitative study; we sourced our data from the secondary environment. Data analysis was carried out via content analysis technique while the study was predicated on the framework of technological theory of social change, especially as espoused by Ogburn (1947), who posits that technology is the primary engine of progress in service delivery. Among other findings, it was revealed that negative attitude of Nigerian Government to emerging technologies in terms of timely decision for adoption, and corrupt intent of leaders are the most debilitating factors responsible for the slow pace of e-governance in Nigeria. The study therefore recommends among others, attitudinal change in the public sector to redirect the psyche of the public service on the indispensability of acquisition and effective use of emerging technologies to ensure precision in public service delivery.


Background: Leading Health Indicators (LHIs), a subset of objectives for Healthy People 2020, were selected to communicate at-risk health issues and actions that can be taken to address them. Nationally, the number of children, adolescents, and adults who visited the dentist in the past year has decreased, suggesting that oral health continues to be a problem caused by barriers preventing access to oral health services. This review aimed to identify strategies to increase access to oral health services that will be useful in moving toward the LHI objectives. Methods: Preliminary research was conducted on the LHI via the Healthy People 2020 website. Health-related, peer-reviewed articles were selected and evaluated to determine current strategies used to increase access to oral health services that would lead to achievement of the LHI objectives. Results: Evidenced-based literature shows that economic, educational, and personal barriers prevent access to oral health services. Through health promotion and educational interventions, however, good oral health can be established. Such improvements will lead to attaining the LHI objectives in moving towards the target goals of Healthy People 2020. Conclusions: Since primary prevention and early intervention procedures lead to improved oral health, such methods can be useful in reaching the LHI objectives and the target goal of Healthy People 2020.


Originally presented at Media@lse Fifth Anniversary Conference, 21st - 23rd September 2008, LSE, London. This version available at: http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/21561/ Available in LSE Research Online: October 2008 © 2008 The Author LSE has developed LSE Research Online so that users may access research output of the School. Copyright © and Moral Rights for the papers on this site are retained by the individual authors and/or other copyright owners. Users may download and/or print one copy of any article(s) in LSE Research Online to facilitate their private study or for non-commercial research. You may not engage in further distribution of the material or use it for any profit-making activities or any commercial gain. You may freely distribute the URL (http://eprints.lse.ac.uk) of the LSE Research Online website.


One of the challenges in detecting a pest incursion is the selection of an appropriate sampling technique that is relatively easy to use and inexpensive. Five sampling techniques (sticky traps, water traps, sweep netting, vacuum sampling and direct searching) were used to detect the tomato potato psyllid (Bactericera cockerelli) in potato crops on the North Island of New Zealand. Sticky traps and water traps outperformed the other methods in detecting psyllids. There was weak evidence that water traps outperformed sticky traps, but this difference was minor. Sticky traps closer to the edge of a crop were more likely to catch more psyllids. The results suggest that surveillance for incursion by B. cockerelli into Australia using yellow sticky or water traps would be easier and more time-effective to implement than other methods and would provide a higher probability of detection if the psyllid was in fact present.


A 1 V, 1 mW, 14 bit delta-sigma modulator in a standard CMOS 0.35-/spl mu/m technology is presented. A modified symmetrical bootstrapped switch is used in order to allow rail-to-rail signal switching. A single-loop third-order topology with an oversampling ratio of 100 achieves a dynamic range of 88 dB, a peak SNR of 87 dB and a peak SNDR of 85 dB in a signal bandwidth of 25 kHz.


Aims: To test the clinical accuracy of a web based differential diagnostic tool (ISABEL) for a set of case histories collected during a two stage evaluation. Methods: Setting: acute paediatric units in two teaching and two district general hospitals in the southeast of England. Materials: sets of summary clinical features from both stages, and the diagnoses expected for these features from stage I (hypothetical cases provided by participating clinicians in August 2000) and final diagnoses for cases in stage II (children presenting to participating acute paediatric units between October and December 2000). Main outcome measure: presence of the expected or final diagnosis in the ISABEL output list. Results: A total of 99 hypothetical cases from stage I and 100 real life cases from stage II were included in the study. Cases from stage II covered a range of paediatric specialties (n = 14) and final diagnoses (n = 55). ISABEL displayed the diagnosis expected by the clinician in 90/99 hypothetical cases (91%). In stage II evaluation, ISABEL displayed the final diagnosis in 83/87 real cases (95%). Conclusion: ISABEL showed acceptable clinical accuracy in producing the final diagnosis for a variety of real as well as hypothetical case scenarios.


This research aims to examine the possibility of applying the concept of private participation in managing the municipal business activities including utilities' services in the Palestinian local government units. In order to fulfill the stated purposes of this study, two special questionnaires were articulated and directed to one hundred municipal citizens and 140 municipal stakeholders from local governments and other related agencies. The study found that almost all forms of PPP experiences existed in the Palestinian municipalities at low scale level. The study found that the majority of municipal citizens still prefer that the municipalities own and operate the majority of municipal activities and projects, while private participation should be limited to operating some selected municipal projects in yearly or long term contracts. Finally, this study concluded that the majority of municipal officials including municipal directors are less enthusiastic compared to other stakeholders regarding the partnership with the private sector for both operating the essential services as well as other business projects.


USP30, a deubiquitinating enzyme family, forfeits the ubiquitination of E3 ligase and Parkin on the surface of mitochondria. Inhibition of USP30 results in mitophagy and cellular clearance. Herein, by understanding structural requirements, we discovered potential USP30 inhibitors from an imidazole series of ligands via a validated ubiquitin-rhodamine-110 fluorometric assay. A novel catalytic use of the Zn(l-proline)2 complex for the synthesis of tetrasubstituted imidazoles was identified. Among all compounds investigated, 3g and 3f inhibited USP30 at IC50 of 5.12 and 8.43 μM, respectively. The binding mode of compounds at the USP30 binding site was understood by a docking study and interactions with the key amino acids were identified. Compound 3g proved its neuroprotective efficacy by inhibiting apoptosis on SH-SY5Y neuroblastoma cells against dynorphin A (10 μM) treatment. Hence, the present study provides a new protocol to design and develop ligands against USP30, thereby offering a therapeutic strategy under conditions like kidney damage and neurodegenerative disorders including Parkinson's disease.


Placental development is a major cause of a successful pregnancy, and in the presence of placental dysfunction, there is a higher risk of pregnancy complications. Doppler technology can be used for screening and detecting the more common pregnancy‐associated diseases like preeclampsia, intrauterine growth retardation, and perinatal loss. In this review, the biophysical markers are discussed in the light of the latest information that appeared in the medical literature. © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.


This thesis presents the wear of coated carbide insert in machining carbon steel AISI 1065. Machineability of AISI 1065 is considered good with high strength, high resistance to breakage and high modulus of elasticity. This has increased the tool wear of the coated carbide when it is used to machining of AISI 1065. The main objective of this project is to examine the progress of tool wear, identify the interaction between the different parameters and to find out the optimal parameter that can be used in dry machining. In this project, 33 full factorial design of experiments (DOE) was employed in STATISTICA software to plan and perform the experiment systematically so that any possible experimental error would be minimized. Machining variables considered are cutting length, cutting speed and feed rate. The variables for there levels were 90, 120 and 150 rev/min for cutting speed, 0.13, 0.18, 0.22 mm/rev for the feed rate and 0.8, 1.0, and 1.2 mm for depth of cut respectively. Machining AISI 1065 was carried out by using the conventional lathe machine. The work piece is been turning for 7 rounds for each turning process. After 7 rounds of turning process, wear of the coated carbide insert was investigated and measured by using Microscope MarVision MM320 and Quadra check 300. Experimental data was analyzed in STATISTICA. Analysis of variance (ANOVA) is done to identify the most influencing parameters in this research. From the ANOVA analysis, the cutting speed and the feed rate are the most significant parameter that influencing tool wear. Depth of cut effect can be negligible. The minimum tool wears is at the lowest cutting speed that is 90rev/min and at lowest feed rate 0.13mm/rev.


Merkel cell carcinoma (MCC) of the skin is a rare, aggressive and often fatal neuroendocrine skin cancer. The incidence of MCC has significantly increased in the last decades. Factors that have been associated with the development of MCC include infection with Merkel Cell polyomavirus (MCPyV), ultraviolet exposure, hematologic malignancies and immunosuppression.We present three cases of patients living with HIV who were diagnosed with MCC. HIV cases associated with MCC have been rarely reported and to our knowledge, not yet before in the UK.


This study assesses the effect of long-term (59 years) application of organic and inorganic fertilizers on soil organic matter and enzyme activity. Total organic C, total organic N, hot water soluble C, microbial biomass C and dehydrogenase activity were evaluated in soil from the long-term field experiment in Prague-Ruzyne (Orthic Luvisol, clay loam). Total organic C and N increased significantly in soils treated with organic fertilizers (farmyard manure, compost) and in soils with a combination of organic and mineral NPK fertilizers (manure + NPK, compost + NPK, cattle manure + straw + NPK) compared to soil treated with inorganic fertilizer, cattle slurry + straw and non-fertilized control. Farmyard manure significantly increased hot water soluble C compared to the control. Dehydrogenase activity was significantly increased by all treatments compared to control. The results indicate that additions of organic matter from various sources differ in the effects on soil organic matter and biological activity. The effect of manure was the most favourable; long-term application of cattle slurry + straw is rather similar to mineral fertilization.


The present invention relates to a pyrimidine compound (I) useful as a pharmaceutical intermediate, to a process for preparing said pyrimidine compound, to intermediates used in said process, and to the use of said pyrimidine compound in the preparation of pharmaceuticals.


