Transforming Growth Factor-beta (TGFβ) and activin A (actA) are members of the TGFβ superfamily with overlapping as well as distinct functions in many processes including regulation of inflammation and immunity. Similar to TGFβ, actA has been shown to promote the conversion of CD4+CD25- T cells into induced regulatory T cells (iTregs), and to potentiate iTregs generation by TGFβ. Many cancer cells produce actA, and we have recently found that levels of actA released in vitro by breast cancer cells are enhanced by radiotherapy (RT). Interestingly, prolonged exposure to TGFβ inhibitors also resulted in enhanced actA release, consistent with a compensatory mechanism described in development (Carvalho et al., J Cell Sci, 2007). Here we tested the hypothesis that actA plays a role in regulating anti-tumor immunity induced by local tumor RT and TGFβ blockade in vivo (Vanpouille-Box et al., Cancer Res 2015). 4T1 derivatives with conditional actA knockdown (4T1shActA) or non-silencing control (4T1shNS) were engineered using inducible doxycycline (DOX) plasmids and injected s.c. in BALB/c mice (day 0). ActA gene knockdown (KD) was induced by DOX at day 8. TGFβ neutralizing 1D11 or isotype control antibodies were given i.p. every other day starting on day 12. RT was delivered to the primary tumor in 6Gy fractions on five consecutive days starting at day 13. Mice were followed for tumor growth and survival or euthanized at day 22 or 28 for analysis. Consistent with in vitro data, ActA gene expression was upregulated at day 28 in 4T1 tumors of mice after prolonged TGFβ blockade by 1D11. Neither 1D11 nor ActA gene KD by themselves inhibited tumor growth. However, each intervention significantly improved tumor control achieved by RT. ActA KD in mice treated with RT+1D11 prevented tumor recurrence and improved survival (RT+1D11 vs RT+1D11+shActA p = 0.026; RT+shActA vs RT+1D11+shActA p = 0.0008). Interestingly, blockade of TGFβ or actA resulted in increased intratumoral Tregs (Control: 11.6%; 1D11: 26.2%, shActA: 21%) and markedly enhanced the increase in Tregs seen with RT alone (RT: 15.7%; RT+1D11: 27.5%; RT+shActA: 30.3%). In marked contrast, when both TGFβ and actA were inhibited Tregs significantly decreased in both non-irradiated (1D11+shActA: 13.6%) and irradiated tumors (RT+1D11+shActA: 7.9% of Tregs). IFNγ production by CD8+ T cells in response to the tumor-specific AH1 peptide was significantly higher in RT+1D11+shActA treated mice compared to RT+1D11 (p = 0.045) and RT+shActA (p = 0.0147). Additionally, in RT+1D11+shActA mice expression of the activation marker CD69 was markedly increased in intra-tumoral CD8+ PD-1+ T cells (MFI Control: 187; 1D11: 139.5; shActA: 162; 1D11+shActA: 111; RT: 138.5; RT+1D11: 379; RT+shActA: 182; RT+1D11+shActA: 498.5). Overall, data indicate that TGFβ and actA regulate Tregs numbers in tumors and show a complex interaction with RT. Combined blockade of TGFβ and actA during RT may be required to improve in situ vaccination by RT. Citation Format: Claire I. Vanpouille-Box, Silvia C. Formenti, Sandra Demaria. Regulation of radiation-induced in situ tumor vaccination by TGFβ superfamily members. [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the 107th Annual Meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research; 2016 Apr 16-20; New Orleans, LA. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2016;76(14 Suppl):Abstract nr 4986.


Cases and Stories of Transformative Action Research builds on its companion book, Principles and Methods of Transformative Action Research, by describing and analyzing dozens of examples of successful action research efforts pursued in the past five decades by students and faculty of the Western Institute for Social Research.Some projects are large-scale, and some are modest interventions in the everyday lives of those participating. Some are formal organizational efforts;others are the results of individual or small group initiatives. Included are chapters on community needs assessments and innovative grassroots approaches to program evaluation;the challenges of improving our decision-making during the crisis of the COVID-19 pandemic;strategies of intellectual activism in addressing the growing problem of workplace bullying;action research to preserve and share the history of the Omaha tribe;and plans for an innovative school-based project based on collaborative action-and-inquiry between students and Artificial Intelligence. In addition, there are a number of detailed stories about the use of transformative action research in such areas as somatic and trauma counseling, ethnic studies, health disparities, gender differences, grassroots popular education, and the improvement of statewide steps for preventing child abuse, among many others.This book can serve as an undergraduate or graduate social sciences text on research methods. It is also a guidebook for action-oriented research by academics, professionals, and lay people alike. © 2021 John A. Bilorusky


. Abstract The continuously increasing number of Wireless Fidelity (WiFi) access points have resulted in increased congestion in already congested indoor networks. In recent years, Light Fidelity (LiFi) has presented itself as upcoming access technology to complement WiFi owing to its vast spectrum, high data rates, and secrecy. Infrared (IR) is widely adopted in the uplink of LiFi-based systems. Due to the limited availability of energy in the Internet of Things (IoT) nodes, energy efficiency is vital. This paper presents a client-based adaptive IR uplink transmit power algorithm to enhance energy effi-ciency while satisfying the data rate requirement of IoT nodes. With hardware-based experimentation with LZ1 IR-LED and Heidi lens, the need for such an adaptive transmit power mechanism is first demonstrated. Simulation-based evaluation is then performed, showing that the proposed algorithm outperforms random and fixed uplink optical powers in terms of energy efficiency and satisfaction of data rate requirements of IoT nodes. The results clearly show the need for hardware design of IR-based IoT nodes with integrated adaptive uplink transmit power algorithms for LiFi IoT networks.


A new calcium chloride mediated C–F bond cleavage in electron deficient fluoroarenes followed by functionalisation via C–Se/Te bond formation has been achieved in the absence of any additive/ligand/organometallic reagent. A series of functionalised organo-selenides and -tellurides were obtained in high yields by this procedure. The precise role of calcium and the possible mechanism have been proposed based on DFT analysis.


High-quality data on average specific and absolute emissions from agricultural tractors are needed in calculations of environmental loads caused by different food production techniques and agricultural strategies, but the standards used to calculate these data are not adapted to agricultural conditions. Correct data on typical average engine loads are also important when optimizing engine control systems. The purpose of this work was to calculate average specific emission values in g k Wh -1 and average absolute emission values in g h -1 for a 70 kW tractor using different methodologies and to compare the results. The results show that the average specific hydrocarbon (HC) and carbon monoxide (CO) emissions calculated by European and international standards are lower than the specific emissions calculated from the average use of a 70 kW tractor, especially for tractors partly used for low-load operations and front loading. When studying the absolute amount of emissions, the results instead show that nitrogen oxide (NO x ) emissions are overestimated if calculated according to the standards. The study also indicates that results calculated according to a non-standardized five-point test cycle developed in Germany are more representative for all-round use of tractors in the 50-75 kW range than results from European and international standards. Further, the results show that it is not possible to design one set of weighting factors that gives representative results for all types of agricultural tractors and work operations.


To promote the performance of perovskite solar cells (PSCs), its theoretical power conversion efficiency (PCE) and high stability, elaborative defect passivation, and interfacial engineering at the molecular level are required to regulate the optoelectric properties and charge transporting process at the perovskite/hole transport layer (HTL) interfaces. Herein, we introduce for the first time a multifunctional dipole polymer poly(2-ethyl-2-oxazoline) (PEOz) between the perovskite and Spiro-OMeTAD HTL in planar n-i-p PSCs, which advances the PSCs toward both high efficiency and excellent stability by stimulating three beneficial effects. First, the ether–oxygen unshared electron pairs in PEOz chemically react with unsaturated Pb2+ on the perovskite surfaces by forming a strong Pb–O bond, which effectively reduces the uncoordinated defects on the perovskite surfaces and enhances the absorption ability of the resulting PSCs. Second, the dipole induced by PEOz at the perovskite/HTL interface can decrease the HOMO and LUMO level of Spiro-OMeTAD and optimize the band alignment between these layers, thereby suppressing the interfacial recombination and accelerating the hole transport/extraction ability in the cell. Third, the hygroscopic PEOz thin film can protect perovskite film from water erosion by absorbing the water molecules before perovskite does. Finally, the PEOz-modified PSC exhibits an optimized PCE of 21.86%, with a high short-circuit current density (Jsc) of 24.88 mA/cm2, a fill factor (FF) of 0.79, and an open-circuit voltage (Voc) of 1.11 V. The unencapsulated devices also deliver excellent operation stability over 300 h in an ambient atmosphere with a humidity of 30~40% and more than 10 h under thermal stress.


In a total of 303 cases the diagnosis of epidemic encephalitis was made at the Boston Psychopathic Hospital up to the end of 1934. Only 7 patients had the first symptoms prior to 1917; 25 had the acute attack after the end of 1926. The remaining 271 patients had the first symptoms in the epidemic years from 1917 to 1926 and were arbitrarily selected for this report. As a result of this investigation, 5 of the 271 patients were found to have been suffering from conditions other than epidemic encephalitis, namely cerebral syphilis, Sydenham's chorea, alcoholism and tumor of the brain, and were excluded. Of the total of 266 patients, information was obtained concerning the present condition of 240. Seventy-eight of these were admitted to the hospital within the first three months after the onset of symptoms. The remainder, or 162 patients, were afflicted with sequelae or were in a


Modification of the crystallization kinetics of amorphous systems is an important topic, in particular in the area of drug delivery. Herein, we studied the impact of polyhydroxybutyrate (PHB), a biocompatible polymer with a low glass transition temperature (Tg), on crystal growth rates from the supercooled liquid phase of a variety of organic compounds. Low levels of PHB were mixed with the supercooled liquid and growth rates were monitored using optical microscopy at several temperatures above the Tg of the mixture. Growth rates were determined from a plot of crystal size as a function of time. It was found that PHB inhibited the growth of low Tg compounds, while accelerated crystal growth was observed for compounds that had a much higher Tg (>50 °C) than the polymer. The observations were rationalized based on the extent of mobility differences between the crystallizing compound and the polymer. This is the first reported example of a polymer having compound specific inhibitory or accelerator effects on crystal growth.


