For optimization and evaluation of image quality, one can use visual grading experiments, where observers rate some aspect of image quality on an ordinal scale. To take into account the ordinal character of the data, ordinal logistic regression is used in the statistical analysis, an approach known as visual grading regression (VGR). In the VGR model one may include factors such as imaging parameters and post-processing procedures, in addition to patient and observer identity. In a single-image study, 9 radiologists graded 24 cardiac CTA images acquired with ECG-modulated tube current using standard settings (310 mAs), reduced dose (62 mAs) and reduced dose after post-processing. Image quality was assessed using visual grading with five criteria, each with a five-level ordinal scale from 1 (best) to 5 (worst). The VGR model included one term estimating the dose effect (log of mAs setting) and one term estimating the effect of postprocessing. The model predicted that 115 mAs would be required to reach an 80% probability of a score of 1 or 2 for visually sharp reproduction of the heart without the post-processing filter. With the post-processing filter, the corresponding figure would be 86 mAs. Thus, applying the post-processing corresponded to a dose reduction of 25%. For other criteria, the dose-reduction was estimated to 16-26%. Using VGR, it is thus possible to quantify the potential for dose-reduction of post-processing filters.


Sexual assault survivors often feel traumatized by the care received in traditional hospital emergency departments. To address these problems, Sexual Assault Nurse Examiner (SANE) programs were created to provide comprehensive medical care, crisis intervention, and forensic services. However, there is limited research on the actual experiences and emotional impact of sexual assault survivors who seek treatment from SANEs. This qualitative study examined twenty rape survivors' experiences with forensic nurse examiners of a Midwestern SANE program. Findings suggest that SANEs provided survivors with care and compassion, clear explanations, and choices. Taken together, these positive experiences were perceived as "humanizing". However, some survivors perceived forensic nurses as hurtful when they were not provided with choices, explanation, and/or acted cold and distant. Implications for future research on SANE care and practice are discussed.


Background: Limited knowledge about the molecular mechanism of avian influenza H9N2 virus pathogenicity in birds as well as human hosts has limited the development of effective control against the disease. To overcome this issue detailed understanding of the infectious characteristics of the virus in host cells should be obtained. Objectives: In this study we examined the replication kinetics of H9N2 virus in a chicken hepatoma cell line to obtain insight into the pathogenesis of H9N2 viruses. Materials and Methods: The kinetic replication of H9N2 influenza virus in chicken hepatoma and fibroblastic cells was studied in the presence and absence of supplemental trypsin. High viral titers observed in liver cells in a short time correlated with the degree of cytopathic effects. To determine whether the ultimate outcome of infection results in programmed cell death, the infected cells were observed by the cell viability assay, DNA fragmentation, caspase cascade activation, and quantified lactate dehydrogenase release. Results: The degree of viability was significantly reduced in infected hepatoma cells. Observations of caspase activation and cell DNA laddering in infected cells were not indicative of apoptosis. The infected hepatoma cells released lactate dehydrogenase, which is consistent with cell death by necrosis. Conclusions: Taken together, these data reveal that cellular protease of chicken liver cells allows the replication of high yields of H9N2 virus in the absence of trypsin and also cell death in the infected cells is due to necrosis.


This review was carried out with the objective to study patterns of neurological, psychological and other physical consequences of COVID-19 in the long term. The guidelines of PRISMA (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-analyses) had been followed; 22 articles, published during January 2020 to September 2021, were selected. Original research, review articles, editorial and viewpoints were included. Google Scholar, Medline, and PubMed were searched through 2020 till 2021.Data collection in selected studies was performed mainly through the online survey, telephone survey, use of medical records, and patient interviews. This systematic review contains the studies conducted in the American, Asian and European countries. The major outcomes identified were the neurological, psychological, and other long-term chronic manifestations of COVID‐19. This review demonstrates that long-COVID has started to bring a huge wave of patients, the count of them being millions now, who can enter a phase of disability due to neurological damages if not treated during the early course of illness. Though more disabling than lethal, long-COVID patients with a neurological deficit is expected to overburden the healthcare system globally which is already been struggling to handle acute COVID-19 patients in this once-in-a-lifetime pandemic. Keywords: COVID-19, Neurological and Psychological symptoms, Physical Symptoms, Long-COVID.


Background Stelis (Orchidaceae) encompasses approximately 1100 species of epiphytic orchids distributed throughout the Neotropics, with the highest diversity in Andean South America. Sixty-two species were recorded previously in Mexico. Methods We formally describe here Stelis zootrophionoides as a new species from Chiapas, Mexico. To determine its systematic position, we conducted a morphological comparison with other members of Pleurothallidinae and a phylogenetic analysis of nucleotide sequences from the plastid matK/trnK and trnL/trnF regions, as well as the nuclear ribosomal ITS region for 52 species of Pleurothallidinae. Sequences of 49 species were downloaded from GenBank and those of three species, including the new taxon, were newly generated for this work. The new species is described and illustrated; notes on its ecological preferences and a comparison with closely related species are presented. Conclusions The new species, known only from one location and apparently restricted to the cloud forest in the central highlands of Chiapas, Mexico, is considered a rare species. This small epiphyte is unique among the Mexican species of Stelis by the combination of dark purple flowers with the distal third of the dorsal sepal adhered to the apices of the lateral sepals, which are partially united into a bifid synsepal, leaving two lateral window-like openings, and sagittate labellum. Stelis jalapensis, known from southern Mexico and Guatemala, also has the apices of the sepals adhered to each other, but it is distinguished by its larger flowers with lanceolate, acute dorsal sepal, completely fused lateral sepals (i.e. the synsepal is not bifid), and oblong-elliptic labellum. The phylogenetic analysis shows that S. zootrophionoides is closely related to other Mexican Stelis and corroborates previous suggestions that fused sepal apices have arisen independently in different lineages of Pleurothallidinae.


Humans can orient themselves in their 3D environments using simple 2D maps. Differently, algorithms for visual localization mostly rely on complex 3D point clouds that are expensive to build, store, and maintain over time. We bridge this gap by introducing OrienterNet, the first deep neural network that can localize an image with sub-meter accuracy using the same 2D semantic maps that humans use. OrienterNet estimates the location and orientation of a query image by matching a neural Bird's-Eye View with open and globally available maps from OpenStreetMap, enabling anyone to localize anywhere such maps are available. OrienterNet is supervised only by camera poses but learns to perform semantic matching with a wide range of map elements in an end-to-end manner. To enable this, we introduce a large crowd-sourced dataset of images captured across 12 cities from the diverse viewpoints of cars, bikes, and pedestrians. OrienterNet generalizes to new datasets and pushes the state of the art in both robotics and AR scenarios. The code is available at github.com/facebookresearch/OrienterNet.


The process of urbanization leading to the emergence of towns among the Tiv people of central Nigeria is traceable back to the pre-colonial setting up to the colonial era. In the pre-colonial setting, little settlements existed on the banks of the River Benue and Katsina-Ala. During the colonial era, as a result of the intervention of the Royal Niger Company, these settlements became trading stations thereby growing up into small towns. The further development of colonial infrastructure such as the railways and roads further accelerated the growth of these towns. The sitting of colonial administrative structures in these towns gave a further boost to the growth of population originated as towns. This paper will adopt the use of oral traditions and archival sources in studying the emergence of towns in Tiv society overtime


The in situ rate of egg production (B) and female size of Paracalanus paruus, a particlegrazing copepod, water temperature, and the concentrations of chlorophyll a and particulate nitrogen were measured in 31 collections from the euphotic zone of the sea off southern California. B was correlated positively with chlorophyll a and female size and negatively with temperature. A multiple regression of log B on chlorophyll a, particulate nitrogen, female size, and temperature accounts for 44% of the variation in log B. B was predicted best by an empirical function of food concentration when the food available in nature was considered to be phytoplankton rather than of all types of particulate matter >5 p. An index of immediate food limitation was derived from laboratory data as a function of food concentration. When applied to extensivk measurements of chlorophyll a in the euphotic zone, this index indicates that Paracalanus was often food limited and that food limitation increased along an onshore-offshore transect. Paracalanus was rarely food limited in Santa


Pacific halibut Hippoglossus stenolepis of known age were used to create a reference chronology of radiocarbon levels for the years 1944-1981. Levels of radiocarbon in Pacific halibut otoliths pre-1958 were among the lowest reported to date, but radiocarbon levels increased dramatically post-1960. Subsequently, this reference chronology was used to validate ages determined using the standard break and burn and surface ageing technique. These older fish were collected at a later date but were born during this period of rapidly increasing radiocarbon levels. Otolith cores were compared to the reference chronology based upon the presumed birth year determined from annulus counts and year of capture. The ages derived from both break and burn and surface ageing methods were determined to be accurate.


PurposeThis study aims to build context-specific measurement tools to assess first-year students' digital literacy skills. The purpose is to collect data to provide more meaningful skills support for new students and raise their awareness about the digital literacy skills fundamental to academic study.Design/methodology/approachA set of three scales were developed and piloted at the beginning of 2018 and 2019 fall semesters: (1) a self-assessment survey, (2) an online test to collect indirect evidence and (3) a set of performance tasks. In both rounds, the scales were examined for reliability and construct validity and improved accordingly. The third round, conducted with a different scope, enabled a final reliability check for the online test.FindingsThe results indicate that first-year students need support with higher-order digital literacy skills. Low performers tend to overestimate their skills, so self-assessment surveys fall short in providing needs assessment but provide evidence of awareness when combined with the other scales. Performance tasks provide direct evidence but are not practical with larger numbers of participants. An online test to deliver indirect evidence works well but requires careful reliability considerations.Research limitations/implicationsThe conceptual framework for digital literacies offered in this study was narrowed down to the immediate skills to maintain a feasible scope. The sample size was small in both rounds, but the findings gave insights regarding the skills under scrutiny. Similarly, the scales were subject to close examination and were continuously improved, and the imperfections were monitored carefully while drawing conclusions.Practical implicationsAll of the three scales are ready to be used. Depending on the purpose, they can be given to first-year students together or separately to define their needs for support. Both versions of the survey and performance tasks are presented in the paper, and the test can be found at this link: Digital Literacy Test for Preview.Originality/valueThere are three methods to measure digital skills. Although there are studies using individual or paired methods, this study is distinctive as it combines all three. While other scales to measure digital literacy skills exist, they are not appropriate in every context. Therefore, this study will serve as an example for those wishing to devise context-specific scales.


