The various forms of glutamine synthetase obtained from Bacillus brevis have been found to be antigenically identical. Alkaline phosphatase treatment of the fast moving form (GS4) reduced the electrophoretic mobility of the enzyme. Radiolabelling and autoradiographic studies have also indicated that 32P-incorporation is high in the form depicting high Rm value. Thus, it appears that these forms arise due to covalent modification of the enzyme involving a phosphate group.


Mouse granulated metrial gland cells were cocultured with labyrinthine placental cells and cell-cell contacts examined by scanning electron microscopy. Intimate contacts between granulated metrial gland cells and placental cells were observed and in some of these, differences in the surface morphology of the granulated metrial gland cells were observed. Some contact areas were suggestive of the granulated metrial gland cell monitoring the surface of potential target placental trophoblast cells prior to lysis.


We revisit an attempt to establish a unified chronology of the first ca. 20 Myr of the Solar System in the light of recent data; this period encompasses the formation of the first solids and the earliest planetary processes. We investigate the consistency of calibrations of the chronometers based on the extinct radionuclides 26Al, 53Mn and 129I with one another and with the Pb–Pb chronometer. We find the most persuasive chronology to be that based on identifying isotopic closure of the three short–lived systems in Ste Marguerite with a common event; in effect, this modifies the calibration of the I–Xe system based on Acapulco phosphate. This can be tied, in turn, to an absolute time–scale based on the Pb–Pb and Mn–Cr ages of the angrite LEW86010. The result is a common chronology (agreement between I–Xe and Mn–Cr is particularly striking), although ages derived for calcium–aluminium–rich inclusions (CAIs) are discordant. This discordancy may be explained by nuclear effects in the CAI–formation region.


Reading is a critical skill for postgraduate students—effective reading, reading comprehension, and awareness of varying interpretations contribute to students' greater progress in their academic fields (Anderson, 1999). Many students arrive at their Australian university with a mismatch of expectations and skills. This study examined reading practices as a holistic, multi-dimensional phenomenon, exploring students' reading practices between their first and third semesters at an Australian university. The overall aim of this part of the research was to develop a better understanding of and the changes in reading practices of Thai postgraduate students, in particular the intertextual and extratextual framing used, and the extent of their self-knowledge.


Gas network planning optimization under emission constraints prioritizes gas supply with the least CO$_2$ intensity. As this problem includes complex physical laws of gas flow, standard optimization solvers cannot guarantee convergence to a feasible solution. To address this issue, we develop an input-convex neural network (ICNN) aided optimization routine which incorporates a set of trained ICNNs approximating the gas flow equations with high precision. Numerical tests on the Belgium gas network demonstrate that the ICNN-aided optimization dominates non-convex and relaxation-based solvers, with larger optimality gains pertaining to stricter emission targets. Moreover, whenever the non-convex solver fails, the ICNN-aided optimization provides a feasible solution to network planning.


nef genes from human immunodeficiency virus type 1 isolates BH10 and LAV1 (lymphadenopathy-associated virus type 1) were expressed in Escherichia coli under the deo operon promoter. The two proteins found in the soluble compartment of the bacterial lysate were purified by ion-exchange column chromatography to apparent homogeneity. Determination of the amino-terminal sequence revealed glycine as the first amino acid in the Nef protein, indicating removal of the initiator methionine during expression in E. coli. Under native conditions, the recombinant Nef protein is a monomer of 23 kilodaltons. In denaturing polyacrylamide gels, however, BH10 and LAV1 Nef proteins migrate as 28 and 26 kilodaltons, respectively. GTP binding and GTPase activity were monitored during Nef protein purification. These activities did not copurify with the recombinant Nef protein from either the BH10 or the LAV1 isolate. Purified recombinant BH10 Nef protein was used as an immunogen to elicit mouse monoclonal antibodies. A series of monoclonal antibodies were obtained which reacted with sequences at either the amino or carboxy terminus of Nef. In addition, a conformational epitope reacting with native BH10, but not LAV1, Nef was isolated.


It has become a common part of undergraduate medical training to include case-based and problem-based learning as a way to advance students' understanding and encourage the application of knowledge, with the overall goal of achieving a higher level of clinical ability.1 These usually involve the examination of a stylised and simplified clinical scenarios, allowing the students to explore a disease process, while being guided through the key points on the curriculum. At my institution, in common with others, these sessions are conducted in groups, with the discussion facilitated by a senior clinician. This approach has been demonstrated to be advantageous in promoting effective clinical reasoning.2

When facilitating such sessions, it is my usual practice to provide diagrammatic representations as an additional explanation of decision trees, diagnostic pathways or points of surgical anatomy. The use of additional materials has been suggested as a beneficial adjunct to text-based description and discussion.3 4 For practical purposes, …


A telephone survey was performed to examine the smoke-free policies at Lanarkshire general practices sited outwith health centres. Forty-nine practices were contacted and all agreed to take part. Thirty-three practices (67%) reported that there was a complete ban on smoking within the building. The remaining 16 practices (33%) reported that the building was largely no-smoking with smoking by staff restricted to designated smoking areas. No practices permitted patients to smoke within the main practice premises. Few practices reported experiencing any difficulties with either the implementation or operation of the smoke-free policies. Although it is possible that problems may not have been recognised or not reported, these results are encouraging. They suggest that smoking in surgeries is the exception rather than the rule. The finding that patients largely respect the smoking ban in practice premises also suggests that the health service exemplar role is being recognised by the public. Practices that currently have no smoking restrictions should review their policy. Practices that do impose restrictions must recognise the needs of staff who smoke and offer appropriate support to help them to stop.


Macro-Level Learning through Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs): Strategies and Predictions for the Future is edited by Elspeth McKay and John Lenarcic. This book was published by IGI Global in 2015 also this book has 306 pages. The book consists of 14 chapters in four thematic sections. These sections and chapters are: • Chapter 1-4: Policy Issues in MOOCs Design: Emerging Technology and Change Management Issues for eLearning in the MOOCs Environment • Chapter 5: Social Networking and Collaborative Learning: Building MOOCs Communities • Chapter 6-7: ePedagogy and Interactive MOOCs: ePedagogy and Students' Use of HCI – Integrating Interactivity into Asynchronous MOOCs • Chapter 8-14: Rich Internet Applications and Educational Practice of MOOCs: Educational Training Design


Because the result of the MB fractal model contradicts with the classical contact mechanics, a revised elastoplastic contact model of a single asperity is developed based on fractal theory. The critical areas of a single asperity are scale dependent, with an increase in the contact load and contact area, a transition from elastic, elastoplastic to full plastic deformation takes place in this order. In considering the size distribution function, analytic expression between the total contact load and the real contact area on the contact surface is obtained. The elastic, elastoplastic and full plastic contact load are obtained by the critical elastic contact area of the biggest asperity and maximun contact area of a single asperity. The results show that a rough surface is firstly in elastic deformation. As the load increases, elastoplastic or full plastic deformation takes place. For constant characteristic length scale G, the slope of load-area relation is proportional to fractal dimension D. For constant fractal dimension D, the slope of load-area relation is inversely proportional to G. For constant D and G, the slope of load-area relation is inversely proportional to property of the material ϕ, namely with the same load, the material of rough surface is softer, and the total contact area is larger. The contact mechanics model provides a foundation for study of the friction, wear and seal performance of rough surfaces.


Stable ethylene glycol (EG) and propylene glycol (PG) electrolytes containing СuCl2 · 2H2O, SnCl4 · 5H2O and Trilon B have been developed, which provide electrodeposition of Cu – Sn alloy with tin content varying from 34 to 52 at. % in case of EG and from 51 to 91 at. % in case of PG electrolytes. It is found that the coatings contain phases of Cu6Sn5 и Cu10Sn3 intermetallic compounds, and metallic tin is also present in case of its highest content in the alloy. It is revealed that tin content can be simply varied by the change of current density or concentrations of tin and copper compounds in glycols. The effect of electrolyte composition, deposition conditions, a nature of a substrate on the coatings deposition rate (in the limits of 0.9‒2.9 μm ∙ h‒1), total metal current efficiency (from 40 to 95 %), the ratio of metals in the alloy (from 34 to 91 at. %), its phase composition and microstructure is determined. The conditions for the deposition of Cu – Sn alloy close to the eutectic composition have been found.


Road safety performance constitutes an important issue in road traffic management. Systems have been developed for assessing safety performance; however, these provide only historical or retrospective analyses. Effective safety management requires a prospective viewpoint. The main goal of this research is the integration of microscopic road network simulation with Bayesian Belief Network (BBN) technology for improved prediction of road accident risk. The paper describes the method along with the current state of the development of an accident prediction system. Preliminary validation studies of the road network simulation and BBN models are illustrated.


Gastric cancer is one of the most common forms of malignant tumor, and the development of anti‑gastric cancer drugs with minimal toxicity is of clinical importance. Allicin is extracted from Allium sativum (garlic). Recent research, including clinical experiments, has shown that garlic has anticancer and tumor suppressive effects. The present study aimed to investigate the effects of allicin on the MGC‑803 human gastric carcinoma cell line, and to further explore the possible mechanisms of its tumor suppressor effects. The effects of allicin on the MGC‑803 cells were initially examined using an 3‑(4,5‑dimethylthiazol‑2‑yl)‑2,5‑diphenyltetrazolium bromide assay. Hoechst staining was also used, in order to demonstrate the impact of allicin on MGC‑803 cell apoptosis. In addition, western blot analysis was performed to determine the abnormal expression levels of apoptosis‑associated proteins, following the treatment of MGC‑803 cells with allicin. Western blotting was also used to investigate the specific mechanisms underlying allicin‑induced apoptosis of MGC‑803 cells. The rate of MGC‑803 apoptosis was significantly increased, when the concentration and treatment time of allicin were increased. Hoechst staining detected an enhanced rate of apoptosis, and enhanced expression levels of cleaved caspase 3 were determined by western blotting. Notably, the protein expression levels of p38 were increased when the MGC‑803 cells were treated with allicin. The results of the present study suggest that allicin may inhibit the proliferation and induce the apoptosis of MGC‑803 human gastric carcinoma cells, and this may partially be achieved through the enhanced expression of p38 and cleaved caspase 3.


