It has been recognised that enzymes in reversed micelles have potential for application in chemical synthesis. Before these expectations will be realised many problems must be overcome. This thesis deals with some of them. In Chapter 1 the present knowledge about reversed micelles and micellar enzymology is reviewed. Encapsulation of enzymes in reversed micelles enables the enzymatic conversion of apolar compounds. In the literature only a few cases have been reported of conversions of apolar compounds, and only initial enzyme activities were measured. In Chapters 3 and 4 of this thesis, the conversion of the apolar steroids progesterone and prednisone by 20β-hydroxysteroid dehydrogenase is described. In Chapter 3 it is shown that the reaction proceeds for at least nine hours, indicating that the steroid dehydrogenase used here is fairly stable in a reversed micellar environment under operational conditions. The stability of hydrogenase in reversed micelles was even higher than in an aqueous solution (Chapter 2). In order to function for longer periods of time, redox enzymes require a continuous and sufficient supply of reducing equivalents. Several systems have been described that provide reducing equivalents in aqueous solutions, but no such a system was known for reversed micellar media. In this thesis three methods for the generation of reducing equivalents in reversed micellar media have been applied. Chapter 2 describes a photochemical system for the vectorial transport of electrons from a donor in the continuous phase to an acceptor in the water pool of the reversed micelle. The spatial arrangement of the components is an important factor in determining the efficiency of such systems. The reducing equivalents thus generated can be converted to hydrogen by hydrogenase located in the water pool. In Chapter 3 a combined enzyme system consisting of hydrogenase and lipoamide dehydrogenase converts hydrogen gas into reducing equivalents in the form of NADH that are consumed by 20β-hydroxysteroid dehydrogenase during the conversion of apolar steroids. Based on the results of these two chapters, patent applications were filed in several countries, e.g. in Europe. A copy of this patent application is added as an Appendix. There, a third method is mentioned, i.e. the electrochemical regeneration of NADH and NAD(+). In Chapter 4 it is investigated how the composition of a reversed micellar medium affects the rate of conversion of apolar steroids by 20β-hydroxysteroid dehydrogenase. Evidence was obtained that the steroid concentration in the interphase dictates the rate of conversion. This concentration depends on the hydrophobicity of the substrate as compared to the hydrophobicity of the interphase and the hydrophobicity of the continuous phase. These observations are generalized to guidelines indicating that the difference between the hydrophobicity of the substrate and the interphase must be minimal to ensure a high substrate concentration in the interphase and that the difference between the hydrophobicity of the substrate and the hydrophobicity of the continuous phase must be maximal to keep the substrate concentration in the continuous phase as low as possible. These guidelines will prove useful to predict the optimal composition of a medium for enzymatic conversion of apolar compounds. Not only the composition of a reversed micellar medium with respect to organic solvent and cosurfactant is important, but also the charge of the surfactant used. In Chapter 5, evidence is presented that the charge of the surfactant head groups influences the kinetic parameters K m and k cat of enzymes in reversed micelles, either resulting in an increase or a decrease of activity. Furthermore, an expression is derived for the initial reaction rate of the enzymatic conversion of an apolar substrate in a pseudo two-phase system where the partition equilibrium of the substrate over the two phases can be shifted due to enzyme catalysis. In another section of the Discussion the advantages and disadvantages of reversed micellar media for the enzymatic conversion of apolar compounds are compared with those of other systems that have been proposed for that purpose. In conclusion, in a reversed micellar medium: - a highly organised photochemical system can be created (Chapter 2) - enzymes can be immobilized while retaining their activity (Chapters 1- 5) - enclosure of enzymes can lead to enhanced stability (Chapter 2) - enzymes experience an essentially aqueous micro-environment (Chapter 5) - enzymatic activity can be higher than in aqueous solution (Chapter 4 and 5) - apolar compounds can be converted enzymatically (Chapters 3, 4 and Appendix) - multi-enzymatic reactions can be performed for longer periods (Chapter 3) - cofactors can be regenerated with hydrogen and electricity (Chapter 3 and Appendix) - enzyme activity can be regulated by changing the composition of the interphase and continuous phase (Chapter 4) - the optimal composition for enzymatic conversion of any given apolar compound can be predicted (Chapter 4) - the thermodynamic equilibrium can be shifted in the desired direction (Chapter 5) - the product can be isolated while the other components can be recycled (Chapter 3).


Along with the advent of Building Information Modeling (BIM) came the rising popularity of visualizing not only the product of a project but also the underlying activities leading to such products. For this purpose, the schedule of a project is coupled with its 3D model to visualize how different components of a project are placed during the construction, creating what is known as a 4D model. Through enabling a detailed visualization of the construction processes, 4D models allow the scrutiny of a chosen construction method or schedule for the feasibility in view of the space required for the execution of different tasks. Nevertheless, while there exist several methods to generate a stochastic schedule of a construction project, the de facto practice in the generation and application of 4D models is based on the application of deterministic schedules. Accordingly, the current 4D models cannot represent the uncertainties associated with the start and end time of various construction activities. As a result, any decisions made about the constructability of a project on account of the existing 4D models ignores the risks of delays in the completion of activities and the ensued potential constructability conflicts. This research aims to develop a framework to effectively visualize the risk of constructability conflicts associated with the construction projects. In other words, using the stochastic scheduling paradigm, the proposed framework enables augmenting the existing 4D models with information about the probability of each elements being under construction at any given time. A case study is developed to integrate the stochastic schedules coming from the discrete-event simulation tool with the 3D model of the building and further visualize the scheduling uncertainty in the 4D visualization. It is shown that the proposed method has a strong potential to provide inputs for more precise constructability analysis.


Dengue fever is a mosquito-borne tropical disease caused by dengue virus. When infected by any of the four serotypes of dengue viruses, individuals may be asymptomatic or develop a dengue fever. The latter group can progress into severe form of dengue and the etiology of this is still uncertain. This study aims to elucidate copy number variations (CNVs) of the host genes as the factor causing dengue pathogenesis. Blood samples were collected from hospitalized dengue patients and proceeded to DNA extraction. DNA samples (136) were used for genotyping with Human Genome GeneChip 6.0. CNVs were called using Genotyping Console (GTC) 4.1 and Nexus Copy Number 7.0. Results from both algorithms were merged and stringent CNVs were filtered with three public databases; DGV, HapMap3 and SGVP in search for rare casespecific CNVs. Case-specific underlying genes were used in functional analysis with DAVID and IPA to explicate the dengue related biological processes. Significant genes of interest from both softwares were validated using qPCR. Hundred and thirty-six DNA samples from hospitalized dengue patients in four different hospitals were genotyped. A total number of 50,864 (24,806 gains and 26,059 loss) and 34,257 (31,725 gains and 2,534 loss) CNV events were discovered by GTC and Nexus, respectively. After merging, only 3,052 (2,132 gain and 920 loss) stringent CNVs were left. After filtering with public known databases, of the 385 novel rare CNVs, 257 were specific for cases, and 128 were specific for controls, respectively (p = 0.388). Six hundred and eighty genes were found underlying the CNVs specific for cases and were eventually loaded into functional analysis softwares. GO terms from unbiased DAVID analysis such as defense response (p<0.001; Benjamini corrected p = 0.034), inflammatory response (p<0.001; Benjamini corrected p = 0.04) and response to cytokine stimulus (p<0.001; Benjamini corrected p = 0.038). From the biased IPA analysis, the candidate genes were clustered into enrichment with antigen presentation pathway as the most significant (p <0.001), followed by IL-12 signaling and production in macrophages (p <0.001), and interferon signaling (p <0.001). Genes from both significant GO terms and pathways; namely BCKDHB, CTSB, MR1, TAP2, TNFRS1B and CXCR4 were considered for validation using qPCR. The 9 out of 10 similarities between SNP 6.0 genotyping and qPCR supported the reliability of this assay. In conclusion, the rare CNVs may be involved in dengue pathogenesis. The rare CNV, which has been reported in other diseases (neuropsychiatric diseases, congenital heart disease and dilated cardiomyopathy), is reported for the first time in infectious diseases.


The mission of HL7 Inc. is to provide standards for the exchange, management and integration of data that supports clinical patient care and the management, delivery and evaluation of healthcare services. The scope of this work includes the specifications of flexible, cost-effective approaches, standards, guidelines, methodologies, and related services for interoperability between healthcare information systems. In the field of medical information technologies, HL7 provides the world's most advanced information standards. Versions 1 and 2 of the HL7 standard have on the one hand solved many issues, but on the other demonstrated the size and complexity of the health information sharing problem. As the solution, a complete new methodology has been adopted, which is being encompassed in version 3 recommendations. This approach standardizes the Reference Information Model (RIM), which is the source of all domain models and message structures. Message design is now defined in detail, enabling interoperability between loosely-coupled systems that are designed by different vendors and deployed in various environments. At the start of the Primary Healthcare Information System project, we have decided to go directly to HL7v3. Implementing the HL7v3 standard in healthcare applications represents a challenging task. By using standardized refinement and localization methods we were able to define information models for Croatian primary healthcare domain. The scope of our work includes clinical, financial and administrative data management, where in some cases we were compelled to introduce new HL7v3-compliant models. All of the HL7v3 transactions are digitally signed, using the W3C XML Digital Signature standard.


Mutations at position C1054 of 16S rRNA have previously been shown to cause translational suppression in Escherichia coli. To examine the effects of similar mutations in a eukaryote, all three possible base substitutions and a base deletion were generated at the position of Saccharomyces cerevisiae 18S rRNA corresponding to E. coli C1054. In yeast, as in E. coli, both C1054A (rdn-1A) and C1054G (rdn-1G) caused dominant nonsense suppression. Yeast C1054U (rdn-1T) was a recessive antisuppressor, while yeast C1054-delta (rdn-1delta) led to recessive lethality. Both C1054U and two previously described yeast 18S rRNA antisuppressor mutations, G517A (rdn-2) and U912C (rdn-4), inhibited codon-nonspecific suppression caused by mutations in eukaryotic release factors, sup45 and sup35. However, among these only C1054U inhibited UAA-specific suppressions caused by a UAA-decoding mutant tRNA-Gln (SLT3). Our data implicate eukaryotic C1054 in translational termination, thus suggesting that its function is conserved throughout evolution despite the divergence of nearby nucleotide sequences.


