Background: The Early Career Publishers Committee (ECPC) of the STM Association (the International Association of Scientific, Technical, and Medical Publishers)'s Early Career Publishers Committee (ECPC) aims to engage, and provide tools and resources for, early-career publishers (ECPs) and professionals. The committee believes it is important to survey the community regularly to understand the background, needs, and concerns of its members to better achieve the committee's goals.
 Objectives: Early-career professionals were surveyed in 2014 and 2020: the first survey was undertaken to get a baseline understanding of the community and to guide the newly formed ECPC whereas the second not only sought to review some aspects of the first survey but also to identify and explore ways to improve engagement and support through new or revised survey questions.
 Methods: The two surveys were conducted online through the ECPC mailing list and social networks. The surveys were voluntary, with the option to skip some questions, and responses – some in the form of a rating scale – were collected anonymously. Each survey remained open for over a month to maximize responses, but neither was pretested. Some questions in the first survey were revised in the second in the light of learnings from the first survey.
 Results: Most of respondents were women, 25–54 years old, from the UK or the US, with higher degrees, and working in editorial roles. In the second survey, many respondents were interested in developing their career either in their current
 role or in a different one, and nearly half were actively seeking a new role. Over half said that finding the right role was a challenge. Many had never participated in a publishing-related mentoring scheme, and most had not heard of the STM mentoring scheme before.
 Conclusions: More tools, resources, and outreach for entry-level and younger industry members, for those from countries outside the UK and US, and for those seeking to develop their careers may be useful in the future. The mentoring scheme could be publicized more prominently to drive engagement. A new survey will be needed in the next 2–3 years, given the potential impact of the COVID-19 global pandemic on the number of respondents in the second (2020) survey and their motivation.


PURPOSE
To determine whether iris pigment epithelium (IPE)-induced T regulatory (Treg) cells can suppress the activation of bystander T cells with cell contact via costimulatory interactions.

METHODS
CD8(+) T cells were cocultured with IPE, x-irradiated, and then used as regulators (IPE-induced Treg cells). The target CD4(+) T cells from wild-type control or knockout donors were used for the assay. T-cell activation was assessed for proliferation by examining both [(3)H]-thymidine incorporation and cytokine production. Expression of costimulatory molecules on IPE-induced Treg cells was evaluated using RT-PCR, immunostaining, and flow cytometry. Expression of costimulatory receptors on target T cells or Treg cells was evaluated by flow cytometry. Neutralizing antibodies were then used to abolish regulatory function.

RESULTS
CD8(+) IPE-induced Treg cells significantly suppressed the activation of effector target T cells, e.g., T-cell proliferation and cytokine production such as Th1, Th2, and Th17 cytokines. Although IPE-induced Treg cells expressed various costimulatory molecules, including programmed cell death 1 ligand 1 (PD-L1), only PD-L1 on the Treg cells was actually delivered to target Th1 cells using cell-to-cell interaction (T-T interaction). If neutralizing antibodies for PD-L1 were cocultured with Treg cells, Th1 suppression was impaired. Moreover, Treg cells failed to suppress IFNgamma production by target CD4(+) T cells from programmed cell death 1 (PD-1) knockout donors. Th1-specific inhibition was exclusively achieved with direct cell contact.

CONCLUSIONS
T cells exposed to IPE in the eye that acquires full regulatory capacity express negative costimulators and suppress bystander Th1-type effector cells.


In this paper, an electrical equivalent circuit of a loaded thick Langevin flexural transducer is proposed. As there are two vibration components at the mechanical output terminal of a thick flexural transducer, that is, lateral and rotational components. A load, corresponding to each vibration component, applied to the transducer must also be considered separately. When it is assumed that the load is fluid and that the mechanical output port is the end surface of the flexural transducer, the rotary motion of the end surface only contributes to sound radiation into fluid. An analytical solution of Timoshenko's beam theory given by Miklowitz and the piezoelectric equation are applied to calculate the free vibration mode and the electrical equivalent components of transducer. Using this derived equivalent circuit, the behavior of the loaded flexural transducer is experimentally studied to prove the validity of the proposed circuit.


Background There is a large population of people with spinal muscular atrophy (SMA) in China, and new disease-modifying therapies have become available recently. However, comprehensive data on the management and profile of treatment-naive SMA patients in China are still lacking. Methods As a retrospective study, a large cohort of treatment-naive patients with clinical and genetic diagnoses of 5q SMA were enrolled, ranging from neonatal to 18 years old, from the Neurology Department of Children's Hospital of Fudan University between January 2013 and December 2020. The data regarding their clinical presentations, genetic defects, motor function assessment results, and follow ups were reviewed. Results We enrolled 392 SMA patients (male: female = 189: 203): 1a = 46, 1b = 44, 1c = 31, 2a = 119, 2b = 56, 3a = 52, 3b = 14, from 27 of the 34 administrative districts in China, and 389 patients harbored homozygous deletion of exon 7 in the SMN1 gene (99.2%). The median age of onset was 0.08 (range: 0–0.30), 0.25 (0.06–0.60), 0.42 (0.08–1.50), 0.67 (0.07–5.08), 1.0 (0.40–1.83), 1.5 (1.00–3.00), and 4.04 (1.80–12.00) years old for SMA 1a, 1b, 1c, 2a, 2b, 3a, and 3b patients, while the median age of first assessment was 0.25 (0.08–2.60), 0.42 (0.17–1.90), 0.80 (0.17–4.5), 2.50 (0.5–15.83), 2.92 (1.08–13.42), 4.25 (1.58–17.33), and 7.34 (3.67–14.00) years old, respectively. Patients were followed up with for up to 15.8 years. The median event-free survival time was 7 months, 15 months, and indeterminate in SMA 1a, 1b, and 1c patients (p < 0.0001), with a better survival situation for higher SMN2 copies (p = 0.0171). The median age of sitting loss was 5.75 years and 13.5 years in SMA 2a and 2b (p = 0.0214) and that of ambulation loss was 9.0 years and undefined in SMA 3a and 3b (p = 0.0072). Cox regression analysis showed that higher SMN2 copies indicated better remaining ambulation in SMA 3. The median time to develop orthopedic deformities was 4.5, 5.2, and 10.1 years in SMAs 1c, 2, and 3, respectively (p < 0.0001), with a possible trend of better preservation of joint function for patients under regular rehabilitation (p = 0.8668). Conclusion Our study elucidated insight into the comprehensive management and profile of different types of SMA patients in China, providing a clinical basis for assessing the efficacy of new therapies.


Thyroid dysfunction will be associated with insulin resistance in obese women were common. METHODS: In this cross-sectional study, a total of fifty female subjects with age group of 30-60 years, a whose body mass index was above 30 kg/m were studied for 16 months between July 2013 to November 2014 who were attending general medicine OPD in Siddartha Medical College, Tumkur were studied. Subjects with known disease or disorder of endocrine systems or who were receiving medications like, thyroid hormones preparations, Lithium, Amiodarone or corticosteroids were excluded. Blood samples were assed for T3, T4, TSH, FBS, Fasting Insulin and HOMA IR was calculated. RESULTS: The mean age of the patients was 31.4±7.32 years. Among these subjects TSH analysis revealed that 26% were having subclinical hypothyroidism (SH). We found that 46% (remaining) of these SH subjects are having insulin resistance while 24% of patients with normal thyroid function are having insulin resistance as estimated by HOMA IR. P-value=0.6 and the odds ratio is 0.667, with a 95% confidence interval extending from 0.19 to 2.09. The observed difference in insulin resistance was not statistically between the subjects with SH and normal obese subjects. CONCLUSION: Insulin resistance co exists with thyroid-hypo function in 46% of obese patients it is necessary to do routinely thyroid profile and insulin resistance in all the patients.


The mechanism of resistance to diquat and paraquat was investigated in a bipyridyl-herbicide-resistant biotype of Arctotheca calendula (L.) Levyns. No differences were observed in the interactions of these herbicides with Photo-system I, the active site, in thylakoids isolated from resistant and susceptible biotypes. Likewise, absorption of herbicide through the cuticle and gross translocation were identical in plants of the two biotypes. Foliar application of either 25 g ha−1 diquat or 200 g ha−1 paraquat rapidly inhibited CO2-dependent O2 evolution of leaf segments of the susceptible biotype. O2 evolution of leaf segments of the resistant biotype was less affected by these treatments. Fluorescence imaging was used to observe visually, as fluorescence quenching, the penetration of herbicide to the active site. These experiments demonstrated that diquat appears at the active site more slowly in the resistant biotype compared to the susceptible biotype. HCO3-dependent O2 evolution of thin leaf slices was less inhibited by diquat in the resistant biotype than in the susceptible biotype. The mechanism of resistance to the bipyridyl herbicides in this biotype of A. calendula is not a result of changes at the active site, decreased herbicide absorption or decreased translocation, but appears to be due to reduced herbicide penetration to the active site.


This paper describes building information modeling (BIM) research by students and faculty of the University of Nebraska's Peter Kiewit Institute (PKI). The paper also describes work in conjunction with the United States Strategic Command (USSTRATCOM), located at Offutt Air Force Base in Omaha, Nebraska, USA. The objective of this on-going research is to create a virtual modeling environment where architects and planners can present building concepts and design options to customers in a way that is more easily envisioned by the client. The proposed environment would integrate BIM and virtual environments by allowing a free exchange of data between applications. The specific research mentioned in this paper focuses on visualization and editing of interior room configurations for use by USSTRATCOM. The software used for this research project was Autodesk Revit, Autodesk 3DS Max, and a proprietary gaming engine called Unity, developed by Unity Technologies and based in San Francisco, California, USA. This paper covers the development of a system architecture in which BIM will be integrated with a virtual simulation environment built in Science Applications International Corporation's (SAIC's) On-Line Interactive Virtual Environment (OLIVE) and discusses research results to date.