Effects of alkyl side chains (R-) on the electronic structural properties of aliphatic amino acids are investigated using quantum mechanical approaches. The carbon (C 1s) binding energy spectra of the aliphatic amino acids are derived from the C 1s spectrum of glycine (the parent spectrum) by the addition of spectral peaks, depending on the alkyl side chains, appearing in the lower energy region IP < 290 eV (where IP is the ionization potential). The two glycyl parent spectral peaks of the amide 291.0 eV [C((2))] and carboxylic 293.5 eV [C((1))] C atoms are shifted in the aliphatic amino acids owing to perturbations depending on the size and structure of the alkyl chains. The pattern of the N 1s and O 1s spectra in glycine is retained in the spectra of the other amino acids with small shifts to lower energy, again depending on the alkyl side chain. The Hirshfeld charge analyses confirm the observations. The alkyl effects on the valence binding energy spectra of the amino acids are concentrated in the middle valence energy region of 12-16 eV, and hence this energy region of 12-16 eV is considered as the `fingerprint' of the alkyl side chains. Selected valence orbitals, either inside or outside of the alkyl fingerprint region, are presented using both density distributions and orbital momentum distributions, in order to understand the chemical bonding of the amino acids. It is also observed that the HOMO-LUMO energy gaps of the aliphatic amino acids are reduced with the growth of the alkyl side chain.


The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has led to the paralysis of the worldwide economy caused by the population's lockdown to stop the virus spreading, making it difficult to do exercise. The aim of this study is to analyse the commitment to and feeling of insecurity related to practising sport, sports habits and the profile of the Spanish population during lockdown according to the level of addiction to exercise. The sample consisted of 1019 subjects with a mean age of 35 years old. The variables analysed were exercise addiction, commitment to and feeling of insecurity related to sport, and sport habits. Three groups were identified according to their addiction level to exercise: asymptomatic (n = 202), symptomatic (n = 756), and at risk of addiction (n = 61). The main results indicated that a higher addiction level was associated with a higher number of days and time spent on exercise per week. Six percent of the subjects were at addiction risk, and they had a lower feeling of insecurity towards sport. These findings provide information to governments on the need to promote physical activity programmes at home to promote adequate fitness and mental wellbeing in the population.


Prostaglandin E2 (PGE2) is a product of the COX pathway and its production is believed to be elevated at sites of atherosclerotic lesions. PGE2 does not alter platelet responses by itself, but does modulate responses in the presence of other agonists. Previous studies using knockout mice models found conflicting evidence to studies using human platelets with regard to the receptors that mediate the platelet effects of PGE2. Here we further investigated the effects of PGE2 on platelet aggregation to submaximal agonist stimulation. Platelet rich plasma (PRP) was prepared by centrifugation at 175 g for 15 min. PRP was incubated with the EP3 receptor antagonist, L-798 106 (0.3–30 nM) for 20 min, before addition of PGE2 (0.1–30 μM) and incubation for a further 20 min. Aggregation on 96-well plates was then stimulated by addition of 0.6 μM U46619, followed by reading of absorption over 16 min with shaking between readings. By itself 0.6 μM U46619 caused submaximal aggregation, this was potentiated by PGE2 at concentrations up to 1 μM; concentrations beyond this inhibited aggregation. Pre-treatment with L-798106 significantly reduced the potentiating action of low concentrations of PGE2 on platelet aggregation. For example, in the presence of 0.6 μM U46619 alone aggregation was 37%±12%, in the presence of 0.3 μM PGE2 this increased to 65%±9%, with the further addition of 10 nML-798 106 this was reduced to 40%±5% (n=4). These results indicate that PGE2 has both pro-aggregatory (at lower concentrations) and anti-aggregatory (at higher concentrations) effects upon platelets, and that the EP3 receptor contributes to the potentiating action of PGE2 on human platelet aggregation.


The flow structure and lift response of a separated flow over an airfoil that is subjected to an impulsive type of pitching motion are compared to the response produced by a localized pulse disturbance at the leading edge of an airfoil. Time-resolved PIV data are used to obtain the velocity field on the suction side of the airfoil. POD analysis shows that the majority of energy is contained within the first four modes. Strong similarities in the shapes of the POD basis functions are found, especially for the second mode, irrespective of the type of actuation (global or local). The time-varying coefficient of this second POD mode tracks the negative of the lift coefficient or circulation in each case. Basis functions from the localized actuation data were projected on the velocity field of the globally actuated flow to obtain a hybrid set of coefficients. The hybrid coefficients matched reasonably well with the coefficients obtained from the original POD analysis for the globally excited flow. Both types of actuation were found to generate very similar Lagrangian flow structures. The results suggest a certain degree of universality in the POD modes/flow structures for the separated flow over an airfoil, irrespective of the type of excitation.


Functional studies of bronchial smooth muscle contractility, particularly in humans, are now well standardized regarding to tissues collection, tension setting and results expression. This type of model is usually considered as simple for analysis of pharmacological interactions between ligands and receptors. In fact, the multiplicity of cell types implicated in the bronchial response makes of isolated bronchi preparation a complex model. Examples are given with studies on endothelin or tachykinins. Inflammation and bronchial hyperresponsiveness models were proposed. Models of passive sensitization or pretreatment with cytokines are described. Functional studies of contractility are included in larger investigations including the analysis of the associated biochemical and electrical phenomenon.


The two-dimensional steady flow of an incompressible viscous fluid past a circular cylinder, placed symmetrically in a simple shear field, has been studied for both the stationary and the freely rotating case by solving numerically the Navier-Stokes equations for values of the Reynolds number R in the range \[ 0.047 \leqslant R \leqslant 70. \] At R = 0·047, the present results are in substantial agreement with the analytic small-R perturbation solution given by Robertson & Acrivos (1970). Inertia effects were found, however, to play a significant role even at R = 1, and hence the calculated flow pattern for R ≥ 1 differs significantly from that of the creeping-flow solution. Specifically, for the freely rotating case, the region of closed streamlines decreases rapidly in extent with increasing R, two symmetrically placed wakes are formed on either side of the cylinder and the dimensionless rotational speed of the freely suspended cylinder decreases as R-½. In fact, for a value of R as low as 70, many of the gross features of the flow are surprisingly similar to those described by an inviscid solution except for the difference in the two sets of pressure profiles and the fact that the numerical results do not as yet exhibit the expected flow separation on the surface of the cylinder.


A non-hydrolytic one pot sol-gel method has been used to synthesize mesoporous silica ionogels with the confined ionic liquid (IL) 1-ethyl 3-methyl imidazolium tetra fluoro-borate [EMIM][BF(4)]. The precursor for obtaining the SiO(2) matrix was tetraethyl orthosilicate (TEOS) and formic acid was used as a catalyst. These ionogels have been characterized by density measurements, TEM, BET, DSC, TGA and FTIR. The incorporation of the ionic liquid [EMIM][BF(4)] enhances the gellification rate which results in the ionogels having very low density (~0.3 g cm(-3)). The low density has been explained on the basis of the creation of 'blind embedded pores' in the matrix (apart from open pores) due to very rapid gellification (~1 min). Morphological studies provide experimental evidence for the presence of blind pores/voids inside the ionogel ingots. We have also shown that the IL entrapped in nanopores (~7-8 nm pore size) of the SiO(2) matrix has different physical properties than the bulk IL viz. (a) the phase transition temperatures (T(g), T(c) and T(m)) of the IL change upon confinement, (b) the thermal stability reduces upon confinement, and (c) the pore wall interaction with the IL results in changes in the C-H vibrations of the imidazolium ring and alkyl chain (the former increasing) which is also indicated in our DFT-calculation.


Magnetic reconnection (Parker, 1957; Sweet, 1958; Petschek, 1964; Yamada et al., 2010; Biskamp, 2000; Tsuneta, 1996; Kivelson and Russell, 1995; Yamada, 2007; Birn et al., 2001; Drake et al., 2003) is considered important to many astrophysical phenomena including stellar flares, magnetospheric disruptions of magnetars, and dynamics of galactic lobes. Research on magnetic reconnection started with observations in solar coronae and in the Earths magnetosphere, and a classical theory was developed based on MHD. Recent progress has been made by understanding the two-fluid physics of reconnection, through space and astrophysical observations (Tsuneta, 1996; Kivelson and Russell, 1995), laboratory experiments (Yamada, 2007), and theory and numerical simulations (Birn et al., 2001; Daughton et al., 2006; Uzdensky and Kulsrud, 2006). Laboratory experiments dedicated to the study of the fundamental reconnection physics have tested the physics mechanisms and their required conditions, and have provided a much needed bridge between observations and theory. For example, the Magnetic Reconnection Experiment (MRX) experiment (http://mrx.pppl.gov) has rigorously cross-checked the leading theories though quantitative comparisons of the numerical simulations and space astrophysical observations (Mozer et al., 2002). Extensive data have been accumulated in a wide plasma parameter regime with Lundquist numbers of S = 100 − 3000, where S is a ratio of the magnetic diffusion time to the Alfven transit time.


Nanometer scale patterns have been fabricated using evaporated films of C60 and its derivative, C60(CH2)2(C10H6), as negative type electron beam (e-be am) resists. E-beam irradiation reduces the dissolution rate of the films in organic solvents such as monochlorobenzene. In addition, the rate of thermal sublimation in vacuum is also reduced by the exposure. These molecules have quite similar resist properties. They exhibits good resolution and high dry-etch durability. The performance of the resists was demonstrated by defining about 20nm dot patterns in the resist films and fabricating Si nanopillars, about 20nm in diameter and 100nm high, by subsequent plasma etching. The results of optical measurements suggest that the exposure mechanism of C60 resist may be due to destruction of the molecules by e-beam irradiation.


