Legal reforms throughout Latin America have increased the transparency of the criminal justice process and improved defendants' rights. Many scholars conjecture that such reforms also improve "good governance" and by extension economic development. Paradoxically, despite such assertions, there are few quantitative studies that examine the precise effect of such legal reforms. Using original data sets, the impact of Chile's criminal law reforms on the rights of criminals and economic development is tested. The results show that Chile's criminal law reform has enhanced defendants' rights by reducing the percent of individuals incarcerated. The reform has had a positive effect on regional economic activity, but little effect on foreign direct investment at the regional level.


Increasing international integration is going to make European welfare states somewhat more alike no doubt about that. The intra-European integration is creating less different economic conditions between the countries. And the increasing economic interaction with Asia is putting pressure on them all to lower costs and/or go for high value-added export production. This paper argues, however, that increasing alikeness in a number of respects may not amount to convergence (i.e. the development of similar institutions), and that the different welfare states are going to retain their specific characteristics for quite a long time. The argument is based on a perception of societal convergence as a complex process, a characterization of the differences between welfare states as being deep-rooted differences of culture and on a hypothesis that cultural change on such an aggregate level is a very slow process.


Recently low power listening (LPL) MAC protocols based on duty-cycling mechanism have been studied extensively to achieve ultra low energy consumption in wireless sensor networks (WSNs). However, state-of-the-art LPL scheme still suffers from some performance degradation due to its own protocol incompleteness. In this paper, we propose the τ-duration CCA method to mitigate the collision probability in ACK-based LPL MAC protocol and show its performance improvement via analytical and experimental results. Our performance study indicates that ACK-based LPL MAC protocol which adopts the τ-duration CCA is significantly better than normal ACK-based LPL MAC protocol in terms of energy consumption.


To overcome the disadvantage of conventional fusion forecasting models, two main research ways are attempted. Firstly, the idea of the comprehensive evaluation is adopted to evaluate the forecasting models which needed to be selected by the multi-attribute comprehensive evaluation model. Secondly, the forecast precision of each forecasting model influenced by the time is compared in rationally way. Thereby, the dynamic fusion forecasting method in which the objectivity and the subjectivity information is integrated is established, Finally, the civil automobile population forecasting problem is taken as research background, the multi-model dynamic fusion forecasting method is put into application, and the application results shows that the validity of the method is validated.


The Study sought to fundamentally generate information on the relationship between tendering duration and project complexity/determinants of cost and duration in order to determine via a scientific model, realistic tendering durations of various types of federal building projects in Nigeria.  To achieve this, historical data on project cost, project duration and tendering duration were obtained for 78 federal building projects.  They were subjected to correlation and regression analysis to test for statistical significance and the relationship between tendering duration and cost variables. Results of the regression analysis revealed that there is a significant relationship between tendering duration and project cost, which can be seen from the strong statistical correlation; R square value = 0.53 and the P(significant) values of 0.00 < alpha value ? (0.05)adopted in the study. Furthermore, a significant relationship between tendering duration and project duration was revealed. The statistical correlation was however observed to be higher; with R square value = 0.80 and P(sig) values < ? (0.05). Hence, the following models were developed which proved significant for the sampled projects based on the quadratic regression equation: First, the tendering duration – project cost model which is in the form; TD = 2.574 + 1.137E-9C – 5.245E-20C 2 , where TD is the tendering duration in weeks and C, project cost.  Second, the tendering duration-project duration model expressed as TD = 1.299 + 0.073D + 0.000D 2 , where D is the project duration in weeks. The study recommends that the Federal Government should formulate bidding deadlines for different categories of building projects based on complexity factors of cost and duration, via adoption of the models proposed by the study. This will promote standards, efficiency in project planning, achievement of fairness and transparency in the public tendering system. Key Words: Building Projects, Development, Federal Government, Models, Nigeria, Tendering Duration.


Studies of gender identity show gender and sex are not natural but they are the products of working of power in societies such as institutions, discourse, and practices. One of the contributions of recent gender studies is to question the instability of masculine and feminine gender identity. This study is an application of Judith Butler concept 'performative' on Margaret Atwood novel Cat's Eye(1988) relying on Butler's concepts of identity and performance. The novel deals with gender performativity and the role of patriarchal society played on the female characters. Throughout her female protagonists, Atwood raises the question of woman's place in a patriarchal society. The premise of this study is not only to determine the extent to which gender performativity determines the character's identity but also to illustrate how gender identity is unstable and constructed socially and culturally.


A 25 year old British man of previous good health presented with persistent generalised lymphadenopathy and was found to be human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) antibody positive. Three years later after weight loss and loose stools Strongyloides stercoralis was identified in the latter and successfully treated with thiabendazole. Shortly afterwards, a further episode again responded rapidly, but was swiftly followed by a final and fatal illness with severe debility and metabolic imbalance unresponsive to all treatment. Necropsy showed widespread and heavy strongyloidiasis with pulmonary haemorrhage, bronchopneumonia, and meningitis.


Soil salinisation is a global problem that hinders the sustainable development of ecosystems and agricultural production. Remote and proximal sensing technologies have been used to effectively evaluate soil salinity over large scales, but research on digital camera images is still lacking. In this study, we propose to relate the pixel brightness of soil surface digital images to the soil salinity information. We photographed the surface of 93 soils in the field at different times and weather conditions, and sampled the corresponding soils for laboratory analyses of soil salinity information. Results showed that the pixel digital numbers were related to soil salinity, especially at the intermediate and higher brightness levels. Based on this relationship, we employed random forest (RF) and partial least-squares regression (PLSR) to model soil salt content and ion concentrations, and applied root mean squared error, coefficient of determination and Lin's concordance correlation coefficient to evaluate the accuracy of models. We found that ions with high concentration were estimated more accurately than ions with low concentrations, and RF models performed overall better than PLSR models. However, the method is only suitable for bare land of coastal soil, and verification is needed for other conditions. In conclusion, a new approach of using digital camera images has good potential to predict and manage soil salinity in the context of precision agriculture with the rapid development of unmanned aerial vehicles.


Musical theater has captivated American audiences from its early roots in burlesque stage productions and minstrel shows to the million-dollar industry it has become on Broadway today. What is it about this truly indigenous American art form that has made it so enduringly popular? How has it survived, even thrived, alongside the technology of film and the glitz and glamour of Hollywood? Will it continue to evolve and leave its mark on the twenty-first century? Bringing together exclusive and previously unpublished interviews with nineteen leading composers, lyricists, librettists, directors, choreographers, and producers from the mid-1900s to the present, this book details the careers of the individuals who shaped this popular performance art during its most prolific period. The interviewees discuss their roles in productions ranging from On the Town (1944) and Finian's Rainbow (1947) to The Producers (2001) and Bounce (2003). Readers are taken onto the stage, into the rehearsals, and behind the scenes. The nuts and bolts, the alchemy, and the occasional agonies of the collaborative process are all explored. In their discussions, the artists detail their engagements with other creative forces, including such major talents as Leonard Bernstein, Jerome Robbins, Bob Fosse, Liza Minnelli, Judy Garland, Barbra Streisand, Jule Styne, Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein, Alan Jay Lerner, Zero Mostel, and Gwen Verdon. They speak candidly about their own work and that of their peers, their successes and failures, the creative process, and how a show progresses from its conception through rehearsals and tryouts to opening night. Taken together, these interviews give fresh insight into what Oscar Hammerstein called "a nightly miracle" - the creation of the American musical.


ABSTRACT For remote sensing of Great Lakes ice cover, a field experiment campaign was conducted in the 1997 winter season across the Straits of Mackinac and Lake Superior. The campaign was coordinated in two expeditions on two different United States Coast Guard icebreaker vessels, the Biscayne Bay in February and the Mackinaw in March. Aboard these icebreakers, the Jet Propulsion Laboratory C-band polarimetric scatterometer was used to measure backscatter signatures of various ice types and open water at incidence angles from 0° to 60°. The radar measurements include incidence angles and polarizations of spaceborne Synthetic Aperture Radars (SAR) on ERS, RADARSAT, and Envisat satellites. The radar data together with in situ measurements form a signature library that can be used to interpret SAR data for ice classification and mapping. Results are presented for backscatter signatures of Great Lakes ice types from thin lake ice to thick brash ice with different snow-cover and surface conditions. The signature library indicates that several ice types can be identified with multi-polarization SAR data; however, single-polarization data can result in misclassification of ice and open water at different ranges of incidence angle and wind conditions. For incidence angles larger than 30°, thick brash ice, the most difficult for icebreaking operations and the most hazardous for ship navigation, can be uniquely identified by co-polarized backscatter for all wind conditions below the gale force.


All possible combinations of insertion mutations in the three genes encoding the acyl carrier protein-dependent late acyltransferases of lipid A biosynthesis, designated lpxL(htrB),lpxM(msbB), and lpxP, were generated in Escherichia coli K12 W3110. Mutants defective in lpxM synthesize penta-acylated lipid A molecules and grow normally. Strains lacking lpxP fail to incorporate palmitoleate into their lipid A at 12 °C but make normal amounts of hexa-acylated lipid A and are viable. Although lpxL mutants and lpxL lpxM double mutants grow slowly on minimal medium at all temperatures, they do not grow on nutrient broth above 32 °C. Such mutants retain the ability to synthesize some penta- and hexa-acylated lipid A molecules because of limited induction oflpxP at 30 °C but not above 32 °C. MKV15, an E. coli lpxL lpxM lpxP triple mutant, likewise grows slowly on minimal medium at all temperatures but not on nutrient broth at any temperature. MKV15 synthesizes a lipid A molecule containing only the four primary (R)-3-hydroxymyristoyl chains. The outer membrane localization and content of lipid A are nearly normal in MKV15, as is the glycerophospholipid and membrane protein composition. However, the rate at which the tetra-acylated lipid A of MKV15 is exported to the outer membrane is reduced compared with wild type. The integrity of the outer membrane of MKV15 is compromised, as judged by antibiotic hypersensitivity, and MKV15 undergoes lysis following centrifugation. MKV15 may prove useful as a host strain for expressing late acyltransferase genes from other Gram-negative bacteria, facilitating the re-engineering of lipid A structure in living cells and the design of novel vaccines.