What determines how contact with the out-group affects behavior? We show experimentally that casual interethnic contact in a postconflict society can increase ethnic bias. Day laborers in Kabul, Afghanistan, were equally altruistic toward their in-group and their out-group when out-group members were not physically present. When out-group members were physically present in an environment where no guidance for interaction or explicit incentives for cooperation were given, out-group altruism was decreasing in time among those who did not speak the out-group's language, suggesting that this contact highlights differences in descent-based attributes and increases in-group identification. We provide evidence for a psychological mechanism leading to in-group bias in casual, everyday interactions in a postconflict society, with implications for studying the nature of ethnic bias in political and economic behavior. Results suggest that interethnic interaction does not automatically improve ethnic relationships, and attention should be paid to the conditions under which interaction occurs.


In the current epidemiological situation of COVID-19 in countries such as Italy, quantifying the contribution of asymptomatic infections to SARS-CoV-2 transmission is of crucial importance for pandemic control. We conducted a retrospective epidemiological study to characterize asymptomatic COVID-19 cases occurred in the Apulia region, Italy, during the first epidemic wave of COVID-19 outbreak.We analyzed data collected in a regional surveillance platform developed to manage the emergency through investigation and follow-up of cases and contacts, contact tracing, laboratory and clinical data collection. We included asymptomatic laboratory-confirmed cases defined as persons infected with SARS-CoV-2 who did not develop symptoms/clinical signs of the disease.Between February 29 and July 7, 2020, a total of 4,536 cases were diagnosed with COVID-19 among 193.757 tests performed. The group of persons with asymptomatic SARS-CoV-2 infection consisted of 903 cases; the asymptomatic proportion was 19.9% (95%CI: 18.8-21.1%); this decreased with increasing age (OR: 0.89, 95%CI: 0.83-0.96; p=0.001), in individuals with underlying comorbidities (OR: 0.55, 95%CI: 0.41-0.73; p<0.001), and males (OR: 0.69, 95%CI: 0.54-0.87; p=0.002). The median asymptomatic infectious period was 19 days (IQR: 14-31) and the cumulative proportion of persons with resolution of infection 14 days after the first positive PCR test was 74%.In Europe and globally, there is again an increase in the number of new cases, mainly asymptomatic. As the public health community debates the question of whether asymptomatic and late spreaders could sustain virus transmission in the communities, such cases present unique opportunities to gain insight into SARS-CoV-2 adaptation to human host.


With the continuous increase of embedded system hacking, the security of system booting and I/O port is facing new challenge. Aiming at solving these problems, two secure designs that can enhance the security performance of start-up process and I/O port access control of embedded Linux is presented in this paper. Integrating Linux kernel security mechanism and security storage function of TPM (Trusted Platform Module) efficiently, two mechanisms are provided to expand security services which are not only credible booting, but also I/O access control mechanism with the support of safe file system to strengthen the security protection of system sensitive data. Two designs are robust through hardware-based protection and underlying security support relying on TPM chip so as to resist the illegal invasion through the test of booting and I/O control.


Cognitive radio makes it possible for an unlicensed user to access a licensed spectrum opportunistically on the basis of non-interfering. In this paper, a novel version of list-coloring based channel allocation is proposed. The concept of priority is defined to guarantee the fairness of channel allocation. Moreover, the feed-back loop of call failing probability (CFP) is introduced to deepen the extent of fairness during channel allocation. It is shown by simulations that the proposed channel allocation strategies can achieve both substantial fairness gain and nice spectrum utilization as compared with the original list-coloring based channel allocation methods.


Mebendazole and I²-cyclodextrin molecular inclusion complexes and mebendazole solid dispersions with polyethylene glycol 6000 were prepared by solvent method in different mixing ratios to increase the rate and extent of dissolution and absorption of mebendazole for an effective chemotherapy of human echinococcosis. The enhancement of dissolution of mebendazole was dependent on the carriers used and the nature of presentation of mebendazole in the carriers (physical mixturelsolid dispersion/molecular inclusion). The differential scanning calorimetry indicated the solid inclusion complex formation of mebendazole and I²-cyclodextrin at 1:2 molar ratio and mebendazole-polyethylene glycol solid dispersion at 1:4 weight ratio. Stability study reported a significant decline in the potency of mebendazole in all mebendazole-polyethylene glycol solid dispersions. Dissolution rate and dissolution efficiency of mebendazole were improved by both molecular inclusion complexes and solid dispersions of all mixing ratios than the corresponding physical mixtures and pure drug, 1:2 mebendazole-I²cyclodextrin showing the highest dissolution among all the preparations. As mebendazole has been reported to undergo extensive first pass metabolism, also a single dose plasma level bioavailability study in rabbits was conducted to confirm the bioavailability performance of mebendazole from the 1:2 mebendazole-I²cyclodextrin complex. In the study, not only a statistically significant (p<0.05), but also a great improvement in bioavailability of mebendazole was achieved with 1:2 mebendazole-I²cyclodextrin complex as compared to its physical mixture. Bioequivalency study was also performed for 1:0.5 mebendazole- bcyclodextrin complex and 1:4 mebendazole-polyethylene glycol solid dispersion (which were equivalent to each other in dissolution behavior) and this study showed a result opposite to what was expected on the basis of their in vitro drug release profiles. The reported risks in the use of cyclodextrins and the observed stability problem associated with mebendazole-polyethylene glycol solid dispersions were considered in deciding a choice for the treatment of human echinococcosis.


Abstract Purpose: To develop a predictive model to inform the probability of lower limb prosthesis users' functional potential for ambulation. Materials and Methods: A retrospective analysis of a database of outcomes for 2770 lower limb prosthesis users was used to inform a classification and regression tree analysis. Gender, age, height, weight, body mass index adjusted for amputation, amputation level, cause of amputation, comorbid health status and functional mobility score [Prosthetic Limb Users Survey of Mobility (PLUS-M™)] were entered as potential predictive variables. Patient K-Level was used to assign dependent variable status as unlimited community ambulator (i.e., K3 or K4) or limited community/household ambulator (i.e., K1 or K2). The classification tree was initially trained from 20% of the sample and subsequently tested with the remaining sample. Results: A classification tree was successfully developed, able to accurately classify 87.4% of individuals within the model's training group (standard error 1.4%), and 81.6% within the model's testing group (standard error 0.82%). Age, PLUS-M™ T-score, cause of amputation and body weight were retained within the tree logic. Conclusions: The resultant classification tree has the ability to provide members of the clinical care team with predictive probabilities of a patient's functional potential to help assist care decisions. Implications for Rehabilitation Classification and regression tree analysis is a simple analytical tool that can be used to provide simple predictive models for patients with a lower limb prosthesis. The resultant classification tree had an 81.6% (standard error 0.82%) accuracy predicting functional potential as an unlimited community ambulator (i.e., K3 or K4) or limited community/ household ambulator (i.e., K1 or K2) in an unknown group of 2770 lower limb prosthesis users. The resultant classification tree can assist with the rehabilitation team's care planning providing probabilities of functional potential for the lower limb prosthesis user.


This study (N = 216) measured the strength of endorsements for ingroup leaders who varied in both their relative ingroup prototypicality and distributive intergroup fairness. Leadership endorsement overall was positively related to group members' levels of social identification and negatively related to their levels of reported self-interest. Among low identifiers, however, leaders' distributive behavior reliably predicted endorsements, with stronger endorsements provided for distributively fair than unfair leaders. Among high identifiers, in contrast, both leaders' distributive behavior and relative ingroup prototypicality were important. Leaders high in ingroup prototypicality received strong endorsements from high identifiers regardless of the leaders' ingroup-favoring, outgroup-favoring, or fair intergroup behavior. Leaders low in ingroup prototypicality and who were relatively similar to the outgroup received strong endorsements from high identifiers only when the leaders made ingroup-favoring distributions. These data are interpreted within a social identity theory framework.


The inclusion complex is one way to enhance active substance solubility, affecting medicine dissolution and penetration. The inclusion complex is formed by utilizing b-cyclodextrin as the host of the active compounds. The Ibuprofen (2-(4-isobutyl-phenyl)propionate) is a propionate acid derivative and classified in class II of the Biopharmaceutic Classification System, which has low dissolutions and high permeability. This study aims to develop a nanogel containing ibuprofen-β-cyclodextrin inclusion complex with the ratio of 1:1, 1:2 and 2:1; and to compare the in-vitro diffusion profile with pure ibuprofen gel. The inclusion complex of ibuprofen-β-cyclodextrin was prepared using the coprecipitation method with the three molar comparison ratio of 1:1, 1:2, and 2:1. The in-vitro study was performed using the gel-based viscolam, comparing the three formulas of ibuprofen-β-cyclodextrin with pure ibuprofen gel. The ibuprofen concentration of each gel tested in the experiment was 1%. The particle size characterization of ibuprofen-β-cyclodextrin inclusion complex gel resulted in having nanoparticle size (510 nm). This characteristic indicates that the inclusion complex gel could enhance the cumulative release amount of ibuprofen compared with pure ibuprofen gel with a relatively smaller particle size (156 nm). Pure ibuprofen and inclusion complex powder size measured to be 763 nm and 957 nm, respectively. The ibuprofen-b-cyclodextrin inclusion complex gel with a molar ratio of 2:1 demonstrated an increase in in-vitro diffusion profile of ibuprofen with a cumulative release amount of 740.3 µg.cm -2 . Meanwhile, pure ibuprofen gel had the cumulative release amount of 294.74 µg.cm -2 . The gel containing ibuprofen-β-cyclodextrin inclusion complex could enhance the cumulative release amount of ibuprofen compared to pure ibuprofen gel. The ibuprofen-β-cyclodextrin inclusion complex gel at a ratio of 2:1 exhibited an increase in the diffusion of ibuprofen in-vitro .