Following an acute central nervous system (CNS) injury, axonal regeneration and functional recovery are extremely limited. This is due to an extrinsic inhibitory growth environment and the lack of intrinsic growth competence. Retinoic acid (RA) signaling, essential in developmental dorsoventral patterning and specification of spinal motor neurons, has been shown through its receptor, the transcription factor RA receptor β2 (RARβ2), to induce axonal regeneration following spinal cord injury (SCI). Recently, it has been shown that in dorsal root ganglion neurons (DRGs), cAMP levels were greatly increased by lentiviral RARβ2 expression and contributed to neurite outgrowth. Moreover, RARβagonists, in cerebellar granule neurons (CGN) and in the brain in vivo, induced phosphoinositide 3-kinase dependent phosphorylation of AKT that was involved in RARβ-dependent neurite outgrowth. More recently, RA-RARβpathways were shown to directly transcriptionally repress a member of the inhibitory Nogo receptor (NgR) complex, Lingo-1, under an axonal growth inhibitory environment in vitro as well as following spinal injury in vivo. This perspective focuses on these newly discovered molecular mechanisms and future directions in the field.


Semicarbazide-sensitive amine oxidase (SSAO) is both a soluble- and membrane-bound transmembrane protein expressed in the vascular endothelial and in smooth muscle cells. In vascular endothelial cells, SSAO contributes to the development of atherosclerosis by mediating a leukocyte adhesion cascade; however, its contributory role in the development of atherosclerosis in VSMCs has not yet been fully explored. This study investigates SSAO enzymatic activity in VSMCs using methylamine and aminoacetone as model substrates. The study also addresses the mechanism by which SSAO catalytic activity causes vascular damage, and further evaluates the contribution of SSAO in oxidative stress formation in the vascular wall. SSAO demonstrated higher affinity for aminoacetone when compared to methylamine (Km = 12.08 µM vs. 65.35 µM). Aminoacetone- and methylamine-induced VSMCs death at concentrations of 50 & 1000 µM, and their cytotoxic effect, was reversed with 100 µM of the irreversible SSAO inhibitor MDL72527, which completely abolished cell death. Cytotoxic effects were also observed after 24 h of exposure to formaldehyde, methylglyoxal and H2O2. Enhanced cytotoxicity was detected after the simultaneous addition of formaldehyde and H2O2, as well as methylglyoxal and H2O2. The highest ROS production was observed in aminoacetone- and benzylamine-treated cells. MDL72527 abolished ROS in benzylamine-, methylamine- and aminoacetone-treated cells (**** p < 0.0001), while βAPN demonstrated inhibitory potential only in benzylamine-treated cells (* p < 0.05). Treatment with benzylamine, methylamine and aminoacetone reduced the total GSH levels (**** p < 0.0001); the addition of MDL72527 and βAPN failed to reverse this effect. Overall, a cytotoxic consequence of SSAO catalytic activity was observed in cultured VSMCs where SSAO was identified as a key mediator in ROS formation. These findings could potentially associate SSAO activity with the early developing stages of atherosclerosis through oxidative stress formation and vascular damage.


The superior performance promised by multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) antenna technologies relies on accurate channel state information (CSI) to be available at the receiver. This is particularly challenging when MIMO antenna is employed in conjunction with orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing (OFDM) modulation, and the channels are to be estimated in one OFDM symbol. The difficulty is that for each sub-carrier, there are more than one channels to be estimated, one for each transmit antenna, leading to an underdetermined system. Theoretically, perfect recovery of CSI is impossible even in the absence of noise as the number of unknowns is more than the number of observations. Nevertheless, knowing the fact that the channels are correlated in frequency, this paper devises an iterative algorithm to estimate the CSI at all sub-carriers from all of the antennas. Our proposed technique is inspired by the observation that a simple linear function can well approximate the channel variation in frequency and that permits us to have more CSI estimates than observations at the receiver. Simulation results illustrate that for a (2,1)1 OFDM system with 128 subcarriers, the mean-square-error (MSE) in channel estimation can be made below 10-7 for channels with root-mean-square (rms) delay spread of 150 nsec as compared to MSE of 10 -3 for the conventional estimation method using orthogonal training sequences and a standard interpolation function


The present research examined the consequences of telling young children they have a reputation for being smart. Of interest was how this would affect their willingness to resist the temptation to cheat for personal gain as assessed by a temptation resistance task, in which children promised not to cheat in the game. Two studies with 3- and 5-year-old children (total N = 323) assessed this possibility. In Study 1, participants were assigned to one of three conditions: a smart reputation condition in which they were told they have a reputation for being smart, an irrelevant reputation control condition, or a no reputation control condition. Children in the smart reputation condition were significantly more likely to cheat than their counterparts in either control condition. Study 2 confirmed that reputational concerns are indeed a fundamental part of our smart reputation effect. These results suggest that children as young as 3 years of age are able to use reputational cues to guide their behavior, and that telling young children they have a positive reputation for being smart can have negative consequences.


Blockchain technology offers a promising solution for decentralized data sharing and communication among IoT devices. The decentralization aspect of blockchain technology has made it a popular topic for integration with IoT systems, including UAVs. Therefore, the use of blockchain technology in UAV systems has led to the growing interest of researchers, particularly in swarm UAV systems, where decentralization is crucial for ensuring safety and continuity. This study proposes a new data management model that integrates blockchain technology into UAV systems, with a particular focus on swarm UAV systems. By leveraging the decentralized structure of blockchain, the proposed system offers robustness against tampering and irreversibility, ensuring secure data transfer between UAVs and decentralized processing. Especially for mission plan and command upload operations, blockchain enables the distribution of critical information to all UAVs in the system. A use case scenario is also presented to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed model in controlling and managing real-world problems.


The starting point of this paper is that there is no self-maintenance of most tissue-specific regulatory proteins. There in only one cycle within regulatory genes hierarchy--"germ line" cycle ensuring the next generation ontogeny. The consequences of this are stage-specificity of gene expression and organism ageing. To explain the existence of long-living differentiated cells, we assume that certain genes cause specific repression of mRNAs encoding regulatory proteins, thereby stabilizing the mRNAs. On the contrary, the mRNAs encoding regulatory proteins necessary for proliferation are to be translated due to growth factors. If one of the genes encoding such mRNAs acquires a foreign (viral, for example) promoter, the cell will divide infinitely; this can explain a number of nuclear proto-oncogenes properties. From this view-point, cell proliferation and differentiation, ontogeny and regeneration are considered.


This paper applies the Bogoliubov–de Gennes equation and the Blonder–Tinkham–Klapwijk approach to study the oscillatory behaviour of differential conductance in a normal metal/insulator/metal/d-wave superconductor junction carrying a supercurrent Is. We find that (i) a three-humped structure appears at a nearly critical supercurrent Is and z ≈ 0.5 for the normal metal/insulator/metal/dx2+y2-wave superconductor junction; (ii) the zero-bias conductance peak splits into two peaks with sufficiently large applied current for the normal metal/insulator/metal/dxy-wave superconductor junction; (iii) the conductance spectrum exhibits oscillating behaviour with the bias voltage and the peaks of the resonances are suppressed by increasing supercurrent Is.


This article presents an intervention study developed within an international cooperation program, and aimed at promoting the school inclusion of children with disabilities in Mozambique. To avoid the risk of exporting models from a local context to another, and in order to favour a sustainable social change, a participatory and ecological framework was adopted. The main aim of the Participatory Action Research (PAR) carried out was to explore teachers' views and beliefs concerning disability and inclusion, and determine best practices to fully include students with disabilities. The paper illustrates the overall outcomes of a participatory research development process, and the results achieved in each phase. The final purpose is to increase the knowledge on school inclusion of children with disabilities in the Global South. Potentials and challenges of using clinical psychological, ecological and collaborative paradigms to address issues concerning health promotion and development of children with disabilities and local development are also discussed.


Increasing use of cyber-campaigns is being made by social movements and political groups. Nevertheless, this popularity is often accompanied by undesirable consequences for social movements such as the violence denounced by contemporary feminism. Thus, some digital mobilisations create a rift between the physical and digital worlds — something that often gives rise to homogenisation of socio-cultural categories such as gender, race, and age. In this paper, we analyse the #BringBackOurGirls campaign, which sprang to life five years ago. Its path reveals the success of these cyber-campaigns in the field of contemporary feminism. Feminist Critical Discourse Analysis (FCDA) is used to take a feminist genealogical approach to new materialisms. In doing so, it examines the temporal and spatial trajectory of the campaign to reshape affirmative feminist politics. These politics involve reconfiguring pre-established notions such as 'girl', 'agency', and 'otherness' to provide social movements with the capacity to respond. We therefore undertake an ethnographic examination of the hashtag (Bonilla & Rosa, 2015) to compare the beginning of the campaign with the situation now. We draw on these results to localise the shift from the local scale to the global one, in which structural powers, individual agency, and 'glocal' [local-global] and feminist affirmation policies become diluted.


Graphene, the atomically-thin honeycomb carbon lattice, is a highly conducting 2D material whose exposed electronic structure offers an ideal platform for chemical and biological sensing. Its biocompatible, flexible and chemically inert nature associated with the lack of dangling bonds, offers novel perspectives for direct interfacing with biological molecules. Combined with its exceptional electronic and optical properties, this promotes graphene as a unique platform for bioelectronics. Among the successful bio-integrations of graphene, the detection of action potentials in numerous electrogenic cells including neurons has paved the road for the high spatio-temporal and wide-field mapping of neuronal activity. Ultimate resolution of sensing ion channel activity can be achieved with neural interfaces, and it was shown that macroscale electrodes can record extracellular current of individual ion channels in model systems, by charging the quantum capacitance of large graphene monolayer (mm2). Here, we show the field effect detection of ion channel activity within neuron networks, cultured during several weeks above graphene transistor arrays. Dependences upon drugs, reference potential gating and device geometry confirm the field effect detection of individual ion channel and suggest a significant contribution of grain boundaries, which provide highly sensitive nanoscale-sized sensing sites. Our theoretical analysis and simulations demonstrate that the ion gating of a single grain boundary in liquid affects the electronic transmission of the whole transistor channel, resulting in significant conductance variations. Monitoring the ion channels activity is of great interest as most of neurodegenerative diseases relied on channelopathies, which rely on ion channel abnormal activity. Thus, such highly sensitive and biocompatible neuro-electronics which open the way to FET detection at the sub-cell precision should be useful for a wide range of fundamental and applied research areas, including brain-on-chip, pharmacology, and in vivo monitoring or diagnosis.