A few years ago it was proposed that characteristic masses for each furnace analyte represented a stable property of the analyte and the furnace system. L'vov has put this proposal on a firm theoretical footing by calculating the characteristic mass values from spectroscopic data, a mathematical model of the furnace and the assumption that the analyte is totally atomised in the modern furnace. His calculated values agree fairly well with the experimental characteristic masses for 23 of the 30 most common furnace analytes. In this paper the stability of the characteristic mass values is considered further. It is also shown that these data provide an important quality assurance opportunity for furnace analysts. An instrumental system that does not adequately reproduce the reported characteristic masses is not likely to be working optimally. The frequent current practice of using the method of standard additions in preference to an analytical working curve to quantify furnace analyses can mask errors, particularly background correction errors, and provide erroneous results. Nevertheless, we are still unable to obtain stable values for the characteristic mass with the precision available with modern instrumentation. The problems and deficiencies which cause this to be true are discussed.


Abstract Over the last 25 years, the Europace journal has greatly contributed to dissemination of research and knowledge in the field of syncope. More than 400 manuscripts have been published in the journal. They undoubtedly improved our understanding of syncope. This symptom is now clearly differentiated from other forms of transient loss of consciousness. The critical role of vasodepression and/or cardioinhibition as final mechanisms of reflex syncope is emphasized. Current diagnostic approach sharply separates between cardiac and autonomic pathways. Physiologic insights have been translated, through rigorously designed clinical trials, into non-pharmacological or pharmacological interventions and interventional therapies. The following manuscript is intended to give the reader the current state of the art of knowledge of syncope by highlighting landmark contributions of the Europace journal.


We investigate the development of business ownership (self-employment) rates over time at the sectoral level and the effect of these rates on sectoral output growth. In an earlier exercise, Carree et al. (2002) presented an analysis of the interrelationship between economy-wide business ownership rates and economic development. Their analysis raised an important research question: to what extent do differences in business ownership rates at the economy-wide level reflect differences in the sectoral structures of economies or differences in business ownership rates at the sectoral level? The current article investigates this question making use of a sectoral data base of 21 OECD countries for the period 1970-98. Estimation results suggest that there is, on average, a too low business ownership rate in manufacturing and a too high business ownership rate in services.


Blood utilization was evaluated in elective surgical procedures over a period of 6 months using different indices such as crossmatch to transfusion ratio(C/T ratio), transfusion probability (%T), and transfusion index (TI). Out of 436 units of blood crossmatched for 207 patients, only 132 were transfused with no utilization of 69.7% of crossmatched blood. In wound debridement, split thickness skin grafting (STSG), open reduction internal fixation (ORIF), mastectomy, and prostatectomy all the 3 indices showed significant blood utilization whereas in all ENT surgery utilization of blood provided was nil. This study showed that there was excessive crossmatching of blood and changing the blood ordering pattern can minimize this. Keywords : blood utilization, elective surgery The Tropical Journal of Health Sciences Vol. 13(1) 2006: 15-17


We investigated the diameter-dependent performance of Si and InAs nanowire metal-oxide-semiconductor field-effect transistors (NW MOSFETs) by developing a gate capacitance model. A nonparabolic effective-mass approximation and a semiclassical ballistic transport model were used. The capacitance model helped interpret the different contributions of the capacitances, which were due to the inversion-layer centroid and density of states. As a result, the inversion-layer centroid was close to the surface with a shrinking diameter. In Si NWs, this effect increased the gate capacitance in a small diameter. On the other hand, in InAs NWs, the density of states could decrease the gate capacitance in a small diameter. In both NWs, the on-current drastically increased in diameter smaller than 5 nm mainly due to the increase in the gate capacitance. The diameter-dependent injection velocity reached a peak around 5 nm in both NWs. Our results could imply that the peak in the diameter-dependent injection velocity is a universal feature of NW MOSFETs. With respect to intrinsic gate delay, the highest injection velocity led to the best performance of Si NWs; however, this case was not accompanied with the best performance of InAs NWs.


Students with physical disabilities experience many problems with learning. The self-regulated learning model is an independent learning model that teaches students how to effectively organize and manage themselves, to ensure optimal learning outcomes. Our purpose is to analyze how teacher support and academic self-efficacy could influence the self-regulated learning model, specifically with academic self-efficacy as a mediating variable. We used survey as our research instrument. Meanwhile, the analysis method used path analysis. Our findings show that academic self-efficacy could significantly increase the self-regulated learning of physically disabled students. Teacher support had a minimal effect on improving the self-regulated learning of physically disabled students. We also found the importance of academic self-concept as a mediator in increasing self-regulated learning of physically disabled students. Future research is advised to include other social support variables such as parental and peer support into the model. Our findings can be used as a reference for developing a curriculum on a self-regulated learning model for disabled students.


We develop a duopoly model in which firms compete for the market (e.g., investing in process innovation or product development) as well as in the market (e.g., setting quantities or prices). Competition for the market generates multiple equilibria that differ in the firms' investment levels, relative size, and profi tability. We show that monopolization that affects competition in the market can act as an equilibrium selection device in competition for the market. In particular, it eliminates equilibria that are undesirable for the monopolizing rm, while not generating new equilibria. This result complicates the task of determining whether a rm's dominance in a given market is the result of fair competition or unlawful monopolization. We discuss a number of implications for antitrust policy and litigation, and illustrate these by means of two well-known antitrust cases.


Purpose
The purpose of this study is to provide an analysis of the teacher education program focused on the development of the research competence of the preservice teachers, difficulties they encountered in conducting action research and the need to provide them with realistic research opportunities.

Design/methodology/approach
This qualitative study made use of data sources taken from observations, feedback sessions, presentations and follow-up written interview of 133 randomly selected preservice teachers.

Findings
Findings reported that the multicultural preservice teachers have novice research skills and that the real-world application of their research skills developed their research competence. However, they encountered difficulties creating their action research, such as in the literature review and the research conceptualization.

Research limitations/implications
Aside from the self-reported experiences of the students, the training on the action research mainly focused on the conceptualization, design formulation of interventions and proposal writing stage but were not implemented due to course constraints.

Practical implications
This study can assist policymakers to integrate a mandatory research course as part of the curricular offerings and for the university to create space for students to practice their research skills based on real-life problems in the basic level institutions.

Social implications
Understanding the challenges, difficulties, and basic competence in the research development of the preservice teachers would strengthen the research practice of the future teachers for evidence-based teaching in the schools.

Originality/value
The limited literature focus on the development of research competence on teacher education students using action research, including the difficulties that university students experience in doing research based on a societal context.


This work focuses on complete 3D facial geometry prediction, including 3D facial alignment via 3D face modeling and face orientation estimation using the proposed multi-task, multi-modal, and multi-representation landmark refinement network (M$^3$-LRN). Our focus is on the important facial attributes, 3D landmarks, and we fully utilize their embedded information to guide 3D facial geometry learning. We first propose a multi-modal and multi-representation feature aggregation for landmark refinement. Next, we are the first to study 3DMM regression from sparse 3D landmarks and utilize multi-representation advantage to attain better geometry prediction. We attain the state of the art from extensive experiments on all tasks of learning 3D facial geometry. We closely validate contributions of each modality and representation. Our results are robust across cropped faces, underwater scenarios, and extreme poses. Specially we adopt only simple and widely used network operations in M$^3$-LRN and attain a near 20\% improvement on face orientation estimation over the current best performance. See our project page here.


There is increasing evidence from the literature that indicates the association between impaired sperm DNA integrity and male infertility. However, the data is insufficient regarding recurrent implantation failure (RIF) and sperm DNA damage. This study aimed to investigate the association between sperm DNA fragmentation and RIF cases. Basic semen parameters and sperm DNA fragmentation index (DFI) of men whose partner was suffering from RIF were compared with men whose partner was diagnosed with unexplained infertility (UEI) but had clinical pregnancies following IVF treatment. A retrospective analysis from a large‐volume IVF center has been performed, and a total of 197 couples underwent analysis. Two groups were formed, couples with RIF and couples diagnosed with UEI but had clinical pregnancies (controls) following IVF cycles. The mean number of cycles showed significant differences between the groups. However, no statistical difference was observed between RIF and the control group regarding patient characteristics, semen parameters, and sperm DNA fragmentation index (DFI). Also, no statistically significant correlation was found between sperm DFI and clinical pregnancies in the unexplained infertility cohort. Our results show that sperm DNA fragmentation may not be an important contributing factor to RIF cases.


The acquisition of genital herpes simplex virus (HSV) is still a significant risk to sexually active individuals. This chapter addresses the epidemiology and natural history of genital herpes, and new therapies that have changed the natural course of events following infection. The possibility of an HSV vaccine is also discussed.


