Abstract The effect of binocular competition on the development of ocular activation columns in areas 17 and 18 of cats was studied using the 14C-2-deoxyglucose (14C-2DG) technique to visualize the regions of cortex activated by one eye in cats reared with equal alternating monocular exposure (equal AME), unequal AME, or monocular deprivation (MD). The average size of the ocular activation columns of the eye stimulated during administration of 2DG was positively correlated with the competitive advantage during rearing. In order of increasing percentage of visual cortex activated, the eyes were (1) deprived eye of MD cats, (2) less experienced eye of unequal AME cats, (3) either eye of equal AME cats, (4) more experienced eye of unequal AME cats, and (5) experienced eye of MD cats. In area 17, the shape of the activation columns also was affected by the relative experience of the eye. The columns of the deprived eye of MD cats were widest in layer IV, where they were about the same width as those of the less experienced eye of the unequal AME cats; in other layers they were narrower, sometimes disappearing altogether. In contrast, the activation columns of the less experienced eye of the unequal AME cats were about the same width in all layers. These results suggest that when one eye is placed at a severe disadvantage and receives no patterned input, as in MD, both geniculocortical connections and intracortical connections may be disrupted, but when the disadvantage is less, as in unequal AME, only the geniculocortical connections are disrupted. Binocular competition also affected the intensity of activation within columns in area 17. We used video densitometry to determine ratios of the amount of label in cortical and thalamic structures. Both the ratio of label in area 17 to that in the lateral geniculate nucleus (LGN) and the ratio of label in the binocular segment of area 17 to that in the monocular segment were significantly less for the deprived eye of MD cats than for any other group. These results suggest that even within the smaller activation columns, deprived geniculocortical afferents are relatively ineffective at driving cortical cells. This finding is consistent with earlier reports that the synapses from the deprived pathway are both morphologically abnormal and reduced in number. The cortical labeling for the less experienced eye of the unequal AME cats and the experienced eye of the MD cats were also significantly less than that in equal AME cats. The decreased labeling for the experienced eye activation columns suggests that, in order to cover an abnormally large area, afferents representing the experienced eye must make fewer synaptic contacts within that area and that there are intrinsic limits on the number of synapses that one axon can make.


The principal components of classical senile plaques (SP) in Alzheimer's disease (AD) appear to be A4/beta protein and paired helical filaments (PHF). A4 deposits may evolve into classical SP in brain regions vulnerable to the formation of PHF. We have investigated the diatribution of A4 deposits using an immunostain and the neurofibrillary change using the Gallyas stain in various regions of the hippocampus. This region is particularly affected in AD and also has relatively restricted inputs and outputs. In 6 patients we found a significant preponderance of A4 deposits in the adjacent parahippocampal gyrus (PHG) compared with all regions of the hippocampus. However, plaque-like clusters of PHF (Gallyas plaques) were more abundant in the subiculum while neurofibrillary tangles (NFT) were more abundant in the subiculum and region CA1 compared with the PHG and other hippocampal regions. Hence, A4 deposits appear to be concentrated in the region providing a major input into the hippocampus while the neurofibrillary changes are characteristic of the major output areas (subiculum and CA1). Hence, the data suggest that A4 formation and the neurofibrillary changes may occur in regions of the hippocampus that are connected anatomically.


The objective of this study was to observe the impact temperature has on stridulation (chirping) of Gryllus pennsylvanicus (field cricket) and Gryllodes sigillatus (banded cricket).  Dolbear's Law states that the number of cricket stridulations can be converted to degrees Celsius by counting the number of stridulations in 8 seconds and then adding 5 to get the environmental temperature using the tree cricket Oecanthus fultoni .   The belief is based on an increase in environmental temperature causing an increase in the activity levels of crickets, which will increase the rate of stridulation.  The hypothesis is that both cricket species (field and banded ) will increase stridulation rate as increases occur in environmental temperature and that the observed number of stridulations will be used to predict temperature using the previously mentioned formula.  Crickets were incubated at four different temperatures (20, 22, 24 and 26 o C) with a constant light to dark cycle.  Measurements of sound pressure were recorded during the dark cycle using a Vernier Microphone and compared to digital audio recordings.  Preliminary data indicates that stridulation rate increases at higher environmental temperatures and that the use of the audio recordings is preferred over use of the Vernier microphone.  Future research should involve incorporating more species of crickets and a wider variety of environmental temperatures.


The otoliths of teleost fishes the Middle Miocene (Badenian) marine deposits (Upper Langhian - Lower Serravalian, 15 MY ago) of southern Poland, studied in the six key sections (Korytnica Basin, Nawodzice, and Rybnica in the Holy Cross Mountains; Łychow area in the Lublin Upland; Beczyn at the Carpathian margin; Niskowa in the Carpathians), appear to significant components of diversified organic assemblages which may be interpreted in terms the composition and structure particular communities. These communities are indicative of a spectrum facies that ranges from near-shore ones, confirmed either to rocky (Korytnica) or to flat sandy shores (Nawodzice, Niskowa), through the variable offshore facies (Rybnica, Łychow), to those approaching a deep neritic or even bathyal zone (Beczyn). The systematically accounted forms, totaling over 22,600 specimens, represent 145 taxa distinguishable at their species Ievel, the three of which are viz. Micromesistius arcuatus sp. n., "genus Bythitinarum" wenglinelis sp. n., and  Sciaena rybnicensis sp. n. The richest numerically and most taxonomically assemblage is that of the world-famous Korytnica Basin which contains 105 taxa belonging to 47 families. A comparison with ololiths of the present-day fishes (NOLF'S Collection) allowed to revise a number of taxa of ancient forms, and to recognize the presence of some forms formerly unknown from the fossil state. Of the revised taxa, noticeable is the well-known species " Gadus " vel " Colliolus " friedbergi , established the Polish material by CHAINE & DUVERGIER in 1928, and which revealed to be identical with Trisopterus sculptus (KOKEN, 1891). Moreover, highlighted is the occurrence species indicative of tropical and/or subtropical climatic conditions and of the lndo-Pacific bioprovince affinitties. Of such forms, significant are i.a. rare representatives of the families Chaetodontidae BONAPARTE, 1832, and Scaridae RAFlNESQUE, 1810, which are typical coral-reef dwellers in modem faunas.


In December 2017 the Assembly of the State Parties to the Rome Statute decided to activate the International Criminal Court's jurisdiction over the crime of aggression. After the historical activation decision, crime of aggression is now one the four core crimes under the Court's jurisdiction, alongside with genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes. This article reviews how crime of aggression, often referred to as the supreme international crime, after decades of politically influenced negotiations finally found its place in the jurisdiction of the Court. In addition to the historical review of the establishment of jurisdiction, the article also describes the legal state that entered into force. Discussion has a focus in the extent of the Court's jurisdiction, which, due to many compromises under the negotiation process is far from extensive.