A method for immobilization of palladium nanoparticles in magnetically separable polymeric nanocapsules is presented. The method is based on co-encapsulation of palladium nanoparticles stabilized by hyperbranched polyamidoamine (H-PAMAM-C15) modified with palmitoyl groups and hydrophobic magnetite nanoparticles within polyurea nanospheres. The synthesis of these polyurea nanospheres is based on nanoemulsification of chloroform, containing magnetic nanoparticles and palladium acetate, in water using suitable surfactants or dispersants. Then, the chloroform nano-droplets are confined in a polyurea shell formed by interfacial polycondensation between isocyanate and amine monomers. The palladium acetate was reduced with hydrogen to create palladium nanoparticles dispersed in the core of the polyurea nanocapsules. These catalytic polymeric nanoreactors were utilized in hydrogenation of alkenes and alkynes in water. The nanoreactors were easily separated from the reaction mixture via application of external magnetic field. The recyclability of these nanoreactors was examined in hydrogenation of styrene; no significant change was observed in their reactivity for up to four cycles.


At three sites on Cape Cod, Mass., successive gypsy moth, Lymantria dispar (L.), larval densities were estimated using simultaneous measurements of the number of frass pellets produced per larva (frass yield) and the number of frass pellets falling in the forest per unit area (frass drop). Estimated larval densities declined through the period of larval development at all sites. Frass yield was positively correlated with ambient temperature. Frass drop was positively correlated with the basal area of host trees immediately around the frass trap. At a low-density population, rate of frass drop exhibited a diel periodicity similar to that of larval feeding. Mean-variance relationships of frass drop measurements and density estimates indicated that frass pellets and larvae were spatially aggregated within stands. The optimal ratio of drop to yield samples and the number of replicates of each sample necessary to obtain a given level of precision decreased with increasing density.


Signs and symptoms of mitochondrial trifunctional protein deficiency may begin during infancy or later in life. Features that occur during infancy include feeding difficulties, lack of energy (lethargy), low blood glucose (hypoglycemia), weak muscle tone (hypotonia), and liver problems. Infants with this disorder are also at high risk for serious heart problems, breathing difficulties, coma, and sudden death. Signs and symptoms of mitochondrial trifunctional protein deficiency that may begin after infancy include hypotonia, muscle pain, a breakdown of muscle tissue, and a loss of sensation in the extremities (peripheral neuropathy).


We study temperature and pump power dependence of fluorescence in Cr4+:forsterite crystal. We find that the luminescence yield has a strong temperature and pump power dependence. We also observe two-photon fluorescence induced by continuous wave pumping of Cr4+:forsterite and study its temperature behavior as well. The obtained results are used as a guidance to construct high-power, high energy femtosecond Cr4+:forsterite oscillator.


No recent advances have been made in the treatment of patients with advanced bladder cancer and, to date, targeted therapies have not resulted in an improvement in outcome. The mammalian target of rapamycin pathway has been shown to be up‐regulated in bladder cancer and represents a rational target for therapeutic intervention. In the present phase II study of everolimus, one near‐complete response, one partial response and several minor responses suggest that everolimus possesses biological activity in a subset of patients with bladder cancer. To maximize benefit from targeted agents such as everolimus, the preselection of patients based on molecular phenotype is required.


The automatic detection of liver tumors by computed tomography is challenging, owing to their wide variations in size and location, as well as to their irregular shapes. Existing detection methods largely rely on two-stage detectors and use CT images marked with bounding boxes for training and detection. In this study, we propose a single-stage detector method designed to accurately detect multiple tumors simultaneously, and provide results demonstrating its increased speed and efficiency compared to prior methods. The proposed model divides CT images into multiple channels to obtain continuity information and implements a bounding box attention mechanism to overcome the limitation of inaccurate prediction of tumor center points and decrease redundant bounding boxes. The model integrates information from various channels using an effective Squeeze-and-Excitation attention module. The proposed model obtained a mean average precision result of 0.476 on the Decathlon dataset, which was superior to that of the prior methods examined for comparison. This research is expected to enable physicians to diagnose tumors very efficiently; particularly, the prediction of tumor center points is expected to enable physicians to rapidly verify their diagnostic judgments. The proposed method is considered suitable for future adoption in clinical practice in hospitals and resource-poor areas because its superior performance does not increase computational cost; hence, the equipment required is relatively inexpensive.


Despite the well-established efficacy of exposure therapy in the treatment of pathological anxiety, many therapists believe this treatment carries an unacceptably high risk for harm, is intolerable for patients, and poses a number of ethical quandaries. These beliefs have been shown to account for two related problems: (a) underutilization of exposure therapy, and (b) overly cautious and suboptimal delivery the treatment, which likely attenuates treatment outcomes. At present, there is little guidance for those who train exposure therapists to address these concerns. This article reviews therapist negative beliefs about exposure therapy and discusses their modification based on findings from social and cognitive psychology pertinent to belief change, including dual-processing in reasoning, the need for cognition and affect, and attitude inoculation. A number of strategies are offered for augmenting training in exposure therapy in order to promote positive beliefs about the treatment. These strategies involve: (a) therapists engaging in simulated exposure therapy exercises and presenting arguments in defense of exposure's safety, tolerability, and ethicality, and (b) training therapists using emotion-based appeals (e.g., case examples) to supplement research findings. Directions for future research on practitioner concerns about exposure therapy are discussed.


PURPOSE: The diagnosis and treatment of gestational diabetes mellitus is controversial. We undertook a survey of obstetricians/gynaecologists to identify current screening practices and differences between Saxonia-Anhalt and Berlin. METHODS: A questionnaire was sent to 267 practicing obstetricians/gynaecologists in Saxonia-Anhalt and 441 in Berlin. The questionnaires included items on the diagnosis and treatment of gestational diabetes. RESULTS: A response rate of 37 % in Saxonia-Anhalt and 35 % in Berlin was achieved. 90 % of the respondents would welcome the integration of a general screening for gestational diabetes into the standard German prenatal care plan. In spite of this great support only 37 % of the obstetricians/gynaecologists in Saxonia-Anhalt and 36 % in Berlin screened their patients generally. Important risk factors for the screening were rarely or not mentioned. CONCLUSION AND DISCUSSION: The survey confirms disparate policies regarding the screening for and treatment of gestational diabetes. There are differences between Saxonia-Anhalt and Berlin. This can only be changed by appropriate inclusion in the German prenatal care plan.


This paper analyses the relationship between corporate bond issues and the existence of corporate governance frameworks that influence the development of financial markets by reducing information asymmetries and conflicts of interest. To this end, the international corporate bond market is reviewed and corporate governance standards in Brazil and in the four countries belonging to the Latin American Integrated Market (MILA) —Chile, Colombia, Mexico and Peru— are evaluated using a bond issues indicator developed by the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), the Andean Development Corporation (CAF) and the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB). The evidence gathered using a probit panel model and a pooled probit model indicates that adherence to corporate governance standards can increase the likelihood that a firm will be able to carry out a successful international bond issue.


Based on the conception and characteristics of green construction supply chain, the article improves the balanced scorecard to build a performance evaluation indicator system which is more comprehensive and quantitative. Taking into account the general problems including indicator confusion and subjective weighting in performance evaluation, the article chooses principal component analysis to reduce dimensions of indicators established above. Then attempt to build a target weight optimization model based on AHP indeterminacy interval matrix and use genetic algorithm for final solution. All of these suggest a set of scientific evaluation process. Case analysis shows its theoretical feasibility and important practical application.


From paved roads that carry crops to market to modern grain silos that reduce postharvest losses, infrastructure is critical to achieving food security. But nothing is currently having a more profound effect on farmers in the developing world than telecommunications networks. In the Indian state of Tamil Nadu, for instance, the ubiquitous cell phone and expanding broadband Internet coverage are revving up an experiment called Village Knowledge Centers, the template for an ambitious initiative to help farmers boost yields by disseminating information. A similar effort has just gotten under way in India's northern neighbor, Bhutan.


Maritime networks establish wireless multi-hop networks to provide wireless broadband service at sea, connecting various kinds of ships, maritime buoys, and beacons. The maritime networks possess two distinguishing characteristics highly affected by maneuver at sea–dynamic link quality and bandwidth constrained, and dynamic network topology–that warrant specific attention. Unlike land vehicles, maneuver at sea is affected by sea surface movement and wave occlusions, which can cause unstable environment with a high rate of link breakages caused by low link stability, as well as low and highly variable bandwidth. In spite of the need to achieve performance close to high-speed terrestrial wireless broadband service on land, there is only a perfunctory effort to investigate maritime networks. There is an urgent need to refresh the interest to investigate, as well as to further enhance, maritime networks. This paper presents a review of the limited research works of this topic, which revolve around the networking issues in the link, network, and upper layers, in the literature. The objective is to establish a foundation in order to motivate a new research interest in maritime networks. Open issues are also presented to foster new research initiatives in this burgeoning and exciting area.