An extremely sensitive and reliable procedure for the determination of physiological (normal) Pt levels in human urine is described based on UV photolysis of the sample followed by the determination of Pt with magnetic sector field ICP-MS. Owing to the low blank values, which are a consequence of the minimal reagent addition required, UV photolysis was used to decompose the organic matrix components. Magnetic sector field ICP-MS operated in the low resolution mode afforded detection limits that were 100 times lower than those obtained in the high resolution mode or with conventional quadrupole ICP-MS and was found to be advantageous for the ultratrace determination of non-interfered isotopes. The detection limit in urine samples was 0.24 ng l–1 using standard nickel cones. The use of a high performance nickel skimmer cone did not result in an improvement in the detection limit, because the analyte and background signals were enhanced to a similar extent. The urinary Pt levels in 16 non-exposed persons ranged between 0.48 and 7.65 ng l–1(arithmetic mean: 1.72 ng l–1).


Understanding of the substantial disparity in health between low and high socioeconomic status (SES) groups is hampered by the lack of a sufficiently comprehensive theoretical framework to interpret empirical facts and to predict yet untested relations. We present a life-cycle model that incorporates multiple mechanisms explaining (jointly) a large part of the observed disparities in health by SES. In our model, lifestyle factors, working conditions, retirement, living conditions and curative care are mechanisms through which SES, health and mortality are related. Our model predicts a widening and possibly a subsequent narrowing with age of the gradient in health by SES.


Most people have experienced the sensation of having a word on the tip of the tongue. A common assumption is that a major driving force underlying the tip-of-the-tongue (TOT) state is conscious partial recollective access to some of the unretrieved word's attributes, such as its first letter. In the present study, under free-report conditions, participants provided more partial recollection responses during TOTs than non-TOTs without being more accurate among their provided responses. Under forced-guessing conditions in which participants needed to guess at the unidentified target word's first letter, participants exhibited false partial recollective experience during TOTs. This was shown by a strong tendency during TOTs to indicate that they knew the first letter, when in actuality, they were wrong in their first-letter guess. An additional experiment showed illusory partial recollection of a contextual detail during TOTs relative to non-TOTs. The full pattern of results portrays an alternative possible theoretical relationship between TOT states and subjective partial recollective experience. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).


Soil texture is a key parameter in agricultural processes and an important measure for agricultural prediction, water cycle, filtering of pollutants and carbon storage. Besides, its estimation is essential for agronomists, hydrologists, geologists and environmentalists and for modeling in these application areas. Several studies have been based on understanding and modeling the biological, physical and chemical processes in the soil. Regarding the texture of the soil, few researches propose soil texture spatialization, and are generally based on ground measurements. Among other things, field observations or laboratory analyzes are very expensive and are not very representative. Indeed, the soil texture presents a strong heterogeneity even at the scale of a field. It is then necessary to use precise and spatialized information on soils. These methods are generally based on remote sensing data and particularly optical data to restore soil component. However, these techniques are strongly affected by atmospheric conditions. This constraint is not valid for Radar sensors (Radio Detection And Ranging). Radar data are mainly sensitive to soil moisture and soil roughness, and has also been evaluated for its ability to perform texture measurements. The aim of this study is evaluate the potential of these techniques based on optical and radar data for soil texture estimation. By its composition, its structure, its texture and its porosity, soil moisture is strongly influenced by the soil nature. With the arrival of Sentinel-1 (S-1) and Sentinel-2 (S-2) ESA spatial missions, data are acquired with high spatial and temporal resolution between July and early December 2017, on a semi-arid area in central Tunisia. This study is therefore conducted using S-2 SWIR (Short-Wave Infrared) bands (B11 and B12, most sensitive to clay) and soil moisture products derived from radar data. And algorithms based on the support vector machine (SVM) and random forest (RF) methods are proposed for the classification and mapping of clay content. In order to evaluate the approach and determine the adequate data (between optical and radar data) allowing to precisely characterize the clay content, a cross-validation was used. The SWIR bands lead to less satisfactory outcomes compared to soil moisture. With an overall accuracy of approximately 65%, soil moisture achieved the best performance for estimating soil texture. The results also showed that RF and SVM are robust classifiers for texture estimation despite the small number of training data. However, RF displays greater accuracy and speed of simulation compared to SVM.


Seruk spring, located in Batu, East Java, is a spring with four different Land Use Systems (LUS) in its surrounding area, comprising a mixed, a pine, an eucalypt, and a bamboo forests. Over time, there have been changes in land use around the area of Seruk Spring. This results in a decrease in the environmental quality, and even in the spring's water discharge. As spring serves as an important part of people living in the immediate vicinity, this research aimed to determine the differences in litter quality, earthworm populations, and soil porosity at each LUS. Litter was measured in each area and analyzed in the laboratory to determine its biomass and quality. Earthworm populations and biomass were measured with the iron box method, while the soil porosity and organic matter were based on secondary data from the previous research. The correlation among all the parameters was analyzed with Principal Components Analysis (PCA) using PAST 3 software. The results showed that the bamboo forest had the most suitable land-use system around spring, based on the highest litter thickness and its quality in the area. The different qualities of each LUS provided diverse advantages for the spring ecosystem. The presence of the bamboo forest around the spring area should be conserved, to maintain the quality of the ecosystem and the sustainability of the spring area itself.


Nodal segments collected from shoots of adult grafts on juvenile rootstocks from seedlings grown under full sun and shade (40%), and from adult plants grown without and with shade (80%) were cultivated in vitro. In addition, nodal segments from field grown plants were cultivated in vitro under the following conditions: control; sixty days after dormex (hydrogenated cyanamide 49%) application at 2% and 4%; sixty days after partial pruning; and 75 days of 80% shading. Sixty days after culture initiation, seedlings and adult plants under shade produced no browning explants. The highest percentage of budbreak (PBB) (100%) was obtained at 20 days in explants of seedlings; at 40 days in explants of adult plants under shade. At sixty days, adult and grafted plants without shade presented 40% and 35% browning explants, respectively, and 85% and 80% budbreak explants, respectively. At sixty days, the control treatment produced 65% budbreak; the dormex treatment with the concentrations of 2% and 4%, 80% and 70% PBB, respectively; the partial pruning, 65%. Dormex application at 2% increased PBB and percentage of leaves formed to more than that of the control.


The Coomassie brilliant blue protein assay is commonly used because of its sensitivity and convenience, but it is not well understood on a molecular level. This study attempts to gain better understanding of the assay system through spectrophotometric binding studies carried out on selected proteins under solvent conditions characteristic of the normal protein assay. The studies were generally conducted at high protein/dye concentration ratios, where only the high-affinity dye binding sites would be occupied. Modified Scatchard and Hill analyses show that these high-affinity sites are few in number compared to the total number of dye-binding sites on a given protein. The magnitudes of the high-affinity binding constants are typical of noncovalent binding interactions.


This paper presents a model of workflow-oriented virtual enterprise based on policy driven and multi-agent service composition. The cooperation of the members in virtual enterprise will be implemented through the dynamic composition and execution of the services, which is workflow-oriented. Each service has its own policies for selection of the suitable services to achieve the cooperation and composition, which are described in WSPL and also registered into UDDI center as same as service description. In the policies, it defines the conditions for composition and cooperation, such as the accepted range of QoS with corresponding price charge, etc. The whole composition process will be executed through the interactions among multi agents, which include business analysis agent, service mapping agent and service allocation agent. Through such policy driven and multi-agent service composition, it can address win-win in the dynamically establishment of the workflow-oriented virtual enterprise.


Introduction From the beginnings of orthotopic liver transplantation (OLT) in the 1960s until today, the outcomes, as measured by 1 or 5-year graft survival, have steadily improved such that the 5 year survival is exceeding 70% (1). This dramatic improvement is multifactorial and can be attributed to innovations and developments in multiple areas including immunosuppression, surgical technique, intraoperative anesthesia care, perioperative critical care, patient evaluation and selection. While it is difficult to weight the contribution of individual factors, evidence supports that experience plays a significant role too (2). While anesthesia and critical care have contributed to the improvement in outcome, it is difficult to identify which innovations or developments have had the most impact. Experience is certainly an important factor as recently suggested by Hofer et al. (3) who showed an association between anesthesiologist experience and mortality after OLT. This supports the trend of specialty fellowship training in liver transplant anesthesia and need for qualified anesthesia leadership in transplant centers (4). However, while experience of the anesthesiologist seems to be an important factor, there is no general agreement on management protocols for liver transplant anesthesia (5,6). Management is generally guided by institutional protocols that have evolved over time. Evidence to favor certain anesthesia techniques and protocols over others is lacking and despite the variability in protocols between different centers and even countries, outcomes are very similar (1,7,8). Recent advances in areas such as hemodynamic monitoring, coagulation monitoring and therapy (e.g. coagulation factor concentrates) and the rise in use of electronic records (allowing for detailed intraoperative physiologic data mining), may elucidate the contribution of certain factors to overall outcome and lead to the development of consensus in perioperative management during liver transplantation. In the following article, we highlight areas of clinical management that have the potential to offer improvements in how we manage patients undergoing liver transplantation.


There is considerable pressure on conservation planners to use existing data from herbarium and museum collections for planning and monitoring, despite the weaknesses of such data. It is thus important to be able to assess the quality of this information. One application of these data is the production of species richness maps. However, sampling- effort is generally not consistent throughout a region for maps generated from collections data, and it is thus desirable to identify geographic grid cells (such as quarter degree squares: QDS) for which there has been low sampling effort. We describe a technique that can be used to identify QDS that are likely to have low species richness that is due to insufficient sampling effort rather than to low actual species richness. The technique exploits relationships between climate and species richness to detect QDS that are poorly sampled. This approach offers advantages over the current practice of applying a single threshold across the entire map region to detect QDS that are poorly sampled. Here we report on the application of our technique to plant species richness data in the PRECIS database. Results reveal that the majority of QDS in the Flora of Southern Africa region can be considered to be poorly sampled, even when using conservative thresholds for richness values. The advantages and weaknesses of the technique are discussed and issues requiring further investigation are highlighted.