The effect of maturity at harvest on the digestibility and intake of large bale silage made from whole-crop barley and wheat when fed to growing heifers was evaluated. Two crops of spring barley (Hordeum distichum cv. Filippa and Kinnan) and 1 of winter wheat (Triticum aestivum cv. Olevin) were harvested at the heading, milk, and dough stages of maturity. The silage was fed to 36 dairy heifers in a balanced crossover experiment with 3 periods and 9 treatments (diets based on 3 crops and 3 stages of maturity), organized into 6 pairs of 3 × 3 Latin squares. No clear relationship was observed between intake and stage of maturity of whole-crop cereal silage, but intake was positively correlated to silage DM content (P < 0.001, r = 0.46) and negatively correlated to NDF content (P < 0.001, r = -0.42). Organic matter digestibility decreased between the heading and milk stages of maturity in all crops (P < 0.001), did not differ between the milk and the dough stages in the 2 barley crops, but increased in the wheat silage (P = 0.034). The NDF digestibility decreased between the heading and milk stages in all crops (P < 0.001), whereas it decreased in 1 barley crop (P < 0.001), increased in the other barley (P = 0.025), and was unchanged in the wheat between the milk and dough stages of maturity. Starch digestibility was less in the 2 barley crops compared with the wheat at the dough stage of maturity (P < 0.001). The feeding value of the whole-crop barley and wheat declined between the heading and milk stages of maturity, but thereafter the effect of maturity on the feeding value was minor.


Background: GSK2636771 is a potent, orally bioavailable and selective inhibitor of PI3Kβ (apparent Ki = 0.89 nM), with >900-fold selectivity over PI3Kα/PI3Kγ and 10-fold over PI3Kδ. It inhibits AKT phosphorylation and downstream signaling measured as decrease of PRAS40-, GSK3β-, and RPS6-phosphorylation in PTEN deficient cell lines. Methods: An ongoing phase I/IIa FTIH, open label dose escalation study of GSK2636771, once daily (QD), is being conducted to evaluate safety, pharmacokinetics (PK), pharmacodynamics (PD) and efficacy in pts with advanced tumors deficient in PTEN. The study comprised 3 parts: starting-dose selection, 3+3 dose escalation, and phase II expansion. PD was assessed in tumor and platelet rich plasma samples. Archival tumor samples were analyzed for alterations in a custom panel of select oncogenes and tumor suppressors by next-generation sequencing and copy number analyses. Results: As of Nov 2014, 62 pts (38 m: 24 f, mean 60 yrs) were enrolled and dosed at 7 dose levels (25 - 500 mg). In total 5 DLTs (3x hypophosphatemia/ 2x hypocalcemia G3) were observed in 3 pts at 500 mg, defining MTD. AEs ≥20% (all grades) included diarrhoea, nausea, vomiting, fatigue, abdominal pain, anemia, decreased appetite and headache. Cmax was reached 4-6 h after single and repeat dosing, with a mean t1/2 of 17.1-38.6 h across cohorts. Increases in mean Cmax and AUC(0-24 h) were dose-proportional up to 350 mg, but less than proportional at 400 and 500 mg. Phospho/total AKT ratio was decreased by >50% in platelet-rich plasma in 21 of 23 pts across various doses. Similarly, phospho/total AKT ratio was decreased (median 35%) in post-treatment tumor biopsies compared to pre-treatment tumors in 4 of 5 pts treated at 400 mg dose. One pt (prostate) had a RECIST PR and 17 pts had SD, 8 of whom were on study for ≥6 months. Exploratory genomic analyses of tumor samples from 10 prostate cancer pts revealed a PIK3CB L1049R mutation in the tumor of one of the pts who remained on study for 33 weeks and an increased PIK3CB gene copy number in the tumor of a pt who achieved PR. Preclinical characterization of PIK3CB L1049R mutation is ongoing, as it is homologous to the oncogenic PIK3CA H1047R mutation. These data suggest potential clinical benefit with GSK2636771 in pts with tumors harboring genetic alterations in PIK3CB. Tumors from other histologies are being analyzed for alterations in key cancer-relevant genes, including PIK3CB. Conclusions: MTD and recommended phase II dose of GSK2636771 is 400 mg QD. Pathway inhibition was observed with limited anti-tumor activity in pts with PTEN deficient tumors. Pts with tumors harboring concomitant genetic alterations in PIK3CB may benefit from GSK2636771 treatment. Recruitment into phase II expansion is ongoing. Citation Format: Johann de Bono, Hendrik-Tobias Arkenau, Joaquin Mateo, Jeffrey R. Infante, Howard A. Burris, Yung-Jue Bang, Joseph Eder, Sunil Sharma, Hyun C. Chung, Shaun Decordova, Karen E. Swales, Michelle D. Garrett, Desamaparados Roda-Perez, Meichun Ding, Mark Russo, Li Yan, Ben Suttle, Jerry M. Tolson, Wendy S. Halsey, Ganji Gopi, Harjeet K. Van Der Keyl, Shanker Kalyana-Sundaram, Ganesh M. Sathe, Monica Motwani, Rakesh Kumar. Exploratory genetic analysis of tumors from a phase I/II dose escalation study of GSK2636771 in patients (pts) with PTEN deficient advanced tumors. [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the 106th Annual Meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research; 2015 Apr 18-22; Philadelphia, PA. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2015;75(15 Suppl):Abstract nr CT328. doi:10.1158/1538-7445.AM2015-CT328


BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE: Hypoxic-ischemic encephalopathy (HIE) after perinatal asphyxia in term neonates causes long-term neurologic sequelae or death. A reliable evidence-based prognosis is essential. The study goal was to investigate the prognostic value of currently used clinical tests in neonatal patients with perinatal asphyxia and HIE. METHODS: Searches were made on MEDLINE, Embase, Central, and CINAHL for studies occurring between January 1980 and November 2011. Studies were included if they (1) evaluated outcome in term infants with perinatal asphyxia and HIE, (2) evaluated prognostic tests, and (3) reported outcome at a minimal follow-up age of 18 months. Study selection, assessment of methodologic quality, and data extraction were performed by 3 independent reviewers. Pooled sensitivities and specificities of investigated tests were calculated when possible. RESULTS: Of the 259 relevant studies, 29 were included describing 13 prognostic tests conducted 1631 times in 1306 term neonates. A considerable heterogeneity was noted in test performance, cut-off values, and outcome measures. The most promising tests were amplitude-integrated electroencephalography (sensitivity 0.93, [95% confidence interval 0.78–0.98]; specificity 0.90 [0.60–0.98]), EEG (sensitivity 0.92 [0.66–0.99]; specificity 0.83 [0.64–0.93]), and visual evoked potentials (sensitivity 0.90 [0.74–0.97]; specificity 0.92 [0.68–0.98]). In imaging, diffusion weighted MRI performed best on specificity (0.89 [0.62–0.98]) and T1/T2-weighted MRI performed best on sensitivity (0.98 [0.80–1.00]). Magnetic resonance spectroscopy demonstrated a sensitivity of 0.75 (0.26–0.96) with poor specificity (0.58 [0.23–0.87]). CONCLUSIONS: This evidence suggests an important role for amplitude-integrated electroencephalography, EEG, visual evoked potentials, and diffusion weighted and conventional MRI. Given the heterogeneity in the tests' performance and outcomes studied, well-designed large prospective studies are needed.


The aim of this paper is to re-examine nursing work from a Marxist perspective by means of a critique of two key concepts within nursing: autonomy and caring. Although Marx wrote over 150 years ago, many see continuing relevance to his theories. His concepts of capital, ideology and class antagonism are employed in this paper. Nursing's historical insertion into the developing hospital system is seen in terms of a loss of autonomy covered over by the development of cults of loyalty toward those institutions, while the concept of emotional labour is used to re-examine nursing's high valuing of "caring" and to understand it as potentially exploitative of nurses. Raising awareness of this alternative way of understanding nursing work can become a first step toward change.


The changes in the thermally stimulated current (TSC) response of polyethylene to 200 rad of X-rays or neutrons are investigated after the exposure of specimens to a large dose of the respective radiation. This was done in order to assess possible changes in the trap concentration of the specimens. It is shown that both X-rays and neutrons can create additional traps in polyethylene at a rate dependent on the amount, and possibly fractionation, of the doses used. The results indicate a higher trap creation rate for low doses as compared with high doses, within the dose ranges used.


Adult onset Still's disease (AOSD) is an uncommon, systemic, inflammatory disorder of unknown etiology, characterised by spiking fevers, skin rash, and arthritis. Treatment consists of glucocorticosteroids and immunosuppressive drugs. Over the last few years it has become increasingly evident that treatment with the IL-1 receptor antagonist (IL-1RA) anakinra is highly effective even in patients with intractable disease. So far, there are scant data available on the effects of anakinra in pregnancy. We report two patients with AOSD who successfully gave birth while treated with anakinra during pregnancy.


This paper introduces a hybrid combined weight-place value method for evaluating the sustainable of urbanization. The values of development index are calculated by combined weight method. A case study of urbanization in Liaoning demonstrates the process of using the evaluation method. The result indicates that the urbanization in Liaoning is better. The development between economic, environments, social, public service and livelihood is enhancing conspicuously.


We have studied the effects of plasma and of cumene hydroperoxide (CUM) on adenosine diphosphate ribosyl transferase (ADPRT) from mononuclear leukocytes (HML) of patients with colonic adenomatous polyps (n = 22), with colonic hyperplastic polyps (n = 5) and with neither type of polyp (controls) (n = 6). ADPRT was measured after incubation of HML with plasma alone (termed the plasma value), and with plasma plus CUM (50 microM) (the activated value); the difference elicited by CUM was termed the induced value. There was no significant difference in values between the control and hyperplastic polyp groups: these were combined for further analysis. The plasma (P = 0.038), activated (P = 0.009) and induced (P = 0.0024) values of the combined group all differed significantly from those of the adenoma group. At low exposures, CUM stimulated both ADPRT and unscheduled DNA synthesis and, at higher exposures, inactivated both. Pretreatment of HML with vitamin E protected against these effects of CUM, while pretreatment with diamide (which depletes GSH) accentuated the effects. This study demonstrates a differential reaction of ADPRT in patients harboring colonic adenomas and suggests that the origin of this difference may lie in cellular responses to oxidative stress.


Hospitalized patients are in danger of deep venous thrombosis either due to a genetic tendency, immobilization or the underlying medical condition. Paradoxically heparin, the substance used to prevent this complication, can lead to thrombo-embolic phenomena, which can be life threatening. We report a case of heparin-induced thrombocytopenia, which caused a massive pulmonary embolism, and its management by administering a thrombolytic agent in a situation where bleeding seems inevitable.