The aim of this thesis is to describe and defend ?The Constraint-Based View?, which is a particular conception of the nature of, and relationship between, ideal and non-ideal theories of justice. Traditionally, ideal theory is characterised by the assumption of ?full compliance?, while non-ideal theory is characterised by the assumption of ?partial compliance?. In other words, ideal theories assume that those for whom the theory is meant to apply will be entirely willing and able to comply with the theory?s requirements, while non-ideal theories do not.In Chapter 1 of this thesis, I describe and assess this original conception as well as several alternative accounts of ideal and non-ideal theory, in order to offer a broad survey of the existing literature, and to identify the various ways that these conceptions fail to capture fully the relationship between ideal and non-ideal theory.In Chapter 2, I draw a distinction between two different approaches to theorising about justice. ?Axiological? or ?A-Type? approaches are characterised by the fact that they include almost no assumptions as inputs to the theory, and that they are not intended to provide action-guiding recommendations as part of the outputs of the theory. In contrast, ?Practical? or ?P-Type? approaches include additional assumptions as part of their inputs and are intended to form part of a process that ultimately produces action-guiding recommendations. In Chapter 3, I describe and defend my preferred conception of the relationship between ideal and non-ideal theory ? the ?Constraint-Based View? (CBV). According to the CBV, there is a spectrum of theoretical approaches that can be more or less ideal, depending on the extent to which they include ?soft constraints? as part of the inputs to the theory. Soft constraints are facts about the world that can be changed, in contrast to hard constraints, which are facts about the world that cannot. I argue that this way of thinking about the relationship between ideal and non-ideal theory is more useful than the alternative conceptions considered in Chapter 1. In Chapter 4, I examine the roles that feasibility considerations should play in ideal and non-ideal theory, from the perspective of the CBV and in Chapter 5, I explain the implications of adopting the CBV for what I call ?transitional theory?, which is concerned with the transition from the status quo towards a more ideal state of affairs. In Chapter 6, I offer an example of the CBV in action, by considering its implications for the debate over duties of justice towards future generations.


Palladium-catalyzed carboxylative coupling of benzyl chlorides with allyltributylstannane was successfully conducted to produce benzyl but-3-enoates in satisfactory to good yields. The carboxylative coupling reaction occurred smoothly under mild conditions in the presence of palladium nanoparticles in tetrahydrofuran.


Current locomotion algorithms in structured (in-door) 3D environments require an accurate localization. The several and diverse sensors typically embedded on legged robots (IMU, coders, vision and/or LIDARS) should make it possible if properly fused. Yet this is a difficult task due to the heterogeneity of these sensors and the real-time requirement of the control. While previous works were using staggered approaches (odometry at high frequency, sparsely corrected from vision and LIDAR localization), the recent progress in optimal estimation, in particular in visual-inertial localization, is paving the way to a holistic fusion. This paper is a contribution in this direction. We propose to quantify how a visual-inertial navigation system can accurately localize a humanoid robot in a 3D indoor environment tagged with fiducial markers. We introduce a theoretical contribution strengthening the formulation of Forster's IMU pre-integration, a practical contribution to avoid possible ambiguity raised by pose estimation of fiducial markers, and an experimental contribution on a humanoid dataset with ground truth. Our system is able to localize the robot with less than 2 cm errors once the environment is properly mapped. This would naturally extend to additional measurements corresponding to leg odometry (kinematic factors) thanks to the genericity of the proposed pre-integration algebra.


The mass and semimajor axis distribution of gas giants in exoplanetary systems obtained by radial velocity surveys shows that super-Jupiter-mass planets are piled up at ≳1 au, while Jupiter/sub-Jupiter-mass planets are broadly distributed from ∼0.03 au to beyond 1 au. This feature has not been explained by theoretical predictions. In order to reconcile this inconsistency, we investigate evolution of gas giants with a new type II migration formula by Kanagawa et al., by comparing the migration, growth timescales of gas giants, and disk lifetime, and by population synthesis simulation. While the classical migration model assumes that a gas giant opens up a clear gap in the protoplanetary disk and the planet migration is tied to the disk gas accretion, recent high-resolution simulations show that the migration of gap-opening planets is decoupled from the disk gas accretion and Kanagawa et al. proposed that type II migration speed is nothing other than type I migration speed with the reduced disk gas surface density in the gap. We show that with this new formula, type II migration is significantly reduced for super-Jupiter-mass planets, if the disk accretion is driven by the disk wind as suggested by recent magnetohydrodynamic simulations. Population synthesis simulations show that super-Jupiter-mass planets remain at ≳1 au without any additional ingredient such as disk photoevaporation. Therefore, the mystery of the pile-up of gas giants at ≳1 au will be theoretically solved if the new formula is confirmed and wind-driven disk accretion dominates.


The continuous changes in the economic, social and physical agricultural environment call for resilient livestock production systems and food chain networks around the world and Namibia in particular. Because of the low profitability, cattle farming in Namibia is heavily dependent on correct decision making for farmers to survive. Access to digital tools and interactive technologies for farming systems has increased rapidly and it is likely to play a significant role in meeting future challenges. This has not been properly propagated in beef cattle production areas of Namibia. The paper employed ordinary least square and dynamic models to investigate farmer's net worth in livestock production systems as function of herd size per hectare, carcass price per kilogram and the El Nino Southern Oscillation Index. Results show that herd size per hectare significantly impacts net worth without prior knowledge about 1.627 percent, while exhibiting the impact of 1.523 percent on net worth with prior production knowledge. Farmers thus become more carcass price per kilogramme responsive (increases net worth by 1.131 percent) when prior information is incorporated in the decision making process at farm level. The price elasticity of the two models are 0.60 and 0.70, respectively, points out that improved access to knowledge allows for livestock price responsiveness of 0.1 percent. The significance of these variables calls for introducing technologies to mitigate the impact of changes on cattle production and the agribusiness sector by linking production to climate adaptability for resilient food markets.


In his opening address to the 2008 Gulbenkian conference Can There Be Life Without the Other?, the distinguished writer on cultural studies Arjun Appadurai summarises the challenge that faces us all: 'If we can agree that dialogue is always a risky affair, we can ask ourselves what risks are involved and why it is worthwhile, even compulsory, to take these risks today'. In a time of globalisation and social instability, finding a way to live with the 'Other' has never been a more urgent obligation. In the papers in this latest volume of the "Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation"'s conference series, thirteen authors explore the risks and the potential of communication between communities, faiths and cultures. Each writer brings to the subject a wealth of scholarship; their disciplines encompass the social sciences, literature, art, religion and psychology. Each brings, too, a global perspective, as a citizen of the diasporas of the twenty-first century. They offer a politics of hope to a world in crisis.


The work deals with a method to identify the electrical parameters of a three-phase-squirrel-cage induction-motor. The identification of the electrical parameters is based on analysis of the stator current motor response to a DC step input voltage applied to the stator windings. In this case, an analytical motor model for DC excitation is developed to produce the theoretical dynamic response function. A numerical interpolation method based on the Gauss-Newton interpolation algorithm, is employed to obtain the values of the motor electrical parameters from the digitized current step response and from the theoretical response function. The validation of the method and parameters is performed by comparing simulated and real data of the free acceleration response.


ABSTRACT When Hume, in the Treatise on Human Nature, began his examination of the relation of cause and effect, in particular, of the idea of necessary connection which is its essential constituent, he identified two preliminary questions that should guide his research: (1) For what reason we pronounce it necessary that every thing whose existence has a beginning should also have a cause and (2) Why we conclude that such particular causes must necessarily have such  particular effects? (1.3.2, 14-15) Hume observes that our belief in these principles can result neither from an intuitive grasp of their truth nor from a reasoning that could establish them by demonstrative means. In particular, with respect to the first, Hume examines and rejects some arguments with which Locke, Hobbes and Clarke tried to demonstrate it, and suggests, by exclusion, that the belief that we place on it can only come from experience. Somewhat surprisingly, however, Hume does not proceed to show how that derivation of experience could be made, but proposes instead to move directly to an examination of the second principle, saying that, "perhaps, be found in the end, that the same answer will serve for both questions" (1.3.3, 9). Hume's answer to the second question is well known, but the first question is never answered in the rest of the Treatise, and it is even doubtful that it could be, which would explain why Hume has simply chosen to remove any mention of it when he recompiled his theses on causation in the Enquiry concerning Human Understanding. Given this situation, an interesting question that naturally arises is to investigate the relations of logical or conceptual implication between these two principles. Hume seems to have thought that an answer to (2) would also be sufficient to provide an answer to (1). Henry Allison, in his turn, argued (in Custom and Reason in Hume, p. 94-97) that the two questions are logically independent. My proposal here is to try to show that there is indeed a logical dependency between them, but the implication is, rather, from (1) to (2). If accepted, this result may be particularly interesting for an interpretation of the scope of the so-called "Kant's reply to Hume" in the Second Analogy of Experience, which is structured as a proof of the a priori character of (1), but whose implications for (2) remain controversial.


Lately, the FDA warned that varenicline may increase the risk of myocardial infarction or other cardiovascular events,being higher in patients with prior history. Objective: To determine an increase in the number of cardiovascular events in a group of patients treated with varenicline vs bupropion. Material and Methods: Prospective study with the patients attending our smoking cessation practice in the last 6 months.We analyzed different variables and Cardiovascular events. This evalution was carried out 3 and 6 months after the treatment initiation which lasted up to 2 months.We carried out a descriptive analysis. Results: From a total of 313 patients(175 varenicline;138 bupropion).The treatment with varenicline was more frequent in men who were older, with a main smoking history, diabetes, ischemic heart disease and higher scores in the Richmond test.We observed no significant differences regarding the cardiovascular events in both groups. Conclusions: Both drugs have shown the same safety profile for cardiovascular events. We observed a higher frequency regarding the blood pressure increase.