Aims Paediatric obesity is a growing concern for the health service. There is currently no consensus for routine screening of metabolic profiles and medical treatment in obese paediatric patients. We aimed to determine medium-term outcomes of Metformin treatment on BMI, glucose and insulin levels in obese paediatric patients. Methods In a retrospective review, data were collected from obese paediatric patients treated with Metformin for insulin resistance between October-09 and October-14. Demographic data was collected from these patients including presence of acanthosis nigricans (AN) and family history of T2DM. Changes in BMI SDS, glucose and insulin were analysed. Paired sample T-tests were used to compare pre and post treatment results (treatment washout period of 1 month). Results 70 patients were treated with metformin (50=female) (35=British White, 18=Pakistani) at a mean age of 12.7 (6.1–17.2) years. Mean BMI 35.2 (24.2–48.5 kg/m2) and BMI SDS 3.4 (2.2–4.7). All the patients had insulin resistance at start of treatment. 21 (30%) of these had both family history of T2DM and AN. An additional 22 patients had AN only (total with AN=43, 49%). Those with AN had significantly higher basal insulin levels (p < 0.05) than those without. Metformin was associated with reduced BMI z-score at 6–12 months (-0.1 SDS, p < 0.05) and 18–24 months (-0.2 SDS, p < 0.05). Reduction in fasting and postprandial glucose levels were (-0.1 mmol/L, p = 0.17) and (-0.5 mmol/L, p = 0.17) respectively, with a significant reduction in postprandial glucose levels in those patients with impaired glucose tolerance (n = 13) (-1.9 mmol/L, p < 0.05). Metformin was associated with a reduction in fasting insulin (-3.0 mU/L,p = 0.44), and significantly reduced 2 h insulin (-118.0 mU/L, p < 0.05) after treatment for 12–18 months. Conclusions Acanthosis nigricans is a good clinical indicator for the presence of insulin resistance. Metformin treatment is significantly associated with reduction in BMI z-score from 6 months and reduced postprandial insulin levels after treatment. It should be considered as a treatment modality in normoglycaemic obese paediatric patients for weight stabilisation and improvement of insulin resistance, which may have longer term implications on metabolic health.


ABSTRACT In this article, we introduce a new methodology to perform dimension reduction for a stationary multivariate time series. Our method is motivated by the consideration of optimal prediction and focuses on the reduction of the effective dimension in conditional mean of time series given the past information. In particular, we seek a contemporaneous linear transformation such that the transformed time series has two parts with one part being conditionally mean independent of the past. To achieve this goal, we first propose the so-called martingale difference divergence matrix (MDDM), which can quantify the conditional mean independence of V ∈ Rp given U ∈ Rq and also encodes the number and form of linear combinations of V that are conditional mean independent of U. Our dimension reduction procedure is based on eigen-decomposition of the cumulative martingale difference divergence matrix, which is an extension of MDDM to the time series context. Interestingly, there is a static factor model representation for our dimension reduction framework and it has subtle difference from the existing static factor model used in the time series literature. Some theory is also provided about the rate of convergence of eigenvalue and eigenvector of the sample cumulative MDDM in the fixed-dimensional setting. Favorable finite sample performance is demonstrated via simulations and real data illustrations in comparison with some existing methods. Supplementary materials for this article are available online.


The practise of law has become an increasingly global enterprise; the cultures of the law firms involved in international practice are becoming more homogeneous and nowhere is that more apparent than in the processes that law firm partnerships use to determine partner compensation.


Background: Gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM) diagnosis is resource intensive and controversial. A modified COVID-19 GDM diagnostic method was introduced at Western Health Melbourne, an Australian tertiary hospital caring for a multi-ethnic population with a high GDM prevalence at 20-23%. In place of a universal 2 hour 75g OGTT, a novel two step diagnostic method was instituted. A fasting blood glucose (FBG) was performed with thresholds based on a secondary analysis of HAPO data. A FBG of ≥5.1mmol/L (91.8mg/dL) diagnosed GDM; women with FBG 4.7-5.0mmol/L (84.6-90.0mg/dL) proceeded to an OGTT (IADPSG diagnostic criteria); FBG ≤4.6mmol/L (82.8mg/dL) was considered to exclude GDM.
 Methods: A retrospective cohort study of singleton pregnancies birthing after 20 weeks' gestation compared perinatal outcomes in 6469 women who underwent modified screening (MS) during the COVID-19 pandemic with 8669 women who had conventional screening (CS) prior to COVID-19.
 Results: GDM prevalence was the same using either MS or CS (22.9 vs 22.2% p=0.31) with similar rates of insulin use. There was no difference in the prevalence of large for gestational age infants (10.3 vs 9.4% p=0.06), pre-term birth (6.6 vs 6.4% p=0.53) or gestational age at birth (39.2 vs 39.1 weeks). Mean birth weight was increased with MS (3335g vs 3307g) and small for gestational age rate reduced (9.1 vs 10.5% p=0.01). The MS group had fewer inductions (34.2 vs 39.8% p<0.01). Primary caesarean section rate was unchanged (18.4 vs 18.4% p=0.91). MS reduced the need for an OGTT by 76%. Women with a FBG ≤4.6mmol/L by MS had non-inferior outcomes compared to women with a FBG ≤4.6mmol/L with CS irrespective of GDM diagnosis.
 Conclusion: In a large multi-ethnic cohort with a high prevalence of GDM, modified screening using FBG greatly reduced the number of resource intensive OGTTs with non-inferior perinatal outcomes. A prospective randomised trial comparing these methods is warranted.

 J. Deitch: None. J. M. Said: None. G. R. Teale: None. D. Kevat: Advisory Panel; Novo Nordisk, Speaker's Bureau; Boehringer Ingelheim and Eli Lilly Alliance, Novo Nordisk, Abbott Diabetes, AstraZeneca. I. Lee: None. C. J. Yates: None. E. Kathpal: None. P. Lawton: None. I. Shahid: None. C. Steele: None. P. S. Hamblin: None. B. Krishnamurthy: None.

 Australian Government Research Training Program; Sheppard Millar Lowe Research Trust Scholarship


Greek papyri recovered from the sands of Egypt represent a precious source of data for early Christianity. Egypt is the land of the earliest Greek translation of books from the Hebrew Bible. The Greek Old Testament or Septuagint was undertaken within the Jewish community of Alexandria from near the middle of the 3rd to the 2nd century BC. Alexandria became the first centre of Christianity in Egypt. Then, the Christian doctrine spread to the villages of the Egyptian chora. Christian papyri mirror this historical context. The earliest Christian papyri are biblical and literary. Besides these, documentary texts offer unique insights into the everyday life and society of Christians in Egypt. Private letters, in particular, reveal the activities and worries of laymen and women, monks and church officials. Papyrological evidence also enlightens the relationship of Christianity with local religious practices. After an overview of the contribution of papyri to our knowledge of early Christianity, this article will focus on documentary specimens dealing with health issues in the form of requests for healing prayers and amulets written on papyrus. Health was, in fact, a common cause for concern and a central aspect of the daily reality of Christian communities.Contribution: This article contributes to shedding light on the role of papyrological evidence in reconstructing the everyday lives of people in Egypt. Christian documentary papyri are particularly illuminating on the day-to-day life of early Christian communities. Their study expands our socio-cultural understanding of aspects – such as healing – that, although important, are poorly known from the literary tradition.


BACKGROUND
Oral hypofunction is defined as the reversible stage preceding oral dysfunction. However, its assessment and management need further examination and consideration.

OBJECTIVE
The present study aimed to examine the current state of oral hypofunction among outpatients at the university hospital.

METHODS
New outpatients underwent medical interviews and detailed assessment of oral hypofunction at their initial visit to our dental department. Oral hypofunction was diagnosed if results of three of the following seven assessment items were below cutoff values: poor oral hygiene, oral dryness, reduced occlusal force, decreased tongue-lip motor function, decreased tongue pressure, decreased masticatory function, and deterioration of swallowing function. The relationships between factors used to diagnose oral hypofunction as well as the distributions of assessment values were clarified.

RESULTS
Seventy-five of 209 patients (35.9%) were finally diagnosed with oral hypofunction. Diagnosis of oral hypofunction was significantly related to patient age, Eichner index, a chief complaint of dental or periodontal disease or ill-fitting dentures, and a history of neurodegenerative disease. The lowest quintile values for poor oral hygiene, oral dryness, and decreased masticatory performance were all above current cutoff values. Reduced occlusal force contributed strongly to the diagnosis of oral hypofunction.

CONCLUSION
Oral hypofunction in dental outpatients at a university hospital was associated with patient age, medical history, and chief complaint at presentation. Diagnosis of oral hypofunction can be closely related to reduced occlusal force. The validity of cutoff values for assessments of oral hypofunction needs further consideration.


The present invention relates to a vacuum exhaust system of a sterilizer, comprising: a sterilization chamber; a first vacuum pump connected to one side of the sterilization chamber; an oil mist trap section for exhausting steam incoming from the sterilization chamber via the first vacuum pump; and a second vacuum pump connected to the first vacuum pump and the oil mist trap section. The vacuum exhaust system of a sterilizer according to the present invention comprises the second vacuum pump connected to the first vacuum pump and the oil mist trap section, wherein by turning the second vacuum pump on to apply a vacuum to the operating oil in the first vacuum pump, thereby providing a certain pressure for evaporating water in liquid state to the first vacuum pump, the present invention can vaporize the water vapor trapped in the operating oil in the first vacuum pump.