The Golem B computer is a fast machine using emitter-coupled logic and multi-layer circuits. The autonomous floating point arithmetic unit obtains its instructions and operands from buffers loaded ahead of need. Its main part, for 56-bit fractions, uses two 4-operand adder complexes with stored carries.In multiplication instructions, 4 bits of the multiplier are used to form a new partial product in each pass through an adder complex. Division instructions use a base-4 non-restoring algorithm. Addition favours the case of equal or nearly equal exponents, but 112 sum bits are accumulated for all exponent differences.An effort has been made to provide instructions and number formats that will aid the writing of compilers and operating systems.


The Brick Flat massive sulfide body is one of a group of eight individual bodies that constitute the Iron Mountain cluster in the southern part of the West Shasta district. Before they were separated by postmineral faulting, five of the eight sulfide bodies formed a single large deposit about 1,375 m long with a mass of some 23 million metric tons. The pyritic Brick Flat sulfide body is one of the five faulted segments of this deposit. It was stripped of its overlying cover and partly mined for its sulfur content in the 1950s and 1960s, and was mapped and sampled in some detail as part of the recent West Shasta project investigations.The Brick Flat massive sulfide lies within medium phenocryst rhyolite that is characteristic of the ore-bearing middle unit of the Balaklala Rhyolite. It is interpreted to be downfaulted a vertical distance of 75 to 85 m from the Old Mine sulfide-gossan orebody along the north-dipping Camden South fault. It is bounded in turn on its north side by another parallel fault, the Camden North, which drops the orebody down another 75 m to the level of the Richmond orebody. A weakly pyritized rhyolitic tuff lies a few tens of meters beneath the sulfide and a discontinuous belt of tuff lies a few tens of meters above and parallel to the N 60 degrees E-trending main belt of massive sulfides in the Iron Mountain cluster. The spatial coincidence of massive sulfide bodies and tuff beds at a stratigraphic level several tens of meters higher suggests that either a graben or a narrow elongate basin constituted the depositional environment at the time the deposits were formed.


Past research on the speech of apnoea patients has revealed that resonance anomalies are among the most distinguishing traits for these speakers. This paper presents an approach to characterize these peculiarities using GMMs and distance measures between distributions. We report the findings obtained with two analytical procedures, working with a purpose-designed speech database of both healthy and apnoeasuffering patients. First, we validate the database to guarantee that the models trained are able to describe the acoustic space in a way that may reveal differences between groups. Then we study abnormal nasalization in apnoea patients by considering vowels in nasal and non-nasal phonetic contexts. Our results confirm that there are differences between the groups, and that statistical modelling techniques can be used to describe this factor. Results further suggest that it would be possible to design an automatic classifier using such discriminative information.


Purpose: To evaluate histological changes and duration of enhancement after the intra-arterial injection of helium gas microbubbles in comparison with conventionally used carbon dioxide (CO2) microbubbles at US Material and Methods: Four different doses of helium gas microbubbles (0, 0.1, 0.2 and 0.5 ml/kg) mixed with normal saline and own blood were injected into the celiac artery of 8 rabbits. After one week, autopsies were performed on all animals and histological changes in the liver, stomach and spleen were studied on hematoxylin-eosin stains. in addition, VX-2 tumor strains were transplanted into the femoral muscle in 5 other rabbits. Four weeks after transplantation, we catheterized the femoral artery and either CO2 or helium gas microbubbles were injected under US observation. We evaluated the duration of enhancement in the tumors with the two types of microbubbles Results: On histological evaluation, damage in hepatic cells as well as multiple areas of gastritis in the stomach were seen when a dose of 0.5 ml/kg of helium gas was used. Damage in the liver and stomach was slight at a dose of 0.2 ml/kg. the spleen was not damaged at doses of under 0.5 ml/kg. in the evaluation of tumor enhancement, the duration of enhancement with helium gas microbubbles ranged from 28 to 45 min (average 36 min) while that with CO2 ranged from 4 to 12 min (average 9 min) (p>0.001 at paired t-test) Conclusion: Intra-arterial injection of helium gas should not exceed 0.2 ml/kg: a dose of 0.5 ml/kg may cause damage to the liver and stomach. the duration of enhancement with helium gas microbubbles is significantly longer than that with CO2 microbubbles


A novel aerobic, Gram-stain-positive, motile, moderately halophilic and coccoid bacterial strain, designated LCB217T, was isolated from a saline-alkali soil in north-western China and identified using a polyphasic taxonomic approach. Growth occurred with 3-15 % (w/v) NaCl (optimum 3-5 %), at 10-45 °C (optimum 30 °C) and at pH 7.0-9.0 (optimum pH 9.0). Strain LCB217T contained MK-7 and MK-8 as the predominant menaquinones and anteiso-C15 : 0, iso-C14 : 0 and iso-C16 : 0 as the major fatty acids. The polar lipids from strain LCB217T consisted of diphosphatidylglycerol, phosphatidylglycerol, phosphatidylethanolamine, phosphatidylcholine, one unidentified phospholipid, one unidentified aminophospholipid and one unidentified lipid. The peptidoglycan type was A4α (l-Lys-d-Glu). Phylogenetic analysis of the 16S rRNA gene sequence showed that strain LCB217T belonged to the genus Planococcus and was closely related to the type strains Planococcus plakortidis AS/ASP6 (II)T (98.2 % similarity), Planococcus maitriensis S1T (97.7 %) and Planococcus salinarum ISL-16T (97.2 %). The G+C content of the genomic DNA was 49.4 mol%. DNA-DNA relatedness values between strain LCB217T andPlanococcusplakortidis AS/ASP6 (II)T, Planococcusmaitriensis S1T andPlanococcussalinarum ISL-16T were 29.5, 38.1 and 39.5 %, respectively. On the basis of the phenotypic, phylogenetic and genomic data, strain LCB217T represents a novel species of the genus Planococcus, for which the name Planococcus salinus sp. nov. is proposed. The type strain is LCB217T (=CGMCC 1.15685T=KCTC 33861T).


Art is a tool for children to enjoy life. Rhythmic activities, narration, and using attractive educational methods are devices to express feelings, problems, thoughts and beliefs. Art therapy methods create unique opportunities to express and challenge feelings and lead to improvement of mental health and personal promotion indirectly. Regarding the fact that art therapy methods are seen in most psychological viewpoints, we tried to use some of them in reducing primary boys in fifth grade of elementary schools anxiety. The current study is an experimental study with pre and post testing. The statistic society is all boys in fifth grade of elementary schools in Yazd and 28 are chosen through accessible sampling that had anxiety with Katel anxiety test. The experimental model was done in 20 sessions and included: painting therapy, theatre therapy, film therapy, sand therapy and narration. The post test was done one month after the last session. Findings showed that there is a meaningful difference in pre and post testing. A reduction of 39.28 percent in anxiety was seen compared to the first session. Free expression of art by kid Art therapy, as a medic method, is the best predictor of unconscious personalities. Art therapy helps us get aware of kids' imagination, feelings and unsaid words in the simplest way. Anxiety, as an unwanted psychological mood, can disorganize kids' mental and physical health and art therapy can be lessened anxiety.


This study describes the case of a dentigerous cyst in a six-year-old patient treated by decompression of the lesion. The patient's main clinical complaint was facial asymmetry with displacement of the nasal cavity. Clinical examination showed an extensive lesion in the left side of maxilla invading the nasal cavity. An interdisciplinary course of treatment for this patient was indicated to preserve the impacted permanent tooth inside the lesion. A panoramic radiograph and computed tomography scan were requested for planning the surgery. A decompression surgery was performed and an incisional biopsy revealed the presence of a dentigerous cyst in the maxilla. A second operation was performed two years later to disimpact the permanent incisor and promote its eruption by means of orthodontic traction. The patient was thoroughly followed for a few years. Bone repair at the dentigerous cyst site was perfect.


Measurements of charged pion and kaon production are presented in centrality selected Pb+Pb collisions at 40A GeV and 158A GeV beam energy as well as in semicentral C+C and Si+Si interactions at 40A GeV. Transverse mass spectra, rapidity spectra, and total yields are determined as a function of centrality. The system-size and centrality dependence of relative strangeness production in nucleus-nucleus collisions at 40A GeV and 158A GeV beam energy are derived from the data presented here and from published data for C+C and Si+Si collisions at 158A GeV beam energy. At both energies a steep increase with centrality is observed for small systems followed by a weak rise or even saturation for higher centralities. This behavior is compared to calculations using transport models (ultra-relativistic quantum molecular dynamics and hadron-string dynamics), a percolation model, and the core-corona approach.


Understanding contents in social networks by inferring high-quality latent topics from short texts is a significant task in social analysis, which is challenging because social network contents are usually extremely short, noisy and full of informal vocabularies. Due to the lack of sufficient word co-occurrence instances, well-known topic modeling methods such as LDA and LSA cannot uncover high-quality topic structures. Existing research works seek to pool short texts from social networks into pseudo documents or utilize the explicit relations among these short texts such as hashtags in tweets to make classic topic modeling methods work. In this paper, we explore this problem by proposing a topic model for noisy short texts with multiple relations called MRTM (Multiple Relational Topic Modeling). MRTM exploits both explicit and implicit relations by introducing a document-attribute distribution and a two-step random sampling strategy. Extensive experiments, compared with the state-of-the-art topic modeling approaches, demonstrate that MRTM can alleviate the word co-occurrence sparsity and uncover high-quality latent topics from noisy short texts.