The challenge for design and manufacturing of future advanced gas turbine systems is to meet the requirement of increasing turbine inlet temperature (TIT), which is higher than the substrate melting temperature. Increasing high thermal load also causes severe oxidation and corrosion of base alloy in gas turbine. Current approach is coating the inlet turbine blade with thermal barrier coating (TBC) combined with internal cooling channel in the substrate. However, neither the ceramic coating layer nor the metallic bond coat in the TBC system can provide structural loading support to house the internal cooling channels. Development of structural bond coat with embedded cooing channels can be one of the key technologies for future advanced turbine systems.
 In this research, high temperature protective structural coating on top of a superalloy substrate (popular for making gas turbine component) by additive manufacturing (AM) technique using oxide dispersion strengthening (ODS) powder is presented. A novel combined mechanochemical bonding (MCB) plus ball milling (BM) process is utilized to produce ODS powders suitable for AM applications. AM-processed ODS coating by direct energy deposition (DED) method on MAR-247 substrate were carried out. The ODS coated samples were then subjected to cyclic thermal loadings for over 4000 cycles (each cycle consists of alternating between 45 minutes at 1100 °C and 45 minutes at room temperature). SEM and EDX were applied for oxide formation analyses of the ODS coating at selected thermal cycles. In particular, stability of gamma prime phase in the ODS coating at different thermal cycles is analyzed. Test results revealed a thin continuous durable alumina oxide layer on ODS coating surface after over 4,000 thermal cycles. Test results also showed relatively stable substrate microstructures due to the protective alumina surface oxide layer and strong bonding at ODS coating/substrate interface is maintained. Oxidation weight gain of a AM-processed ODS sample is conducted and the results compared favorably with those literature available alumina forming alloys (AFA) under similar testing conditions.


Abstract In South American rivers, Eichhornia crassipes and other floating plants intertwine and form floating rafts commonly known as "camalotales" which are especially abundant during flooding periods. During extraordinary floods, hectares of floating mats are drifted by the Plata Basin Rivers. In the Río de la Plata several reports suggest that many animal and plant species from subtropical latitudes colonizes the area through these large rafts. These episodes are very important from the economic point of view because they cause several troubles to navigation and other activities. On the other hand, benefits to biodiversity are conspicuous, and many authors consider this process vital to the Río de la Plata wetlands and forests. However, there is scarce knowledge about Eichhornia rafts plant species composition. With the aim of creating an exhaustive list of the flora of the Eichhornia rafts, we visited the Río de la Plata coast during a massive Eichhornia rafts arrival. Thirty-two plant species were recorded in three different plant assemblages: Eichhornia rafts sensu stricto, floating reeds (canutillares) and embalsados. In front of this unexpected we emphasize the need to include this phenomenon in regional biodiversity conservation plans.


A 19 mm diameter prototype bioprosthetic valve mounted in a cardiac pulse duplicator was characterized using Doppler echocardiography and qualitative flow visualization at a heart rate of 72 bpm. Analysis of the flow visualization images revealed that the prototype and control valve leaflets open symmetrically but close asymmetrically. The asymmetry in the closing of the valves is likely due to the large pressure gradients across the valves and may have implications for the long term mechanical failure of the valves. The relatively high peak systolic velocity of 309.9 cm/s, which was measured in the prototype 19 mm valve, can be attributed to the small valve diameter and the high cardiac output used in the current study.


The article explains the pitfalls and advantages of home visits and how physicians can successfully incorporate them into their current practice.


Insufficient-order system identification can result in a multimodal mean square error surface on which a gradient-type algorithm may converge to a local minimum. In this letter a new composite gradient algorithm (CGA) is presented which is due to achieve global convergence when the output error surface contains local minima. The proposed algorithm combines the useful properties of the output error (OE) and equation error (EE) adaptive filtering methods using a new dynamic error surface. The CGA provides a single convergence point for the gradient-search algorithm independently of the initial conditions. The "global convergence" conjecture is illustrated by simulation examples showing good global convergence properties even in such undermodeled cases when the Steiglitz-McBride algorithm fails. >


As workstations become more powerful and speed and bandwidth of networks increase, parallel computing on a network of heterogeneous systems becomes more attractive. However, heterogeneity makes effective use of resources more difficult. Four presentations in the minisymposium discussed the software assistance required to alleviate these difficulties. The first speaker described overall requirements and issues in heterogeneous distributed computing. The second speaker presented an approach to extending a message-passing interface and providing a full set of tools necessary for heterogeneous distributed computing. The third speaker emphasized the necessity of providing a safer message-passing interface, and the last speaker described the status of tools that manage resources in a heterogeneous environment.


The data growth generated by pervasive mobile devices and the Internet of Things at the network edge (i.e., closer to mobile users), couple with the demand for ultra-low latency, requires high computation resources which are not available at the end-user device. This demands a new network design paradigm in order to handle user demands. As a remedy, a new MN network design paradigm has emerged, called Mobile Edge Computing (MEC), to enable low-latency and location-aware data processing at the network edge. MEC is based on network function virtualization (NFV) technology, where mobile network functions (NFs) that formerly existed in the evolved packet core (EPC) are moved to the access network [i.e., they are deployed on local cloud platforms in proximity to the base stations (BSs)]. In order to reap the full benefits of the virtualized infrastructure, the NFV technology shall be combined with intelligent mechanisms for handling network resources. Despite the potential benefits presented by MEC, energy consumption is a challenge due to the foreseen dense deployment of BSs empowered with computation capabilities. In the effort to build greener 5G mobile network (MN), we advocate the integration of energy harvesting (EH) into future edge systems.


An isolated perfused rat hindlimb preparation was used to study the impact of local muscle adaptations induced by endurance exercise training on muscle performance and peak muscle oxygen consumption. Rats were trained for 12-15 wk by a running program (30 m/min up a 15% grade for 1 h/day 5 days/wk) shown previously to increase muscle mitochondrial enzyme activity. Sedentary (n = 11) and trained (n = 11) hindlimbs of similar size were perfused with a similar inflow (12.1 ml/min) at a similar oxygen content (18.1 ml O2/100 ml blood). Tetanic contractions (100 ms at 100 Hz) at 4, 8, 15, 30, 45, and 60/min were elicited in consecutive order. Initial tension was better maintained by muscles of trained animals at all frequencies above 4 tetani/min (P less than 0.05). Oxygen consumption (mumol.min-1.g-1) increased similarly in both groups at the lower contraction frequencies but was greater (P less than 0.05) in the trained [3.52 +/- 0.32 (SE)] than in the sedentary (2.44 +/- 0.31) group at 60 tetani/min. The peak oxygen consumption of the trained group (3.93 +/- 0.27) was 20% greater (P less than 0.05) than that of the sedentary group (3.28 +/- 0.28) when peak values for each animal, irrespective of the contraction condition, are compared. Blood flows to the contracting muscle (approximately 100 ml.min-1.g-1) and, therefore, oxygen deliveries (mumol.min-1.g-1) were not different between sedentary (7.99 +/- 0.56) and trained groups (8.35 +/- 0.61). Thus the 20% higher peak oxygen consumption was achieved by a greater oxygen extraction.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)


Radiofrequency ablation (RFA) is an effective modality for the treatment of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), because it can induce large coagulated necrosis in a few sessions. We have recently reported that the combination therapy of percutaneous ethanol injection (PEI) with RFA (PEI-RFA) created enhancement of coagulated necrosis compared with RFA alone. In the present study, we adopted PEI-RFA for the treatment of HCCs located in the regions that are difficult to treat with RFA alone. Five patients with biopsy-proven HCC and liver cirrhosis underwent PEI-RFA therapy. In these patients, HCCs were located beside the gallbladder, inferior vena cava or portal vein or kidney, or immediately under the diaphragm. Prior to RFA, 99.5% ethanol was injected into the region of HCC located in the regions where RFA energy appears to be difficult to reach. In all cases, HCC was totally coagulated by PEI-RFA. Injecting ethanol prior to RFA therapy caused no major side effects. These results indicate that PEI-RFA may be effective for the treatment of HCCs located in the regions that are difficult to treat with RFA alone as well as large-sized HCCs.


