Maritime shipping is considered as the most eco-friendly and fuel-efficient method of transport in ton-miles terms and moves about 90% of the worldwide trade (UNCTAD, 2020) [1]. The third GHG study (IMO, 2014) [2] estimates that shipping accounts for approximately 2.2% of the global anthropogenic CO2 emissions, addressing a 0.5% decrease from the second GHG study measures (IMO, 2009) [3]. However, the sector has seen increasing pressure, through new guidelines to improve its environmental performance, especially considering its commitment to harmful contamination emissions on human wellbeing. Sea transport represents 5–8% of the worldwide SOx emissions (Eyring et al., 2005) [4], and around 15% for NOx (Corbett et al., 2007) [5], while PM emissions from transportation close to coastlines and ports have been connected to fatalities attributed to respiratory health issues. The IMO is regulating the greatest sulfur limits in fuel through the changed MARPOL Annex VI, which additionally assigned sulfur emission control areas (SECA) where more tight limits apply. Current SECAs incorporate the Baltic Sea, the North Sea, the North American Emission control area (ECA) that broadens 200NM from the US and Canadian coasts, and the US Caribbean ECA. The last two ECAs have likewise set limitations on PM and NOx emissions. The first results of the SECAs on emissions limitation show critical enhancements. In relevant literature, there has been no recent update on the portion of sea transport in SOx emissions, and the most recent solid estimate is in the previously mentioned investigation of Eyring et al., back in 2005. On a later publication, Zis and Psaraftis (2018) [6] utilized information from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) on its part nations and assessed those SOx emissions from all transportation modes represented 3.5% in 2015. Taking into account that road transport represented 0.48%, the portion of maritime transportation in SOx emissions has been radically diminished since 2005.

Notwithstanding the introduction of SECAs, as of January 2010 the European Union (EU) set a sulphur limit of 0.1% for ships berth in EU ports with stays longer than 2 h, as well as when sailing on inland waterways [7]. European Commission has advanced the further arrangement of shorepower to its part states through an authority suggestion [8]. Port authorities all throughout the planet have launched initiatives that advance utilization of low-sulfur fuel in their proximity, with the port of Singapore being a notable example under the Green Ship and Green Port programs offering monetary incentives for clean practices that reduce CO2 and SOx emissions. At last, the ports of Los Angeles and of Long Beach have presented voluntary speed reduction programs (VSRP) in their proximity in return for a decrease of port disbursements accounts and are moving towards making the use of shorepower for ocean going ships mandatory.

Concerning guidelines focusing on sulfur outflows, ship owners can consent by one or the other changing to ultra-low sulphur fuels like Marine Gas Oil (MGO) or investing in scrubber systems that treat the exhaust gases to remove SOx and PM emissions hence permitting the utilization of Heavy Fuel Oil (HFO). Additionally, to adapt to guidelines on emissions at ports a vessel can either utilize cleaner fuel or, on the other hand, be retrofitted to get shorepower if the port has cold ironing facilities. Thusly, to address ecological regulation the shipowners have to pay to obtain abatement technology or increase their operating costs by utilizing cleaner yet more expensive fuel. Which option of the above mentioned is more cost-effective for the shipowner depends on various factors, including ship type, ship size, regulations affecting the waters in which the ship sails, and ports of call. Simultaneously, the choice of a port to put resources into innovations that permit the arrangement of shorepower relies upon a few variables, which stem from emissions decrease strategies, and the entrance pace of the innovation in the calling ships.

The last decades the demand of energy is being increased continuously. The massive use of different types of non-renewable sources of energy has led to very important problems in the earth, as global warming, by the production of big amounts of greenhouse gases (GHGs) [52]. Nitrogen oxides (NOx), carbon monoxide (CO) and carbon dioxide (CO2) are some of the elements that are being produced by the burning process of marine diesel engines and pollute the atmosphere. This fact is a result of the use of Heavy Fuel Oil (HFO) in vessels' engines which is preferred by the shipowners especially for economy reasons [53].

New technologies concerning alternative sources of energy have started to provide new environmental standards by reducing the emissions of harmful for the environment gases as CO2. More than the 80% of the harmful emissions in the atmosphere are related to carbon [54]. Consequently, decarbonization constitutes on of the biggest environmental problems and despite the fact that the efficiency in terms of energy in the maritime transport has been increased significantly, shipping industry has the responsibility of almost 940 million tons of CO2 emissions in the atmosphere per year. Taking into consideration the continuously increase of the global fleet we can easily understand that these emissions are going to reach a higher level in the next few years [55]. The use of alternative fuels seems to be the only solution for the environment and European Union has already include in her White Paper on Transport their introduction [56]. More specifically, in 2016, European Union has already released a «Strategy for liquefied natural gas and gas storage» in order to highlight the advantages and the potential of the use of LNG to all members of the Union. Moreover, in October 2014, the executive committee of the European Union obliged 139 ports in Europe to act appropriate in order to have the possibility to offer bunkering facilities for LNG until 2020 [59]. Additionally, the effort to control the pollution emissions was strengthen by the International Maritime Organization (IMO) through the introduction of new regulations. More specifically, International Convention for the Prevention of Pollution from Ships (MARPOL) was embraced by the IMO which also adopted amendments to MARPOL Annex VI (Resolution MEPC.203 (62)) through the introduction of an energy efficiency design index in order to reduce the CO2 emissions [54, 61].

This paper discusses the possibility of different types of fuels or technological investments to be used as marine fuels from the perspective of shipowners, terminal operators, and regulatory bodies while considering the extent of ecological improvement that can provide. The first section of this paper presents a concise literature review of relevant research in port emissions as well as regulations that are used nowadays, which are imposed by the International Maritime Organization (IMO). The subsequent section presents an analysis and evaluation of different types of fuels which should appraise the new ecological equilibrium following the established environmental and safety regulations. In the last part, the benefits and drawbacks of its kind of fuel are widely expressed.


Abstract. Alternative subsidence mechanisms related to groundwater extration and surface loading of built infrastructure in Shanghai have been evaluated to explain continued subsidence despite the controlled reduction of groundwater extraction. The traditional theory of aquifer-system compaction embodied in the aquitard drainage model cannot fully explain this phenomenon. Two possible alternative mechanisms were studied previously: (i) surface loading attributed to urban construction; (ii) creep occuring in sandy deposits of aquifers. These mechanisms could not fully explain the observed subsidence. Two additional alternative mechanistic models are proposed that involve principles of load transfer considering the temporally and spatially redistributed stresses associated with groundwater extraction: (i) the Cosserat continuum mechanism, considering shear force on the permeable coarse-grained matrial in the aquifer due to hydraulic gradients in the aquifer; and (ii) internal erosion of fine-grained (clay and silt) particles within the aquifer. Initial results based on simulations incorporating Cosserat mechanics look promising.


Ceramide accumulation has been associated with ischemic stroke. Myriocin is an effective SPT inhibitor, which reduces the levels of ceramides by inhibiting de novo synthesis pathway. However, the role of myriocin in cerebral ischemia/reperfusion (I/R) injury and its underlying mechanism remains unknown. The present study established an experimental rat model of middle cerebral artery occlusion (MCAO). We employed UPLC-Q-TOF/MS-based lipidomic analysis to identify the disordered lipid metabolites and the effects of myriocin in cerebral cortical tissues of rats. In this study, we found 15 characterized lipid metabolites involved in sphingolipid and glycerophospholipid metabolism in cerebral I/R-injured rats, which were significantly reversed by myriocin. Specifically, the mRNA expression of metabolism-related enzyme genes was detected by real-time quantitative polymerase chain reaction (RT-qPCR).We demonstrated that myriocin could regulate the mRNA expression of ASMase, NSMase, SGMS1, SGMS2, ASAH1, ACER2, ACER3 involved in sphingolipid metabolism and PLA2 involved in glycerophospholipid metabolism. Moreover, TUNEL and western blot assay showed that myriocin played a key role in regulating neuronal cell apoptosis. In summary, the present work provides a new perspective for a systematic study of metabolic changes in ischemia stroke and the therapeutic applications of myriocin.


ABSTRACT For buildings in tropical climates, the use of open windows for natural ventilation can not only provide low cost and low energy comfort but also provide thermal delight for occupants. However open windows let in environmental noise. The size and location of windows in walls are key but this study set out to determine whether there are any window forms that can effectively reduce the level of sound ingress into a building. A top-hung window was chosen for this study looking at the dimensions of the window opening and its orientation in relation to the environmental noise source. The top-hung form was selected for its potential to balance the functions of allowing airflow while potentially blocking and reducing noise levels with its window pane angle. The window pane was tested in a laboratory at three opening angles: 0° (closed), 5°, and 10° to let the outdoor air in. The angles were also tested in three different orientations in relation to the noise source position: perpendicular, sideways 60°, and sideways 90°. The test was conducted at 1/3 octave band frequency as specified by ASTM E90-09 to obtain the transmission loss, then ASTM E1332-90 was referred to calculate the outdoor-indoor transmission class (OITC) of the specimens. The study revealed that window orientation and extent of the openings and window pane angle have little effect on noise reduction. The paper concludes with a discussion of how higher levels of natural ventilation can be achieved, particularly in noisy urban areas. The top-hung window, once open, barely blocks environmental noise. However, when the window was closed, the perpendicular orientation offered more noise reduction when compared windows placed sideways to the noise source. The adjustable pane-angle of a top-hung window placed perpendicular to the airflow, and thus the noise source, seemed to have the most potential to balance the functions of allowing airflow when opened and reducing significant noise when closed. Nonetheless, an open window that through its design alone can significantly reduce the ingress of ambient noise into a building is still an issue.