Phospholipid membranes support essential biochemical processes, yet remain difficult to characterize due to their compositional and structural heterogeneity. The two most common phospholipid headgroup structures in biological membranes are phosphatidylcholine (PC) and phosphatidylethanolamine (PE), but interactions between PC and PE lipids remain underexplored. In this study, we apply ultrafast two-dimensional infrared (2D IR) spectroscopy to quantify the headgroup effects on interfacial dynamics in PC/PE lipid mixtures. Experiments are interpreted through molecular dynamics simulations using the molecular dynamics with alchemical step (MDAS) algorithm for enhanced sampling. Experimental results indicate that the PE content decreases H-bond formation at the ester carbonyl positions near the lipid membrane's hydrophobic core as a result of increased packing density. The observed dehydration is linked to faster molecular dynamics within the interfacial region.


Background
The advantages of nanomedicines include preferential delivery of the payload directly to tumor tissues. CYT-21625 is the novel, first-in-class gold nanomedicine designed to target tumor vasculature and cancer cells by specifically delivering recombinant human tumor necrosis factor alpha (rhTNF) and a paclitaxel prodrug.

Methods
We analyzed TNF receptor expression in publicly available gene expression profiling data and in thyroid tissue samples. Mice with metastatic FTC-133 and 8505C xenografts and the MEN1 conditional knock-out mice were treated weekly with CYT-21625 and gold nanoparticles with rhTNF only (CYT-6091); controls included mice treated with either paclitaxel or saline. In vivo luciferase activity was used to assess the effects on tumor growth. Computed tomography, magnetic resonance imaging, and 18F-Fludeoxyglucose positron emission tomography were used to study tumor selectivity in mice with insulin-secreting pancreatic neuroendocrine tumors (PNETs). All statistical tests were two-sided.

Results
Anaplastic thyroid cancer (ATC) expressed statistically significantly higher levels of TNF receptor superfamily 1A and 1B messenger RNA (n = 11) and protein (n = 6) than control samples (n = 45 and 13, respectively). Mice (n = 5-7 per group) with metastatic ATC (P < .009) and FTC-133 xenografts (P = .03 at week 3, but not statistically significant in week 4 owing to reduced sample size from death in non-CYT-21625 groups) treated with CYT-21625 had a statistically significantly lower tumor burden. Treatment with CYT-21625 resulted in loss of CD34 expression in intratumoral vasculature, decreased proliferating cell nuclear antigen, and increased cleaved caspase-3. Intratumoral vascular leakage occurred only in mice with PNET and ATC treated with CYT-6091 and CYT-21625. CYT-6091 and CYT-21625 preferentially deposited in PNETs and statistically significantly decreased serum insulin levels (n = 3 per group, P < .001). There were no toxicities observed in mice treated with CYT-21625.

Conclusions
CYT-21625 is effective in mice with PNETs and metastatic human thyroid cancer with no toxicities. Thus, CYT-21625 should be studied in patients with advanced PNETs and thyroid cancer.


Car muffler has the role to form the exhaust gas from high temperature- pressure to lower level and reduce the generated noise. Because of this role, its durability decrease as deformation by heat is occurred. This study is to analyze the flow of exhaust gas inside muffler and its coupled thermal deformation with 3-D modeling and ANSYS. There is the fastest flow at the exit of muffler with the maximum velocity of 54 m/s. And the maximum deformation or equivalent stress is shown at this model respectively as 0.00435 mm or 3414.4 MPa by the influence of heat and pressure at part of intersection with inlet and body of muffler.


The Arrhenius equation correlates the rate of a chemical reaction with the corresponding activation energy, reaction time and reaction temperature, where the latter is measured in Kelvin. Although the equation is rather simple it can be used to summarize the kinetics of most chemical reactions in a surprisingly good manner. The activation energy is an interesting parameter that can be seen as an energy barrier which the reacting chemicals have to pass before a chemical reaction is initiated. Thus, the higher the activation energy, the lower is the rate of the chemical reaction. Moreover, the equation can also be used, for example, to forecast the influence of a higher temperature on the composition of a product consisting of components with different activation energies. In such a case, a component with higher activation energy will increase its rate of reaction more than a component with lower activation energy. The composition of the original product will thus obtain a shrinking fraction of the fast reacting component. The report gives some guidelines of how to calculate the activation energy for a given case in a pulp mill. ADDRESS OF THE AUTHOR: Ulf Germgård (email@example.com), Department of Engineering and Chemical Sciences, Karlstad University, SE 651 88 Karlstad, Sweden


Insulin causes uptake of glucose into cells and also causes increases in skeletal muscle blood flow by vasodilatation. In order for insulin to act at receptors on the skeletal muscle membrane, it must move through the capillary endothelium. In conditions associated with insulin resistance, insulin-induced glucose uptake and vasodilatation are often blunted and disordered transport across endothelium has been suggested.
Firstly, studies were conducted using the hyperinsulinaemic euglycaemic (HE) clamp in rats to assess the relationship between insulin-induced muscle vasodilatation and glucose uptake into skeletal muscle. Insulin-induced vasodilatation was abolished by nitric oxide (NO) synthase inhibition in Wistar rats, implicating NO. Nutritional status and hence availability of glucose also affected vasodilatation in Wistar rats, leading to the proposal that vasodilatation was linked to glucose metabolism.
Vasodilator response to insulin was significantly higher in lean versus obese Zucker rats. Nicotinic acid (NAc) did not decrease plasma FFA concentrations versus HE clamp, nevertheless, vasodilator response and glucose uptake were enhanced in lean and obese rats by some mechanism other than lowering FFA.
Optimisation of the microdialysis technique allowed measurement, for the first time, of interstitial insulin concentrations in lean and obese Zucker rats and showed a significant difference under basal conditions.


In this paper the author considers the dilemma between geocentrism and heliocentrism approaching from the viewpoint of biblical tradition. Conceived in this way, the conception of geocentrism is not inconsistent with heliocentrism, but appears rather as its complement on a more profound metaphysical plan. It will be seen further on that even the heliocentric system is dependent on this metaphysical framework, whereas the converse is not the case and, therefore, it may be said that the geocentric system appears as elder in an ontological sense as it also preceded in history. Eventually the author proves the assertion that the postmodern science can be considered as a return to conceptions of traditional Cosmology.


Zero forcing is a combinatorial game played on a graph with a goal of changing the color of every vertex at minimal cost. This leads to a parameter known as the zero forcing number that can be used to give an upper bound for the maximum nullity of a matrix associated with the graph. A variation on the zero forcing game is introduced that can be used to give an upper bound for the maximum nullity of such a matrix when it is constrained to have exactly q negative eigenvalues. This constrains the possible inertias that a matrix associated with a graph can achieve and gives a method to construct lower bounds on the inertia set of a graph (which is the set of all possible pairs (p,q) where p is the number of positive eigenvalues and q is the number of negative eigenvalues).


The Schuylkill Metals facility in Plant City Florida (SMPCI) operated as a battery recycling facility for approximately 13 years. During its operation, the facility disposed of battery components in surrounding wetland areas. In March of 1991 the U.S. EPA and SMPCI entered into a Consent Decree for the remediation of the SMPCI site using stabilization/solidification and on-site disposal. In November of 1994, ENTACT began remediation at the facility and to date has successfully stabilized/solidified over 228,000 tons of lead impacted battery components and lead impacted material. The ENTACT process reduces the size of the material to be treated to ensure that complete mixing of the phosphate/cement additive is achieved thereby promoting the chemical reactions of stabilization and solidification. ENTACT has met the following performance criteria for treated material at the SMPCI site: (1) Hydraulic Conductivity less than 1x10{sup -6} cm/s, (2) Unconfined Compressive Strength greater than 50 psi, (3) Lead, Cadmium, Arsenic, Chromium TCLP Leachability below hazardous levels.


As the paradigm changes from the Rational planning process to the collaborative planning process, citizens are the main subject establishing the town and city. Community design is growing with the participation of local people to improve town environment. So new social and communication problems have been caused and there have been lots of discussion on regional communication. And also community space is one of main factors of more liveable and safer community. For communities to become alternatives with realistic meanings in this changed society, considerations on social and spatial conditions are needed. Therefore, community space which works as a device of physical environment for activation of communities needs more active changes which encourages social communication. This Study analysed comprehensive case studies of participatory project of the making community space. Above all, the network of the project participants must established; residents, professionals, government, NGOs, and sponsors. From the suggestion of the site and presentation of a problem to the planning, design, construction and maintenance, residents and experts were closely linked. Also, local government and administration suggested the project priorities and guidelines. Through interviews, discussions, surveys, a variety of design games and feedback, planning and design process of making community space was progressed.


Home schooling is an enduring American tradition that counts Abraham Lincoln, Woodrow Wilson, and Thomas Edison among its most distinguished progeny.' Although teaching children at home is still an uncommon alternative to public and private schools, the practice is growing. It is estimated that more than 300,000 elementary and secondary school age children were taught at home in 1992.2 Society clearly has legitimate interests in the education of its youngest citizens. To protect those interests, states regulate home schooling just as they do conventional private schools. Unlike private schools, however, home schooling parents frequently find state requirements impossible to meet. When state standards effectively deny parents the opportunity to teach their children at home, the parents often assert that the state has infringed upon their constitutional rights. The United States Supreme Court has held that the liberty interests protected by the Fourteenth Amendment extend to activities involving child rearing and education.3 It has not,


In recent years, the Internet is revolutionizing information availability much like the Power Grid revolutionized energy availability a century earlier. We will explore the differences and similarities of these two critical infrastructures and identify ways for convergence which may lead to an energy internet. Pricing signals, nodal forecasting, and short-term elasticities are key concepts in smart energy flows respecting the delicate equilibrium involved in generation-demand and aiming at higher efficiencies. We will discuss how intelligent forecasting approaches operating at multiple levels (including device or nodal levels) can ameliorate the challenges of power storage. In addition to higher efficiencies, an energy internet may achieve significant reliability and security improvements and offer greater flexibility and transparency in the overall energy-environmental relation.