This study investigated the potential of flow cytometry for assessment of both the immunology and oncology of breast cancer and explored the possibility of correlation between the two. The T cell receptor gamma/delta expression was studied in lymphocytes found in the tumour (TILs), in the tumour draining lymph nodes and in the blood. During this study the T lymphocytes were divided into CD3, CD4 and CDS phenotypic subsets to assess differences. Tumour Infiltrating Lymphocytes (TILs) were observed to have a greater median expression of CD3+ CD8+ whereas in contrast the lymph node lymphocytes (LNL) are shown to have a higher median expression of CD3+ CD4+ gamma/delta+ lymphocytes. Interestingly the majority of gamma/delta+ lymphocytes were double negative (CD4- and CD8-) which may indicate a role for this subset in immunology of breast cancer. Breast tumours often have reduced MHC class I expression, which in effect means that normal cytotoxic T cell mediated tumour killing is inhibited. Consequently other non MHC mediated killing methods, possibly mediated by the double negative gamma/delta T cell subset, may be important in tumour immunology. The immune response was assessed in a tumour invaded and a tumour free lymph node removed from the same patient. The phenotype and activation of these lymphocytes was measured by flow cytometry to study the effect of metastatic tumour on the nodal immune response. The most significant difference was noted in the T lymphocyte phenotype, with the tumour invaded lymph node having an increased percentage of CD8+ cytotoxic T cells (p<0.001) which were replaced in the tumour free node, by CD4+ T helper cells (p=0.008). The trend was clearly shown as a decreased CD4/8 ratio in the tumour invaded node, increasing significandy in the tumour free node (p<0.001). Significant changes were also observed for activation marker expression with HLA DR levels significantly higher in the tumour invaded nodes for both CD8+ T cells (p=0.023) and CD4+ T cells (p=0.036). The interleukin-2 receptor expression however was only significantly increased in the tumour invaded nodes for CD8+ T cells (p=0.029) these trends possibly being indicative of the effect of tumour invasion on the immune system. Low and high axillary nodes which had been removed from each breast cancer patient were used to assess which of the observed lymphocyte phenotype and activation differences were local and also to compare stage I and II nodal responses. The stage II patients were then further subdivided into 4 subsets on the presence or absence of metastatic tumour within these lymph nodes. Phenotypic changes were observed in the 22 stage I patients only with a significant increase in CD3+ T cell percentage in the low node (p=0.042), with a concomitant decrease in the high node. The opposite was observed for CD 19+ B cells (p=0.036), with a lower percentage in the low node. This trend was reflected in the significant decrease in the CD3/CD19 ratio (p=0.036). No significant phenotypic trends were noted for pooled stage II patients. However when the subsets of stage II patients were analysed a significant trend for T cells was noted in the subset with low node tumour invaded and the high node tumour free with a higher CD4/8 ratio in the low invaded node, decreasing in the high node (p=0.05). Lymphocyte activation trends were observed in the 22 paired stage II nodes only. The low nodes showed significantly higher percentages of CD4+ HLA DR+ lymphocytes (p=0.01) and of interleukin-2 receptor (Tac) expression on both CD8+ T cells (p=0.05) and CD4+ T cells (p<0.001). The stage II subsets showed significant changes in activation, with the low node tumour invaded and high node tumour free showing significandy higher percentages of CD8+ HLA DR+ lymphocytes in the low node compared to the high node (p=0.05). Trends of increasing interleukin-2 receptor (Tac) expression in the low node were observed for CD4+ T cells (p=0.005). A trend of increasing expression of IgG on CD 19+ B cells was observed in the subset with both low node and high node tumour free (p=0.05). The general conclusion was that the invasion of the node was reflected primarily in the HLA DR response on CD8+ (T cytotoxic) cells while distance from the tumour was reflected by the interleukin-2 receptor (tac) response on CD4+ (T helper) cells.


Climate change and urbanization are converging to challenge city drainage infrastructure due to their adverse impacts on precipitation extremes and the environment of urban areas. Sustainable drainage systems have gained growing public interest in recent years, as a result of its positive effects on water quality and quantity issues and additional recreational amenities perceived in the urban landscape. This paper reviews recent progress in sustainable drainage development based on literature across different disciplinary fields. After presenting the key elements and criteria of sustainable drainage design, various devices and examples of sustainable drainage systems are introduced. The state-of-the-art model approaches and decision-aid tools for assessing the sustainable alternatives are discussed and compared. The paper further explores some limitations and difficulties in the application of the innovative solutions and suggests an integrated and trans-disciplinary approach for sustainable drainage design.


This article discusses some examples of jackknifing multitaper estimates of spectra, coherences, and frequency estimates. Examples include barometric pressure data, where spectrum with an extremely large range plus many narrow-band processes are seen. Analysis of dropped-call rates in cellular phone systems and their coherence with solar radio data illustrates further uses of the jackknife and some of the complexities encountered in processes with many spectral lines. The third example is a reexamination of the 663-year record of Nile River levels, a process claimed to be long-memory. There are persistent terms, but not of the form usually classed as long-memory. We begin by explaining the terms in the title.


In the face of the fast depletion of natural resources worldwide resulting from industrial and economic cannibalism, selfishness and marginalization are becoming more and more pronounced in a globalizing world. The phenomena of selfishness and marginalization are manifest in the introduction of stringent immigration laws by most industrialized countries in the North to ward off migrants from the less developed economies in the South; and also the reinforcement of existing laws by the latter to protect their citizens and natural resources in recent years. Issues of national identity, territorial integrity as against the centrality of humanity remain an Achilles heel toward the attainment of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). As far as 1968, Ahmadou Kourouma, an Ivorian novelist, in his very first narrative text, "Les Soleils des Independances" later translated into English as The Suns of Independence, raised the tragic dilemma of national identity at the expense of 'human identity'. In the absence of concrete steps to address the issues over the years, Liberia, Sierra Leone and La Cote d'Ivoire were engulfed in intestine civil strife over two decades later. The main causes of this strife are found in the irrational quest for self-identity in the name of nationality and ethnic superiority for greater access and control of "national" resources. This paper examines the upsurge of socioeconomic and political exclusion, and the potential threats they pose to the realization of the recently launched Sustainable Development Goals. It is done through a critical reading of Kourouma's The Suns of Independence, Allah is not obliged and 'Quand on refuse, on dit non'. The study is posited within the analytical framework of literary studies and sociocriticism


We report a case of myopic choroidal neovascularization that showed improvement after a single injection of ranibizumab. A 45-year-old Chinese man with high myopia presented with sudden onset painless central scotoma of his right eye of 2 weeks' duration. There was no history of trauma. His right eye vision on presentation was 6/30 which showed no improvement with pinhole. The right fundus showed myopic maculopathy at the posterior pole with subretinal hemorrhage at the inferotemporal fovea. The optic disc was tilted with inferotemporal peripapillary atrophy. There was a myopic maculopathy appearance in the macula of the left eye. Fundus fluorescein angiography revealed choroidal neovascularization at the fovea of the right eye. A diagnosis of right eye choroidal neovascularization secondary to myopic maculopathy was made. A single intravitreal injection of ranibizumab 0.05 mL was given. Ten weeks following intravitreal injection, vision had improved to 6/7.5, and repeated fundus fluorescein angiography showed absence of choroidal neovascularization. Follow-up at 6 months showed visual acuity had normalized to 6/6 with glasses, which was maintained up to 12 months following treatment. The right fundus showed no further subretinal hemorrhage with no new lesions.


Background Exercise interventions can result in weight loss, which is associated with reductions in disease risk. It is unknown how the volume of exercise prescribed in a one-time exercise intervention impacts long-term body fatness. We compared 24-month body fat changes among postmenopausal women previously prescribed 300 versus 150 minutes/week of exercise in a year-long exercise intervention trial. Methods The Breast Cancer and Exercise Trial in Alberta (BETA) was a two-centred randomized controlled trial in Alberta, Canada. The trial consisted of a 12-month intervention and 12-month observation period. For the intervention, participants were randomized to either a moderate-volume exercise group (150 min/week) or a high-volume exercise group (300 min/week). Participants in this study were 334 inactive postmenopausal women who had been followed-up to 24 months. The primary outcome for this study was 24-month change in total body fat using dual energy X-ray absorptiometry scans. Other measures included weight, waist and hip circumferences, subcutaneous and intra-abdominal fat from computed tomography scans, and lean mass. Researchers were blinded to randomization group when measuring body fat. Results Both groups self-reported ∼180 minutes/week moderate–vigorous activity at 24 months. No statistically significant difference was found in total body fat at 24 months between the two groups. Statistically significant effects (comparing high versus moderate groups) were found for BMI (least-square mean change (95% CI): −0.66 (−0.97, −0.36) versus −0.25 (−0.55, 0.05) kg/m2, P=0.04), waist-to-hip ratio (−0.033 (−0.040, −0.026) versus −0.023 (−0.030, −0.016), P=0.05), and subcutaneous abdominal fat area (−32.18 (−39.30, −25.06) versus −22.20 (−29.34, −15.05) cm2, P=0.04). Conclusion Prescribing 300 versus 150 minutes/week of exercise to inactive postmenopausal women resulted in some long-term greater decreases in measures of body composition but no overall differences in total body fat loss. This trail is registered with NCT01435005.


Carbon coated hollow alpha-Fe2O3 spheres were prepared via a facile two-step hydrothermal method. The appearance and crystalline structure of the samples were characterized by scanning electron microscopy (SEM), X-ray diffraction (XRD) and transmission electron microscopy (TEM). The morphology showed that the hollow spheres were composed of well crystallized nanoparticles after the first hydrothermal reaction and subsequent calcinations. A thin carbon film was coated on each Fe2O3 nanoparticles after the second hydrothermal procedure. This carbon coating was probably beneficial to maintain the microstructure of the active material during repeatable lithiation and delithiation. Afterwards, the samples were assembled into half-cells to investigate the electrochemical properties. The electrode delivered relatively high initial discharge/charge capacities of 1291/890 mA h g(-1) at the rate of 0.3 C. The reversible capacity maintained very well in a prolonged 140 cycles. The capacity retention was 89% after 70 cycles, and that was 81% after 140 cycles. This exceptional lithium storage property was probably attributed to the porous and hollow structure which allowed the penetration of electrolyte to the inner of the electrode, the nanoscale Fe2O3 particles which shortened the migration pathway for lithium ion, and the carbon coating which kept the active materials structure intact. The attractive electrochemical performance suggested the carbon coated hollow Fe2O3 spheres would be the potential anode material for future lithium ion battery.