The double layer capacitances and zero charge potentials of certain solid metal electrodes in LiCl-KCl melts at 450℃ have been measured by an A. C. bridge method. The zero charge potentials, e, for Pt, Ag, Cu and Al electrodes are +0.2, -0.4, -0.6 and -1.0 V respectively which was estimated by the minima of C-V curves. If these data together with selected ones from published works in NaCl-KCl melt at 700℃ plotted against their own ionization free energy, △Z_2, a straight line, paralleled that in aqueous solution, may be drawn and expressed as:e=0.305(△Z_2/q)+Awhere q——1 mole electron charge and A——constant.It indicates that the zero charge potentials between two chlorides molten salt are alike of same solid metals but differ of different ones, and their difference is similar to that in aqueous solution. Thus, it seems to be proposed that the zero charge potentials of the solid metals in molten salts are only determined by the nature of metals themself.


Evaluating surface bacterial growth at buried interfaces can be problematic due to the difficulties associated with obtaining samples. In this work, we present a new method to detect signals from microorganisms at buried interfaces that is nondestructive and can be conducted continuously. Inspired by vascular systems in nature that permit chemical communication between the surface and underlying tissues of an organism, we created a system in which an inert carrier fluid could be introduced into an empty vascular network embedded in a polymer matrix. When a microorganism layer was grown on top, small molecules produced by the growth process would diffuse down into the carrier fluid, which could then be collected and analyzed. We used this system to nondestructively detect signals from a surface layer of Escherichia coli using conductivity, ultraviolet-visible (UV-vis) absorbance spectroscopy, and high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) for organic acids, methods that ranged in sensitivity, time-to-result, and cost. Carrier fluid from sample vascularized polymers with surface bacterial growth recorded significantly higher values in both conductivity and absorbance at 350 nm compared to controls with no bacteria after 24 h. HPLC analysis showed three clear peaks that varied between the samples with bacteria and the controls without. Tests tracking the change in signals over 48 h showed clear trends that matched the bacterial growth curves, demonstrating the system's ability to monitor changes over time. A 2D finite element model of the system closely matched the experimental results, confirming the predictability of the system. Finally, tests using clinically relevant Staphylococcus aureus and Pseudomonas aeruginosa yielded differences in conductivity, absorbance, and HPLC peak areas unique to each species. This work lays the foundation for the use of vascularized polymers as an adaptive system for the continuous, nondestructive detection of surface microorganisms at buried interfaces in both industry and medicine.


Language resources (LRs) are essential for research and application development. In this article we outline relevant principles for LR validation. We argue that the best way to validate LR is to implement it all along the way of LR production and have it carried out by an external and experienced institute, so that this institute can help define the validation criteria in terms of LR specifications and tolerance margins. We address which tasks should be carried out by the validation institute, and which not. Further, a standard validation protocol is shown, illustrating how validation can prove its value all along the production phase in terms of prevalidation, full validation and pre-release validation.


A series of methods for solving the multi-object estimation problem in the context sequential Bayesian inference is presented. These methods concentrate on dealing with challenging scenarios of multiple target tracking, involving fundamental problems of nonlinearity and non-Gaussianity of processes, high state dimensionality, high number of targets, statistical dependence between target states, and degenerate cases of low signal-to-noise ratio, high uncertainty, lowly observable states or uninformative observations. These difficulties pose obstacles to most practical multi-object inference problems, lying at the heart of the shortcomings reported for state-of-the-art methods, and so elicit novel treatments to enable tackling a broader class of real problems. The novel algorithms offered as solutions in this dissertation address such challenges by acting on the root causes of the associated problems. Often this involves essential dilemmas commonly manifested in Statistics and Decision Theory, such as trading off estimation accuracy with algorithm complexity, soft versus hard decision, generality versus tractability, conciseness versus interpretativeness etc. All proposed algorithms constitute stochastic filters, each of which is formulated to address specific aspects of the challenges at hand while offering tools to achieve judicious compromises in the aforementioned dilemmas. Two of the filters address the weight degeneracy observed in sequential Monte Carlo filters, particularly for nonlinear processes. One of these filters is designed for nonlinear non-Gaussian high-dimensional problems, delivering representativeness of the uncertainty in high-dimensional states while mitigating part of the inaccuracies that arise from the curse of dimensionality. This filter is shown to cope well with scenarios of multimodality, high state uncertainty, uninformative observations and high number of false alarms. A multi-object filter deals with the problem of considering dependencies between target states in a way that is scalable to a large number of targets, by resorting to probabilistic graphical structures. Another multi-object filter treats the problem of reducing the computational complexity of a state-of-the-art cardinalized filter to deal with a large number of targets, without compromising accuracy significantly. Finally, a framework for associating measurements across observation sessions for scenarios of low state observability is proposed, with application to an important Space Surveillance task: cataloging of space debris in the geosynchronous/geostationary belt. The devised methods treat the considered challenges by bringing about rather general questions, and provide not only principled solutions but also analyzes the essence of the investigated problems, extrapolating the implemented techniques to a wider spectrum of similar problems in Signal Processing.


AIM
Maternal immunisation coverage is suboptimal in Aotearoa New Zealand. Our objective was to highlight discrepancies resulting from how maternal immunisation coverage for pertussis and influenza is measured in Aotearoa New Zealand.

METHOD
A retrospective cohort study of pregnant people was undertaken using administrative datasets. Maternity and immunisation data from three sources (National Immunisation Register [NIR], general practice [GP], and pharmaceutical claims) were linked to determine the proportion of immunisation records not recorded in the NIR but captured in claims data, and to compare this with coverage data available from Te Whatu Ora - Health New Zealand.

RESULTS
We found that while increasing numbers of maternal immunisations are being captured in the NIR, around 10% remain unrecorded on the NIR, but within claims datasets.

CONCLUSION
Accurate maternal immunisation coverage data is important for public health action. Implementation of the whole-of-life Aotearoa Immunisation Register (AIR) is an important opportunity to improve completeness and consistency of maternal immunisation coverage reporting.


Polymer-clay nanocomposites are more popular in many industries and applications due to improved mechanical and gas barrier properties over pure polymers and classical polymer-based composites. The mechanism by which clay platelets, with thicknesses in the nanometer range, as opposed to the hundred-nanometer range in the other two dimensions, introduce the mechanical and other properties improvement can be attributed to their high efficiency in creating discontinuities to flows through the bulk matrix polymer material. However, the extent of this improvement depends on the success of separation or achieving full exfoliation of the clay platelets through the bulk matrix. Since such full exfoliation is not achievable experimentally, the aspect ratio of the filler particles is not a simple value that mathematical models employ to describe mechanical properties. In this work, a modification is proposed to improve such models by using relationships utilizing different concentrations of varying filler platelets thicknesses. The improvements in elastic tensile modulus are discussed with consideration of the effect of clay platelet inclusions geometry as depicted through the proposed modification to considered models to capture the effect of nano-platelets on the properties of the composite.


Diisopropyl dithiolanylidenemalonate (isoprothiolane) was oxidized with m-chloroperbenzoic acid to give a monosulfoxide, disulfoxide, and disulfone. The monosulfoxide was subjected to addition reactions with such nucleophiles as methanol, thiols, and amines at the thioacetal carbon to open the dithiolane ring, affording a thiosulfinate, sulfinate and disulfide. The presence of a small amount of sodium carbonate accelerated the reactions and, moreover, reformed isoprothiolane from the ring-opened addition products. The further oxidation products were transformed into dithianes by reacting with nucleophiles. Isoprothiolane monosulfoxide inhibited alcohol dehydrogenase, an SH enzyme.


Dequalinium chloride has been known as one kind of antibiotic that displays a broad antimicrobial spectrum and has been clinically proven to be very safe. In recent years, studies have shown that dequalinium chloride can inhibit the growth of malignant tumours, and reports were mainly used for solid tumours. Glioblastoma is the most common malignant neuroepithelial tumour of the central nervous system in adults, and the prognosis of glioblastoma is poor as it has a high resistance to apoptosis. This review summarizes the current understanding of dequalinium chloride‐induced cancer cell apoptosis and its potential role in glioblastoma resistance and progression. Particularly, we focus on dequalinium chloride as it exerts a wide range of anti‐cancer activity through its ability to target and accumulate in the mitochondria, and it effectively inhibits the growth of glioblastoma cells in vitro and vivo. Dequalinium chloride is an inhibitor of XIAP and can also act as a mitochondrial targeting agent, which gives it an interesting perspective regarding recent advances in the treatment of malignant glioma.


1 Plasma prednisolone levels have been compared following the administration of enteric-coated prednisolone to fasted and non-fasted subjects. The effect on plasma levels of altering the formulation of the enteric-coating has also been studied. 2 The presence of food in the stomach at the time of administration does not affect the absorption of enteric-coated prednisolone tablets. 3 There was considerable inter-subject variation in plasma prednisolone levels after administration of shellac based enteric-coated tablets. However, plasma levels were more consistent when a preparation whose formulation was based upon cellulose acetate phthalate (CAP) was given. 4 It is concluded that the pattern of absorption and plasma prednisolone levels depend on the formulation of the enteric coating. The bioavailability of the CAP based preparation is similar to that of plain prednisolone.


Evoked otoacoustic emissions (EOAEs) were recorded twice in 20 ears of 15 newborns. The recordings were performed in a room of the well baby ward, using the ILO88 in its default setting, i.e. with click stimulation. On the first test occasion, the infants were between 3 and 51 h of age, and EOAEs were identified in 10 ears. On the second test occasion, while the infants were at least 1 day older (range 42-107 h), EOAEs were present in all ears. The second EOAE was stronger, so the EOAE appeared to grow in the first days postpartum. This might be due to middle ear clearance of amniotic fluid, shortly after birth. The results of the EOAEs of the second examination were compared with 10 EOAEs in adult ears. The response levels of the newborns were significantly higher than in the adults. The (cross)-correlation peak value of the two tests' waveforms is over 0.75, however sometimes only after filtering around the most pronounced emission frequencies. The study proves that newborns failing the EOAE screen in the first 24 h after birth can pass if retested 1 day later, simply because of growth of EOAE strength.


We report on the generation of an efficient phase-conjugate wave by anisotropic four-wave mixing in planar iron-doped y-cut LiNbO(3) waveguides. The pump waves are orthogonally polarized with respect to the signal and phase-conjugate waves. Reflectivities of the phase-conjugate signal of as much as 65% are reached in the waveguide. Experimental results are compared with numerical solutions of the corresponding system of coupled-wave equations.