TANGO [1] is a modern distributed device control system toolkit used to control synchrotrons, lasers and a wide variety of equipment for doing physics experiments. The performance of the network protocol is a key component of TANGO. TANGO is based on the omniORB (for C++) and Jacorb (for Java) implementations of CORBA. CORBA offers an interface definition language with mappings to multiple programming languages, an efficient binary protocol, a data representation layer, and multiple services. In recent years a new series of binary protocols based on AMQP have emerged from the high frequency stock market trading business. At about the same time a protocol called ZMQ [2] was open sourced in 2008. In 2011 the TANGO community decided to take advantage of ZMQ. In 2012 the kernel developers successfully replaced the CORBA Notification Service with ZMQ in TANGO V8. The first part of this paper will present the software design, the issues encountered and the resulting improvements in performance. The second part of this paper will present a study of how ZMQ could replace CORBA completely in TANGO.


In nine urban Ohio school systems, low-income minority students identified as academically promising in sixth grade are eligible to participate in an intervention program. In the present study, twenty-two African American students in the program were asked to provide their perceptions of the transition to ninth grade. Specifically, the role of motivating factors, peers, school, teachers, parents, and neighborhood were examined. These students faced similar stressors, yet some were more able to achieve academic success. Results highlight the salience of mothers, the challenges of the ninth-grade curriculum, and adjustment to a bigger, more complex school environment for high and low performers. The implications for improving cooperation between school and family are discussed.


The first very important step for the refractive surgery is the selection of the patients, because there are situations when the surgery for reducing the diopters can produce complications which are difficult to solve. The investigation of the patients who come for a refractive surgery has many steps and each step has his importance.


A managed programme to review engine failures and take necessary preventative measures has been in place successfully in the Royal Navy since the introduction of gas turbines into service in the 1970's. One of the more prominent failure mechanisms with the Tyne RM1C and Spey SM1A engines has been the degradation of main line bearings accounting for 25 percent of all engines rejected. Historically, since the first recorded incident in March 1987, the failures pointed to poor performance of the bearings themselves. However, maintenance studies and recent analysis indicates that a vast proportion have occurred through previously unidentified chloride corrosion as a result of contamination of the lubricating oil system with salt water from the seawater lubricating oil cooler (SWLO cooler). Despite joint ownership of both engine variants with the Royal Netherlands Navy, there was no clear evidence until about five years ago to suggest why tube perforation was occurring. Indeed, the fact that failures have only occurred in Royal Navy service is an interesting twist to the problem. This paper summarises the phenomenon of SWLO cooler corrosion caused by Microbial Induced Corrosion (principally Sulphate Reducing Bacteria – SRB). It highlights the conditions in which SRB occurs along with demonstrated prevention in Royal Navy gas turbine service through the combined efforts of maintenance and development of a new titanium tubestack. The fault finding and remedial recovery experience may well be of interest to operators of marine gas turbines, both naval and commercial, who use tube type heat exchangers, especially when operating or undertaking work in estuarial waters and non tidal basins or when undertaking littoral duties. This is a practical view of the issue from an operators perspective and whilst utilising a wealth of research and technical data available on the subject, it relates the issues at hand to the particular corrosion problem and is not intended as an introduction into organic chemistry.Copyright © 2004 by ASME


Unsupervised Domain Adaptation (UDA) is a popular technique that aims to reduce the domain shift between two data distributions. It was successfully applied in computer vision and natural language processing. In the current work, we explore the effects of various unsupervised domain adaptation techniques between two text classification tasks: fake and hyperpartisan news detection. We investigate the knowledge transfer from fake to hyperpartisan news detection without involving target labels during training. Thus, we evaluate UDA, cluster alignment with a teacher, and cross-domain contrastive learning. Extensive experiments show that these techniques improve performance, while including data augmentation further enhances the results. In addition, we combine clustering and topic modeling algorithms with UDA, resulting in improved performances compared to the initial UDA setup.


When microinjected into normal fibroblasts, cytoplasmic extracts of cells transformed by Rous sarcoma virus caused dissolution of microfilament bundles. This activity was not found in extracts of normal cells. The maximum effect was seen within 30 min of injection, and the activity could still be measured after a 10-fold dilution of the cytoplasmic extracts (14 mg/ml original protein concentration). The activity was trypsin sensitive and was destroyed by boiling, but was not RNase sensitive. Protein synthesis was not required for the disruption of actin-containing stress fibers by the injected activity. Microinjected cytoplasts prepared from normal 3T3 cells also showed dissolution of microfilament bundles, indicating that the cell nucleus was not required for expression of activity. Extracts made from fibroblasts transformed by Rous sarcoma virus having a temperature-sensitive mutation in the src gene were also temperature sensitive in the microinjection assay. Thus, the activity of extracts from cells infected with src mutant virus, but not from cells infected with wild-type virus, was destroyed either by in vitro incubation of the extract at the nonpermissive temperature before injection or by incubation of recipient cells at the nonpermissive temperature after injection. We conclude that the microinjection assay can detect a cytoplasmic activity coded for by the src gene of Rous sarcoma virus and that an early direct or indirect target of the src gene product is the cytoskeleton and cell motility system. This result is discussed in relation to the hypothesis that submembranous arrays of microfilaments, microtubules, and their associated proteins interact with cell surface receptors to form a surface modulating assembly that functions as a key regulator of cell growth.


The preventive effect of oolong tea on vigil stress was investigated in 55 Chinese women. The subjects received 4 servings of tea bag daily, the tea bags in each containing 2 g dry weight of oolong tea or barley tea, or else water, for a period of one week. The results of a questionnaire indicated that ingestion of oolong tea improved symptoms of stress such as stiffness of the shoulders, fatigue of the eyes and headaches, as well as ameliorated the stress-induced increase in the number of errors in calculation tasks compared with controls. In addition, plasma cortisol levels were significantly lower in the oolong tea group (17.84 ± 2.46 µg/dl) than in the barley tea group (21.33 ± 6.47 µg /dl) or water group (22.95 ± 6.98 µg/dl). Ingestion of oolong tea significantly alleviated the vigil stress-induced increase in plasma lipid peroxide levels, which may have been related to the stress-relieving effects of caffeine or antioxidant properties of polyphenols contained in the tea. These findings suggested that oolong tea has anti-stress effect, with no adverse effects on appetite or physical fitness.


Field research can be associated with both qualitative and quantitative research methods, depending on the problems faced and the goals to be achieved. The success of data collection in the field research depends on the determination of the appropriate sampling technique, to obtain accurate data, and reliably. In studies that have problems related to specific issues, requiring a non-probability sampling techniques one of which is the snowball sampling technique. This technique is useful for finding, identifying, selecting and taking samples in a network or chain of relationships. Phased implementation procedures performed through interviews and questionnaires. Snowball sampling technique has strengths and weaknesses in its application. Field research housing sector become the case study to explain this sampling technique.


Trilobites are a highly diverse group of extinct arthropods persisting for 300 MYA in the marine ecosystem of the Earth. Though uncommon elements of Pennsylvanian rocks.  A new species and genus rank is proposed. The specimen consists of a well-preserved cast mold of exoskeleton.  Horizon Late Carboniferous.   Etymology, of name, type locality and named after prominent naturalist, gracilis L. for graceful. Holotype JRF, 13-16.   Description Exoskeleton specimen is roughly oval to semi-elliptical in outline.  A well preserved pygidium and near complete thorax, cranidium is missing.  Thorax 9-10 segments, axial furrow deep and curved.  X-ray study helped to appreciate sutures, furrows and angulation. Pleural furrows are distinct and convex anteriorly. Thorax axis with gentle slope to pygidium.  Length of thorax  (sag) exoskeleton is 65mm,width 32mm. Width of pygidium across the anterior margin 15 mm, length 29 mm.  Pygidium, semi-elliptical 9-10 axial rings of terminal pad like structure and the lateral area.  Furrows well marked and deep.  Small posterior axial ridge.   Conclusion: The characteristic of the specimen size and configuration of pygidium differed from typed species and needs to be placed in a separate and specific genus.  X-ray study helped in delineating fine structures. It can be a useful research tool for study of unusual specimens. These findings add to Paleoecology and stratigraphic knowledge of marine fauna.


Using steel pedestals has become an effective method for elevating simply supported bridges in the United States. However, a method is needed to estimate their lateral load capacity and probability of failure subjected to different levels of applied loads. This paper shows the development of probabilistic models for the lateral load capacity of steel pedestals. The capacity models consider the prevailing uncertainties, including statistical uncertainty and model errors due to inaccuracy in the model form or missing variables. The proposed capacity models are used to estimate the conditional failure probability (or fragility) of an example steel pedestal for given sets of lateral and vertical loads. Because of the discontinuity in the limit state function, Monte Carlo simulation is used to estimate the fragility. Results show that for the studied steel pedestal, increasing vertical load decreases the probability of failure subjected to lateral loads. To investigate the effect of different random variables on the results, a sensitivity analysis is also conducted for the example steel pedestal.


This report is a summary of results of a study aimed at the development of silicon nitride composites of enhanced fracture toughness and strength utilizing particulate and whisker dispersoids. Composited with 40% higher fracture toughness and 25% higher room-temperature fracture strength over that of the base silicon nitride ''monolith'' have been prepared using 30 v/o SiC whisker dispersoids. An increase in fracture toughness of 70% has been observed at 35 v/o whisker additions. Both fracture toughness and strength improvements persist over a wide range of temperatures (25-1200/degree/C). These composites exhibit excellent oxidation resistance and improved resistance to slow crack growth and creep at elevated temperatures. A process for fabrication of complex composite ceramic parts was developed and demonstrated. The present study has also provided extensive information regarding microstructure-property dependence in dispersoid-modified ceramics, which has been utilized to derive a formal theory of fracture toughness and microstructure relationship. 22 refs., 49 figs., 21 tabs.