Four prostaglandin compounds synthetized at ICCF [chloprostenol triacetate (a), the isopropylic ester of the chloprostenol analogue (b), a PGA2 sulprostone analogue (c) and a PGE2 analogue (d)] were tested with respect to the cytotoxic effect, by successive studies on chicken embryo fibroblasts (CEF) and on human cells (HeLa). It was established that (b) and (d) display a high cytotoxicity, while (a) and (c) were relatively well tolerated by the cell layer. The spectrofluorometric determinations showed that these drugs did not induce modifications at the cell membrane level. The treatment with 4 micrograms/ml PGs (a) and (c) of HeLa cells inoculated with Sendai virus produced a significant decrease of TCID50/ml 24 hrs after drug introduction into the culture medium, from 10(6.5) to 10(4.5) and to 10(3.25), respectively.


Electron microscope radioautographs of nerve ending fractions from mouse cerebrum show that radioactive protein is associated with nerve endings 15 and 90 minutes after intracerebral injection of tritiated leucine and lysine. The results are consistent with synthesis of protein at nerve endings, or with extremely rapid transport of particulate protein to nerve endings in the mouse cerebrum, or both.


The origins of modern legislation regulating civil public archives in Spain date back to the 19th century, although some of Spain's current historical archives, such as the Archives of the Crown of Aragon, have their roots in the Middle Ages. In the second half of the 19th century, the need to preserve collections of the Inquisition, as well as from confiscated monasteries and religious houses, gave rise to the establishment of the State Historical Archive. The aforementioned legislation has been extensively revised since 1978 to additionally reflect the new Spanish territorial political model established by the current Basic Standard, which has gradually established a complex system of competencies in the field of public archives in Spain, depending on whether they are owned by the state (State Archives System) or by Spanish autonomous communities or other territorial public administrations (Autonomous Communities Archives System), as it has been outlined in the case law of the Constitutional Court of Spain. From the point of view of the Spanish state, Law 16/1985 of 25 June on the Spanish historical heritage is the basic normative act for the regulation of the state's public archives, currently under the Ministry of Culture and Sports, specifically, under the General Subdirectorate of State Archives. The said archives are under the authority of a special body of officials – archivists, librarians and archaeologists. On the other hand, at the level of the Autonomous Communities, each Autonomous Community has approved its own specific legislation regarding the archives they own or have jurisdiction over. In this regard, by way of example and in relation to their representativeness, the legislation of the autonomous communities of Andalusia (current Law 7/2011 of 3 November on documents, archives and documentary heritage of Andalusia) and Catalonia (current Law 10/2001 of 13 July on archives and the circulation of records) has been discussed.


Handling evolution in component-based software archi- tectures is a non trivial task. Indeed, a series of changes ap- plied on software may alter its architecture leading to sev- eral inconsistencies. In turn, architecture inconsistencies lead to software erosion and shorten its lifetime. To avoid architectural inconsistencies and increase software reliabil- ity, architecture evolution must be handled at all steps of the software lifecycle. Moreover, changes must be treated as first class entities. In this paper, we propose an evolution management model that takes these criteria into account. The model is a support for our three-level Dedal architec- tural model. It captures and handles change at any of the Dedal abstraction levels: specification, implementation and deployment. It generates evolution plans using evolution rules proposed in previous work. The generation process is implemented using the ProB model checker and evaluated through three evolution scenarios of a Home Automation Software.


AbstractA large fraction of papers in the climate literature includes erroneous uses of significance tests. A Bayesian analysis is presented to highlight the meaning of significance tests and why typical misuse occurs. The significance statistic is not a quantitative measure of how confident one can be of the "reality" of a given result. It is concluded that a significance test very rarely provides useful quantitative information.


This research analyze is it proper achievement in the program jamkesmas in helping poor people in the city of semarang. Operation of the concepts and an indicator of success ( in executing guidance jamkesmas 2012 ) of the theory of systems ( the process of ) according to Tatang m. Amirin, because what to evaluate in limited only the process of determination of the achievement of program jamkesmas in the city of semarang. And knowing the participation of stakeholders in setting targets JAMKESNAS Program in Semaran


Bacteriuria during pregnancy may result in serious complications, including development of acute pyelonephritis in the third trimester and premature labor. Because uninfected women commonly experience symptoms associated with urinary tract infections and many bacteriuric women are asymptomatic, all pregnant women should be screened by quantitative urine cultures. The goal of antimicrobial therapy is complete elimination of bacteria from the urinary tract. Major indications for complete urologic evaluation are failure of a patient with signs of acute upper-tract infection to improve on appropriate treatment and bacterial persistence after initial sterilization of the urine. Either problem may require surgical intervention.


Oedipa Maas's anti-categorical revelation that middles should not be excluded in Pynchon's The Crying of Lot 49 is understood by its author in more debatable terms two decades later, once it is clear that the 1960s struggles for revolution have come to a stop. In 1990 the literary space of Vineland is revealed as a failed refuge where Pynchon ironizes on the notion of balance by portraying a living dead icon represented by the Thanatoids. As predicted in The Crying of Lot 49 , all sorts of simulacra have taken over 1980s California to propitiate a coming back to conservative ideology. In Vineland , the new icon is cunningly associated to magical realism, a hybrid mode that points to the writer's concern with anti-categorical middles but also with the ultimate impossibility to fulfill Oedipa's alleged revelation. Thus, the iconic living dead become a bleak intratextual response to the purportedly optimistic social views of Pynchon's second novel.


This contribution is a short overview of some of the highlights in the application of density functional based ab initio molecular dynamics methods to aqueous liquids and their chemistry. Recent progress in the study of liquid water at neutral and finite pH is discussed in some detail, such as the first principles computation of the molecular dipole moment in the liquid and the equilibrium constant for auto-dissociation. Also mentioned are some recent simulations of chemical reactions in aqueous solutions. We conclude with an outlook for the near future.


Phytochemical screening showed that mundu (Garcinia dulcis (Roxb) kurz) leaves contain flavonoid. Extract of flavonoids were 12,40 g. Antioxidant test was carried out using the DPPH free radical capture method using UV-Visible spectroscopy at a maximum wavelength of 515 nm. Based on the linear regression obtained IC50 values for flavonoid coumpound were 25.02 mg/L. Antibacterium test was done by using agar diffusion method and antioxidant by using DPPH method on flavonoid compound .The activity of antibacteria of flavonoid compound on Staphylococcus aureus bacteria was 15.33 mm and Escherichia coli had inhibiting zone of 15.1 mm which could be categorized as a very strong antioxidant substance.