Actinic keratosis (AK) is a common dermatologic condition in which hyperplastic epidermal lesions develop in response to excessive and chronic exposure to ultraviolet (UV) radiation. If left untreated, AK can progress to squamous cell carcinomas of the skin. Incidence is rising worldwide as a result of the progressive aging of populations and an increase in lifetime cumulative exposure to UV radiation. Currently, various treatment options exist, which range from topical medications to light-based therapies and procedural modalities. In this article, we will review the treatment options for AK with a focus on assessments of patient satisfaction with treatment.


This paper studies intersection and union type assignment for the calculus λµ˜ µ [6], a proofterm syntax for Gentzen's classical sequent calculus. We show that this notion is closed for subject-expansion, and show that it needs to be restricted to satisfy subject-reduction as well, even when limiting reduction to (confluent) call-by-name or call-by-value reduction, making it unsuitable to define a semantics.


Titanium carbide (TiC) thin films have been grown on Si (100) substrates using a pulsed neodymium: yttrium-aluminum-garnet (Nd:YAG) laser deposition method. X-ray diffraction (XRD) pattern of the TiC film shows that substrate temperature is one of the most important parameters in the fabrication of crystalline TiC film. Crystalline TiC films can be prepared at substrate temperatures above 500°C. Field emission scanning electron microscope (FE-SEM) indicates that the surface of the film is very smooth and pinhole-free.


Garden dill is a popular seasoning plant used in central Europe and Asia. It is characterized by a relatively long period of seeds germination, as well as, uneven emer- gence of seedlings. The aim of research, conducted in the years 2009-2010, was the as- sessment of the effect of selected emergence improving cultivation treatments on the ger- mination and growth of plants, as well as yield and chemical composition of dill. Two- factorial experiment was established according to randomized split-plot method, in three replications. The first factor involved post - sowing flat soil covering with the use of white polypropylene textile, transparent perforated foil, as well as 2 cm - thick sand layer and 5 cm layer of peat moss mixed with top layer of the soil. In control object post - sow- ing covering was not applied. The second factor consisted in irrigation. Results obtained in the experiment show that irrigation contributed to the increase in dill herb yield, on av- erage, by 21.4%. Among cultivation treatments applied, including flat covers and mulch- ing, the highest increase in yield was ensured by the use of polypropylene textile (86.8%). It was also shown that dill accumulated nitrates in its leaves only to a small extent. Both irrigation and introduction of flat covers from polypropylene textile and perforated foil, as well as mulching with sand and peat moss did significantly accelerate garden dill emer- gence.


Objective To examine cardiovascular disease (CVD) mortality burden attributable to ambient temperature; to estimate effect modification of this burden by gender, age and education level. Methods We obtained daily data on temperature and CVD mortality from 15 Chinese megacities during 2007–2013, including 1 936 116 CVD deaths. A quasi-Poisson regression combined with a distributed lag non-linear model was used to estimate the temperature-mortality association for each city. Then, a multivariate meta-analysis was used to derive the overall effect estimates of temperature at the national level. Attributable fraction of deaths were calculated for cold and heat (ie, temperature below and above minimum-mortality temperatures, MMTs), respectively. The MMT was defined as the specific temperature associated to the lowest mortality risk. Results The MMT varied from the 70th percentile to the 99th percentile of temperature in 15 cities, centring at 78 at the national level. In total, 17.1% (95% empirical CI 14.4% to 19.1%) of CVD mortality (330 352 deaths) was attributable to ambient temperature, with substantial differences among cities, from 10.1% in Shanghai to 23.7% in Guangzhou. Most of the attributable deaths were due to cold, with a fraction of 15.8% (13.1% to 17.9%) corresponding to 305 902 deaths, compared with 1.3% (1.0% to 1.6%) and 24 450 deaths for heat. Conclusions This study emphasises how cold weather is responsible for most part of the temperature-related CVD death burden. Our results may have important implications for the development of policies to reduce CVD mortality from extreme temperatures.


The problem of trust and reputation systems in social networks estimation's are considered.  The interval representation models of the trust are used for the uncertainty accounting. The method of determining trust/reputation in social networks is implemented as a sequence of actions: definition of the trust to provider is based on their reputation, subscriber's choice for interaction is made by criterion of maximum expected value of their utility function, then correction of the numerical estimation of trust and reputation of the selected subscriber is performed.


Total hip arthroplasty is a well established reconstruction technique for deteriorated hip functions. Canal fill ratio, which indicates stability of the stem implanted into the femoral bone, was proposed. However, almost of all the conventional methods were semi-automatic or manual segmentation of the stem, the cortex bone, and the cancellous bone, which can cause variation of the analysis result and wasting massive evaluation time. The canal fill of the stem should be evaluated in three-dimensionally in order to adapting to actual situation. The objective of this study is to propose an automated three-dimensional evaluation of canal fill ratio of the stem in CT image. The proposed method could automatically segment the stem, the cortex bone, and the cancellous bone. In addition, three-dimensional canal fill ratio was evaluated.


Brand valuation has taken great relevance within the companies. The reason is that it is constituted like an attribute more of the company. There is one characteristic that emphasizes over the rest: the difficulty to apply to objective criteria for its economic valuation. Although, it is a fact that consumers appreciate the brand of the products that they acquire. In the wine sector that is more evident. The objective of this work is to establish a methodology for the valuation of the capacity of Brand income generation. We apply that methodology to the two biggest Brands belonging to the Denomination of Origin Ribeiro: Vina Costeira and Vina Reboreda. We estimate therefore the value that each of them create for the propietary warehouses of its rights.


Abstract The transport and budget formulations developed for a translating system are used to study the mass and absolute angular momentum budgets of a Midwest cyclone. Using isentropic coordinates a mass circulation is isolated which transports angular momentum into the lower half of the tropospheric vortex and out of the upper half during the cyclone's development and maturation. The occlusion process, characterized by the vertical development of the cyclone vortex into the middle and upper troposphere, occurred through a redistribution of angular momentum by an upward transport of angular momentum associated with the diabatic release of latent heat and an upward redistribution by internal pressure torques.


The p53 gene and protein in 2005: new results, promising opportunities. The p53 gene is one of the most important genes which is involved in the regulation of cell division and tumor formation. The normal function of the p53 protein is to arrest the cell division and to turn the cell towards apoptosis in the case of cell stress and DNA damage, thereby to protect the integrity of the genome. Several p53 gene mutations that have function in carcinogenesis have been found in various tumors, including gastrointestinal carcinomas. The loss of p53 response plays an important role in the malignantly transformed cell proliferation. Promising experiments try to substitute the lost functions of the p53 gene. With their help new anti-tumor therapeutic methods should be developed.


We study the performance of policy gradient methods for the subclass of Markov games known as Markov potential games (MPGs), which extends the notion of normal-form potential games to the stateful setting and includes the important special case of the fully cooperative setting where the agents share an identical reward function. Our focus in this paper is to study the convergence of the policy gradient method for solving MPGs under softmax policy parameterization, both tabular and parameterized with general function approxima-tors such as neural networks. We first show the asymptotic convergence of this method to a Nash equilibrium of MPGs for tabular softmax policies. Second, we derive the finite-time performance of the policy gradient in two settings: 1) using the log-barrier regularization, and 2) using the natural policy gradient under the best-response dynamics (NPG-BR). Finally, extending the notion of price of anarchy (POA) and smoothness in normal-form games, we introduce the POA for MPGs and provide a POA bound for NPG-BR. To our knowledge, this is the first POA bound for solving MPGs. To support our theoretical results, we empirically compare the convergence rates and POA of exact and sample-based policy gradient variants for both tabular and neural softmax policies.


Knowledge of the internal magnetization distributions M(r) of polarizable media allows straightforward calculation of fields for any configuration which includes these media. Although useful calculations have been made using an assumed M(r) , little work directed at calculating M(r) has been done. This paper includes assumptions that, in addition to Maxwell's equations, are sufficient for determining the resultant integral equation. A method for the solution of this equation for M(r) is also presented. As an example, the nonuniform demagnetizing fields and magnetization distributions are calculated for cylinders of isotropic magnetic material. The results for these samples are compared with experimentally determined values and show average errors less than 9 percent for M(r) .


at the current state-of-the-art for of SCD significant limitations. ventricular fibrillation (VF) irreversible, immediate in metropolitan areas with emergency medical survival of out-of-hospital cardiac arrest SCD (ICDs), the of SCD. effective these must be cardiac arrest. of one of the major dilemmas in current SCD management: How to identify SCD victims before their


This study was designed to investigate the influence of electromagnetic radiation with a frequency 900 MHz pulse-modulated by frequencies 7, 16, 30 and 60 Hz on the neuronal interrelations. The irradiation decreased the values of interneuronal correlation and consequently the effectiveness of cortical synapses.


With the introduction of the Kinect as a gaming interfaces, its broad commercial accessibility and high quality depth sensor has attracted the attention not only from consumers but also from researchers in the robotics community. The active sensing technique of the Kinect produces robust depth maps for reliable human pose estimation. But for a broader range of applications in robotic perception, its active sensing approach fails under many operating conditions such like objects with specular and transparent surfaces. Recently, an initial study has shown that part of the arising problems can be alleviated by complimenting the active sensing scheme with passive, cross-modal stereo between the Kinect's rgb and ir camera. However, the method is troubled by interference from the IR projector that is required for the active depth sensing method. We investigate these issues and conduct a more detailed study of the physical characteristics of the sensors as well as propose a more general method that learns optimal filters for cross-modal stereo under projected patterns. Our approach improves results over the baseline in a point-cloud-based object segmentation task without modifications of the kinect hardware and despite the interference by the projector.


In this paper we propose an improved image segmentation model combining the region and edge information for inhomogeneous images. First, we define a new energy functional in a variational level set formulation based on the region information, including the local and global intensity fitting terms. Then we incorporate the edge information into the energy functional by adding a non-negative edge detector function to detect boundaries more easily. We apply a weight function to control the influence of the local and global intensity information dynamically. Therefore, the proposed model can segment more general images more accurately, including images with intensity inhomogeneity. Finally, the special structure of the newly defined energy functional ensures that we can apply the split Bregman method to minimize it much more efficiently. We have applied our model to synthetic and real images and numerical results have demonstrated the high efficiency of the improved model.