LINC-NIRVANA (LN) is a high resolution, near infrared imager that uses a multiple field-of-view, layer-oriented, multi-conjugate AO system, consisting of four multi-pyramid wavefront sensors (two for each arm of the Large Binocular Telescope, each conjugated to a different altitude). The system employs up to 40 star probes, looking at up to 20 natural guide stars simultaneously. Its final goal is to perform Fizeau interferometric imaging, thereby achieving ELT-like spatial resolution (22.8 m baseline resolution). For this reason, LN is also equipped with a fringe tracker, a beam combiner and a NIR science camera, for a total of more than 250 optical components and an overall size of approximately 6x4x4.5 meters. This paper describes the tradeoffs evaluated in order to achieve the alignment of the system to the telescope. We note that LN is comparable in size to planned ELT instrumentation. The impact of such alignment strategies will be compared and the selected procedure, where the LBT telescope is, in fact, aligned to the instrument, will be described. Furthermore, results coming from early night-time commissioning of the system will be presented.


Objective: to substantiate the efficacy of bipolar impulses of different shapes and duration. Method. The investigation used the dynamic model II of the mammalian ventricular cardiomyocyte membrane in the guinea-pig, proposed by Luo and Rudy (1994—2000). The cardiomyocyte membrane was acted by substituting the current density of the impulse under study. The threshold impulse energy ratio considered as an integral index of the threshold action (a measure of efficiency) of an impulse measured in μA 2 ms/cm 4 was then calculated. A comparison was made between a classical quasi<sinusoidal impulse, a stepwise quasi-sinusoidal, rectilinear, classical trapezoidal, trapezoidally modulated (the presence of high-frequency, high-amplitude oscillations of current) impulse and its unmodulated equivalent, and a trapezoidal low<angle front tail impulse of the duration equal to that of the classical quasi-sinusoidal one. The shape of the impulses corresponded to the 100-ohm resistance of the chest. Results. The most effective impulses  proved  to  be  a  quasi-sinusoidal  stepwise  impulse  (229.6  μA 2 ms/cm 4 ),  next  a  classical  quasi-sinusoidal  impulse (249 μA 2 ms/cm 4 , +9%) and a trapezoidal low<angle front tail one (253.0 μA 2 ms/cm 4 , +10%). The trapezoidally modulated impulse (397 μA 2 ms/cm 4 , +73%) turned out to be lowest effective (in the threshold impulse energy ratio). The other  impulses  were  intermediate  between  the  above  impulses  in  the  following  order:  a  modulated  trapezoidal impulse equivalent (272.0 μA 2 ms/cm 4 ), next a rectilinear impulse (273.5 μA 2 ms/cm 4 ), and a classical trapezoidal one (307.0 μA 2 ms/cm 4 ). Conclusion. In terms of the excitation threshold of the Luo-Rudy model of the guinea-pig cardiomyocyte membrane, the most effective impulses are quasi<sinusoidal stepwise, next quasi<sinusoidal and trapezoidal low-angle front tail ones.


AIMS
To assess the dose-effect relationship between self-reported drug intake and the concentration of drugs and/or their metabolites in hair and to examine factors that may mediate this relationship.

DESIGN AND SETTING
A cohort study among young drug users (YDU) in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, which began in July 2000. At intake, YDU were asked to report their average drug intake over a 2-month period. A hair sample was taken and then analysed for cocaine, benzoylecgonine (BE), morphine, 6-monoacetylmorphine and methadone. Weighted least-squares regression analysis was used to model hair-test results as a function of reported drug use.

PARTICIPANTS
Subjects were 95 YDU (using cocaine, heroin, methadone and/or amphetamines at least 3 days/week) aged 18-30 residing in Amsterdam in 2000-2001.

FINDINGS
Of the 95 YDU, one-third were women; mean age was almost 26; 30% had black hair, 33% blond hair and 37% brown hair. Cocaine use was reported by 92%, heroin by 75% and methadone by 64% of participants. All hair samples contained one or more drugs. Crude correlation coefficients between reported drug doses and drug concentrations in hair ranged between 0.45 and 0.59. The multivariate regression analysis showed that, for one or more types of drug, black-haired people, women and non-western European people had relatively high drug concentrations in hair (significant slope effects). The corresponding multivariate correlation coefficients ranged between 0.63 and 0.87.

CONCLUSIONS
Hair testing can be used to quantify drug use in epidemiological studies, given that factors such as hair colour and sex are taken into account.


What are the benefits provided by a payment system? What are the tradeoffs in public versus private payment systems and in restricted versus open payments arrangements? Modern payment systems encompass a variety of institutional designs with varying degrees of counterparty protection. We develop a framework which allows for an examination and comparison of payment systems and specification of conditions leading to their adoption. We relate these conditions to the design of present large-value payment systems (Fedwire, CHIPS, Target, etc.).


The evolution of two-component cold atoms on a ring with quasispin-orbit (qSO) coupling and spin-flip has been studied analytically (for arbitrary particle number $ N $ without interaction) and numerically (for a few-body system with interaction). Counter-propagating and oscillating persistent spin-currents have been found. The regularity governing the period and amplitude of oscillation has been clarified. When the strengths for the qSO coupling and spin-flip are fixed, the frequency of oscillation can be effectively tuned by the Raman detuning, while the amplitude can be tuned by either changing the initial status and/or the Raman detuning. When the initial numbers of atoms of the two-components $N_{1}$ and $N_{2}$ are close to each other, the oscillation will be seriously suppressed. The condition for maximizing the amplitude of oscillation is given.


Purpose of the Study: This study was conducted to detect and characterize the genes encoding extended spectrum β-lactamases and associated β-lactamases (carbapenemases and Ambler Class C β-lactamases). Patients and Methods: In 2011, out of the 65 non-duplicative Klebsiellapneumoniae collected from blood culture at Charles Nicolle hospital of Tunisia, 36 were resistant to 3rd generation cephalosporin. Results: All strains showed a double disk synergy test positive. They were mainly isolated in intensive care unit (31%). They were frequently resistant to most antibiotics tested, except colistin and tigecyclin. Five isolates (13%) showed reduced susceptibility to carbapenems. blaCTX-M-15 was harbored by 35 strains and blaSHV-12 by one. blaCTX-M-15 were associated with blaTEM-1 (n=21), blaOXA-48 and blaCMY-2 (n=1) and blaOXA-48and blaTEM-1 (n=4). The conjugation wassuccessfulfor4/5 strains (3 harboring blaCTX-M-15 and one blaSHV-12). The plasmids carrying the blaCTX-M-15 were assigned to IncN or IncL/M only for 2 strains. The remaining blaCTX-M-15-carrying plasmid was negative for all of the replicons tested as well as the blaSHV-12-carrying plasmid. Conclusion: Our results confirm the spread of CTX-M-15 in our institution. To our knowledge, this is the first report of K. pneumoniae coproducing CTX-M-15, CMY-2 and OXA-48. The implementation of preventive measures against the spread of these multiresistant bacteria is needed.


Background. Presentation of the probability as an intrinsic property of the nature leads researchers to switch from deterministic to stochastic description of the phenomena. The kinetics of the interaction has recently attracted attention because it often occurs in the physical, chemical, technical, biological, environmental, economic, and sociological systems. However, there are no general methods for the direct study of this equation. The expansion of the equation in a formal Taylor series (the so called Kramers–Moyal's expansion) is used in the procedure of stochastization of one-step processes.Purpose. However, this does not eliminate the need for the study of the master equation.Method. It is proposed to use quantum field perturbation theory for the statistical systems (the so-called Doi method).Results. This work is a methodological material that describes the principles of master equation solution based on quantum field perturbation theory methods. The characteristic property of the work is that it is intelligible for non-specialists in quantum field theory.Conclusions. We show the full equivalence of the operator and combinatorial methods of obtaining and study of the one-step process master equation.


We have compared the efficacy of granisetron with perphenazine in the prevention of vomiting after tonsillectomy with or without adenoidectomy in children. In a prospective, randomized, double-blind study, 90 paediatric patients, ASA I, aged 4-10 years, received granisetron 40 mg kg-1 or perphenazine 70 mg kg-1 (n = 45 each) intravenously immediately after an inhalation induction of anaesthesia. A standard general anaesthetic technique was employed throughout. A complete response, defined as no emesis with no need for another rescue antiemetic, during the first 3 h (0-3 h) after anesthesia was 87% with granisetron and 78% with perphenazine (P = 0.204). The corresponding incidence during the next 21 h (3-24 h) after anaesthesia was 87% and 62% (P = 0.007). No clinically serious adverse events were observed in any of the groups. We conclude that granisetron is a better anti-emetic than perphenazine for the long-term prevention of post-operative vomiting in children undergoing general anaesthesia for tonsillectomy.


Texts designed to introduce political science students to the history of political thought or to past political theories have been commonplace in the discipline, as have disputes about their pedagogical utility or justifiability, and methodological debates concerning their adequacy or legitimacy. In an effort to address these disputes and some of these debates, I construct three models of historiographical inquiry. Each model represents a particular approach, and each is defined in terms of three common features. The methodological debates are joined both indirectly and directly: indirectly by identifying clearly the major features and purposes of these approaches, and directly by consideration of such issues as the nature of a historical tradition, the legitimacy of certain interpretive strategies and presuppositions, and the viability of certain conceptions of past political theory. I conclude that each approach can make significant contributions to the education of political science students.


Forty-six asthmatic children with repeated respiratory infections presented symptoms of allergic rhinitis. All patients were treated locally for allergic rhinitis either with disodium cromoglycate or beclomethasone dipropionate. After six months of treatment, 95% of the children showed improvement of allergic rhinitis and 84% improvement of bronchial asthma, as well as fewer infections. We concluded that allergic rhinitis plays an important role in facilitating infections of the upper respiratory tract, and a possible association of rhinitis, viral infections and bronchial asthma is discussed.