Aggressive digital papillary adenoma has only been identified as an entity within the past six years. Only forty patients have been reported in the literature with this lesion. The lesion is found three times more commonly on the hands than on the feet. The lesion typically enlarges slowly and is asymptomatic. Patients in half of the reported cases have experienced local recurrence after initial removal. The authors present a case of aggressive digital papillary adenoma of the foot.


The purpose of this investigation was to assess the mining strategy for steep reefs at Mine A mine in 2005 and 2006. Reefs steeper than 35i?½ were discovered when production commenced at the mine. At that time reefs steeper than 35i?½ were not popular in South African tabular gold mines, therefore new techniques of mining them had to be developed. The underhand mining method was chosen for this purpose. The project was about assessing ventilation, support costs, local support cycles, adherence to the minei?½s support standards, mine planning and efficiencies of the underhand mining method. The project work was covered by doing a literature research for underhand mining methods and performing a literature review of the mining methods, support methods, ventilation standards at Mine A. Underground visits were conducted at Mine A mine for data collection, and Mine B was visited to obtain information on support costs and efficiencies. During the investigation it was realized that the underhand mining method was an appropriate method for mining steep reefs; however, there were some challenges related to ventilation and support installation. Efficiencies could be realized with the underhand mining method and planning and scheduling were not different from breast mining.


Conflict accompanies religious life in Indonesia. Social interactions based on prejudice and stereotype still thrive in social relations. On the other hand, for some people religion is seen as a pathological source of conflict, not as a potential creativity for the building of a peaceful culture. In that context, this paper is compiled through a descriptive qualitative method with literature study. This method is used to discover key concepts and their application to efforts to find transformation and reformative strategies from religious conflicts. This transformation and reformative strategy is placed on the assumption that each culture has independent media to build a culture of peace through the internal culture of the community as an effective reconciliation force in building relationships between religious schools (mazhab) and social groups. From this analysis, three main concepts and strategies are found for the development of a culture of peace; first, opening the faucet of intercultural communication based on the existing culture in society, second, building a reformative-transformative national culture that is relevant to the needs of society and the current development. Third, the reformulation of religious understanding and interpretation as the spearhead of religious peace building. These three things have significance for efforts to build a basis for making every policy, social transformation and development of a peaceful culture to achieve future harmony for socio-religious life in Indonesia.


Habitat selection by female Dall's sheep (Ovis dalli dalli) during lambing was studied in interior Alaska, U.S.A., in 1988 and 1989. Selection of habitat changed with the chronology of lambing. During the pre-lambing period, maternal females selected sites with forage and avoided snow-covered areas. During peak lambing, food and steep slopes continued to be selected. Distance to escape terrain was a critical component of habitat selection by females throughout lambing. Maternal bands that ventured farther from escape terrain were in larger groups. Abundance of forage also increased in areas that were farther from this terrain.

Habitat selection by females also differed between years. In 1989, a late spring storm resulted in deep snow and delayed phenology of plants; forage was of lower quality, and the growing season was much shorter in 1989 than in 1988. Births of lambs also occurred later and less synchronously in the second year. Females selected terrain characteristics that were related to avoiding predators in 1988 when forage was more plentiful, but selected sites with forage in 1989 when food was less abundant.

Group size of maternal bands was larger in 1988 than in 1989, and females foraged most efficiently during 1988. Large groups may not have occurred in 1989 because lambs were born asynchronously, preventing cohesive movements of maternal bands with lambs of differing ages.

Both the chronology of lambing and a variable environment affected habitat selection by females. Maternal females made trade-offs between the requirements for forage to meet the high energetic costs of lactation and the risk of predation.


Modern ground-motion prediction models use datasets of recorded ground-motion parameters at multiple stations during different earthquakes and in various source regions to generate equations that are later used to predict site-specific ground motions. These models describe the distribution of ground motion in terms of a median and a logarithmic standard deviation ( e.g. , Strasser et al. 2009). This standard deviation, generally referred to as sigma (σ), exerts a very strong influence on the results of probabilistic seismic hazard analysis (PSHA) ( e.g. , Bommer and Abrahamson 2006). Although there are numerous examples of sigma being neglected in seismic hazard, it is now generally accepted that integration over the full distribution of ground motions is an indispensable element of PSHA (Bommer and Abrahamson 2006). Attempts to justify, on a statistical basis, a truncation of the ground-motion distribution at a specified number of standard deviations above the median have proven unfeasible with current strong-motion datasets (Strasser et al. 2008). The most promising approach to reduce the overall impact of sigma on the results of PSHA is to find legitimate approaches to reduce the value of the standard deviation associated with ground-motion prediction equations (GMPEs).

The present state-of-the-practice of seismic hazard studies applies the standard deviations from ground-motion models developed using a broad range of earthquakes, sites, and regions to analyze the hazard at a single site from a single small source region. Such practice assumes that the variability in ground motion at a single site-source combination is the same as the variability in ground motion observed in a more global dataset and is referred to as the ergodic assumption (Anderson and Brune 1999).

In recent years, the availability of well recorded ground motions at single sites from multiple occurrences of earthquakes in the same regions allowed researchers to estimate the ground-motion variability …


Today's office is plagued by problems of rising costs and low productivity. Office automation and office information systems are proposed as a possible solution to many of the information handling problems of the office. The technology is available and the market place is ready for office automation. However, several challenges need to be met before the proposed remedy can be applied effectively. Automated solutions to the different aspects of the office information handling problem need to be integrated. Models and techniques need to be developed to represent and analyze information flow in an office. Interfaces need to be developed that are easy to use and integrate many different capabilities. Finally, one must examine the impact on people of office automation and produce solutions that are acceptable to the end users. To attack these problems, human factors, software and hardware engineering techniques have to be brought to bear.


Hydroxyapatite (HAP)-coated metal composites were made by the dipping method. The specimen substrates were Ti plates with a thickness of 2 mm. The HAP coating was carried out in HAP-sol for 1 min by the dipping method. The concentration of HAP-sol for the coating ranged from 3.28 to 9.99 wt%. Excellent coating was observed on Ti substrate dipped once in 9.99 wt% sol. A surface pretreated with a sandblasting provided a much better coating than a smooth surface. As the concentration of sol increased, the weight change and the coating thickness increased. Above 7 wt% sol, they increased sharply.