To the Editor.— Blair et al1provide evidence that low levels of physical fitness, defined by treadmill exercise performance, are a risk factor for future cardiovascular mortality, cancer mortality, and all-cause mortality in a population of predominantly white, middle-aged men and women. They suggest that if all unfit persons became fit there would be a significant reduction in the death rate. The observed decrease in cancer mortality is intriguing. Possibly preclinical cancer can influence performance on the treadmill by humoral, metabolic, and/or other factors. If so, the exclusion from analysis of cancer deaths that occur within 4 years of baseline should eliminate the probability of a confounding preclinical cancer effect. If most cancer mortality occurred during the first few years after treadmill testing, it would be suggestive of the poor treadmill performance that results from a preclinical cancer effect. Perhaps the authors can provide data on cancer mortality in


The structure and distribution of herbaceous species were examined in cultivated fields and in adjacent habitats in light of herbicide use and tillage. The diversity and vegetation cover of the herbaceous layer of hedgerows and woodland edges were lower on sites at which herbicides had been sprayed in recent years, probably due to herbicide drift during application on adjacent fields. Herbicide use and tillage had an impact on the species composition of the cultivated fields: there was a higher proportion of annual and introduced species in cultivated fields subjected to herbicide use and tillage than in fields that were not regularly treated or tilled. The species that were found only in non-crop habitats were primarily native and perennials, few of which were weed species, whereas a high proportion of the species found only in cultivated fields were annual and introduced species, several of which were considered weeds. Key words: Woodland edge, hedgerow, herbicide, tillage, weeds, life span


In the past, musical instruments were developed over long periods of time by skilled craftsmen. Today, most instruments are mass-produced. Design of musical instruments as mass-produced products requires using strategies which make it easier to identify customer needs and develop exact specifications. To develop useful specifications it is necessary to convert general descriptions into something which can be commonly understood and also be interpretable in terms of acoustic metrics. In this study, methods for analysis and specification of steady state parts of alto saxophone sounds were developed. Saxophonists' use of verbal descriptions of saxophone sounds was investigated. Sound stimuli were binaurally recorded. Judgements upon perceived qualities were made by saxophonists and non-saxophonists using the method of verbal attribute magnitude estimation. Perceptual dimensions were identified using principal component analysis of listening test data. Three prominent dimensions were found and described using the verbal attributes: 1) warm/soft, 2) back vowel analogues and 3) sharp/rough. The perceptual dimensions were modelled as linear functions of acoustic metrics. The results were validated through listening tests with new subjects and new stimuli. Based on the findings, the method was seen as an approach which can enhance the musical instrument design process.


The term primitive neuroectodermal tumor (PNET) names a group of malignant neoplasms of presumed neural crest origin; they are composed of round small cells, and may be centrally located or outside. The former are currently seen in childhood, mostly in reference to the posterior fossa, and include medulloblastoma and neuroblastoma. Outside of the central nervous system includes peripheral neuroectodermal tumor of the bone (PNET-B, Tefft's tumor), Askin's tumor, and even Ewing's sarcoma. We describe a case in a young adult, with extremely unusual spinal localization, in which histopathological and immunohistochemical analysis were done; also, a review of some features is presented clinical-histopathological issues concerning related.


Proceedings: AACR 104th Annual Meeting 2013; Apr 6-10, 2013; Washington, DC

Background: Growing evidences have demonstrated that the tumor microenvironment comprises a variety of stromal cells that play a crucial role in tumor progression and metastasis. Among them, cancer stem cells (CSCs) were a subset of the bulk tumor responsible for tumor development and metastasis. However, whether CSCs in cancer microenvironment could influence the characteristics of cancer cells has not been addressed. The present study is aimed to investigate the contribution of CSCs in ovarian cancer cell metastasis and signaling pathway that mediate CSCs effects. Material and methods: Ovarian CSCs were obtained from A2780 and SKOV3 cell lines by serum-free culture selection. Transwell and wound-healing assay were used to determine the ability of invasion and migration of cancer cells with or without CSCs in the lower wells. We next examined EMT markers at both protein and mRNA levels by real-time PCR, Western blotting and immunofluorescence analysis in the ovarian cancer cells before and after co-cultured with CSCs, or treated with rhCCL5; or blocking with control IgG, anti-CCL5, CCR1, CCR3, CCR5 antibody and NF-kappa B inhibitor. ELISA, Immunofluorescence and Western blotting were used to determine whether NF-κB activation was involved in CCL5-mediated EMT of cancer cells by CSCs. We further conducted an immunohistochemical staining of CCL5, CCR1, CCR3 and CCR5 in benign ovarian tissues, primary or invasive ovarian carcinoma tissues. Results: We found that co-culture of A2780 and SKOV3 cells with CSCs significantly promoted the migration and invasion of cancer cells in a cell number-dependent manner. Furthermore, in A2780 and SKOV3 cells, co-cultured with CSCs induced an EMT phenotype from cabblestone-like to spindle-like morphology, accompanied by down-regulated epithelial markers (E-cadherin) and up-regulated mesenchymal markers (Snail, vimentin, N-cadherin). We further found that addition of anti-CCL5 or its receptors (CCR1, CCR3, CCR5) antibody to the co-culture system of CSCs with A2780 or SKOV3 cells showed an inhibition of the invasion and migration, and EMT promoted by CSCs. Furthermore, treatment of A2780 and SKOV3 cells with recombinant CCL5 for 24 hours enhanced the invasion of cancer cells, and induced EMT in a dose-dependent manner. We also found that the expression of CCL5 and its receptors in invasive ovarian carcinoma were much stronger compared to primary ovarian carcinoma. Interestingly, we found the activity of NF-kappa B also increased in A2780 and SKOV3 cells when co-cultured with CSCs or treatment with rhCCL5; Moreover, NF-kappa B inhibitor significantly decreased the migration and invasion of cancer cells exerted by CSCs. Conclusions: Our results suggest that CCL5 derived from CSCs plays a critical role in promoting ovarian cancer progression by induction of EMT via the activation of NF-kappa B.

Citation Format: Bo Zhu, Haixia Long. Cancer stem cells enhance invasion of cancer cells via CCL-5-mediated epithelial-mesenchymal transition. [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the 104th Annual Meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research; 2013 Apr 6-10; Washington, DC. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2013;73(8 Suppl):Abstract nr 2807. doi:10.1158/1538-7445.AM2013-2807

Note: This abstract was not presented at the AACR Annual Meeting 2013 because the presenter was unable to attend.


Purpose: To compare isobaric with hyperbaric 9.75 mg bupivacaine injected intrathecally, and to evaluate the effects of subsequent injection of lidocaine 2% into the epidural space. Methods: Patients in group 1 (n=30) received isobaric 9.75 mg bupivacaine and in group 2 (n=30) hyperbaric 9.75 mg bupivacaine injected into the subarachnoid space in a combined spinal-epidural technique. They were undergoing urological, gynecological, orthopedic, gastro-intestinal or vascular surgery. Using a double blind technique, the followings parameters were measured: cutaneous analgesia to pinprick, motor blockade, time for two segment regression, time for complete regression of the motor block, quality of anesthesia. In 12 patients the effect of epidural injections of 3 ml lidocaine 2% was observed. Results: Motor and sensory block developed more rapidly (five minutes) in the isobaric group ( < 0.05) . Maximum upper level (T7 ± 2 ), two-segment regression (52 min in both groups), motor recovery (160 vs 157 min), and quality of anesthesia did not differ between the two groups. Thirty nine epidural injections of 3 ml lidocaine 2% were given in 12 patients 10 min after spinal injection, 28 were in the hyperbaric group (P < 0.05). Twenty six of the epidural injections produced an increase in sensory block of 0 or 1 dermatome, and 13, of 2 or more. Conclusion: The block developed more rapidly in the isobaric group, but both isobaric and hyperbaric 9.75 mg bupivacaine produced adequate upper levels of analgesia for surgery. The effect of epidural injections of 3 ml lidocaine 2% was usually minimal.


SUMMARY: The article revises the traditional conceptualization of the "Atlantic history" in the age of revolutions that also became the classic case for theories presenting nations as instigators of imperial collapses. Jeremy Adelman asserts that the study of imperial crises and the study of the origins of nationalism in colonial societies should inform each other more than they do. The article demonstrates how bringing these two separate fields of scholarship together, and questioning the tacit and not-so-tacit beliefs upon which they rest, can reframe the complex passages from empires to successor states, free from some of the teleologies of decline and triumph. First, presumptions about the inevitability of imperial decline in the "age of revolutions" have cast the tensions and upheavals of the period as a sign of the sclerosis and demise of transatlantic systems, when they might better be thought of as responses to imperial adaptations. There was little that was inevitable about imperial demise. Second, revolutions were imperial in nature; that is, they were part of empire-wide transformations in that they yielded new social practices in defining the internal life of sovereign politics, as efforts to put empires, and their parts, on a different footing in order to confront external pressures. Revolutions did not begin as secessionist episodes; "nations" emerged as products of tensions wrought by efforts to recast the institutional framework of imperial sovereignty.  These arguments suggest a different approach to the axial shift from Atlantic empires to nation-states. They raise the prospect of altered historical sequelae, the possibility of inversions and backslidings, historic starts that went nowhere and others that never caught on despite the efforts to impose national conventions and structures on them. If the nation-state is not considered the automatic post-cursor to empire, the variety of routes, including a host of "might-have-beens," needs to be restored to the narrative about the age of revolutions. Indeed, for many corners of the Atlantic world, what emerged from imperial revolutions was not the antithesis to empire, but the revitalization of the notion of empire itself; to many contemporaries, the nation did not necessarily define itself in opposition to empire. There was a sense of the politics of imperial revolutions, their "chain of disequilibria," which was more important than the cohering nationalist drive to bring an end to empire. In the age of imperial revolutions, events and their meanings were not so easily compressed into a notion of historical time that yielded to the emergence, if not triumph, of nations. The article reconsiders histories of Atlantic "imperial revolutions" in the light of this theoretical program.


