Improving brittle fracture prediction is crucial for structural integrity assessment. In current safety assessments, fracture mechanics treats polycrystalline steels as homogeneous continua. In reality, deformation of structural steels is heterogeneous. Part of this heterogeneity is due to the elastic and plastic anisotropy of their constituent (often randomly orientated) grains. This paper will compare the predicted failure stresses from tensile tests performed on a ferritic pressure vessel steel using the crystal plasticity finite element approach alongside measured carbide distribution and classical Beremin cleavage model. Available tensile data of 22NiMoCr37 steel at low temperature (−91°C and −154°C) were analysed using Bridgman solutions to account for the necking effect on the stress state at the centre of necking where brittle cracking initiates. This stress state imposed on representative volume element (RVE) made up of 10×10×10 randomly orientated grains, whose deformation is simulated using crystal plasticity finite element modelling (CPFEM). Randomly distributed carbides were produced based on the measured carbide size distribution and density for this steel. By assuming carbides as Griffith microcracks, the cleavage fracture stress in each grain can be assessed based the maximum principal stress on the cleavage crystal plane and an assumed surface energy. By repeating the random carbide distribution 1,000 times, brittle fracture probability can be calculated. Detailed examination shows that the above approach is actually a verification of the BEREMIN local approach model for cleavage fracture. The modelling results were compared with the available ductility data at −91°C and the interpolated ductility data at −154°C at the centre of necking. It is foreseen that this approach will lead to improvements in brittle fracture modelling in heterogeneous ferritic steels by introducing realistic surface energies and real defect distributions in specific materials, when used alongside the CPFEM submodelling approach.Copyright © 2008 by ASME


Adeno-associated virus (AAV) shows significant potential as a gene delivery system. Although it is ubiquitous in its distribution, with approximately 85% of the adult population in the United States seropositive for the virus, it has never been associated with clinical disease. Not only is AAV non-pathogenic, but it can infect with high efficiency both dividing and terminally-differentiated cells, moreover the wild-type virus integrates into a specific chromosomal site. It also has a broad host range and the virus is extremely resistant to environmental extremes. These characteristics make it particularly attractive as a gene delivery vehicle. As the enthusiasm driving the proliferation of clinical gene transfer protocols has dampened recently due to the lack of clinical success often reflecting immunogenicity and inefficiency of the gene transfer methods used in these trials, AAV with minimal (if any) toxicity and high efficiency in a wide range of cells and tissues, may become the vector-of-choice for many applications. There have been a number of comprehensive recent reviews of AAV biology and this article specifically discusses recent advances in the use of AAV vectors with particular emphasis on AAV vector-mediated in vivo gene transfer in the mammalian central nervous system.


We observed intense intracellular immunofluorescence of rat lung fibroblasts stained with hybridoma culture supernatant containing monoclonal antibodies to human plasma fibronectin, but no pericellular matrix staining. Immunoprecipitation and absorption experiments revealed that this intracellular staining by hybridoma-conditioned medium was due to binding of fibronectin-antifibronectin immune complexes via the fibronectin to intracellular procollagen. The anomalous staining patterns we encountered were not revealed by the usual controls for immunohistochemical specificity, and also occurred in rat tissue sections. This general phenomena--binding of serum antigens present in hybridoma medium to cellular components--could in principle result in artifactual staining with monoclonal antibodies to other serum components, so investigators using monoclonal antibodies should be aware of this new artifact. Our results also demonstrate that fibronectin binds specifically to native procollagen. Monoclonal antibodies may be useful for studying fibronectin-procollagen and other macromolecular interactions.


A total of 26 different food types and 12 elaborated diets were analysed by low-level gamma spectrometry to measure their content of 238U(234Th), 228Ra(228Ac), 226Ra(214Pb), 210Pb, 137Cs and 40K. The concentrations of these radionuclides measured in some imported foodstuffs were compared with those measured in some locally produced ones. Moreover, the concentrations found in the analysed foodstuffs and composite diets were compared with the data available in literature from other locations, such as Egypt, Brazil, Poland and Hong Kong. 40K contributed highest to the daily dose produced by the intake of comestibles. The largest 40K concentrations were measured in the chickpeas and beans with 380 +/- 30 and 380 +/- 20 Bq kg(-1) fresh weights, respectively. The artificial radionuclide 137Cs was measured only above detection limits in the potatoes and sweet potatoes. A mean annual effective dose of 362 microSv with a standard deviation of 110 microSv was calculated from the composite diets.


Abstract.
 This article provides morphological and molecular characteristics of Punctodera stonei Brzeski, 1998. Comparison of partial sequences of 18S and 28S rDNA genes from P. stonei sampled in Poland and Punctodera sp. from Canada showed their 100% similarity. This is the first report on the occurrence of P. stonei outside of Europe. We provide data on morphology of males and 2nd stage juveniles of this species and an identification key to males of the genus Punctodera Mulvey et Stone, 1976. Moreover, the paper presents evolutionary relationships of P. stonei within the family Heteroderidae.


Ennead VI. 4. 1 (Volkmann's edition, p. 363, 1. 7): καὶ ὅμως ἐν μὲν ταῖς ποιότησι τὸ αὐτὸ μεμερισμένον θεωρεῖται, ἐπί δὲ ψνχῆς τὸ αὐτὸ οὐ μεμερισμένον κ.τ.λ. As there is no antithesis to justify ὅμως (praeterea, Ficinus) we should read ὅλως, which neatly sums up the argument: 'in a word, while in qualities the same thing is seen as divided, in soul the same thing is not divided,' etc.


Elite perceptions about Europe are very important in understanding the current trajectory of the European integration process, as well as the future perspectives for the continent. In this article, we present the main descriptive results of an empirical analysis looking at the attitudes of Spanish political and economic elites along the three dimensions of the IntUne project: representation, identity, and scope of governance. We examine the set of explanatory factors that may account for such attitudes. These factors are also tested through multivariate analyses. The 2007 IntUne project survey is used as the main database.


This 6-year prospective study is the first to compare two psychometrically sound risk assessment tools for sexually abusive youth: JSORRAT-II and MEGA♪. Cross-validated on representative samples of over 500 youth, these measures have cutoff scores, allowing for a more exact assessment of risk. Study sample consisted of 129 male adjudicated adolescents housed in a secured residential treatment facility for sexually abusive youth. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) analysis showed that MEGA♪ Risk Scale was mildly predictive of sexual recidivism over a 6-year period (mean follow-up = 15.6 months)—area under the curve (AUC) = .67; 95% confidence interval [CI] = [0.52, 0.82]; p < .015. JSORRAT-II was not predictive (AUC = .57; 95% CI = [0.42, 0.72]; p < .297). The study contributes to scant literature on the most contemporary, statistically robust risk assessment tools for sexually abusive youth.


INTRODUCTION
Co-receptors involved in cell entry of the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and mutations in genes encoding their ligands may play a role in the susceptibility to infection and resistance to the progression of the infection. The best studied mutations that can exist in these genes are the CCR5-Δ32, CCR2-64I and SDF1-3'A mutations. The frequency of these mutations vary from continent to continent and even from region to region. However, there is limited information on their distribution throughout the Turkish population. Istanbul is the city with the highest number of documented HIV-infected patients in Turkey, which can be attributed to the population size. The aim of this study was to determine the distribution of three AIDS-related gene variants among HIV-infected and uninfected population in Istanbul, Turkey and to estimate the contribution of these variants to susceptibility or resistance to HIV.

METHODOLOGY
A total of 242 healthy individuals and 200 HIV-positive patients were included in the study. CCR5 polymorphisms were genotyped by polymerase chain reaction. CCR2 and SDF1 polymorphisms were genotyped using PCR restriction fragment length polymorphism (PCR-RFLP).

RESULTS
The allelic frequencies for CCR5-Δ32, CCR2-64I and SDF1-3'A were 4.07%, 19.8% and 28.7%, respectively. No individual was found to carry the homozygous CCR5-Δ32 mutation in either cohort. No polymorphism was found to be significantly elevated in the HIV-infected cohort compared to the healthy group.

CONCLUSIONS
The distribution of CCR5-Δ32, CCR2-64I, and SDF1-3'A variants does not differ between HIV-infected and uninfected patients. CCR2-64I and SDF1-3'A frequencies are relatively high where as the frequency of CCR5-Δ32 is low.


ABSTRACT Coarse granular solids in debris flows are supported within a clay-water matrix by strength and buoyancy. The magnitude of buoyancy is determined in part by the density contrast between coarse grains and matrix, but also by the pore-pressure increase associated with transfer of the weight of coarse grains as they are supported by matrix strength. Buoyancy therefore increases with concentration of coarse grains and can greatly increase the competence of the flow. Mobility of debris flows probably is also enhanced by increased buoyancy, due to reduction of internal friction. Therefore, large buoyancy forces, due to heavy loading of the matrix by coarse solids, may be significant in producing the high competence and mobility exhibited by many natural flows.


reported that PEG placement is a worthwhile treatment. Our study objective was to explore the general experience and quality of life of patients living with a PEG tube. It is proposed that a better understanding of the patient perspective contributes to the success of the intervention and overall improvement in patient care. Methods: A neutral questionnaire with closed and open-ended questions was developed, tested, and used to collect data in person, over the phone and via the internet. Quantitative data were analyzed to determine whether the patients' experiences were positive, neutral or negative. Chi square was used to test for signifi cance. A frequency count of qualitative data was also done. Results: Of the 51 participants, 84% felt the PEG tube had a positive/neutral eff ect on their QoL. 90% felt that the PEG tube was "very much" or "quite a bit" worthwhile. Additionally, 96% would recommend it to another patient. Of the 12 questions refl ecting domains of QoL impacted by living with a PEG tube, 11 were answered positively or neutrally by greater than 70% of participants. Comments from patients included: "it's a lifesaver", "it's a great invention", "the benefi ts outweigh the negatives", "just do it". Conclusion: Th e experience of patients in this study, who received a PEG tube during their treatment for head and neck cancer, is generally positive or neutral. Th is will assist with the decision-making for patients considering a PEG tube and for clinicians evaluating its impact. Th ese results also provide support and encouragement for outpatient PEG tube placement programs.