All dams in the world are exposed to sedimentation phenomena. This phenomenon has been widely reported in the United States, Russia, Taiwan, Iran, France, Sudan and North Africa. Algeria loses an annual water storage volume of 32 million m3 in the 114 dams in operation; fifteen of these dams are severely threatened by phenomenon of sedimentation. Dredging practices are a challenge for the development and maintenance of dams and ports activities. In geotechnical engineering, the valorization of dredging sediments and their use in public works is a way increasingly prospected by researchers these last years. Several additives, such as cement, lime and mineral additives such as fly ash, silica fume, rice husk ash..., have been used for stabilization of soft soils. Lime as an additive is most commonly used to stabilize fine soils due to its effectiveness and economic usage. The present study investigates the use of natural pozzolana combined with lime for the stabilization of dredged dam sludge. Laboratory tests were undertaken to study the effect of natural pozzolana, lime or a combination of both on the sludge's engineering properties. Natural pozzolana and lime were added to sludge at ranges of 0–20 and 0–8%, respectively. Consistency, compaction, unconfined compressive strength tests (UCS) and shear strength were performed on untreated and treated sludge samples to assess the physical and mechanical characteristics of the sludge. Treated samples were cured for 1, 7, 28 and 90 days. The results show that the dredged sludge can be successfully stabilized by combining natural pozzolana and lime.


Conventional cryptographic methods are not appropriate for IoT environments due to the specific IoT devices constraints, such as memory usage, time and computational costs. This leads to the emergence of the lightweight cryptography field. This paper investigates the different lightweight cryptographic design methods and proposes an IoT-based cryptographic method, called Ultra-Lightweight method (ULM), to enhance the performance, memory usage and security of IoT devises. The proposed method is based on three methods (i.e, bitslice, WTS and involutive), and thus accumulating their various advantages such as, memory use, efficiency and security. To validate our proposal, a cryptosystem is designed using ULM method. The designed cryptosystem is benchmarked based on the following metrics: performance (by measuring its execution time and the number of clock cycles needed to run it), the quantity of used memory (by measuring ROM and RAM consumption), and security level (by measuring its diffusion and confusion levels along with its resistance to linear and differential attacks). The results show that the cryptosystem designed using the proposed method outperforms existing methods in terms of memory use, security and performance.


Background
Since winter 2020, excess deaths due to COVID-19 have been higher in Eastern Europe than most of Western Europe, partly because regulatory enforcement was poor.

Methods
This paper analysed data from 50 countries in the WHO European Region, in addition to data from USA and Canada. Excess mMortality and vaccination data were retrieved from "Our World In Data" and regulation implementation was assessed using standard methods. Multiple linear regression was used to assess the association between mortality and each covariate.

Results
Excess mortality increased by 4.1 per 100 000 (P = 0.038) for every percentage decrease in vaccination rate and with 6/100 000 (p=0.011) for every decreased unit in the regulatory implementation score a country achieved in the Rule of Law Index.

Conclusion
Degree of regulation enforcement, likely including public health measure enforcement, may be an important factor in controlling COVID-19's deleterious health impacts.


Due to a number of factors, the Catholic Church has in recent years been required to be innovative in the way it organizes its parishes. Canon law addresses some options for dioceses that need to restructure their parishes. This study considers three of them: pastoring multiple parishes through a team of pastors (Code of Canon Law 517.1); entrusting pastoral care to someone other than a priest (c517.2); and appointing a single priest to pastor more than one parish (c526.1). The effect of each of these models on the change in parish Sunday Mass attendance is empirically estimated. No significant difference in Mass attendance was found between those parishes that had experienced an organizational restructuring and those that had not. When comparing the three different models of parish restructuring, parishes that were led by a team of priests were found to outperform parishes that had experienced the other two restructuring options.


The potential exists for titanium and amalgams to become galvanically coupled in the oral cavity. While low galvanic corrosion rates have been measured in vivo for titanium-amalgam or mercury-free alloy couples, concerns exist over released corrosion products and adverse tissue responses. It was hypothesized in this study that coupling titanium to amalgams or gallium alloys increased the release of metallic corrosion products and decreased cellular activity and function. The effects of titanium coupled and uncoupled to a conventional amalgam, palladium-enriched spherical high copper amalgam, a dispersed type high copper amalgam, and a mercury-free gallium alloy were evaluated in 24-h cell culture tests. Viability, proliferation, and collagen synthesis were evaluated by the uptake of neutral red, 3H-thymidine, and immunoassay of procollagen, respectively, and compared to cells not exposed to any test material. The gallium alloy-titanium couple resulted in significant decreases in cellular viability, proliferation, and collagen synthesis as compared to the other coupled and uncoupled samples. Few differences in the cellular responses of the other coupled and uncoupled samples were observed. Atomic absorption analyses indicated increased release of metal ions from the amalgam and gallium alloy samples coupled to titanium as compared to their uncoupled condition, although the differences were not always significant. Galvanic corrosion of amalgam-titanium couples in the long term may become significant, and further research is needed. Coupling the gallium alloy to titanium may result in increased galvanic corrosion and cytotoxic responses.


Active interrogation is a method of detecting fissionable materials by directing radiation, normally high energy photons or neutrons, at a volume of interest. The resulting fission events can produce a unique signature in the form of delayed neutrons and gammas that can be used to identify a material. A common application of this technique is in the detection of special nuclear materials (SNMs) such as 235U. A requirement has been identified to provide a directional detector for use in one of these high flux active interrogation environments. Many detectors of ionising radiation exist but few are capable of directionality. Those that are tend to be heavy and inefficient. A novel method for providing directionality for radiation detection, previously developed by the author, is to be used – the RadICAL detector. The idea is based upon the fact that detector response depends upon the radiation pathlength and area presented to a particle flux. Thus a rotating slab of detector gives a characteristic temporal response that can be used to identify the direction of the photon flux. This concept is to be used to locate fast neutrons produced by a material of interest within an active interrogation scenario. The first objective of this study was to model a RadICAL detector. The original model was built using a simple ray tracing method and this was followed by the construction of a more complicated Geant4 Monte-Carlo model. The results of this modelling were used to inform decisions made in the building of a prototype detector. Further modelling was conducted to investigate the optical properties of the detector. The second objective was to design and build a number of these detectors based on this modelling. These detectors were then tested by exposing them to a number of different sources under a variety of different conditions and evaluating the response. The third objective was to develop a detector capable of determining the direction of an active interrogation source. This involved a variation on the RadICAL method, the RadICAL Stack, whereby counts from a stack of stationary detectors were fitted to a standard response curve in order to determine the direction of the source. The detectors were built from Eljen EJ299-33 so that the localisation technique could be combined with pulse shape discrimination techniques to separately determine the location of gamma and neutron sources. Both the RadICAL and the RadICAL Stack detection methods were shown to be effective at determining the direction of a gamma source. A four element detector was built and shown to achieve an angular resolution of approximately 4:4±0:3 when detecting a 3.7 MBq 137Cs source at distances up to 2.1m. The same detector was shown to achieve an angular resolution of approximately 2:95±0:32 when detecting discriminated neutrons from a 150 MBq 252Cf source at distances of up to 4m.