We are grateful to the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) for funding this research. The project 'The health and wellbeing of grandparents caring for grandchildren: The role of cumulative advantage/disadvantage' (ESRC ES/K003348/1) was funded under Phase I of the Secondary Data Analysis Initiative (SDAI). We also wish to thank our project partners for their support: Grandparents Plus, the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation, and the Beth Johnson Foundation. We would like to thank all the contributors to the report for their hard work, advice and expertise. We stress that this was independent research which may not necessarily represent the views of our partner organisations.We would wish to give special thanks to members of the project's Advisory Group, that is Sarah Wellard, Director of Policy, Research and Communications at Grandparents Plus for her valuable contributions to the report and for all her work on dissemination activities; Professor Emily Grundy at the London School of Economics for her scientific advice; Annabel Knight, Programme Manager at the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation for her invaluable support and guidance; and Steve Robinson, Chief Executive of the Beth Johnson Foundation for his sponsorship and encouragement.


SCOPE
Molecular networking (MN) analysis intends to provide chemical insight of untargeted mass spectrometry (MS) data to the user's underlying biological questions. Foodomics is the study of chemical compounds in food using advanced omics methods. In this study, we developed an MS-MN-based foodomics approach to investigate the composition and anti-obesity activity of cannabinoids in hemp oil.

METHODS AND RESULTS
A total of 16 cannabinoids were determined in optimized microwave pretreatment of hemp oil using the developed approach. Untargeted metabolomics analysis revealed that cannabinoid extract (CE) and its major constituent (cannabidiol, CBD), could alleviate high glucose-induced increases in lipids and carbohydrates, and decreases in amino acid and nucleic acid. Moreover, CE and CBD were also found to suppress the expression levels of mdt-15, sbp-1, fat-5, fat-6, fat-7, daf-2, and elevate the expression level of daf-1,daf-7, daf-16, sod-3, gst-4, lipl-4, resulting in the decrease of lipid synthesis and the enhance of kinetism. Canonical correspondence analysis (CCA) uncovered strong associations between specific metabolic alterations and gene expression levels.

CONCLUSION
These findings from this exploratory study offered a new insight into the roles of cannabinoids in the treatment of obesity and related complications. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.


This paper investigates any difference in employing Reading strategies, relates them to various item types of reading comprehension in TOEFL iBT (copyrighted by ETS, 2005). Sixty-six respondents (26 males and 40 females) participated in the present study. A list of reading strategies (adopted from Cohen & Upton, 2006), followed by a test of reading comprehension that took forty-five minutes to complete were used. Before the test begun, the participants were instructed how to specify the strategies that they employed during taking the test. To address the research question, the analyses of the results revealed that the difference is significant in the use of Reading strategies for various item types. On the basis of the findings language teachers are recommended to teach different Reading strategies in order to help TOEFL applicants to use them related to different item types more efficiently and effectively.


There is an increasing focus on the hydrometallurgical processing of nickel-rich laterite ore due to declining global reserves of nickel sulphides. The development of new technology called hybrid nickel leaching circuit that encompasses pressure acid leaching (PAL) and atmospheric leaching (AL) processes has made processing of low-grade ores (with nickel content as low as 0.5%) a possibility. However, significant challenges exist in lowering the operating costs for this new process including the reduction of sulphuric acid and the energy required to heat the pulp to the desired temperature (250oC). To address above challenges, a detailed understanding of the process chemistry together with interactions between unit operations feeding into and out of the system is required. To accomplish this, a software package with powerful convergence algorithms, control loops, background chemical equilibrium, aqueous thermodynamics and extensive databases containing information on the physical properties of desired components is needed. Using such a process simulator, it is possible to produce numerically rigorous mass/energy balances for as many variations of the model as desired. This allows enhanced analysis of the flowsheet, better process design, and ultimately, better business decisions. Although there have been several studies on hybrid circuit, most of these studies have only dealt with the effects of process variable such as temperature, acidity, pulp density. Thus far, no complete study has been published on the modelling of different proposed scenarios. The present work constitutes an effort towards bridging this gap. A number of possible flowsheeting combinations were simulated using a commercial software packages SysCAD, and some optimal configurations were identified.


Despite a considerable amount of discussion and research in the course of many years, aural cholesteatoma has remained a matter of controversy. This review concerns only the definition, terminology and pathology of this common and severe disease.


Background
Long-term marathon running improves many cardiovascular risk factors, and is presumed to protect against coronary artery plaque formation. This hypothesis, that long-term marathon running is protective against coronary atherosclerosis, was tested by quantitatively assessing coronary artery plaque using high resolution coronary computed tomographic angiography (CCTA) in veteran marathon runners compared to sedentary control subjects.

Methods
Men in the study completed at least one marathon yearly for 25 consecutive years. All study subjects underwent CCTA, 12-lead electrocardiogram, measurement of blood pressure, heart rate, and lipid panel. A sedentary matched group was derived from a contemporaneous CCTA database of asymptomatic healthy individuals. CCTAs were analyzed using validated plaque characterization software.

Results
Male marathon runners (n = 50) as compared with sedentary male controls (n = 23) had increased total plaque volume (200 vs. 126 mm3, p < 0.01), calcified plaque volume (84 vs. 44 mm3, p < 0.0001), and non-calcified plaque volume (116 vs. 82 mm3, p = 0.04). Lesion area and length, number of lesions per subject, and diameter stenosis did not reach statistical significance.

Conclusion
Long-term male marathon runners may have paradoxically increased coronary artery plaque volume.


Background:A widespread approach today is to transfuse bleeding trauma patients with RBC concentrates and plasma at a 1:1 ratio. This regime is supported by a range of observational studies showing lower mortality in bleeding patients receiving equal volumes of plasma and RBCs. The rationale for this practice is still unclear with several studies failing to show any survival benefits of increased plasma use, perhaps due to a failure to account for the timing of transfused units. Objective:To study the association between plasma-to-RBC ratios and risk of death in trauma patients, using appropriate methods. Design, Settings, and Participants:In a retrospective cohort study, we assembled data on 741 transfused trauma patients at a large trauma center. Measures of transfusion therapy were assessed entirely time dependently, and relative risk of death was compared between patients receiving low to high plasma-to-RBC ratio (< 0.85 vs > 0.85). Measurements and Results:In the time-dependent analyses, we saw no significant association between a low plasma ratio and the risk of death. However, age more than 75 years, injury severity score greater than 33, Glasgow Coma Scale less than 8, and systolic blood pressure lower than 90 mm Hg were all significantly associated with increased risk of death. Conversely, when the analyses were conducted with conventional methods, a strong protective effect of high plasma ratios was seen. Conclusions:The key finding in our study is the strikingly different results produced by time-dependent analyses and the conventional analyses when studying survival and plasma-to-RBC ratio, supporting recent claims that prior studies showing benefit of high plasma ratios might have suffered from survival bias. There is a great need for further studies on the subject to enable improvements in treatment of massively bleeding trauma patients.


The paper presents super resolving configurations that are integrating two digital mirror devices (DMDs) in the aperture and/or in the intermediate image plane. The usage of the DMDs allows obtaining geometric resolution improvement, enhancing field of view and reduction of aberrations such as defocusing and blurring that is obtained due to relative movement during the integration time. The idea behind all the above mentioned applications is to use the DMDs to properly encode the space and the spatial frequency domains such that the object's information can be separated from the above mentioned aberrations, distortions, limitations and noises.


This invited talk deals with studying a service-driven web manufacturing methodology and exploring its potential applications in industry. In the aspect of methodology, basic equipment e-service model, manufacturing executive system configuration, and system running in the context of real-time information scheduling, sharing and tracking mechanism are three key issues that should be solved in advance. On the basis of our bottom-up research strategy, first of all, an e-service fundamental model attached to any a CNC machine tool is put forward. It is actually a server front-end of the machine tool and is able to provide online service functions including machining data sampling and handling, process quality control, machining operations visualization, collaboration, etc, through three modes, that is, access mode, subscription mode and broadcast mode. In terms of connecting all server front-ends with each other, secondly, we establish a web-based manufacturing executive system referring to decomposing the manufacturing tasks and allocating necessary manufacturing resources by means of using both BOM and Gantt charts. Furthermore, this web-based manufacturing executive system in a "Browser/Server/Web Database" three-tire architecture can run under the control of real-time information scheduling, sharing and tracking mechanism based on a time-dependent instantiated template net (TIT-net). As methodology verification, we use an industrial case to demonstrate the methodology mentioned above. The further potential applications in industry are also discussed in detail in this invited talk.


A prototype software system has been built to evaluate the usefulness of simple artificial intelligence systems in aircraft cockpits. Laboratory evaluations of the system were conducted using a simulated aircraft in a full-mission scenario. Pilot task performance and workload were measured under two conditions: baseline and enhanced with the prototype knowledge-based decision-aiding system; some of the results achieved statistical significance. On the average, the knowledge-based system improved pilot performance in locating surface objects by 36%. Performance was improved an average of 42% for tasks related to successful response to mission emergencies. Workload was decreased by 13%. Overall, 83% of the pilots perceived the prototype system to be as effective as, or more effective than, the baseline system. In direct comparisons 81% of the pilots preferred the enhanced to the baseline system.<<ETX>>


The histories of the revolutionary anti-colonial movements in South Asia and their engagement with the October Revolution are reflected upon, in this article. Accompanying these reflections is a sensitivity to contemporary problems of Islamophobia, the manipulation of popular protests by imperial powers and the internal ethnic and cultural divisions that invariably prise open the doors for imperialist interventions. The relationship between South Asian anti-colonial movements and the October Revolution
was reciprocal.


We consider the production of ultrarelativistic parapositronium and orthopositro-nium atoms in collisions of high energy electrons (E e > 0.5 TeV) and laser photons. Our results demonstrate the opportunity of intensive positronium beam formation with Lorentz–factor γ ∼ 10 6 using laser beam conversion on high energy electrons at the future e + e − Linear Accelerators.