Abstract. Up to date geospatial data provide the foundation for the development of smart and connected communities. While high-resolution 2D imagery is becoming widely available at less than monthly intervals and several infrastructure layers (e.g., roads, building footprints) are updated on a continuous basis, digital surface models (DSM) are generated less frequently and become quickly obsolete in rapidly developing regions. We present a methodology for continuous and efficient updates of DSM based on automated change detection from high-resolution satellite imagery that is used to develop UAS deployment plan, data acquisition, and DSM generation for targeted areas. The resulting UAS-derived DSM is then seamlessly fused with existing (usually lidar-based) DSM. We demonstrate our methodology in a rapidly developing watershed in the Triangle Region, North Carolina. The change detection maps were created using pixel-based classification methods on monthly composite data generated from PlanetScope satellites (3m resolution) as input for UAS flight planning, data acquisition, and processing. In future work a GRASS GIS script using a moving window resampling process will create flight areas to resample the change detection output into 10 acres flight areas for the UAS flight planning software, and a plugin for WebODM will be developed using GRASS GIS to enable seamless updates to centralized repositories of DSM.


Retrosynthesis in organic chemistry seeks a possible way to synthesize a complex organic molecule by considering the reverse synthesis route. Chemists can explore multiple possibilities and find the most efficient synthesis route by starting from the target molecule and returning to simple reactants. This work is an essential guide for doing retrosynthesis analysis by providing examples and explanations of the fundamental notions and procedures involved. We will discuss topics like bond disconnections, FGIs, and synthons. This work illustrates the retrosynthesis analysis of complicated organic molecules using the discussed principles and methods.


Summary
The net assimilation rate (E) of a plant population (the mean rate of increase in total dry weight per unit leaf area, measured over a period of 1 or 2 weeks), represents the excess of the rate of photosynthesis of the leaves (P) over the rate of respiration of the whole plants (R), both expressed per unit leaf area (E=P—R). To determine P, photosynthesis was prevented on some days during the experimental period by shading plants, and the effect on E was measured. The plants were held in a controlled environment to ensure that external conditions affecting photosynthesis were the same on all days and effects on change with age in the rate of photosynthesis were avoided by appropriate distribution of the shading days. With these precautions, E was linearly related to n, when n (the number of days when photosynthesis was permitted in an experimental period of 15 days) ranged from 15 to 9. The regression coefficient b of E on n measures the contribution of 1 day's photosynthesis to E, so the photosynthetic component P of EN,the net assimilation rate when photosynthesis is permitted every day in an experimental period of N days, is given by Nb. The respiratory component, R,is estimated by the difference EN—P, or graphically by extrapolating the regression line to n= 0.

This method showed that young sugar-beet plants had a greater net assimilation rate than barley plants solely because they had a greater rate of photosynthesis of the leaves; the values of the rate of respiration of whole plants for the two species were identical.


The results of studies of quartz wettability by an ecological foundry binder are presented. Water glass modified with nanoparticles of metal oxides, such as: MgO, Al2O3 and ZnO in organic solvents (methanol or propanol) was used as a binder in the investigations. The nanoparticles were undergoing electrochemical synthesis in the process of anodic dissolution of metals such as Zn, Al, Mg. Wettability was assessed by measuring the time-related changes of the contact angle θ in a quartz-water glass system. In the measurements of the contact angle a prototype apparatus and previously developed methodology were used. Systematic tests of the quartz wettability by water glass modified with nanoparticles have indicated that this parameter depends, among other things, on the amount of the introduced modifier, and on the type of nanoparticles and type of the solvent applied. The performed investigations have proved that quartz was best wetted (small contact angle) by water glass modified with the nanoparticles of MgO and Al2O3 in propanol.


Free space optical communication has become an attractive solution for data transmission due to its cost-effective, license-free and high bandwidth characteristics. The performance of such systems, however, is highly affected by the effects of optical turbulence. Multiple laser transmitters can be used to mitigate the turbulence fading by exploiting the advantages of spatial diversity. In this work the statistical properties of the received signal of a link employing spatial diversity was investigated. The statistical properties of the photo-current generated at the receiver — required for evaluating performance parameters like availability and bit error rate — were obtained by means of computer simulation. The results presented here can be very helpful in designing a free space optical link with spatial diversity, since they are presented in function of system configurations and impairment conditions.


It was investigated whether different types of mental or developmental disorders (MDD) would be rated differently in terms of stereotypic perceptions and behavioral tendencies and whether these effects of stereotypes on behaviors would be mediated via emotional responses in line with the stereotype content model (SCM). Furthermore, an experimental investigation sought to ascertain whether predictions about behavioral intentions of bystanders in a cyberbullying scenario towards a victim with MDD could be derived from the general behavioral tendencies as predicted by the SCM. Two-hundred-forty-eight undergraduate students (62% female) aged 18-35 (M=22.5) were randomly allocated to one of five conditions (anxiety, depression, schizophrenia, Asperger's or control). Stereotypes, emotional and behavioral responses as well as bystander intentions were assessed. Results largely confirmed the general application of the SCM to MDD; however, this was not the case for bystander intentions in cyberbullying. Implications for the application of the SCM and methodological considerations are discussed.


In a two-dimensional area-preserving map we found a kind of noninvertibility that is induced by a piece-wise smooth property of the map. This can lead to the appearance of such kinds of elliptic islands that attract the iterations from a set of initial values outside themselves, while behaving regularly inside. We suggest calling such islands quasi-attractors. PACS: 05. 45. -a


In this study, tropical peat swamp soils from Giam Siak Kecil-Bukit Batu Biosphere Reserve (GSKBB) in Indonesia was evaluated to assess the impact of oil palm and rubber plantations on this unique organic soil through comparisons with soils from a natural forest using a polyphasic approach (chemical and molecular microbial assays). Changes in the ammonium, nitrate and phosphate concentration were observed in soils converted to agricultural use. Soil enzyme activities in plantation soils showed reduced β-glucosidase, cellobiohydrolase and acid phosphatase activities (50% - 55% decrease). PCR-DGGE based analysis showed that the soil bacterial community from agricultural soils exhibited the lowest similarity amongst the different microbial groups (fungi and Archaea) evaluated (34% similarity to the natural forest soil). Shannon Diversity index values showed that generally the conversion of tropical peatland natural forest to rubber plantation resulted in a greater impact on microbial diversity (ANOVA p < 0.05). Overall, this study indicated substantial shifts in the soil microbial activity and diversity upon conversion of natural peatland forest to agriculture, with a greater change being observed under rubber plantation compared to oil palm plantation. These findings provided important data for future peatland management by relating changes in the soil microbial community and activities associated to agricultural practices carried out on peatland.


Lippia section Goniostachyum comprises plants distinguished by their numerous axillary florescences (three to six, sometimes up to nine) and tetrastichous floral bracts. Species of section Goniostachyum occur in the Neotropics, from Mexico to northern Argentina. Delimitation of the species grouped under Goniostachyum has remained unclear. Forty-one names exist under this section, but only c. eight to ten names have been used frequently. To resolve the taxonomy of this group, a modified population aggregation analysis, based on the phylogenetic species concept, was employed. As a result, Goniostachyum is here circumscribed to only four species: L. grata, L. origanoides, L. sericea and L. stachyoides. These species are supported by different combinations of three characters of the 13 qualitative attributes analysed: canescent sericeous pubescence, frondose or frondose-bracteose inflorescences and free or fused florescence apical bracts. Two varieties based on significant differences among quantitative characters are recognized: L. stachyoides var. stachyoides and L. stachyoides var. martiana comb. nov. Fifteen lectotypifications and four neotypifications are proposed. © 2012 The Linnean Society of London, Botanical Journal of the Linnean Society, 2012, 170, 197–219.


Lipopolysaccharide (LPS) plays an important role in tumor suppression by activating macrophages. After macrophages activation, a trail of cytokines was secreted, including IL-1β. Previous studies reported that the anti-tumor function of IL-1β is concentration-dependent, and increasing the level of IL-1β will enhance its anti-tumor effect. Cytolysin A (ClyA), a member of the protein family called pore-forming toxins (PFTs), is secreted by Gram-negative bacteria, which has a potential role in enhancing the secretion of IL-1β. In this study, the function of Cytolysin A was evaluated by investigating its ability to induce innate immune responses in macrophages and the signaling pathway(s) involved in LPS-induced production of IL-1β. The production of IL-1β was highly enhanced when the macrophages were treated with LPS and ClyA together. The production of IL-1β was regulated by TLR4-MyD88-IL-1β pathway and NLRP3-ASC-Caspase1-IL1β pathway. By treating the colon cancer cell line CT26 with the conditioned medium, the proliferation of CT26 cells was inhibited and the apoptosis of CT26 cells was increased. In conclusion, this study indicated that ClyA enhances the production of IL-1β induced by LPS in human macrophages. The proliferation of CT26 cells was inhibited and the apoptosis was increased when being treated with the macrophage-conditioned media, which provides a feasible treatment for colon tumor.


This dictionary provides coverage of current language and usage for learners of German and English. The Collins Pocket German Dictionary offers the user the following features: innovative use of colour and layout for maximum ease of reference; up-to-date wordlists including developments in the German and English languages; special treatment of basic vocabulary items; special entries on German life and culture; thousands of phrases showing words used in context; German spelling changes fully implemented; and a dictionary skills supplement with puzzles and wordgames to help the user get the most out of the dictionary.