Objective
The aim of the study was to investigate the influence of phototherapy in treatment of neonatal hyperbilirubinemia on the serum level of tumour necrosis factor-α (TNF-α).
 Background
Jaundice is the most common clinical diagnosis in neonatal medicine that requires medical attention. Phototherapy is the most commonly used intervention to treat and prevent severe hyperbilirubinemia. Some investigations have expressed concern about potential toxic effects of phototherapy; one possible harmful consequence is affection of cytokines production and lymphocyte subtypes, which can affect the function of the immune system of the newborn.
Recent research has provided evidence that phototherapy is associated with some long-term side effects such as melanocytic nevi and skin cancer, allergic diseases, asthma, patent ductus arteriosus and retinal damage.
 Patients and methods
A total of 30 term neonates with neonatal jaundice were included in this study who had indirect bilirubin levels higher than 14 mg/dl, and 15 healthy matched newborns were selected as controls.
Blood samples were obtained from hyperbilirubinemic newborns before exposure and at 72 h of exposure to phototherapy and from controls at the time of examination.
Serum TNF-α levels were measured in the samples using enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay kits.
 Results
Serum TNF-α levels in both patients before phototherapy and the control group did not differ significantly. Serum TNF- levels significantly increased after 72 h of exposure to phototherapy, indicating the strong effect of phototherapy on TNF-α serum level.
 Conclusion
These results demonstrate that, in addition to the well-known positive effect of phototherapy on the neonatal serum bilirubin level, this therapeutic modality increased serum TNF-α that can affect the function of the immune system in newborns.


Communication is an essential factor for human interactions. Surely there must be communication to be any interaction between people. Main objective of communication is being understandable. In this context, if the intelligibility could not be achieved, problems would occur between people. These problems effect both flow of human life and all areas where humans are. One of these areas is aviation. When causes of accidents and incidents are examined in aviation history, it is seen that the majority of the accidents and incidents are related with human factors. The main reason of human induced accidents and incidents is communication problem. Especially, communication problems between pilots and controllers are vital. Besides ambiguity, read back mistakes, confusing phraseology, similar call signs, poor English knowledge or heavy foreign accents, miscommunication or poor communication may lead crashes of aircraft and incidents. In this study, major aircraft accidents and incidents which are experienced in the past due to communication problems will be examined and solution proposals will be developed in order to prevent potential accidents.


Environmental noise in the residential area is appeared with different types and features along with the growth of society. In particular when the economic level is raised up, the demand of residents for the environmental noise becomes more sensitive. The existing research on the environmental noise was initiated in the 1980`s and resulted that the children`s jumping sound was most annoying among the noises transmitted from the other unit. This result caused such activities that the researches were focused on the floor impact noise and that the laws in relation to environmental noise within residential area were revised strictly. This study aimed to survey the consciousness of residents for the environmental noise and to see how it is changed comparing with the previous one. Ultimately this result could be useful to establish the target for research or noise control to make the comfortable residential environment.


Abstract The micro-fibers increase the consistency and uniformity of concrete, which can improve the protective properties of concrete cover and thus should reduce the corrosion of the reinforcement bars in the reinforced concrete elements. The article presents a study which main objective was to specify the effect on concrete mix the addition of steel or polypropylene micro-reinforcement fibers on the reinforcing bars corrosion process. The research included measuring the reinforcement corrosion progress caused by the chloride impact as well as cyclical freezing and thawing specimens test. To measure the electrochemical corrosion progress the non-destructive i.e. galvanostatic pulse method was used. The results were used to conduct a comparative analysis.


It is a well-known fact that a lack of information will lead to suboptimal decisions. But even when actors jointly have all the information they need to make a well-informed decision, they may fail to find a superior alternative. This hidden profile paradigm would cause misrepresentations of crisis situations and lead to ineffective response. In this research-in-progress paper, we present the first stage of our experimental study on group decision making in humanitarian disaster response, in which we want to find out how teams can be supported to share more information, make better sense, and ultimately avoid such misrepresentations of crisis situations. First results reveal that humanitarian disaster response teams are able to share significantly more information if they would make use of more advanced information and communication systems. However, none of the teams in the experimental setup managed to find the optimal decision.


A wafer level package (WLP) that has a flip chip form and uses thin-film redistribution with solder bumps to connect the package to the printed wiring board directly is discussed in this paper. A liquid molding compound is used for the encapsulation process. Since the thickness of the fan-out WLP is smaller than that in a traditional integrated circuit (IC) package, the fan-out WLP induces more serious warpage. Warpage plays an important role during the IC encapsulation process, and too large a warpage would not let the package proceed to the next manufacturing process. This paper uses an approach that considers both cure- and thermal-induced shrinkages during the encapsulation process to predict the amount of warpage. Cure-induced shrinkage is described by the pressure-volume-temperature-cure (PVTC) equation of the liquid compound. The thermally induced shrinkage is described by the coefficients of thermal expansion of the component materials. The liquid compound properties are obtained by various techniques, such as cure kinetics by differential scanning calorimetry- and cure-induced shrinkage by a PVTC testing machine. These experimental data are used to formulate the PVTC equation. A fan-out WLP is first simulated, and the simulation results are verified with experiments. It is shown that an approach that considers both thermal and cure/compressibility effects can better predict the amount of warpage for the fan-out WLP. The PVTC equation is successfully implemented, and it is verified that warpage is governed by both thermal and cure shrinkages. The amount of warpage after molding could be accurately predicted with this methodology. Simulation results show that cure shrinkage of the liquid compound is the dominant factor responsible for package warpage after encapsulation.


Purpose To estimate the prevalence of dietary supplement (DS) use, investigate the related factors associated with DS use among preschoolers and support the adequate nutrition. Methods We conducted a questionnaire survey of mothers of children aged between 1 and 6 years who visited pediatric clinics in 3 Korean cities (Jeonju, Suncheon, Jeongeup) between October and November 2012 at Presbyterian Medical Center. The responses from 929 questionnaires were analyzed. Results Approximately 45.1% of the preschoolers used DS in the past month. The following factors were associated with greater use of DS: older age (p<0.001), whether or not the preschoolers attended kindergarten (p<0.001), higher mother's concern about the nutritional facts (p<0.001), whether or not the mother use DS (p<0.001), whether or not the mother counsel with a doctor or pharmacist about DS use (p<0.001). Vitamin·mineral supplements (77.5%) were the most commonly used DS among the preschoolers, followed by ginseng (49.3%) and probiotics (25.6%). Additionally, of the DS users, 95.9% gave DS to their healthy children. Of the users and non-users, 97.6% and 62.2%, respectively, indicated that they would like to have their children take DS. The information on DS was obtained from family or friends in 48.2% of the DS users and from doctors in only 6.1%. Conclusion Approximately half of the preschoolers in our study used DS, which might not have been medically indicated for most of them. Therefore, the role of professionals in counseling on desirable diet behaviors and DS use for preschoolers is warranted.


We apply deep-neural-network-based techniques to quantum state classification and reconstruction. We demonstrate high classification accuracies and reconstruction fidelities, even in the presence of noise and with little data. Using optical quantum states as examples, we first demonstrate how convolutional neural networks (CNNs) can successfully classify several types of states distorted by, e.g., additive Gaussian noise or photon loss. We further show that a CNN trained on noisy inputs can learn to identify the most important regions in the data, which potentially can reduce the cost of tomography by guiding adaptive data collection. Secondly, we demonstrate reconstruction of quantum-state density matrices using neural networks that incorporate quantum-physics knowledge. The knowledge is implemented as custom neural-network layers that convert outputs from standard feedforward neural networks to valid descriptions of quantum states. Any standard feed-forward neural-network architecture can be adapted for quantum state tomography (QST) with our method. We present further demonstrations of our proposed [arXiv:2008.03240] QST technique with conditional generative adversarial networks (QST-CGAN). We motivate our choice of a learnable loss function within an adversarial framework by demonstrating that the QST-CGAN outperforms, across a range of scenarios, generative networks trained with standard loss functions. For pure states with additive or convolutional Gaussian noise, the QST-CGAN is able to adapt to the noise and reconstruct the underlying state. The QST-CGAN reconstructs states using up to two orders of magnitude fewer iterative steps than a standard iterative maximum likelihood (iMLE) method. Further, the QST-CGAN can reconstruct both pure and mixed states from two orders of magnitude fewer randomly chosen data points than iMLE.


Dispersion conditions of ZrB2 powder in water were investigated using poly(ethyleneimine) (PEI) as a dispersant. Pulverization of ZrB2 powder to submicrometer size was difficult and a substantial amount of large particles remained after an intensive planatery milling for 72 h. The isoelectric point (IEP) of ZrB2 powder was measured to be pH 5.8 by electrophoresis, which shifted to pH 6.2 after milling. The application of PEI changed the IEP of the boride slurry to ∼pH 11. Well-dispersed aqueous ZrB2 slurries with a high solid loading (up to 45 vol%) were fabricated at pH 6.5–7.5 by the application of 1.5 wt% PEI.


In this paper, we propose a low-error fixed-width redundant multiplier design. The design is based on the statistical analysis of the value of the truncated partial products in binary signed-digit representation with modified Booth encoding. The overall truncation error is significantly reduced with negligible hardware overhead. Simulation on DCT/IDCT of images with 256 gray levels shows our proposed multiplication design has higher PSNR/SNR.


Inositol polyphosphate-5-phosphatase K [INPP5K (MIM: 607875)] acts as a PIP3 5-phosphatase and regulates actin cytoskeleton, insulin, and cell migration. Biallelic pathogenic variants in INPP5K have recently been reported in patients affected by a form of muscular dystrophy with childhood onset. Affected patients have limb girdle muscle weakness, often associated with bilateral cataracts, short stature, and intellectual disability. Here we report four patients affected by INPP5K-related muscle dystrophy, who were apparently unrelated but originated from the same geographical area in South Italy. These patients manifest a recognizable phenotype characterized by early onset muscular dystrophy associated with short stature and intellectual disability. All affected subjects were homozygous or compound heterozygous for the c.67G > A (p.Val23Met) missense change and shared a common haplotype, indicating the occurrence of a founder effect.


We estimate a model with countryand industry-specific shocks that extends the dummy variable model used in the portfolio diversification literature by relaxing the restriction that all stocks with exposure to a given shock have the same exposure to that shock. We find that: i) This restriction is strongly rejected by the data. ii) Many industry betas are negative, while almost all country betas are positive. This difference in within-group heterogeneity may explain why country shocks have historically outweighed industry shocks in explaining international return variation. iii) We use the betas to construct portfolios whose volatility is substantially below that of the world market, both in and out of sample. JEL classification: G11, G15


1. Hepatic drug metabolism was investigated in normal, adjuvant-induced arthritic (AA), indomethacin-treated AA and prednisolone-treated AA rats. The contents of P450 and b5 and the activities of NADH-b5 reductase (fp2), NADPH-ferrihaemoprotein reductase, P450 mixed function oxidase, FAD-monooxygenase and several enzymes involved in conjugation were remarkably lower in AA than in normal rats. 2. Many of the decreased enzyme activities were restored to normal levels by the continuous administration (3 weeks) of indomethacin or prednisolone, which improved the arthritic states of the animals. However, the restoration of FAD-monooxygenase activity by the administration of indomethacin or prednisolone was incomplete. The P450 and b5 contents and the fp2 activity in prednisolone-treated AA rats were also significantly lower than those in normal rats. 3. These findings indicate that the ability of the liver to metabolize drugs (both oxidation and conjugation) in AA rats is greatly decreased and that a long series of the treatment of AA rats with anti-inflammatory drugs is required to restore several enzyme activities.