ATM is currently considered the primary WAN technology with Internet protocols providing the routing and transport requirements. Another WAN technology being considered is packet over SONET. Using the Advanced Communication Technology Satellite, NASA has demonstrated and is experimenting with these technologies. This article summarizes some of the major completed and ongoing experiments and demonstrations performed using commercial standard protocols such as ATM and TCP/IP over broadband satellite networks.


AIMS
The current report examined associations between romantic partner, peer and individual substance use behaviors in a sample of American adolescents.

DESIGN
The report used two waves of data (8th and 9th grades) from the Partnerships to Enhance Resilience (PROSPER) intervention project and focused on dating couples and their friends in 54 sampled school-cohorts. Hierarchical logistic regression models examined the associations between friend, partner and friend-of-partner substance use and daters' future drinking and smoking.

SETTING
Surveys administered in rural Pennsylvania and Iowa secondary schools.

PARTICIPANTS
A total of 744 dating couples.

MEASUREMENTS
Student participants completed questionnaires that assessed substance use, background characteristics and dating and friend nominations. Friend, partner and friend-of-partner substance use were assessed at each wave directly from respective reports.

FINDINGS
Consistent with a bridging hypothesis, friends-of-partner drinking had a strong and independent association with subsequent drunkenness (b = 1.40, P < 0.01) and drinking (b = 0.82, P < 0.01) among daters, and these associations did not vary by gender. A similar association was not observed for smoking, where partner (b = 0.77, P < 0.01) and direct friends (b = 1.19, P < 0.05) smoking showed strong and significant associations with future smoking, but friends-of-partner smoking did not (b = -0.44, P > 0.10).

CONCLUSION
Romantic partner and peer behaviors have substantially different associations with adolescent drinking and smoking. Intervention efforts aimed at reducing teenage smoking should be aimed at proximal peer and romantic relationships, whereas interventions of teenage drinking should also include the wider circle of indirect friends.


ABSTRACT According to primary socialization theory, adolescents develop beliefs about alcohol by interacting with peers, as well as other socialization agents. Although communication is essential to this belief-formation process, few studies have identified the specific alcohol-related messages that adolescents exchange with their peers, and more specifically friends, that lead to certain anti- and/or pro-alcohol-related beliefs. Consequently, the goal of this study was to develop a multidimensional measure of alcohol-specific communication with friends. Based on survey data from 259 high school students, the results indicated that communication with friends involving warnings against drinking alcohol, disapproval of alcohol consumption, and making fun of others for drinking alcohol was negatively related to pro-alcohol beliefs and intentions. Communication with friends involving rumors, teasing each other about drinking alcohol, intentions to drink alcohol, different types of alcohol, experiences with alcohol, and talking about how many peers drink alcohol was positively related to pro-alcohol beliefs and intentions.


Giant cell ependymoma (GCE) is a very uncommon variant of ependymoma, known for having varying degrees of nuclear pleomorphism. There are only 34 reported cases of GCE in the English literature. We describe an additional case of a young woman who presented with a tumor located in sacral soft tissue, which was not connected to the spinal cord and did not show additional lesions in the central nervous system. Complete tumor resection was performed and no recurrences or metastasis were detected after 5 months of follow‐up. Only one of all the reported GCE was located in the sacral subcutaneous region, where ependymomas are rarely found and usually have myxopapillary histology. Ours is the second report showing microscopic features of GCE in the soft‐tissue region. GCE should be considered in the differential diagnosis of lumbosacral subcutaneous tumors to avoid misdiagnosing it as a malignant lesion. Since GCE could be an extraspinal extension of an intraneural ependymoma, it would be important to evaluate whether it is connected to the spinal cord.


The advent of self-driving cars has pushed the boundaries on the safety of automobiles, but most modern self-driving car systems ignore the possibility of a car slipping resulting from inclement weather or driver error [1]. Passengers and bystanders would benefit heavily if self-driving cars could handle slipping by learning to drift with the turn rather than against it (by applying the brakes, or turning away, which is the instinctive action), preventing many fatalities [2]. Our project is aimed at studying the drifting of an autonomous remote controlled (RC) car using reinforcement learning (RL) techniques. Specifically, we experimented with a model-free approach with dueling double Deep Q-networks (DQN) and a model-based approach with Probabilistic Inference for Learning COntrol (PILCO) for finding an optimal drift controller. Since robotic systems are prone to wear with use, a simulator is used to model the car dynamics and train a preliminary drift controller which is then transferred to the real car. Using these techniques, we were successful in obtaining an optimal drift controller on the simulator, which was stable and robust to varying physical conditions. Other than the drift controller, this project makes important contributions in the form of novel approaches like using DQN for obtaining a drift controller and using the policy learned from DQN for PILCO initialization. Additionally, this report presents a metric, Dm, to objectively quantify the quality of a sustained circular drift.


Structural studies of the Saint-Salvy zinc deposit and other Hercynian, veinhosted ore deposits in the French Massif Central and Pyrenees reveal a fourstage evolution of mineralized structures under rheological control: (i) localization of potential mineralized areas, guided by the presence of first-order lithological or structural heterogeneities that caused stress and strain perturbations; (ii) creation of second-order heterogeneities, corresponding to indurated shear zones that acted as rheological discontinuities; (iii) tectonic activation of these second-order heterogeneities, opening voids that allowed circulation of hydrothermal fluids and periodic trapping of ore minerals; (iv) reworking and partial destruction of the mineralized structures, caused by the reactivation of anisotropic surfaces acting as zones of weakness. The interaction between preexisting, first-order heterogeneities and regional shear strain caused instability, which in turn produced second-order and then lower-order heterogeneit...