An attempt has been made in this paper to analyze the development of Social Studies education in Nigeria. It examines how Social Studies was introduced as an experimental subject and later as a compulsory one in the primary and junior secondary school. The paper identifies those organizations that were responsible for its introduction and growth. Social Studies has integrated population education, environmental education, peace education, human rights education, AIDS/STD education and family life education into its curriculum. Regardless of the giant strides made in the discipline since its introduction four decades ago, the subject is yet to be offered at the senior secondary school level. It is, therefore, suggested that the subject be upgraded to senior secondary school level. Social studies education has therefore contributed to the overall education development of Nigeria.


An experiment was conducted to compare effects of emulsified soybean oil and non-emulsified soybean oil on the quality of broiler feed differing in the feed type and the broiler feeding stage in vitro. A 2 × 2 × 3 factorial arrangement was designed with two fat sources (soybean oil and emulsified oil), two feed types (mash and pellet) and three broiler feeding stages (starter, grower and finisher). Four samples of feeds were collected from each combination of factors at the beginning of the experiment and stored at 20°C. Subsamples were taken at 15-day intervals to determine the moisture content, peroxide value (PV), acid value (AV) and the total fungal count over a 45-day period; weight loss percentage was determined by weighting the samples at days 0, 15, 30 and 45; fines percentage in pellets was only determined at day 0. The emulsified oil reduced (P < 0.05) the fines percentage, increased (P < 0.05) the moisture content, decreased (P < 0.05) the weight loss percentage and PV, did not affect (P > 0.05) the AV and the total fungal count. Results showed that the emulsified oil decreased weight loss, increased pelletability, moisture content and oxidation stability without affecting fungal growth.


Protection in capability-based operating systems is comsidered. The concept of a conditional capability, which is a generalization of a conventional capability, is proposed. The conditional capability can only be exercised when certain conditions relating to the context of its use are satisfied. It is shown that such capabilities form a basis upon which features such as domains of protection, revocation, and type extension can be built. The implementation of these features can be isolated into sepuate modules thus leaving the basic protection module uncluttered and simplifying the overall structure of the system.


This research thesis is dedicated to the design of recommendation system for television. Nearly every household has at least one TV and pays a broadcast provider for a number of channels.. Orientation in program offer can be challenging and having a real time overview of hundreds of channels is impossible. This means the money paid for service is ineffective if not wasted completely. Recommendation systems are designed to save time and effort when searching for a suitable content. The system learns user preferences from past observations and suggests a content fitting these preferences. There are 5 basic recommendation techniques, each using different kind of knowledge for their prediction and their hybrid combinations. In this thesis, two most commonly implemented approaches are described in detail, namely, content and collaborative filtering. The main focus of this work is on handling categorical data as electronic program guide can provide a rich description of a program. State-of-the-art methods associated with this two recommendation approaches are described and some of them are extended to improve their performance. For my design, I choose to apply a probabilistic approach allowing comprehensive manipulation of the categorical data as well as providing insight into feature relationships of the content description. Graphical models meet all the requirements and because of this reason they become the primary approach the design on is built on. A novel approach based on transfer learning is applied to the graphical network in this thesis. This approach is able to benefit from user group information, therefore overcoming the issue of insufficient user data. The proposed recommendation system is applied to a television environment involving the emerging technique of hybrid broadband and broadcast (HBB) transmission of TV content. HBB is a standardized platform combining and harmonizing streams from broadband and broadcast sources allowing a simple implementation of entertainment services to enhance the user experience. Recommendation engine is one of the interactive services in this framework allowing the user to have an overview of favourite programs. The recommendation is made based on the estimation of a rating prediction. The item with the highest predicted rating is then recommended. This makes an accurate rating prediction crucial for the performance evaluation of the model. Because of this, beside the commonly used mean absolute error (MAE), a new metric to measure the performance of a recommendation engine is proposed which focuses on the importance of rating prediction. Experiments are performed on real world data set provided by Yahoo Labs. It is a collection of movies with their description categorized in a number of features and user ratings. The item description is often incomplete with many feature values missing. This is common for many data sets. Another typical issue encountered by this data set is the sparseness of the user-item matrix and item-feature matrix. It is beneficial if the recommendation system is designed in a way that these issues are either minimized or the model is robust enough that the system design is not affected by them. The model proposed in this work incorporates a method for missing value estimation and does not suffer from the sparsity issue.


Reflection seismics has been intensively used for the last four decades by marine geologists and geophysicists for imaging Earth structures below the seafloor. Because their subject of interest is below the sea bottom, solid Earth scientists do not usually consider the seismic signal propagating in the water column and most often do not even record it, in order to save data storage space.

Two physical oceanographers, Gonella and Michon [1988],first reported internal waves revealed by reflection seismics in the northeastern Atlantic. Only recently, though, has the scientific community realized the importance of this issue, after Holbrook et al. [2003] published reflection seismic sections of the water column off Newfoundland, Canada, showing reflectors related to the major oceanographic front between the Labrador Current and the North Atlantic Current.


Abstract Suspensions of proximal tubules were obtained by collagenase digestion of rat renal cortex followed by centrifugation on a percoll gradient. NAD content in tubules incubated at 37°C was decreased by 40–60% compared with tubules incubated at 4°C. This change occurred within 30 min and was maintained for up to 2 hr. Inhibitors of NAD hydrolysing enzymes prevented the depletion of cellular NAD at 37°C. Acute changes in proximal tubule NAD content at 37°C were not accompanied by changes in phosphate uptake by brush border membrane vesicles subsequently prepared from the same tubules. In contrast, incubation of tubules with parathyroid hormone (10-6 M) produced the expected inhibition (20%) of brush border membrane transport of phosphate. One implication of these findings is that acute changes in total NAD content of proximal tubules at 37°C may not influence the phosphate transport system in the renal brush border membrane. Other interpretations are discussed.


Background and importance One of the strategies for the rational use of antibiotics is conversion of intravenous antibiotic treatment to oral as soon as possible, without compromising the therapeutic response of the patient. This can reduce the number of possible adverse effects associated with parenteral use and have an economic impact. Aim and objectives This study was conducted to promote early switching from intravenous to oral treatment in patients who were prescribed parenteral antibiotic treatment for >3 days and to analyse the degree of acceptance of the interventions performed by the pharmacists. Material and methods A prospective interventional study was carried out between February and April 2019. All patients receiving intravenous antibiotic treatment for >3 days were analysed by two pharmacists. Antibiotics included levofloxacin, ciprofloxacin, linezolid and metronidazole. The oral switch was proposed in patients who tolerated oral administration, with no fever and decrease in inflammatory markers (leucocytes and C reactive protein) and whose clinical condition had improved. Those excluded were critically ill patients and infections that were not candidates for sequential therapy (CNS infections, undrained abscesses, endocarditis and endovascular prosthetic infections). The intervention consisted of a message from the pharmacist sent through the electronic prescription programme to the responsible physician with a recommendation to switch to oral administration. Data were extracted from the management software (Farmatools) and collected in an Excel spreadsheet. Results A total of 117 patients were selected (53.9% men, median age 69 years). Patients were hospitalised in: pneumology (48.7%), surgery (18.8%) and internal medicine (8.6%). An intervention was made in 57 (48.7%) patients. In 78.9% (45) the intervention was accepted and 21.1% (12) were denied by medical staff. Antibiotic, number of interventions (percentage of total) and number of interventions accepted (percentage) were: levofloxacin n=40 (70.4%), acceptance 33 (82.5%); metronidazole n=7 (12.2%), acceptance 4 (57.1%); ciprofloxacin n=6 (10.5%), acceptance 4 (66%); and linezolid n=4 (7.0%), acceptance 4 (100%). Conclusion and relevance Review of antibiotic prescriptions by the pharmacist service increased early sequential therapy, and the degree of acceptance by medical staff was high. This was related to a decrease in adverse effects and costs per patient. References and/or acknowledgements No conflict of interest.


The impact of uncertainty on money growth has occupied a prominent place in monetary policy analysis in recent years. Some papers examining this issue use ad hoc estimates and measure variability rather than uncertainty. We employ a multivariate GARCH model, which measures uncertainty by the conditional variance of the data series, to investigate whether macroeconomic uncertainty and monetary uncertainty Granger-cause changes in real money. We find that macroeconomic uncertainty impacts positively on US real M2 growth over a one- to two-year horizon but that monetary uncertainty does not cause changes. Instead, our results indicate that real money growth causes monetary uncertainty.


A real-time electronic CDS for pneumonia (ePNa) identifies possible pneumonia patients, measures severity and antimicrobial resistance risk, and then recommends disposition, antibiotics, and microbiology studies. Use is voluntary, and clinicians may modify treatment recommendations. ePNa was associated with lower mortality in emergency department (ED) patients versus usual care (Annals EM 66:511). We adapted ePNa for the Cerner EHR, and implemented it across Intermountain Healthcare EDs (Utah, USA) throughout 2018. We introduced ePNa through didactic, interactive presentations to ED clinicians; follow-up visits identified barriers and facilitators to use. Email reminded clinicians and answered questions. Hospital admitting clinicians encouraged ePNa use to smooth care transitions. Audit-and-feedback measured utilization, showing variations from best practice when ePNa and associated electronic order sets were not used. Use was initially low, but gradually increased especially at larger hospitals. A user-friendly interface, frequent reminders, audit-and- feedback, a user survey, a nurse educator, and local physician champions are additive towards implementation success.


NABIH AMIN FARIS and MOHAMMED TAWFIK HUSAYN : The Crescent in crisis : an interpretative study of the modern Arab world, [vii], 191 pp., map [on end-papers]. Lawrence : University of Kansas Press, 1955. $4. This presentation of the Arab world and its problems to the American reader by two Arab authors is divided into three sections. The first, entitled ' Introducing the Arab world ', consists of three chapters, dealing with the definition of the terms ' Arab ' and ' Arab world ' and the natural and political divisions of that entity. The second part, entitled ' Unifying factors ', consists of two chapters, one on basic unifying factors, such as a common language, history, religion, and mentality, the other on new unifying factors, such as schools, the press, radio, and cinema, political parties, modern means of communication, modern economic developments, and external influences and pressures, educational, economic, and political. The third and largest section is headed ' Divisive factors ', and contains chapters devoted to dynastic rivalries, the foreign powers, religious minorities, national minorities, diversity of political aims, disparity in political development, economic and social disparity, and cultural disparity. A final chapter sums up the present aspirations and demands of the Arabs.