This work demonstrates the use of surface acoustic wave (SAW) atomization together with a nonuniform evaporation and nucleation process to give sub-50-nm diameter monodisperse nanoparticles. SAW atomization is a straightforward and energy efficient technique to generate relatively homogeneous particle size distributions that can be carried out on a chip-scale microdevice for portable drug delivery applications or scaled up for industrial production. It employs technology originally developed for the entirely different purpose of signal filtering and multiplexing, and provides direct control over the size of the particles through adjustment of the operating frequency of the ultrasonic vibration.


This work studies the structure of proofs containing non-analytic cuts in the cut-based system, a sequent inference system in which the cut rule is not eliminable and the only branching rule is the cut. Such sequent system is invertible, leading to the KE-tableau decision method. We study the structure of such proofs, proving the existence of a normal form for them in the form of a comb-tree proof.We then concentrate on the problem of efficiently computing non-analytic cuts. For that, we study the generalisation of techniques present in many modern theorem provers, namely the techniques of conflict-driven formula learning.


Introduction.There are various osteoplasty methods aimed at managing the challenge of jaw atrophy. When the scope of the osteoplasty is extensive it is not always possible to prepare an appropriate amount of bone tissue without additional surgeries. In some cases there is a lack of intraoral bone tissue sources for this kind of operations. Using extraoral sources of bone tissue is not always justified; it is invasive and patients take longer to recover and return to work. Using alternative sources of bone biomaterials might help establish a less invasive osteoplasty protocol.Goal.To demonstrate the efficiency of alveolar ridge osteoplasty with the application of laminar technique and using various combinations of autograft and allograft tissues.Materials and methods.To achieve the goal set we have examined and treated fourteen patients (N=14) surgically. All patients presented a clinical picture of severe atrophy in dentoalveolar segments 3 and 4, knife-edged ridge, Cawood and Howell class IV–V. Depending on the combination of autograft and allograft biomaterials patients were split into three study groups and one control group.Results and discussion.Positive outcomes for the treatment administered were observed in 13 out of 14 patients. Complications were determined by the lack of soft tissue, exposure of the graft or its suppuration. All the patients in all the groups underwent a control CT which confirmed the bone tissue growth at the area of the augmentation performed.Conclusion.Using the bone biomaterial allograft in combination with autograft bone makes it possible to get good clinical results in all the groups observed. This method may be a method of choice eliminating the additional invasive procedure of bone transplant harvesting; it does, however, require further, more detailed research.


We have shown that the Jaynes-Cummings model (JCM) with an environment-induced pure decoherence is an exactly solvable problem. Rabi oscillation of atomic population inversion and oscillation in the field population get trapped due to decoherence. But the decay of the coherence properties of the atom as well as of the field is comparatively slower than that of the population terms. It is also shown that although the fast oscillation in nonclassical properties are suppressed due to decoherence but an initial Poissonian field acquires a sub-Poissonian character in the steady state. So unlike the ordinary spontaneous emission all the nonclassical properties of the system are not erased.


HISTORICAL Soon after the introduction of arsphenamin, in 1910, reports began to appear in the literature of untoward effects, severe reactions, and even deaths following its use intravenously. The most important papers on the subject, now grown quite voluminous, will be given in the bibliography.1All the different types of reactions, from simple transient fever to fatal acute hemorrhagic encephalitis or nephritis were considered. No attempt was made at first to separate out of the complexa any distinct groups or types of symptoms. As a result, much confusion and misunderstanding in the description, tabulation, interpretation and explanation of these was produced. Gradually, one type of clinical picture occurring during or immediately after an intravenous arsphenamin injection, began to stand out. The chief symptoms were: redness of the face, dyspnea, a feeling of anguish and distress, cough and precordial pain. It was described first probably by Notthaft in 1911. In his


Crocodilians and their allies have survived several mass extinction events. However, the impact of the K-Pg mass extinction event on crocodylomorphs is considered as minor or non-existent although other clades of archosaurs, e.g., non-avian dinosaurs and pterosaurs, went extinct completely. Previous approaches using fossil occurrence data alone have proven inconclusive. In this paper, we take a phylogenetic approach using extant and extinct species. The time-calibrated phylogeny of extant crocodilians provides insights into the pattern of recent biodiversity changes whereas fossil occurrence data provide insights about the more ancient past. The two data sources combined into a single phylogeny with extinct and extant taxa provide a holistic view of the historical biodiversity. To utilize this combined data and to infer the impact of the K-Pg mass extinction event, we derive the likelihood function for a time-varying (episodic) serially sampled birth-death model that additionally incorporates mass extinctions and bursts of births. We implemented the likelihood function in a Bayesian framework with recently developed smoothing priors to accommodate for both abrupt and gradual changes in speciation, extinction and fossilization rates. Contrary to previous research, we find strong evidence for the K-Pg extinction event in crocodiles and their allies. This signal is robust to uncertainty in the phylogeny and the prior on the mass extinctions. Through simulated data analyses, we show that there is high power to detect this mass extinction and little risk of false positives.


The research objective was to compare the value of the Earnings Response Coefficient (ERC) with the Accounting Earnings Response Coefficient (AERC). Research on earnings response has been carried out with mixed results using the Earnings Response coefficient. Several researchers provide arguments and highlight the weaknesses of the ERC measure used to measure earnings quality. This study suspects that the size of the ERC may be different if cash flows are applied and not only earnings based on historical cost or accrual principles. The synthesis process is carried out to generate new concepts and then comparisons will be made of the ERC and AERC results. The study was conducted on 69 companies listed on the Indonesia Stock Exchange in 2014-2017. The results of the different test results for the ERC and AERC values on the Paired Sample Test value are significant (0.000), which means that the value obtained by adding CFO to the AERC equation is different from the ERC concept. These results indicate that the earnings quality resulting from the AERC regression by adding the CFO value to the AERC equation is the earnings quality after being corrected by CFO, so that the AERC value reflects the real earnings quality.


The CBC's and NBC's primetime broadcasts of the 2014 Winter Olympics were analyzed to determine differences between the media treatment of home nation and foreign athletes. The CBC results showed that Canadian athletes represented 48.5% of total athlete mentions and constituted all of the top 20 most-mentioned athletes. NBC results showed that American athletes represented 43.9% of their total mentions and 65% of the top 20 most-mentioned athletes. The CBC was more likely to attribute Canadian athletic successes to commitment and intelligence, and non-Canadian successes to strength. The CBC was more likely to discuss the emotions and background of non-Canadians and make neutral/other comments about Canadians. NBC was more likely to attribute American failures to experience. Comparisons between the networks revealed 30 significant differences in the manner of depicting home athletes compared to athletes from other nations.


Our memories for past experiences can range from vague recognition to full-blown recall of associated details. Neuroimaging research has tried to understand the brain mechanisms underlying qualitatively different memories for decades (Yonelinas, 2002). On the one hand, Electroencephalography (EEG) has shown that recall signals unfold a few hundred milliseconds after simple recognition and are hallmarked by sustained voltage deflections over left posterior sensors (Herron, 2007; Johansson & Mecklinger, 2003; Mecklinger, Rosburg, & Johansson, 2016; Rugg & Curran, 2007). However, sensor-based analyses only provide limited insights into the supporting brain networks. On the other hand, functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) has revealed a 'core recollection network' centred on posterior parietal and medial temporal lobe (MTL) regions (Hayama, Vilberg, & Rugg, 2012; Johnson, Suzuki, & Rugg, 2013; King, de Chastelaine, Elward, Wang, & Rugg, 2015; Rugg, Johnson, & Uncapher, 2015; Rugg & Vilberg, 2013; Thakral, Benoit, & Schacter, 2017). However, due to the relatively poor time resolution of fMRI, the temporal dynamics of these regions during retrieval remain largely unknown. In order to overcome these modality-specific limitations, we here used Magnetoencephalography (MEG) in a verbal episodic memory paradigm assessing correct rejection (CR) of lures, item recognition (IR) of old words and associative recall (AR) of paired target words. We found that power decreases in the alpha frequency band (10-12 Hz) systematically track different mnemonic outcomes in both time and space: Over left posterior sensors, alpha power decreased in a stepwise fashion from 500 ms onward, first from CR to IR and then from IR to AR. When projecting alpha power into source space, the 'core recollection network' known from fMRI studies emerged, including posterior parietal cortex (PPC) and hippocampus. While PPC showed a linear change across conditions, hippocampal effects were specific to recall. Critically, the hippocampal recall effect emerged ∼200 ms before the PPC recall effect, suggesting a bottom-up recall signal from hippocampus to PPC. Our data thus link engagement of the core recollection network to the temporal dynamics of episodic memory and suggest that alpha rhythms constitute a fundamental oscillatory mechanism revealing when, where and how our memories are retrieved. Highlights Alpha rhythms distinguish between different retrieval outcomes Alpha power time courses track item recognition and associative recall Source alpha power decreases track the fMRI core recollection network Hippocampal recall signal precedes parietal signal


ABSTRACT This article argues that United States Intelligence Community analysts can and should periodically telework as routine professional development and as a research supplement to traditional all-source intelligence analysis. We offer four key benefits to tapping into this reservoir of unclassified information that would improve the quality of the intelligence product, enable better liaison and academic exchange, and steward the profession. We conclude that an overdue rebalancing of classified and publicly available sources could be aided by telework, but only once analysts break free from 'the cult of the SCIF' will publicly available information receive the analytical attention that it deserves.