Volterra series is a powerful tool for black-box macro-modeling of nonlinear devices. However, the exponential complexity growth in storing and evaluating higher order Volterra kernels has limited so far its employment on complex practical applications. On the other hand, tensors are a higher order generalization of matrices that can naturally and efficiently capture multi-dimensional data. Significant computational savings can often be achieved when the appropriate low-rank tensor decomposition is available. In this paper we exploit a strong link between tensors and frequency-domain Volterra kernels in modeling nonlinear systems. Based on such link we have developed a technique called speedy tensor-aided Volterra-based electronic simulator (STAVES) utilizing high-order Volterra transfer functions for highly accurate time-domain simulation of nonlinear systems. The main computational tools in our approach are the canonical tensor decomposition and the inverse discrete Fourier transform. Examples demonstrate the efficiency of the proposed method in simulating some practical nonlinear circuit structures.


BACKGROUND
Major adverse cardiac and cerebrovascular events (MACCE) represent the most common cause of serious perioperative morbidity and mortality. Our aim was to identify risk factors for MACCE in a broad surgical population with intermediate-to-high surgery-specific risk and to build and validate a model to predict the risk of MACCE.

METHODS
A prospective, multicentre study of patients undergoing surgical procedures under general or regional anaesthesia in 23 hospitals. The main outcome was the occurrence of at least one perioperative MACCE, defined as any of the following complications from admittance to discharge: cardiac death, cerebrovascular death, non-fatal cardiac arrest, acute myocardial infarction, congestive heart failure, new cardiac arrhythmia, angina, or stroke. The MACCE predictive index was based on β-coefficients and validated in an external data set.

RESULTS
Of 3387 patients recruited, 146 (4.3%) developed at least one MACCE. The regression model identified seven independent risk factors for MACCE: history of coronary artery disease, history of chronic congestive heart failure, chronic kidney disease, history of cerebrovascular disease, preoperative abnormal ECG, intraoperative hypotension, and blood transfusion. The area under the receiver-operating characteristic curve was 75.9% (95% confidence interval, 71.2-80.6%).

CONCLUSIONS
The risk score based on seven objective and easily assessed factors can accurately predict MACCE occurrence after non-cardiac surgery in a population at intermediate-to-high surgery-specific risk.


The naphthalene derivative fluorescent probe F6 was synthesized and a 1 × 10−3 mol/L solution of Al3+ and other metals to be tested was prepared for the subsequent experiments. The Al3+ fluorescence system of the naphthalene derivative fluorescent probe F6 was successfully constructed as demonstrated by fluorescence emission spectroscopy. The optimal time, temperature and pH of the reaction were investigated. The selectivity and anti-interference ability of the probe F6 for Al3+ were investigated by fluorescence spectroscopy in a methanol solution. The experiments showed that the probe has high selectivity and anti-interference ability for Al3+. The binding ratio of F6 to Al3+ was 2:1, and the binding constant was calculated to be 1.598 × 105 M−1. The possible mechanism of the binding of the two was speculated. Different concentrations of Al3+ were added to Panax Quinquefolium and Paeoniae Radix Alba. The results showed that the recoveries of Al3+ were 99.75–100.56% and 98.67–99.67%, respectively. The detection limit was 8.73 × 10−8 mol/L. The experiments demonstrated that the formed fluorescence system can be successfully adapted for the determination of Al3+ content in two Chinese herbal medicines, which has good practical application.


BACKGROUND
The healthy aging index (HAI) was developed as a marker of health in multiple systems that can identify individuals who age most successfully.

METHODS
We calculated an HAI in 934 Framingham Offspring Study participants aged 60 or older at baseline. Heart rate and C-reactive protein (CRP) were added in modified versions of the HAI. Cox proportional hazard models were used to quantify the association of the HAI with mortality, cardiovascular disease (CVD), and cancer. We used fully conditional specification to multiply impute missing values for HAI components, increasing the sample size by 44%.

RESULTS
Over 10 years of follow-up, there were 138 deaths, 103 incident cases of CVD, and 138 incident cases of cancer. In models adjusted for age, sex, and behavioral risk factors, the HAI was associated with mortality (hazard ratio [HR] per unit of HAI 1.24, 95% confidence interval [CI] 1.13-1.36) and with CVD (HR 1.27, 95% CI 1.13-1.42), but not with cancer (HR 1.01, 95% CI 0.91-1.11) in observed (non-missing) data. In multivariable models further adjusting for prevalent diseases, results were slightly attenuated. When including heart rate and CRP, a modified HAI gave stronger associations. Results with imputed data are similar to results from complete case analyses.

CONCLUSIONS
In our large community-based sample, the HAI is a strong predictor of mortality and CVD. Other factors that are strongly associated with mortality, such as heart rate and CRP can improve the ability of the HAI to identify the healthiest older adults.


Summary Introduction: Rose grain aphid (Metopolophium dirhodum Walk.) is one of the most important pests on cereals in Poland. The economic importance of this pest has increased in recent years due to the increase in the area of maize cultivation. M. dirhodum is an oligophagic aphid feeding also on different rose species. Objective: The purpose of the present study was to evaluate the dynamics of population of M. dirhodum on the saltspray rose. Methods: The studies were conducted on saltspray rose stands at Aleksandria Park in Siedlce in 2005–2009. At each selected stand, 50 rose shoots were observed every 7 days from March to spring migration of the aphid. Results: First fundatrices of the M. dirhodum on the R. rugosa were observed at the end of March. The rose-grain aphid population development on the primary host during May, and reached maximum population in the middle of May. During autumn, the aphid backed for overwintering on the primary host. Conclusion: While the M. dirhodum population outbreaks, the aphid might be a serious pest of the saltspray rose.


Beer brewing is a biotechnological process whereby agricultural products such as barley and hops are converted to beer by control of biochemical reactions in malting, mashing and fermentation. Breweries produce significant amounts of solid and liquid wastes from the production process. About 200 g of brewery wet spent grains and 11 Litres of wastewater are discharged per Litre of beer produced. The spent grains are disposed in a wet state with 70 % - 80 % moisture content. In this state spent grains deteriorate fast and becomes mouldy within hours, and unless controlled and properly managed, cause problems to the environment. Because solid waste that comes from the brewery industry is mainly organic in nature and highly biodegradable, it is quite suitable for anaerobic digestion. The objective of this study was to ascertain possibility of treating brewery spent grains in the process of anaerobic digestion and it was achieved by carrying out a series of  experimental trials using spent grains as the feed substrate and varying process conditions in a high-rate digester unit. Study indicates that the anaerobic digestion of brewery spent grains could be accomplished with careful control of the process by adjusting certain parameters such as pH, temperature and volatile acid concentration. It could be further shown that the degradation of brewery solid waste generate substantial quantity of biogas with methane content around 65 % i.e. burnable gas. Experimental trials using high rate reactor showed that the maximum gas yield of brewery waste was 0.596 m 3 /kgVS added under mesophilic condition. This means very high degree of degradation with the substrate showing amenability to the anaerobic digestion process. The study thus indicates the potential for recycling of this waste stream as an energy stream back into beer production process.


This report describes the work done by Science Applications International Corporation to study the effects of energetic particles on the microstability of a high temperature tokamak. The effects of an energetic population on ballooning modes in a large aspect ratio, shifted circular flux surface tokamak equilibrium are investigated with the newly developed gryokinetic numerical technique. The gryokinetic equations for the background ion and electron, as well as that of the energetic population are solved directly as an initial problem. The energetic particles are modeled with a slow-down distribution in energy. It is found that the ballooning mode stability of the plasma with an energetic species of increasing concentration does not differ much from an increase in the background plasma beta, except for possible energetic particle drift resonances. This result is encouraging to the idea that energetic particles such as alphas may be used to stabilize the ballooning modes in a fusion reactor.


Background: The Arm Function in Multiple Sclerosis Questionnaire (AMSQ) has been developed to assess upper extremity function of patients with multiple sclerosis (MS). A minimal clinically important difference (MCID) value has not been determined yet. Objective: The objective of this study is to determine an MCID for AMSQ. Methods: We used the sensitivity- and specificity-based approach with dichotomized global perceived effect as an anchor. Results: The receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve yielded an optimal threshold value of 14.5 (sensitivity 0.68 and specificity 0.79). The area under the ROC curve value was 0.77. Conclusion: We identified an MCID of 15 points for the AMSQ (range 31–186).


This paper examines the core concepts and principles that underpin the participatory and decentralized approach to rural development using the Grassfield Participatory and Decentralized Rural Development Project (GPDERUDEP) in Cameroon as a case study. It describes how the local development fund (LDF) was used within GP-DERUDEP to shift resources and responsibilities for investment planning, contracting and implementation at the level of rural communities thus strengthening service provision, community and economic development. The paper posits that a critical appraisal of the mechanisms and structures of decentralization within the context of poverty alleviation strategies can provide clues in facing the challenges encountered in implementing projects in resource poor economies. The paper illustrates a framework that links social capital and community development to economic development outcomes. Data were obtained through project evaluations, field observations and focus group discussions with project stakeholders. The project provides an innovative approach to engage the state and local stakeholders in collective strategic decision-making in rural development. Project achievements are visible in socio-economic infrastructure and social capital but challenges persist in implementing decentralization policies due to entrenched top-down values and dependence on foreign donors to fund and sustain rural development programme in Cameroon. Keywords: Community Development, Decentralization, Participation, Grassfield Project, Local Development Fund


Hemoglobins D-Los Angeles (beta 121 Gln) and Aida (alpha 64 Asn) were encountered in an Asian Indian, unassociated with any clinical manifestations. These hemoglobins had normal oxygen affinities and were stable to heat and isopropanol. The ratio of alpha chain synthesis to beta chain synthesis was close to unity. The identical change in isoelectric points of the two variants produced an interesting electrophoretic pattern.