The use of strength formulations' characteristic of marine structural components in reliability assessment is investigated throughout a series of systematic studies The marine structural components used were the stiffened plate and the ring and stringer stiffened cylinder and the design scenario is their resistance to compressive loads (buckling) which is the most common failure modes in marine structures. The systematic studies provided a good understanding of the behaviour of the several strength formulations when they are used in reliability calculations. Also, the importance of all uncertainties involved was analysed and commented. The formulations considered for the stiffened plates buckling strength were the proposals of Faulkner, Guedes Soares, Ivanov and Rousev, Carlsen, Ueda and Yao, Soreide and Czujko, Valsgard, ABS, Dier and Dowling and Stonor et al. The formulations are flilly described in the text along with the discussion of their reliability assessment results. The formulations considered for the ring-stringer stiffened cylinders buckling strength were the proposals of several codes of practice API Bui 2U, RCC, DnV CN-30.1 and ECCS-29. They are finally described in the text along with the discussion of their uncertainties and reliability assessment The strength modelling parameters are the most important variables in the reliability assessment and they were investigated for the case of the ring-stringer stiffened cylinders All formulations were compared with two large test results databases and the uncertainties were derived for all cases. Finally the last chapter aggregates the conclusions of the systematic studies for the stiffened plates and cylinders with the demonstration of the importance of good strength modelling for the reliability based design of structures. The methodology for good strength modelling is described and used in improving the strength formulations for the ring-stringer stiffened cylinders.


Bacteriophytochromes (BphPs) are light-regulated biliprotein photoreceptors widely occurring in bacteria. BphPs exists in two spectral distinct states: the red-light absorbing state (Pr) and the far-red light-absorbing state (Pfr). BphPs are composed of an N-terminal photosensory core module and a light-controlled C-terminal histidine kinase module. The detailed mechanism on how photoconversion, initiated by a light-triggered isomerization of the biliverdin chromophore, is conducted from the N-terminal to the C-terminal domain and how the histidine kinase is modulated is still not clear. In this work Agp1 from Agrobacterium tumefaciens is used as a model phytochrome. The method of labeling full-length Agp1 mutants with single accessible Cys residue using fluorescence probes is described. Different absorption spectra showed that neither mutagenesis nor fluorescence labeling exerts significant effects on the photoconversion behavior of various Agp1 mutants. The histidine kinase activity assay revealed that the labeled holoproteins exhibit wild-types like autophosphorylation activity that depends on the Pr and the Pfr state. Fluorescence spectroscopic data suggested that fluorescence resonance energy transfer occurs from the donor Atto495 to the acceptor Atto565 in double-labeled Agp1-A362C, K514C, H554C, R603C, I653C, and V674C mutants. Red light irradiation gave rise to small changes on fluorescence emission intensity in some mutants but in some no remarkable inter-subunit distance changes occurred during the photo-conversion from Pr to Pfr in full-length Agp1. In contrast to double-labeled samples, significant changes in fluorescence intensity were observed in single-labeled samples.


PURPOSE
This phase I trial was designed to (1) establish the dose of O6-benzylguanine (O6-BG) administered intravenously as a continuous infusion that suppresses O6-alkylguanine-DNA alkyltransferase (AGT) levels in brain tumors, (2) evaluate the safety of extending continuous-infusion O6-BG at the optimal dose with intracranially implanted carmustine wafers, and (3) measure the pharmacokinetics of O6-BG and its metabolite.

PATIENTS AND METHODS
The first patient cohort (group A) received 120 mg/m2 of O6-BG over 1 hour followed by a continuous infusion for 2 days at escalating doses presurgery. Tumor samples were evaluated for AGT levels. The continuous-infusion dose that resulted in undetectable AGT levels in 11 or more of 14 patients was used in the second patient cohort. Group B received the optimal dose of O6-BG for 2, 4, 7, or 14 days after surgical implantation of the carmustine wafers. The study end point was dose-limiting toxicity (DLT).

RESULTS
Thirty-eight patients were accrued. In group A, 12 of 13 patients had AGT activity levels of less than 10 fmol/mg protein with a continuous-infusion O6-BG dose of 30 mg/m2/d. Group B patients were enrolled onto 2-, 4-, 7-, and 14-day continuous-infusion cohorts. One DLT of grade 3 elevation in ALT was seen. Other non-DLTs included ataxia and headache. For up to 14 days, steady-state levels of O6-BG were 0.1 to 0.4 micromol/L, and levels for O6-benzyl-8-oxoguanine were 0.7 to 1.3 micromol/L.

CONCLUSION
Systemically administered O6-BG can be coadministered with intracranially implanted carmustine wafers, without added toxicity. Future trials are required to determine if the inhibition of tumor AGT levels results in increased efficacy.


Access to energy is a pressing issue in both developed and developing countries. To achieve socio-economic development, countries worldwide, including those in Africa, must carefully plan their energy transitions, considering the advantages and disadvantages of different approaches and learning from past experiences. In Nigeria, over 80% of the population in underdeveloped areas lacks access to energy, with cooking being the primary energy-consuming activity. As the oil-producing powerhouse of Africa, Nigeria is increasingly becoming a significant emitter of greenhouse gases, and without intervention, emissions are projected to rise dramatically by 2040. This study focuses on the status of energy transition and climate change awareness in the northern part of Nigeria. A research questionnaire was designed to gather responses related to our research questions, following a comprehensive literature review. The collected responses were analyzed to generate structured results. The findings indicate that the majority of participants (51%) fall within the 20-30 age bracket. Notably, 52% of respondents rely on firewood as their primary energy source, while gas usage (24%) is also relatively high but considerably lower than firewood. Encouragingly, our study reveals that 51.4% of respondents expressed a preference for switching from firewood to electric cookers as their home energy source, despite the significant investment required for power infrastructure and policy support. Overall, the results of this study contribute to addressing awareness gaps, framing communication strategies, and promoting public engagement in the campaign against climate change risks and the adoption of safer energy transitions.


This study explores the expansion of international education focusing on International Baccalaureate (IB) schools in England, France, Israel, Argentina, and Chile. As a whole, conditions such as economic globalization and neoliberal education policies favor the expansion of IB schools. Certain national contexts and educational traditions encourage the adoption of IB programs, while other traditions hinder their propagation. The increase of IB schools results from strategies aimed at insertion of the IB into national education markets and its adaptation to different national systems. There is also an unintended percolation of the IB worldview and activities within national curricula and policies. These strategies and mechanisms are uncovered by tracking the embeddedness of the global IB in national education systems.


The economic development of Saudi Arabia depends largely upon the receipts from the exports of crude oil being spent as government expenditure on growth needs. Saudi Arabia is included in the "very high human development" category of United National Development Programme. Using time series data from 1990 to 2016, the study finds that both government spending and oil exports are significant drivers of human development index (HDI) in Saudi Arabia. The study estimates that a 100 (million barrels) increase in oil production will increase the HDI with 4% point. Similarly, a 1% increase in total government expenditure increases 10% point in HDI. The study also reports that expenditure on education contributes the most to HDI. The study also finds an inverse relationship between health expenditure and economic growth. This finding resulted in a recommendation of streamlining the health sector. Finally, the study predicts that HDI index will be 0.94 by 2030.