To help students view mathematics in a more favourable light, a number of former pupils were contacted and asked to give details of how they use mathematics in their daily lives. This information was gathered through an online questionnaire or visits to the school to talk to pupils—a booklet of responses was also given to students. Attitudinally pre- and post-testing students suggested that this initiative helped address pupils' concerns regarding the purpose of classroom mathematics. The diversity of professions also helped dispel many myths about the usefulness of mathematics. Subsequently, the project has proven to be a catalyst for a range of cross-curricular projects and events inspired by the former pupils' case studies, all of which serve to continue to address the initial aims of the project regarding pupil perception of the subject, in the light of both workplace and everyday life.


This study seeks to understand the relationship between the physical and social neighborhood environment and self-reported hypertension status in order to improve the health of Baltimore City residents. However, the mechanism through which neighborhood disorder is associated with hypertension is unclear. Self-reported hypertension status and demographic information from 711 Baltimore City heads of households from the Windows to Health survey was combined with corresponding neighborhood block order/disorder ratings on the presence of violence, alcohol and other drugs using the Neighborhood Inventory for Environmental Typology (NIfTEy). Regression models were used to test the relationship between (1) neighborhood disorder and hypertension status, (2) neighborhood disorder and stress symptoms (tiredness, headache, and trouble concentrating), and (3) stress symptoms and hypertension status. Results showed a statistically significant association between neighborhood disorder (violence) and stress symptoms (tiredness) after adjusting for age, sex, race, employment status, and highest level of education completed (OR 1.35, CI 1.03-1.77). However, there was no association between neighborhood disorder and hypertension status or stress symptoms and hypertension status. It is possible stress symptoms could be related to other health outcomes. Given the shown relationship between neighborhood disorder and stress symptoms, public health practitioners should design and implement neighborhood level interventions in communities with high levels of disorder in order to improve the health and well-being of residents.


Floating-Harbor syndrome is a rare genetic disorder of unknown aetiology. It was described for the first time in 1973. The syndrome is characterized mainly by short stature, delay in speech development and characteristic facial features. This article describes a report of a case of the syndrome and emphasizes the oral aspects, including descriptions of soft tissues, teeth, occlusion, stage of dental development and findings on examination of the temporomandibular joint. The treatment provided and its outcome is also described. Hopefully this information will be compared with findings from other patients in the future to assist in clarifying the phenotype of the Floating-Harbor syndrome.


The Hangudi Bawana Tata Lahir Batin Association has consistently nurtured its character through several rituals and activities. However, this association often gets stigma and rejection because it is considered contrary to the character of Islam. Therefore, there is a need for research that describes the concept of Character Education in the Society in the Perspective of Islamic Education. This research is qualitative research. The subject of the research is the Chairperson, the administrator, and two people (members) in the Hangudi Bawana Tata Lahir Batin Association Yogyakarta. Data was collected by interview, observation, and documentation methods. The data analysis technique uses the Miles Huberman model, which consists of data reduction, data display, verification. The data validity technique uses triangulation of sources, methods, and time techniques. The results of the study show that there are three characters of Islamic perspective developed in the Paguyuban, namely: 1) Divine character. 2) Human Character. 3) Natural Character. In its application, all the characters developed are implemented into activities carried out by the Paguyuban. Regarding character habituation, this association has several methods used, including Qishah and Hiwar methods, uswah methods, refraction methods, promises and threats methods and ibrah and mau'idah methods.


Home healthcare is undergoing significant evolution as it matures as an industry segment. As different types of providers are attracted to home care, home care product companies are finding their customer bases dividing in two--traditional referral customers and a new type of customer, those looking for joint ventures and contracts.


The hydrodynamic design of the bilge keels is important for the ship's resistance and roll performance. It also affects the ship wake field at the propeller plane and can greatly influence the propulsor performances in terms of noise, efficiency and cavitation. The objective of this work is to investigate the effect of bilge keels on the hull flow during steady turns for a displacement ship with a skeg and a bow dome. An Unsteady Reynolds Averaged Navier Stokes Solver (URANS) CFDShip-Iowa, Version 4, developed at the University of Iowa is used to simulate the flow around the Naval Surface Warfare Center-Carderock Division (NSWCCD) ship model# 5617 with bilge keels at different steady turning conditions. The effect of separated flows caused by the bilge keels and the skeg during steady turns on the flow distributions at the propeller plane will greatly influence the flow at the propeller planes. It was observed that during a high speed port turn at full rudder angle, the onset flow to the port side bilge keel was mainly influenced by the flow around the bow dome and the onset flow to the starboard side bilge keel was subject to the free stream hull flow. The drift angle varies along the bilge keel span during steady turning and complex vortical flow structures were developed on the leeward side of the bilge keels due to flow separations caused by the flow over the tip of the bilge keel from the windward side to the leeward side. The vortical flow generated by the starboard bilge keel also merged with the separated flow caused by the skeg and form a streamwise vortical structure that was convected downstream into the propeller plane. The wake field at both port and starboard propeller planes were analyzed from the simulation results. It can be concluded from the analysis that the starboard side propeller plane was subject to a uniform cross flow and the port side propeller plane was subject to a cross flow that consisted of both cross flow component and a mean swirl that was caused by the streamwise vortical flow generated by the flow separation upstream. The cross flow component at the propeller planes can effectively produce side force affecting the lateral motion of the ship. It can be concluded from the simulations that the bilge keels have great influence on the wake distributions at the propeller planes and can affect the propeller performance during maneuvering in terms of hydrodynamic and structural loadings. Great care should be taken to ensure that the bilge keels be designed properly in the future not just for both seakeeping and propulsion, but also for maneuvering.


Presented paper deals with investigation of selected ternary oxidic system with high content of silicates from the viewpoint of surface properties. Research was focused not only on experimental investigation, but mostly on theoretical modelling of surface tension. This approach was chosen due to absence of compact set of information from the area of heterogeneous processes at high temperatures. It is moreover very often difficult to access appropriate data. Surface propertieswere investigated by sessile drop method. Afterwards calculation was made with use of selected semi-empirical models and obtained outputs were confronted with experimentally obtained data. Modelling comprised also temperature dependence of surface tension and influence of SiO2 on its values.


Performing face recognition under extreme poses and lighting conditions remains a challenging task for current state-of-the-art biometric algorithms. The recognition task is even more challenging when there is insufficient training data available in the gallery, or when the gallery dataset originates from one side of the face while the probe dataset originates from the other. The authors present a new method for computing the distance between two biometric signatures acquired under such challenging conditions. This method improves upon an existing Semi-Coupled Dictionary Learning method by computing a jointly-optimized solution that incorporates the reconstruction cost, the discrimination cost, and the semi-coupling cost. The use of a semi-coupling term allows the method to handle partial 3D face meshes where, for example, only the left side of the face is available for gallery and the right side of the face is available for probe. The method also extends to 2D signatures under varying poses and lighting changes by using 3D signatures as a coupling term. The experiments show that this method can improve recognition performance of existing state-of-the-art wavelet signatures used in 3D face recognition and provide excellent recognition results in the 3D-2D face recognition application. Dat Chu University of Houston, USA Shishir Shah University of Houston, USA Ioannis A. Kakadiaris University of Houston, USA DOI: 10.4018/978-1-4666-5966-7.ch004


Neisseria meningitidis, when cultured in iron-restricted environments, synthesises new outer-membrane proteins, many of which are necessary for their survival and growth. Some of these proteins e.g. transferrin-binding proteins 1 and 2 (Tbp1 and Tbp2), are required for the acquisition of iron from transferrin and are examples of important iron-regulated meningococcal surface antigens which are not expressed after growth in common laboratory media. The antigenicity and antigenic heterogeneity of these proteins have been extensively studied, and the bactericidal activity of antibodies directed to them have been studied. In this work we analysed the ability of such antibodies to inhibit transferrin binding and to block iron uptake from human transferrin. Antisera from mice immunized with either meningococcal outer membrane vesicles, purified Tbp1/2 complexes, or purified Tbp2, were incorporated in radiolabeled-iron uptake assays. Uptake was blocked by more than 80% in the homologous strains, but blocked much less efficiently in some heterologous strains, correlating well with inhibition of transferrin binding and with an inhibitory effect on bacterial growth. Inhibition of iron uptake from citrate was unaffected which suggests that this effect is due to antibodies against the components of the transferrin binding system, specially Tbp2. Our results support the importance of these proteins and their suitability to be considered in the development of effective vaccines against serogroup B meningococci.


ABSTRACT Gao, S., 2020. Strategy of improving the industrial and commercial administration ability of port type park. In: Yang, Y.; Mi, C.; Zhao, L., and Lam, S. (eds.), Global Topics and New Trends in Coastal Research: Port, Coastal and Ocean Engineering. Journal of Coastal Research, Special Issue No. 103, pp. 663–667. Coconut Creek (Florida), ISSN 0749-0208. With the development of socialist market economy, the reform of China's economic system has achieved a historic leap. In this process, the functions of industrial and commercial administration can meet the needs of the society to a certain extent through a series of adjustments and reforms, but there are still some problems in the improvement of management ability. Therefore, this paper puts forward a strategy for the improvement of industrial and commercial administration ability of port type parks. This paper analyzes the basic functions and existing problems of the current industrial and commercial administration, from the perspective of economic and social development, the transformation of government functions and the development of industrial and commercial administration, focusing on the analysis of the necessity and urgency of the transformation of industrial and commercial administration functions to service type, and puts forward specific countermeasures for the development of industrial and commercial administration service enterprises. From the aspects of building a good market competition environment, strengthening factor guarantee and improving the service level of the team, the paper puts forward the countermeasures and suggestions for developing service-oriented industry and commerce. The comparative experiment results show that the proposed strategy for improving the industrial and commercial administration capacity of port park has better research results and the strategy is feasible.