The paper quantifies the thermodynamic limits on the energy and exergy use that would result from the use of PCM in photovoltaic BIPV modules versus not using PCM, by limiting module temperature to 298 K and the thermal energy use in buildings according to a set of hypotheses. The results obtained have been extended to six different climates. The results show that the maximum use of PCM depends heavily on the climate, therefore in hot climates as Seville, Cairo and Nairobi, the improvements in energy efficiency are very important (multiplied from 6 to 9 times), while in cold climates as London and Helsinki, the improvements are not that significant (multiplied from 1.5 to 2 times). The exergetic efficiency improvements range of about 5% for all climates, due to the low operating temperature of the PCM. These materials requirements are significant, ranging between 31 and 193 kg/m, with thicknesses between 3.9 and 24.2 cm/m.


Different tautomeric and zwitterionic forms of chelidamic acid (4-hydroxypyridine-2,6-dicarboxylic acid) are present in the crystal structures of chelidamic acid methanol monosolvate, C(7)H(5)NO(5)·CH(4)O, (Ia), dimethylammonium chelidamate (dimethylammonium 6-carboxy-4-hydroxypyridine-2-carboxylate), C(2)H(8)N(+)·C(7)H(4)NO(5)(-), (Ib), and chelidamic acid dimethyl sulfoxide monosolvate, C(7)H(5)NO(5)·C(2)H(6)OS, (Ic). While the zwitterionic pyridinium carboxylate in (Ia) can be explained from the pK(a) values, a (partially) deprotonated hydroxy group in the presence of a neutral carboxy group, as observed in (Ib) and (Ic), is unexpected. In (Ib), there are two formula units in the asymmetric unit with the chelidamic acid entities connected by a symmetric O-H···O hydrogen bond. Also, crystals of chelidamic acid dimethyl ester (dimethyl 4-hydroxypyridine-2,6-dicarboxylate) were obtained as a monohydrate, C(9)H(9)NO(5)·H(2)O, (IIa), and as a solvent-free modification, in which both ester molecules adopt the hydroxypyridine form. In (IIa), the solvent water molecule stabilizes the synperiplanar conformation of both carbonyl O atoms with respect to the pyridine N atom by two O-H···O hydrogen bonds, whereas an antiperiplanar arrangement is observed in the water-free structure. A database study and ab initio energy calculations help to compare the stabilities of the various ester conformations.


This study examines the current situation of Japanese family firms. We present evidence from Japan, with a focus on longevity and succession problems. Despite the existence of long-established firms that have survived through the centuries, research on family firms in Japan has barely begun. We build on the few existing studies in this field. We contend that the particularity of Japan can provide interesting inputs to the field of family firms. Supported by the findings, this study suggests a new line of research and contributes to the following: 1) rethinking the definition of family firms; 2) assessment of the status quo based on a comparative approach between Western countries and Japan; 3) stock-taking of Japanese centenary firms; 4) classification of family business issues, especially those related to succession.


Full-chip power grid analysis is time consuming. Several techniques have been proposed to tackle the problem but typically they deal with the power grid as a whole or partition at unnatural boundaries. Using a locality effect under flip-chip packaging, we propose a natural partitioning approach based on overlapping power grid "shells". The technique makes more efficient any previous simulation techniques that are polynomial in grid size. It is also parallelizable and therefore extremely fast. Using complete partitions gives no loss of accuracy compared to a full matrix solution, while lesser partitions are conservative for droop and current. Results on a recent Pentium/spl reg/ microprocessor design show excellent speed and accuracy.


This paper deals with the most recent developments of cross flow microfiltration (CFMF), some of them just patented, in the dairy industry. Combination of the use of uniform trans- membrane hydraulic pressure concept (UTP) with its different ways of carrying out microfiltrate recirculation, longitudinal porosity gradient and of new ceramic membrane materials allows nowa- days to get a differential separation of each category of milk particles. Pretreatment by CFMF of incoming milk is used for the production of low heated fluid milks having a flavor similar to that of raw milk and a shelf life 3 to 5 times longer than that of classical products. Results observed in the retention by the MF membrane of pathogenic bacterial species allow it to be said that the hygienic safety of cheeses made from raw MF milk is, at least, equal or even higher than that of cheeses made from pasteurized milk. Numerous other applications of CFMF are under development such as removal of residual fat from whey or the clarification and the removal of bacteria from cheese brine but the most promising are undoubtedly the differential separation of micellar casein and of small milk fat globules. With the products obtained on both sides of the MF membrane, dairy technology will have the possibility not only to improve yield and quality of many dairy products but also to create a diversified range of new textures. microfiltration / membrane / liquid milk / native casein / brine / whey / cheese


The description of the interaction of electrons and optical phonons in semiconductor superlattices and quantum well structures requires analytical expressions for atomic displacements and macroscopic electrostatic potentials accompanying the excitation of polar phonons. Recent discussion of this problem has revealed that the conventional macroscopic dielectric continuum theory contains uncertainties giving rise to controversial results even in the long-wavelength limit. The authors demonstrate that the uncertainties can be lifted if the complete branch dispersion of the underlying bulk phonons and boundary conditions derived from microscopic equations of motion are taken into the continuum theory. In the limit of vanishing dispersion the resulting envelopes confirm the predictions of Huang and Zhu as well as of Bechstedt and Gerecke within the unified model.


The World Health Organization's Health Promoting Schools (HPS) framework is a whole-school approach to promoting health that recognizes the intrinsic relationship between health and education. Our recent Cochrane systematic review found HPS interventions produced improvements in a number of student health outcomes. Here we reflect on what this review was not able to tell us: in other words, what evidence is missing with regard to the HPS approach. Few HPS interventions engage with schools' "core business" by examining impacts on educational outcomes. Current evidence is dominated by obesity interventions, with most studies conducted with children rather than adolescents. Evidence is lacking for outcomes such as mental or sexual health, substance use, and violence. Activities to engage families and communities are currently weak and unlikely to prompt behavioral change. The HPS approach is largely absent in low-income settings, despite its potential in meeting children's basic health needs. Intervention theories are insufficiently complex, often ignoring upstream determinants of health. Few studies provide evidence on intervention sustainability or cost-effectiveness, nor in-depth contextual or process data. We set out an agenda for future school health promotion research, considering implications for key stakeholders, namely, national governments, research funders, academics, and schools.


Introduction: Identifying training needs and implementing appropriate courses is one of the important steps to empower managers and experts specialists. This has the most important role in improving organizational performance. In this study, considering the importance of training programs effectiveness, the training needs of managers and experts and their relation to individual and institutional factors was determined in the Health Departments of Universities of Health and Medical Sciences. Methods: This retrospective study was conducted in spring 2010. Communities of this research were the staff of Universities' Health Departments in the field of Health Deputy. They were selected from 13 universities by random systematic and stratified methods. All available directors and experts were responsibly elected and interviewed as the census. The questionnaire included individual and organizational variables and 28 management topics that confirmed validity and reliability. Results: In total 293 managers and expert specialists were studied, the average require education based on 26 (92.9 %) out of 28 subjects review, was respectively more than 3.5 (total score 5). Declaring level of training needs in a few cases had significant difference with type of universities, sex, age, work experience, educational level, MPH courses, headquarters units and the current location of the people. (P<0.05) Conclusion: According to the very high level of announced requirements, it is suggested to have short term and long term management training courses.


Prostate cancer is now the most common cancer and the second most common cause of death from cancer among men. Therapy of curative intention is only possible in organ confined disease. The use of prostate specific antigen (PSA) and digital rectal examination (DRE) results in a three fold increase in prostatic carcinoma detection. Levels of PSA > 4 ng/ml are indications for sextant biopsies of the prostate. There did not exist an intermediate range or 'grey zone' of PSA 4-10 ng/ml where wait and see diagnostic procedure is indicated. In PSA levels > 10 ng/ml curative therapy can only performed in 15-44% of the cases. PSA and DRE examination should be performed between the age of 50 and 70 years when life expectancy exceeds ten years. In case of familiar history the case finding has to start at the age of 45. There is no support for the common opinion that early detection finds clinically insignificant cancer since autoptical prevalence of prostate cancer is about 40% and early detection discover only 3-4%. Results about the usefulness of active screening in a population will be available in 2005.


Transneuronal transport of neurotropic viruses is a useful tool for morphological analysis of the organization of multisynaptic neuronal pathways. Rabies virus is known to label neurons transsynaptically in a retrograde direction. Here, we examined the input systems of the primary motor cortex with respect to the somatotopic arrangement. Rabies virus was injected into the hindlimb, proximal forelimb, distal forelimb, and orofacial regions of the primary motor cortex in macaques, and the distribution patterns of neuronal labeling were analyzed in the prefrontal cortex, basal ganglia, and cerebellum. Four days after the injections, third-order neuron labeling was observed in various regions of the prefrontal cortex. After the viral injection into the proximal forelimb (shoulder, elbow) region, neuronal labeling was noted primarily in the dorsal region of the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex; on the other hand, after the viral injection into the distal forelimb (wrist, digits) region, neuronal labeling was preferentially distributed in the ventral region, with the highest density in the ventrolateral convexity. In the case of the orofacial injection, prefrontal neuron labeling was predominant not only in the ventrolateral convexity but also in the orbitofrontal cortex. However, the hindlimb injection resulted in relatively sparse neuron labeling as predominantly involving the neurons in the medial prefrontal cortex. With the 4-day postinjection period, neuronal labeling was noted in the striatum retrogradely via the motor cortico-basal ganglia loop. Two distinct sets of striatal neurons were labeled: one in the dorsal putamen and the other in the ventral striatum (ventromedial putamen and nucleus accumbens). The dorsal striatal labeling was somatotopically arranged, indicating that the hindlimb, orofacial, or forelimb region was located in the dorsal, ventral, or intermediate zone of the putamen, respectively. The distribution pattern of the ventral striatal labeling was essentially the same regardless of body part representation. Likewise, Purkinje cells of the cerebellar cortex were also labeled in a somatotopic fashion. Neuronal labeling from the forelimb representation was observed mainly in lobules III-VI and crus I. The proximal forelimb labeling was both rostral and lateral to the distal forelimb labeling. Yet, the hindlimb labeling was located both rostral and lateral to the proximal forelimb labeling.