ABSTRACT We use a panel study of Michigan current and former welfare recipients to estimate the prevalence and persistence of health problems in the post-reform welfare population and their role in women's employment. Rates of health problems were disproportionately high. Over 70 percent of current and former welfare recipients reported limitations in physical functioning; over 60 percent met the criteria for a mental health disorder measured in the study; and 37 percent reported having a child with a health problem in at least one of four interviews over a 4 1/2-year period. Women who reported physical health, mental health, or child health problems at multiple waves worked fewer months. There were no race-based differences in employment length or in physical health problems, but African-Americans were less likely than whites to meet the diagnostic screening criteria for depression, to meet criteria for general anxiety disorder, and to report a child with a health problem. These findings suggest that the inclusion of persistent health problems as determinants of work in human capital models increases understanding of the transition from welfare to work. Policies need to reexamine welfare's work requirements to encourage states to provide services and supports to recipients.


A comprehensive set of technical solutions has been developed for the distributed network of digisonde ionospheric sounders to make their data available in a timely and user‐friendly fashion. In a significant engineering effort, 34 digisondes operating worldwide stand as a modern sensor network with on‐site intelligent data interpretation, data delivery to multiple locations for the automated storage and dissemination to end users, and a software suite for interactive data visualization/editing and remote network maintenance and sounding schedule control. The paper discusses lessons learned from the system operations and outlines future efforts.


Abstract. We study the interaction of solar wind protons with the Earth's quasi-parallel bow shock using a hybrid-Vlasov simulation. We employ the high-fidelity global hybrid model Vlasiator to include effects due to bow shock curvature, tenuous upstream populations, and foreshock waves. We investigate the local uncertainty of the position of the quasi-parallel bow shock as a function of several plasma properties, and find that for a significant portion of time, the local bow shock position is challenging to define. Our results support the notion of upstream structures causing patchwork reconstruction of the quasi-parallel shock front in a non-uniform manner. We propose a novel method for spacecraft data to be used to analyze this quasi-parallel reformation. We combine our hybrid-Vlasov results with test-particle studies and show that shock non-locality appears to have little direct efficient on particle injection. We show that proton energization, which is required for injection, takes place throughout a larger shock transition zone. Non-local energization of particles is found regardless of the instantaneous non-locality of the shock front. Distortion of magnetic fields in front of and at the shock is shown to have a significant effect on proton injection. We additionally show that the density of suprathermal reflected particles upstream of the shock may not be a useful metric for the probability of injection at the shock, as foreshock dynamics and particle trapping appear to have a greater effect on energetic particle accumulation at a given position in space. Our results have significant implications for statistical and spacecraft studies of the shock injection problem.


The ODA TC pilot project "Small scale irrigation using collector wells - Zimbabwe" began
in October 1992. This report outlines progress made on all aspects during the fourth six
months of work.
The six project schemes are now complete. Two additional schemes for Plan International
(NGO) are also near to completion. As planned, these schemes represent a range of physical,
social, economic and institutional settings. The number of families obtaining domestic water
from 011k-funded schemes is 1319 and the number of families with allotments on the
community gardens is approximately 577.
Individual socio-economic baseline surveys have been carried out for the six project
communities and now provide data on social, institutional, economic and agricultural aspects
of rural life before scheme installation. This information is being used in monitoring and
evaluating the impacts of the schemes on the communities and in drawing up guidelines for
the design and implementation of future schemes. Shortage of water is the principal problem
reported by respondents at all sites. At some, the priority is for a cleaner and more reliable
source of domestic water. At others, the priority is for water to allow vegetables to be grown
for home consumption and for sale.
Monitoring of garden performance is proceeding well. The first scheme completed in Chivi
District in 1991 continues to produce high returns, recording an average gross margin of
Z$19,900 per ha per year for three years of operation. First gross margins recorded at pilot
project schemes are similarly high, being Z$18,204 and Z$25,444 at Muzondidya and Gokota
respectively. The figure for Gokota actually represents less than one complete year and is an
indication of the excellent returns possible from small areas intensively cultivated if water can
be made available in these dry areas. Social and institutional "teething" problems were
encountered at most of the earlier schemes. However, production figures indicate that these
have been overcome. Valuable lessons have also been learnt by project staff that led to
significant improvements in implementation of the later schemes.
Good progress has been made on the comparison of well design at each scheme location.
Total water use from the collector wells is typically 15-20 cubic metres per day.
Improvement to yield by radial drilling has been very good at four of the five sites drilled to
date, and both pump tests and well performance suggest that the wells at Dekeza, Nemauka
and Mawadze could in fact now support a garden larger than 0.5ha if required. First results
comparing performance of the collector wells with other well types at each scheme location
indicate that single high yielding boreholes may be technically viable in some areas.
However, real comparison can only be made when pump tests are completed during a period
of drought. Economic viability of siting high yielding boreholes to support community
gardens is also shown to depend very much on the success rate of drilling.
Excellent progress has been made to distil experiences and knowledge gained during this pilot
phase and to draft guidelines to assist future development of community gardens using
groundwater. A decision tree is being developed that shows key steps now known to be
important to achieve successful collaboration with communities and to help ensure
implementation of schemes more likely to be sustainable from a social point of view. This
also includes the key steps required to determine the most cost-effective well design to
support a community garden in any area.
Indicative values of agroeconomic performance of different types of irrigation system
operating in Southern Zimbabwe highlight the important role that community gardens using
groundwater can play, addressing in particular the primary needs of improved health and
poverty alleviation in poor rural communities in dry areas. Indeed, much interest is being
expressed by various organisations in the region wishing to develop these type of schemes.
It is timely, therefore, for discussion amongst senior GoZ staff and ODA to determine how
best to proceed from this pilot phase and to develop groundwater based community gardens
on a wider scale.


Protein fibrils are relevant not only in medicine and amyloid-related neurodegenerative diseases, but also as functional structures in material science or biology. The assembly of protein into fibrils can be promoted or inhibited based on the chosen environmental conditions and interaction with suitable components. We review here the key strategies for promotion and inhibition of protein fibrillation in both physiological and non-physiological conditions in order to create functional designs. The major variables discussed are solvent conditions, metals/ions, biopolymers, aromatic compounds, and surface active components. Due to bias in research directions, deeper investigation has traditionally been carried out for inhibition of fibrillation, but focus has recently shifted. Thus, while various strategies are presented on the breakdown of mature protein fibrils, emphasis is given to the approaches leading to increased rigidity and length of resultant fibrils. We highlight important areas in this field that require further development and promising lines of future experiments.


Through Law Number 16 of 2019 as an Amendment to Law Number 1 of 1974 concerning Marriage, Indonesia made a breakthrough by setting a higher minimum age for girls who want to marry from 16 to 19 in 2019. Those who wish to marry before the age of 19 must gain permission from the Court. However, the Court granted 97% of the marriage dispensation cases. Existing studies in this issue already analyze why the judges grant marriage dispensations, mainly avoiding the worst possible outcomes for the children. Based on our literature analysis, the acceptance of the marriage dispensation is more prominent because of the Maqosidus Sharia (the purpose of Islamic Law). This context leads to a fewer rejection of applications for the dispensation of marriage. We take a different route by analyzing the rejected applications to understand the Court's negotiation process leading to rejection. We collected 17 rejected marriage dispensation applications from different religious courts between 2018 and 2021 on the Court's online database. Then, we analyzed how the negotiation process occurred between the parties involved in the trial, namely between the Judge, the Petitioner (parents), and the husband/wife candidate (children) as the object of the marriage dispensation stipulation. On the other hand, analysis on the rejected cases found five main reasons for rejection: the immaturity of the husband/wife candidates, the Judge's judgment that the marriage will bring harm to the children, lack of evidence of an urgent need for marriage because of the Judge's advice, and administrative reasons.


This study aimed to compare neuronal function in the lower limbs of elite footballers and an age-matched control group. Conduction velocity, response latency and amplitude following electrical stimulation were investigated. Thirty male football players and 30 untrained males comprised the subject and control groups, respectively. We showed that professional football players have significantly slower sural nerve conduction velocity than untrained controls (p<0.05). Although we found no signs of neuropathy, mild changes in nerve conduction velocity were evident in the sural nerve of the players. Motor conduction velocity of tibial nerve was also significantly prolonged in this group when comparing dominant and non-dominant extremities (p<0.05). The tibial nerve muscle action potential amplitude was lower in the players' dominant limbs compared with the controls (p<0.05). We found no statistical difference in motor conduction velocities, distal latencies and amplitudes of the common peroneal nerve when comparing players and controls in both dominant and non-dominant limbs (p>0.05). Our results showed abnormalities of function in the sural and tibial nerves in football players compared with untrained controls, which may indicate early signs of neuropathy.


car-Objectives: Neurogenic stunned myocardium (NSM) is a cardiac condition resulting from acute neurological events that can lead to a reduction in myocardial strain, an important parameter used to assess cardiac function. The aim of our study was to investigate the NSM and its impact on myocardial strain. Methods: 82 consecutive patients (mean age: 66 ±14 years, 36 male) presenting with acute ischemic stroke were consecutively included. LV functions of all patients were evaluated by two-dimensional (2D) speckle-tracking echocardiography. High-sensitive cardiac Troponin I (hs-cTnI) level>0.04ng/mL was accepted as increased. Results: 33 patients (40.2%) had elevated hs-cTnI and 23 patients (28%) had insular cortex involvement. The stroke patients with elevated hs-cTnI had higher frequencies of coronary artery disease and insular cortex involvement, higher NT-proBNP levels, and lower left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF), global longitudinal strain (GLS), global and regional circumferential strain compared to patients with normal troponin levels. Although the patients with insular cortex involvement had significantly higher hs-cTnI levels, there were not any significant differences in LVEF and 2D-STE parameters between the groups. Conclusion: Elevated troponin levels may be associated with a decrease in LVEF and myocardial strain parameters, especially in acute ischemic stroke patients with insular cortex involvement; and may be considered as a sign of neurogenic myocardial stunning.