This paper uses a balanced panel of large manufacturing firms to study the dynamic effects of computerizing VAT invoices on tax revenues and firm behavior in China, 1998-2007. We find that computerization explains 10.8% of cumulative VAT revenues and increases the effective average tax rate by approximately 9-12% in the seven subsequent years. The evidence suggests that the effects of computerization change over time: tax revenue gains are likely to be smaller in the long run. Meanwhile, firms reduce output and input, and increase productivity monotonically over time.


Abstract This article presents an archetypal reading of Bharati Mukherjee's Jasmine that foregrounds the narrator's agency in her sequential transformations in the narrative. The critic starts from a broader conception of the term agency that encapsulates those instinctive types of actions in which the protagonist, and people in everyday life, find themselves implicated. In other words, the term agency should not be limited to fully conscious and deliberate acts, hence the concept "instinctive agency." Other scholars have seen that the denomination factor in Jasmine, i.e. the fact that every characterological transformation the narrator experiences coincides with a name given to her by a male partner, is a clear sign of her diminishing subjectivity and lack of agency. This study refutes this claim by foregrounding the agentive role of her personal history, and by presenting a thorough psychological and archetypal analysis of the male partners with whom she relates. This article also refutes Mukherjee's claim that complete abnegation of the old self is required for transformation to occur. By highlighting the ways in which the protagonist's old Indian self comes to the surface time and again throughout her journey, the article evidences that the author's views regarding self-transformation are psychologically unrealistic. The article concludes with the perspective that it is inaccurate to regard Jasmine as a sheer receptacle of male power and postcolonial influence, and that a deeper psychological reading substantiates her agency and subjectivity in the postmodern world in which her narrative of self-transformation unfolds.


This research is based on the reason that subject matter in the equality program has no relevance to daily life. The purpose of this research is to develop teaching materials based on vocational skills and further can be used as a reference in improving the learning process in Equality Program. Teaching materials are developed to meet the learning needs in developing academic potential by taking into account aspects such as cultural background, geographical location, physiological, psychological, level of age and self concept. This research is a development research using 3D model adopted from 4D model that is define, design, and develope. From the results of this study found that the vocational skills-based teaching materials effectively used in the learning process of citizens learning equivalence program that can be used to improve and develop the quality of equality programs. Keyword—Teaching Materials, Vocational Skills,


A mode-matching technique for the analysis of TE/sub 011/ mode waveguide cylindrical bandpass filters including losses is presented. The modes of a lossy radial waveguide are derived and the generalized scattering matrix of the lossy cavity coupled by two rectangular apertures is computed enforcing an impedance boundary condition on the cavity sidewall. Cavity sidewall losses as well as top and bottom wall losses are therefore taken accurately into account. Numerical and experimental results are given for a four cavity filter in Ka band. >


Von Willebrand disease (vWD) is a frequent congenital bleeding disorder with an autosomal, usually dominant, mode of inheritance. Its clinical expression and mechanism (quantitative or qualitative abnormality of von Willebrand Factor) are extremely heterogeneous. The bleeding symptoms vary in intensity from one patient to the other (including in the same family) and also with time in a given patient. The role of vWF in platelet adhesion to the subendothelium and as a carrier of Factor VIII explains the prolongation of the bleeding time and of the APTT in the typical forms of vWD. These tests, however, may be only slightly abnormal or even normal in the numerous mild forms of the disease which are often diagnosed because of bleeding complications following surgery or delivery. The specific tests (assay of vWF antigen, assay of ristocetin-cofactor activity, assay of Factor VIII activity) usually lead to the diagnosis. The latter remains uncertain, however, in some cases where results are at the lower limit of normal. Once the diagnosis is established, highly specialized methods are required to determine the type of vWD. The therapy of vWD relies on the use of either virus inactivated plasma concentrates or DDAVP.


The aim of this work was to determine whether there is any relationship between wax production rate and propolis production. High (P1) and low (P2) propolis-producing hives were chosen in a selection process. Through controlled matings, four different groups of beehives were obtained: D1 hives, originating from the mating of P1 queens and P1 drones; D2 hives, originating from P1 queens and P2 drones; D3 hives, originating from P2 queens and P1 drones; and D4 hives, originating from P2 queens and P2 drones. After 110 days, one frame with wax foundation was put in the center of each hive and the areas that the honeybees drew out the comb were estimated. The propolis can be collected thirty days after placement of the collectors. Propolis is preferentially deposited on the sides of the collector that receive the greatest exposure to sun and wind, mainly in the winter. D1 beehives accumulated five times more propolis than did D2 and D3, and 34 times more than D4.  D4 beehives drew out the combs more efficiently, when compared to the D1, D2 and D3 beehives.


Previous studies in our laboratory have shown that in fetal plasma arachidonic (AA) and docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) levels are higher (about two fold) than in maternal plasma whereas the reverse situation was observed for the levels of their C18 precursors linoleic acid (AL) and alpha-linolenic acid (AAL) (13). This paradoxical situation raises the questions of the origin of the long chain polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) and of the ability of fetal liver to desaturate and elongate C18 precursors since placenta was shown not to be able to desaturate fatty acids. This question should be answered for the rationale of formula feeding supplementation either with long chain PUFAs or with their C18 precursors. Three experimental approaches can contribute to elucidate this dilemna: nutritional studies with formula supplementation, investigations on hepatic enzymes in vitro, in vivo experiments using stable isotopes. Supplementation of formulas with AAL in precise conditions (AL/AAL ratio: 6.4/1 and AL intake: 4.95% of total energetic supply) was done in a multicentric study including 88 premature newborns (32 weeks post conceptional age) for five weeks. The plasma phospholipid and red blood cell DHA status was found to be closer to human milk feeding than with standard formula feeding and most of the n-6 pathway was preserved. The data suggests that in premature newborns a significant conversion of AAL into DHA is possible provided an equilibrium is respected between AL and AAL supplies. This conversion is confirmed both by in vitro and in vivo studies: in fetal livers (obtained from therapeutic abortion) significant delta 6 and delta 5 desaturase activities were measured by a radiochemical method using reverse phase HPLC separation of [1-14C] labelled substrates and products in the n-6 and in the n-3 series. Substrate inhibition was observed especially at delta 5 desaturation and the maximum velocities were relatively limited mainly in the n-6 pathway which was slower than in the n-3 serie. These data are in agreement with recent preliminary data obtained in different laboratories with stable isotopes in vivo but in infants born in term: experiments using either 13C or deuterium labelled fatty acids concluded to the conversion of C18 essential fatty acids into AA and DHA justifying (AAL) formula supplementation for sustaining DHA status in preterm newborns.


Background COPD is associated with increased pulmonary vascular resistance, leading to increased right heart load, decreased filling pressure and stroke volume of the left ventricle (LV). Exercise training (ET) is assumed to increase exercise capacity and quality of live. It is hypothesized that exercise training exhibits beneficial effects on LV function in COPD. Methods 10 COPD patients(GOLD I/II/III/IV = 4/4/1/1) were prospectively examined at enrolment and after 6 month ET (twice weekly, 1.5 hr). The ET contained group training (warming), followed by individual strength and endurance components. LV enddiastolic volume (LVEDV), endsystolic volume (LVESV), stroke volume (LVSV) and ejection fraction (LVEF) were assessed by transthoracic echocardiography. LV mass (LVM) was obtained based on the Penn-cube convention. LV enddiastolic and endsystolic wall stress was calculated using the wall stress index as previously reported. Results Echocardiographic results are displayed in table 1. Furthermore pCO 2 values in capillary blood gases decreased from 40.5 ± 6.8 to 38.2 ± 6.7 (p=0.015). Conclusions Improved cardiac function based on increased LV stroke volume and mass was observed after 6 months of ET. The increase of LV volume and mass was not associated with increased ventricular wall stress. It is concluded that moderate exercise training leads to improved LV function and stroke volume in COPD.


Aim: the efficacy and safety of combined therapy with anticholinergics and alpha blockers in comparison with alpha blockers monotherapy among patients with BPH. Methods: We conducted a single blinded RCT and 80 patients with BPH who referred to Ali-ebn-abitaleb, Zahedan were included. One group received 0.4 mg/d Tamsulosin in addition to Tolterodine and the other group received the same doses of Tamsulosin in addition to placebo. Both groups were evaluated before and 6 months after treatment with special attention to clinical symptoms, life quality improvement and treatment satisfaction. SPSS was applied for data analysis. Results: There is no significant difference between these two groups of patientsr demographics and basic indices such as PVR, PSA and the volume of prostate. IPSS was significantly improved among patients who received Toltrodine (p=0.0008) whereas both groups showed same score before treatment. Conclusion: It seems that combined therapy with anticholinergics and alpha blockers is a safe and efficient regimen among patients with BPH, either as primary or alternative treatment after the failure of conventional treatments.


"Objective – Goals of economic development is to increase economic growth, increase employment opportunity, equalize income distribution, and increase standard of living which will reach out community welfare. Therefore, to achieve all those goals, programs which can enhance economic activities with high intensity are needed. It will create more job opportunities and higher income, which mean poverty can be minimalized. One of the efforts to increase economic growth and public income is to develop human capital. The research is aimed to create the development of human capital model which includes training, skill, experience, and other supports particularly creativity and innovation and regarding enhancing welfare of weaving industry's workers. Methodology/Technique – This research used quantitative and qualitative methods with primary and secondary data which were taken by interviews, questionnaires, and observation. The research took place in several villages/districts in Sambas Regency, those were Jagur, Tumuk Manggis, Tanjung Mekar, Sumber Harapan, and Sajad districts. Considering that population data was not available accurately, respondents were selected based on purposive method and was adapted with the research goal. Findings – The research showed that human capital model to develop weaving industry was very likely to be done through comprehensive development by stakeholders in Sambas Regency (government and public figures), higher education institutions, and companies (business group) so that labour income could increase. Novelty – This developed model, then, is one of means that can be used to improve welfare of weaving industrial workers so that it can be new finding for human capital theory development."