There has been a tradition of preventive home visiting to the elderly by Public Health Nurses for quite a time. There is no agreement as to the effect of these visits; until now no study has been performed on this topic in the Netherlands. Studies from other countries suggest a positive effect: viz. a reduction in mortality and hospital admissions. Recommendations for a replication study in the Netherlands are made.


The mononuclear molybdenum complexes [MoO2(acac)2] (1, acac=acetylacetonate), [MoO2(SAP)(MeOH)] (2), and dinuclear oxomolybdic complexes [MoO2L]2 [L=salicylideneaminophenolato (SAP, 5), salicylideneaminoethanolato (SAE, 6), salicylideneaminomethylpropanolato (SAMP, 7)] have been investigated as (pre)catalysts for the epoxidation of olefins under solvent‐free conditions, using tert‐butylhydroperoxide (TBHP, 70 % in water) as an oxidant. Complexes 6 and 7, although active, are limited by ligand hydrolysis during the catalytic process, whereas complexes 2 and 5 are not altered under catalytic conditions and yield essentially the same selectivity and activity, which is not suppressed by excess MeOH. Although these catalysts are less active than 1, their selectivity is higher (97–98 %). DFT calculations are consistent with the active form of the catalyst being the 5‐coordinate "[MoO2(SAP)]". The oxidant is activated by forming a weak adduct stabilized by a very loose Mo⋅⋅⋅O interaction and a hydrogen bond, predisposing it to the oxygen transfer to external olefin by a mechanism closely related to Bartlett's epoxidation with peroxyacids.


MSH/ACTH4-10 induces a dose dependent increase of latency scores during retention of a passive avoidance response, when injected SC prior to retention but not when administered immediately after the learning trial. Intracerebroventricular administration of anti-vasopressin serum immediately after the learning trial or 1 hr prior to retention induces marked deficits in passive avoidance behavior as indicated by low latencies during retention. SC injection of MSH/ACTH4-10 increased latency scores in animals which received anti-vasopressin serum prior to retention, but did not alter latencies in animals, which received anti-vasopressin serum after the learning trial. These results suggest that MSH/ACTH4-10 is involved in retrieval processes and is able to differentiate between the effects of vasopressin on memory consolidation and on retrieval.


We study numerically the annihilation of an $\ensuremath{\omega}$-stabilized Skyrmion and an anti-Skyrmion in three spatial dimensions. To our knowledge this is the first successful simulation of Skyrmion\char21{}anti-Skyrmion annihilation which follows through to the point where the energy is carried by outgoing meson waves. We encounter instabilities similar to those encountered is earlier calculations, but in our case these are not fatal and we are able to simulate through this process with a global energy loss of less than $8%$ and to identify robust features of the final radiation pattern. The system passes through a singular configuration at the time of half-annihilation. This is followed by the onset of fast oscillations which are superimposed on the smoother process which leads to the appearance of outgoing waves peaked at roughly $45\ifmmode^\circ\else\textdegree\fi{}$ to the incident direction. We investigate the two prominent features of this process: the proliferation of small, fast oscillations and the singular intermediate configuration. We find that our equations of motion allow for a regime in which the amplitude of certain small perturbations increases exponentially. This regime is similar but not identical to the situation pointed out earlier regarding the original Skyrme model. We argue that the singularity may be seen as the result of a pinch effect similar to that encountered in plasmas.


A discussion is presented of the development of an expert system which enables the authors to decide where to insert the data links in order to design the most desirable network configuration. The decision will be based on factors such as traffic load, network performance, network capabilities, users' requirements, etc. Machine learning capability can be incorporated into such expert systems to monitor the operation of the system. This capability allows the authors to reconfigure the design as they learn about the system in order to optimize system throughput and user requirement.<<ETX>>


Background: Patient satisfaction is an important indicator for the quality of health services. Inpatient satisfaction (72%-77%) and outpatient (75%%-57%) and net death rate (0-85%) in the Islamic Hospital Surabaya from 2015-2017 has not fulfilled the minimum service standards from the Health Minister Act No.129/2008. The observational study using a cross sectional design was deployed for this finding. A survey was conducted at 15 work units over a three  month period, namely emergency, outpatient, inpatient, radiology, laboratory, pharmacy and special care.
Objective: This study aims to identify the cultural-psychological element and examine the factors that influence the achievement of the minimum service standards.
Method: a survey was conducted in 15 work units, distributed in the emergency department, outpatient, inpatient, radiology, laboratory, pharmacy and special care. 179 staff were involved as the source of information.
Results: Only nine  work units reached the minimum service standards category. The cultural-psychological element was categorized as the highest cause. Value and belief on the quality of service resulted to 73.3%, while expectations had a 53.3%. All the cultural-psychological elements of the values and beliefs  have  shown tosignificantly affect the quality of the services positively.
Conclusion: This study recommends the preparation of the minimum service standards, specifically for certain units in order to assess the quality of service that can be measured properly.


The influence of surface active agents on the square wave polarographic behavior of uranyl acetylacetone was investigated. Tritone-X-100 decreases specifically the S. W. peak height of each uranyl-acetylacetonato species, the adsorption layer is specifically penetrable by each one. From this specific depression the overall stability constant of uranyl acetylacetonato complexes, in 1 M sodium perchlorate, was calculated as log BETA /sub 2/ = 12.5. Electrocapillary curves for TX-100 and acetylacetone are also presented. (auth)


The effects of hypoxia on the activities of some enzymes of antioxidative, non- enzymatic scavenging system, membrane permeability, lipid peroxidation, and some reactive oxygen species (ROS) in leaves of Zea mays were investigated. Samples were taken 48, 96, 144, and 192 h after the start of hypoxia treatment. A 192 h hypoxia treatment resulted in a significant rise in membrane permeability, lipid peroxidation (malondialdehyde level), and the production of hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) and superoxide (O2 - ) in maize leaves. A short duration of hypoxia enhanced the activity of superoxide dismutase (SOD; EC 184.108.40.206), catalase (CAT; EC 22.214.171.124), ascorbate peroxidase (APX; EC 22.214.171.124), and glutathione reductase (GR; EC 18.104.22.168), while further hypoxia significantly decreased the enzyme activity but increased the content of reduced glutathione (GSH) and ascorbic acid (AsA). It was observed that the reduction in SOD activity was greater than that in GR and APX (H2O2 scavengers). Our results showed that O2 - induced membrane damage and lipid peroxidation, and that excessive accumulation of O2 - is due to the reduced activity of SOD under hypoxia.


Expression of macrophage receptor with collagenous structure (MARCO) by tumor-associated macrophages is associated with poor prognosis of multiple types of cancer. In this article, we report that cancer cells (e.g., breast cancer and glioblastoma cell lines) can upregulate surface MARCO expression on human macrophages not only via IL-6-induced STAT3 activation but also via sphingosine-1-phosphate receptor (S1PR)-mediated IL-6 and IL-10 expression followed by STAT3 activation. We further found that MARCO ligation induces activation of the MEK/ERK/p90RSK/CREB signaling cascade, leading to IL-10 expression followed by STAT3-dependent PD-L1 upregulation. Such MARCO-induced macrophage polarization is accompanied by increased expression of PPARG, IRF4, IDO1, CCL17, and CCL22. Ligation of surface MARCO can thus result in decreased T cell responses mainly by reduction of their proliferation. Taken together, cancer cell-induced MARCO expression and its intrinsic regulatory function within macrophages are, to our knowledge, new aspects of cancer immune evasion mechanisms that need to be further studied in the future.


AIMS AND OBJECTIVES
The aim of this research is to undertake a systematic review of the existing literature to determine effective physical and psychosocial interventions for homeless women.

BACKGROUND
Homelessness is an increasing problem worldwide. Homelessness results in considerable risk to the health and social and psychological well-being of those without permanent shelter. Community nurses require effective interventions to assist homeless women to improve their health; however, little is known about effective interventions for this unique group.

METHODS
A search of several databases was conducted. Seven hundred and fifteen papers were initially identified, with only six studies meeting the inclusion criteria.

RESULTS
The methodologies included the following: randomised controlled trials (2), quasi-experimental (3) and a comparative study (1). Due to the diversity of the designs, measurement tools, interventions and outcomes of these studies, narrative synthesis was used to appraise their effectiveness. Study interventions such as structured education and support sessions (with and without advocates or support persons) and therapeutic communities reduced psychological distress and healthcare use, improved self-esteem, reduced drug and alcohol use within some limitations.

CONCLUSIONS
The aspects of the effective interventions could form the basis of community nursing programmes for our communities. Further research is required to ensure that homeless women and their children receive effective nursing interventions.

RELEVANCE TO CLINICAL PRACTICE
Community nursing can develop and trial programmes for homeless women including content within group sessions, counselling or advocacy within or without a therapeutic community, as presented in this review.


This study is a contribution to the recently introduced notion of argumentative style (van Eemeren 2019) in the framework of the pragma-dialectical approach. It aims at characterizing a detached argumentative style,
 by focusing on a speech event pertaining to the communicative activity type organizational discourse, a report on EU environment and climate
 change policies. The analysis concerns the executive summary and the key findings of the report, reconstructed in the analysis as the
 concluding stage of the critical discussion corresponding to the pragma-dialectical model. The notion of text type (Adam 1992) used in the analysis has allowed a more fine-grained characterization of the detached argumentative style,
 especially since the communicative practice under analysis displays a specific discourse format and structure for reasons of
 conventionalization and institutionalization. In such circumstances, determined by the type of conventionalization imposed by the context,
 the adoption of a detached argumentative style appears to be a pre-requisite. In the concluding stage of a critical discussion the
 difference of opinion is not restated, while the most significant standpoints are synthetically (re)presented by an adequate balance of
 narrative, descriptive and metadiscursive text strategies meant to support the objectivity, the conciseness of the presentation and also
 ensuring the necessary density of information required in a report summary or the presentation of key findings, respectively. While explicit
 negative evaluations or formulations of standpoints are avoided, the recommendations are presented as open to adoption or reconsideration by
 policymakers.