In high performance, computing concurrent applications are sharing the same file system. However, the bandwidth which provides access to the storage is limited. Therefore, too many I/O operations performed at the same time lead to conflicts and performance loss due to contention. This scenario will become more common as applications become more data intensive. To avoid congestion, job-schedulers have to play an important role in selecting which application run concurrently. However I/O-aware mapping strategies need to be simple, robust and fast. Hence, in this article, we discuss two plain and practical strategies to mitigate I/O congestion. They are based on the idea of scheduling I/O access so as not to exceed some prescribed I/O bandwidth. More precisely, we compare two approaches: one grouping applications into packs that will be run independently (i.e., pack-scheduling), the other one scheduling greedily applications using a predefined order (i.e. list-scheduling). Results show that performances depend heavily on the I/O load and the homogeneity of the underlying workload. Finally, we introduce the notion of characteristic time that represents information on the average time between consecutive I/O transfers. We show that it could be important to the design of schedulers and that we expect it to be easily obtained by analysis tools.


A tool, MIDES, for automatic learning of models and supervisors for discrete event systems is presented. The tool interfaces with a simulation of the target system to learn a behavioral model through interaction. There are several different algorithms to choose from depending on the intended outcome. Moreover, given a set of specifications, the tool learns a supervisor that can help ensure the controlled system guarantees the specifications. Furthermore, the state-space explosion problem is addressed by learning a modular supervisor. In this paper, we introduce the tool, its interfaces, and algorithms. We demonstrate the usefulness through several case studies.


Production data from coalbed degasification wells characteristically exhibit a negative decline curve. The dynamics of this methane production are complex and interrelated. As production begins, water and free gas are often first recovered. Continued production lowers pressure and increases permeability to gas, allowing adsorbed gas to flow. This pressure drop within the formation causes sublimation whereby gas, which is absorbed within the coal, forms on the walls of the micropores. Finally, the desorption through production disturbs the chemical and physical equilibrium of the coal, thus enabling the coal to resume generation of methane.


In dentistry, problems of craniofacial, osteochondral, periodontal tissue, nerve, pulp or endodontics injuries, and osteoarthritis need regenerative therapy. The use of stem cells in dental tissue engineering pays a lot of increased attention, but there are challenges for its clinical applications. Therefore, cell-free-based tissue engineering using exosomes isolated from stem cells is regarded an alternative approach in regenerative dentistry. However, practical use of exosome is restricted by limited secretion capability of cells. For future regenerative treatment with exosomes, efficient strategies for large-scale clinical applications are being studied, including the use of ceramics-based scaffold to enhance exosome production and secretion which can resolve limited exosome secretory from the cells when compared with the existing methods available. Indeed, more research needs to be done on these strategies going forward.


In the letter we describe and demonstrate a completely new application of SAW filters in present-day communication systems to realise a kind of transmit-receive switch (TRS). The TRS using the SAW filter works well up to expectations, replacing the required two bandpass filters and an antenna directional coupler. To do this the undesired reverse propagation sidelobe (higher) of a group-type unidirectional transducer (GUDT) has been used to advantage. The theoretical and experimental results are found to be in one-to-one correspondence.


There have been a long string of efforts to understand the source of the variability observed in microquasars but no model has yet gained wide acceptance, especially concerning the elusive High-Frequency Quasi-Periodic Oscillation (HFQPO). We first list the constraints arising from observations and how that translates for an HFQPO model. Then we present how a model based on having the Rossby Wave Instability (RWI) active in the disk could answer those constraints.


A promising approach to Smart Energy Grids is to empower communities of consumers with a novel role in the management of their electricity by sharing excess electricity and therefore becoming energy producers (prosumers). We achieve it using a framework to connect dynamic, context-aware, heterogeneous virtual and real entities on the Internet of Smart Meters (IoSM). We transform the smart electricity meters into fully-fledged intelligent computers on the IoSM and enable them to securely collect data from heterogeneous meters and sensors, detect smart meters with similar goals, exchange and aggregate data from multiple autonomous physical or virtual meters, and manage the actual energy demand and ensure the achievement of demand response for the community involved. Domain ontologies are used to store the semantics of the collected data from IoSM. A problem we have encountered is how our framework can use ontologies for community-grounded decision rules, which need to be consistent based on aggregation of collected data and contexts. We use Semantic Decision Table (SDT), which is a decision table enhanced with ontology technologies, to tackle the problem. This paper records our efforts in 1) the general design of the framework; 2) decision support models, namely SDTs, for fulfilling this requirement; 3) an algorithm of creating invocational SDTs; 4) the implementation of visualizing invocational SDTs.


In this paper we present a novel concept for cognitive assistance and training in manual industrial assembly. In the European FP7 project COGNITO, our aim is to design a mobile, personal system, which instructs operators in task solving and tool handling. The system not only provides instructions, but it is also able to understand and induce human workflows. Due to its high sensing capabilities, the system automatically analyzes and records assembly workflows by observing advanced users to build-up a system-internal understanding of assembly processes. The captured knowledge is then used by the system to assist and train inexperienced operators. The overall approach is based on state-of-the-art techniques in motion and object tracking, task analysis, decision-making and user-adaptive visualisation by means of augmented reality. The COGNITO system is an important step towards cognitive operator support. Enterprise knowledge can be documented, shared and applied in a cooperative and interactive manner, enabling human operators to keep pace with increased complexity in industrial processes.


This study examines how the Russian Internet Research Agency (IRA) troll attacks against the 2016 U.S. presidential candidates on social media varied based on three important characteristics: frontrunner status, political party affiliation, and the gender of the candidate. The frequency of attacks, types of attacks, and audience engagement via retweets were assessed. A content analysis of 4,518 IRA troll messages posted on Twitter (i.e., tweets) shows that frontrunners, Democrats, and the female candidate received the most attacks. In terms of attack types, attacks on character/integrity occurred most frequently and were more likely to be directed at frontrunners, Democrats, and the female candidate. Tweets attacking these three groups were also more likely to be retweeted than tweets without an attack.


In this paper, we analyze the performance of a concatenated code with two different inner decoding schemes. One is the error- detecting inner coding, and the other is the error-detecting-and-correcting inner coding scheme. We compare the performance of the two decoding schemes for finite and infinite block length cases when the concatenated code is applied to slow frequency-hopping spread-spectrum multiple access (FH-SSMA) communication systems. Our results show that the error-detecting-and-correcting inner decoding scheme outperforms the error-detecting inner decoding scheme for finite block lengths, while there exists a performance trade-off for infinite block length case.


PURPOSE
To preliminarily explore the cytotoxicological responses of keratinocytes derived from human embryonic stem cells(K-hESCs) to drugs, and to provide a basis for the establishment of a new biosafety evaluation model.

METHODS
CCK-8 assay was used to detect cell viability and cytotoxicity. The detection of pharmacological response was observed and compared when K-hESCs directly derived from human embryonic stem cells, human gingival epithelial cells (HGECs), and human immortalized oral epithelial cells (HIOECs) were treated with retinoic acid (RA), 5-fluorouracil(5-FU), dexamethasone(DEX), and penicillin G(PG). Statistical analysis was performed using SPSS 16.0 software package.

RESULTS
After drugs were applied to HGECs, HIOEC and K-hESCs, the half inhibitory concentrations (IC50) of RA was 6.1±0.03, 5.62±0.05 and 6.58±0.02, respectively. The IC50 of 5-FU was 1.65±0.02,3.00±0.02 and 1.72±0.04, respectively. The IC50 of DEX was 113.67±0.014,328±0.002 and 126.17±0.05, respectively. The IC50 of PG was 2200±1.34,3795±2.42 and 2880±1.5, respectively. The IC50 of the four drugs between HIOEC and HGECs had significant differences(P<0.05), but there was no significant difference in IC50 between K-hESCs and HGECs(P>0.05). The IC50 of K-hESCs and HIOEC also had significant differences(P<0.05).

CONCLUSIONS
IC50 of K-hESCs was closer to HGECs than HIOEC. It was speculated that K-hESCs could simulate the response of normal human cells in cytotoxicity study.


We consider the problem of privacy-preserving data release for a specific utility task under perfect obfuscation constraint. We establish the necessary and sufficient condition to extract features of the original data that carry as much information about a utility attribute as possible, while not revealing any information about the sensitive attribute. This problem formulation generalizes both the information bottleneck and privacy funnel problems. We adopt a local information geometry analysis that provides useful insight into information coupling and trajectory construction of spherical perturbation of probability mass functions. This analysis allows us to construct the modal decomposition of the joint distributions, divergence transfer matrices, and mutual information. By decomposing the mutual information into orthogonal modes, we obtain the locally sufficient statistics for inferences about the utility attribute, while satisfying perfect obfuscation constraint. Furthermore, we develop the notion of perfect obfuscation based on χ2-divergence and Kullback–Leibler divergence in the Euclidean information space.


Despite the progress made in diversity hiring and promotion initiatives, minority men and women in the federal government remain underrepresented in the senior executive service workforce. An exploratory case study of 12 minority men and 12 minority women in a federal agency described and explored the perceived personal barriers and challenges experienced with SES advancement. The subfocus explored the perceived influence of support received from agency leaders on SES career advancement. This study was grounded in the expectancy theory and the motivation–hygiene theory to support the career advancement and promotion framework. From the thematic patterns personal and institutional barriers eight themes emerged to offer insight into how taking charge of career development and receiving support from agency leaders can help minority men and women with SES advancement. Future recommendations are outlined.


Abstract Let (R, m) be a d-dimensional Cohen–Macaulay local ring. In this paper we prove, in a very elementary way, an upper bound of the first normalized Hilbert coefficient of a m-primary ideal I ⊂ R that improves all known upper bounds unless for a finite number of cases, see Remark 2.3. We also provide new upper bounds of the Hilbert functions of I extending the known bounds for the maximal ideal.