Anomalously warm sea-surface temperatures (SSTs) are associated with interannual and decadal variability as well as with long-term climate changes indicative of global warming. Such oscillations could precipitate changes in a variety of oceanic processes to affect marine species worldwide. As global temperatures continue to rise, it will be critically important to be able to predict the effects of such changes on species' abundance, distribution, and ecological relationships so as to identify vulnerable populations. Off the coast of British Columbia, warm SSTs have persisted through the last two decades. Based on 16 years of reproductive data collected between 1975 and 2002, we show that the extreme variation in reproductive performance exhibited by tufted puffins (Fratercula cirrhata) was related to changes in SST both within and among seasons. Especially warm SSTs corresponded with drastically decreased growth rates and fledging success of puffin nestlings. Puffins may partially compensate for within-season changes associated with SST by adjusting their breeding phenology, yet our data also suggest that they are highly vulnerable to the effects of climate change at this site and may serve as a valuable indicator of biological change in the North Pacific. Further and prolonged increases in ocean temperature could make Triangle Island, which contains the largest tufted puffin colony in Canada, unsuitable as a breeding site for this species.


MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are small non-coding RNAs that modulate gene expression transcriptionally (transcriptional activation or inactivation) and/or post-transcriptionally (translation inhibition or degradation of their target mRNAs). This phenomenon has significant roles in growth and developmental processes in plants and animals. Bos taurus is one of the most important livestock animals, having great importance in food and economical sciences and industries. However, limited information is available on Bos taurus constituent miRNAs because its whole genome assembly has been only recently published. Therefore, computational methods have been essential tools in miRNA gene prediction and discovery. Among these, machine-learning-based approaches are used to characterize genome scale pre-miRNAs from expressed sequence tags (ESTs). In this study, a support vector machine model was used to classify 33 structural and thermodynamic features of pre-miRNA genes. Public bovine EST data were obtained from different tissues in various developmental stages. A new algorithm, called BosFinder, was developed to identify and annotate the whole genome's derived pre-miRNAs. We found 18 776 highly potential pre-miRNA sequences. This is the first genome survey report of Bos taurus based on a machine-learning method for pre-miRNA gene finding. The bosfinder program is freely available at http://lbb.ut.ac.ir/Download/LBBsoft/BosFinder/.


Abstract Privacy and sharing are believed to share a dynamic and dialectical tension, where individuals have competing needs to be both open and closed in contact with others [8]. Online, technology can impact this dynamic process [68]. Indeed, a number of researchers observed that users' stated privacy attitude do not match their behavior [2, 3, 23, 30, 64, 81]. In these studies privacy attitude is compared with behavior via a number of concepts related to privacy. While it is known in psychology that attitudes are multidimensional constructs [10, 15, 76], the question arises whether the user ambivalence with regards to privacy is due to different or contradictory cognitive and affective components of privacy and sharing attitude. We conducted an empirical study to investigate the difference between privacy attitude and sharing attitude. A US sample of N = 60 MTurk workers was assigned to two groups and asked to describe in a 250-word free-form response what [privacy/sharing] online means for them. Responses were coded in quantitative content analysis. The presence and frequency of codes were compared across conditions. Emotions and relationships to other parties were evaluated as predictors for a discriminative logistic regression classifying both attitudes. We found that privacy and sharing attitude differ significantly across a number of the extracted codes. Participants in privacy attitude were significantly more likely to express fear and significantly less likely to express happiness. For sharing attitude the reverse is true. We found that a discriminant logistic regression on a tone analysis of the participants' responses offers excellent discrimination between privacy and sharing attitude. We cross-validated this classifier with another sample of N′ = 54. The observed differences contribute an understanding of user states in privacy (and sharing) situations online and has implications for both privacy research and practice.


Purpose

The purpose of this study is to highlight the techniques and applications used to adapt information literacy (IL) modules in such a way that students acquired the IL skills through the use of tablet technology. The focus at higher education institutions has been placed on embracing the ever-changing Web technologies to enhance teaching and learning. This case study reports on a collaborative effort between faculty and librarians in 2014, where tablet technology was integrated into the Information Literacy Certificate Programme of Environmental Management Extended Curriculum Programme (ECP) students.

Design/methodology/approach

To support teaching with technology at the Cape Peninsula University of Technology (CPUT), a pilot project was conducted in 2014 using tablet technology to train IL to a group of 20 ECP Environmental Management students in the Applied Sciences Faculty. All modules were adapted for this purpose meaning that students used the tablet throughout the training sessions.

Findings

Good collaboration between librarians and faculty, as well as interaction between students increased. Some of the challenges faced were unstable internet connection; many Web applications identified by the trainers to use during the training were not compatible with the Nexus 7 Tablet. Overall, the training went well. In the end, the librarians were successful in achieving learning to take place among students.

Originality/value

Currently CPUT Libraries promotes the Information Literacy (IL) Certificate Programme to first year students, integrating IL into the curriculum of faculty. It is hoped that this paper will give insight for academic librarians wishing to incorporate mobile technologies into their IL training programmes.


On-chip networks have emerged as a scalable and high-bandwidth communication fabric in many-core processor chips. However, the energy consumption of these networks is becoming comparable to that of computation cores, making further scaling of core counts difficult. This thesis makes several contributions to low-swing signaling circuit design for the energy efficient on-chip networks in two separate projects: on-chip networks optimized for one-to-many multicasts and broadcasts, and link designs that allow on-chip networks to approach an ideal interconnection fabric. A low-swing crossbar switch, which is based on tri-state Reduced-Swing Drivers (RSDs), is presented for the first project. Measurement results of its test chip fabricated in 45nm SOI CMOS show that the tri-state RSD-based crossbar enables 55% power savings as compared to an equivalent full-swing crossbar and link. Also, the measurement results show that the proposed crossbar allows the broadcast-optimized on-chip networks using a single pipeline stage for physical data transmission to operate at 21% higher data rate, when compared with the full-swing networks. For the second project, two clockless low-swing repeaters, a Self-Resetting Logic Repeater (SRLR) and a Voltage-Locked Repeater (VLR), have been proposed and analyzed in simulation only. They both require no reference clock, differential signaling, and bias current. Such digital-intensive properties enable them to approach energy and delay performance of a point-to-point interconnect of variable lengths. Simulated in 45nm SOI CMOS, the 10mm SRLR featured with high energy efficiency consumes 338fJ/b at 5.4Gb/s/ch while the 10mm VLR raises its data rate up to 16.OGb/s/ch with 427fJ/b. Thesis Supervisor: Li-Shiuan Peh Title: Associate Professor Thesis Supervisor: Anantha P. Chandrakasan Title: Professor


The Web was designed as an information space by Tim Berners-Lee, with the goal not only that it should be available for human reading, but also that machine would be able to participate in and help users to communicate with each other. Web information integration can only free them from the tedious tasks of finding the relevant data sources. But the most existing systems do not really integrate information. Deeper information integration, or knowledge fusion (KF), involves not only delivering the information available via the links to user, but also analyzing, and merging the information results coming from information sources by solving the result consistencies, removing duplicates, etc. In the paper, we give a formal model for knowledge fusion for XML data and the KF-based information access architecture.


A critical problem for Internet traffic classification is how to obtain a high-performance statistical feature based classifier using a small set of training data. The solutions to this problem are essential to deal with the encrypted applications and the new emerging applications. In this paper, we propose a new Naive Bayes (NB) based classification scheme to tackle this problem, which utilizes two recent research findings, feature discretization and flow correlation. A new bag-of-flow (BoF) model is firstly introduced to describe the correlated flows and it leads to a new BoF-based traffic classification problem. We cast the BoF-based traffic classification as a specific classifier combination problem and theoretically analyze the classification benefit from flow aggregation. A number of combination methods are also formulated and used to aggregate the NB predictions of the correlated flows. Finally, we carry out a number of experiments on a large scale real-world network dataset. The experimental results show that the proposed scheme can achieve significantly higher classification accuracy and much faster classification speed with comparison to the state-of-the-art traffic classification methods.