Introduction Abductor muscle deficiency can be a debilitating problem following hip arthroplasty surgery. We report outcomes of a novel method of abductor muscle function reconstruction surgery in patients with chronic, irreparable gluteus medius and minimus defects Patients and Methods Four consecutive patients who underwent our method of abductor reconstruction surgery were retrospectively reviewed. All patients had severe pain and positive Trendelenberg gait before surgery. Technique: the vastus lateralis (VL) muscle was raised on its neurovascular pedicle and transferred 12-14 centimetres by proximal translation. The proximal portion of VL was reattached via bony anchors to the external surface of the iliac wing just below the iliac crest. The distal portion of VL reattached to the lateral femoral shaft, lateral intermuscular septum, and the fascia of vastus intermedius. Results Average follow-up was 10 months (range 7-15 months). Three of the four patients report dramatic improvement in pain as measured by the visual analogue pain scale. The same three patients report being "extremely satisfied" with the pain relief achieved and "extremely satisfied" with the operation overall. Two patients reported being "extremely satisfied" with improvements in walking. Hip abduction power improved in all patients but to varying degrees. conclusion The results show that our method of VL transfer may be a viable option for patients with severe abductor deficiency. Modest but clinically relevant early results are seen.


Unwanted pregnancies with their negative impact on both women and children occur on an ongoing basis in Gauteng, South Africa. One way to prevent unwanted pregnancies is to use areliable contraceptive method available free of charge from primary health care clinics providing family planning services throughout Gauteng Province. A literature review was completed on women and access to family planning services and an interview schedule (questionnaire) was developed. The purpose of this study was to describe guidelines to meet the expectations of clients accessing family planning services provided by a clinic in Region F, Area 28 of the Greater Johannesburg metropolitan council. This quantitative, exploratory, descriptive and comparative study measured the gaps between the expectations of participants on service delivery and the extent to which these expectations were met. A convenience sample was conducted and consisted of 50 women of reproductive age (ages 15 to 49) attending the family planning clinic. Pre-testing of the instrument was conducted. Structured interviews with a interview schedule were conducted before and after women attended a family planning service. Inferential statistics indicated that there was a significant gap between the client expectations of family planning service delivery and the extent to which these expectations were met. Of the sixty-four items where women indicated the extent of their expectations the findings on only three items were not statistically significant. These gaps were addressed by proposing managerial guidelines to be implemented by the nurse manager in charge of the facility, on which this article will focus. Validity and reliability principles were ensured in the study. Ethical principles were adhered to during the research process.


Four types of experiment have been carried out to investigate the strength properties of annealed metals when the stressed volume is small enough to lie between the existing dislocations in a crystal. These are (i) indentation experiments of a soft metal surface with a hard stylus, (ii) blunting of a soft metal tip against a hard surface, (iii) compression of individual metal crystals, and (iv) bending of thin filaments. The experiments were performed in either a scanning electron microscope or a transmission electron microscope with the use of micro-loading devices capable of applying loads down to 0.1 mgf (10-6 N). In the blunting experiments carried out in the transmission electron microscope it was possible to observe dislocations directly in the tip during loading. The majority of the experiments were carried out on gold. The results showed that strengths similar to the theoretical value can be achieved but in the experiments in which the stress was applied at an external surface (experiments (i), (ii) and (iii) above) the strength was strongly dependent on the condition of the interface. The strength that could be sustained by a region of perfect crystal in contact with a hard metallic surface was about five times less than the theoretical strength. These relatively low strengths are probably due to interfacial tractions producing very high local stresses. The introduction of some polymeric or amorphous layer at the interface raised the strength to the theoretical level. It is suggested that this is due to the fact that the polymeric layer removes most of the stress concentration. Transmission electron microscopy through aluminium tips during blunting showed that plastic deformation could take place at quite low stresses in a dislocation-free crystal with no dislocations remaining in the crystal during the early stages of blunting. Dislocation build up only occurred in the later stages of deformation. The yield stress was found to decrease with plastic strain in all the experiments, and could fall to values which were not substantially greater than those observed in large specimens. Comparison of the compressive strength of two spherical gold crystals, 0.5 μm and 2 mm in diameter respectively, showed that the small crystal was only twice as strong as the large crystal after they had both undergone equal amounts of compression. The maximum strengths observed for gold (μ/20) are greater than those calculated by Kelly (1966) (ca. μ/50) and are nearer the value deduced by Brown & Woolhouse (1970) for the generation of dislocations around precipitate particles in alloys. The low strengths observed on deformed crystals are considered in the context of dislocation generation in small volumes and it is concluded that although a source mechanism of the Frank–Read type may be able to operate on this scale, some other source mechanism may also exist.


Near-threshold voltage computing promises an order of magnitude improvement in energy efficiency, enabling future processors to integrate 100s of cores running concurrently. However, such low voltage operation accompanies extreme parametric variations, resulting in unreliable operation of the processor. The memory bit-cells in on-chip caches are most vulnerable to failure due to their tight functionality margins. In this paper we focus on the NTV challenges with the last-level cache (LLC) management for future multicores. The state-of-the-art mechanisms enable a hybrid of disabling faulty cache lines and error correction capabilities to maximize the usable cache capacity in the LLC. We postulate that future technologies will suffer from extreme fault rates and some portions of the LLC need to be disabled. This will put unprecedented stress on the LLC capacity impacting the existing management schemes for placement, movement and replication of data. We focus our attention on evaluating the state-of-the-art LLC data management schemes and observe that a scheme optimized for nominal voltage operation may not necessarily perform optimally at NTV. We show that LLC data management schemes must be rethought and redesigned for the emerging energy efficient NTV multicores.


Background: Development of novel agents and drug combinations are urgently needed for the treatment of breast cancer especially triple negative breast cancer (TNBC). P276 is a potent cyclin-dependent kinase inhibitor with excellent antiproliferative activity against various human cancer cell lines. Here, we report the activity of P276, as a single agent and in combination with paclitaxel or gemcitabine/carboplatin in TNBC cell lines. Material and Methods: In vitro effect of P276 on breast cancer cell lines was determined by cytotoxicity assay, flow cytometry, western blotting and immunofluorescence studies. The antiangiogenic potential of P276 was evaluated using HIF-1 a and VEGF inhibition assay, wound healing and tube formation. In vivo efficacy was studied using human xenograft models in SCID and nude mice. Results: Human breast cancer cell lines including TNBC, treated with P276 were found to be highly susceptible with IC 50 ranging from 0.3 to 1.0 mM. In MCF-7 (Her2 - , BRCA +/− ) and MDA-MB-231 (ER - , PR - , Her2 - ). P276 significantly down regulated cell cycle proteins pRb ser780 , cyclin D1, Cdk4 and antiapoptotic protein Bcl-2 followed by 80-85% apoptosis. P276 treatment also lead to the inhibition of PARP enzyme activity or PARP cleavage depending on the cell type. Interestingly, P276 inhibited the key angiogenic mediators HIF-1 a and VEGF with IC 50 of 0.095mM and 0.31mM respectively in reporter gene based assays. These antiangiogenic effects were confirmed by immunofluorescence and migration studies in TNBC cell lines and endothelial tube formation. In breast cancer patient derived tumor cell line MAXF 401 (basal like) xenografts in nude mice, cyclical dosing of P276 showed growth inhibition of 71%. Moreover, combination studies of P276 with paclitaxel or gemcitabine plus carboplatin showed synergistic effect in TNBC cell lines. Discussion: Our studies provide compelling evidence for the clinical development of P276 for the treatment of triple negative breast cancer either as monotherapy or in combination with paclitaxel or gemcitabine/carboplatin. Citation Information: Cancer Res 2010;70(24 Suppl):Abstract nr P6-15-05.


To the Editor Vyssoki et al investigated the effects of sunshine on suicide incidence and found a small yet significant positive correlation between the number of suicides and hours of daily sunshine for the day of suicide and up to 10 days prior to suicide after differencing for the effects of season, as well as a significant negative correlation between the number of suicides and daily hours of sunshine for the 14 to 60 days prior to the suicide event. These effects were found in the entire sample and in violent suicides. They analogized this finding to the recovery discrepancy between psychomotor activity and depressed mood. Nonetheless, they also recognized that the discrepancy rarely occurred. Therefore, the discrepancy seems unlikely to contribute to the very opposite significance because the rare discrepancy would be averaged out. In my opinion, the change in hours of sunshine may be a better and more reasonable variable related to suicide. If the duration of daily sunshine does contribute to suicide incidence in Austria, the suicide peak should be in summer, with substantially longer bright light exposure. However, according to Schony et al, the peak suicide rate in Austria is in spring, while in August, there are fewer suicide cases than at other times... Language: en


Background—Although endovascular radiotherapy inhibits neointimal hyperplasia, the exact cellular alterations induced by β irradiation remain to be elucidated. Methods and Results—We investigated in vitro the ability of 32P-labeled oligonucleotides to alter (1) proliferation of human and porcine vascular smooth muscle cells (VSMCs) and human coronary artery endothelial cells (ECs), (2) cell cycle progression, (3) cell viability and apoptosis, (4) cell migration, and (5) cell phenotype and morphological features. β radiation significantly reduced proliferation of VSMCs (ED50 1.10 Gy) and ECs (ED50 2.15 Gy) in a dose-dependent manner. Exposure to β emission interfered with cell cycle progression, with induction of G0/G1 arrest in VSMCs, without evidence of cell viability alteration, apoptosis, or ultrastructural changes. This strategy also proved to efficiently inhibit VSMC migration by 80% and induce contractile phenotype appearance, as shown by the predominance of α-actin immunostaining in β-irradiated ce...