ABSTRACT Background: Synedrella nodiflora (L.) Gaertn. (Asteraceae), a native Ghanaian shrub, has been used for the treatment of epilepsy, hiccup and threatened abortion. The present study aimed at investigating the possible mechanisms of antioxidant effects of the hydro-ethanolic extract of the whole plant.Methods: Total phenolic content was determined using the Folin- Ciocalteau assay and the antioxidant capacity by the phosphomolybdenum method. The antioxidant activity was evaluated by the 1, 1-diphenyl-2-picryl-hydrazyl (DPPH) scavenging assays, reducing power assay and inhibition of linoleic acid peroxidation and lipid peroxidation in pentylenetetrazole (PTZ)- kindled rat brains. Results: The extract (0.1-3.0 mg ml- 1) was found to contain phenolic compounds which could be responsible for the antioxidant properties since the coefficient of correlation between the Total Phenolic Content (TPC) and the Total Antioxidant Capacity (TAC) was high (r2 = 0.9908). Both n-propyl gallate (0.001-0.03 mg ml- 1), a reference antioxidant and the extract (0.1-3 mg ml- 1) exhibited antioxidant properties by reducing Fe3 + to Fe2 + in the reducing power test, scavenged DPPH free radicals and effectively inhibited linoleic acid autoxidation and also inhibited lipid peroxidation in PTZ-kindled rat brains. Conclusions: These findings suggest that hydro-ethanolic extract of Synedrella nodiflora contains antioxidant principles which may contribute to its traditional use in epilepsy management.


It is argued that ports are playing a crucial role in developing nations' economy. Still, solutions to improving port service quality (PSQ) to boost ports' competitive capacity is questionable. Hence, this study aims to investigate port service quality (PSQ) by using integration of the extension Fuzzy Analytic Hierarchy Process and Importance-Performance Analysis (IPA) from port users' perspectives. From the relevant literature and expert interview, the hierarchical structure of PSQ embracing six dimensions with 29 criteria was first established. To test the research model, the Dong Nai port joint stock company (DNPC) and their port-service users were empirically investigated. It is found that: (1) the importance degree of dimensions is ranked as follow: empathy (21.07%), tangibles (20.15%), assurance (15.97%), reliability (15.54%), responsiveness (12.53%), diversity (14.74%); (2) for criteria of PSQ, top five criteria concerned by shipping companies and ocean freight forwarders comprise: "proactive provision of vessel schedules", "cargo handling facilities and equipment", "detailed schedule", "accuracy and consistency of schedules", and "geographical location"; (3) there are four service attributes (SAs) needing to prioritize for improvement, including "perfect transportation of cargos", "ability in dealing with cargo damage", "willingness in helping customers", "provision of special cargo-related services". The practical policy is that port authorities should transfer the limited resources from SAs in Quadrant IV to Quadrant II to enhance the PSQ.


A polishing machine adopting a new unique structural mechanism has been developed, named as a swing-arm type polishing machine. The mechanism is such that the tool path tracks on a spherical surface, of which the diameter is adjusted by setting lip the machine mechanism properly. It has a strong benefit especially for polishing axis-symmetric concave mirror surfaces. The swing-arm type polishing machine with 5-axes has been designed in order to polish a concave mirror surface lip to diameter of 2 meters. The drawings are made using 3D CAD and strain-stress analysis has been done by finite element method. AC servo-motor has been used to move the swing arm and a operating software has been developed using a LapVIEW tool. Result of the test run was satisfactory which convinces the usefulness of the swing-arm type polishing machine.


Traumatic intracranial aneurysms (TICA) are rare in occurrence, constituting less than 1% of the total cases of intracranial aneurysms. Cervical posttraumatic aneurysms arising from major blood vessels supplying the brain are also extremely rare. Their variable locations, morphological variations and the presence of concomitant head injury makes their diagnosis and treatment a challenge. In this review, we discuss the epidemiology, etiology, classification and management issues related to TICA as well as traumatic neck aneurysms and review the pertinent literature.


The Kenyan Vision 2030 envisages a vibrant SME sector as one of the key sectors meant to make the economy industrialized by the year 2030. However, the SME sector has recorded poor performance in the past. Because most SMEs expand naturally and in accordance with the initial entrepreneur's vision, many enterprises in this sector are run in a haphazard manner. Some organizations lack suitable structures and management processes, while in others, the original director is in charge of everything, from cash receipts, banking, and withdrawals, to more complex entrepreneurial responsibilities. Therefore, this study examined how operational strategies influence small and medium enterprises' performance in Nairobi City County, Kenya. The study specifically sought to examine the influence of supply chain strategy, product development strategy, process design strategy and customer focus strategy. The study was guided by Balance score card model, resource-based view theory, quality management theory and Ansoff Matrix theory. This study adopted a descriptive research design. The study population was SMEs based within the Nairobi City County. The number of SMEs directly targeted was 94. A census of 94 respondents was carried out. This is because the population for each category of the respondents was small. A structured questionnaire was used as a data collection tool to all the respondents. A questionnaire was piloted on 20 respondents to make sure that any error or missing item in it is identified and addressed so as to make sure they are valid and reliable. Validity was assessed using construct and content validity tests. Reliability was assessed with the use of Cronbach's alpha coefficient. Quantitative data was analyzed using descriptive statistics such as mean and standard deviation and presented in tables, and figures. In addition, the study conducted inferential statistics that involved correlation analysis and multiple regression analysis to test the relationship between independent variables and dependent variable. The study found that supply chain strategy, product development strategy, process design strategy and customer focus strategy had a significant positive influence on the performance of Small and Medium Enterprises in Nairobi City County, Kenya. The study concluded that effective supply chain strategy leads to better collaboration with suppliers, better control quality and improved risk mitigation. Designing processes allows businesses to identify inefficient workflows, structures, and systems, re-design them based on current business needs, and implement the modified processes promptly to improve results. Product development strategy provides an ideal framework for creating new products or improving the performance, cost or quality of existing products. Customer focus strategy leads to improved sales, reduce the cost to serve, increase satisfaction and improve their operational efficiency. The study recommended that the management of Small and Medium Enterprises in Nairobi City County, Kenya should aim to efficiently and effectively implement lean supply chain strategy. In order to increase sales of their products, improve market position, boost customer loyalty, SMEs should generate insights that drive innovation and design user-centered products. When opening a new branch or department, business owners and managers need to understand what process design is, what its objectives are, and how it can improve the performance of their companies. The SMEs should put customer focus values at the heart of their culture that unite employees under common goals even roles that do not have day-to-day customer interactions.


Successful treatment of lymphoma represents a major achievement of modern medicine. At diagnosis, the major emphasis is placed properly on achieving durable remission. Once treatment has been successful, however, the emphasis must shift to helping the patient resume a normal and productive life. The primary care physician will probably be responsible for the long-term care of these patients. He or she should be alert to the possible disease- and therapy-induced problems such patients face (even years after treatment), especially those common problems in which informed intervention is most effective. The approach summarized here can be readily integrated with normal health surveillance measures but should be modified to suit the individual patient and supplemented as new information appears. Use of these guidelines may help the cured lymphoma patient realize maximum benefit from difficult but lifesaving therapy.


In the paper, the mature newborns of women over 40 were compared to the mature ones of young mothers. The babies were born in the Institute of Gynecology and Obstetrics in Lódź, in the years 1997-1998, and the comparison was done by the analysis of some neonatal parameters. The newborns of older women were delivered by cesarean section mainly. The birth weights average of the index babies was lower than the birth weights average of the controlled ones. Some clinical parameters in both analysed groups were similar. The most important difference concerned the congenital malformations and intrauterine hypotrophy--these disorders were clearly more frequent among the newborns of older mothers.


Present study is focused on improving heat transfer from a porous plate by cooling of air with transpiration cooling. Effects of Reynolds number of the air channel flow and particle diameter on cooling effectiveness of porous plate and efficiency of system were investigated experimentally. It was observed that increasing Reynolds number of 15.2% causes a decrease of 6.9% on cooling efficiency of the system and a decrease of 8.6% on cooling effectiveness of porous plate. Decreasing particle diameter causes a significant decrease on surface temperature and an increase on cooling effectiveness of porous plate. Difference of cooling effectiveness of porous plate from dp = 40-200 ?m is 12%. Verification of this study was also shown by comparing experimental results of this study with literature.


Vehicle-to-Pedestrian (V2P) communication using wireless LAN (Local Area Network) has issues. Fast Device Discovery is one of them. In this paper, we proposed two novel methods to solve this issue. The methods are Collective Scanning and Collective Scanning + Extension Receiving. Collective Scanning improves the scanning time by a vehicle which operates in one channel receives responses from all pedestrians which operate in available channels. Collective Scanning + Extension Receiving, is an extension method of Collective Scanning, improves the scanning time and prevents the detection leakage of pedestrians by a vehicle that extends waiting of responses depending on the number of responses from pedestrians. We evaluated two proposal methods compared with conventional Active Scanning of IEEE 802.11 about the scanning time and the detection rate of pedestrians using Network Simulator-3 (NS-3). In the result, by Collective Scanning, the scanning time improved 24.51 millisecond (ms) from 114.74 ms with the same detection rate in the environment that has one vehicle and within 50 pedestrians when comparing with Active Scanning of IEEE 802.11. By Collective Scanning + Extension Receiving, the scanning time improved 42.52 ms from 114.65 ms with the same detection rate in the environment that has one vehicle and more than 50 pedestrians when comparing with Active Scanning of IEEE 802.11.