Archaeobotanical macro remains recovered from the Ayanis fortress and the outer town of the Urartian period of the Iron Age (685-645 BC), located in the area of Van (Turkey), were investigated. Most of the remains were charred due to fire. Large quantities of Hordeum vulgare L. (hulled barley), Panicum miliaceum L. (broomcorn millet), and Setaria italica (L.) P.Beauvois (foxtail millet) were found at the study site, indicating the storage of agricultural surplus. Other types of cereal remains were also recorded, including Triticum aestivum L. (bread wheat) and Secale cereale L. (rye). Ground wheat grains were also recovered and their starch microstructure under scanning electron microscope suggests that these remains represent a bulgur-like food preparation. The data suggest that in the area of Ayanis plant-based agricultural activities were based mainly on cereals in the Iron Age. The findings also include fruits of Carum carvi L. (caraway, Persian cumin), Coriandrum sativum L. (coriander), and Petroselinum crispum (Mill.) Fuss (parsley). In view of the folkloric use of these plants, it is thought that the material from Ayanis represents condiments and/or medicinal herbs used by the Urartians in Anatolia about 2600 years ago.


Purpose Clinical usefulness of sentinel lymph node (SLN) mapping in colorectal cancer remains controversial. The aim of this study is to evaluate the accuracy of the SLN mapping technique using serial sectioning, and to compare the results between ex vivo and in vivo techniques. Methods From February 2011 to October 2012, 34 colon cancer patients underwent SLN mapping during surgical resection. Eleven patients were analyzed with the in vivo method, and 23 patients with the ex vivo method. Patient characteristics and results of SLN mapping were evaluated. Results The SLN mapping was performed in 34 patients. Mean age was 67.3 years (range, 44-81 years). Primary tumors were located in the following sites: 13 in the right colon (38.2%) and 21 in the left colon (61.8%). SLN mapping was performed successfully in 88.2% of the patients. There was no significant difference in the identification rate between the two methods (90.9% vs. 87.0%, P = 1.000). Both the mapping methods showed a low sensitivity and high rate of skip metastasis. Conclusion This study showed that SLN evaluation using serial sectioning could not predict the nodal status with clinically acceptable accuracy despite the high detection rate.


The teaching of pronunciation has for a long time concentrated on segmental features. Increasingly, however, writers and researchers have called for greater emphasis to be placed on the teaching of suprasegmentals because of their influence on intelligibility. The purpose of this article is to reiterate that call for the teaching of English prosody, particularly intonation, to learners of English. This is done through an examination of discourse intonation features of English spoken in Malaysia and Singapore. Using the discourse intonation model by David Brazil (Brazil, Coulthard & Johns 1980, Brazil 1997) as a theoretical framework, this article describes seven common intonation features and discusses how these features may affect communication with English speakers from other countries. It also examines implications for teaching, with particular reference to national English language programmes. Although this discussion is based on Malaysia and Singapore, it may be of interest to other readers in Southeast Asia, where the acquisition of good English pronunciation has become increasingly important in national curricula.


Functionalized nitronyl nitroxide biradical ligands incorporating pyridine groups hold CoII and LnIII ions together, creating biradical-based 3d-4f tetranuclear complexes [Ln2Co2(hfac)10(NITPhPybis)2] [LnIII = Gd (1), Tb (2), Dy (3), and Ho (4); NITPhPybis = 5-(4-pyridyl)-1,3-bis(1'-oxyl-3'-oxido-4',4',5',5'-tetramethyl-4,5-hydro-1 H-imidazol-2-yl)benzene; hfac = hexafluoroacetylacetonate]. These complexes have a centrosymmetric cyclic molecular structure in which two biradicals perform as tetradentate ligands to bind two CoII and two LnIII ions, resulting in a rare octaspin system. Direct-current (dc) magnetic susceptibility studies reveal that the strong antiferromagnetic CoII-NO magnetic exchange dominates the present magnetic system, while magnetic coupling of Gd-ON is ferromagnetic. Analysis of the magnetic data of the Gd complex allows us to determine the magnetic parameters through the appropriate magnetic model. Alternating-current (ac) magnetic susceptibility investigations indicate that 2 displays frequency-dependent out-of-phase signals under a zero dc field, while ac magnetic susceptibilities of 3 show field-induced frequency dependence, which is a typical feature of slow relaxation of the magnetization. Complexes 1-4 represent the first nitronyl nitroxide biradical-based 3d-4f compounds.


The objective of this research is to develop a general methodological framework for planning and evaluating the effectiveness of highway reconstruction strategies on the system's performance measures, in particular safety, mobility, and the total cost of network rehabilitation. Transportation networks are characterized by uncertainty that stems from different sources and transportation planners should consider risks involved in uncertainty in model parameters. In this research, Conditional Value at Risk (CVaR) is used to quantify and measure the risk in pavement performance and travel demand. First, a method of constructing risk‐based rehabilitation policies for a network of pavement facilities that ensures a specific quality level is introduced. Second, to enhance network mobility, several optimization models to minimize travel time for all paths connecting the same origin and destination pair is presented. Finally, to improve network safety during capacity expansion decisions, two models are presented to reduce accident rate by changing the ratio of flow to the link capacity to reduce injury and fatal accidents and property damage accidents.


We hypothesized that it would be possible to detect the distribution of cortical activation by using a sensitive, rapid, high‐resolution infrared imaging technique to monitor changes in local cerebral blood flow induced by changes in focal cortical metabolism. In a prospective study, we recorded in 21 patients the emission of infrared radiation from the exposed human cerebral cortex at baseline, during language and motor tasks, and during stimulation of the contralateral median nerve using an infrared camera (sensitivity 0.02°C). The language and sensorimotor cortex was identified by standard mapping methods (cortical stimulation, median nerve somatosensory‐evoked potential, functional magnetic resonance imaging), which were compared with infrared functional localization. The temperature gradients measured during surgery are dominated by changes in local cerebral blood flow associated with evoked functional activation. The distribution of the evoked temperature changes overlaps with, but extends beyond, functional regions identified by standard mapping techniques. The distribution observed via infrared mapping is consistent with distributed and complex functional representation of the cerebral cortex, rather than the traditional concept of discrete functional loci demonstrated by brief cortical stimulation during surgery and by noninvasive functional imaging techniques. By providing information on the spatial and temporal patterns of sensory‐motor and language representation, infrared imaging may prove to be a useful approach to study brain function. Ann Neurol 2003


Headwater streams provide important aquatic habitat, link hillslope sediments with lowland systems, and are an extensive and important component of the fluvial system. Headwater streams are characterised by steep gradients, poorly sorted sediments, large roughness elements and often exhibit diverse morphologies, described as step-pool, rapid or riffle-pool. Despite their importance, headwater streams have received relatively little attention compared to lowland systems and analysis has centred on approaches developed lowland rivers assuming hydrostatic pressure distributions and low channel gradients. In order to investigate the applicability of these methods in a small headwater streams, two hydrodynamic models were applied. The 1-dimensional model, HEC-RAS and 2-dimensional model, River 2D were use to characterise the hydraulics of East Creek, British Columbia. Two reaches, one with rifflepool morphology, the other with rapid morphology were studied. Both reaches exhibit high relative roughness. The hydrodynamic models were calibrated to observed water surface data by adjusting the roughness coefficient employed by the model and the results were compared to observed depths and velocities. Two bedload transport formulae were used in conjunction with the models to provide an indirect test of the hydraulic results. Both hydrodynamic models were able to replicate the observed conditions with a reasonable degree of accuracy, although extensive calibration was required, particularly in HEC-RAS and the roughness coefficient incorporated many resistance components (e.g grain roughness, form roughness). Similar results were found in certain areas with River 2D. When applied predicatively, neither model accurately captured the variation in flow resistance and thus calculated results deviated from the observed conditions. It was also found that River 2D was unable to model very low flows were form resistance from large bed material was high. Results of the sediment transport analysis were also poor, but further consideration of both hydrodynamic and bedload transport model resolution may provide more reliable results.


We report on observational results obtained for 78 objects originally classified as bona-fide or candidate gamma Doradus stars. For the southern objects, we gathered echelle spectra with the CORALIE spectrograph attached to the Euler telescope in 1998-2003 and/or Johnson-Cousins B,V,Ic observations with the MODULAR photometer attached to the 0.5-m SAAO telescope in 1999-2000. For the northern objects, we obtained Geneva U,B,B1,B2,V,V1,G observations with the P7 photometer attached to the 1.2-m MERCATOR telescope in 2001-2004. At least 15 of our objects are binaries, of which 7 are new. For 6 binaries, we determined the orbit for the first time. At least 17 objects show profile variations and at least 12 objects are multiperiodic photometric variables. Our results allow us to upgrade 11 objects to bona-fide gamma Doradus stars and to downgrade 8 objects to constant up to the current detection limits. Mode identification is still ongoing, but so far, only l = 1 and 2 modes have been identified.


This paper focuses on elements that are involved in a specific type of judgment, namely, those involving facts that, in virtue of contingent reasons, are out of our epistemic reach. Its goal is to propose a philosophical explanation about why we, in informal contexts, take some facts as contingently unknowable. In order to accomplish that goal, we develop a theory that defines contingently unknowable facts in a very specific way. We establish three clauses that are jointly necessary and sufficient — so we argue — for taking an arbitrary fact as contingently unknowable. In a variety of contexts, this strategy has the potential of reducing efforts in an epistemological analysis of this particular type of unknowability.