Improvement of worst group performance and generalization performance are core problems of current machine learning. There are diverse efforts to increase performance, such as weight norm penalty and data augmentation, but the improvements are limited. Recently, there have been two promising approaches to increase the worst group performance and generalization performance, respectively. Distributionally robust optimization (DRO) focuses on the worst or hardest group to improve the worst-group performance. Besides, sharpness-aware minimization (SAM) finds the flat minima to increase the generalization ability on an unseen dataset. They show significant performance improvements on the worst-group dataset and unseen dataset, respectively. However, DRO does not guarantee flatness, and SAM does not guarantee the worst group performance improvement. In other words, DRO and SAM may fail to increase the worst group performance when the training and test dataset shift occurs. In this study, we propose a new approach, the sharpness-aware group distributionally robust optimization (SGDRO). SGDRO finds the flat-minima that generalizes well on the worst group dataset. Different from DRO and SAM, SGDRO contributes to improving the generalization ability even the distribution shift occurs. We validate that SGDRO shows the smaller maximum eigenvalue and improved performance in the worst group.


Surfactant protein C (SP-C) is a 3.7-kDa hydrophobic peptide isolated from organic extracts of pulmonary surfactant which is secreted by alveolar type II cells after synthesis and posttranslational processing of a 21-kDa proSP-C peptide (SP-C21). Previously characterized epitope-specific proSP-C antisera were used to study early proteolytic steps of proSP-C processing by adult rat type II cells. Western blotting and immunocytochemistry using anti-NPROSP-C (epitope = Met10-Glu23) each demonstrated marked attenuation of proSP-C protein expression by culture on plastic. Processing was therefore studied by metabolic labeling of freshly isolated type II cells maintained in suspension in serum-free media. With the use of anti-NPROSP-C, immunoprecipitation of cell lysates continuously labeled for 4 h with [35S]methionine demonstrated radiolabeled bands of M(r) 21, 16, and 10-6,000 while anti-CTERMSP-C (epitope = Ser149-Ser166) failed to detect 35S-bands of M(r) < 16,000. Pulse-chase studies demonstrated synthesis of 35S-proSP-C21 with a time-dependent dependent appearance of 16-kDa and 10- to 6-kDa forms which was blocked by addition of brefeldin A. SP-C precursors were not detected in the media. Quantitative analysis of the major bands by direct beta-counting indicated a precursor-product relationship between SP-C21 and SP-C16. These results demonstrate the utility of freshly isolated type II cells for characterization of SP-C synthetic pathways and show that early proSP-C processing events include synthesis of a 21-kDa primary translation product followed by extensive intracellular proteolysis of the proSP-C COOH-terminal in subcellular compartments of type II cells which are distal to the trans-Golgi network.


Nanosized bismuth titanate, Bi4Ti3O12, was prepared via a high-energy ball milling process through mechanically assisted synthesis directly from the oxide mixture of Bi2O3 and TiO2. The Bi4Ti3O12 phase started to form after 1 h of milling. With increasing the milling time from 3 to 12 h, the particle size of formed Bi4Ti3O12 did not reduce significantly. The grain size was less than 16 nm and showed a strong tendency to agglomeration. The nucleation and phase formation of Bi4Ti3O12, crystal structure, microstructure, powder grain size and specific surface area were followed by XRD, Rietveld refinement analysis, SEM and the BET specific surface area measurements. Raman spectroscopy was used to explain the structural properties of Bi4Ti3O12 powder, prepared by mechanically assisted synthesis. Reduction in grain size with the increase of milling time was also noted (change in the position and relative intensity), which indicated changes in the structure, caused by nanodimension grains. The sample milled for 12 h and subsequently sintered at 1000 °C for 24 h exhibited a hysteresis loop, confirming that the synthesized material possesses ferroelectric properties.


Microorganisms provide both beneficial and harmful effects to human beings. Beneficial effects come from the symbiotic relationship that exists between humans and microbiota, but then several human illnesses have turned some friendly microbes into opportunistic pathogens, causing several microbial-related diseases. Various efforts have been made to create and utilize antimicrobial agents in the treatment and prevention of these infections, but such efforts have been hampered by the emergence of antimicrobial resistance. Despite extensive studies on drug discovery to alleviate this problem, issues with the toxicity and tolerance of certain compounds and continuous microbial evolution have forced researchers to focus on screening various phytochemical dietary compounds for antimicrobial activity. Linolenic acid and its derivatives (eicosapentaenoic acid and docosahexaenoic acid) are omega-3 fatty acids that have been studied due to their role in human health, being important for the brain, the eye, the cardiovascular system, and general human growth. However, their utilization as antimicrobial agents has not been widely appreciated, perhaps due to a lack of understanding of antimicrobial mechanisms, toxicity, and route of administration. Therefore, this review focuses on the efficacy, mechanism, and toxicity of omega-3 fatty acids as alternative therapeutic agents for treating and preventing diseases associated with pathogenic microorganisms.


Lithium is known as a 'simple metal' and the lightest alkaline metal in the periodic table. At ambient pressure lithium forms a body-centred-cubic structure and the conduction electrons are considered to be almost free from interaction with the atomic core. However, Neaton and Ashcroft (Neaton J B and Ashcroft N W 1999 Nature 400 141) predicted that dense lithium at around 100 GPa will be found to transform to a low-symmetry phase and show a semi-metallic behaviour, in their calculation. Recently Hanfland et al(Hanfland M, Syassen K, Christensen N E and Novikov D L 2000 Nature 408 174) reported the experimental behaviour of the existence of new high-pressure phase of lithium above 40 GPa which tends towards symmetry-breaking transitions. Here we report electrical resistance measurements on lithium performed at pressures up to 35 GPa at the temperature of 80 K.


This article discusses the conceptual provisions for the management of transformational projects. The purpose of the paper is to substantiate the need to develop a methodology for managing transformational projects in complex socio-economic systems. The methodology of the management of transformation projects are considered in this paper, on the one hand, as a doctrine on the scientific method of cognition of phenomena and processes related to systemic, radical transformations in socio-economic systems, and on the other hand, as a set of methods that can be applied to the theory and practice of managing transformational projects, having their own objective prerequisites. According to the results of the research, the conceptual provisions for the management of transformational projects should be based on the scientific vision and definition of the essence of the basic concept (the basic concept) – the transformation project.


The marrow myeloid precursor cells of a haematologically normal patient were labelled by intravenous injection of tritiated thymidine. Young labelled segmented neutrophils were then released from the marrow into the blood by an injection of cortisol. These PMN had a significantly lower LAP activity than the older blood neutrophils. It is shown that within the morphologic boundaries of the segmented PMN, the cells are still in different stages of cytoplasmic maturation. In addition, labelled and unlabelled neutrophils showed a linear and parallel increase of LAP activity during the 24 h following cortisol injection. This observation suggests that the neutrophil prematurely released in the blood can mature into normal LAP=PMN and more generally that LAP activity of a blood neutrophil increases with time.


Typical grinding operations in batch production are characterized by multiple data streams sampled at distinct intervals. A unique estimation strategy is proposed for integrating rapidly sampled sensor signals with postprocess inspection data from a series of grinding cycles. After a nonlinear state-space model is derived from existing analytical models, system observability is tested for various combinations of sensors and measurement settings. A multirate simultaneous state and parameter estimation scheme is developed based on extended Kalman filters for real-time estimation of the model parameters and part quality. Results from case studies demonstrate that the proposed scheme enables challenging estimation tasks to be undertaken that cannot be performed using traditional approaches.


Objective. In Japan, there are several clinical reports that risperidone (RIS) oral solution (OS) requires shorter time for tranquilization and induces fewer extrapyramidal symptoms (EPS) than other dosage forms; i.e. fine granules (FG). Our aim is to compare plasma levels of RIS, its active metabolite (9-OH-RIS), and their sum (active moiety; AM) between RIS-OS and RIS-FG in a multiple-dose regimen. Method. A 12-week cross-over study was conducted in nine patients with schizophrenia treated with 3 mg of RIS twice daily. The study period was divided into four terms, each term being 3 weeks. RIS-FG and RIS-OS were given in two alternate terms each. Blood samples were collected on the last day of each term just before and at 1 h after RIS treatment to measure plasma levels of RIS, 9-OH-RIS, and prolactin. Result. Plasma levels of RIS, 9-OH-RIS, AM, and prolactin before treatment were significantly lower for RIS-OS than for RIS-FG, while no significant difference was observed between the two forms at 1 h after administration. Conclusion. In a multiple-dose regimen, RIS-OS treatment caused a larger diurnal fluctuation in plasma level of AM than RIS-FG. These variations may explain the differences in severity of EPS between the 2 forms.


Postpartum depression (PPD) and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) continue to be prevalent, and disabling women with mental disorders and obstetric violence (OV) may be a trigger for them, particularly during maternity. We aimed to analyze the association between manifestations of OV with the development of PPD and PTSD during pregnancy, childbirth, and postpartum. This systematic review was based on the PRISMA 2020 statement and explored original articles published between 2012 and 2022. A total of 21 articles were included in the analysis, and bias was assessed by the Effective Public Health Practice Project's Quality Assessment Tool. The highest rate of PPD symptoms appeared in women under 20 years old, multiparous, and with low education levels. The higher PTSD ratio was present in women under 35 years, primiparous, and with secondary studies. The mode of labor (instrumental or C-section) was identified as a major risk factor of PPD, being mediator variables of the informal coercion of health professionals and dissatisfaction with newborn healthcare. Instead, partner support during labor and high satisfaction with healthcare during birth were protective factors. Regarding PTSD, the mode of labor, several perineal tears, and the Kristeller technique were risk factors, and loss of autonomy and coercion modulated PTSD symptomatology. The protective factors for PTSD were respect for the labor plan, adequate communication with health professionals, social support during labor, and the skin-to-skin procedure. This systematic review provides evidence that OV contributes to PPD and PTSD, being important in developing standardized tools to prevent it. This study recommends changes in maternal healthcare policies, such as individualized healthcare assistance, humanized pregnancy protocols, and women's mental health follow-up, and improvements in the methodological quality of future research.