The objective of image segmentation is to define disjoint regions of interest from a digital image. The region-growing approach among many segmentation methods employs connectivity, local homogeneity, and other image-dependent characteristics as features for segmentation. A three-dimensional CT (computed tomography) image can be formed by imaging a contrast-injected subject. The spreading scenario is similar to region growing. The intensity degradation along the contrast-spreading paths requires local-homogeneity information for better segmentation. We present the properties of a symmetric region-growing (SymRG) approach that is suitable for processing medical CT images. We review the concept and definitions of SymRG, describe its seed-invariant property and computational separability. These significant factors govern the region-growing behavior (unidirectional region growing and inter-slice merging) and computational and memory-usage efficiency. We also propose a general SymRG algorithm for any dimensional images and demonstrate experimental results.


Abstract We report a case of pseudomyxoma peritonei (PMP) arising in a 62-year-old male patient with Lynch syndrome (LS). The patient's medical history included an adenocarcinoma of the colon for which a right hemicolectomy was performed and a pancreatectomy due to an intraductal papillary mucinous neoplasm (IPMN) with invasive colloid carcinoma. It was considered that the PMP could be a metastasis of the earlier colonic or pancreatic carcinoma. The pancreatic carcinoma, colon carcinoma, and PMP tissues were examined, and immunohistochemical and molecular analyses were performed to determine the PMP origin. Histopathologic examination revealed morphological similarities with the pancreatic colloid carcinoma, and further immunohistochemical and molecular analyses, including a shared GNAS mutation, confirmed the pancreatic origin of the PMP. In conclusion, this is a unique case of a patient with LS presenting with PMP originating from an IPMN with invasive colloid carcinoma, several years after pancreatectomy. The present case has important diagnostic implications. The IPMN should be considered as a rare extracolonic manifestation of LS, and pancreatic carcinoma origin should be considered in patients presenting with PMP. This case report highlights the added value of molecular diagnostics in daily pathology practice.


Located approximately 40 kilometers south of Okak Bay, the Cirque property lies within an area spanning 40 km long by 5-10 km wide that contains several localized, magmatic Ni-Cu sulphide occurrences. With the exception of the OKG prospect located approximately 35 km north of the Cirque prospect, most of the magmatic Ni-Cu sulphide occurrences are hosted within Mesoproterozoic varieties of leucotroctolite, leuconorite, leucogabbro, and anorthosite of the Nain Plutonic Suite. -- The Cirque property (LBN, Licence #1764M), so named because the gossan lies within a 1 km wide cirque, consists dominantly of massive and layered anorthosite and lesser amounts of leuconorite/leucogabbro and leucotroctolite. Outcrop exposure has defined the mineralized zone to strike approximatelyl km northwest and dip to the west Ground and borehole geophysical surveys have defined a corresponding narrow zone (250 to 300 m wide) plunging steeply to the southeast. Six drill holes at the top and two of six drill holes at the base of the cirque have intersected sulphide zones of variable widths and textures. Mineralization consists of massive, net, and disseminated pyrrhotite with minor chalcopyrite. Trace pentlandite occur as fine flame-lamellae within massive pyrrhotite. -- Overall, the metal contents in all of the holes are low (average Ni/Cu = ≤ 1, Pd and Pt values <50 ppb). The best intersection is from borehole LBN-4 (390.35m): 0.28% Ni, 0.44% Cu, and 0.12% Co over 5.1 m. Localized, elevated Cu values were intersected in several boreholes but were not extensive; the greatest is 3.9% Cu over 20 cm in a 1.5 cm wide sulphide vein @ 923.92 m in borehole LBN-8. Values from neighbouring properties to the north (Canadian States Resources; Licence #1514M) and west (Noranda Mining and Exploration Ltd.; Licence #915M) are anomalous; highest values from grab samples are 0.36-0.85% Ni and 1.8% Ni, respectively. -- Sulphide mineralization at the Cirque gossan consists of thin, irregular lenses and stringers, steeply dipping to the west and east, wrapping around and crosscutting iron stained, unmineralized leucoanorthosite. Fractured and embayed edges of plagioclase crystals by sulphide minerals at the Cirque gossan suggest thermal erosion of semi-crystallized plagioclase-rich fractionate by a Fe-rich sulphide melt which had mobilized from depth. Although not common, thermal erosion textures have also been reported on the neighbouring Canadian States Resources property (Licence #1514M). This epigenetic-style of magmatic sulphide mineralization is important because, although the host magma for the sulphide mineralization is absent, analyses can still be made based on the geology and geochemistry of the gossan. -- Major and trace element geochemistry of the rocks at the Cirque indicate that the there are at least two magma sources: one formed anorthosites, leucotroactolite, and leuconorite/leucogabbro with similar REE signatures and positive Eu anomaly and another, richer in incompatible elements with a slight negative Eu anomaly, formed the ferrodiorite dykes which intrude the anorthosites. The parental (or least fractionated) material for the anorthosites, leucotroctolite, leuconorite/leucogabbro could possibly have a geochemical composition similar to a clinopyroxenite sample located in talus along the cirque wall. Isotopic data (ISr = 0.704 to 0.706 and eNd = -8.76 to -2.72, calculated at 1.39 Ga, and δ³⁴SCDT= 2.5 to 3.0‰) indicate that the crustal contaminants of the magma in the Cirque area are the Paleoproterozoic Churchill Province gneiss and the Nain Province gneiss. The Tasiuyak gneiss may also be a possible source, but to a lesser extent. Estimated total crustal contamination is between 20 to 60%. -- Sulphide geochemistry of the Cirque area indicate that the Canadian States Resources property, Licence #1514M may have a different source magma than that of the Cirque sulphides, however, the epigenetic-style mineralization on the Noranda "Hilltop" property suggests that the source of the sulphides may be to the west where pyrrhotite-bearing pyroxenite sill and dykes have been observed. Low R factors (25 to 100) and PGE ratios indicate that the initial sulphide melt at the Cirque may have segregated from a metal-poor magma possibly due to a low degree of partial melting and extensive crystal fractionation history. Nonetheless, given that extensive zone of localized anomalous Ni and Cu values, it is still possible that a significant Ni-Cu sulphide occurrence may exist in the surrounding area.


Contact toxicity of essential oils (EOs) isolated from cumin, Cuminum cyminum seeds, marigold, Tagetes terniflora leaves and flowers, mandarin, Citrus reticulata and bitter orange, Citrus aurantium, fruit peels and monoterpenoids, citrenallol, geraniol and linalool against Sitophilus oryzaeLinnaeus and Callosobruchus maculatus Fabricius adults were evaluated. A synthetic pyrethroid, Deltamethrin, was employed as a standard. All EOs grain-protective properties were concentration, time and insect species dependent. Two days post exposure, mandarin EO was the most toxic to S. oryzae with LC50 value of 8974 ppm, bitter orange and cumin EOs were the most toxic to C. maculatus with LC50 values of 1138.5 and 1626.2 ppm. Five days post exposure, bitter orange, mandarin, cumin, and marigold EOs showed similar contact toxic activities against S. oryzae with LC50 values of 1752.7, 2090.8, 2210.9, and 3296.6 ppm, respectively. Mandarin and cumin EOs were the most toxic against C. maculatus with LC50 values of 14 and 63 ppm, respectively. Deltamethrin was significantly most toxic agent than all tested EOs against both S. oryzae and C. macultatus with LC50 values of 10.7 and 8.7 ppm. Binary mixtures of all EOs were highly toxic against S. oryzae compared to the single EO. They possess either antagonistic or synergistic toxic effects against C. maculatus. All monoterpenoids showed a moderate contact toxic effect against both S. oryzae and C. maculatus adults compared with EOs.The results proved that EOs alone or in mixtures and monoterpenoids have the potentials to act as grain protectants against S. oryzae and C. maculatus.


It is a great pleasure to publish this book, a collection of papers reporting the 11thacademic forum of Urban Research Plaza held at the Multi-media room of Universitas Gadjah Mada on February 18, 2013. The contributors came from Japan and Indonesia. This academic forum was jointly organized by Urban Research Plaza Yogyakarta Sub-center of Universitas Gadjah Mada, Osaka City University, and Indonesia Institute of the Arts. The theme was 'Social Accessibility through Culture' This academic forum has drawn ou{; attention into how locality should be tapped in our efforts to empower urban community in order that urban development can be adddressed more accordingly and effectively. The urban study in the mainstream of academic society was clearly established as a global study, and nowadays, it is growing alongside urban social problems, which are becoming all too familiar for countries with ongoing urban development. The local government normally addresses urban social problems, sometimes with limited financial support from government at a higher level. Recent increasing interests have been shown in participatory arts programs, which are low-cost, flexible, and responsive to local needs. This use of arts and cultural activity coincides with a shift in the emphasis in regeneration strategies towards seeing local people as the principal asset, through which renewal can be achieved. In today's world, there is an emerging trend to decentralize the investment, operation, and maintenance of publi c services to the lower levels of the government. However, the transfer of responsibilities to local governments is not always matched with necessary resources. Financing urban infrastructure development is a common and persistent challenge to the local or city governments across the world.
There is a growing support for the view that real improvements in urban development will not be achieved until the issue of people empowerment is . addressed. However, if empowerment is defined as a grassroots political process, which results in a redistribution of power in society, urban development should take into account the locality and sites as substantive examples of people'" empowerment. The unsheltered property of human beings in the form of intangible property such as knowledge, trust, shared understanding and beliefs, values and other factors can be made as took that enable members of urban society to improve their quality of life.

Those arguments are the base why research and discussion on social accessibility through culture are important issue in urban research context. This conference aimed at developing interdisciplina ry perspective to inform activities in the public, private, and nonprofit sectors as well as future research to improve the quality of social life in urban communities. The forum was divided into two sessions. The papers presented in this book are from Universitas Gadjah Mada: written by lka Putra, Mimi Savitri, Jujun Kurniawan, Ario Wicaksono, from Indonesian Institute of the Arts: written by Alfi Luviani, Retno Mustikawati, and form Osaka City University: written by Tomoko Hayashi, Banban Li.