Anorexia nervosa (AN) is characterised by the restriction of energy intake in relation to energy needs and a significantly lowered body weight than normally expected, coupled with an intense fear of gaining weight. Treatment of AN is currently based on psychological and refeeding approaches, but their efficacy remains limited, since 40% of patients after ten years of medical care, still present symptoms of AN. The intestine hosts a large community of microorganisms, called the "microbiota", which live in symbiosis with the human host. The gut microbiota of a healthy human is dominated by bacteria from two phyla: Firmicutes and majorly Bacteroidetes. However, the proportion in their representation differs on an individual basis and depends on many external factors, such as medical treatment, geographical location, and hereditary, immunological and lifestyle factors. Drastic changes in dietary intake may profoundly impact the composition of the gut microbiota, and the resulting dysbiosis may play a part in the onset and/or maintenance of comorbidities associated with AN, such as gastrointestinal disorders, anxiety, and depression, as well as appetite dysregulation. Furthermore, studies have reported the presence of atypical intestinal microbial composition in patients with AN compared to healthy normal-weight controls. This review addresses the current knowledge about the role of the gut microbiota in the pathogenesis and treatment of AN. The review also focuses on the bidirectional interaction between the gastrointestinal tract and the central nervous system (microbiota-gut-brain axis), considering the potential use of the gut microbiota manipulation in the prevention and treatment of AN.


In the present study, ZnO thin film have been prepared on glass substances using chemical spray pyrolysis with thickness 1000 Ao laser  Nd-YAG irradiation (weavlength 532 nM) and energy (300mW) for 10s from 50cm distance. Optical properties ( energy gap, absorption coefficient, extinction coefficient) have been studied.
The results show that laser irradiation cause reduce in energy gap from (3.04)eV to (2.88)eV.


This article hopes to contribute to two debates: the impact of senior workers' employment status on their future pension rights; and the pension gaps between men and women, which are still considerable in the cohorts retiring now. We know that unintended career breaks after age 50 have a major impact on pension rights and, in return, on individuals' decisions about when to retire, but until now we had little data on the characteristics of the occupational trajectories of men and women after 50. This article seeks to address that gap by painting a full picture of careers after age 50, regardless of employment status at and after 50. It also compares accrual of pension rights and retirement age by trajectory and gender. To do so, this article uses data from the all-scheme contributor samples and the all-scheme retiree samples collected by DREES, and examines the cohorts born in 1934, 1938 and 1942 – for which we have the whole career after age 50 until retirement – and occasionally, the 1946 and 1950 cohorts. In these cohorts, employment rates are found to decrease steadily with age, with unemployment, paid pre-retirement and "other economically inactive" (excluding the dispensation from seeking work for seniors, paid pre-retirement and sickness or disability) becoming increasingly prevalent. Although the gaps between men and woman narrowed between the cohorts born in 1934 and 1942, a higher percentage of women than men from those cohorts have been "other economically inactive" after age 50, even when they were in employment at 50. Conversely, a higher percentage men from the cohorts born in 1934, 1938 and 1942 have been in paid pre-retirement. Consequently, women accumulate fewer pension rights after age 50 and generally retire later, even when they had an equivalent occupational status to their male counterparts at 50. Lastly, because they have shorter periods of economic, women's retirement seem more sensitive to their late career trajectories.


This article explores the question of consistency in ex-smokers' experiences of temptation to smoke. Data were collected from 57 ex-smokers who called a relapse-prevention hotline on two occasions. Relapse situations were classified through cluster analysis and were also coded on McKennel's Smoking Motivation factors. Cognitive and behavioral coping efforts were recorded. Only modest trans-situational consistency was observed. The two relapse episodes did not systematically fall into the same cluster. Data suggested that social aspects of relapse situations might be most consistent. Behavioral coping showed modest trans-situational consistency, whereas cognitive coping showed no stability. The implications of these findings for the prospect of individually tailored interventions are discussed.


Introduction in cancer cells, activating mutations in PIK3CA and AKT1 genes, major players of PI3K-AKT-mTOR signalling pathway, are widely reported in many cancers and present attractive targets for the identification of new therapeutics and better cancer management. The present study was planned to evaluate the mutational status of PIK3CA and AKT1 genes in bladder cancer patients and to assess the association between these mutations and patients´ clinico-pathological features. Methods in this prospective study, bladder cancer biopsies and matched urine sediments samples were collected form 70 patients. Mutations were assessed by deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) sequencing and correlation with clinico-pathological data was performed using SPSS software. Results AKT1 alterations were poorly detected. Only one patient with pT1 stage and high-grade tumour carried the E17K mutation. In PIK3CA exon 9, 2 point mutations, E545K and Q546E, and a SNP (E547E) were reported, whereas in exon 20, 2 point mutations (L989V and H1047R) and 2 SNPs (I1022I and T1025T) were detected. PIK3CA mutations were mainly observed in early stages and high-grade tumours. Statistical analysis showed no significant association between the studied AKT1 and PIK3CA mutations and patients´ clinico-pathological parameters (p > 0.05). Detection of these mutations in voided urine samples showed a high specificity (100%) for both genes and a moderate sensitivity: 100% for AKT1 and 66.7% for PIK3CA genes. Conclusion this study shows clearly that mutations in AKT1 and PIK3CA are rare events and could not be considered as valuable biomarkers for bladder cancer management.


SUMMARY Large amounts of high-titre E. coli α-haemolysin were produced in a nutrient broth medium. Production was enhanced by growth in a medium containing large molecular-weight components. The haemolysin was purified by "salting out" with ammonium sulphate precipitation at its iso-electric point (pI = 4·6) and by chromatography on Sephadex G-200. Evidence is presented that the haemolysin is a large protein (approximate molecular weight = 580,000) that was not easily dissociated into smaller subunits. Lethality in mice and rabbits was not observed after intravenous injection of α-haemolysin, but hard swellings appeared at injection sites after the intradermal administration of active haemolysin preparations. The haemolysin did not cause fluid accumulation in ligated intestinal segments in rabbits.


Abstract Tomato pesticides health risk was assessed in Meru district of Arusha region, one of the key tomato producers in Tanzania. Tomato samples and consumption information were collected from 50 farmers using Food and Drug Administration standards and twice administered twenty-four hour recall questionnaire respectively. Analysis for pesticide residues was done using Gas Chromatography Mass Spectrometry. Dietary pesticide exposure was estimated deterministically by combining pesticide residue levels and tomato consumption levels. Pesticide levels were detected for; permethrin (mean, 5.2899 mg/kg), chlorpyrifos (mean, 7.5281 mg/kg) and ridomil (mean, 2,854.279 mg/kg) in 18% of samples. Health Risk Indices, determined as ratio of estimated daily intake to acceptable daily exposure, for chlorpyrifos, permethrin and ridomil were greater than one. This implies that, lifetime consumption of fresh tomatoes can pose health risk for chlorpyrifos, permethrin and ridomil. Awareness raising on good practices for pesticide application and food safety strengthening are recommended to protect public health against pesticides.


"Zen Play" is a graduation project that has been conducted to create a feedback system within the back-end part of a serious game, developed by Clicks and Links, to grade the energetic behavior of the users inside their houses. Its functioning comes together with the installation of a Smart Meter inside the residence. The aim of the "Zen play" project, through the support of the Serious game, is to involve and engage the player towards a better sustainable energetic behavior, by giving to the user a clear objective to reach every week including an active real-time feedback. Existing games and old theses proved not to work correctly when the aim was to calculate the scored points from a player, especially when connected to Smart meters like in this case. The main reason for this shortcoming is the multitude of variables that are not considered during the measurements. The energetic consumptions in a house can be divided in two groups: "HVAC", which stands for "Heating Ventilation Air Conditioning", and non-HVAC. The non-HVAC are the ones that are principally affected by users' decisions and they represent the focus of this project. The huge majority of past years researches and improvements were made with HVAC appliances, since the biggest savings can be done with them. The consumption of these appliances depend both on the characteristics of dwellings and on their inhabitants' behavior. The initial idea of this project, was to focus on changing the energy related habits of householders and, as long as the energy consumed with non-HVAC group is mainly affected by inhabitants' actions and choices, focusing on these elements is the best way to teach people to have a more sustainable lifestyle. Within this second group, two factors proved to affect the consumption next to people behaviors: the number of inhabitants and the efficiency of the appliances. These variables are being translated into correction factors ranging from 0 to 1, defined as normalization, to help creating a fair score among the different users when they consume energy and interact with the game. The most efficient appliance will have a correction factor of 1, while the least will have a correction factor bigger than 0. The score is made by the relationship with the distance between an average consumption and the consumption perceived by the system, together with the distance between the same average consumption and the optimal consumption. The player is provided with a standard score and a one where the correction factor is applied. The Mpare system divides the analyses in single appliance or multiple appliances, and for this second group, the score is calculated through a weighted mean. The final score is calculated by adding the total consumption of the labeled and standard appliances, multiplied by the percentage of impact, minus the energy used during stand-by mode by all the appliances considered by the system. The aim is provide tips to optimize or correct the use of appliances grading the overall consumption and showing the daily, weekly or monthly CO2 footprint.


Despite the complexity and importance of sociolinguistic knowledge in the Korean language, KFL textbooks and curriculum fall short in incorporating sociolinguistic issues due to their focus on grammar and communication. To address this challenge, this paper introduces an advanced level content-based course in which online TV shows of various genres in addition to readings on Korean sociolinguistics are effectively utilized to enhance sociolinguistic competency. That is, students watch relevant online TV shows not only for content but also to analyze the language with the sociolinguistic tools gained from the lecture and readings on given topics such as honorifics/address terms, gender and language, dialects, and internet language. Furthermore, the results of student questionnaires and interviews on the effect of sociolinguistic knowledge on their L2 in ter language upon completion of the course are reported. Finally, we discuss the pedagogical implications of explicit sociolinguistic instruction in KFL curricula at all levels.