Objectives To assess the prevalence and predictors of non-adherence to clinic appointments in adult patients with poorly controlled hypertension. Design A descriptive cross-sectional study. Setting A primary care setting (family medicine clinic) overseen by family physicians in Kano, Nigeria. Participants Two hundred and thirty-four randomly selected patients, aged ≥ 18 years with a diagnosis of hypertension, who had been on treatment for ≥1 year and had a current blood pressure of ≥140/90 mmHg were included. Main outcome measures Non-adherence to clinic appointment among participants Results Participants' mean age was 55±12.2 years (range: 23–85 years); they were predominantly females (163, 69.7%). Sixty (25.6%) participants were non-adherent to clinic-appointments. Being employed (OR [Odds ratio] =2.92, 95%CI [confident interval] =1.52–5.65, P=0.002), inability of participants or their children to pay the medical bills (OR=2.92,95%CI=1.42–6.00, P=0.004), and systolic blood pressure (SBP) of <160mmHg (OR=0.43, 95%CI=0.22–0.86, P=0.018) were predictors of clinic appointment non-adherence. Conclusions The prevalence of non-adherence to clinic appointments was high. Being employed, patients or their children's inability to pay medical bills, and higher SBP were predictors of non-adherence to clinic appointments. Therefore, more studies are needed on effective interventions to reduce non-adherence to clinic appointments in this setting.


River blockages formed by rock avalanches appear to pose a higher hazard potential than other landslide dams, given the extreme run-out distances and volumes of rock avalanche deposits. Recent research has identified rock avalanche deposits to have internal sedimentology consisting of a coarse surficial material (carapace) and a finer fragmented interior (body) potentially of critical importance to rock-avalanche dam stability. Physical scale modelling of overtopping failure and breach development in rock avalanche dams was used to quantify the influence of this sedimentology on critical breach parameters, and their prediction using existing embankment dam breach technologies. Results from this study indicate that the time to failure for rock avalanche dams is approximately twice that observed for homogeneous dams due to the armouring properties of the carapace; and that peak discharge is not significantly affected by sedimentology. While application of empirical, parametric, dimensional and physically based models indicated that uncertainty associated with predicted dam break discharges could range from ±19% to ±107%, no modelling technique was able to simulate the armouring phenomenon adequately. Comparison of actual and simulated breach evolution shows linear assumptions of breach depth and width development (as observed in homogeneous dams) to be incorrect. In the context of hazard management, the results suggest that empirical regression relationships should be used for rapid assessment of potential dam break flood magnitude.


Sonography is not considered to be a radiation hazard; it is noninvasive and can be widely used for examining external genitalia. We examined six cases of Peyronie's disease of the penis by high‐resolution real‐time ultrasound. The sonographic findings include a thick echogenic plaque with echogenicity similar to or higher than the tunica albuginea; a calcified plaque in thickened tunica albuginea; and are occasionally associated with calcification in the corpora cavernosa. Sonography may clearly localize the abnormal thickened area of collagen deposition and calcification. Repeated sonography after intracavernosal papaverine injection may further confirm the correlation of the plaque and the abnormally curved erectile penis. Doppler ultrasound may be used for further evaluation of the vascular condition if impotence coexists.


We introduce an optical heterodyne four-wave mixing (HFWM) spectroscopy with subnatural linewidth. In the HFWM spectroscopy strong bichromatic pump and an arbitrarily intense monochromatic probe field are employed. We show that a coherent two-photon emission by the HFWM process could result in subnatural linewidth.


According to the amino acids sequence of OC-IdeltaD86 gene and Escherichia coli codon usage, we synthesized this gene by overlap extension PCR method with 7 oligonucleotides DNA fragments. The PCR fragment was inserted into pGEM-T-easy vector and the recombined plasmid was named pGEM-T-OC-IdeltaD86. Two oligonucleotides into which the BamH I and Xho I sites were introduced were designed and synthesized based on pGEM-T-OC-IdeltaD86 and pet21b, and the PCR fragment into which the BamH I and Xho I sites were introduced was obtained. After digesting it with BamH I and Xho I, OC-IdeltaD86 gene was cloned into the corresponding sites of pet21b and obtained prokaryotic expression vector pet21b-OC-IdeltaD86. OC-IdeltaD86 gene was expressed in E. coli (BL21(DE3)plysS) after IPTG(Isopropyl beta-D-1-thiogalactopyranoside) inducement for 5 hours. The fusion protein of OC-IdeltaD86:6His gene accounted for 11.4% of total protein and 16.4% of soluble protein, which had been successfully purified by Ni-NTA and concentrated by PEG20000. This protein can effectively inhibit papain activity in vitro and may be used in anti-nematode research in vivo.


The paper describes some research results obtained during our implication in the UNIKM national project (contract no. 92074/2008). There shall be analysis the stage of the knowledge management in higher education institutions in Romania by presenting the research results of a pilot survey. In this context, there will be identifies a number of existing facilities, services, systems that contribute to knowledge management in higher education, such as information technologies facilities (started from databases and other services have extended to virtual reality), networks, communities, partnerships which provide data, information and knowledge to different kind of users (students, professors, administrative employees). Then there are consider the challenges associated with the creation of a knowledge environment in higher education, and explore the opportunities offered by viewing knowledge as an asset for this organization type. Effective knowledge management implicates changes in organizational culture, values, structures and motivation policy. 1. KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT IMPORTANCE FOR MODERN ORGANIZATIONS In global economy, modern organizations need competitive advantage despite their faced with major challenges linked with increasing competition. Organizations have to efficient, and effective manage their knowledge assets. Such organizational behavior determines the increasing. Nowadays, knowledge management imposes a large diversity of business models, depending on the organization profile, dimension or its process development. There are recognized several knowledge management enablers (that sustained in different degrees the desire business model for an organization) such as: collaboration, trust, learning, centralization, formalization, T-shaped skills, and information and communication technology support. An integrative strategic approach in the field of knowledge management always conduct to an equilibrium between the ITC used and the techniques, methods and tools for managing people (Sveiby, 2001). Because of this balance, it is useful to clarify the knowledge management definition Table 1 presents an overview of the field together with the dominant perspective or approaches. Figure 1. Knowledge Management Dimensions. ANNALS of the ORADEA UNIVERSITY. Fascicle of Management and Technological Engineering, Volume X (XX), 2011, NR1


Local variation in cortical connectivity profiles is typically modeled as having a coarse spatial scale that can be parcellated into cortical systems of large, interconnected brain areas. We created a common model of the human connectome using a new algorithm – "connectivity hyperalignment" – that discovers shared basis functions for connectivity topographies. Transforming individual connectivity data into the common model connectome dramatically increases intersubject correlation of connectivity profiles. More importantly, the common model connectome captures shared fine-scale spatial variation in connectivity profiles that is obscured by other methods of aggregating multi-subject data into a common space. We found similar results using fMRI data obtained in the resting state and while subjects watched a movie. Fine-scale variations in connectivity profiles are closely related to fine-scale distinctions in representations of information. These results reveal the existence of a shared fine-scale structure in the human connectome that was not incorporated in previous models.


OBJECTIVE
HIV and illicit drug use have been associated with altered nutrition, immune function, and metabolism. We hypothesized that altered composition and decreased diversity of the intestinal microbiota, along with microbial translocation, contribute to nutritional compromise in HIV-infected drug users.

METHOD
We enrolled 26 men and 6 women, 15 HIV infected and 17 HIV uninfected, in this exploratory, cross-sectional study; 7 HIV-infected and 7 HIV-uninfected participants had used cocaine within the previous month. We examined the independent effects of cocaine use and HIV infection on the composition and diversity of the intestinal microbiota, determined by 16S rRNA gene pyrosequencing. Using dietary records, anthropometrics, and dual x-ray absorptiometry, we examined the additional effects of nutritional indices on the intestinal microbiota. We compared markers of inflammation and microbial translocation between groups.

RESULTS
Cocaine users had a higher relative abundance of Bacteroidetes (M ± SD = 57.0% ± 21 vs. 37.1% ± 23, p = .02) than nonusers. HIV-infected individuals had a higher relative abundance of Proteobacteria (Mdn [interquartile range] = 1.56% [0.5, 2.2] vs. 0.36% [0.2, 0.7], p = .03), higher levels of soluble CD14 and tumor necrosis factor-α, and lower levels of anti-endotoxin core antibodies than uninfected subjects. HIV-infected cocaine users had higher interferon-γ levels than all other groups. Food insecurity was higher in HIV-infected cocaine users.

CONCLUSIONS
We identified differences in the relative abundance of major phyla of the intestinal microbiota, as well as markers of inflammation and microbial translocation, based on cocaine use and HIV infection. Nutritional factors, including alcohol use and lean body mass, may contribute to these differences.


The first year as a qualified nurse in a critical care area is extremely stressful. The difficulties in transition from student to intensive care nurse cause great stress and anxiety on the NQN. A structured education programme helps to support the NQN, but emphasis on the need for a structured support network is essential in helping the NQN during their transition from student to intensive care nurse. The importance of senior and junior staff, practice education team and psychologist play a crucial part in supporting the NQN during their journey to intensive care nurse, from both a social and education need.


An efficient metal-free procedure for the formal α-carboxylation of primary alcohols has been developed. The method involves a one-pot oxidation/Passerini/hydrolysis sequence and provides access to α-hydroxy acids bearing a broad range of functional groups. A minor modification to the reaction conditions extends the range of accessible products to α-hydroxy esters.


The multi-robot coverage problem is an essential building block for systems that perform tasks like inspection, exploration, or search and rescue. We discretize the coverage problem to induce a spatial graph of locations and represent robots as nodes in the graph. Then, we train a Graph Neural Network controller that leverages the spatial equivariance of the task to imitate an expert open-loop routing solution. This approach generalizes well to much larger maps and larger teams that are intractable for the expert. In particular, the model generalizes effectively to a simulation of ten quadrotors and dozens of buildings in an urban setting. We also demonstrate the GNN controller can surpass planning-based approaches in an exploration task.


With the global spread of English and its many ramifications, TESL/TEFL scholars and practitioners cannot afford to be ignorant about the status of English as a global language, its relationship to other languages, and language policies in different contexts, which often, directly or indirectly, involve English. Although this book does not focus on English and only marginally discusses language learning and teaching, TESL/TEFL professionals can benefit from reading this comprehensive volume by gaining an understanding of language policy issues and reflecting on their profession in light of the issues discussed.