Background: Promoting L 6 rat myoblast cell (L 6 RMC) survival in the pro-apoptotic environment is critical to myoblast cell replacement for skeletal muscle degenerative disease therapy. Tanshinol (Danshensu), one of the principal bioactive components in salvia miltiorrhiza bunge, has been used widely in skeletal muscle system (SMS) diseases treatment and serves as an antioxidant to protect myoblast cells against oxidative stress. The present study was undertaken to investigate the protective effects of Tanshinol on L 6 RMC injury induced by hydrogen peroxide (H 2 O 2 ). After challenge with 100 µM H 2 O 2 for 1h, loss of cell viability and excessive apoptotic cell death were observed in cultured L 6 RMC, tanshinol treatment conferred protective effects against the loss of cellular viability in a concentration-dependent manner. Materials, Methods & Results: L 6 rat myoblast cells (L 6 RMC) were maintained DMEM containing 4.5 g/L glucose and supplemented with 10% (v/v) fetal bovine serum (FBS), 100 U/mL penicillin and 100 µg/mL streptomycin on tissue culture fl asks in a 37°C humidifi ed atmosphere of 95% air and 5% CO 2 . Cells were subcultured every 2-3 days. The cells were stained with SABC-Cy3 fl uorescence and measured by counting the nuclei. L 6 RMC viability was determined by MTT assay in 96-well plates. The cells were counter-stained with H & E staining and Hoechst 33342 fl uorescent staining. Cell cycle phase distribution and apoptosis rates were detected by flcytometry. Western blot were repeated three times, and qualitatively similar results were obtained. L 6 RMC were pretreated with Tanshinol 375, 187.5, 93.75 mg/mL for 24 h, followed by treatment of 1000, 500, 100 µM H 2 O 2 for 1h (P < 0.05) with viability by MTT method. Tanshinol 187.5 mg/ mL pretreatment was protected in L 6 RMC from H 2 O 2 -induced apoptosis with H&E staining and Hoechst 33342 fl uorescent staining (P < 0.05). Tanshinol 375, 187.5, 93.75 mg/mL treatment showed the upregulation of Bcl-2 and the reduction of Bax antibody staining (P < 0.05) and western blot 375, 187.5, 93.75 mg/mL of three concentrations of Tanshinol of protection is different and 187.5 mg/mL is the best protection (P < 0.05) with fl ow cytometry. L6 RMC was treated with Tanshinol in the presence or absence of JNK and MAPK inhibitor, SP600125 and PD98059 at each 10 µM via modulation of JNK/MAPK signaling pathways. Discussion: Tanshinol (Danshensu) of the principal bioactive components in salvia miltiorrhiza bunge was attenuated L 6 rat myoblast cells (L 6 RMC) apoptosis induced by H 2 O 2 and the myoprotective effects of Tanshinol might be due to the activation of JNK/MAPK. L 6 RMC was potential to substitute for lost tissue, will survive, differentiate, and integrate into existing skeletal muscle networks and are very sensitive to increases of ROS which results in cell apoptosis. This study provided more data to support the antioxidant roles of Tanshinol in L 6 RMC, which are responsible for myogenesis for normal skeletal muscle functions in adults. These data demonstrate that the oxidative- induced calpain-dependent pathways could play a pivotal role in the depletion of the satellite cell pool leading to an impairment in regeneration events and the development of sarcopenia. Inhibition of JNK and MAPK with SP600125 (a JNK inhibitor) and PD98059 (a MAPK inhibitor) signifi cantly increased H 2 O 2 -induced acute apoptosis. Therefore, adaptive cyoprotection through JNK/MAPK will be switched on upon H 2 O 2 injury in L 6 RMC and the transient activation of JNK/MAPK signaling delays the H 2 O 2 induced acute apoptosis.


The objective of this study is to develop a knowledge-base framework for generating cooperative answers to indirect queries. An indirect query can be considered as a nonstandard database query in which a user did not specify explicitly the information request, h a cooperative query answering system, a user's indirect query should be answered with an informative response, either an affirmative response or a negative response, which is generated on the basis of the inference of the user's information request and the reformulation of the users' indirect query. This paper presents methods for inferring users' intended actions, determining users' information requirements, and for automatically reformulating indirect queries into direct queries. The inference process is carried out on the basis of a user model, call user action model, as well as the query context. Two kinds of informative responses, i.e. affirmative responses and negative responses can be generated by a rule-based approach.


PURPOSE OF REVIEW
Respiratory viruses are common in solid organ transplant (SOT) recipients and recognized as a significant cause of mortality and morbidity. This review examines the literature on influenza and noninfluenza viruses in the SOT recipient.

RECENT FINDINGS
Advances in immunosuppression and antimicrobial prophylaxis have led to improved patient and graft survival, yet respiratory viruses continue to be a common cause of disease in this population. Influenza viruses have received top priority regarding prevention and treatment, whereas advances in molecular diagnostic tests detecting an array of other respiratory viruses have expanded our knowledge about the epidemiology and impact of these viruses in both the general population and SOT patients. Effective treatment and prevention for noninfluenza respiratory viruses are only emerging.

SUMMARY
Respiratory viruses can contribute to a wide array of symptoms in SOT, particularly in lung transplant recipients. The clinical manifestations, diagnosis, and treatment options for influenza and noninfluenza viruses in SOT patients are reviewed. PCR and related molecular techniques represent the most sensitive diagnostic modalities for detection of respiratory viruses. Early therapy is associated with improved outcomes. Newer classes of antivirals and antibodies are under continuous development for many of these community acquired respiratory viruses.


PURPOSE
To evaluate the efficacy and safety of diamond burr superficial keratectomy in the treatment of visually-significant anterior corneal lesions.

METHODS
A retrospective review of 23 eyes (23 patients). Pre- and postoperative visual acuities and refractions, slit-lamp biomicroscopic findings, and the incidence of recurrence of disease after keratectomy were studied.

RESULTS
Nineteen eyes had map-dot-fingerprint basement membrane dystrophy and 4 had Salzmann's nodular degeneration. All patients presented with decreased vision, as well as varying degrees of glare, halos, and monocular diplopia. Postoperative follow-up ranged from 3 to 39 months (mean 10.6 months), and no recurrence of the original disease occurred within this period. This procedure improved the best-corrected visual acuity from 20/36 (LogMar 0.250) to 20/24 (LogMar 0.076) by LogMar statistical evaluation (p<0.001) and caused a statistically non-significant (p=0.232) myopic change in the mean refractive spherical equivalent (-0.36 diopter +/- SD 2.28 preoperatively to -0.71 +/- 2.26 postoperatively). Glare and monocular diplopia were subjectively reduced or eliminated in all patients. One patient had mild anterior stromal haze which decreased the bestcorrected visual acuity from 20/25 to 20/30.

CONCLUSION
Diamond burr superficial keratectomy appears to be an effective and safe method of removing visually-significant anterior corneal opacities.


Most spatial conservation planning for wide-ranging or migratory species is constrained by poor knowledge of species' spatio-temporal dynamics and is only based upon static species' ranges. However, species have substantial variation in abundance across their range and migratory species have important spatio-temporal population dynamics. With growing ecological data and advancing analytics both of these can be estimated and incorporated into spatial conservation planning. However, there is limited information on the degree to which including this information affects conservation planning. We compared the performance of systematic conservation prioritizations for different scenarios based on varying the input species' distributions by ecological metric (abundance distributions versus range maps) and temporal sampling resolution (quarterly, monthly, or weekly). We used the example of a community of 41 species of migratory shorebirds that breed in North America and we used eBird data to produce weekly estimates of species' abundances and ranges. Abundance distributions at a monthly or weekly resolution led to prioritizations that most efficiently protected species throughout the full annual cycle. Conversely, spatial prioritizations based on species' ranges required more sites and left most species insufficiently protected for at least part of their annual cycle. Prioritizations with only quarterly species ranges were very inefficient as they needed to target 40% of species' ranges to include 10% of populations. We highlight the high value of abundance information for spatial conservation planning, which leads to more efficient and effective spatial prioritization for conservation. Overall, we provide evidence that spatial conservation planning for wide-ranging migratory species is most robust and efficient when informed by species' abundance information from the full annual cycle.


Three groups of ectoparasites, namely, Mallophaga, ticks and feathermites, were recovered from two hundred and sixty-seven alcids of six specie's (Alca torda, Uria aalge, Uria lomvia, Plautus alle, Cepphus grylle, Fratercula arctica) examined. Mallophaga of the genera Saemundssonia, Quadraceps (Ischnocera) and Austromenopon (Amblycera) were recovered from five alcids; only Saemundssonia and Quadraceps from C. grylle. One species of ixodid tick, Ixodes (Ceratitodes) uriae, was recovered from all but P. alle and C. grylle, the majority of which were examined in the winter. Only A. torda and F. arctica harboured feathermites belonging to the genus Alloptes. Four new geographical records and one new host record are reported. -- No significant difference (P > 0.05) was found in the mallophagan infestation of hosts and in the tick infestation of U. aalge from year to year. The tick infestation of F. arctica differed in 1972 and 1973, probably due to few immature Larus argentatus being present in the colony during the latter year. No significant difference was noted for the mallophagan and tick infestation of hosts with regard to sex of the hosts. A correlation was noted only between the weight and mallophagan infestation of U. lomvia. -- Data on the degree of infestation of both adults and chicks with each parasite species are presented. The infestation of adult hosts was related to the host habitat. Chicks were always more heavily infested with Mallophaga than adults. Fluctuations, related to tho host biology, occurred in the mallophagan population on F. arctica. Details on the transfer of Mallophaga from adults-to-chicks are given. -- The distribution of each parasite species on the hosts was determined; the same mallophagan genus generally occupying the same habitat on the different host species. The tick distribution on hosts varied with the host species. -- The population dynamics of each mallophagan species on each alcid was examined. Due to increased reproductive activity, nymphs were more common on adults during the winter and were always dominant on chicks. The sex ratio of each species varied with the host, females being generally more common in winter and on chicks. Correlations were determined for the stages and sexes of each species population on hosts. -- An ischnoceran and an amblyceran occupied virtually the same habitat on the hosts with correlations always existing between them. No interspecific competition existed between the genera on each host. All stages and sexes of the total mallophagan population on hosts were correlated. -- Ixodes ariae preferred U. aalge as hosts. Their distribution in the colony was affected by the density of the hosts and the substrate. The seasonal activity of the tick in the hesting areas and on the hosts were similar. The engorgement time for each stage on various hosts was determined and their percentage increases in weight recorded. The pathological reaction bf the host's skin to tick attachment is described. Observations were made on reproduction and measurements made of a spermatophore. The oviposition rate and the development of each stage under different temperatures and humidity regimes was determined. The life-cycle, based on field and laboratory data, is presented.