Users have to require authentication with many times different a set of username and password which access various service providers and applications in their daily task and on social life. In this case, the user must need to memorize many pair of a set of username and password. This one is then to enforce the users using ordinary/same passwords or to keep note of passwords somewhere. It is a problem as a secret of private user information on social life which to generate more crucial problems for a business applications. To get rid of this problem, a single sign on (SSO) is suggested. SSO describing a set of username and password maintain multiply passwords to access for different service providers and applications. In this study, we argued out the prevalent and the current issue of SSO protocols in literature and CAS which is one of the SSO protocols, is used to examine a model of business application.


tions by analyzing the structure of density functions. This work was motivated by the paper [10] in which the distribution of the product of two non-central chi-square variables is obtained. Their problem arose from a problem in the physical sciences connected with the theory of spinstabilized rockets. It is pointed out in [101 that the original problem was to obtain the distribution of the product of a central Raleigh and a non-central Raleigh variable. By examining the structure of the density function of non-central Raleigh or non-central chi-square it is apparent that the density is the product of the special cases of two special functions. In [8, chapter 2] a lengthy treatment of Raleigh and associated distributions is given. We do not know any other particular problem in the physical sciences, but from the structural property of the problem pointed out in [10] it is quite likely that there may be a number of such problems in the physical sciences or in other disciplines, which are to be tackled. Hence we will give the distribution of the product of two independent stochastic variables whose density functions can be expressed as the product of any two special functions. Products of H-functions are used so that almost all classical density functions (central or non-central) will be taken care of, since H-functions are the most generalized special functions. Since a number of types of factors can be absorbed inside the H-function we think that all the distributions which are frequently used in the statistical theory of distributions will be included in this problem that we discuss here, with some modifications in some cases. Several special cases are pointed out so that one can easily get the distribution of the product or ratio of independent stochastic variables whose density functions are products of special functions. The result in [101 is obtained as a special case and further, the distributions of the products of two non-central F simple and multiple correlation coefficients are pointed out for the sake of mathematical interest because, structurally, the density functions in these cases belong to different categories. Since several properties of H-functions are available in the literature, it is easy to study other properties or to compute percentage points of the product distribution discussed in this paper. The approach of examining the structure of densities may simplify the problem of obtaining distributions of several statistics. 2. Some definitions and basic results. In this section some definitions and some preliminary results which are used in the derivation of the distribution of a


One hundred amniotic fluids were tested for the presence of ABH blood group substances. Gestation at amniocentesis ranged from 12 to 28 weeks, with a mean of 16.6 weeks. The secretor status of the fluid was correlated with the secretor status of the baby after birth as determined from a sample of saliva. Fluid and saliva correlated in 98 % of cases. It is felt that contamination with blood is likely to be the main source of error in typing amniotic fluids. However, because of the weaker activity of the anti‐H serum, the detection of the presence or absence of H‐substance can be doubtful if duplicate tests are not carried out. It is recommended that all fluids be checked for contamination with blood and that duplicate assays be done on two successive occasions. If these precautions are taken, the secretor typing of the amniotic fluid accurately reflects the secretor status of the individual foetus. Though probably not of wide application, the test could be of value in prenatal detection of dystrophia myotonica in individual cases.


Aspergillosis is a common opportunistic fungal infection affecting the nose and paranasal sinuses. The disease presents in various forms ranging from non-invasive to invasive, destructive and allergic types. We report here a rare case of invasive aspergillosis in an immunocompetent host with the literature review.


Wilson1in 1912, in an article entitled "Progressive Lenticular Degeneration: A Familial Nervous Disease Associated with Cirrhosis of the Liver," first clearly defined the condition now most widely known as hepatolenticular degeneration. His accurate description included and amplified the poorly characterized so-called pseudosclerosis, described by Westphal2and by Strumpell2in the closing years of the last century. Since the publication of Wilson's article, considerably more than 100 cases of this disease have been reported in the literature. The essential features of the syndrome are cirrhosis of the liver and a bilateral softening and degeneration of the lenticular nuclei. Although not hereditary in the sense of being passed from one generation to the next, the disease has a pronounced familial tendency and frequently affects several children in the same family. As many as five of seven siblings have been known' to have the disease. It is a disease


Thank you for reading lead us into temptation. As you may know, people have search hundreds times for their chosen readings like this lead us into temptation, but end up in harmful downloads. Rather than enjoying a good book with a cup of tea in the afternoon, instead they cope with some malicious virus inside their computer. lead us into temptation is available in our book collection an online access to it is set as public so you can get it instantly. Our book servers spans in multiple countries, allowing you to get the most less latency time to download any of our books like this one. Merely said, the lead us into temptation is universally compatible with any devices to read.


Habia Teknofluor AB makes parts of PTFE. With their process they reaches a pressure of 250bar at maximum. For their parts to improve they need to reach 400bar at least. We will give suggestions that can solve their problem. All our suggestions is described in the report with a conclusion. The suggestions should be as easy and effective as possible.


OBJECTIVES
We examined trends from 1998 to 2010 in bullying, bullying victimization, physical fighting, and weapon carrying and variations by gender, grade level, and race/ethnicity among US adolescents.

METHODS
The Health Behavior in School-Aged Children surveys of nationally representative samples of students in grades 6 through 10 were completed in 1998 (n = 15,686), 2002 (n = 14,818), 2006 (n = 9229), and 2010 (n = 10,926). We assessed frequency of bullying behaviors, physical fighting, and weapon carrying as well as weapon type and subtypes of bullying. We conducted logistic regression analyses, accounting for the complex sampling design, to identify trends and variations by demographic factors.

RESULTS
Bullying perpetration, bullying victimization, and physical fighting declined from 1998 to 2010. Weapon carrying increased for White students only. Declines in bullying perpetration and victimization were greater for boys than for girls. Declines in bullying perpetration and physical fighting were greater for middle-school students than for high-school students.

CONCLUSIONS
Declines in most violent behaviors are encouraging; however, lack of decline in weapon carrying merits further attention.


Aims: In this study, we aimed to examine whether five-year-old children with varying first-language (L1) vocabulary skills benefitted differentially from second-language (L2) teacher-led group talk and peer-play talk when acquiring L2 vocabulary in preschool contexts. Design: The participants were 26 bilingual children, speaking Turkish (L1) and Norwegian (L2), who participated in a longitudinal study. At age five, they experienced variability in the amount and diversity of the L2 talk they were exposed to in interactions with teachers and peers. Data and analysis: Preschool L2 talk exposure was assessed by calculating the density of word tokens and word types in video-taped teacher-led group talk and in peer-play talk. The children's vocabulary skills were assessed in L1 at age five and in L2 at ages four, five, six, seven and 10, using translated versions of the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test-III. To obtain a more reliable estimate of the children's L2 vocabulary skills we used data from all time points to fit a longitudinal growth model. Findings: Children with more developed L1 vocabulary skills who were exposed to teacher-led talk and peer-play talk with a high density of tokens had more developed L2 vocabulary skills at age five. This interaction effect remained after controlling for maternal education. Originality: Few previous studies, if any, have analyzed whether the interaction effects between L1 vocabulary skills and L2 exposure may impact L2 vocabulary skills; that is, whether children with more developed L1 vocabulary skills are more prepared to make use of the L2 environment. Implications: Interdependency among languages may be mediated by classroom talk quality. Rather than limiting the discussion of L1–L2 relations to issues of direct transfer, future research should include children's experiences with using socio-pragmatic skills when interpreting word meaning.


Toxic oxysterols in a hypercholesterolaemia-relevant proportion cause suicidal death of human erythrocytes or eryptosis. This process proceeds through early production of reactive oxygen species (ROS), release of prostaglandin (PGE2) and opening of PGE2-dependent Ca channels, membrane phosphatidylserine (PS) externalisation, and cell shrinkage. The present study was the first to reveal that a bioavailable phytochemical, indicaxanthin (Ind) from cactus pear fruit, in a concentration range (1·0–5·0 μM) consistent with its plasma level after a fruit meal, prevents PS externalisation and cell shrinkage in a dose-dependent manner when incubated with isolated healthy human erythrocytes exposed to an oxysterol mixture for 48 h. Dietary Ind inhibited ROS production, glutathione (GSH) depletion, PGE2 release and Ca2+ entry. Ind alone did not modify the erythrocyte redox environment or affect other parameters. Ex vivo spiking of normal human blood with the oxysterol mixture for 48 h induced eryptosis, resulting in the production of ROS and decreased levels of GSH, which was prevented by concurrent exposure to 5 μm-Ind. The adherence of eryptotic erythrocytes to the endothelium causes vascular tissue injury. Erythrocytes isolated from blood incubated with the oxysterol mixture plus 5 μm-Ind did not adhere to endothelial cell monolayers. Eryptotic erythrocytes may contribute to thrombotic complications in hypercholesterolaemia. Our findings suggest the positive effects of diets containing Ind on erythrocytes in hypercholesterolaemic subjects.


The aim of this study was to determine the associations of older assisted living residents' tooth brushing habits with health and nutritional status. We assessed the tooth brushing habits, nutritional status, oral health, use of dental services, and morbidity of 1,447 assisted living residents in the Helsinki metropolitan area of Finland. Of the residents, 17% did not clean or had not cleaned their teeth and/or dentures daily. Those not cleaning their teeth and/or dentures daily were more often male, less educated and had a mean length of stay in assisted living longer than those who cleaned their teeth and/or dentures daily. They were more often malnourished and dependent in ADLs. In addition they more often had poorer oral health and used fewer dental services. Poor tooth brushing habits indicate poor oral and subjective health. More attention should focus on the oral hygiene of frail older assisted living residents.


: The main purpose of this study was to meta-analyse the single-case studies on the use of activity schedules with individuals with autism spectrum disorders. The other purposes were to assess the design standards of activity schedule studies, estimate the treatment effect of activity schedule, describe the characteristics of activity schedule studies, and determine whether activity schedule is an evidence-based practice for children with autism spectrum disorders in improving appropriate behaviours. The nonoverlap of all pairs (NAP) was used to analyse the treatment effect measure. According to results, seven out of 32 activity schedule studies met the design standards with and without reservation. Twenty-four children with autism spectrum disorders whose age ranged between 3 and 17 years participated in the studies. The target behaviours were on task, independent transition, appropriate peer-play, and following schedule. The photographs and texts were used in both traditional and innovative activity schedules. The overall NAP score shows that the activity schedule has a strong effect for those participants with autism spectrum disorders. Finally, this meta-analysis indicates that an activity schedule can be recommended as an evidence-based practice to improve the appropriate behaviours of children with autism spectrum disorders.