In the legal practice a preliminary contract often precedes the conclusion of the contracts on the transfer of immovable property, but deposit is also frequently stipulated both along with the preliminary contract and the final contract. These two concepts open numerous questions both in theory and in practice. The author analyses the details the parties have to agree upon if the preliminary contract is to emerge, the form of conclusion and especially the legal consequences of omission to execute the obligation to conclude the main contract. With respect to the latter, his position is that the idea that in such case a judicial judgement can replace the main contract can be accepted only if it is linked to the enforced execution of the decision ordering such conclusion and not as direct effect of the judgement. Analysing the deposit along the preliminary contract on the transfer of immovable property, open issues were considered, including the permissibility and the usefulness of such contracting. In practice, the deposit is frequently stipulated in the preliminary contract against omission to fulfil the obligation from the final contract rather than from the preliminary contract. This is not allowed by the law and the courts often pass such verdicts. The deposit along the preliminary contract actually does not have all the characteristics (functions) of the "standard" deposit: e. g. it cannot by definition be included into fulfilment of the obligation. In the light of the jurisprudence dilemmas, the author investigated whether the norms on the deposit and dedit are dispositional – namely, whether the parties may stipulate a different design. The general conclusion is that, in spite of the fact that the preliminary contract is a complex and controversial concept, and although the reasons for the preliminary contracting could be achieved by other means (e. g. deferred condition or time-limit), with respect the tradition, it can remain an institution of contract law, but it is useful to re-examine and specify the rules on certain issues, for example, effects and enforced execution and other consequences. With respect to the deposit, no matter how it seems archaic and globally abandoned institution, in certain cases it may still be useful, especially because it is given in advance and not owed and especially if the parties are allowed, within the limits established by the legal order, to adjust it to their needs.


THE fact that the engine power in full‐throttle flight is governed by thermodynamic conditions involving the atmospheric pressure and temperature at the air intake; while the engine power in throttled flight is, by adjustment of the throttle position, entirely at the choice of the pilot, is the cause of certain fundamental differences in the correction of full‐throttle and throttled tests to standard conditions. For, whereas full‐throttle flight, in which the aerodynamic forces are subject to a thermodynamical limiting condition, involves both aerodynamics and thermodynamics, throttled flight is purely aerodynamic. A simple illustration is provided by throttled level flight in which the throttle is adjusted until the airscrew thrust is equal to the drag at the air speed selected by the pilot; that is, the engine power is fixed by aerodynamic conditions alone.


Interaction among autonomous agents in Multi-Agent Systems (MASs) is the key aspect for solving complex problems that an individual agent cannot handle alone. In this context, social approaches, as opposed to the mental approaches, have recently received a considerable attention in the area of agent communication. They exploit observable social
commitments to develop a verifiable formal semantics by which communication protocols can be specified. However, existing approaches for defining social commitments tend to
assume an absolute guarantee of correctness so that systems run in a certain manner. That is, social commitments have always been modeled with the assumption of certainty. Moreover, the widespread use of MASs increases the interest to explore the interactions between different aspects of the participating agents such as the interaction between agents' knowledge and social commitments in the presence of uncertainty. This results in having a gap, in the literature of agent communication, on modeling and verifying social commitments in probabilistic settings.

In this thesis, we aim to address the above-mentioned problems by presenting a practical formal framework that is capable of handling the problem of uncertainty in social
commitments. First, we develop an approach for representing, reasoning about, and verifying
probabilistic social commitments in MASs. This includes defining a new logic called the probabilistic logic of commitments (PCTLC), and a reduction-based model checking
procedure for verifying the proposed logic. In the reduction technique, the problem of model checking PCTLC is transformed into the problem of model checking PCTL so that
the use of the PRISM (Probabilistic Symbolic Model Checker) is made possible. Formulae of PCTLC are interpreted over an extended version of the probabilistic interpreted systems
formalism. Second, we extend the work we proposed for probabilistic social commitments to be able to capture and verify the interactions between knowledge and commitments.
Properties representing the interactions between the two aspects are expressed in a new developed logic called the probabilistic logic of knowledge and commitment (PCTLkc).
Third, we develop an adequate semantics for the group social commitments, for the first time in the literature, and integrate it into the framework. We then introduce an improved version of PCTLkc and extend it with operators for the group knowledge and group social commitments. The new refined logic is called PCTLkc+. In each of the latter stages, we respectively develop a new version of the probabilistic interpreted systems over which the
presented logic is interpreted, and introduce a new reduction-based verification technique to verify the proposed logic. To evaluate our proposed work, we implement the proposed verification techniques on top of the PRISM model checker and apply them on several case studies. The results demonstrate the usefulness and effectiveness of our proposed work.


The possible formation of tensor condensates originated from a tensor-type interaction between quarks is investigated in the three-flavor Nambu–Jona–Lasinio model including the Kobayashi–Maskawa–'t Hooft interaction, which leads to flavor mixing. It is shown that independent two tensor condensates appear and a tensor condensate related to the strange quark easily occurs by the effect of the flavor mixing compared with one related to light quarks. Also, it is shown that the tensor condensate related to the strange quark appears at a slightly smaller chemical potential if the Kobayashi–Maskawa–'t Hooft interaction is included, due to the flavor mixing effect. It is also shown that the two kinds of tensor condensates may coexist in a certain quark chemical potential due to the flavor mixing.


NMR signals from all four histidine ring C epsilon protons and three of the four histidine C delta protons in the protein staphylococcal nuclease have been assigned by comparing spectra of the wild-type (Foggi strain) protein to spectra of three variants that each lack a different histidine residue. All proteins studied were cloned and overproduced in Escherichia coli. The NMR spectra of the three mutant proteins (H8R, H46Y, and H124L) used to make these assignments were similar to one another and to those of the wild type, except for signals from the mutated residues. The pKa values of those histidines conserved between the wild type and the mutants remained essentially unchanged. Multiple histidine C epsilon proton resonances due to non-native forms of nuclease were observed in both thermally induced and acid-induced unfolding. Residue-specific assignments of H epsilon protons in the thermally denatured forms of the mutant H46Y were obtained from connectivities to the native state by saturation transfer.


In this paper, we discuss a community-university partnership struck with the intention of carrying out data analysis for the purposes of service planning and policy implementation that led us to find ourselves in the middle of significant stakeholder conflict. The purpose of this paper is to reflect upon and illuminate the challenges affecting this partnership revealing the impactful contextual factors through a process of reflection and consultation with the research literature. The significant benefits to ensuring a participatory process for both the university faculty and community agency have been cited in the research literature; yet the very real challenges inherent in such a process are less well documented. This example of civic engagement is presented through a partnership between a university faculty member and a children's mental health center. An analysis of the partnership within the project is presented to illuminate power and contextual factors that can influence partnership projects. As part of the contextual factors, we review the process of partnerships both through the literature and analysis of our project. Suarez-Balczar, Harper, and Lewis' (2005) model for developing university community partnerships provides guidance while questions for considering the scope are recommended and suggestions for future partnerships including increasing stakeholder breadth are identified.


Flame quenching by a variable-width rectangular-slot burner as a function of pressure for various propane-oxygen-nitrogen mixtures was investigated. It was found that for cold gas temperatures of 27 degrees C, pressures of 0.1 ro 1.0 atmosphere, and volumetric oxygen reactions of the oxidant of 0.17, 0.21, 0.30, 0.50, and 0.70, the relation between pressure p and quenching distance d is approximately given by d (unity) p (superscript -r) with r = 1, for equivalence ratios approximately equal to one. The quenching equation of Simon and Belles was tested. For equivalence ratios less than or equal to unity, this equation may by used, together with one empirical constant, to predict the observed quenching distance within 4.2 percent. The equation in it's present form does not appear to be suitable for values of the equivalence ratio greater than unity. A quantitative theoretical investigation has also been made of the error implicit in the assumption that flame quenching by plane parallel plates of infinite extent is equivalent to that of a rectangular burner. A curve is presented which relates the magnitude of this error to the length-to-width ratio of the rectangular burner.


Network opinions, with their inner structures and special mechanisms, have great effects on the formation of college students' "Three Outlooks". Network education of morality and ideology, enforced message checking, grading of webs can be used to guide network opinions and decrease their negative effects on college students.


A telling of Georgia Davis Powers' history links her story within the social, political, feminist, and historical context of our world's history. Black women through the centuries have wanted to share their experiences and tell how they labored for common causes. This woman through her modernizing politics has done much to encourage people/citizens to believe public engagement is worth the time. Georgia Davis Powers has a story about the Kentucky Civil Rights Movement and Kentucky politics that should be told. Powers lived most of her life through America's most defining twentieth-century transformation—the dismantling of legally- protected racial segregation. Now at ninety, the time is immediate to capture and store her [story]. Powers served as Kentucky's first woman elected state senator from 1967 to 1988, marking her, too, as Kentucky's first elected black state senator. In her twenty-one years she won battles over housing, labor, and discrimination matters. She championed bills for open housing, labor, and against race, class, sex, and education discrimination. Powers sponsored and co-sponsored some 147 bills, 75 of which became law during her tenure.


Wave energy has a promising technical potential that could contribute to the future energy mix. However, costs related to the deployment of wave energy converters (WECs) are still high compared to other technologies. In order to reduce these costs, two principle options are available, a reduction in cost and an increase in productivity. This paper presents a reliability-based computational tool to identify typical decision problems and to shed light on the complexity of optimising a wave power farm. The proposed tool is used to investigate productivity and availability of a wave energy farm during 10 years of operational life. A number of optimization possibilities to improve productivity, namely vessel choice, maintenance regime, failure rate and component redundancy, are then explored in order to assess their effectiveness. The paper quantifies the yield increase and provides a practical approach to evaluate the effectiveness of strategic and operational decision options. Results, in terms of the variations in productivity and availability of the farm, are analysed and discussed. Conclusions highlight the importance of reliability-centred simulations that consider the specific decision parameters throughout the operational life to find suitable solutions that increase the productivity and reduce the running cost for offshore farms.