REVOLUTIONARY WOMANHOOD: FEMINISM, MODERNITY AND THE STATE IN NASSER'S EGPYT Laura Bier Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2011 "The woman question" in its various articulations and cultural expressions has historically been bound up with notions of national identity and nationalism. Through developing and unpacking the concept of state feminism Laura Bier grappled with the complex and contradictory discourses that shaped hegemonic notions of womanhood in the Nasser era. Drawing upon policy studies, political speeches, women's press, film, and literature the study was grounded in a cultural history, and fleshed out the connections between the construction of national womanhood and the conceptual framing of revolution. In short, the primary focus of the study was the relation between the construction of feminine identity and the modern nation-state. State feminism is the central point of analysis, which was then explored through a descriptive problematizing of four themes: the ideological framing of working women, secularism and law, family planning and reproduction, and international feminism. As a category for inquiry state feminism was located in the Nasser regime's modernizing project, but had its historical roots in the earlier period of colonial control. As such, state feminism was framed by the interlocking discourses of modernity, inclusion, and political participation, which were then set against traditional modes of social organization. State feminism, then, must be understood as a constellation of practices and ideologies that aimed to transform women into modern political subjects. Thus, for Bier state feminism was at its core a didactic project. Noting that the Nasser regime did not significantly transform the number of women in the workforce, Bier put forth the argument that the discursively constructed figure of the working woman played an important role in the articulation of the public sphere as modern and secular. The reconfiguring of the public sphere also shaped images of the home around a bourgeois model of domesticity. As such, the image of working women as a sign of modernity did little to destabilize the patriarchal organization of domestic labour. In fact, Bier gave extensive examples of state policies and incentives that were designed to create the conditions for women to access the tools of modern living, thereby creating a prescriptive model of femininity that drew upon imagery of both domesticity and professionalism. Policies that dealt specifically with the family drew multiple conflicting perspectives into the public debate, which then had adverse outcomes for women generally and working class women in particular. …


Geoelectric investigations of the subsurface structures of parts of the Gidan Kwano campus Federal University of Technology (F.U.T) Minna, Nigeria were carried out using vertical electrical soundings technique. The area lies within the Pre-Cambian Basement Complex of Northern Nigeria. This study was carried out with the aim of determining subsurface structures of the area for groundwater potentials and to possibly locate those areas that could be useful for civil engineering work at a very low risk. Thirty-six vertical electrical soundings along six profiles (A-F) were carried out during the geophysical survey. The survey was carried out on grid 500m x500m.  The data obtained were interpreted using computer based program named Zohdy. The result of the interpreted vertical electrical soundings (VES) curves reveals three distinct geo-electric curves types were delineated: K, H and HK-curves with H-type having the most prolific aquifer. The result also shows 3 geo-electric layers which were confirm by borehole lithology. The aquifers in the study area are likely to be found in the fractured basement layers of eastern and southeastern parts of the study area. The civil engineering work can be sited in the northern and southwestern parts of the study area which are the region of shallow basement.


The Maasai produced a variety of commercial handicrafts (mats, belts bangles, necklaces, earrings and key-holders) with the beads being the predominant material. The stakeholders were community based organizations (CBOs), Maasai rural training centre (MRTC) and the government. CBOs and MRTC supplied their members with materials, organized meetings, trainings and seminars, marketed products and paid their members wages. The government was responsible for registration of CBOs, provision of permits for meetings and seminars, and marketing of handicrafts through the Ministry of Trade. Income from commercial handicraft is very little; however it is used to finance various livelihood aspects like education, health-care, housing, and provision of food. The commercial handicrafts also have promoted cultural heritage among the Maasai as well as Kenya's international recognition. Thus, the commercial handicrafts are a livelihood option for the Maasai but it face the hurdles of individualized production systems that are subjects of external exploitation, inadequate capital, unreliable markets and lack of government policy to direct the commercial handicrafts trade.


Provenance and paleocurrent data from synorogenic fluvial sandstones can be used to constrain theories about the timing and structural style of Laramide foreland uplifts and associated basins. The Green River basin of southwestern Wyoming is a large ellipsoidal basin bounded by uplifts with diverse orientations and basement rock compositions. Sandstone from the main body of the Eocene Wasatch Formation in the Green River basin was sampled along the south and west flanks of the Rock Springs uplift. Petrographic examination and paleocurrent measurements reveal two main facies. The first facies is rich in feldspar and metamorphic rock fragments derived from the Wind River Mountains to the north. The second facies is dominated by quartz and sedimentary rock fragments, reflecting a source in the Uinta Mountains to the south. Distribution of these facies indicates that a sediment lobe extends 15 km into the basin from the Uinta Mountains. Another sediment lobe originates from the Wind River Mountains and extends approximately 100 km south into the basin. This pattern suggests that the topographic axis of the depositional basin was an east-west-trending trough about 15 km north of the Uinta Mountains. The position of the basin axis is inferred to reflect greater subsidence nearmore » the Uinta Mountains. The asymmetric distribution of the two facies of the Wasatch Formation thus supports the model of basin subsidence caused by thrust-loading and indicates the Uinta Mountains were the dominant active thrust block bounding the Green River basin during the early Eocene.« less


Summary.  Activated protein C (APC) serves as an 'on demand' anticoagulant. Defects in the APC anticoagulant pathway are underlying risk factors for the development of venous and arterial thrombosis. APC has recently been shown to significantly reduce mortality in patients with severe sepsis, presumably by virtue of its ability to down‐regulate coagulation as well as inflammation. Our objective was to develop an assay that, for the first time, permits rapid detection of plasma APC. This assay will expedite studies of APC in a variety of vascular disease states including sepsis, severe atherosclerosis, diabetes, and vasculitis. By generating a highly APC‐specific monoclonal antibody (HAPC 1555), we have developed an assay that, for the first time, allows rapid detection of plasma APC. The Kd measured for the interaction between APC and HAPC 1555 based on BIAcore studies and binding to immobilized HAPC on microtiter plates is 6.2 ± 0.9 and 8.8 ± 1.0 nmol L−1, respectively. The interaction between HAPC 1555 and APC is Ca2+‐dependent, with a Ca2+ concentration of 313 ± 48 µmol L−1 required for half maximal binding. HAPC 1555 interferes with APC‐mediated inactivation of factor (F)Va in the presence and absence of phospholipids, suggesting that HAPC 1555 binds to the FVa binding domain of APC. When HAPC 1555 was used in an APC enzyme capture assay, therapeutic APC levels could be measured in 1.5 h, and physiologic levels of APC could be detected between 3 and 19 h. APC levels were also shown to vary markedly in patients with severe sepsis. The rapidity of our APC assay makes APC detection in patients practical clinically. This assay will expedite studies of APC in a variety of vascular disease states including sepsis, severe atherosclerosis, diabetes, and vasculitis.


Addressing the ongoing controversy of overly aggressive high-frequency trading practices in financial markets, Kearns, Kulesza, and Nevmyvaka report the results of an extensive empirical study estimating the maximum possible profitability of such practices and arrive at figures that are surprisingly modest. Their findings highlight the tension between execution cost and trading horizon that is confronted by high-frequency traders. They provide a controlled and large-scale empirical perspective on the high-frequency debate that has heretofore been absent. The authors' study employs a number of novel empirical methods, including the simulation of an "omniscient" high-frequency trader who can see the future and act accordingly.


Intelligent Agent is being applied to User Interface Domain increasingly. This paper describes the features of user interface model based on the Agent, analyzes the principle and function of the model, view and controller in the model-view-controller( MVC) framework. The object-oriented model using MVC can improve design efficiency. In a broad sense, a practical system is given as an example to implement MVC model in our practical software design.


Given the static condition of the global economy marketers are cutting advertising budgets commensurate with dismal sales. It is a longstanding belief that utilizing a standardized advertising approach not only controls good ideas and provides for a consistent image but it also has the benefit of controlling expenses through economies of scale. With this in mind, the purpose of the study was to determine the degree of standardization or lack thereof in advertising strategies in the cosmetics and fragrances advertising industries in the United States and Hong Kong. The findings of this study sug-gest that there is a high level of standardization in the advertising for perfumes because Hong Kong belonged to the British for a long time and individuals' needs and desires for love and acceptance are the same irrespective of geography. On the other hand, only a moderate form of standardization was noted in the advertising for cosmetics. This may be attributed to the fact that different beauty concepts are held among different regions. Implications of the findings are also noted.


Endogenous clocks enable organisms to adapt their physiology and behavior to daily variation in environmental conditions. Metabolic processes in cyanobacteria to humans are effected by the circadian clock, and its dysregulation causes metabolic disorders. In mouse and Drosophila were shown that the circadian clock directs translation of factors involved in ribosome biogenesis and synchronizes protein synthesis. However, the role of clocks in Drosophila neurogenesis and the potential impact of clock impairment on neural circuit formation and function is less understood. Here we demonstrate that light stimuli or circadian clock causes a defect in neural stem cell growth and proliferation accompanied by reduced nucleolar size. Further, we define that light and clock independently affect the InR/TOR growth regulatory pathway due to the effect on regulators of protein biosynthesis. Altogether, these data suggest that alterations in growth regulatory pathways induced by light and clock are associated with impaired neural development.


We explore the sensitivity of Southern Ocean surface and deep ocean temperature and salinity biases in the FOCI coupled climate model to atmosphere-ocean coupling time step and to lateral diffusion in the ocean with the goal to reduce biases common to climate models. The reference simulation suffers from a warm bias at the sea surface which also extends down to the seafloor in the Southern Ocean and is accompanied by a too fresh surface, in particular along the Antarctic coast. Reducing the atmosphere-ocean coupling time step from 3 hours to 1 hour results in increased sea-ice production on the shelf and enhanced melting to the north which reduces the fresh bias of the shelf water while also strengthening the meridional density gradient favouring a stronger Antarctic Circumpolar Current (ACC). With the shorter coupling step we also find a stronger meridional overturning circulation with more upwelling and downwelling south and north of the ACC respectively, as well as a reduced warm bias at almost all depths. Tuning the lateral ocean mixing has only a small effect on the model biases, which contradicts previous studies using a similar model configuration. We note that the latitude of the surface westerly wind maximum has a northward bias in the reference simulation and that this bias is unchanged as the surface temperature and sea-ice biases are reduced in the coupled simulations. Hence, the surface wind biases over the Southern Hemisphere midlatitudes appear to be unrelated to biases in sea-surface conditions.