BACKGROUND The use of the Arndt endobronchial blocker has not gained widespread acceptance during video-assisted thoracoscopic surgery (VATS) because of its high cost and longer time to operative lung collapse especially in patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). The use of a ventilator disconnection technique has been shown to produce a comparable degree of lung collapse when used with either a double-lumen tube or an Arndt endobronchial blocker. OBJECTIVE We hypothesised that the use of bronchial suction through the suction port of the endobronchial blocker would be associated with a comparable time to achieve optimum lung collapse as the disconnection technique. DESIGN A randomised, double-blind study. SETTING Single university hospital. PARTICIPANTS Fifty-eight patients with spontaneous pneumothorax scheduled for elective VATS using the Arndt endobronchial blocker for one-lung ventilation (OLV). INTERVENTIONS Patients were randomly assigned to one of two groups (n = 29 per group) to deflate the operative lung with either disconnection of the endotracheal tube from the ventilator for 60 s prior to inflation of the endobronchial blocker or connection of a suction pressure of -30 cmH2O to the suction port of the endobronchial blocker through the barrel of a 1 ml syringe. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES The primary outcome was the time to total lung collapse. Secondary outcomes included surgeon rating of lung collapse, overall surgeon satisfaction, need for further fibreoptic bronchial suction manoeuvres and intraoperative hypoxaemia. RESULTS The bronchial suction technique was associated with a significantly shorter time to total lung collapse than the disconnection method [93 (95% confidence interval, 95% CI 81.3 to 103.7) vs. 197 (95% CI 157.4 to 237) s respectively; P < 0.001]. Both the disconnection and bronchial suction groups had a comparable surgical rating of excellent lung collapse 40 min after the start of OLV (65.5 vs. 79.3%, respectively; P = 0.24), overall surgeon satisfaction [median (interquartile range, IQR) 9 (8 to 10) vs. 9 (8 to 10) respectively; P = 0.90] and intraoperative hypoxaemia (3.5 vs. 0%, respectively; P = 0.32). No patient in the bronchial suction group needed further manoeuvres to collapse the surgical lung. Moreover, the presence of COPD showed a significant positive correlation with the time to total lung collapse (Spearman r = 0.564; P < 0.001). CONCLUSION The use of continuous bronchial suction through the lumen of the Arndt blocker offers an effective method to accelerate lung collapse. TRIAL REGISTRATION Clinicaltrials.gov identifier: NCT02030795.


Neuropathic pain (NPP) is a kind of pain caused by disease or damage impacting the somatosensory system. Ion channel drugs are the main treatment for NPP; however, their irregular usage leads to unsatisfactory pain relief. To regulate the treatment of NPP with ion channel drugs in clinical practice, the Chinese Association for the Study of Pain organized first-line pain management experts from China to write an expert consensus as the reference for the use of ion channels drugs . Here, we reviewed the mechanism and characteristics of sodium and calcium channel drugs, and developed recommendations for the therapeutic principles and clinical practice for carbamazepine, oxcarbazepine, lidocaine, bulleyaconitine A, pregabalin, and gabapentin. We hope this guideline provides guidance to clinicians and patients on the use of ion channel drugs for the management of NPP.


This paper presents a solution to the challenges faced by contrastive learning in sequential recommendation systems. In particular, it addresses the issue of false negative, which limits the effectiveness of recommendation algorithms. By introducing an advanced approach to contrastive learning, the proposed method improves the quality of item embeddings and mitigates the problem of falsely categorizing similar instances as dissimilar. Experimental results demonstrate performance enhancements compared to existing systems. The flexibility and applicability of the proposed approach across various recommendation scenarios further highlight its value in enhancing sequential recommendation systems.


An experimental facility of advanced packaging electroplating cell is developed to study the uniformity of the temperature and flow field in the high precision electroplating cell. Based on heat transfer and computational fluid dynamics, a 2D numerical model is founded to analyze the temperature field and flow field of the experimental electroplating cell enclosure. Combing with test and simulated results, the effects of the heat source intensity, ventilated mode and heat transfer coefficient on the thermal field of the cell are discussed. Under the condition of natural convection with temperature gradient driving, although heat/cold source intensity and ventilated mode both have effects on the temperature field and flow field of the electroplating enclosure, the heat/cold source is the more marked factor influencing the uniformity of temperature field and flow field. The experimental and simulated results can give a way to enhance the uniformity of the temperature field and flow field and to improve the quantity of the WL-CSP electroplating.


RADIATION POISONINGIn June 1995, a pregnant scientist in a lab at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) said she had been poisoned by a radioactive isotope, and 26 of her co-workers were subsequently found to have been contaminated as well. Last week, an investigation into this bizarre affair drew to a close, leaving many questions unanswered. In a decision issued on 17 September, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission concluded that the radiation exposure of the scientist, Maryann Wenli Ma, and others was "deliberate." But it could not identify the perpetrator and offered no motive.


Rationale Prehospital initiation by paramedics may enable delivery of neuroprotective therapies to stroke patients in the hyperacute period when they are most effective in preclinical studies. Magnesium is neuroprotective in experimental stroke models and has been shown to be safe with signals of potential efficacy when started early after onset of human cerebral ischemia. Aims (a) To demonstrate that paramedic initiation of the neuroprotective agent magnesium sulfate in the field is an efficacious and safe treatment for acute stroke; (b) To demonstrate that field enrollment of acute stroke patients is a practical and feasible strategy for phase 3 stroke trials, permitting enrollment of greater numbers of patients in hyperacute time windows. Design Multicenter, randomized, double-blinded, placebo-controlled, pivotal clinical trial. Study Procedures The study is enrolling 1700 patients (850 in each arm) with likely acute stroke, including both cerebral infarction and intracerebral hemorrhage patients. Inclusion criteria are: (a) likely stroke as identified by the modified Los Angeles Prehospital Stroke Screen (mLAPSS), (b) age 40–95, (c) symptom onset within 2 h of treatment initiation, and (d) deficit present ⩾15 min. Paramedics administer a loading dose of magnesium sulfate (Mg) or matched placebo in the field, 4 grams over 15 min. In the Emergency Department, a maintenance infusion follows, 16 grams Mg or matched placebo over 24 h. Outcomes The primary endpoint is the modified Rankin Scale measure of global disability, assessed using the Rankin Focused Assessment, 90 days after treatment. Secondary efficacy endpoints include the NIHSS (neurologic deficit), Barthel Index (activities of daily living), and the Stroke Impact Scale (quality of life).


We introduce a new imaging method for radio interferometry based on sparse- modeling. The direct observables in radio interferometry are visibilities, which are Fourier transformation of an astronomical image on the sky-plane, and incomplete sampling of visibilities in the spatial frequency domain results in an under-determined problem, which has been usually solved with 0 filling to un-sampled grids. In this paper we propose to directly solve this under-determined problem using sparse modeling without 0 filling, which realizes super resolution, i.e., resolution higher than the standard refraction limit. We show simulation results of sparse modeling for the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) observations of super-massive black holes and demonstrate that our approach has significant merit in observations of black hole shadows expected to be realized in near future. We also present some results with the method applied to real data, and also discuss more advanced techniques for practical observations such as imaging with closure phase as well as treating the effect of interstellar scattering effect.


Purpose: We investigated the effectiveness of monotherapy with Cosopt in reducing intraocular pressure (IOP) in patients who could not tolerate the side effects of prostaglandin (PG) formulations or who preferred to avoid combination therapy. Subjects and methods: The subjects were patients with broadly defined primary openangle glaucoma or ocular hypertension who had been treated with PG formulations combined with brinzolamide. Mean IOP was compared before and after treatment was changed to monotherapy with Cosopt. Results: Overall, switching to monotherapy with Cosopt significantly reduced IOP (p= 0.038), particularly in the group of patients who had been treated with unoprostone combined with brinzolamide (p=0.005). However, IOP did not change in the subjects who had received PG analogs with the suffix "-prost" combined with brinzolamide. Conclusions: Our results show that Cosopt is effective in reducing IOP, and that it can be considered as a treatment option for patients with glaucoma who cannot tolerate the side effects of PG formulations or who are unresponsive to PG. (日本医科大学医学会雑誌 2013; 9: 152―155)


The stability of sufentanil in human plasma kept under various storage conditions was investigated. Extraction was performed using solid phase extraction with new mixed-mode cation exchange Oasis® MCX columns; quantification was carried out using gas chromatography equipped with a mass spectrometry detector. When plasma was left at 4°C in nonsilanized tubes, concentrations of sufentanil decreased significantly during the first hour. In plasma samples kept at −25°C for 8 hours in nonsilanized glass tubes, a significant decrease of sufentanil concentrations was found, with an average loss of 10.1% of the initial concentration. A significant decrease occurred when plasma was kept in silanized glass tubes for 12 hours at −25°C. The current study emphasizes the importance of sampling and storage conditions for an accurate determination of sufentanil concentration in plasma.