While recent person re-identification (ReID) methods achieve high accuracy in a supervised setting, their generalization to an unlabelled domain is still an open problem. In this paper, we introduce a novel unsupervised disentanglement generative adversarial network (UD-GAN) to address the domain adaptation issue of supervised person ReID. Our framework jointly trains a ReID network for discriminative features extraction in a source labelled domain using identity annotation, and adapts the ReID model to an unlabelled target domain by learning disentangled latent representations on the domain. Identity-unrelated features in the target domain are distilled from the latent features. As a result, the ReID features better encompass the identity of a person in the unsupervised domain. We conducted experiments on the Market1501, DukeMTMC and MSMT17 datasets. Results show that the unsupervised domain adaptation problem in ReID is very challenging. Nevertheless, our method shows improvement in half of the domain transfers and achieve state-of-the-art performance for one of them.


At present massively multiplayer online games allow several thousands of players to stay in a single, persistent virtual world. Because of the fast growing interest in this type of servers, we started researching their efficiency and scalability. Our target was an analysis of the MMOG server, which could service up to 1000 players in a single virtual world. We made an assumption that the server will be distributed and running on a dedicated cluster. As the implementation platform we chose Erlang/OTP its main advantages being integration with a distributed database, soft realtime and supporting distributed applications. In this paper we discuss the realisation of the project, and practical aspects of the measurement of server parameters.


To first order, faults are locked while stress builds up to a devastating earthquake. However, we know that faults also slip slowly. After decades of geophysical observation, slow slip is now recognized as part of a continuum of transient deformation ranging from the dynamic propagation of seismic rupture to aseismic events over a wide range of durations and sizes. A growing body of evidence suggests that large‐scale slow slip events can be decomposed into a multitude of smaller, temporally clustered events. Slow slip is more frequent and more dynamic than is suggested by conceptual models of rate‐strengthening, stable slip.


Background:Little is known about the relationship between salivary protein glycopatterns and oral microbial communities in the patients of gastric cancer (GC) and type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM).Methods:In this study, the oral microbiome of healthy volunteers (HVs) and GC patients were detected using 16S rDNA sequencing. The Fucose-neoglycoproteins were synthesized and used to explore the effects of Fucose moiety against Aggregatibacter segnis (A. segnis). The sialoglycoproteins were isolated and used to assess the role of the Siaα2-3/6Gal-linked glycans against Candida albicans (C. albicans).Findings:The results showed that five species (e.g. A. segnis, Megasphaera micronuciformis) were significantly increased (p<0.05) while two species (Streptococcus salivarius and Oral taxon 870) were significantly decreased (p<0.01) in the saliva of GC patients compared to HVs. The adhesion of A. segnis could be inhibited by 30 μg/mL of fucose-neoglycoproteins. The growth and adhesion of C. albicans could be inhibited gradually by 50-400 μg/mL sialoglycoproteins. And Siaα2-3Gal moieties played a major role against the growth and adhesion of C. albicans.Interpretation:These findings provide a novel theory that dynamic communities of oral microbiota are regulated naturally by host salivary protein glycopatterns, having important implications for developing new carbohydrate drugs for oral and body health. Funding:This study was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 81871955), the China Postdoctoral Science Foundation (Grant No. 2020M673628XB), and the Natural Science Foundation of Shaanxi Province (Grant No. 2021JQ-446).


Our previous transgenic analyses revealed that a 600-base pair β-myosin heavy chain (βMyHC) promoter conferred mechanical overload (MOV) and non-weight-bearing (NWB) responsiveness to a chloramphenicol acetyltransferase reporter gene. Whether the same DNA regulatory element(s) direct βMyHC expression following MOV or NWB activity in vivo remains unknown. We now show that a 293-base pair βMyHC promoter fused to chloramphenicol acetyltransferase (β293) responds to MOV, but not NWB activity, indicating a segregation of these two diverse elements. Inclusion of the βMyHC negative regulatory element (−332 to −300; βNRE) within transgene β350 repressed expression in all transgenic lines. Electrophoretic mobility shift assays showed highly enriched binding activity only in NWB soleus nuclear extracts that was specific to thedistal region of the βNRE sense strand (dβNRE-S; −332 to −311). Supershift electrophoretic mobility shift assay revealed that the binding at the distal region of the βNRE sense strand was antigenically distinct from cellular nucleic acid-binding protein and Y-box-binding factor 1, two proteins shown to bind this element. Two-dimensional UV cross-linking and shift Southwestern blotting analyses detected two proteins (50 and 52 kDa) that bind to this element. These in vivo results demonstrate that segregated βMyHC promoter elements transcriptionally regulate βMyHC transgene expression in response to two diverse modes of neuromuscular activity.


The basic question that is addressed in this paper is finding the closest separable state for a given entangled state, measured with the Hilbert-Schmidt distance. While this problem is in general very difficult, we show that the following strongly related problem can be solved: find the Hilbert-Schmidt distance of an entangled state to the set of all partially transposed states. We prove that this latter distance can be expressed as a function of the negative eigenvalues of the partial transpose of the entangled state, and show how it is related to the distance of a state to the set of positive, partially transposed (PPT) states. We illustrate this by calculating the closest biseparable state to the W state and give a simple and very general proof for the fact that the set of W-type states is not of measure zero. Next we show that all surfaces with states whose partial transposes have constant minimal negative eigenvalue are similar to the boundary of PPT states. We illustrate this with some examples on bipartite qubit states, where contours of constant negativity are plotted on two-dimensional intersections of the complete state space.


Aeromonas dhakensis is the most virulent Aeromonas species pathogenic to both animals and humans. The degree of its risk to health seems masked by misidentifications. We present the genome sequence of A. dhakensis Igbk (sequence type 1171), associated with snails, harboring the OXA-726 gene in the chromosome. ABSTRACT Aeromonas dhakensis is the most virulent Aeromonas species pathogenic to both animals and humans. The degree of its risk to health seems masked by misidentifications. We present the genome sequence of A. dhakensis Igbk (sequence type 1171), associated with snails, harboring the OXA-726 gene in the chromosome.