Does this have implications for students' motivation and learning? It certainly does. In my research in collaboration with my graduate students, we have shown that what students believe about their brains — whether they see their intelligence as something that's fixed or something that can grow and change — has profound effects on their motivation, learning, and school achievement (Dweck, 2006). These different beliefs, or mindsets, create different psychological worlds: one in which students are afraid of challenges and devastated by setbacks, and one in which students relish challenges and are resilient in the face of setbacks.


A general formulation of nodal virtual work force computation for three-dimensional finite-element analysis is presented. For problems with objects touching each other, a special shell element is used and its implementation methodology is presented. It is noted that additional surface integration is needed when volume integration changes to surface integration. Numerical results are compared and validated using their corresponding analytical solutions.


Two new relative entropy quantities, called the min- and max-relative entropies, are introduced and their properties are investigated. The well-known min- and max-entropies, introduced by Renner, are obtained from these. We define a new entanglement monotone, which we refer to as the max-relative entropy of entanglement, and which is an upper bound to the relative entropy of entanglement. We also generalize the min- and max-relative entropies to obtain smooth min-and max-relative entropies. These act as parent quantities for the smooth Renyi entropies (ETH Zurich, Ph.D. dissertation, 2005), and allow us to define the analogues of the mutual information, in the smooth Renyi entropy framework. Further, the spectral divergence rates of the information spectrum approach are shown to be obtained from the smooth min- and max-relative entropies in the asymptotic limit.


Based on a series of data collected by Cassini-Huygens, we constrain the composition of the primordial bricks that formed Titan and quantify the chemical exchanges that occurred on Titan between the interior and the atmosphere since its accretion. Assuming that the bricks that formed Titan had a composition close to that of Enceladus and that of the planetesimals in the feeding zone of Saturn, we show that accretional melting generate an CH4-CO2-H2S - dominated atmosphere of more than 10 bars in equilibrium with a water ocean. The partial atmospheric pressure of ammonia remains low (< 0.01 bar for T< 300 K) owing to its high solubility in liquid water. Photochemical conversion of atmospheric ammonia into nitrogen is possible just after accretion but requires the water ocean remains in contact with the atmosphere during at least 10-50 millions of years. We show that most of the gas species, except N2 and 36Ar, released during accretion are likely to be re-incorporated in the interior during the post-accretional cooling phase, owing to efficient clathration at the water/ocean interface. During this process, xenon is predicted to be almost entirely removed from the primitive atmosphere and to be stored in the form of clathrate hydrate in the interior. The composition of gases released during the rest of the evolution is determined by the stability of each gas species relative to the clathrate phase and is expected to be dominated by CH4 and CO2, and to contain small amounts of argon and CO. It can be anticipated from our analysis that flows and deposits of CO2-rich materials would be associated to cryovolcanic events. Although the detection of 40Ar clearly support that interaction with the silicate phase has occurred during Titan's history, it is still unclear if significant chemical exchanges has occurred with the rocky core. Only detection of 38Ar and of the other noble gas isotopes by a future mission will permit to determine how the silicate phase has contributed to the volatile budget of Titan. Isotopic ratios in the surface materials (H2O, CO2 ice, organic matters, gas clathrate ammonia hydrate) will also permit to identify the probable volatile reservoir in Titan's interior as well as the release mechanism.


A general method is introduced for the rapid and simultaneous evaluation of each member of large encoded catalyst libraries for the ability to catalyze a reaction in solution. The procedure was used to select active catalysts from a library of potential polymer-bound multifunctional catalysts. From approximately 7000 beads screened (3150 distinct catalysts), 23 beads were selected for catalysis of an acylation reaction. Kinetic experiments indicate that the most strongly selected beads are also the most efficient catalysts.


In this paper, we study physical adversarial attacks on object detectors in the wild. Prior arts on this matter mostly craft instance-dependent perturbations only for rigid and planar objects. To this end, we propose to learn an adversarial pattern to effectively attack all instances belonging to the same object category (e.g., person, car), referred to as Universal Physical Camouflage Attack (UPC). Concretely, UPC crafts camouflage by jointly fooling the region proposal network, as well as misleading the classifier and the regressor to output errors. In order to make UPC effective for articulated non-rigid or non-planar objects, we introduce a set of transformations for the generated camouflage patterns to mimic their deformable properties. We additionally impose optimization constraint to make generated patterns look natural for human observers. To fairly evaluate the effectiveness of different physical-world attacks on object detectors, we present the first standardized virtual database, AttackScenes, which simulates the real 3D world in a controllable and reproducible environment. Extensive experiments suggest the superiority of our proposed UPC compared with existing physical adversarial attackers not only in virtual environments (AttackScenes), but also in real-world physical environments. Codes, models, and demos are publicly available at this https URL.


Fatigue in muscles is a reason for the low skill performance of soccer players so this study sought to find out the effect of the quadriceps muscle fatigue resulting from an isotonic contraction on some kinematic variables and the accuracy of soccer players' execution of the corner kick. A test for the accuracy of the corner kick and the leg press exercise was used on a sample of 8 international soccer players, and their means were as follows: age: 26.8 ±2.3 years, height: 174 ±12 cm, mass: 71 ±6 kg, training age: 14.6 ±1.8 years. The performance of the corner kick test was videotaped by three cameras and Kinovea program for kinematic analysis was used. The results showed a negative effect of the quadriceps muscle fatigue after isotonic contractions on kinematic variables and on the accuracy of corner kicks. The study results point to the necessity of enhancing the ability of soccer players in terms of endurance of muscle strength in the quadriceps muscle to the highest possible extent due to the importance of that element in their skillful performance, including the accuracy of the implementation of corner kicks.


In the present work, we investigate the structural and luminescence properties of the bismuth tungstate Bi2WO6. This phase is interesting because of its electrical [1], photocatalytic [2] and luminescence [3] properties. Polycrystalline samples were elaborated using a coprecipitation technique followed by a calcination process at different temperatures (300, 400, 600 and 900°C). The samples were characterized by X-ray diffraction, scanning and transmission electron microscopy (SEM, TEM) analyses. The space group Pca21 has been confirmed for this phase. The transmission electron microscopy analysis showed that this structural configuration is valid at a very low scale. Crystal cell parameters and cell volume depend on elaboration temperature. Luminescence experiments of these polycrystalline samples were performed under UV-laser light irradiation. Luminescence intensities depend on the elaboration conditions.


In modern times, land is considered an extremely important commodity and much effort goes into the garden designing and landscaping process by the landscape architects. the process of landscape architects demonstrating the garden design to a client has been a tedious task. This is primarily due to the lack of domain knowledge, as a client would have to understand and visualize the arrangements of a garden and this may also be a haphazard process of landscape architects trying to express the idea using an existing software solutions which delivers a two dimensional view of the garden design. Thus, all of these issues are of utmost importance to be addressed since the process is very time consuming and expensive. This paper analyses numerous approaches to landscape designing CAD designing tools and critically evaluating research carried out on 2D and 3D based CAD designing tools. for the purpose of this study, few interior designing tools/approaches also have been critically evaluated. Various logical considerations are also explored and comments have been presented.


Abstract. The ethmoidal region of the skull houses one of the most important sense organs of mammals, the sense of smell. Investigation of the ontogeny and comparative anatomy of internal nasal structures of the macrosmatic order Scandentia is a significant contribution to the understanding of the morphotype of Scandentia with potential implications for our understanding of the primate nasal morphological pattern. For the first time perinatal and adult stages of Ptilocercus lowii and selected Tupaia species were investigated by serial histological sections and high-resolution computed tomography (μCT), respectively. Scandentia show a very common olfactory turbinal pattern of small mammals in having two frontoturbinals, three ethmoturbinals, and one interturbinal between the first and second ethmoturbinal. This indicates a moderately developed sense of smell (moderately macrosmatic). The observed septoturbinal is probably an apomorphic character of Scandentia. A general growth in length occurs during postnatal ontogeny; thus the adult ethmoidal region is proportionally longer compared to the rest of the skull. Throughout ontogeny Ptilocercus has a proportionally longer nasal cavity than Tupaia. Major differences exist between Ptilocercus and Tupaia in regard to the proportions of the nasal cavity which correlate with the position of the orbits. Compared to Tupaia, Ptilocercus shows more anteriorly oriented orbits and has a proportionally longer nasal capsule than Tupaia and based on anatomy probably a higher level of olfactory discrimination. Furthermore, Ptilocercus has a platybasic skull base that resembles a derived feature of Ptilocercidae. In contrast, Tupaia has a distinct septum interorbitale leading to a tropibasic skull, a pattern that is a plesiomorphic character of Tupaiidae and Scandentia in general. This finding helps us to understand the septum interorbitale pattern in Primates. Our results indicate that differences among the investigated Scandentia species are correlated with adaptations to foraging and behavioural biology.


CONTEXT
Thyroid growth is regulated by TSH and requires mammalian target of rapamycin (mTOR). Thyroid cancers frequently exhibit mutations in MAPK and/or phosphoinositol-3-kinase-related kinase effectors.

OBJECTIVE
The objective of the study was to explore the contribution of RET/PTC, RAS, and BRAF to mTOR regulation and response to mTOR inhibitors.

METHODS
PCCL3 cells conditionally expressing RET/PTC3, HRAS(G12V), or BRAF(V600E) and human thyroid cancer cells harboring mutations of these genes were used to test pathways controlling mTOR and its requirement for growth.