We thank Dr Brinjikji and colleagues for the letter written in response to our recently published article, "Localized Marked Elongation of the Distal Internal Carotid Artery with or without PHACE Syndrome: Segmental Dolichoectasia of the Distal Internal Carotid Artery." We have read with interest the articles published by Brinjikji et al and McLaughlin et al in recent years. In 2013, the latter reported "pure arterial malformations (PAM)" of the posterior cerebral artery in a young female adult and described them as dilated, overlapping, and tortuous arteries with a coil-like appearance and/or a mass of arterial loops without any associated venous component. Their reported lesion (showing a benign natural history) has a striking resemblance to lesions seen in some of our patients. In 2017, Brinjikji et al reported a case series comprising 12 patients diagnosed with PAM located in different intracranial arteries. To highlight the regionality of this phenomenon, we focused on cases of segmental involvement of the distal internal carotid artery. Although we have not drawn any pathogenetic conclusion about this morphologic aberration, we believe that publishing research about such lesions, including all intracranial locations, may improve the understanding of this type of lesion. Furthermore, we believe that the term "segmental intracranial dolichoectasia" better represents these lesions than the term "malformation" because a malformation accompanies a functional defect, which is not applicable in our cases. However, further research is necessary to determine an appropriate name for this lesion. We thank Dr Brinjikji and colleagues for their comments on our article, as well as for sharing their experience and encouraging others to report similar cases for promoting a deeper understanding of this disease entity.


The conductivity of the conducting polymer polypyrrole was measured as a function of time ta during aging at 120 °C, and as a function of temperature T between 15 K and 300 K for various aging times. It is shown that the dependence of the conductivity with time and temperature for long aging times merges into a unified expression: ln {σ(ta, T)} ∝ - (ta/T)1/2. Such a behaviour can be accounted for by a model in which the conductivity of aged polypyrrole is governed by a hopping mechanism between conducting clusters separated by an insulating layer, the thickness of which increases as √ta.


H.264 Scalable Video Coding (SVC) extension has spatial scalability which is able to provide various resolution sequences for a single encoded bit-stream. In order to reduce redundancies between different layers, for spatial scalable intra-coded frames, co-located reconstructed 8×8 sub-macroblock in base layer (BL) is up-sampled to predict the marcoblock (MB) in enhancement layer (EL). Unfortunately, simple 1-D poly-phase up-sampling filter used in current SVC isn't cable of achieving ideal result, which limits the performance of inter-layer intra prediction (ILIP). This paper proposes an adaptive optimization method for inter-layer texture up-sampling by applying wiener filter and controlling it at block level. Working as an additional part of ILIP, the proposed method can greatly reduce the prediction error between the original EL signals and the up-sampled BL signals. Experimental results show that, the proposed method achieves bit rate reduction up to 14.25% and PSNR increment up to 0.97 dB when compared with the traditional method in current SVC.


In the process of analysis of agricultural and weather factors influence on winter wheat yields it was revealed that the critical factors for the yield formation are (totally in Ukraine): the quantity of days with temperatures below 17 degrees of frost Celcius; the quantity and intensity of precipitation; quantity of days with temperatures exceeded 0 and 5 degrees of heat Celsius in winter time period. All above listed weather changes effect historical yields and make them differ very much year to year. Thus, using above listed factors winter wheat yield equalizations and coefficients that may be used for yield forecast were calculated. The consistency of the equalization's results for winter wheat production was discovered for total Ukraine winter wheat production number. But these equalization's coefficients need to be corrected with simple regression equalization every year. Correlation coefficients between the real yield and estimated yield under the calculated equalizations is 0.71 and 0.64, when p < 0.01. As yield is the main factor of winter wheat production in Ukraine, so this method could be used for estimation of wheat production and used for official wheat crop prognosis to lead the agricultural policy in Ukraine.


Several prominent philosophers of science, most notably Ron Giere, propose that scientific theories are collections of models and that models represent the objects of scientific study. Some, including Giere, argue that models represent in the same way that pictures represent. Aestheticians have brought the picturing relation under intense scrutiny and presented important arguments against the tenability of particular accounts of picturing. Many of these arguments from aesthetics can be used against accounts of representation in philosophy of science. I rely on Dominic Lopes' recent summary of arguments against various views of picturing and reformulate some of them to fit the philosophy of science context. My specific targets here are Giere and Steven French. I go on to argue that assuming all scientific models and images represent in the same way is not the best guide to understanding scientific practice.


We describe the PerDiS persistent distributed store and its garbage collection algorithm. The PerDiS store behaves like an object-oriented persistent shared memory, and is accessed transactionally. Applications get direct access to persistent data in their own memory, and use the usual C/C++ pointer dereferencing and assignment to navigate and modify the object graph. PerDiS provides persistence by reachability based on the Larchant algorithm. We focus on the issues of implementation for large-scale sharing. The main problems we face involve concurrency, ordering and consistency. We also address performance/modularity trade-offs


X-ray phase contrast and dark-field imaging techniques provide important and complementary information that is inaccessible to the conventional absorption contrast imaging. Both grating-based imaging (GBI) and speckle-based imaging (SBI) are able to retrieve multi-modal images using synchrotron as well as lab-based sources. However, no systematic comparison has been made between the two techniques so far. We present an experimental comparison between GBI and SBI techniques with synchrotron radiation X-ray source. Apart from the simple experimental setup, we find SBI does not suffer from the issue of phase unwrapping, which can often be problematic for GBI. In addition, SBI is also superior to GBI since two orthogonal differential phase gradients can be simultaneously extracted by one dimensional scan. The GBI has less stringent requirements for detector pixel size and transverse coherence length when a second or third grating can be used. This study provides the reference for choosing the most suitable technique for diverse imaging applications at synchrotron facility.


Our major undertaking relates to the modelling of Business Intelligence System (BIS) in term of functionalities for the decision-making process. We regard the BIS as a system that aids in decision-making and dedicated to strategic piloting of a firm. We define BIS as the complex set of Economic Intelligence Process (EI process), principal actors implied (decision maker and watcher) and strategic information system. The EI process on which we are based breaks up into several stages: identification of the decisional problem stake, translation of decisional problem into questions of relevant information search, treatment, analysis and presentation of added value information, interpretation of the relevant indicators to resolve decisional problem, decision, capitalization of strategic knowledge and protection of informational patrimony. The EI process management enables us to identify the criteria of success of this process to ensure its good practice in the firm. We identify strategic factors relating to the clarification of the strategic vision of the decision maker and the realization of a good strategy. A good strategy should be flexible i.e. not only adapted to the scenario in which one believes, but also should allow orientation change if there occurs important events in an environment. The individual factors relate the competence of actors in taking a good decision at the convenient period. The informational factors relate to the evaluation of the information relevance. We also identify organisational factors which translate the flexible nature of the organisational structure allowing the appropriation of BIS, the important degree of decentralization of decision-making and an informational culture which raises a climate of communication favourable to exchange experiences and knowledge. Lastly, the technological factors are summarized in the conception of a knowledge based information system which provides a personalized and adaptive help to the user profile


The impressive breakthroughs of the last two decades in the field of machine learning can be in large part attributed to the explosion of computing power and available data. These two limiting factors have been replaced by a new bottleneck: algorithms. The focus of this thesis is thus on introducing novel methods that can take advantage of high data quantity and computing power. We present two independent contributions. First, we develop and analyze novel fast optimization algorithms which take advantage of the advances in parallel computing architecture and can handle vast amounts of data. We introduce a new framework of analysis for asynchronous parallel incremental algorithms, which enable correct and simple proofs. We then demonstrate its usefulness by performing the convergence analysis for several methods, including two novel algorithms. Asaga is a sparse asynchronous parallel variant of the variance-reduced algorithm Saga which enjoys fast linear convergence rates on smooth and strongly convex objectives. We prove that it can be linearly faster than its sequential counterpart, even without sparsity assumptions. ProxAsaga is an extension of Asaga to the more general setting where the regularizer can be non-smooth. We prove that it can also achieve a linear speedup. We provide extensive experiments comparing our new algorithms to the current state-of-art. Second, we introduce new methods for complex structured prediction tasks. We focus on recurrent neural networks (RNNs), whose traditional training algorithm for RNNs – based on maximum likelihood estimation (MLE) – suffers from several issues. The associated surrogate training loss notably ignores the information contained in structured losses and introduces discrepancies between train and test times that may hurt performance. To alleviate these problems, we propose SeaRNN, a novel training algorithm for RNNs inspired by the "learning to search" approach to structured prediction. SeaRNN leverages test-alike search space exploration to introduce global-local losses that are closer to the test error than the MLE objective. We demonstrate improved performance over MLE on three challenging tasks, and provide several subsampling strategies to enable SeaRNN to scale to large-scale tasks, such as machine translation. Finally, after contrasting the behavior of SeaRNN models to MLE models, we conduct an in-depth comparison of our new approach to the related work.