Introduction: Gestational Diabetes Mellitus (GDM) has public health importance far beyond its immediate effect on the mother and child. Pregnancy is a diabetogenic state and GDM is a major driver of the Type 2 diabetes epidemic. About 1% 3% of all pregnant women will show glucose intolerance. GDM is the most common metabolic complication that affects pregnant women. The frequency of GDM and its associated maternal, prenatal and long term morbidity emphasizes the importance of screening method. Aim: To study the role of 50 gm glucose challenge test for screening of gestational diabetes Method: Two hundred and fifty antenatal patients between 24-28 weeks of gestation were screened for gestational diabetes by 50 gm oral glucose challenge test. Comparison was made among normal patients and patients diagnosed with gestational diabetes regarding risk factors, clinical examination, routine and special investigations and pregnancy outcome Results: Out of 250 patients 150 had no risk factors while 100 had one or more risk factors. 10 patients (4%) were diagnosed as having gestational diabetes. 8 patients were detected at 24-28 weeks and 2 were detected from the risk factor group at 32-34 weeks. Conclusion: Universal screening of all pregnant patients during 24-28 weeks with glucose challenge test is simple, convenient, cheap and easy to organize instrument to identify women with GDM. In India we recommend universal screening of all pregnant women, as they have 11 fold increased risk of developing glucose intolerance during pregnancy compared to Caucasian women.


The modern Bulgarian mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) and Y-chromosome gene pools predominantly consist of Western Eurasian haplogroups. In contrast, the Eastern Eurasian lineages are found at very low frequencies in Bulgarians, being represented only by mtDNA haplogroups C (0.2%), D (0.4%) and Z (0.1%) (Karachanak et al., 2012) and Y-chromosome haplogroups C, N and Q (each 0.5%) (Karachanak et al., 2013). A similar pattern is observed in ancient mtDNA samples of proto-Bulgarian human remains, which belong exclusively to Western Eurasian mtDNA haplogroups (Nesheva et al., 2015). In order to investigate Bulgarian ancestry from the perspective of Eastern Eurasian haplogroups, we have analyzed the distribution of Y-chromosome haplogroups C, N and Q and mtDNA haplogroups C, D and Z across Eurasia. The survey was performed using literature data for more than 15,000 individuals from different Eurasian (sub-) populations for each of these haplogroups. The collected data were used to construct Eurasian frequency maps of the considered haplogroups and to test the significance of their incidence between Bulgarians and Europeans, European neighboring populations of Bulgaria and populations, which according to some historical conceptions could have common ancestry with proto-Bulgarians, namely: Altaian, Caucasus, Siberian and Central Asian populations. The spatial distribution of mtDNA haplogroups C, D and Z and Y-chromosome haplogroups C, N and Q contrasts their high frequency among Altaic populations and their occasional appearance in Bulgarians. Furthermore, the comparison of the occurrence of these haplogroups shows no link between Bulgarians and Altaic and Caucasus populations. Based on the substantial genetic input of proto-Bulgarians to the modern Bulgarian gene pool, the present study confirms the nonexistence of a close Y-chromosomal or mtDNA link between proto-Bulgarians on the one hand and Altaic and Caucasus populations on the other.


Private enforcement has long been a central part of US antitrust law experience, while it has played minor roles or none at all in European competition law systems. This contrast is fundamental to understanding differences between European and US competition law and to assessing the potential consequences of increasing the role of private enforcement of competition law in Europe. It is also central to decisions about competition law development in much of the world, because in this respect most competition law systems in the world resemble European competition laws rather than US antitrust law.In this essay, I examine the private enforcement of competition law in the US and Europe against the backdrop of efforts in Europe to rely more heavily on private enforcement in the enforcement of its competition law. As part of its so-called 'modernization' efforts, which went into effect on May 1, 2004, the European Commission seeks to reduce reliance on administrative authorities and to encourage those harmed by restraints on competition to bring private law suits in national courts. There is, however, widespread uncertainty about the prospects for successfully incorporating private litigation into European competition law systems. There is also uncertainty about which, if any, measures should be taken to enhance acceptance of private enforcement.This article provides a comparative perspective on these issues that can provide a more solid basis for making informed decisions in the area.


Kangaroo management is important to the sustainability of Australia's rangeland landscapes. The commercial harvest of kangaroos assists in reduction of total grazing pressure in the rangelands and provides the potential for supplementary income to pastoralists. Indeed, the commercial kangaroo industry is considered by natural resource scientists as one of the few rural industry development options with potential to provide economic return with minimal environmental impact. While the biology and population ecology of harvested kangaroo species in Australia is the subject of past and present research, the social, institutional and economic issues pertinent to the commercial kangaroo industry are not well understood. Our research is addressing the lack of understanding of social issues around kangaroo management, which are emerging as constraints on industry development. The non-indigenous stakeholders in kangaroo harvest are landholders, regional management authorities, government conservation and primary production agencies, meat processors, marketers and field processors (shooters) and these industry players generally have little understanding of what issues the commercial harvest of kangaroos presents to Aboriginal people. Consequently, the perspectives and aspirations of Aboriginal people regarding the commercial harvest of kangaroos are not well considered in management, industry development and planning. For Aboriginal people, kangaroos have subsistence, economic and cultural values and while these values and perspectives vary between language groups and individuals, there is potential to address indigenous issues by including Aboriginal people in various aspects of kangaroo management. This research also examines the Aboriginal interface with commercial kangaroo harvest, and by working with Aboriginal people and groups is exploring several options for greater industry involvement. The promotion of better understandings between indigenous and non-indigenous people with interests in kangaroo management could promote industry development through the marketing of kangaroo as not only clean and green, but also as a socially just product.


Few reports in the literature document acute taste disturbance following exposure to toxic chemicals. We describe the case of a 54-year-old man who presented with primary complaint of tongue numbness and persistent problems with taste 1.5 years following oral exposure to a commercial cleaning agent. A test of olfaction revealed normosmia for age and gender. Lingual tactile two-point discrimination testing showed reduced somatosensation. Taste threshold testing using a 3-drop method demonstrated severe hypogeusia, though the patient was able to discriminate tastants at lower concentrations with a whole mouth swish and spit test. We conclude that clinical evaluation of dysgeusia can be performed using a number of previously published testing methods, however, determining causative factors may be confounded by duration since exposure, lack of knowledge of baseline taste function, and medications. Although many testing options exist, basic taste testing can be performed with minimal expertise or specialized equipment, depending on the patient history and goals of evaluation.


Fibrosarcoma (FS) is a malignant proliferation of fibroblasts. Malignancies of fibroblasts are decidedly rare in the oral and oropharyngeal region, but FS is, nevertheless, the commonest mesenchymal cancer of the region, representing more than half of all sarcomas .This article reports a case of a seventy three-years old lady that reported to our clinic with FS affecting the maxilla. The objective of our study was to discuss the biological behavior of this tumour and treatment modalities. Clinical evaluation revealed a huge tumour involving the whole left maxilla. Radiographically the tumour involved both maxillary sinuses and the nose. Histologically, the Haematoxylin and Eosin (H&E) stained tissue sections revealed a poorly differentiated FS from the soft tissue of the maxilla. Surgery, which would entail a wide resection of bones of the region including the floor of the orbit and nasal bones, was thought to be incompatible with life and instead the patient was referred for palliative radiotherapy. The biological behavior of this tumour (locally destructive, late metastasis) enables our patient to contain that huge and extensive lesion to such an extreme age. As FS may metastasize to the lungs, liver and bones, follow-up of the patient with chest x-rays or CTScan would have been very important following surgery. The prognostic factors for FS depend on clinical stage, histological grade of malignancy, tumour location, local recurrences and incomplete resection if surgery contemplated. Taking into account that our case was of a poorly differentiated grade, coupled with the fact that the tumour was located at inaccessible site, factors that pointed to a poor prognosis. These factors affected the survival of the patient with FS. Key words : Fibrosarcoma, Craniofacial, Biological behaviour, Management.


Tranexamic acid (TXA) has been shown to reduce post-operative blood loss, but the dosage and method of administration remains controversial. The purpose of our study was to study the effectiveness of topical TXA in a cohort of patients (n=224) undergoing TKA by a single surgeon. Two groups of patients who received topical TXA were compared to patients who did not receive TXA. Patients that received topical TXA had the least early postoperative blood loss, with patients that received topical TXA with a tourniquet and a drain having the least. Patients receiving TXA required fewer transfusions than patients who did not receive TXA and there was no difference in the rate of symptomatic DVT/PE. Our results support the use of topical TXA during TKA.


Objectives: In this study, we aimed to compare modified Krauss polyacrylamide gradient gel electrophoresis (PAGGE) and high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) methods in classification, quantification, and separation of lipoproteins and determining low-density lipoprotein (LDL) size. Methods: Blood specimens were obtained from eightyseven volunteers. We measured LDL size using the PAGGE method and HPLC method with total cholesterol (TC) and triglyceride (TG) peaks. In the PAGGE method, Coomassie Brilliant Blue (CBB) staining was used instead of Sudan black staining, unlike the original method. The relationship between PAGGE and HPLC methods was evaluated by Pearson correlation test and Passing-Bablok regression analysis. Agreement between them was evaluated by Kappa analysis and Bland-Altman plots. Results: Statistically significant correlation was found between the LDL size with PAGGE and HPLC methods under the cholesterol curve (HPLC-TC) (r=0.924, p<0.001). Similarly, there was a statistically significant correlation between PAGGE and HPLC methods under the TG curve (HPLC-TG) (r=0.910, p<0.001). In the PAGGE method, within-day precision was found as 2% and between-day precision as 3%. It was determined agreement between HPLC-TC vs. HPLC-TG methods and HPLC-TG vs. PAGGE methods was higher than HPLC-TC vs. PAGGE (Kappa values; 0.68, 0.71, and 0.44, respectively). Conclusions: The PAGGEmethod can be a reliablemethod for measuring LDL size. HPLC method under cholesterol and triglyceride peaks may be used in clinical practice interchangeably, but clinical decision limits should be different. In addition, our study demonstrated that measurement methods for LDL size could be simplified with several modifications.