RESULTS
TSH/cAMP-induced growth of PCCL3 cells requires mTOR, which is stimulated via protein kinase A in a MAPK kinase (MEK)- and AKT-independent manner. Expression of RET/PTC3, HRAS(G12V), or BRAF(V600E) in PCCL3 cells induces mTOR but does not entirely abrogate the cAMP-mediated control of its activity. Acute oncoprotein-induced mTOR activity is regulated by MEK and AKT, albeit to differing degrees. By contrast, mTOR was not activated by TSH/cAMP in human thyroid cancer cells. Tumor genotype did not predict the effects of rapamycin or the mTOR kinase inhibitor AZD8055 on growth, with the exception of a PTEN-null cell line. Selective blockade of MEK did not influence mTOR activity of BRAF or RAS mutant cells. Combined MEK and mTOR kinase inhibition was synergistic on growth of BRAF- and RAS-mutant thyroid cancer cells in vitro and in vivo.

CONCLUSION
Thyroid cancer cells lose TSH/cAMP dependency of mTOR signaling and cell growth. mTOR activity is not decreased by the MEK or AKT inhibitors in the RAS or BRAF human thyroid cancer cell lines. This may account for the augmented effects of combining the mTOR inhibitors with selective antagonists of these oncogenic drivers.


H.264 is the newest video coding standard and has achieved a significant improvement in coding efficiency. The entropy coding methods used in H.264 are CAVLC and CABAC. Although these two variable length code methods can achieve high compression, they are very sensitive to channel errors. This paper presents a joint source-channel MAP (maximum a posteriori probability) decoding method to dealing with this sensitivity to channel errors and applied it to the decoding of the motion vector in H.264 coded video stream. Although H.264 codec has proposed several error resilience methods, we believe this method could provide additional error resilience to H.264 stream. Experiment indicates that our JSCD achieves significant improvement than a separate scheme.


Aneuploidy is a ubiquitous feature of human tumors, but the acquisition of aneuploidy is typically detrimental to cellular fitness. To investigate how aneuploidy could contribute to tumor growth, we triggered periods of chromosomal instability (CIN) in human cells and then exposed them to a variety of different culture environments. While chromosomal instability was universally detrimental under normal growth conditions, we discovered that transient CIN reproducibly accelerated the ability of cells to adapt and thrive in the presence of anti-cancer therapeutic agents. Single-cell sequencing revealed that these drug-resistant populations recurrently developed specific whole-chromosome gains and losses. We independently derived one aneuploidy that was frequently recovered in cells exposed to paclitaxel, and we found that this chromosome loss event was sufficient to decrease paclitaxel sensitivity. Finally, we demonstrated that intrinsic levels of CIN correlate with poor responses to a variety of systemic therapies in a collection of patient-derived xenografts. In total, our results show that while chromosomal instability generally antagonizes cell fitness, it also provides phenotypic plasticity to cancer cells that can allow them to adapt to diverse stressful environments. Moreover, our findings suggest that aneuploidy may function as an under-explored cause of therapy failure in human tumors.


This study aimed to evaluate the advantages of using a high-powered ultrasonic vibration cutting device (HP-UVCD) in orthognathic surgeries. We analyzed 22 consecutive patients who underwent Le FortⅠosteotomy and bilateral sagittal split osteotomies for cleft lip and palate. We used conventional power instruments, such as reciprocating saws and rotating burrs in the first 10 patients, and an HP-UVCD in the remaining 12 patients. Surgical time, intraoperative blood loss, and postoperative inferior alveolar nerve affection were retrospectively investigated. The surgical time in the ultrasonic group (223±12.217 min) was significantly shorter than that in the conventional group (278±11.153 min, P=0.008). The amount of intraoperative blood loss in the ultrasonic group was an average of 230±45.154 g, and that in the conventional group was an average of 343±49.463 g. Although the blood loss in the ultrasonic group was reduced compared with that in the conventional group, this difference was not statistically significant (P=0.118). All patients in both groups recovered normal sensation by 6 months postoperatively. Our findings suggest that the HP-UVCD can be used in place of a reciprocating saw or rotating burrs in orthognathic surgeries, resulting in reduced surgical time and minimal blood loss. The use of an ultrasonic bone-cutting device may allow for a safer and less invasive orthognathic surgery.


Microbial resources from the human gut may find use in various applications, such as empirical research on the microbiome, the development of probiotic products, and bacteriotherapy. Due to the development of "culturomics", the number of pure bacterial cultures obtained from the human gut has significantly increased since 2012. However, there is still a considerable number of human gut microbes to be isolated and cultured. Thus, to improve the efficiency of obtaining microbial resources from the human gut, some constraints of the current methods, such as labor burden, culture condition, and microbial targetability, still need to be optimized. Here, we overview the general knowledge and recent development of culturomics for human gut microorganisms. Furthermore, we discuss the optimization of several parts of culturomics including sample collection, sample processing, isolation, and cultivation, which may improve the current strategies.


We provide a qualitative review of key X–ray spectral diagnostics of astrophysical plasmas. We begin with a brief discussion of the two major types of equilibria, collisional ionization and photoionization, and then consider the behaviour of hydrogen–like, helium–like, iron L–shell and iron K–shell transitions for these separate cases. Where possible, we discuss explicit examples using high–resolution spectra acquired by the grating instruments on the Chandra and XMM–Newton observatories.


Bulk loading of neurons with fluorescent calcium indicators in transparent albino Xenopus tadpoles offers a rapid and easy method for tracking sensory-evoked activity in large numbers of neurons within an awake developing brain circuit. In vivo two-photon time-lapse imaging of an image plane through the optic tectum allows defining receptive field properties from visual-evoked responses for studies of single-neuron and network-level encoding and plasticity. Here, we describe loading the Xenopus tadpole optic tectum with the membrane-permeable AM ester of Oregon Green 488 BAPTA-1 (OGB-1 AM) for in vivo imaging experiments.


In application of remote sensing technology, the type and character of major geologic hazards, as collapse, landslide and mudflow of Hebei mountain region are primarily studied, which is laid the basis to present a schedule of type classification of most dangerous geologic hazards. Beside, regional delimitation of growing degree of hazard in mountain area is carried out by adopting multivariant discriminate method, and individual sections need to be monitoring and protecting are delineated.


Traumatic brain injury (TBI) causes a variety of neuropathological manifestations including cognitive, emotional, physiological and psychological deficits. Physical exercise is known to ameliorate neurological impairments induced by various brain injuries. We investigated the effects of treadmill exercise on memory impairments due to TBI in relation to dopamine and D2 dopamine receptor. TBI was induced with an electromagnetic-controlled cortical impact device. The rats in the exercise groups were scheduled to run on a treadmill for 30 min once a day for 28 days after TBI induction. Then, step-down avoidance task, radial 8-arm maze test, immunohistochemistry for tyrosine hydroxylase (TH), and western blot for D2 dopamine receptor were performed. TBI impaired short-term and spatial learning memories. TBI decreased TH expressions in the prefrontal cortex (PFC), striatum, hippocampus dentate gyrus, and substantia nigra (SN). By contrast, the expressions of D2 dopamine receptor in the PFC, striatum, hippocampus, and SN were increased by TBI. Treadmill exercise alleviated the impairments of short-term and spatial learning memories observed in TBI rats. TH expression was decreased and D2 dopamine receptor expression was increased in TBI rats. Treadmill exercise enhanced TH expression and suppressed D2 dopamine receptor expression in TBI rats. TBI deteriorated short-term and spatial learning memories, in contrast, treadmill exercise alleviated the TBI-induced memory impairments by up-regulating dopamine level and down-regulating D2 dopamine receptor expression.


Abstract The majority of patients who experience cutaneous adverse drug reactions (cADRs) concurrently receive multiple medications, meaning that the causative drug remains unidentified. We explored the association between human leukocyte antigen (HLA) alleles and cADRs, regardless of the allergenic drug, to investigate whether different drug-induced cADRs were associated with the same or similar risk alleles in a Han Chinese population. We genotyped a sample of 146 cADR patients and 230 population controls from the same hospital and systematically analyzed the association between HLA Class I genes and cADRs. The carrier frequency of HLA-B*46:01 in cADR patients was found to be significantly higher than that in population controls (P = .0021, odds ratio [OR] = 2.18, 95% confidence interval [CI]: 1.33–2.58). Subgroup analysis showed that HLA-B*46:01 was significantly associated with urticaria and erythema multiforme (P = .0077, OR = 2.53, 95% CI: 1.30–4.91; and P = .0049, OR = 2.77, 95% CI: 1.39–5.50, respectively). Furthermore, a significant association was also detected between HLA-A*02:01 and erythema multiforme (P = .0038, OR = 2.65, 95% CI: 1.31–5.33). This study is the first to demonstrate that HLA-B*46:01 is a risk allele for cADRs in a Han Chinese population, indicating that screening for HLA-B*46:01 prior to the administration of medication may predict the risk of developing cADRs.


The purpose of this article is to map the social landscape of the burgeoning fantasy baseball gaming phenomenon. This study relies upon two approaches: an analysis of the existing gambling literature to look for useful theory and research applications, and observations of fantasy baseball players to better understand their behaviors. The authors seek to provide an exploratory framework that will aid in the development of future theory and research on these phenomena.


This paper introduces the field of international textbook research and discusses how the WorldViews project is working towards enhanced access to textbook resources for digital humanities research.