Information Technology plays a significant role in the education construction of student profile. The main intend of this research was to study and point important issues regarding the use of information technology (IT) in enhancing learning in higher education. The study was conducted among the students at South East European University, aiming to offer better education for the students by screening the current situation of using information technology and proposing several possible solutions for improvement.


Demographics on national, regional, and global Pentecostalism provide an essential backdrop to almost every kind of quantitative or qualitative study done on other aspects of Pentecostalism. This article outlines both the history and the research findings related to the subject of defining, categorizing, and counting Pentecostals. Subjects covered include early attempts to count Pentecostals, the development of taxonomies of different types of Pentecostals and Charismatics, and statistical estimates of Pentecostals and Charismatics by type.


A phytochemical study of the 95% ethanolic extract of the whole plant of Lancea tibetica Hook. f. et Thoms. led to the isolation of a new trehalose ester, 6-O-undecanoyl-α,β-trehalose (1), along with 23 known compounds (2–24), of which compounds 2–17 were isolated from this plant for the first time. The structures of these compounds were established on the basis of spectroscopic methods. Compound 1 was evaluated for their in vitro anti-proliferative activities against MCF-7, NCI-H460 and Hep-G2 tumour cell lines. Compound 1 exhibited potent inhibitory activity against NCI-H460 cell growth, in contrast to moderate cytotoxic activity against MCF-7 and Hep-G2 cells.


Relativistic rotation causes a change of QCD critical temperatures. Various phenomenological and effective models predict a decrease of the critical temperatures in rotating QCD. Nevertheless, lattice simulations showed that the critical temperature in gluodynamics increases due to rotation. We extend the lattice study to the theory with dynamical fermions. We present the first lattice results for rotating QCD with 𝑁 𝑓 = 2 dynamical clover-improved Wilson quarks. We also study separately the effect of rotation on gluonic and fermionic degrees of freedom. It is shown that separate rotations of gluons and fermions have opposite effects on the critical temperatures. In aggregate, the pseudo-critical temperatures in QCD increase with angular velocity. Dependence of the results on the pion mass is also discussed


The present study of the everyday behavior of alcohol misusers is part of a series of studies using a special technique for conveniently reaching the participants at any time, anywhere in order to sample their everyday behavior. One purpose of the study was to help a group of heavy drinkers to reduce or cease drinking. Another purpose was to study how alcohol misusers differ from matched nondrinking people and to obtain a psychological profile of them before and during their attempts to control their drinking. The belief was that an experimental design with a moral contract and electronic surveillance would facilitate drinkers' attempts to control their alcohol consumption. The results in terms of reduced and terminated drinking were very satisfactory, and the method of random action sampling made detailed and explorative analyses possible. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science Ltd.


In the early years of the 20th century, a group of young artists including Ernst Kirchner, Vassily Kandinsky and Franz Marc, liberated themselves from traditional representation by using distortion and vibrant, unrealistic colour in their painting. Eroticism became a tool for exposing the lies and decadence of society, whilst motifs borrowed from African, Oceanic and Buddhist art further questioned bourgeois culture. Later, the cruelty of World War I was reflected violently in the work of Max Beckmann, Otto Dix and George Grosz. In light of an exhibition at the Palazzo Grassi, Venice, this text re-evaluates the range of approaches taken by these radical artists, presenting more than 400 of their works and accompanying essays by art historians. Organized by theme, they describe the historical background of Expressionism and the two main groups Die Brucke and Der Blaue Reiter, looking at the links with Romanticism and Futurism, iconography, supporters, critics, collectors and theory. The main part of the book comprises the works themselves, each accompanied by text documenting their meaning and history. Artist's biographies are also provided.


Seventeen patients with benign prostatic hypertrophy were treated with 50 mg allylestrenol per day for a long period of time (mean: 37.7 weeks), and subjective and objective findings, transrectal ultrasonotomography, urodynamics, serum lipids and hormone levels were examined. Improvement rates of subjective and objective findings were 42.9-92.9%. A significant decrease in weight and diameter (antero-posterior, lateral) of the prostate was observed, but the difference in the height of the prostate was not significant. Increase in intravesical pressure was observed in 9 out of 14 cases (64.3%) and the decrease in area under the urethral pressure curve at functional profile length was observed in 6 out of 11 cases (54.5%). Slight increase of the serum lipid levels was observed in a few cases, but in many cases the fluctuation was within normal range. Although clear decrease in the testosterone levels was seen, decrease of libido and potency was observed in only one case (5.9%). No other side-effect was found. The overall efficacy rate was 58.8%, and clinical usefulness of Allylestrenol on benign prostatic hypertrophy was confirmed.


[Abstract]: The aim of this project is to investigate, construct and evaluate a radio controlled tracked reconnaissance and inspection vehicle. It is envisaged that this project would implement a series of wireless web cams or video cameras to transmit a video feed back to a remote portable location to allow for the inspection of hazardous
and inaccessible locations.

The concept of having mobile robots that are able to control themselves in either an autonomous or semiautonomous operational mode is not at all new. Over the years there have been many different attempts at constructing robots capable of this feat. Generally, most robots of this nature are designed primarily for military use. Under military use, these robots are often deployed for bomb diffusion and bomb placement as well as general reconnaissance.

The primary objectives of this project were to construct a remote controlled semi-autonomous robotic tracked inspection vehicle for the inspection of hazardous and inaccessible locations. It was also necessary that this
vehicle be highly stable, and easily adaptable to form the basis for further developments of suitable attachments such as grapplers or robotic manipulators such as arms and hands.

The main design criteria for this device were:
- Must be able to be constructed from easily available materials and components.
- Must be ruggered and durable especially if it is to be used in hostile environments.
- Must be easy and intuitive to operate to facilitate ease of use.
- Must have sufficient power and runtime to make its deployment worthwhile.

In conclusion, the device which was designed and constructed implemented various components; a large number of these components had to be custom manufactured for this device. Once construction was complete, it underwent numerous hours of infield testing in order to determine its effectively as a remote mobile tracked reconnaissance and inspection vehicle.


There is limited research regarding amphibian distribution and status in rural upland habitats in Britain. Previous studies suggest potential influences on distribution and abundance arising from habitat modification and acidification. However, the extent to which these factors influence distribution at the landscape level is unclear. This study aimed to evaluate whether particular features of the aquatic and terrestrial habitat influence distribution and breeding ecology of common frogs (Rana temporaria L.) in rural upland areas. In particular, the extent to which aquatic and early terrestrial life-stages might be impacted upon by the quality of their respective habitats was investigated. Common frogs were found to be widespread and ubiquitous throughout the study area. No evidence was found to suggest that any specific biotic or abiotic feature of either the aquatic or terrestrial habitat significantly influenced distribution and relative abundance of breeding adults. However, reproductive success was found to be significantly impacted upon by acidity in coniferous and hilltop habitats. It is probable that juvenile recruitment at some ponds is chronically reduced and populations are maintained through immigration. Recruitment in improved habitats was highly variable between ponds and between years, although it was not possible to elucidate precise controls on larval populations in the natural habitats studied. Significant differences in physical condition at metamorphosis among wild populations were demonstrated. This may signify possible differences in future growth, life-fitness and dispersal ability between populations, or at least between natal ponds. Dispersal by new juveniles is potentially affected by the vegetation structure surrounding breeding ponds. Intra- and interspecific differences in behaviour regarding microhabitat use were demonstrated. Rural upland habitats can be valuable habitats for amphibians and the common frog in particular. However, further research is required to better understand rates of recruitment and immigration and how terrestrial habitats mediate juvenile survival and dispersal.


A modified model is proposed for calculation of transitional boundary layer flows. In order to develop the eddy viscosity model for the problem, the flow is divided into three regions; namely, pre-transition region, transition region and fully turbulent region. The pre-transition eddy-viscosity is formulated by extending the mixing length concept. In the transition region, the eddy-viscosity model employs two length scales, i.e., pre-transition length scale and turbulent length scale pertaining to the regions upstream and the downstream, respectively, and a universal model of stream-wise intermittency variation is used as a function bridging the pre-transition region and the fully turbulent region. The proposed model is applied to calculate three benchmark cases of the transitional boundary layer flows with different free-stream turbulent intensity (1%∼6%) under zero-pressure gradient. It was found that the profiles of mean velocity and turbulent intensity, local maximum of velocity fluctuations, their locations as well as the stream-wise variation of integral properties such as skin friction, shape factor and maximum velocity fluctuations are very satisfactorily predicted throughout the flow regions.


S OF CURRENT ARTICLES Esophageal Intramural Pseudodiverticulosis Beauchamp JM, Nice CM, Belanger MA, et al: Radiology 113:273, 1974 The authors review the pertinent literature and present three cases of esophageal intramural pseudodiverticulosis. The etiologic, histologic, and other common denominators are discussed: hyperplasia of the mucosa, dilatation of the esophageal mucous glands, protrusion of diverticula through existing neurovascular gaps, elevated intraluminal pressure, relative obstruction of the esophagus, history of dysplagia, and the association of Candida albicans. Six references, four figures including radiographs are included. Early Draining Veins in Acoustic Neurinomas King CD, Long ML, Hammon WM: Radiology 113:369, 1974 The authors present this heretofore unreported finding as an aid in the earlier and more accurate diagnosis of acoustic neurinomas., Two cases of proven acoustic neurinoma are described, in which the authors were able to demonstrate the early venous drainage by vertebral angiography. They further discuss how this modality in addition to audiometry and other radiographic methods enables the examiner to utilize the hvpervascularitv that many of these tumors exhibit in establishing a preoperative diagnosis. Twentv references and four radiographs are presented. The Biomechanics of Maxillofacial Trauma Nahum AM: Clinics Plast Surg 2:59-64, 1975 An excellent discussion on the physics, impact tolerance of the facial bones, the roles played by the soft tissues of the face, and the prevention of facial injury is presented in considerable detail utilizing much experimental material. Seven figures, including three tables and 12 references are included.