Objectives Retrospective assessment of environmental pesticide exposure is challenging. Exposure measurements or information on crop-specific pesticide use are often lacking historically. We applied expert assessment to reconstruct historical pesticide use patterns in the Netherlands, and evaluated reliability and accuracy of this procedure. Methods For six main crops in the Netherlands, two experts per crop individually rated the probability (percentage of farmers applying) and frequency of use of authorised active ingredients between 1961 and 2005 per 5-year period. Inter-rater agreement was investigated by the percentage overall agreement and weighted Cohen's κ's (κw). Experts' ratings were compared with self-reported pesticide use from recent farmer surveys to determine accuracy of the ratings. Results Inter-rater agreement on the probability of use varied between crops (κw 0.25 to 0.69), as well as agreement on the frequency of use (κw 0.32 to 0.64). Inter-rater agreement was marginally higher for herbicides and fungicides than insecticides. Comparisons with survey data indicated fair to good accuracy of the experts' ratings for the probability (κw 0.48 to 0.65) and frequency of use (κw 0.38 to 0.68). For all crops except fruit, the specificity of the experts' ratings was higher than the sensitivity. Conclusions Overall inter-rater agreement between experts was fair to good and experts' ratings were reasonably accurate. Results of this study indicate that expert assessment can be used to derive information on historical pesticide use, which is essential for epidemiological studies evaluating the effect of (past) environmental exposure to pesticides on health.


Seismic hazard analyses are associated with large uncertainties when historical data are insufficient to define secular rates of seismicity. Such uncertainties may be decreased with geological data in areas where seismicity is shallow and produced by Quaternary faulting. To illustrate, we examine intraplate Japan. Large intraplate earthquakes in Japan characteristically produce surface ruptures along mappable Quaternary faults and show a systematic relation between seismic moment, M_0 and rupture length I (log M_0 = 23.5 + 1.94 × log I). It is observed that, within the bounds placed by geologically assessed slip rates, the mean regional moment release rate M_0 resulting from slip on mapped Quaternary faults is in accord with estimates of M_0 determined with the 400-yr record of seismicity. Recent work also shows that when the repeat time T of earthquakes on Quaternary faults in southwest Japan is assumed to equal M_0/M_0^g (where M_0 is estimated for rupture extended over the entire fault length and M_0^g is the geologically assessed moment release rate of each fault), the moment frequency distribution of earthquakes predicted from the geologic record is virtually identical to that seen with the 400-yr record of seismicity. These observations indicate that the geologic record of Quaternary fault offsets contains sufficient information to predict both the spatial and size distribution of intraplate earthquakes in Japan. A contour map of the average recurrence time of ground shaking of JMA intensity ≧V is thus computed using an empirical relation between seismic moment and the areal distribution of seismic intensity and assuming that the repeat time T of earthquakes on each Quaternary fault equals M_0/M_0^g. The map demonstrates how Quaternary fault data may be used to assess long-term seismic hazard in areas of active faulting where historical records of seismicity are relatively short or absent. Another shortcoming of conventional seismic hazard analysis is that hazard is not considered a function of the time since each fault in a region last ruptured. A simple procedure is used to demonstrate how the time-dependent nature of the earthquake cycle affects the evaluation of seismic hazard. The distribution of seismic shaking characteristic of large interplate earthquakes offshore of Japan is estimated from published isoseismal maps. The observed average repeat times of ruptures along specific segments of the plate boundaries then provide the basis to make probabilistic estimates of the next expected time of seismic shaking due to plate boundary earthquakes. When data are too few to document the average repeat times of rupture, the estimates of probability are calculated with data relating to the relative coseismic slip during past earthquakes and the rate of interseismic strain accumulation, interpreted within the framework of the time predictable model of earthquake occurrence. Results are displayed as maps of instantaneous seismic hazard: the probability that seismic shaking will occur conditional to knowledge of where in time each fault in a region presently resides with respect to the earthquake cycle.


The article aims to analyse whether the National Security Act in South Korea has been used to restrict freedom of expression under the justification for protecting national security. It also focuses on studying whether criminal defamation and insult has been abused or misused by the state to limit freedom of expression and if so, what will be a legislative alternative for the abuse. Major three arguments of the article are as below. First of all, restriction on freedom of expression on the ground of national security shall only be based on a clear and specific law so that arbitrary interpretation is not made. Based on international human rights standards, application of the law to legitimately restrict freedom of expression should be extremely careful so that it does not harm other public interests. Also, expressing opinion on historical facts should not be subject to restriction. However, the National Security Act is often arbitrarily and excessively applied in South Korea and it is even applied to restrict expressing opinions on historical fact. Therefore, the National Security Act should be abolished, as repeatedly recommended by various international human rights bodies. Secondly, regarding defamation charges, freedom of expression should not be restricted when opinion is expressed for public interest and based on facts. According to international human rights standards, even if it is based on false information, criticising public figure can be restricted only when obvious malice is found. However, in South Korea, one can be punished by law even when he/she expresses an opinion based on the fact. Even though defamation charges can be dropped when fact is uncovered for public interest, this exemption is very restrictively and untimely performed. Therefore, charging a person who uncovered fact with defamation should be abolished. Lastly, international human rights standards state that insulting a public figure should not be punished, especially when a public figure holds a political power. In line with this, insulting government bodies such as administrative bodies or military should not be subject to punishment. However in South Korea, criticising the Government is often punished for defamation. Therefore, defamation should also be abolished.


This paper presents a solution to recovering the rigid transformation (rotation and translation) that brings two 3-D point sets into alignment, when the correspondences between the points are not known and there exist missing data. This is called the general 3-D rigid body motion problem (also known as absolute orientation problem). For ideal cases with no missing points, a closed-form solution based on eigenstructure decomposition is proposed to recover the correspondences of the two point sets and their motion. For general cases where missing points occur, this paper proves that the correspondence problem could be reduced to a weighted bipartite matching problem. Using a heuristic measure of point pair aanity derived from the eigenstructure decomposition, an eecient weighted bipartite matching algorithm is used to determine the correspondences. Outlier issue is explored. A fast outlier removal algorithm is combined with the weighted bipartite matching algorithm to improve the the correspondence recovery. The robustness of the algorithm to both noise and outliers is shown in simulations and experiments on data from real images.


Zinc tris-thiourea sulphate (ZTS) and divalent metal ions (Cd 2+ and Ni 2+ ) doped zinc tris-thiourea sulphate materials are synthesized from aqueous solution and single crystals are grown from aqueous solution by slow evaporation technique. The unit cell parameters of the grown crystals are evaluated by single crystal X-ray diffraction analysis. The powder X-ray diffraction patterns are recorded and indexed for further confirmation of crystalline nature of grown crystals. The presence of functional groups in the grown crystals has been confirmed by FTIR analysis. The incorporation of cadmium and nickel ions entered into ZTS crystals is confirmed from SEM-EDX analysis. TGA/DTA thermal analyses revealed that the materials have good thermal stability. Mechanical behaviour have been studied using Vicker's microhardness measurements. UV-visible transmission spectra have been recorded in the spectral range 200-900 nm to find the cut-off wavelength and optical band gap E g of grown crystals in non-linear applications. The nonlinear optical properties of pure and doped ZTS crystals were confirmed by Kurtz Perry powder method using Nd:YAG laser source.


This paper is a specific cost-benefit study concerning 25-64 years people flu vaccination. For this active population the vaccination rate is only 12% and the cost of absenteeism is potentially high. To make the balance between prevention costs and (direct and indirect) avoided costs by the vaccine, we use a basic case with mean value parameters as: efficacy rate of vaccine, impact of epidemics, size of vaccinated population, immunization length and compensation rate of the so-called production losses. These parameters are then supposed to vary in a sensitivity analysis. In any case net benefit of vaccination appears, which size varies mainly in relation to epidemics and vaccinated population extents. But improvements are to be achieved for giving more precise values to "real" efficacy rate of vaccination and effective economic impact of absenteeism on production.


Background Adalimumab (ADL) tapering based on clinical assessment is a usual practice especially in patients who have achieved clinical remission. Objectives To analyze how personalized management guided by biological drug monitoring (BDM) in rheumatoid arthritis (RA), psoriatic arthritis (PsA) and ankylosing spondylitis (AS) patients impacts the annual direct costs to the Health System and the quality-adjusted life year with respect to conventional practice in Spain. To evaluate the effectiveness of BDM in the reduction of the number of days with high disease activity compared with conventional practice. Methods In a pragmatic, non-randomized, non-inferiority clinical study, adult patients treated with ADL (40 mg sc) who remained clinically stable for at least 6 months were recruited in 3 sites. Patients were grouped in Control (CG) and Intervention groups (IG) according to the site. ADL frequency was adjusted based on physician criteria. Patients are assessed at 8 timepoints (8 visits) for up to 18 months. Trough ADL and anti-ADL antibodies levels are measured with Promonitor-ADL and Promonitor-ANTI-ADL (Progenika, SA). BDM data were released only to the IG, and blinded to the CG (managed according to clinical assessment only). Physicians in the IG were not obliged to follow any therapeutic algorithm based on BDM results but could use tests to alter doses based on their judgement. Endpoints include DAS28, BASDAI, BASFI and HAQ-DI scores at every timepoint. Cost-effectiveness will be evaluated according to associated costs and QALY. Results A total of 169 patients were recruited (disease, N IG, N CG, %) (RA, 30, 33, 37.3%; PsA, 33, 21, 32%; and AS, 46, 6, 30.8%). Median disease duration was 117, 98.5 and 101.5 months for RA, PsA and AS, respectively. At baseline, 10 (16.7%) and 29 (26.6%) patients had low disease activity, 50 (83.3%) and 80 (73.4%) patients were in remission, and median trough ADL levels were 5,5 and 5,3 mg/L in the CG and IG, respectively. Mean follow-up (FU) was 505 and 499 days in the CG and IG, respectively. ADL doses were tapered in 22/60 (36,7%) and 39/109 (35,8%) patients in the CG and IG, respectively. Patients were in remission an average of 329 vs 344 days in the CG and IG, respectively. The number of flares in the CG and IG was 53 and 69, respectively. The rate of flares per patient-year of FU is 0,639 vs 0,463 in the CG and IG, respectively (difference of -0,176; CI95%: -0,379 to 0,0289). The risk of flare is 27,5% lower in the IG (IRR=0,7252; CI95%: 0,4997 to 1,0578). Quality of life (EQ-5D-5L) was significantly better in the IG at visits 2 (p=0,001) and 3 (p=0,035); EQ-5D-5L was higher (although not statistically significant) in the IG in the remaining visits. Average cost of ADL per patient-year was 11.898,60€ vs 11.240,81€ (-657.78€) in the CG and IG, respectively. Conclusions Preliminary results show that rheumatic patients have better quality of life, lower risk of flares and incur in lower treatment costs if patient management is complemented with BDM data. Disclosure of Interest E. Ucar: None declared, Í. Gorostiza: None declared, C. Gόmez: None declared, C. Pérez: None declared, J. De Dios: None declared, B. Alvárez: None declared, A. Ruibal: None declared, C. Stoye: None declared, M. Vasques: None declared, J. Belzunegui: None declared, A. Escobar: None declared, Z. Trancho: None declared, A. Ruiz del Agua Employee of: Employee of Progenika Grifols, A. Martínez Employee of: Employee of Progenika Grifols, C. Jorquera: None declared, D. Nagore Employee of: Employee of Progenika Grifols