CONTENTS I. Introduction 32 II. Synthesis of carbocyclic polymers 32 III. Synthesis of heterocyclic polymers 35 IV. Synthesis of cyclic copolymers 39


Naruto fruit was sampled at the beginning of maturation period, and lipid composition in their rind (flavedo) tissues was determined during storage. Effects of gibberellin (GA) and ethephon, and different storage temperatures were also investigated. During storage of the fruits at 18°C, decreases in glycolipid total fatty acid, particularly linolenic acid (18:3) content, and in mono(MGDG) and di-galactosyldiglyceride (DGDG) contents were paralleled by a loss of chlorophyll content. Neutral and phospholipid total fatty acid contents, and phosphatidylcholine (PC), phosphatidylethanolamine (PE) and phosphatidylinositol (PI) showed no consistent tendency during storage, although there was a decrease in phospholipid 18: 3 content. Free sterol content and sterol/phospholipid ratio increased markedly at a later stage of storage. GA treatment delayed the reduction of total (assessed by fatty acids) and major glycolipid contents. In neutral, phosphoand glycolipids, GA delayed the reduction of their 18:3 composition at the expense of oleic (18: 1) and linoleic acid (18: 2), while ethephon enhanced it by reducing a desaturation of 18: 2 to 18: 3. PC/PE ratio was increased slightly by GA and reduced by ethephon. Fruits were stored at 5, 10 and 20°C for about a month. Total fatty acid content of phosphoand glycolipid, and MGDG, DGDG, PC, PE, and PI content were negatively correlated with storage temperature. Free sterol content decreased as the temperature increased, but the sterol/phospholipid ratio remained unchanged. Lower temperature retained more 18: 3 composition for all lipid fractions, similar to the effect of GA.


It has been a year since the survey of Detroit school-children for organic heart disease was first undertaken. These children, numbering about 148,000, were first examined by their school physicians. Of the 148,000 children examined, 1,373 were found to have some cardiac defect at the first examination. Later the 1,373 children were carefully studied and classified under the classification recommended by the Society for the Prevention and the Relief of Heart Disease: Class 1. Patients with organic heart disease who are able to carry on their habitual physical activity. Class 2. Patients with organic heart disease who are able to carry on diminished physical activity. A. Slightly decreased. B. Greatly decreased. Class 3. Patients with organic heart disease who are unable to carry on any physical activity. Class 4. Patients with possible heart disease. Class 5. Patients with potential heart disease. Class 6. Those having no heart disease. Of necessity


estimates of immigration are certainly overstated, especially as regards thle immigration from Canada. So mucli, however, is certain, that 13.1per cent. of the population is foreign born; that there are at present over 2 millions who were born iin Germany, as many in Ireland, and about 1 million in Great Britain, these together constituting 9.5 of the whole people. The black or coloured population, being the product of slavery, is thinly spread along the middle zone, but densely in the south, constituting over 50 per cent. of that of Soutl Carolina, Mississippi, and Louisiana, little less in Georgia, Virginia, Alabama, and Florida, and over 15 per cent. from Delaware in the east to Texas in the west. Thei pure negro, though shlort-lived, is extremely prolific under the soutliern sunl, but the mixed or coloured race, slhunned by and shunning botlh black and white, is rapidly deteriorating and dying out. Dr. Lonigstaff speaks of intermarriages between whlite and coloured persons as being less frequent since than before the emancipation. Treating of the '. G'rowth of Mfodern Cities," Dr. Longstafl's observations are well worthy of attention on the part of a a certain class of politicians. " The tendency of people to flock into cities is," lhe says, " observed alike in old countries witlh increasing populations, such as England and Germany, and witlh a stationary population like France, in a new but populous country like the United States, but, perhaps, most strikingly of all, in very newly settled countries witlh small populations, such as Victoria, New South WTales, and even MIanitoba, the verynewest." "The causes," he adds, " are manifol(l. On the one hand, the application of machinery to agriculture has diminished the demand for agricultural labourers; and, at the same time, the increased use of meat as an article of diet (itself, he might have added, an indication of the growing prosperity of the working classes) has greatly augmented stock farming, which requires few hands. On the otlher hand, the application of machinery and steam have led to an unexampled development of manufacturing industries attracting labour from all parts to the chief centres of industry, the migration. . . . being immensely facilitated by improved means of communication." In MNanitoba one-fifth, in Queensland over a fifth, and in New South Wales a fourth, of the population lives in the capital; 'while in New Zealand one-third, and in Victoria two-fifths, is to be found in the four largest towns. In France the natural increase of the rural population greatly exceeds that of the towns, in many of which the deaths actually outnumber the births; yet, in the twenty-five years 1861-1886, the population of Paris has increased 38 per cent., Lille 42, Bordeaux 47, Marseilles 44, and of others from 25 to 30 per cent. Discussing the growth of London, Dr. Longstaff shows, by comparing the natural increase of the population with the ceinsus returns of 1871 and 1881, that though the population of tlhe central area declined by 74,000, at least 152,000 must have migrated from it, in like manner act least 260,000 settled in the inner and 198,00) in the outer ring. He says at least, since we know not lhow many " paired" or exchanged witlh others moving in the opposite directions. Our statistics of the foreign population of London are very imperfect; 60,000 at least are foreign born aliens, and an unknown proportion of the 19,000 " British subjects born abroad," manybeing Britislh only by naturalisation; half of the total foreigners in England are found in l ondon. Passing over a chlapter on Food Supplies and Some Suggestions for the Census, we come to the chapters dealing with medical statistics. lie finds the decline in the death rate to be mainly onw,ing to the greatly reduced number of deaths from fever and phthisis, concurrently with which there has been a real rise in those from diseases of the lungs, heart, kidneys, and cancer. The increased mortality from respiratory diseases is, however, not sufficient to account for the derrease in phtlhisis by different diagniosis, and this gain is the more valuable on account of the age of the lives saved and the health of their progeny. Tlhe tendency is to the prolongation of useful working life, but not, he tlhinks, to greater longevity, and the present increased mortality at advanced ages cannot be explained by the recent diminislhed mortality in early life. since lhalf a century must elapse before the latter can come into operation in such a wvay. He also makes the striking anid s,omewhat paradoxical observation that as a falling rate can only sink to zero, and a rising one may rise indefinitely, the ultimate result of the clhanges in the mortality from different diseases may conceivably be a higher total death rate than the present. Again, since the sanitary conditions of towns are in many respects better than those of villages, and the age constitution of urban populations is such as, cateris paribus, should be accompanied by a lower death rate than that of rural communities, the actual higher mortality of towns is connected with conditions of town life per se, of a nature not amenable to sanitary improvements. The discussion of the causes of summer and iinfantile diarrhcea and of the distribution of diphtheria present a mass of facts, evidence positive and negative, and exposure of fallacies for the further investigation of these problems rather than any decided conclusionis. His mathematical demonstration of the probability of a certain number of husbands and wives dying of phthisis within a few years of oine another as a mere matter of coincidence irrespectively of its communiicability, is capable of wider application to such questions as the alleged heredity of cancer. A remarkable outcome of Dr. Longstaff's study of the seasonable prevalence of fevers in Lonidon is the striking correspondence between the curves of typhus and so-called "simple continued fever," which the hiighest authorities believe in most cases to imply obscure and unrecognised enteric fevers, thougrh the curve of this last is totally different. Such books as Dr. Longstaffs appear but rarely, and if the selected writings of Dr. Farr constituted the basis of the science of vital statistics, Dr. Longstaff's essays exhibit it in its highest present development, and provide a mass of facts and materials indispensable to the medical statist, and of others which claim serious attention on the part of the statesman and the economist.


We describe the optimization of InP quantum dot material for laser applications, demonstrate some of the interesting physics that results from the nature of this material and describe initial results in promising application areas.


Quantitative studies of selected features of peripherally induced Rickettsia mooseri (= R. typhi) infection in Rattus norvegicus-derived white laboratory rats revealed a unique association between microbe and amplifying vertebrate host which appears to be especially conducive to maintenance of the enzootic cycle. Both adult and newborn (1-3 days old) rats were highly susceptible to percutaneous infection (ID50 = approximately 1 organism), but neither showed signs of disease or died even when inoculated with 10(4)-10(5) plaque-forming units. Gain in body weight of infected newborn rats was indistinguishable from that of uninfected newborn rats over the first 3 weeks of life. The course of the systemic infection, as measured by the rise and fall of R. mooseri titers in blood, brain and kidney and the serum antibody response, was almost identical in adult and newborn rats. Thus, despite their immaturity in certain immunological processes, newborn rats controlled postnatal R. mooseri infection about as well as did adult rats. The rickettsemic period of about 10 days corresponds to the period of infectivity of inoculated rats for fleas. Rickettsiae were not isolated from blood, brain or kidneys by methods employed for more than 4-5 weeks after infection. Serum antirickettsial antibodies persisted for at least 60 weeks postinfection, i.e., longer than the usual life span of rats in nature and, hence, are a valid measure of the cumulative experience of rat populations with R. mooseri infection.


The purposes: to define dynamics of indicators of heart rate variability in reply to a physiological load in group of patients with heart failure in compcerison with control group. We examined 230 patients on a complex of daily monitoring of ECG «DNA» with the program of heart rate variability at carrying out of scalene assays. With increase of class of heart failure at loads the power of VHF decreases (t=3,5) LF (t=5,1) and HF (t=3,7) increase, but, estimating dynamics of indicators between rest and load, insufficient depression of LF and HF, in comparison with normal group becomes perceptible. In group with high degree of heart failure of loads insufficient realisation of the sinus knot of sympathetic activation and insufficient depression of activity of vagus nerve observed.


This research is aimed to investigate the influence of the competence of audit committee on the relationship between the corporate ownership structure and reporting quality. We used secondary data, which is the annual report of listed companies at Indonesia Stock Exchange from 2013-2016 respectively. The sampling method is purposive sampling where the researcher obtained 116 companies as the sample. Data examination uses multiple linear regression analysis using IBM SPSS program (Statistical Program for Social Science) 20 in data processing. The results showed that family ownership, and foreign ownership has a positive but not significant effect on the financial reporting quality, while family ownership and audit committee competence has a positive and significant effect on financial reporting quality, as well as foreign ownership and audit committee competence has a positive and significant effect on the financial reporting quality. The result of this research is expected to be a consideration and recommendation for the firms to fill audit committees with people who have competence / expertise in accounting and finance and improve the ownership structure so that the monitoring function becomes effective and efficient in achieving the objectives of the conceptual framework of financial reporting which leads to reducing the manipulation of financial statements.