When using Link-State Protocols in IP networks, forwarding loops can occur transiently when the routers adapt their forwarding tables as a response to a topological change. In this Book, we present a mechanism that lets the network converge to its optimal forwarding state without risking any transient loops and the related packet loss. The mechanism is based on an ordering of the updates of the forwarding tables of the routers. Our solution can be used in the case of a planned change in the state of a set of links and in the case of unpredictable changes when combined with a local protection scheme. The supported topology changes are link transitions from up to down, down to up, and updates of link metrics. Typically we have chosen a Network consisting of routers. Link costs are generated randomly for simulation. Dijkstra's algorithm has been employed for computing shortest paths. Routing tables are computed dynamically. Link failures are simulated. Avoiding transient loops in each case is demonstrated, by constructing a Reverse Shortest Path Tree using Spanning Tree Algorithm of the Graph.


Purpose
This paper aims to propose a new multi-layered optimal navigation system that jointly optimizes the energy consumption, improves the robustness and raises the performance of a quadrotor unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV).

Design/methodology/approach
The proposed system is designed as a multi-layered system. First, the control architecture layer links the input and the output spaces via quaternion-based differential flatness equations. Then, the trajectory generation layer determines the optimal reference path and avoids obstacles to secure the UAV from collisions. Finally, the control layer allows the quadrotor to track the generated path and guarantees the stability using a double loop non-linear optimal backstepping controller (OBS).

Findings
All the obtained results are confirmed using several scenarios in different situations to prove the accuracy, energy optimization and the robustness of the designed system.

Practical implications
The proposed controllers are easily implementable on-board and are computationally efficient.

Originality/value
The originality of this research is the design of a multi-layered optimal navigation system for quadrotor UAV. The proposed control architecture presents a direct relation between the states and their derivatives, which then simplifies the trajectory generation problem. Furthermore, the derived differentially flat equations allow optimization to occur within the output space as opposed to the control space. This is beneficial because constraints such as obstacle avoidance occur in the output space; hence, the computation time for constraint handling is reduced. For the OBS, the novelty is that all controller parameters are derived using the multi-objective genetic algorithm (MO-GA) that optimizes all the quadrotor state's cost functions jointly.


On 30 September 2017, the United Kingdom implemented a powerful new investigative tool known as an "unexplained wealth order" in its Criminal Finances Act 2017. On 7-8 November 2017, London hosted the Fifth OECD Forum on Tax and Crime. Against this background, as well as other recent developments that have shown a spotlight on the interlinkages between tax and crime, this working paper researches the role that tax laws and tax authorities play in either helping or hindering unexplained wealth orders. In doing so, it derives some relevant considerations for United Kingdom authorities as they move forward in implementing this new law.


To prospectively evaluate the effect of inpatient pulmonary rehabilitation (iPR) on anxiety and depression as outcome measures in patients with COPD, we studied 149 consecutive adults COPD referred to our iPR after an exacerbation. Patients were divided according to the GOLD staging into: Group 1 (stage 2a, n = 48, FEV1 63 +/- 9% pred.), Group 2 (stage 2b, n = 53, FEV1 42 +/- 6% pred.) and Group 3 (stage 3, n = 48, FEV1 25 +/- 7% pred.). The iPR consisted of twelve 3-hours daily sessions. Hospital Anxiety Depression (HAD) Scale as well as 6-minute walk (6MWD) with evaluation of dyspnea (D) and leg fatigue (F) at rest and end of effort, and health related quality of life by means of St. George Respiratory Questionnaire (SGRQ) were assessed before (T0) and after (T1) the iPR. 6MWD, D and F at end of effort and SGRQ total score similarly improved (p < 0.001) in all groups after iPR. The mean level of HAD-anxiety (from 9.1 +/- 4.0 to 7.7 +/- 3.5, from 9.0 +/- 4.6 to 7.2 +/- 4.6 and from 8.1 +/- 4.1 to 6.7 +/- 4.3 in group 1,2 and 3 respectively) and HAD-depression (from 9.4 +/- 3.5 to 8.2 +/- 3.5, from 9.1 +/- 4.2 to 8.2 +/- 4.5 and from 9.0 +/- 4.0 to 7.4 +/- 4.5 respectively) similarly changed (p < 0.0001) over time in all groups. The total percentage of patients with abnormal score (> 10) of HAD-anxiety (from 31% to 21%) and HAD-depression (from 30% to 22%) significantly decreased (p < 0.05) after the iPR. Inpatient pulmonary rehabilitation may improve levels of anxiety and depression as well as symptoms, exercise capacity and health related quality of life in moderate to severe COPD patients after an acute exacerbation.


Insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus or type 1 diabetes is an autoimmune multifactorial disease which has a great socio-economic impact. In Morocco, less is known about the contribution of Human leukocyte antigen (HLA) alleles to type 1 diabetes susceptibility. Our study focused on evaluating the distribution of class II HLA genes among Moroccan patients presenting type 1 diabetes coming from different regions of the country. A total of 76 patients diagnosed with type I diabetes were compared to a group of 248 healthy controls matched by age, sex, and ethnic origin. The HLA class II (DR and DQ) typing of patients and controls was performed using polymerase chain reaction sequence-specific primers (PCR-SSP). Ambiguous typings were reanalyzed by Luminex technology. We found a significant association between HLA-DRB1*03 (p = 0.0001), DRB1*04 (p = 0.0001), DQB1*02 (p = 0.0001, OR = 4.4) and DQB1*03 (p = 0.002) alleles frequencies and the susceptibility to diabetes. The HLA-DQB1*06 allele was significantly decreased in patients (p = 0.008). DRB1*03-DQB1*02, DRB1*04-DQB1*03 and DRB1*04-DQB1*02 haplotypes induce susceptibility to type 1 diabetes while DRB1*13-DQB1*06 and DRB1*15-DQB1*06 haplotypes seems to confer a protective effect in our population. These data highlights that Moroccans diabetic patients do share a series of traits with diabetics of other origins but also have specific characteristics. Key words : Type 1 diabetes, susceptibility, human leukocyte antigen (HLA), Moroccan population.


RNA-mediated virus resistance based on natural antiviral RNA silencing has been exploited as a powerful tool for engineering virus resistance in plants. In this study, a conserved 3'-region (positions 9839-10117, 279 nt) of the capsid protein (CP) gene of papaya ringspot virus (PRSV), designated CP279, was used to generate an intron-containing hairpin RNA (ihpRNA) construct by one-step, zero-background ligation-independent cloning (OZ-LIC). The RNaseIII-deficient Escherichia coli strain M-JM109lacY was identified as the best choice for producing large quantities of specific ihpRNA-CP279. Resistance analyses and ELISA data verified that most papaya plants mechanically co-inoculated with TRIzol-extracted ihpRNA-CP279 and PRSV were resistant to PRSV, and resistance was maintained throughout the test period (>2 months post-inoculation). In contrast, a 1-2 day interval between sequential inoculation of PRSV and ihpRNA-CP279 did not result in complete protection against PRSV infection, but delayed the appearance of viral symptoms by 3 to 4 days. These findings indicate that direct mechanical inoculation of papaya plants with bacterially-expressed ihpRNA-CP279 targeting the PRSV CP gene can interfere with virus infection. This work lays a foundation for developing a non-transgenic approach to control PRSV by directly spraying plants with ihpRNA or crude bacterial extract preparations.


At the heart of any great computer game are expertly designed levels: the locales and stages that define gameplay. And at the core of any strong game development team are the level designers: the people who create the spaces and environments that you move through while playing the game. And because level design doesn't require a fine arts or programming degree, it's one of the best avenues into a career in game development. Level Design for Games: Creating Compelling Game Experiences is the definitive guide to level design, both for aspiring game developers, and for industry pros looking for practical, best-practice tips and advice. With over ten years of experience with some of the industry's top developers, Phil Co starts the reader at the very beginning of the game development process, explaining the level designer's role in the all-important preproduction phase. Co then moves into the production phase, using a fictional level to demonstrate how to create and refine your level. Packed with screenshots, diagrams, and real-world examples, this book gives you all the tools you need to build your own professional-grade level, including level narratives, descriptions, diagrams, and templates. Chapter assignments help you practice what you've learned, and the demo of Epic's UnrealEngine2 Editor (UnrealEd), included on the companion CD-ROM, gives you hands-on experience with an industry-standard tool. Phil Co has a degree in architecture from the University of Virginia but opted instead for a career in video games. Starting out as a tester at SEGA, he's been a level designer since 1996 for some of the best-regarded game developers in the industry, including Cyclone Studios, Blizzard, and Valve Software, makers of the hugely popular "Half-Life" series. Phil lives in Seattle with his wife and son. "Anyone interested in a level design career should read this book. Phil does an excellent job covering all the aspects of level design across several game genres." -Rob Pardo, Vice President of Game Design, Blizzard Entertainment "An indispensable guide to the theory, process, and practice of level design." -Robin Walker, Designer, Valve Software "This book contains a wealth of valuable information for anyone interested in Level Design. It is one of the few books I would recommend to my gaming students." -Todd Robinson, Game Design Instructor, Academy of Art University, San Francisco


This paper aims to re-engineer one of the core modules naming career management of the organizations, which is inherited by Human resource management platform in the organizations. Employees of the organizations stay proactive and motivated when their individual careers are also management and taken care of by the organizations. In this study, an entrepreneurial approach has been acquired regarding the existing career management situation in the Bangladeshi manufacturing organizations. Entrepreneurial approach can drive the flexible and leniency of top management and individual employees' innovative attitude that will in a way create a better work environment. Qualitative approach with philosophical notions and paradigms named ontology and methodology has been followed in this study with Miles, Huberman and Saldana's techniques, Eisenhardt and Yin's viewpoints, Creswell and Stakes' measures. 'Multiple case studies' method has been used in this study. During choosing the cases purposeful sampling has been done. Twelve case studies with eighty-seven participants' thorough interviews have been taken, observed and analysed. NVIVO Mac coding and soft systems techniques are used to analyse and integrate data. After the analysis, career management module is found with three basic themes, which are 1) Training and development, 2) Performance management, and 3) job security. Each of these themes has two or three categorized codes, which are calculated from the open and raw codes. Following Auerbach and Silverstein and Creswell's techniques data has been validated with 1) conformity- confirm the final codes from the participants, 2) reflexivity-intake researchers' expert stances to critically analyse and judge the complex pathways, 3) justifiability-step by step detailed procedures that is done in an 'end to end' way during the research and 4) transferability- join the codes and reengineer the overall module. From this study, the condition of each of these categorized codes and themes of twelve cases are measured and outlined. This re-designed module has been also connected with employee rights' protocols recognized by Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), International Labour Organization (ILO) and Bangladesh Labour Act (BDL) in order to replace it in the re-engineered novel HRM framework. This connection and mapping not is another entrepreneurial approach to motivate the employees and make them feel that organizations not only think of their 'career management' professional side but also equally treats them as flesh and blood human beings and think of their rights. This complex process of re-designing and integrating the HRM module 'Career Management' is quite an entrepreneurial approach where researchers dug into all codes in in-depth and detailed manner and used soft systems technique to map.