Historical cohort study that assessed the adherence rate of patients of randomized clinical trials (RCT) of pharmaceutical industry in cardiology to appointments and follow-up medical treatment. This study was conducted at the cardiology research unit in a public university hospital in Porto Alegre, Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil. High adherence was regarded as > or = 80%. Seven RCT (120 medical records) were revised. We discovered that 117 (97%) of patients had adherence to follow-up visits to > or = 80%; 83.3% of patients had rates of > or = 80% adherence to medication in the study; the median number of tablets ingested, among patients with good adherence was 175 (72-500), and among patients with lower adherence was 500 (500-962). These results indicate that patients in studies with longer follow up and greater number of oral medication present loss in adherence


This paper deployed geospatial techniques in mapping e-learning preparedness index (EPI) of Secondary Schools across 37 States in Nigeria. Dataset of three e-learning factors (EFs) specifically technology, infrastructure and human capital disaggregated into six indicators namely: teachers' computer literacy (TCL), teachers' educational qualification (TEQ), power availability (PA), computer access (CA), laboratory availability (ALab) and library availability (ALib) were sourced from Nigeria Bureau of Statistics' archive. Simple percentages and map algebraic algorithm in ArcGIS 10.8 Software with weights of 0.226 for CA, PA (0.225), TCL (0.220), TEQ (0.218), ALab (0.192) and ALib (0.008) generated from principal component analysis varimax rotation component score coefficients in SPSS 22 constituted the main analytical frameworks. The finding showed that about 70.89% variations in EFs were explained by the first component. Spatially, 8 States were ranked Very High (EPI = 0.78 - 0.92) and 10 States ranked High (EPI = 0.71 - 0.78). Besides, 6 States ranked Moderate (EPI = 0.64 - 0.71); 7 States ranked Low (EPI = 0.56 - 0.64) while; 6 States ranked Very Low (EPI = 0.42 - 0.56) as seen in the attached model. The findings offer stakeholders priceless opportunities for knowledgeable policy decisions to heighten e-learning in the country.


B182 Background Although the overall death rates from cancer (CA) are on the decline, CA remains to be the second leading cause of death among both men and women in the U.S. Based on the American Cancer Society (ACS) 2006 estimates, the leading sites of CA deaths among men are lung, colo-rectal, prostate, and pancreatic CA. Among women, lung CA also is estimated to be the leading cause of death, followed by breast, colo-rectal, and pancreatic CA. Moreover, prostate, lung, and colorectal CAs are estimated to account for the largest number of new CA cases in men; while breast, lung and colorectal CA are the highest incident CAs in women. While pancreatic CA accounts for only 2% of new cases among both men and women, it remains to be one of the four leading causes of CA deaths in the US. Overall, CA incidence rates appear to be steady or declining in both sexes and for all ages combined. Very few studies have examined trends of the leading and most lethal CAs among younger age categories. Trends analyses (TAs) are a useful indicator for monitoring changes in CA incidence over time. Aims The purpose of this abstract is to examine age and gender trends among these leading lethal CAs from 1975-2003 in order to identify potential trend changes, variations, or disparities over time in younger age categories and possible reasons for these changes. Methods The Epidemiology and Genetics Research Program (EGRP) of the National Cancer Institute (NCI) in collaboration with the Surveillance and Epidemiology End Results (SEER) Program have performed preliminary TAs for incidence rates of malignant cases of breast, colorectal, lung, pancreas and prostate CA in individuals less than 50 years of age. Annual percent changes (APCs) were calculated for incidence rates in 5 year age group from 1975-2003 (www.seer.cancer.gov; SEER*Stat database). Further TAs by CA type, age group, and gender will be performed to identify possible variations in trends among these lethal CAs. Results Preliminary TAs of the SEER data shows an overall increase in incidence in men under age 50 for colorectal and prostate CA from1975-2003. Women under age 50 show increased incidence of pancreatic CA in recent years (1999-2003). This age group of women also exhibits an overall increased incidence of breast CA (1975-2003); however, rates show a significant decline from 1994-2003. The overall lung CA incidence for both men and women under 50 is on the decline; yet incidence rates appear to be rising for younger women from 1999-2003. More specific results of the TAs by age categories will be reported. Conclusions TAs are a useful indicator for monitoring cancer direction and changes. Many factors can be assessed in association with such trends that may be useful for monitoring rise of some CAs among certain age or gender groups and hence necessitate future research to identify such issues. These may include advances in screening, major prevention efforts, and observations of perceived birth cohort risk.


Computational protein design has the potential to deliver novel molecular structures, binders, and catalysts for myriad applications. Recent neural graph-based models that use backbone coordinate-derived features show exceptional performance on native sequence recovery tasks and are promising frameworks for design. A statistical framework for modeling protein sequence landscapes using Tertiary Motifs (TERMs), compact units of recurring structure in proteins, has also demonstrated good performance on protein design tasks. In this work, we investigate the use of TERM-derived data as features in neural protein design frameworks. Our graph-based architecture, TERMinator, incorporates TERM-based and coordinate-based information and outputs a Potts model over sequence space. TERMinator outperforms state-of-the-art models on native sequence recovery tasks, suggesting that utilizing TERM-based and coordinate-based features together is beneficial for protein design.


This article presents scenarios of watershed pollution costs in Rarotonga, the largest of the Cook Islands in the South Pacific. The valuation method applied here estimates the market costs that would be avoided in the absence of watershed pollution. The study finds gross annual watershed pollution costs in Rarotonga between NZ$3.2 to NZ$17.7, with a best estimate of NZ$7.4, million. The best estimate results in household costs of NZ$2,900 per year and equates to 3.12% of gross domestic product. A wide error margin is placed around these estimates due to uncertain and incomplete datasets, a common situation for small island nations. They are presented as "cost scenarios" rather than definitive results. The article explores the practical, theoretical, and policy issues surrounding the valuation of water resources in the context of small island nations. It is argued that rough estimates of opportunity costs, limited to market goods and services, can supply governments with sufficient information to assess the relative importance of watershed pollution.


With the increasing use of entities in serving people's daily information needs, recognizing synonyms—different ways people refer to the same entity—has become a crucial task for many entity–leveraging applications. Previous work often take a "literal" view of the entity, i.e., its string name. In this work, we propose adopting a "structured" view of each entity by considering not only its string name, but also other important structured attributes. Unlike existing query logbased methods, we delve deeper to explore sub-queries, and exploit tailed web pages and tailed synonyms for harvesting more synonyms. A general, heterogeneous graph-based data model which encodes our problem insights is designed by capturing three key concepts (synonym candidate, web page and keyword) and different types of interactions between them. We cast the synonym discovery problem into a graph-based ranking problem and demonstrate the existence of a closed-form optimal solution for outputting entity synonym scores. Experiments on several real-life domains demonstrate the effectiveness of our proposed method.


Forty curved canals from 20 mesial roots of extracted human mandibular molars were instrumented (Profile .04) using a crown-down technique and divided into two groups. The experimental group was obturated using the Thermafil technique and the control group was obturated using the lateral condensation technique. Topseal sealer was used in both groups. Apical extrusion was recorded. Two molars were used as control teeth. All specimens were stored in 100% humidity for 1 wk, coated with nail polish, except for the apical 2 mm, and were suspended in black India ink for 48 h. Molars were decalcified, rendered transparent, and linear dye penetration was measured. Linear dye leakage and apical extrusion between the techniques were not statistically different (Mann-Whitney U test).


The University of Lampung especially Computer Science Departement has an online journal that publishes various scientific articles written by researchers both students and lecturers. This scientific article is called the online Computating Journal which is published once every 6 months. But, this online Computating Journal has not been structured and classified into the category of science that more specific. Therefore, in this research the abstract Computating Journal will be classified using text mining techniques to process the abstract become more structured and retrieve information in it. Then, the information in the abstract is extracted as a feature by the TFIDF weighting technique. The proposed classification model uses the support vector machine algorithm that has strong consistency. The model classification will be validated by applying the 10-Fold Cross Validation technique.


The presence of two or three conformational isomers in monothiocarbonates has been confirmed by nuclear magnetic resonance and infrared spectroscopies and by dipole moment techniques. The data can best be interpreted by assuming that the conformations involving the s-cis conformation are more stable than that of s-trans, s-trans.


In May 1994, the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) considered crystalline silica to be a potential occupational carcinogen as defined by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration's (OSHA) carcinogen policy [29 CFR 1990], and this information was used in establishing the NIOSH Recommended Exposure Limit (REL) at 50 μg/m3 [1]. NIOSH has long realized that occupational overexposure to respirable crystalline silica (RCS) dust can lead to the development of silicosis, an incurable and often fatal lung disease, but it can also result in health problems that include chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, tuberculosis, chronic bronchitis, emphysema and chronic renal disease. Probably the most significant occupational travesty that brought focus to the effects of silicosis was the Hawk's Nest Tunnel Disaster in southern West Virginia where a 4.83-km (3-mile) tunnel was driven through the Gauley Mountain. The material being removed during the mining of this tunnel for the development of a hydroelectric power plant was a sandstone and limestone ore containing very high levels of crystalline silica. Within months of the completion of this work, 476 of the workers died from acute silicosis [2,3]. This acute silicosis was caused by extremely high respirable dust concentrations while driving this tunnel and was attributed to inconsistent dust-control methods, including poor ventilation and minimal use of water, not allowing the dust to settle after blasting occurred before workers returned back inside the tunnel and no use of respiratory protection.


Edible oils are commonplace in table food, snacks and industrial food products. This inclined the study in this research work which is aimed at investigating the physical properties of the oils and their varying effect on their electrical conductivity, to determine their edible viability and shelf –life. The effect of increased temperature on the viscosity of the oil was studied. Also the electrical conductivity versus power supply through the oil and also the cooling property of the oil were studied using calorimetry experiment. The results show a typical trend of variation in the electrical conductivity and viscosity (dependent variables) and temperature and power supply (independent variables). The electrical conductivity of the oils was found to be increasing with temperature and the viscosity was decreasing with temperature. This is in agreement with earlier postulation. I therefore recommend that it is better to keep edible oils at temperature below 40C so as to maintain acceptable rate of spoilage and thereby elongated shelf-life.