Aim

We evaluate the scale dependence of species richness–environment relationships with a continent-wide analysis of lichen epiphyte communities. Specifically, our goals are to assess: (1) the dependence of local richness on regional processes, (2) whether species richness is primarily influenced by heterogeneity in environmental conditions or the central tendency of those conditions, and (3) whether the relative influence of these different aspects of the environment differs between local communities and regional species pools.

Location

Forests of the contiguous United States.

Methods

We used variation partitioning and model averaging of linear models to relate macrolichen richness at 1923 forest inventory plots (c. 4000 m2) to measures of environmental heterogeneity and mean conditions at local and regional scales. Data included 17 local environmental variables and 11 regional-scale variables which were obtained from a national forest inventory, herbarium records and several climate data sources.

Results

Regional-scale variables explained more unique variation in local species richness and generally had stronger effects than variables measured locally. However, most variation in local richness was explained jointly by local and regional variables. At both local and regional scales, variables measuring environmental heterogeneity explained little variation in species richness and had weaker effects than variables characterizing mean environmental conditions.

Main conclusions

Species richness of epiphytic macrolichens is not regulated by environmental heterogeneity locally or regionally and instead tracks large-scale climate gradients of water availability and temperature. Richness in local communities is influenced by processes operating at both regional and local scales, highlighting the importance of determining large-scale drivers of lichen richness across the North American continent. This research demonstrates a general method for comparing the influence of different aspects of the environment on species richness across scales and should be applicable to many different taxonomic groups.


The central role of type-2 helper T (Th2) cells in the development of allergic responses and immune responses against helminthic parasites is well documented. The differentiation of Th2 cells from naive T cells requires both the recognition of antigen by T cell antigen receptors (TCR) and the activation of downstream signal-transduction molecules of the interleukin 4 receptor (IL-4R) pathway, including Jak1, Jak3, and STAT6. Little is known, however, about how these two distinct pathways cooperate with each other to induce Th2 cells. Here, we use a T cell-specific H-Ras-dominant-negative transgenic mouse to show that TCR-mediated activation of the Ras/mitogen-activated protein kinase pathway alters IL-4R function and is required for Th2 cell differentiation. The enhancement of IL-4R signaling seems to be a consequence of both direct "crosstalk" with the TCR signaling pathway and increased protein expression of downstream signaling molecules of the IL-4R pathway. Therefore, successful Th2 differentiation depends on the effectiveness of the TCR-mediated activation of the Ras/mitogen-activated protein kinase pathway in modifying the IL-4R-mediated signaling pathway.


Positioning an unknown location node can be performed either directly from the signals received at/from the reference nodes, or by estimating some position-related parameters in a first step, and then combining them in an optimal way to get the desired position in a second step. In two-step positioning strategies, different types of parameters can be considered such as the time of arrival (TOA) and the angle of arrival (AOA). On the other hand, Impulse radio (IR) ultra wideband (UWB) signals are characterized by their pulses shorter than 2 ns (bandwidth larger than 500 MHz). Such signals represent an excellent candidate for highly accurate positioning when the TOA technique is employed. In this thesis we consider the problem of parameter estimation for positioning using IR-UWB signals. We treat the general setting of non-linear estimation, study the threshold and ambiguity phenomena, propose some approximations of the statistics of the maximum likelihood estimator (MLE), and derive some approximate upper and lower bounds of the mean squared error (MSE). The obtained results are applied in the context of TOA estimation using IR-UWB signals, and exploited in the design of the pulses that achieve the lowest attainable MSE. We deal with TOA estimation in multiuser time-hopping IR-UWB systems. We introduce a new receiver that we call "delaying-and-multiplying" receiver, and propose a new estimator based on that receiver and named it "maximum delaying-and-multiplying estimator". We compute the asymptotic, local and global performances of the proposed estimator and compare it with some existing benchmark estimators. We study the potential of the proposed estimator in the presence of deterministic and random multiuser interference. We also propose a family of TOA estimators based on the discrete Fourier transform of the received signal for both AWGN and multipath channels. We derive the Cramer-Rao lower bounds (CRLB) for joint TOA and AOA estimation, for AOA based positioning, and for hybrid TOA-AOA based positioning, in UWB multipath channels. We investigate the impact of the overlapping between the different multipath components (MPC) on the joint estimation of the MPCs gains and TOAs. We also derive the CRLBs for the joint estimation of the TOA and the AOA in single-input-single-output (SISO), single-input-multiple-output (SIMO), multiple-input-single-output (MISO) and multiple-input-multiple-output (MIMO) systems. We present a testbed that we realized at Universite catholique de Louvain (UCL) for ranging and positioning by using IR-UWB signals based and employing the TOA technique. Two TOA estimators are considered: the MLE and a threshold-based estimator. We have studied from measurement data the impact of the multipath aspect of the channel and that of the shape of the transmitted pulses on the positioning performances. The obtained results are compared with the theoretical limits.


This paper draws attention to and raises questions about an area of executive incentive compensation, bonuses and non-equity incentives, which seems to have disproportionally rewarded executives while shareholders remain exposed to substantial ongoing economic risks. This area of focus has surfaced because, beginning in 2007 and continuing throughout 2008, financial services firms incurred massive losses, while in the years immediately preceding this deluge of losses many executives were awarded substantial bonuses and non-equity incentives. We assess the risks associated with such payments and build a framework for assessing how shareholder and executive interests diverge as a result of bonuses and non-equity compensation. Our analysis is also meant to serve as a building block for future empirical studies about the relationship between executive incentive compensation paid in cash (bonuses and non-equity incentives) and the financial misstatements and overstatements of income that were at the heart of the financial meltdown.


TiO2/SnO2 thin films heterostructures are grown by the sol-gel-dip-coating technique. It was found that the crystalline structure of TiO2 depends on the annealing temperature and the substrate type. TiO2 films deposited on glass substrate, submitted to thermal annealing until 550°C, present anatase structure, whereas films deposited on quartz substrate transform to rutile structure when thermally annealed at 1100°C. When structured as rutile, this oxide semiconductor has very close lattice parameters to those of SnO2, making easier the heterostructure assembling. Electrical properties of TiO2/SnO2 heterostructure were evaluated as function of temperature and excitation with different light sources. The temperature dependence of conductivity is dominated by a deep level with energy coincident with the second ionization level of oxygen vacancies in SnO2, suggesting the dominant role of the most external layer material (SnO2) to the electrical transport properties. The fourth harmonic of a Nd:YAG laser line (4.65eV) seems to excite the most external layer whereas a InGaN LED (2.75eV) seems to excite electrons from the ground state of a quantized interfacial channel as well as intrabandgap states of the TiO2 layer.


The Habsburg Empire was a sovereign dynasty ruled by the Habsburgs between the 15th and 20th centuries. Although its borders were not defined before the 19th century, what is now Austria, Hungary, some areas of the Czech Republic, the Netherlands and Italy were at some point part of the Empire. Starting in the 17th century, the Empire had Vienna as the capital, which was a hub for culture and craft where silk was a valued commodity. Despite the political and cultural importance of the Empire, little is known of its trade practices and sources of raw material. Using a combination of X-Ray Fluorescence (XRF) and High Performance Liquid Chromatography-Photodiode Array Detector (HPLC-PDA) for the study of a Viennese swatch book, we conducted the first systematic approach to understanding the industry. Benedict Codecasa, a prominent merchant active in Vienna between the late 18th and early 19th century sold silk and other textile goods. Authorized by the Royal Court, Codecasa was assumed to sell luxurious and high-quality textiles. However, our results suggested colored goods were dyed with more focus on aesthetics (finding a similar color) rather than quality through unique recipes. This greatly contrasts with other contemporary textile industries praised for their quality and which, in turn, might be related to comparatively lesser quality textiles sold in Vienna.


Background Dyspepsia and headache frequently co-exist, but the clinical implication of this association is uncertain. We planned to examine the prevalence and impact of dyspepsia in adults with headache. Methods A cross-sectional study was conducted in a secondary care setting. Clinical, psychological and health-related quality of life (HRQOL) data were compared between subjects with headache and controls (non-headache subjects). The impact of dyspepsia was analysed further in subjects with headache alone. Results 280 subjects (93 cases with headache and 187 matched controls) were recruited. The following baseline characteristics of subjects were as follows: mean age 45.0±17.3 years, 57.0% females and ethnic distribution—Malaysian = 45 (48.4%), Chinese n = 24 (25.8%) and Indians n = 24 (25.8%). Headache sub-types among cases with headache were as follows: tension-type headache (TTH) n = 53 (57.0%) and migraine n = 40 (43.0%). Dyspepsia was more prevalent in cases with headache compared to controls (25.8% vs 12.8%, p = 0.011), and headache was independently associated with dyspepsia (OR 2.75, 95% CI 1.39–5.43). Among cases with headache, there was a trend towards a higher prevalence of dyspepsia in those with migraine (27.5%) compared to TTH (24.5%). Subjects with headache and dyspepsia, compared to those with headache alone, had a greater severity of headache symptoms (63.67±22.85 mm vs 51.20 ±24.0 mm VAS, p = 0.029). Overall HRQOL scores were lower in headache subjects with dyspepsia (EQ-5D summary score 0.82±0.18 vs 0.90 ±0.16, p = 0.037 and EQ-5D VAS 62.08±17.50 mm vs 72.62 ±18.85 mm, p = 0.018), compared to those without dyspepsia. Conclusion Dyspepsia is associated with more severe headache symptoms and results in a lower HRQOL in patients with headache.