Kaehler's two-sided angular momentum operator, K + 1, is neither vector-valued nor bivector-valued. It is total in the sense that it involves terms for all three dimensions. Constant idempotents that are "proper functions" of K+1's components are not proper functions of K+1. They rather satisfy "inhomogeneous proper-value equations", i.e. of the form (K + 1)U = {\mu}U + {\pi}, where {\pi} is a scalar. We consider an equation of that type with K+1 replaced with operators T that comprise K + 1 as a factor, but also containing factors for both space and spacetime translations. We study the action of those T's on linear combinations of constant idempotents, so that only the algebraic (spin) part of K +1 has to be considered. {\pi} is now, in general, a non-scalar member of a Kaehler algebra. We develop the system of equations to be satisfied by the combinations of those idempotents for which {\pi} becomes a scalar. We solve for its solutions with {\mu} = 0, which actually also makes {\pi} = 0: The solutions with {\mu} = {\pi} = 0 all have three constituent parts, 36 of them being different in the ensemble of all such solutions. That set of different constituents is structured in such a way that we might as well be speaking of an algebraic representation of quarks. In this paper, however, we refrain from pursuing this identification in order to emphasize the purely mathematical nature of the argument.


Biomass is an alternative fuel that can replace the role of coal, but it has not been widely used because of  low calorific value and less valuable form . Thus  briquetting and pyrolysis are answers to the problem. Pyrolysis is a thermochemical decomposition of organic material at elevated temperatures between 300 0 C - 500 0 C, without participation of oxygen. Biomass materials, widely available in Indonesia, are rice husks, cocoa shells, and cashew shells. The purposes of this study were to determine the effect  of  pyrolysis process, to increase the calorific value and to compare the results of biobriquette calorific composition value of 75% cashew shell - 25%  rice husk by torefaction testing and pyrolysis testing with pyrolysis of biobriquette 75% rice husk - 25% cashew shell . The biomass was then formed into biobriquette to increase the density of the mass. Biobriquette materials used in this study were rice husk and cashew shell. Mass composition between cashew shell and rice husk was 50% - 50%, 75% -25%, and 100%  glued together using PVA glue. Then they were formed into briquettes with 25-30 mm high and 25 mm in diameter with direct sunlight drying for 24 hours. Next, variations of pyrolysis temperature 325 0 C, 350 0 C and 375 0 C were carried out within ranges of time of 15 minutes, 30 minutes, and 45 minutes. The highest increased calorific value was  at 375 0 C within time duration of 45 minutes was 5401.9 cal / g. In addition, the percentage of weight loss occured at 100% biobriquette composition of rice husk weight which decreased by 57.99%. Compared to torefaction and pyrolysis testings with different variations before, both testings produced the best calorific value of 6368.54 cal / g by testing biobriquette 75% cashew shell - 25% rice husk at pyrolysis temperature of 300 0 C.


AUTHOR'S REPLY: I appreciate Warkentin's comments concerning transfusion-related thrombocytopenia. Significant thrombocytopenia from transfusions was not appreciated by myself or our clinical pathology service. The two articles cited by Warkentin show that platelet counts decrease an average of 32.5-38 percent after two to five units of packed cells.P We performed a computer check of platelet counts 24-48 hours after transfusion in 35 patients at our institution. We found a mean decrease in platelet count of 19 percent after four to seven units of packed cells. In addition, Hart et al. showed that platelet count decreased a mean of six percent 24 hours after transfusion.' The maximal fall in platelet count was observed 72 hours after transfusion. In our case report, the patient experienced a 52 percent decrease in platelet count approximately 24 hours after transfusion. This is not consistent with data quoted by Warkentin or our own experience. Although it appears that transfusions may result in some degree of thrombocytopenia, the extent and time course of thrombocytopenia in our patient still implicate cimetidine as the likely etiology. JOSEPH P. RINDONE, Pharm.D. ClinicalSpecialist VeteransAffairs Medical Center (119) Tucson, Arizona 85723


[1] The Improved Limb Atmospheric Spectrometer (ILAS) on board the Advanced Earth Observing Satellite (ADEOS) measured nitrogen dioxide (NO 2 ) and nitric acid (HNO 3 ) profiles from November 1996 to June 1997 at high latitudes in both hemispheres. The ILAS NO 2 ; profiles (version 5.20) are compared with those obtained by balloon-borne and satellite measurements to validate ILAS NO 2 data. Comparisons with balloon-borne measurements indicate that ILAS NO 2 at 25-30 km has a positive bias of 0.3-0.4 ppbv (6-11%). The random difference in NO 2 at 25-30 km is 0.2-0.3 ppbv (3-9%). The random error in the ILAS NO 2 measurements is larger than 100% below 20 km and above 45 km, where the NO 2 ; mixing ratios were less than 1.0 ppbv. It is possible that ILAS NO 2 values were lowered by optically thick aerosols with aerosol extinction coefficients at 780 nm of greater than 0.001 km -1 . The lack of diurnal correction along the line of sight contributes to the positive bias in the ILAS NO 2 values below 25 km. Agreement of the ILAS NO 2 values with those by the Polar Ozone and Aerosol Measurement (POAM) II instrument is within 10-30% at 25-35 km. The agreement with the Halogen Occultation Experiment (HALOE) is as good as ±10% at 25-40 km. ILAS HNO 3 (version 5.20) agrees with balloon-borne HNO 3 to within 0.1 ppbv (0-1%), and the random difference is within 10% at 25 - 30 km.


Field‐induced polarization (FIP) functions were proposed over two decades ago to improve the accuracy of calculated response properties, and the FIP functions in GTO form for H and C to F were tested on small molecules, with encouraging results. The concept of FIP is now extended to all atoms up to Kr. New simplifying approximations for the description of asymptotic highest occupied atomic orbitals (HOAOs) are introduced in this study. They provide the basis for STO and GTO exponents of a complete set of FIP functions from H to Kr, which are both listed for the convenience of the users. Tests on the polarizabilities of a series of atoms and molecules demonstrate that addition of the FIP basis functions to a series of standard basis sets drastically improves the performance of all these basis sets compared to converged results. Moreover, the byproduct of this study (approximate asymptotic HOAOs) provides information for the construction of accurate basis sets for long‐range ground state properties. © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Comput Chem 24: 1582–1591, 2003


IntroductionMETS, which stands for Metadata Encoding and Transmission Standard, is a data communication standard used for digital collections in cultural heritage institutions, including libraries, archives, and museums (Cantara, 2005; Cundiff, 2004; Digital Library Foundation, 2010; Elings & Waibel, 2007; Guenther & McCallum, 2003, Maze, 2012; NISO, 2004). The METS schema is an open standard used for both storing and transmitting data for digital resources. It was developed by the Digital Library Foundation a little over ten years ago, and is currently maintained by the Library of Congress (Library of Congress, 2012, METS Web Site). METS is often used to encode metadata for digital audio, digital video, or digital images. This paper will first provide a brief description of METS as a wrapper with external metadata schemas. The literature review section will then focus on METS' development since 2001, its recent uses with external schemas such as MODS and PREMIS, and its use with digital audio and visual metadata records.METS and External SchemasA METS record is comprised of a wrapper. The wrapper begins and ends with METS tags, and surrounds the external schema with which it is used. The METS wrapper has a basic structure, with up to seven major subsections: a METS Header (metsHDR), a Descriptive Metadata Section (dmdSec), an Administrative Metadata Section (amdSec), a File Section (fileSec), a Structural Map (structMap), Structural Links (structLink), and a Behavior Section (behaviorSec). The METS document must have at minimum the Structural Map (Cundiff, 2004; Digital Library Foundation, 2010). Each of these subsections has elements that provide the means for describing in detail the digital objects. The Structure Map or Structural Map defines a hierarchical structure so users of the digital library object can navigate through it via METS pointers (LC, 2011, METS: An Overview and Tutorial)."External schemas are schemas that define an XML vocabulary and syntax appropriate for use in conjunction with METS in its descriptive and administrative metadata contexts" (Library of Congress, 2011, METS Extenders). METS is displayed using XML (Extensible Markup Language), and it is especially useful as a wrapper with MODS (Metadata Object Description Schema), Dublin Core, and PREMIS (Preservation Metadata: Implementation Strategies). MODS and Dublin Core are descriptive metadata schemas used for identifying digital resources, and PREMIS is an administrative metadata schema used for the preservation of digital resources (Bolin, February 2013).METS Literature ReviewLibrary of Congress METS Web SiteThe intended audience for METS is generally the cultural heritage community, including digital collections in libraries, archives, and museums. Since the METS standard is maintained in the Network Development and MARC Standards Office of the Library of Congress, the Library of Congress METS web site is an invaluable resource for digital libraries and collections with digital objects. The METS web site offers an abundance of resources, which are well organized and easy to navigate, including a basic introductory article (Library of Congress, 2011, METS: An Overview and Tutorial).According to the Library of Congress (2012, METS Web Site), "The METS schema is a standard for encoding descriptive, administrative, and structural metadata regarding objects within a digital library, expressed using the XML schema language of the World Wide Web Consortium." The Library of Congress offers information on external schemas that can be used with METS. The following descriptive metadata schemas have been endorsed by the METS Editorial Board for use with METS: Dublin Core, MODS, MARCXML, and VRA Core. METS has also been endorsed for use with the following administrative metadata schemas: textMD (Schema for Technical Metadata for Text), and MIX (NISO Technical Metadata for Digital Still Images). There are also specific audio and video metadata schemas that are compatible with METS, including audioMD and videoMD. …


There is a revolution today in the adult life cycle. People are leaving childhood sooner, but taking much longer to grow up and much longer to die. By the turn of the century, 1 in 5 persons will be over age 55. As people retire earlier and live to be older, extensive preparation needs to be made for retirement. This should be a priority for health professionals as well as for those they serve.