An experiment has been conducted to study the effect of replacing feed additive zinc-bacitracine with probiotic Bacillus apiarius on layer performance. One thousand two hundreds 22-weeks old layers used in this experiment, were divided into three group-treatments and it further divided into 4 subgroups (100 birds/subgroup) as treatment replicates and distributed randomly. Layer in group I were fed basal diet + Growth promotant antibiotic (GPA)-zinc bacitracin, group II were fed basal diet + B. apiarius culture and group III were fed basal diet + commercial probiotic. Feed and water were given ad libitum during the 16 weeks trial. The treatments had no effect (P>0.05) on feed intake. Percentage of hen-day production of group II (88.75 ± 0.88%) was similar to group III (89.58 ± 1.14%), and both were very significantly (P<0.01) higher than group I (77.83 ± 6.21%). Total egg mass production of group II (5.82 ± 0.30 kg/head/16 weeks), was similar to group III (5.64 ± 0.51 kg/head/16 weeks) and both were significantly (P<0.01) higher than group I (4.85 ± 0.45 kg/head/16 weeks). The FCR value of group II (2.48 ± 0.10) was similar to group III (2.43 ± 0.14) and both were very significantly (P<0.01) better than group I (2.86 ± 0.26). The treatments had no effect on egg weight and egg shell thickness. Yolk's cholesterol content of the group I (4.58 ± 0,56 mg/100 g) was significantly higher than group II (3.72 ± 0.34 mg/100 g) or group III (3.41 ± 0.43 mg/ 100 g). From the present trial it could be concluded that B. apiarius has a potential as probiotic for layer, it even gave better performance and lower cholesterol content of the yolk. Key words: Layer chickens, probiotic, cholesterol


Background Climbing as a weight bearing sport is thought to rely on relative force (force/weight) ratio for performance. As a climbers most valuable tool is the finger flexors, higher BMI is assumed to influence injuries. There is no previous analysis of the influence of BMI on chronic injuries and performance in climbing. Objective Assess possible associations of BMI on level of performance and injuries in climbing. Design Retrospective survey. Setting Item driven web-based questionnaire. Patients (or Participants) 667 active climbers. Interventions (or assessment of risk factors) Descriptive statistics, general linear model (GLM) (SPSS V.25 for windows). Main outcome measurements Gender, age, BMI, level of performance, chronic injury past 6 months. Results 481 male, 186 female, 58.7% were 26–40 years of age, mean BMI 22.78 (male 22.81 (SD 2.30), female 22.71 (SD 2.21), 76% intermediate or experienced climbers, 385 reported having chronic injuries. No associations were found for gender (p=0.336), level of performance (p=0.840), chronic injury (p=447) or BMI. Conclusions The results from this study suggest that BMI does not influence onset of climbing-related chronic injury or level of performance in climbing. Clinical relevance The findings in this study suggest that there is no need for undereating to maintain a low BMI to be able to reach elite levels in climbing or to avoid injuries. It seems that muscular growth is according to the resistance in weight bearing sports as well as other sports.


ABSTRACT Recent studies have demonstrated that lncRNAs play an important role in cancers, particularly osteosarcoma. ZFAS1 is a newly identified and characterized lncRNA linked to a variety of cancers. The role of ZFAS1 in osteosarcoma is mainly unknown. This study discovered that ZFAS1 was upregulated in osteosarcoma patient tissues, which correlates with elevated SRSF3 protein levels. Higher levels of ZFAS1 or SRSF3 were linked to a poor prognosis of osteosarcoma. ZFAS1 knockdown decreased SRSF3 protein levels but had a negligible effect on SRSF3 mRNA expression. Further research indicated that ZFAS1 could bind to the SRSF3 protein directly and prevent degrading. Functional studies revealed that ZFAS1 knockdown inhibited osteosarcoma cell proliferation as measured by the CCK-8 assay, colony formation assay, and Ki-67 immunofluorescence staining. Furthermore, ZFAS1 knockdown reduced the expression of PCNA, CDK1, CDK4, and CDK6, increasing p53 and p16. IT has also been observed that ZFAS1 knockdown inhibited osteosarcoma cell migration and invasion as measured by the wound healing assay and the trans-well assay with or without Matrigel. Furthermore, exogenous SRSF3 expression in ZFAS1-depleted osteosarcoma cells restored SRSF3 expression while simultaneously inhibiting cell proliferation and metastasis. Our findings show that ZFAS1 plays an essential role in osteosarcoma progression by stabilizing the SRSF3 protein. Our study provides novel insight into the role of ZFAS1 in osteosarcoma. ZFAS1 has the potential to be used as a prognostic biomarker as well as a therapeutic target in the treatment of osteosarcoma. Graphical Abstract


The paper presents a procedure for the localized analysis of compound bifurcations. A full range of phenomena are embraced, including loci of equilibria, secondary bifurcation, and imperfection sensitivity, the scheme showing how to generate the appropriate lowest-order non-trivial equations of interest. A number of aids to solution are presented, including the concepts of generalized imperfection and generalized loading parameter. The scheme is developed by using a general non-diagonalized format suitable for numerical analysis, but the special diagonalized form can also be used to good effect. This is illustrated in the application to the interactive buckling of stiffened plates and shells, when local and overall buckling occur simultaneously or nearly so. The modelling relies heavily on the elimination-of-passive-coordinates routine of the general scheme. The study shows that the parabolic umbilic catastrophe is the key phenomenon for most such problems. Finally, the branching analysis is fully illustrated for semi-symmetric branching, where one of the contributing bifurcations is symmetric and the other is asymmetric. In all, ten different loci are treated, including the full imperfection sensitivity at complete and near coincidence plotted in three-dimensional form; these relate to an earlier stiffened-plate formulation. The general scheme is thus made directly accessible for any problem that exhibits a bifurcational manifestation of either the elliptic or hyperbolic umbilic catastrophe.


Precautionary savings occurs in response to uncertainty regarding future income. The precautionary motive to delay consumption and save in the current period rises due to the lack of completeness of insurance markets. Accordingly, individuals will not be able to insure against some bad state of the economy in the future. They anticipate that if this bad state is realized, they will earn lower income. To avoid future income fluctuations and smooth consumption, they set aside a precautionary reserve, by consuming less in the current period, and resort to it in case the bad state is realized in the future. JEL Classification Numbers: D91, D81, E21


Continual learning is the problem of learning from a nonstationary stream of data, a fundamental issue for sustainable and efficient training of deep neural networks over time. Unfortunately, deep learning libraries only provide primitives for offline training, assuming that model's architecture and data are fixed. Avalanche is an open source library maintained by the ContinualAI non-profit organization that extends PyTorch by providing first-class support for dynamic architectures, streams of datasets, and incremental training and evaluation methods. Avalanche provides a large set of predefined benchmarks and training algorithms and it is easy to extend and modular while supporting a wide range of continual learning scenarios. Documentation is available at \url{https://avalanche.continualai.org}.


. Financial market events in 2007 and 2008 pose a fundamental challenge for traditional Financial Services industry risk assessment approaches such as Value at Risk (VaR) models and capital adequacy risk measures. Unexampled events such as the liquidity crunch of the global credit markets, and its impact on individual Financial Services firms, clearly demonstrated the need to complement VaR risk models and traditional risk metrics with other types of risk models and metrics. The goal of the present paper is to introduce such a different type of risk modelling framework, i.e., functional risk modelling. Key concepts from resilience engineering are introduced and leveraged to define the approach. The primary goal of the proposed modelling framework is to identify functional dependencies between a firm's business functions and the functions that drive key behaviours of the global financial markets. An example from 2007's financial markets is used to illustrate the proposed framework, i.e., the rapid demise of the UK based residential mortgage firm Northern Rock.


Purpose Postoperative recovery following colorectal surgery remains impaired by severe complications including postoperative ileus (POI). Human studies of POI have been limited by a lack of safe and easy-to-use objective methods. Motilis 3D-transit is a completely ambulatory, minimally invasive system whereby electromagnetic capsules are followed by external sensors during their passage of the gastrointestinal (GI) tract. The aim of this study was to evaluate the applicability of the 3D-transit system in a surgical setting. Method We included 12 patients as a substudy of the randomised double blind controlled Stimulation of the Autonomic Nervous System In Colorectal Surgery by perioperative nutrition (SANICS)-II trial undergoing elective segmental colonic resection with primary anastomosis at Aarhus University Hospital and Randers Regional Hospital, Denmark. To study region-specific motility, three electromagnetic capsules were administered. One was taken 3 hours before surgery, the next was taken 1 hour before surgery, while the third was placed distal to the anastomosis during surgery. Total and regional GI transit times as well as time until first propulsive colonic contraction were determined. Results All patients tolerated the setup well with no adverse events related to the 3D-transit system. Large variations were found in total GI transit time (26.7–127.6 hours), gastric emptying (0.07–>106.9 hours), small intestinal (1.2–58.4 hours) and colorectal transit time (14.3–>118.1 hours). Time from end of surgery to first propulsive movement in the colon varied from 3.9 to 85 hours. No correlation was found between parameters of GI motility and tolerance of an oral diet or recovery of bowel function. Conclusion The 3D-transit system allows safe assessment of GI motility in patients operated with segmental colonic resections and primary anastomosis for colorectal cancer. Postsurgical motility varies significantly between patients.


Spectral envelope parameters in the form of mel-frequency cepstral coefficients are often used for capturing timbral information of music signals in connection with genre classification applications. In this paper, we evaluate mel-frequency cepstral coefficient (MFCC) estimation techniques, namely the classical FFT and linear prediction based implementations and an implementation based on the more recent MVDR spectral estimator. The performance of these methods are evaluated in genre classification using a probabilistic classifier based on Gaussian Mixture models. MFCCs based on fixed order, signal independent linear prediction and MVDR spectral estimators did not exhibit any statistically significant improvement over MFCCs based on the simpler FFT.