Localized travelling waves to reaction-diffusion systems on the real line are investigated. The issue addressed in this work is the transition to instability which arises when the essential spectrum crosses the imaginary-axis. In the first part of this work, it has been shown that large modulated pulses bifurcate near the onset of instability; they are a superposition of the primary pulse with spatially periodic Turing patterns of small amplitude. The bifurcating modulated pulses can be parametrized by the wavelength of the Turing patterns. Furthermore, they are time periodic in a moving frame. In the second part, spectral stability of the bifurcating modulated pulses is addressed. It is shown that the modulated pulses are spectrally stable if and only if the small Turing patterns are spectrally stable, that is, if their continuous spectrum only touches the imaginary-axis at zero. This requires an investigation of the period map associated with the time-periodic modulated pulses.


Hemodynamic forces play an important role in vascular pathology, particularly in relation to the localization of atherosclerotic lesions and plaque structure. Rapid advances in clinical imaging modalities and more sophisticated methods for assessment of blood flow in conjunction with the development of computational fluid dynamics (CFD) offers the possibility to predict and study flow in the vascular system. It is expected that image-based simulation of flow dynamics and progress in CFD technology may be an important and effective tool for biomechanical research on a new research field of atherosclerosis pathophysiology, risk stratification of plaque progression, prediction of in-stent neointimal hyperplasia and degeneration of bypasses. The paper presents basic data describing components of CFD processing and the emerging applications of CFD in cardiology in the example of pulsatile blood flow simulation in the left coronary artery. The plaque distribution and stability are discussed in relation to local wall shear stress.


This paper investigates the integration of Concentrating Solar Power technology in Combined Cycles for power production. Starting from a state of the art of CSP plants, the paper investigates alternative plant configurations, assessed and compared with a through-life thermoeconomic analysis. Plant layouts include thermal storage to manage the load demand of the plant throughout the day, considering both variable solar input and variable power demand. Focus is on the impact of thermal storage devices on optimal layouts.The hybrid combined CSP plants are analyzed using original software tools, WTEMP for the design point analysis and WECoMP for the time-dependent thermoeconomic optimization, to take into proper account the time-dependent nature of both the electrical load demand and the hour-by-hour irradiation during the year.The analysis shows that combining CSP technology with existing combined cycles a significant reduction of fuel consumption and greenhouse gas emissions is obtained, with an optimal solar share factor of about 20%, providing the grid with fully dispatchable power generation.Copyright © 2014 by ASME


In recent decade, potential application of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV) has enabled replacement of various operations in hard-to-access areas, such as, inspection, surveillance or search and rescue applications in challenging and complex environments. Furthermore, aerial robotics application with multi-agent systems are anticipated to further extend its potential. However, one of the major difficulties in aerial robotics applications is the testing of the elaborated system within safety concerns, especially when multiple agents are simultaneously applied. Thus, virtual prototyping and simulation-based development can serve in development, assessment and improvement of the aerial robot applications. In this research, two examples of the specific applications are highlighted, harbor structure and facilities inspection with UAV, and development of autonomous positioning of multi-UAVs communication relaying system. In this research, virtual prototype was designed and further simulated in multi-body simulation (MBS) feigning the sensing and actuating equipment behaviors. Simultaneous simulation of the control and application system running with software in the loop (SITL) method is utilized to assess the designed hardware behavior with modular application nodes running in Robot Operating System. Furthermore, prepared simulation environment is assessed with multi-agent system, proposed in previous research with autonomous position control of communication relaying system. Application of the virtual prototype's simulation environment enables further examination of the proposed system within comparison degree with postfield tests. The research aims to contribute through case assessment of the design process to safer, time and cost-efficient development and application design in the field of aerial robotics.


BACKGROUND
Exposure of the developing brain to ethanol disposes the fetus to fetal alcohol syndrome and causes a number of changes in several neurochemical systems. In particular, the glutamatergic system is affected by ethanol. Thus, increased sensitivity of glutamate receptors and enhanced transmembrane transport of glutamate were found in primary astrocyte cultures. However, in these in vitro studies, changes in the expression of glutamate transporters were not detected. To further characterize the influence of chronic ethanol exposure on the developing brain, we assessed the transcriptional and translational regulation of glutamate transporters in a less artificial in vitro system.

METHODS
We exposed postnatal rat cortical organotypic slice cultures to ethanol (100 mM) for 4 and 8 days. Expression of the excitatory amino acid transporters EAAT1 and EAAT2 was analyzed in comparison to untreated controls with semiquantitative reverse transcriptase-polymerase chain reaction. In addition, changes in protein expression were detected by Western blotting.

RESULTS
In ethanol-exposed cortical slices, we observed more prominent fiber outgrowth and significantly increased gene expression (EAAT1: +35%, p = 0.029; EAAT2: +251%, p = 0.015). These findings could be verified on the protein level, because Western blot analysis revealed significantly higher levels of EAAT1 (+76%; p = 0.008) and EAAT2 (+104%; p = 0.018) in ethanol-treated slices compared with controls.

CONCLUSIONS
Our results are in concert with earlier studies describing the induction of glutamate transport by ethanol. Enhanced expression of EAAT1 and EAAT2 after ethanol exposure can be viewed as a maladaptive process that disposes the developing brain to fetal alcohol syndrome.


As epitomised in the works of Renzo Piano, Frank Gehry, and Daniel Libeskind, the 'new museum' of art claims its own architectural typology. With asymmetrical silhouettes, gallery spaces that eschew the much derided 'white cube', and cleverly conceived circulation systems, the new museum has been heralded as revolutionising the display of art. Yet its function extends beyond the display and conservation of art. The new art museum is conceived as a multifaceted cultural centre – a public forum – where art and culture are democratised, and families, scholars, students, tourists, and teachers come together. At the same time, the new museum competes with other entertainment venues on a commercial level. As a cultural factory replete with an ambitious programme of temporary exhibitions, media facilities, restaurants, and shops, the new museum emphasises consumption as much as it does contemplation. In fact, the array of non-artrelated diversions contained in the new museum is often more important to the institution's success than the art itself.


The aim of this article is to shed light on a completely neglected subject, which is the relationship between the American copyright scheme and the status of the moral and economic interests of authors as possible universal human rights. Article 27 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, of 1948, proclaims two fundamental rights known as cultural rights: the general right to participate in cultural life; and the material and moral rights of authors with respect to their works. Cultural rights, like human rights in general, are based mainly on natural law philosophy, enhancing the individual rights that every person deserves wherever they are. This article explores these two cultural rights, their inter-relations and possible contradictions, and examines their status as universal human rights. Furthermore, I argue that natural law considerations, which underlie Article 27, can and should be introduced into American copyright law in order to develop copyright law in a more balanced way. Such proposal is reconciled with the interpretation of the United States Constitutional command to legislate copyright law in order to promote cultural progress as determining a utilitarian objective for copyright law. Thus, the importance of this article lies in the proposition of a mechanism to insert the agenda of Article 27 of the Universal Declaration into domestic American copyright law, in a way which is within the Constitutional framework.


This paper describes a method of estimating irregularities in railway tracks using acceleration data measured from high-speed trains. Track irregularities are the main causes of the vibration of high-speed trains and thus should be carefully monitored to maintain the stability and ride quality of the trains. A mixed filtering approach is proposed for stable displacement estimation and waveband classification of the irregularities in the measured acceleration. Accelerometers are mounted on the axle box and the bogie of a high-speed train to measure the acceleration in the lateral and vertical directions. The estimated results are compared with those of a commercial track geometry measurement system. Finally, the performance of the proposed approach and the relationship between the mounted location of the accelerometers and the estimated track irregularities are discussed.


We denominate "21st century bacteria" two types of strange and amazing creatures from the kingdom Protista, discovered between the last years of the twentieth and the present days: the giant bacteria and those with a possible Martian origin. Searching for them, bold investigators have travelled to distant and hostile lands, desolate places and deep waters, performing a kind of investigation that we only can describe as "investigation-adventure". This paper presents expeditions to the Red Sea, fishing the Epulopiscium; to Lake Mono, searching a bacteria able to growth with arsenic; to the Antarctic Circle, finding a meteorite with petrified alien microorganisms; and… to the quiet laboratory, a not less dangerous place.