The autoplastic surgery by intestine tissue has been used for reconstructive therapy of the urinary tract since the middle of the last century; however, cell mechanisms of the urothelium engraftment are still obscure. Intestine stem cells possess plasticity and presumably enable after the autoplastic surgery to transdifferentiate into mature cells of urinary tract. Using the preliminary developed in vivo model for evaluation of somatic cells transdifferentiation into urothelium, we have found that the epithelial intestine cells producing Gfp transdifferentiate into the cryoinjured bladder urothelium of the syngenetic C57BL mice. Gfp was detected in the bladder tissue of mice-recipients using reverted polymerase chain reaction, primary fluorescence and immunofluorescence, while colocalization of the Gfp and Her-4 revealing similar to urothelium staining pattern was demonstrated in a few urothelium cells by double immunohistochemical staining of the bladder tissue with specific antibodies. The results obtained suggest that epithelial intestine cells enable to transdifferentiate into bladder urothelium, however the transdifferentiation level is low and presumably can not provide full functional urothelium engraftment in the case of autoplastic bladder surgery by intestine tissue.


Purpose: The purpose of this study was to quantitatively evaluate the commercially available Model Based Segmentation (MBS) tools in Pinnacle. The first specific aim was to compare the time required to contour structures manually verses the automatic MBS. The second specific aim was to evaluate the algorithm's ability to propagate GTV contours from the treatment planning dataset to CTimages obtained during image‐guidedradiation therapy.Method and Materials: The MBS algorithm was evaluated using the time required to generate the contours, a visual evaluation of the contour accuracy, and a quantitative analysis of the volumes. The quantitative evaluation of volumes was performed by comparing the calculated contour volume for both techniques. The propagation of contours was evaluated using the daily MVCT images of 8 lungcancer patients. For each patient, the GTV was manually contoured on the treatment planningCTimage, and on all MVCT images. The treatment planning contours were used to create a new MBS model for each patient that was then propagated and adapted to each MVCT image. The mesh structures were then converted to contours and evaluated for accuracy. Results: The study showed that using MBS can save a significant amount of time on many structures, but that the rectum, bladder, and orbits took longer to contour with MBS. It was also found that the MBS tools could successfully propagate contours from the treatment plan. Without MBS, 45 to 120 minutes were spent manually contouring the GTV on each MVCT dataset. In contrast, the time required to perform the propagation of contours to +20 MVCT datasets was less than 5 minutes. Conclusion: Model‐Based Segmentation is an efficient alternative to manual contouring. It can be especially helpful for IGRT applications. With the MBS tools, it is possible to rapidly contour and measure tumor response to treatment.


Application of synthetic fermented egg (SFE), via aerosol, to the surface of bait stations increased site visitation by wild dogs and foxes when compared with the use of buried baits alone. An associated increase in bait uptake by foxes at SFE-treated bait stations was observed when compared with bait uptake at untreated stations, although this effect diminished with time, possibly due to the use of non-lethal baits leading to the discovery of all bait stations and the habituation of animals to sites of reward. Bait uptake by wild dogs, although limited, occurred only at stations treated with SFE. Use of an aerosol based form of SFE allowed an ease of field application not previously associated with the use of synthetic lures.


In the field of cancer nursing we are privileged to work with patients who impact out lives forever! They teach us "life lessons" that change our perspective, heighten our awareness, and some even sadden us. The true value of these lessons, however, emerges when we use them to enhance the care we give others. "Thanks... for teaching me that" reflects on some of the lessons one palliative care nurse learned.


'Serious games' can represent complexity and engage people in complex and partially subjective problems and option selection. A concept prototype is emerging to manage, inform and support collaboration in Town Planning in relation to developing policies, regarding future city or street shapes, and judging insertions into existing spatio-physical environments. Whilst some of these tools are already available in a limited and specialised manner, such as standard 3D models, there is no open and inclusive tool to allow multiple clients to meet, experiment and shape the future of their area of concern online. In games, where you can meet in virtual worlds, spatio-physical environments are static whilst avatars and characters are highly dynamic – the inverse requirement for experimenting with future urban form. Can we get the planner to 'play' with the 3D world in a useful and meaningful manner? Can we then meet online and discuss possibilities for sites and districts and see our thoughts manifest in conceptual patterns. This is the theory behind the software. Utilising urban design patterns and planning codes from a global repository of city morphology will be the planning contribution, with the technology the contribution from the games industry.


The conventional algorithm for obtaining the p-ray reflectance (R) of a metal in an attenuated total-reflection (ATR) experiment is to normalize the p-ray reflecting power of the metal (I(p)) with its s-ray reflecting power (I(s)). We found that for these ATR experiments in Kretschmann's configuration, two conditions will make I(s) less than I(p). In the first condition the film itself is absorptive; in the second the film is weakly absorptive but has thin thickness. When I(p) < I(p), the conventional algorithm is not applicable anymore; otherwise, the measured reflectance will be greater than one. With a modified focused-beam ATR experiment, we demonstrated that the above hindrance can be overcome by taking the intensity distribution of the incident p ray as the normalizing signal. The reflectance of the bare prism at incident angles greater than the critical angle is also suggested to be taken as a proper normalization factor.


Prostate cancer is the most common cancer diagnosed in US men, yet little is known regarding the mechanisms controlling prostatic cell growth. Previous work has shown that arginase II (AII) is expressed at high levels in the normal prostate and at higher levels in prostate tumors. AII is involved in synthesis of polyamines, which are essential for rapidly growing tissues and are found in high levels in prostate cancer. This leads to the hypothesis that increased AII activity may be involved in prostate cancer cell proliferation, through AII's role in the urea cycle, polyamine synthesis, and nitric oxide metabolic pathways. Western blot analysis with anti-AII antibody on normal prostate (PZ-HPV-7) and prostate cancer (LNCaP, PC-3, DU 145) cell lines showed the highest AII levels in LNCaPs, a more differentiated prostate cancer cell line, compared to levels in the less differentiated PC-3 and DU-145 cell lines, and in the normal PZ-HPV-7. To assess whether increasing AII in normal prostate increases cell proliferation, arginase was over-expressed in normal cells by transfecting PZ-HPV-7 with an AII vector containing GFP and the selectable marker blasticidin. To examine whether AII is hormone dependent or independent, LNCaP cultures were treated with charcoal-stripped media for varying periods to facilitate hormone removal. Charcoal-stripped LNCaPs were compared with normal LNCaPs via Western blotting using anti-AII and anti-PSA (prostate-specific antigen) antibodies. PSA antibody confirmed the hormone-stripping, while AII antibody showed AII levels were congruent with and without hormone-stripping, suggesting AII regulation is hormone independent. In conclusion, this work is essential in elucidating prostate cancer mechanisms and may suggest new directions for diagnosis and therapeutic intervention.


So many surveys have demonstrated that there are high degrees of morbidity due to mental turmoil among immigrants, mainly depression and apprehension. Few of these studies unveil that migrant bond mentally depressed for the reason that they are tensed with jobs that was not at par with their educational status. From this context, the likelihood of those individuals with a higher education qualifications to end up doing deadly jobs are high, hence lower their self-respect. Those Women who involved in reformation and increasing role in international labor migration presently amount to 49.6 percent of all labor migrants worldwide. At this time, Malaysia has 2.9 million acknowledged and about 3 million unacknowledged workers with the majority of them from Indonesia 50.9%. On Asia continent, the largest class of female employment is domestic workers. Nevertheless, the domestic sector is regularly not protected by labor and industrial relations laws in the host countries, which makes this set of migrants labor particularly vulnerable to mistreatment hence the depression. Studies have shown that stressful experiences increase one's susceptibility to diseases and mental health trouble. This research aimed to assess the effectiveness of the interventions using Solution-focused brief group therapy (SFBGT). BDI, the Beck depression inventory tool is  employed to the quasi pre-test and post-test methodology to evaluate the depression level of Indonesian women migrant workers in Penang state of Malaysia. The novel significance is that this study will benefit the Indonesian government in policy preparation that can validate her citizens who are principally searching for greener pasture offshore.


This article presents the results of a study in a city in the western United States. The authors found that city employees believed that quality knowledge was necessary for improving quality. Results show that departmental leadership was positively associated with teamwork, process improvement and employee satisfaction. Quality knowledge, if followed up with application, can he effective in improving processes. Leadership is necessary to the development of quality tools knowledge. Therefore, both leadership and teamwork are important contextual variables for quality improvement in the public sector.