OBJECTIVE
To investigate clinical effect of probiotics combined with zinc and selenium preparation in the treatment of child rotavirus enteritis.

METHODS
In this retrospective study, the patients were divided into two groups based on treatment method. The control group (n=42) received probiotic therapy, while the experimental group (n=43) received probiotics combined with zinc and selenium preparation. Clinical efficacy, stool frequency and incidence of adverse reactions after treatment were compared to assess the clinical effect.

RESULTS
The clinical effect was improved after intervention (P<0.05), and the total effective rate of two groups was 88.4% (38/43), 50% (21/42), respectively. Time to symptom disappearance was significantly decreased in the experimental group as compared to the control group. The myocardial zymogram indices (CK, CK-MB and AST) were decreased after treatment, and the levels in the experimental group were significantly lower than in the control group (P<0.05). Moreover, we observed that the levels of inflammatory factors (IL-6, IL-8 and hsCRP) in the experimental group were significantly lower than those of the control group after intervention (all P<0.05).

CONCLUSION
Probiotics combined with zinc and selenium preparation can not only significantly improve the clinical effect, but also shorten the course of disease.


In the present paper,  we study a new class of submanifolds of a generalized Quasi-Sasakian manifold, called skew semi-invariant submanifold. We obtain integrability conditions of the distributions on a skew semi-invariant submanifold and also find the condition for a skew semi-invariant submanifold  of a generalized Quasi-Sasakian manifold to be mixed totally geodesic. Also it is shown that a  skew semi-invariant submanifold of a generalized Quasi-Sasakian manifold will be anti-invariant if and only if $A_{\xi}=0$; and the submanifold will be skew semi-invariant submanifold if $\nabla w=0$. The equivalence relations for the  skew semi-invariant submanifold of a  generalized Quasi-Sasakian manifold are given. Furthermore, we have proved that a skew semi-invariant $\xi^\perp$-submanifold of a normal almost contact metric manifold and a generalized Quasi-Sasakian manifold with non-trivial invariant distribution is $CR$-manifold. An example of dimension 5 is given to show that a skew semi-invariant $\xi^\perp$ submanifold is a $CR$-structure on the manifold.


Appropriate and successful design of an adsorbing column needs to predict dynamic changes in outflow concentration of the substance (i.e. breakthrough curve), which is possible by modeling of the adsorption process. In this study, dynamic experiments were carried out by passing two aqueous solutions of 75 and 150 mg-NO -3 L -1 , and a polluted groundwater from Guilan province through a packed bed column of anionic resin, Purolite A-400. Outflow solution was sampled at different time intervals, and the samples were analyzed for nitrate concentration. Dynamic behavior of adsorption was evaluated by modeling of breakthrough curves using Thomas, Bohart-Adams, Lin-Wang and Wolborska models. Comparison and evaluation of the models showed that though the first three models were structurally different and their parameters provided useful information about adsorption process, the data simulated by them were almost the same, and thus parameters of each model could be predicted from the parameters of the two other models without refitting. The predicted curves by the models of Thomas, Bohart-Adams and Lin-Wang were in more agreement with the measured curves than the Wolborska model in all parts of the breakthrough curves, and the dynamic parameters of adsorption process were determined by them more accurately. In the experiment with the polluted groundwater, Thomas model (and other two similar models) deviated from the experimental data at the end of the adsorption process which seemed to be due to the presence of sulfate and phosphate ions in the inflow water.


Proper tuning of control parameters is critical to the performance of a multi-objective evolutionary algorithm (MOEA). However, the developments of tuning methods for multi-objective optimization are insufficient compared to single-objective optimization. To circumvent this issue, this paper proposes a novel framework that can self-adapt the parameter values from an objective-based perspective. Optimal parametric setups for each objective will be efficiently estimated by combining single-objective tuning methods with a grouping mechanism. Subsequently, the position information of individuals in objective space is utilized to achieve a more efficient adaptation among multiple objectives. The new framework is implemented into two classical Differential-Evolution-based MOEAs to help to adapt the scaling factor F in an objective-wise manner. Three state-of-the-art single-objective tuning methods are applied respectively to validate the robustness of the proposed mechanisms. Experimental results demonstrate that the new framework is effective and robust in solving multi-objective optimization problems.


African trypanosomiasis, or sleeping sickness, is a tropical disease caused by trypanosome parasites transmitted by tsetse flies. The focus of this paper is on the cost-effectiveness of alternative drug treatments for patients in the late stage of the disease. Melarsoprol has been used for many decades. More recently, eflornithine has been developed. It has fewer side effects and improves the overall cure rate. It is much more expensive than melarsoprol, however. The objective of the present cost-effectiveness is to identify the costs and benefits that would be involved in switching from melarsoprol to eflornithine in the treatment of late stage sleeping sickness. Benefits are expressed in lives saved as well as in disability adjusted life years (DALYs). The analysis is applied to the case of Uganda. The implications for affordability are also considered, by taking account of how the treatment costs would be shared between the national government, donors and patients. The baseline results indicate that melarsoprol treatment is associated with an incremental cost per life and DALY saved of $209 and $8, respectively. Each additional life saved by switching from melarsoprol alone to a combination of melarsoprol and eflornithine would cost an extra $1,033 per life saved, and an extra $40.9 per DALY gained. Shifting from this second alternative to treatment of all patients with eflornithine leads to an incremental cost per life saved of $4,444 and an incremental cost of $166.8 per DALY gained.


The blueshift of near-band-edge emission and excitonic absorption indicate that Zn2+ ions are successfully substituted by Mg2+ ions in MgxZn1−xO nanopowders for 0≤x≤0.14. The changes in Raman spectral linewidth and the asymmetry of the E2 (high) mode for various Mg contents can be well described by a modified spatial correlation model that considers the grain size distribution. With increasing Mg concentration, the alloy potential fluctuations lead to a decrease in the grain size, which is induced by the surplus Mg2+ that could form MgO clusters surrounding the crystalline MgZnO.


Concerns over digital interference in elections are widespread. Yet evidence of its impact is still thin and fragmented. How do malicious uses of social media shape, transform, and distort democratic processes? And how should we characterize this impact? Existing research into the effects of social media manipulation has largely focused on measuring its purported impact on opinion swings and voting behavior. Though laudable, this focus might be too reductive. Drawing on normative theories of liberal democracy, this paper argues that the threat of digital interference techniques lies beyond their capacity to change individuals' political viewpoints and demonstrates how social media manipulation may undermine popular perceptions of electoral integrity, with potentially far-reaching consequences for public trust. Following this assessment, a preliminary research agenda is formulated, highlighting previously overlooked relationships that can be explored to better understand how malicious uses of social media might shape such attitudes and to what effect.


The challenges faced by organizations include the process of constantly adapting and updating its structures and features in order to fulfill their institutional purpose. In a context of pressure and loss of members, this study is an attempt to understand what does or doesn't motivate religious people to join, remain or leave religious institutions related to the Roman Catholic Church. Based on elements of institutional theory, the study aimed to analyze the relationship between the institutional features of religious institutions and their capacity to attract and retain people for religious life. The research method adopted a qualitative approach focusing on Catholic institutions, collecting data through documents, questionnaires responded by the institutions and a focus group with people who have left religious life in the religious institutions in the last 10 years. By analyzing the relationship between the religious institutions features and the data collected on attraction and retention of people for religious life, it was found that the systems of rules, standards, regulatory principles, beliefs, rites, symbolic universe and ideas, have a direct influence on the attraction and satisfaction or dissatisfaction of these people, depending on the degree of institutionalization and agency capacity. These elements are part of an 'institutional script' that reveals the individuals preferences based on the scenarios, characteristics and historical processes. The study also points out a tension between the perception of the individual and the institution.


Introduction: Paraoxonase-1 (PON1) is a Ca2+ dependent, high-density lipoprotein-associated lactonase which is capable of retarding/inhibiting low-density lipoprotein (LDL) oxidation. LDL oxidation is believed to be central to the initiation and progression of atherosclerosis, therefore, PON1 is considered to be atheroprotective. Areas covered: Relevant literature on PON1 was identified in PubMed. Here, we discuss the background to research on PON1 in atherosclerosis, the evidence for and against PON1 being atheroprotective, potential mechanisms of this atheroprotection and current knowledge on human PON1 regulation. Expert opinion: Although current knowledge on PON1 indicates it to be atheroprotective, further clinical and basic studies are warranted to show that PON1 is causally linked to atherosclerosis, how it is atheroprotective and how it is regulated in vivo in humans.


The effect of salicylic acid (SA) and nitrogen fertilization on forage maize was studied under drought stress in Nehbandan, Iran in 2014. It was a factorial split-plot experiment based on a Randomized Complete Block Design with three replications. The main plot was devoted to irrigation intervals. The sub-plot was factorial of two factors (nitrogen and SA). It was found that deficit irrigationdeclined quantitative yield of maize. Nitrogen fertilization improved forage yield. Fresh and dry forage yield was 65.88 and 665.32% lower under 16-day irrigation interval than under 8-day irrigation interval, respectively. SA application enhanced dry forage yield by 7.06 and 10.35% under 8 and 16-day irrigation intervals, respectively. In total, it was revealed that the concurrent application of SA and N resulted in greater increase in fresh and dry forage yield, which was mostly via the increase in leaf stem weight, as compared to their sole applications.


The aim of this study is to explore the process of the social construction of local authenticity. More specifically, this study intends to outline the managerial practices that are being used to construct local authenticity. The background to this is the much-discussed phenomenon of the 'death of geography', where the Internet is famously implicated. In this study, it is claimed that in parallel to companies' increased use of the Internet, there has been a revalorisation and redefinition of the role of the local. Four key marketing practices that are used to construct local authenticity are identified: adapting employees' interactive manner, adapting employees' local explicit knowledge, using a local branding strategy and applying a local branch design.