Background: Gastric cardia adenocarcinoma (GCA), which has been normalized as type II of adenocarcinoma at esophagogastric junction in western countries. In clinical, most of the GCA patients are lack of early alarming symptoms, more than 90% of GCA patients were diagnosed at advanced stage, resulted in a very poor prognosis, with less than 20% of 5-year survival. Obviously, early detection for GCA plays crucial role in decreasing the high mortality. Metabolomics allows for appraisal of small molecular mass compounds in a biofluid, which may provide a way for finding biomarkers for GCA. Methods: The serum metabolic features of 276 curatively resected GCA patients and 588 healthy control participates were collected from the database of State Key Laboratory of Esophageal Cancer Prevention & Treatment and Henan Key Laboratory for Esophageal Cancer Research of The First Affiliated Hospital of Zhengzhou University to discover the metabolic dysregulation by using the ultraperformance liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry (UPLC-MS). Joint pathway analysis with metabolites identified, survival analysis and auxiliary diagnosis metabolites were discussed in present work. Results: A sum of 200 known differential metabolites were obtained with p<0.05 and fold change FC≥1.25 or FC≤0.8 by comparison GCA and healthy control participates. 12 metabolites significant correlated with survival (p<0.05) and 17 metabolites for potential auxiliary diagnosis(FC>1.5 or FC<0.67) for GCA. Dysregulated arginine biosynthesis was an important pathway of GCA. 9 differential metabolites of 12-ketolithocholic acid, 2-Hydroxybutanoic acid, Aldosterone, All-trans-13,14-dihydroretinol, Hododeoxycholic acid, L-histidine, Malonic acid, Prostaglandin E2 and Sphingosine were identified as potential metabolic markers for distinguishing the GCA and healthy control (AUC=0.976, sensitivity =0.913, specificity =0.027, optimal cut off value=0.470). Conclusions: This work was first identified 12 metabolites significant correlated with survival and 17 metabolites for potential auxiliary diagnosis for GCA. In addition, arginine biosynthesis pathway metabolism showed important roles in GCA. Results provide the understanding of the molecular difference between GCA and healthy control. The novel plasma biomarkers panel could clearly distinguish GCA patients from the healthy control group. This finding may form the basis for the development of a minimally invasive method for GCA detection.


PURPOSE
To determine the usefulness of primary and secondary magnetic resonance (MR) imaging signs of osteomyelitis.

MATERIALS AND METHODS
MR imaging at 1.5 T was performed in 73 feet (62 patients) with clinical concern for osteomyelitis. Images were reviewed retrospectively and separately by two reviewers in a blinded fashion for primary (abnormal marrow signal intensity) and secondary (ulcer, cellulitis, soft-tissue mass, abscess, sinus tract, cortical interruption) signs associated with osteomyelitis.

RESULTS
Of the 73 feet, 43 had osteomyelitis. Discordant marrow signal intensity between individual MR sequences was observed by reader 1 in six (8%) feet and by reader 2 in 15 (21%) feet. For primary signs, fast spin-echo short inversion time inversion-recovery and gadolinium-enhanced fat-suppressed T1-weighted images had the highest sensitivity, and T1-weighted and gadolinium-enhanced fat-suppressed T1-weighted images had the highest specificity and least interobserver variability. Signs of cutaneous ulcer, sinus tract, and cortical interruption had the highest positive predictive value for osteomyelitis; signs of soft-tissue mass and cortical interruption had the highest negative predictive value. All had good interobserver agreement except cellulitis.

CONCLUSION
When osteomyelitis of the foot is suspected, marrow signal intensity can differ on different types of MR images. Identification of secondary signs may augment diagnostic confidence when abnormal marrow signal intensity is seen.


Rudist clams were a diverse group of large, atypical marine bivalves that evolved in the warmer waters of the Earth during the Jurassic and became extinct at the end of the Cretaceous. Rudists were generally gregarious and are considered to be the major reef building organisms in equatorial regions during the Late Cretaceous. Durania maxima is the only species of rudist known from the Smoky Hill Chalk where it occurs sparsely as single individuals or small groups, suggesting that it was at the northern extent of its range. Although specimens of this clam have been collected from the chalk since the 1870s, accurate stratigraphic data is lacking on the type and most other specimens discovered since that time. As noted by Williston (1893), Logan (1898), Hattin (1982) and Stewart (1990), D. maxima occurs most frequently in the lower (Upper Coniacian) chalk, and is present throughout the member. Relatively little work has been done on the occurrence of D. maxima in the Western Interior Sea, in part because it occurs outside the normal geographic range of rudists and does not constitute a significant part of the fauna. The history of the discovery and collection of this fossil bivalve in Kansas is reviewed, and two recently collected specimens are reported here with stratigraphic data.


Many scenes in real life can be abstracted to the sparse reward visual scenes, where it is difficult for an agent to tackle the task under the condition of only accepting images and sparse rewards. We propose to decompose this problem into two sub-problems: the visual representation and the sparse reward. To address them, a novel framework IAMMIR combining the self-supervised representation learning with the intrinsic motivation is presented. For visual representation, a representation driven by a combination of the imageaugmented forward dynamics and the reward is acquired. For sparse rewards, a new type of intrinsic reward is designed, the Momentum Memory Intrinsic Reward (MMIR). It utilizes the difference of the outputs from the current model (online network) and the historical model (target network) to present the agent's state familiarity. Our method is evaluated on the visual navigation task with sparse rewards in Vizdoom. Experiments demonstrate that our method achieves the state of the art performance in sample efficiency, at least 2 times faster than the existing methods reaching 100% success rate.


The present study aimed at evaluating the effect of a phytogenic mixture in the diet on broiler production. A total of 400 day-old unsexed Cobb broiler chicks were randomly allotted to four treatment groups of 10 replications in a randomised design experiment. The phytogenic feed mixture (BMC) contained equal ratios of black cumin, Moringa oleifera and chicory seeds. The treatment groups were as follows: T1 was fed the basal diet, while T2, T3 and T4 were fed the basal diet supplemented with 0.2%, 0.4% or 0.6% of three BMC mixture, respectively. Results showed that increasing the dietary BMC level could be associated with a gradual but significant increase in body weight and improvement in the feed conversion ratio when compared with the control group. Broiler diets enriched with 0.4% to 0.6% of the BMC mixture reduced gut microbial count of coliforms, E. coli and C. perfringens as well as gut pH, compared to the control group. Increasing the dietary BMC mixture level was associated with gradual but significant decrease in serum total cholesterol, low density lipoprotein concentrations and liver enzymes concentrations. However, there was an increase in the high density lipoprotein concentration, and glutathione peroxidase and superoxide dismutase activity in serum. In conclusion, the BMC mixture could be deemed an effective growth promoter, but further research is needed to evaluate it as a viable alternative to antibiotics. Keywords: blood, broiler, carcass, microbiota, oxidative status, performance, phytogenic


Water-in-salt electrolytes (WiSEs) are a class of super-concentrated electrolytes that have shown much promise in replacing organic electrolytes in lithium-ion batteries. At the extremely high salt concentrations of WiSEs, ionic association is more complicated than the simple ion pair description. In fact, large branched clusters can be present in WiSEs, and past a critical salt concentration, an infinite percolating ionic network can form spontaneously. In this work, we simplify our recently developed thermodynamic model of reversible ionic aggregation and gelation, tailoring it specifically for WiSEs. Our simplified theory only has a handful of parameters, all of which can be readily determined from simulations. Our model is able to quantitatively reproduce the populations of ionic clusters of different sizes as a function of salt concentration, the critical salt concentration for ionic gelation, and the fraction of ions incorporated into the ionic gel, as observed from molecular simulations of three different lithium-based WiSEs. The extent of ionic association and gelation greatly affects the effective ionic strength of solution, the coordination environment of active cations that is known to govern the chemistry of the solid-electrolyte interface, and the thermodynamic activity of all species in the electrolyte.


Abstract An attempt to improve the performance of rice (Oryza sativa L.) nursery seedlings through seed priming and its effect on the yield after transplantation was made in a field trial. Priming tools employed during the investigation include pre-germination, hydropriming for 48 h, osmohardening with KCl and CaCl2 (ψs-1.25 MPa) for 24 h, vitamin priming with 10 ppm ascorbic acid for 48 h and seed hardening for 24 h. All the priming techniques resulted in improved germination speed and spread, seedling fresh and dry weight, root and shoot length, number of secondary roots, seedling nitrogen, total sugars and α-amylase activity. Osmohardening with CaCl2 resulted in the best performance as indicated by improved germination speed and spread, seedling vigour and starch metabolism, followed by hardening and osmohardening with KCl. However, improved starch metabolism in coarse rice was observed in osmohardening with KCl. Higher K and Ca contents were observed in seeds osmohardened with KCl and CaCl2, respectively. Maximum straw and kernel yield and harvest index were recorded from osmohardening with CaCl2 in fine and osmohardening with KCl in coarse rice. Increased number of secondary roots and α-amylase activity were accompanied with increased seedling nitrogen and reducing sugars, respectively.


Despite recent advances in treatment strategies, the overall 5-year survival rate for patients with common epithelial cancers is poor largely because of the difficulty in treating metastatic cancers. Therefore, therapeutic agents are urgently needed that can effectively inhibit both primary epithelial tumors and their metastases. One such agent that has shown promise in preclinical studies is the tumor suppressor/cytokine, melanoma differentiation associated gene-7 also known as interleukin-24 (mda-7/IL-24). Preclinical studies from our and other laboratories have shown that overexpression of MDA-7/IL-24 causes a strong tumor- suppressive effect in many human cancer cells but spares normal cells. This gene therapy also enhances the tumor-suppressive activity of radiotherapy and chemotherapy. Secreted MDA-7 protein that is glycosylated also has been shown to have potent antiangiogenic activity both in vitro and in vivo. Studies examining the immune properties of mda-7 have shown that MDA-7/IL-24 unlike the related IL-10, functions as a Th1 cytokine. Recently, an MDA-7 protein-mediated "bystander effect" on tumor cells has been documented. Building on these findings we successfully completed a Phase I clinical trial of adenovirus-based mda-7 cancer therapy that confirmed the safety of this gene therapy. Phase II trials evaluating the efficacy of mda-7-based gene therapy are warranted. The outcome of such ongoing mda-7-based gene therapy trials will allow us to better understand this therapy's clinical utility.