The recently developed Unconventional Fracture Model (UFM*) simulates complex hydraulic fracture network propagation in a formation with pre-existing closed natural fractures, and explicitly models hydraulic injection into a fracture network with multiple propagating branches [1]. The model predicts whether a hydraulic fracture front crosses or is arrested by a natural fracture it encounters, which defines the complexity of the generated complex hydraulic fracture network. While taking into account the leakoff of the fracturing fluid into the formation, the leakoff into the natural fractures should also be considered, especially in low-matrix permeability condi‐ tions. The transmissibility of natural fractures can become significant, and the fracturing fluid can penetrate into natural fractures. Different regions can coexist along the invaded natural fracture: hydraulically opened region filled with fracturing fluid, region of still closed natural fracture invaded by fracturing fluid due to natural fracture permeability, and the region of natural fracture filled with original reservoir fluid. Explicit modelling of hydraulic fractures interacting with permeable natural fractures becomes extremely complicated with the necessity to account for conservation of fluid mass, pressure drop along natural fractures, leak-off into the formation from natural fracture walls, pressure sensitive natural fracture permeability, properties of natural fractures, fluid rheology, while tracking the interface of each region along invaded natural fracture. A main challenge is integrating this hydraulic fracture/natural fracture interaction modelling into the overall hydraulic fracture network propagating scheme without losing model effectiveness and CPU performance. © 2013 Kresse and Weng; licensee InTech. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. The updated UFM model with enhancement to account for leakoff into the natural fractures will be presented.


Human gait has been one of active research topics in the computer vision community for the last years. But most vision-based gait studies focus on gait classification and recognition purposes. Our research focus on computer vision gait analysis from the medical point of view as a means to deduce physical conditions of people and aid the specialist in diagnosing and treating gait anomalies. This paper presents the advances in the development of a low cost 3D surface scanner as a tool for human gait analysis.


Foamed fly ash geopolymer was synthesized in this work to produce geopolymeric lightweight concrete (GLWC). Fly ash was activated by sodium silicate solution, and aluminum powder was employed as an in situ chemical foaming agent. The synthesized pastes were cured at 40 °C for 28 days, with bulk densities of resultant GLWCs ranging from 600 to 1600 kg/m3. The resulting mechanical properties, thermal conductivity, microstructure, and reaction product were fully characterized. Results show that GLWC had higher mechanical strength than commercial aerated concrete and developed 80–90% of its corresponding 28 days strength after curing for 7 days. For densities from 1200 to 600 kg/m3, the thermal conductivity diminished from 0.70 to 0.22 W/mK, which is much better than that of its counterpart, ordinary Portland cement (OPC). Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) images revealed decent matrices comprising geopolymeric gel and unreacted fly ash.


Abstract Most proteins do not function alone but act in protein complexes. For several transcriptional regulators, it is known that they have to homo- or heterodimerize prior to DNA binding. These protein interactions occur through defined protein-protein-interaction (PPI) domains. More than two decades ago, inhibitor of DNA binding (ID), a small protein containing a single helix-loop-helix (HLH) motif was identified. ID is able to interact with the larger DNA-binding basic helix-loop-helix (bHLH) transcription factors, but due to the lack of the basic domain required for DNA binding, ID traps bHLH proteins in non-functional complexes. Work in plants has, in the recent years, identified more small proteins acting in analogy to ID. A hallmark of these small negative acting proteins is the presence of a protein-interaction domain and the absence of other functional domains required for transcriptional activation or DNA binding. Because these proteins are often very small and function in analogy to microRNAs (meaning in a dominant-negative manner), we propose to refer to these protein species as 'microProteins' (miPs). miPs can be encoded in the genome as individual transcription units but can also be produced by alternative splicing. Other negatively acting proteins, consisting of more than one domain, have also been identified, and we propose to call these proteins 'interfering proteins' (iPs). The aim of this review is to state more precisely how to discriminate miPs from iPs. Therefore, we will highlight recent findings on both protein species and describe their mode of action. Furthermore, miPs have the ability to regulate proteins of diverse functions, emphasizing their value as biotechnological tools.


A theoretical basis for modifying the currently popular nominal feedback rules is provided for the conduct of monetary policy so that they react to the forecasted inflation rate, instead of to current or past actual inflation. It is shown that such a modification reduces the risk of economic instability arising from the adoption of a nominal feedback rule, and thus produces results that are closer to the optimal solution. It is furthermore shown that given rational expectations, a forward-looking rule, and a money demand function that is not completely interest-inelastic, the optimal monetary policy entails some degree of policy activism. Friedman s constant money growth rule is therefore shown to be optimal only in a special case, i.e, when the money demand function is completely insensitive to the rate of interest. Empirical simulations are conducted, which support the view that forward-looking nominal instrument rules provide better performance in terms of keeping inflation closer to the targeted level. The simulations also provide a measure of the optimal degree of activism for monetary policy, as well as of the optimal forecasting horizon.


While there is very good epidemiological evidence for induction of thyroid cancer by radiation exposure in children, the risk for adults after exposure is still uncertain, especially when concerning relatively small radiation doses. A cohort of 27415 persons which in 1950 through 1964 had received x-ray treatment for various benign disorders in the locomotor system (such as painful arthrosis and spondylosis) was selected from three hospitals in Northern Sweden. A proportion of this cohort, consisting of 8144 persons (4075 men and 4069 women), had received treatment to the cervical spine and thereby received an estimated average dose in the thyroid gland of about 1 Gy. Standard incidence rates (SIR) were calculated by using the Swedish Cancer Register. In the cervical spine cohort, 22 thyroid cancers were found versus 13.77 expected (SIR 1.60; CI 1.00-2.42). The corresponding figures for women were 16 observed cases versus 9.60 expected cases (SIR 1.67; CI 0.75-2.71). Most thyroid cancers (15 out of 22) were diagnosed >15 years after the exposure. In the remaining part of the total cohort, i.e. those without cervical spine exposure, no increased risk of thyroid cancer was found (SIR 0.98; CI 0.64-1.38). The study strongly suggests that external radiation exposure of adults at relatively small doses increases the risk of thyroid cancer but also that this increase is very much lower than that reported after exposure in children.


Crosstalk effect is crucial for timing analysis in very deep submicron design. In this paper, we present and compare multiple scheduling algorithms to compute switching windows for static timing analysis in presence of crosstalk noise. We also introduce an efficient technique to evaluate the worst case alignment of multiple aggressors.


Many science writers think that taking drugs such as Prozac for depression betrays one's authenticity. This paper belies that notion, promoting the benefits of SSRIs, namely for the relief of depressive symptoms, which leads to a fuller and more meaningful life. Critics of Prozac and the SSRIs, such as Charles Barber, Carl Elliot, Nassir Ghaemi, and David Healy, decry the loss of sadness as a vital organ to one's authenticity. This organic authenticity it seems is the primary indicator that one is following his or her "true self." I argue that an unmedicated self, while suffering from depression, is not the true self and that rather the "true self" is that person who has been lifted from depression by medications such as Prozac, which leads to a more meaningful and productive life. As the number one cause of disability worldwide, according to the World Health Organization, the pharmacologic treatment of depression deserves respect and an open mind to those interventions that have been proven to work.


Single crystals of racemic lead tartrate dihydrate, PbC4H4O6·2H2O, were grown at 308 K by the gel method using silica gel as the growth medium. Differential scanning calorimetry, thermogravimetricdifferential thermal analysis, and X-ray diffraction measurements were performed on the single crystals. The space group symmetry (orthorhombic Pbca) and the structural parameters were determined at room temperature. The structure consisted of PbO8 polyhedra, C4H4O6 molecules, two independent H2O molecules, and zig-zag hydrogen-bonded chains along the aand b-axes linked by O–H···O hydrogen bonds between adjacent molecules. Weight losses due to thermal decomposition of racemic PbC4H4O6·2H2O occurred in the temperature range of 300–1600 K. We suggested that the weight losses in the ranges of 300–900 K and 900–1600 K were caused by the evolution of gases from 2H2O and C4H4O5, and the evaporation of PbO, respectively.


GlcNAc‐coated glycodendrimers, which are polyvalent glycomimetics, display strong in vitro affinity for the rat natural killer cell protein‐1A (NKR‐P1A), a C‐type lectin‐like receptor of natural killer (NK) cells in rats, humans and some strains of mice. Administration of these compounds in vivo results in a substantial increase in the antitumour activity with involvement of the natural cell immunity. To clarify the in vitro and in vivo fate of these molecules, we synthesized labelled glycodendron analogues of the previously studied glycodendrimers. Labelling with fluorescent tags enabled the localization of the glycodendrons in white blood cells, tumours and other tissues by using different imaging techniques such as fluorescence and confocal microscopy. These studies are useful for probing the mechanism of action and fate of artificial ligands and the cell receptors involved.


A method to detect the cloud signature (mainly the cloud liquid water) over the sea ice-covered Weddell Sea in the Austral summer season is presented. By using the polarization differences at the two high frequency channels (i.e., 37 and 85 GHz) of the special sensor microwave/imager (SSM/I), a new quantity called R-factor is defined. Using the R-factor, the atmospheric signal can be easily separated from the surface signal and, more importantly, the surface signal and its variation can be strongly suppressed, especially in regions with low ice concentrations. In regions with high ice concentrations, other sea ice parameters like snow cover play an important role as indicated by simulations using in situ measured sea ice emissivities and observed by the SSM/I. Under the assumption that the sea ice parameters remain sufficiently stable within a short period (e.g., ten days), a method is proposed to determine the background term from SSM/I measurements, allowing the detection of the cloud signature. A comparison with a known SSM/I cloud liquid water algorithm over the open ocean shows a high degree of correlation (0.958) among the cloud signatures detected by the two algorithms. On January 2 and 3, 1996, a low pressure system moved into the sea ice-covered Weddell Sea. Its cloud signature detected using the R-factor method compares well with coincident observations from both visible and infrared sensors.