The labor market remains a crossroads for job seekers and jobseekers who adopt behaviors that allow one to obtain a skilled workforce and others to access jobs through their skills. It is in this logic that this article on "Employability of outgoing university graduates on the labor market in Likasi" appears. A cross-sectional survey of 50 outgoing graduates from Likasi University using the 9item questionnaire reveals that these graduates are not able to meet the immediate needs of the labor market in Likasi due to the lack of transversal skills demanded by this market


Publish/subscribe model has become a prevalent paradigm for building distributed event delivering systems. Content-based publish/subscribe allows high expresses in subscriptions and thus is more appropriate for content dissemination. However, the scalability has remained a challenge in the design of distributed content-based publish/subscribe systems due to the expensive matching and delivering cost of content-based events. In this paper we propose an infrastructure built on top of distributed hash table for efficient content-based data distribution. Based on efficient subscription installation, event publication and event delivery mechanisms, the proposed infrastructure can simultaneously support any numbers of pub/sub schemas with different number of attributes. There are three key features in our design: (1) a locality-preserving hashing mechanism which partitions and maps the content space to nodes. Subscriptions and events are mapped to the corresponding node for efficiently matching; (2) an efficient event delivery algorithm which exploits the embedded trees in the underlying DHT to deliver events to the corresponding subscribers; (3) light-weighted load balancing mechanisms to adjust the load among peers and ensure that no peer is unduly loaded.


Today's radar locates and tracks aircraft, measures the speed of fastballs and helps catch "lead foots." Most radar gather information from objects. However, researchers at the Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI) are exploring radar's ability to measure physiological data in humans. The new radar measures tiny movements of the human body caused by respiration and the beating heart. The Radar Vital Signs Monitor (RVSM) technology was originally designed for use during the Olympics to measure the vitals signs of athletes. RVSM technology, however, has other applications including law enforcement, telemedicine, heart disease screening, security and disaster search.


Deep neural networks suffer from the inability to preserve the learned data representation (i.e., catastrophic forgetting) in domains where the input data distribution is non-stationary, and it changes during training. Various selective synaptic plasticity approaches have been recently proposed to preserve network parameters, which are crucial for previously learned tasks while learning new tasks. We explore such selective synaptic plasticity approaches through a unifying lens of memory replay and show the close relationship between methods like Elastic Weight Consolidation (EWC) and Memory-Aware-Synapses (MAS). We then propose a fundamentally different class of preservation methods that aim at preserving the distribution of internal neural representations for previous tasks while learning a new one. We propose the sliced Cram\'{e}r distance as a suitable choice for such preservation and evaluate our Sliced Cramer Preservation (SCP) algorithm through extensive empirical investigations on various network architectures in both supervised and unsupervised learning settings. We show that SCP consistently utilizes the learning capacity of the network better than online-EWC and MAS methods on various incremental learning tasks.


THE SLOGAN of the environmental movement, "Think globally, act locally," could be appropriated by physicians and others concerned about immigrants who carry infections endemic in their native lands as part of their personal baggage. Given the unprecedented reach of microbes through immigration and other factors such as travel and importation of foreign goods, physicians are discovering that they sometimes need to consider relatively exotic possibilities when diagnosing their patients' illnesses. Recent eruptions of deadly infections, such as Zaire's Ebola virus outbreak in May and last September's pneumonic plague epidemic in India, underscore the globalization of infections in a world shrunk by air travel. And while the real and potential risks posed by the influx of immigrants from areas where infections like tuberculosis (TB) and Chagas disease are endemic seem less cataclysmic than the possibility of a "hot zone" epidemic sweeping the planet, the former pose risks substantial enough to prompt


The paper suggests a method to design sliding sector control for a class of nonlinear systems in which the system trajectories are kept around a nonlinear sliding surface. The sliding surface is designed by using State Dependent Riccati Equations where Algebraic Riccati Equations are solved for frozen system states. The solutions are used to create the nonlinear (or state dependent) sliding surface around which state dependent sliding sectors are formed. The nonlinear system trajectories are forced inside the sliding sector by using the so-called sliding sector control. The method is illustrated by applying it to a nonlinear inverted pendulum model.


A novel homologous series of four 1,4,8,11,15,18-hexakis(pentyl)-22-methyl-25-hydroxyalkylphthalocyanine derivatives with the hydroxyalkyl chain varying from hydroxynonyl through to hydroxydodecyl has been synthesized to investigate the role of the hydroxyalkyl chain in promoting thermotropic liquid crystalline behavior. Polarizing optical miscoscopy reveals that the compound with the shortest hydroxyalkyl chain (hydroxynonyl) exhibits a mesophase with a texture characteristic of a columnar mesophase, common among liquid crystalline phthalocyanine derivatives. However, as the chain is lengthened along the series, there appears a second type of mesophase that shows a schlieren texture. Such a texture is characteristic of a nematic phase and rare among liquid crystalline phthalocyanine derivatives. A fifth compound, the novel 1,4,8,11,15,18-hexakis(pentyl)-22-methyl-25-dodecylphthalocyanine, exhibits only columnar mesophase behavior suggesting that the hydroxyl group at the end of the longer chains of the former compounds is important in developing the nematic phase.


Several topics connecting basic vision research to image compression and image quality are discussed: (1) A battery of about 7 specially chosen simple stimuli should be used to tease apart the multiplicity of factors affecting image quality. (2) A 'perfect' static display must be capable of presenting about 135 bits/min2. This value is based on the need for 3 pixels/min and 15 bits/pixel. (3) Image compression allows the reduction from 135 to about 20 bits/min2 for perfect image quality. 20 bit/min2 is the information capacity of human vision. (4) A presumed weakness of the JPEG standard is that it does not allow for Weber's Law nonuniform quantization. We argue that this is an advantage rather than a weakness. (5) It is suggested that all compression studies should report two numbers separately: the amount of compression achieved from quantization and the amount from redundancy coding. (6) The DCT, wavelet and viewprint representations are compared. (7) Problems with extending perceptual losslessness to moving stimuli are discussed. Our approach of working with a 'perfect' image on a 'perfect' display with 'perfect' compression is not directly relevant to the present situation with severely limited channel capacity. Rather than studying perceptually lossless compression we must carry out research to determine what types of lossy transformations are least disturbing to the human observer. Transmission of 'perfect', lossless images will not be practical for many years.


We created a highly efficient, universal 3D quant um transport simulator. We demonstrated that the simulator scales linearly - both with the problem size (N) and number of CPUs, which presents an important break-through in the field of computational nanoelectronics. It allowed us, for the first time, to accurately simulate and optim ize a large number of realistic nanodevices in a much shorter time, when compared to other methods/codes such as RGF[~N 2.333 ]/KNIT, KWANT, and QTBM[~N 3 ]/NEMO5. In order to determine the best-in-class for different beyond-CMOS paradigms, we performed rigorous device optimization for high-performance logic devices at 6-, 5- and 4-nm gate lengths. We have discovered that there exists a fundamental down-scaling limit for CMOS technology and other Field-Effect Transistors (FETs). We have found that, at room temperatures, all FETs, irre spective of their channel material, will start experiencing unacceptable level of thermally induced errors around 5-nm gate lengths.


Rural livelihoods in Nepal are generally based on ecosystem resources. Despite a large number of studies on the Himalayan livelihoods, representation of the Trans-Himalaya, particularly Upper-Mustang, are rare. Such a scarcity could be associated with the fact that the place was isolated from the rest of the world and mainstream Nepali societies for a long time and also used to be known as 'forbidden kingdom.' This paper documents livelihood situation of Upper-Mustang in reference to the data collected in 66 households, in-depth interviews taken with 22 key informants, and focus group discussions conducted in 6 locations. Household livelihood system was studied with reference to five livelihood capitals, which were transformed into Livelihood Capital Index (LCI) at first and Livelihood Sustainability Index (LSI) later. Households in the Trans-Himalaya fulfill their livelihood requirement from multiple sources such as farming and livestock ranching together with small-scale enterprises, remittance and labouring. Overall status of livelihood capital is weak that cannot satisfy households' food and livelihood requirements. There exists inter-household variation in the status of livelihood capitals. The households with diversified livelihood options have relatively secured livelihood, although such security is relative to the households of Upper-Mustang. Considering the weak status of agro-livestock system, which is mostly associated with unfavorable geographic conditions and lack of agro-livestock service provision, the region has sound scope for tourism industries and production as well as marketing of medicinal and aromatic plants, and fruits. Therefore, there is a plenty of possibility of diversifying livelihoods, however, neither the communities are eager to do so nor the state policies are encouraging. Therefore, together with expansion and advancement of physical infrastructure, effective service delivery and provision for social welfare, government programs should be facilitative for optimum and sustainable utilization of ecosystem resources for the sustainability of household livelihood system. Dhaulagiri Journal of Sociology and Anthropology Vol.11, 2017; 24-59


Rationale: Popliteal cyst developing in the sheath of a peripheral nerve or joint capsule may cause compression neuropathy. Although popliteal cyst is very common lesion, it seldom causes serious complications. Common peroneal nerve compression is rarely caused by an extraneural popliteal cyst. Patient concerns: We presented the case of a 52-year-old female with common peroneal nerve compression caused by an extraneural popliteal cyst. Diagnoses: Electromyography showed the damage of common peroneal nerve. MRI magnetic resonance imaging showed the lump to be a popliteal cyst. She was diagnosed as peroneal nerve injury and popliteal cyst. Interventions: The patient was performed peroneal nerve decompression and popliteal cyst excision surgery. We excised the cyst completely and soluted the common peroneal nerve thoroughly. The cyst was filled with thick mucinous material. Outcomes: The pathological report showed that the excised mass was a popliteal cyst. There were no postoperative complications. Pain and hypoesthesia resolved 6 months after surgery. Lessons: In this case, compression of the common peroneal nerve was due to an extraneural popliteal cyst, a situation rarely encountered. MRI can show in better detail their size and internal contents as well as their relation with surrounding anatomic structures. Patients with nerve entrapment caused by enlarged or ruptured cysts must be microsurgically excised if symptomatic.