Software bots are used to streamline tasks in Open Source Software (OSS) projects' pull requests, saving development cost, time, and effort. However, their presence can be disruptive to the community. We identified several challenges caused by bots in pull request interactions by interviewing 21 practitioners, including project maintainers, contributors, and bot developers. In particular, our findings indicate noise as a recurrent and central problem. Noise affects both human communication and development workflow by overwhelming and distracting developers. Our main contribution is a theory of how human developers perceive annoying bot behaviors as noise on social coding platforms. This contribution may help practitioners understand the effects of adopting a bot, and researchers and tool designers may leverage our results to better support human-bot interaction on social coding platforms.


This article explores how a temporal analysis of singlehood can contribute both to new conceptualizations of singlehood as well as to the study of social time. Prevalent interpretations of waiting single women offer a useful case study as they highlight the temporal organization of social life. Waiting is examined as an interactive setting representing and producing societal symbols, timetables, and collective schedules. Furthermore, this particular form of waiting is mostly featured as an unexpected delay and, accordingly, strengthens the widespread understanding of singlehood as a temporary and transitory life phase. Based on a content analysis, this article seeks to theorize some of the temporal aspects of singlehood, analyze its discursive implications, and study how it reflects and structures dominant discourses of family and social life.


The so-called congenital postural deformities were evaluated in the material of the Hungarian Congenital Malformation Registry, 1970-1976. Seven categories of postural deformities: dislocation of the hip, clubfoot, torticollis, musculoskeletal, other limb, face-nose and auricular were separated. The occurrence of the combination of dislocation of the hip, clubfoot and torticollis is manifold of random combination. These three postural deformities, however, are not associated more often with other nonpostural type abnormalities. Thus the congenital postural deformity association composed of two or more combinations of dislocation of the hip, clubfoot and torticollis without other major congenital abnormalities is treated as a provisional entity. Its birth prevalence is 0.4 per 1000 total births thus after Down syndrome it is the second common type of multiple congenital abnormalities. The aetiology and its higher sib-occurrence are explained by intrauterine maternal moulding factors.


Although genomics and genetic engineering are transforming the way we do science and the way we live, there is a distinct lack of understanding about the basics of molecular biology in the general population. We presentthe Genomic Analogy Model for Educators (GAME) strategy for making concepts in genomics easily under-standable for both students and the general population by using familiar objects and concepts associated withdaily life. These analogies have been turned into web-based tutorials and accompanying laboratory exercises that are intended to be used by students studying biotechnology, genetic engineering, or genomics at highschool level. These tutorials are expected to help students, as well as adults, understand some of the fundamental aspects of biotechnology and genomics.


Crop residues such as corn (Zea mays L.) stover are viewed as an abundant and inexpensive source of biomass that can be removed from fields to produce bioenergy. Assumptions include that with minimum or no-tillage farming methods, there will be no deleterious production or environmental effects. A long-term field study was established in eastern Nebraska, USA, to compare the switchgrass managed as a biomass energy crop versus no-till corn on a non-irrigated site, marginal for row-crop production, in the western Corn Belt. Our objective in this paper is to report on corn stover removal effects on corn grain yields and potential ethanol production in both cropping systems. Corn, under no-till management, and switchgrass were grown at three N fertilizer levels. In the first 5 years (2001–2005), removal of half the available stover significantly reduced corn yields. During that same time period, the potential ethanol yield for switchgrass was equal to or greater than the potential total ethanol yield of corn grain and harvested stover fertilized at the same optimum N rate. The effect of crop residue removal on crop productivity needs to be investigated in other agro-ecosystems and the potential use of dedicated perennial biomass energy crops should remain a viable renewable energy option on non-irrigated marginal croplands. Published by Elsevier Ltd.


Orbital involvement is one of the extramedullary manifestations in acute leukemia. It is common in acute myeloid leukemia, but rare in acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL). We described a 3-year-old girl who presented with progressive proptosis of the right eye and was later diagnosed with precursor B-cell ALL. Initial blood count showed Hb 6.9 g/dL, WBC 42,000/mm3, lymphoblast 50%, and platelet count 185,000/mm3. Bone marrow aspiration revealed 90% lymphoblasts with positivity for CD10, CD19, CD20, CD22, and HLA-DR markers. Computed tomography (CT) scan of the brain and orbit revealed a homogeneous enhancing mass involving the right orbit with intracranial extension. The cytogenetic study showed 46,XX chromosomes. After 4 weeks of induction chemotherapy for very high-risk ALL, although the bone marrow was in remission, the proptosis was partially resolved. CT scan confirmed a decrease in size of the right orbital mass and degree of intracranial extension. Unfortunately, the patient abandoned the treatment after the induction chemotherapy. The actual incidence of orbital involvement in ALL is unknown. Previous case reports describe diverse manifestations of orbital involvement in ALL. The involvement may be unilateral or bilateral, may occur at first diagnosis or at relapse, and may be seen in isolation or with other systemic symptoms. There is no standard treatment protocol. Chemotherapy with or without radiotherapy is generally suggested. The role of upfront hematopoietic stem cell transplantation remains inconclusive. The previously reported prognosis of ALL with orbital involvement is poor.


Australia's not-for-profit sector has fundamentally changed. The sector was once informally organised and unconstrained by the exigencies of commercial and government pressures; at its core there was a strong sense of affection. However, in recent times the sector has exploded to become first a highly organised, competitive space and subsequently a significant economic contributor. Participants in this sector are now de facto organisational structures which function and behave as an extension of the government or as a for-profit company. These changes in behaviour raise questions: are Australia's traditional not-for-profit structures out-dated, and is there a need to introduce a hybrid form of organisation? The starting point of this article is the significant change observed in Australia's not-for-profit sector. From here this article discusses the way these changes have made it an increasingly challenging task to clearly differentiate between traditional not-for-profit organisations, for-profit organisations and social enterprises. This challenge illuminates the complexity and scope of organisational behaviour that has blurred the sector's boundaries. Addressing this issue of blurred boundaries, the United Kingdom has introduced the structure of a Community Interest Company (CIC). Drawing on the UK experience and the identified changes in Australia's not-for-profit sector, this article argues that a new organisational structure such as a CIC is needed. Lastly, this article will identify the shortfalls inherent in a UK-style CIC structure within the Australian corporate framework, and suggests ways in which they could be overcome.


&NA; Nitrogen is a key nutrient for land plants and phytoplankton in terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems. The model alga Chlamydomonas reinhardtii can grow efficiently on several inorganic nitrogen sources (e.g. ammonium, nitrate, nitrite) as well as many amino acids. In this study, we show that Chlamydomonas is unable to use proline, hydroxyproline and peptides that contain these amino acids. However, we discovered that algal growth on these substrates is supported in association with Methylobacterium spp., and that a mutualistic carbon‐nitrogen metabolic exchange between Chlamydomonas and Methylobacterium spp. is established. Specifically, the mineralization of these amino acids and peptides by Methylobacterium spp. produces ammonium that can be assimilated by Chlamydomonas, and CO2 photosynthetically fixed by Chlamydomonas yields glycerol that can be assimilated by Methylobacterium. As Chlamydomonas is an algal ancestor to land plants and Methylobacterium is a plant growth‐promoting bacterium, this new model of mutualism may facilitate insights into the ecology and evolution of plant‐bacterial interactions and design principles of synthetic ecology.


There is an increased acceptance of youth courts grounded in restorative justice principles to divert first-time nonviolent offenders away from formal juvenile court entry. Research assessing the effectiveness of various teen/peer courts is mixed, and focuses mainly on recidivism. This study analyzes 2010 to 2016 Salt Lake Peer Court data to examine the relationship legal and extralegal variables have on the participation in and completion of this diversionary program for first-time youth offenders. Overall, legal factors affected outcomes more than extralegal factors. Gender proved insignificant in both models with race, age, and school socioeconomic status (SES) producing varied significant effects in outcome models. Offense severity produced consistent strong significant effects across model outcomes. Implications of the study point to the possibilities of peer courts for reducing disproportionate minority contact.


Platelet-activating factor (PAF-acethcr, 1-0-alky l-2-acetyl-s n- glycero-3- phosphocholine), is a potent inflammatory mediator that can be formed by a variety of cells and tissues. In the present investigation, the content of PAFacether was determined in mucosal biopsies from the ileum and colon of patients with Crohn's disease and control patients. PAF-acether was found in both groups and was raised in patients with Crohn's disease, both in the ileum and colon.Colonic PAF-accther content was raised irrespective of the presence of colonic inflammation as judged macroscopically. The activity of PAF acetylhydrolase in ileal biopsies was lower in patients with Crohn's disease than in controls, and patients with high disease activity had lower PAF acetylhydrolase activity in plasma than patients in clinical remission or healthy subjects. PAF-acether was also found in small intestinal and colonic mucosa of neonatal rats and was found to decrease as the proportion of epithelial cells decreased during early postnatal development. Cultured intestinal epithelial cells (INT 407 cells) produced PAFaccther when stimulated with calcium ionophorc (A23187) or with phospholipase C from Clostridium perfringens, a naturally occurring bacterial toxin in the intestine. Phospholipase C increased the formation of PAF-acether in INT 407 cells, but did not increase the level of lyso PAF-acethcr. The phospholipase A2 inhibitor 4-bromophcnacyl bromide (BPB) had no significant effect on the PAF- and lysoPAF-acether formation, wheras the calmodulin inhibitor trifluoperazine (TEPA), and the protein kinase C inhibitor 1-(5-isoquinolinylsulfonyl)- -methyl-piperazine (H-7), decreased the PAF-acether formation, but not the lysoPAF-acether formation. Tumor necrosis factor-alpha (TNA-alpha) potentiated phospholipase A2-mediated release of arachidonic acid (AA), after stimulation with phospholicpase C, withour affecting the formation of PAF-acether.These findings indicate that intestinal epithelial cells are able to produce and metabolize PAF-acether, and that increased PAF-acether formation in INT-407 can be evoked by phospholipase C from Clostridium perfringens , a naturally occuring bacterial toxin. Moreover, the findings add further support to the impirtance of bioactive lipids in inflammatory bowel bowel disease and suggest a possible role for PAF-acether in Croh's disease