This study describes the baseline characteristics and treatment patterns of US patients hospitalized with a diagnosis of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID‐19) and pulmonary involvement. Patients hospitalized with pulmonary involvement due to COVID‐19 (first hospitalization) were identified in the IBM Explorys® electronic health records database. Demographics, baseline clinical characteristics, and in‐hospital medications were assessed. For evaluation of in‐hospital medications, results were stratified by race, geographic region, age, and month of admission. Of 6564 hospitalized patients with COVID‐19‐related pulmonary involvement, 50.4% were male, and mean (SD) age was 62.6 (16.4) years; 75.2% and 23.6% of patients were from the South and Midwest, respectively, and 50.2% of patients were African American. Compared with African American patients, a numerically higher proportion of White patients received dexamethasone (19.7% vs. 31.8%, respectively), nonsteroidal anti‐inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs; 27.1% vs. 34.9%), bronchodilators (19.8% vs. 29.5%), and remdesivir (9.3% vs. 21.0%). Numerically higher proportions of White patients than African American patients received select medications in the South but not in the Midwest. Compared with patients in the South, a numerically higher proportion of patients in the Midwest received dexamethasone (20.1% vs. 34.5%, respectively), NSAIDs (19.6% vs. 55.7%), bronchodilators (15.9% vs. 41.3%), and remdesivir (10.6% vs. 23.1%). Inpatient use of hydroxychloroquine decreased over time, whereas the use of dexamethasone and remdesivir increased over time. Among US patients predominantly from the South and Midwest hospitalized with COVID‐19 and pulmonary involvement, differences were seen in medication use between different races, geographic regions, and months of hospitalization.


The cardiovasculature is one of the earliest organ systems to develop in the mammalian embryo and its formation relies on the transmembrane receptor neuropilin (NRP) 1. Thus, the cardiovasculature in NRP1 knockout mice develops abnormally. In addition, the cardiac outflow tract (OFT), a transient, embryonic vessel located at the arterial pole of the heart, fails to septate in these mutants. NRP1 has traditionally been thought to regulate these processes by binding to the vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) A in the vascular endothelium. Nevertheless, NRP1 is also expressed by non-endothelial cells and binds alternative ligands of the class 3 semaphorin (SEMA3) family. During my PhD, I contributed to two studies examining NRP1's role in organ vascularisation, which revealed that non-endothelial NRP1 is dispensable for vascular development, and that NRP1 does not exclusively function as a VEGF-A receptor during this process. I also demonstrated that NRP1, instead of being required as a VEGF-A receptor during OFT remodelling, acts as a SEMA3C receptor to induce an endothelial-to-mesenchymal transition that enables OFT remodelling. In a complementary project, I investigated the role of vascular precursors marked by a novel lineage trace. Vascular progenitors contribute to the formation of the earliest embryonic vessels, but their involvement in later developmental and pathological vessel growth is less well understood. Using a Csf1r-Cre transgene, originally thought to be specific for the monocyte/macrophage lineage, I found that this transgene also labels a subpopulation of endothelial cells in brain and retinal vessels. This labelling was not caused by endothelial CSF1R or unspecific Csf1r-Cre or RosaYfp expression. Furthermore, by analysing embryos from myeloid/macrophage-deficient mice, I demonstrated that Csf1r-Cre-labelled endothelial cells were not derived from the myeloid/macrophage lineage. In adults, the analysis of bone marrow and blood from these mice as well as tamoxifen-inducible Csf1r-Cre mice suggested that Csf1r-Cre labels a bone marrow-derived population of cells that contributes to tissue-resident and circulating vascular precursors.


Nuclear medicine imaging has aroused great interest in the design and synthesis of versatile radioactive nanoprobes, while most of the methods developed for radiolabeling nanoprobes are difficult to satisfy the criteria of clinical translation, including easy operation, mild labeling conditions, high efficiency, and high radiolabeling stability. Herein, we demonstrated the universality of a simple but efficient radiolabeling method recently developed for constructing nuclear imaging nanoprobes, that is, ligand anchoring group-mediated radiolabeling (LAGMERAL). In this method, a diphosphonate-polyethylene glycol (DP-PEG) decorating on the surface of inorganic nanoparticles plays an essential role. In principle, owing to the strong binding affinity to a great variety of metal ions, it can not only endow the underlying nanoparticles containing metal ions including some main group metal ions, transition metal ions, and lanthanide metal ions with excellent colloidal stability and biocompatibility but also enable efficient radiolabeling through the diphosphonate group. Based on this assumption, inorganic nanoparticles such as Fe3O4 nanoparticles, NaGdF4:Yb,Tm nanoparticles, and Cu2-xS nanoparticles, as representatives of functional inorganic nanoparticles suitable for different imaging modalities including magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), upconversion luminescence imaging (UCL), and photoacoustic imaging (PAI), respectively, were chosen to be radiolabeled with different kinds of radionuclides such as SPECT nuclides (e.g., 99mTc), PET nuclides (e.g., 68Ga), and therapeutic SPECT nuclides (e.g., 177Lu) to demonstrate the reliability of the LAGMERAL approach. The experimental results showed that the obtained nanoprobes exhibited high radiolabeling stability, and the whole radiolabeling process had negligible impacts on the physical and chemical properties of the initial nanoparticles. Through passive targeting SPECT/MRI of glioma tumor, active targeting SPECT/UCL of colorectal cancer, and SPECT/PAI of lymphatic metastasis, the outstanding potentials of the resulting radioactive nanoprobes for sensitive tumor diagnosis were demonstrated, manifesting the feasibility and efficiency of LAGMERAL.


Sensorineural hearing loss is a chronic disease, with a serious impact on human communication and quality of life. Exposure to various factors can lead to irreversible hearing impairment, as the auditory epithelium in humans comprises terminally differentiated cells. By contrast, the inner ear of lower vertebrates and invertebrates shows regenerative capacity. Efforts to regenerate the damaged human inner ear may involve renewed cell proliferation, or transplanting cells that can differentiate into sensory cells. Literature review. Animal studies, in vitro studies, retrospective-cohort studies, community-based case-controls, clinical guidelines, and review articles. Embryonic stem cells, inner ear stem cells, and stem cells from other tissues (i.e., neural tissue, hematopoietic system) may be candidates for restoring the auditory epithelium. Transcriptional regulation of p27kip1 is the primary determinant of terminal mitosis and the final number of postmitotic progenitors of hair and supporting cells. Basic helix-loop-helix transcription factor Math1 was found to be necessary and sufficient for the production of auditory hair cells. Notch signaling seems to play a major role in the regulation of Math1, through lateral inhibition. Brn3c, Gfi1, and Barhl1 are also specific transcription factors that have been implicated in hair cell maintenance and consequent survival. Evidence concerning development, maintenance, and regeneration of hair cells is still at an embryonic stage. Combined data, as attempted in the present study, will lead to a more successful management of deafness.


The published data on the methods for the synthesis of vinyl sulfides are considered and generalised. The main attention is given to methods based on electrophilic sulfenylation of unsaturated compounds.


Home network is becoming an important part of global information infrastructure, where the embedded home gateway is a key information device to implement the interconnection and Internet access between devices in a home. In this paper, a SoC (system-on-a-chip) for embedded home gateway (EHGSoC) is proposed, which provides an integrated processing platform with the support of multiple network protocols, multiple hardware interfaces and reconfigurable computing. The hardware-software co-design and co-verification of the EHGSoC is deeply explored, whereas a co-design methodology with reconfigurable architecture is a focus. The aim of this research is to develop an EHGSoC and its corresponding system products, which are low power, high performance-to-price ratio, open and dependable.


More than a quarter century after the end of the Cold War, the debate continues on the appropriate American grand strategy to succeed containment. Despite widespread consensus on American core interests, there is little progress on what specific policy objectives and tools will maximize those interests. We argue that the lack of progress to date stems from a more basic disagreement about how the world works. Specifically, different groups within the debate rely on differing international relations theories: liberalism and realism. Those theories inform beliefs regarding how far away the United States is from an "optimal strategy," or, alternatively, how best to reach the Pareto frontier, given American interests. We demonstrate that this framework can best identify competing schools of grand strategy, where and why they disagree, and the degree to which those disagreements can be resolved through empirical tests. In this way, our paper both maps and presents ways to advance the current debate regarding U.S. grand strategy.


The effects of sulfaphenazole, 1, on typical activities catalyzed by human cytochromes P450 of the 1A, 3A, and 2C subfamilies expressed in yeast were studied. 1 acts as a strong, competitive inhibitor of CYP 2C9 (K(i) = 0.3 +/- 0.1 microM); it is much less potent toward CYP 2C8 and 2C18 (K(i) = 63 and 29 microM, respectively) and fails to inhibit CYP 1A1, 1A2, 3A4, and 2C19. From difference visible spectroscopy experiments using microsomes of yeast expressing various human P450s, 1 selectively interacts only with CYP 2C9 with the appearance of a peak at 429 nm as expected for the formation of a P450 Fe(III)-nitrogenous ligand complex (Ks = 0.4 +/- 0.1 microM). Comparative studies of the spectral interaction and inhibitory effects of twelve compounds related to 1 with CYP 2C9 showed that the aniline function of 1 is responsible for the formation of the iron-nitrogen bond of the 429 nm-absorbing complex and is necessary for the inhibitory effects of 1. The study of two new compounds synthesized during this work, in which the N-phenyl group of 1 was replaced with either an ethyl group or a 3,4-dichlorophenyl group, showed that the presence of an hydrophobic substituent at position 1 of the pyrazole function of 1 is required for a strong interaction with CYP 2C9. A model for the binding of 1 in the CYP 2C9 active site is proposed; that takes into account three major interactions that should be at the origin of the high-affinity and specific inhibitory effects of 1 toward CYP 2C9: (i) the binding of its nitrogen atom to CYP 2C9 iron, (ii) an ionic interaction of its SO2N- anionic site with a cationic residue of CYP 2C9, and (iii) an interaction of its N-phenyl group with an hydrophobic part of the protein active site.