Introduction: Patients with end-stage renal disease (ESRD) are considered at higher risk of influenza-related complications and are listed worldwide among the subjects for whom yearly influenza vaccination is strongly recommended. However, influenza vaccination coverage of patients with ESRD is significantly lower than desired. Areas covered: This paper explores why compliance with official recommendations for influenza vaccination is poor in patients with ESRD and analyzes the true risk of infection as well as the immunogenicity, the effectiveness and the safety of influenza vaccination in these patients. Expert opinion: Epidemiological and clinical data support the importance of influenza in conditioning clinical deterioration of patients with ESRD, particularly in relation to their level of immunosuppression. However, the variable levels of immunodeficiency detected in patients with ESRD may reduce the immune response to influenza vaccination, which appears to be lower than that usually found in healthy subjects. However, few studies are available, and they are difficult to compare for several reasons. Additionally, limited data have been collected on influenza vaccine effectiveness, although the available studies support positive results of vaccination on outcomes of severe disease. Despite such limitations, it is important to highlight that all the available studies have confirmed the good safety and tolerability of inactivated influenza vaccines. These findings, together with the risks associated with influenza in these patients, support annual influenza vaccination in patients with ESRD as well as vaccination of their close contacts and should be presented in educational programs organized for nephrologists and patient associations.


Purpose The pediatric Simple Knee Value (pedi-SKV) is an outcome score in which paediatric patients are asked 'How would you rate your knee today as a percentage of normal (0% to 100% scale with 100% being normal)?'. The primary aim of this study was to validate the pedi-SKV by measuring its correlation with validated knee function scores used most often in paediatric orthopaedics. Methods This prospective study was conducted at a teaching hospital to evaluate the pedi-SKV's validity. A total of 44 paediatric patients (ten to 15 years old), were enrolled prior to anterior cruciate ligament reconstruction as well as 17 healthy controls. A survey form consisting of the Lysholm, International Knee Documentation Committee Pediatric Form (Pedi-IKDC) and pedi-SKV was given to subjects twice (enrolment and six months postoperatively). The criterion validity of the pedi-SKV was determined by correlating it to existing knee functional scores. Responsiveness to change was evaluated by comparing the pedi-SKV scores before and after surgery (enrolment visit and six-month postoperative visit). Discriminative ability was evaluated by comparing the pedi-SKV distribution in patients versus controls. Results There was a strong and significant correlation between the pedi-SKV and the Lysholm and Pedi-IKDC (p < 0.0001). The pedi-SKV had a good responsiveness to change (p < 0.0001 for the pedi-SKV before versus six months postoperatively). Like the other knee-specific functional sores (p < 0.0001), the pedi-SKV was able to distinguish between patients and controls (p < 0.0001). Conclusion The pedi-SKV is a valid outcome measure that is strongly correlated with the Lysholm and Pedi-IKDC. This is a novel simple score that can be used by physicians in their daily practice. Level of evidence II


Security of Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs) is a very crucial factor when deployed for reconnaissance in sensitive areas. The existing symmetric encryption schemes provide a good amount of security, but maintenance of keys is difficult. When asymmetric schemes are used, maintenance of keys is easier, but they provide a lesser degree of security when compared to symmetric encryption schemes. In order to cope up with these shortcomings, we propose to use an improved version of the hybrid encryption scheme, which is a combination of Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) and Elliptical Curve Cryptography (ECC) with cross encrypted keys for secure key exchange and node authentication and hybrid encryption for enhanced cipher-text security. In case of transmission in WSNs, Statistical Cooperative Diversity based on Alamouti code is the most commonly used transmission scheme. However, for an arbitrary number of sensors, Alamouti code limits the BER performance and energy is not distributed equally, thereby creating the energy-hole problem which leads to early dysfunction of the sensors and may eventually lead to dysfunction of the Wireless Sensor Network (WSN). Extended Cooperative Space-time Block Codes (ECBSTBCs), which are obtained from Alamouti code, have the same characteristics of Alamouti code with the energy being distributed equally among the active sensors. With these factors in mind, we propose to use ECBSTBC as the transmission scheme. The improved hybrid scheme is ideal for ECBSTBC based WSN due to the speed of operation and higher degree of security that it offers.


Spider dragline silk is well-known for their excellent strength, extensibility, toughness and biological properties which overwhelmingly exceeds most of the engineered materials available today. Development of spider silk inspired materials is gaining interest due to their wide range of application potential. Various strategies like synthesis of recombinant spider silk, synthetic peptide polymers and polymer silk composites have been used to produce artificial spider silk materials. In our research group, we had demonstrated all these approaches to develop spider silk inspired fibers and materials.


The National Center for Human Genome Research and the Department of Energy convened a committee of geneticists and biologists who use the laboratory mouse in their research programs. Their responsibility was to identify goals and guidelines for completing the genetic and physical maps of the mouse genome. The motivation for convening this group was to make certain that existing and anticipated research projects together represent a comprehensive program for addressing the Five Year Goals of the Human Genome Project. Three meetings were held: the first addressed the contributions that the mouse can make to the Human Genome Project; the second meeting reviewed the status of the genetic map, gene mapping research, and genome informatics; and the final meeting evaluated the status of the physical map and physical mapping research. The committee then prepared a report that reviewed the status of the mouse genome project and made recommendations concerning areas of research emphasis. The resulting Request For Applications entitled 'Mapping the Mouse Genome with Emphasis on Technology Development' (RFA: HG-92-002) is an important mechanism for coordinating mouse genome research and accomplishing the goals of the mouse genome project. Progress towards complete genetic and physical maps has been impressive. The genetic map should be completed on schedule, and ongoing physical mapping projects are promising. Given rapid progress on these maps, the Working Group proposed expanding the focus of the mouse genome effort to begin planning comprehensive approaches for characterizing the function of the large number of genes that will soon be mapped and eventually sequenced.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)


This study shows that electrospray ionization mass spectrometry (ESI-MS), combined with a heated turbo ion-spray interface, allows monitoring protein stabilization by glycerol in solution. Measurements obtained with the two proteins lysozyme and cytochrome c are presented. The observed mass-to-charge (m/z) distributions reveal the stabilizing effect of the additive on the protein conformations against temperature and acid-induced unfolding, as well as against denaturation by acetonitrile. The data obtained with lysozyme allow detection of minor conformational changes upon glycerol addition to the native protein, and suggest that the protein structure in the presence of the additive is slightly compressed compared with its state in water. This result corroborates previous evidence obtained by nuclear magnetic resonance. It is also shown that analysis of the m/z distributions obtained by ESI-MS can lead to detection of partially folded and partially populated states in protein samples.


Microimplant-assisted rapid palatal expansion (MARPE) has been demonstrated successfully in maxillary expansion in late adolescence and adulthood. The maxillary advancement accompanied by expansion is frequently anticipated, which is beneficial for the treatment of class III malocclusion. Airway volume increase can also be noted in some cases from the measurement of cone beam computerized tomography (CBCT) after expansion. The objective of this case report is to demonstrate the feasibility of applying MARPE on late adolescence patients with maxillary transverse deficiency and to present the changes in transverse and anteroposterior dimensions as well as the volume increase in velopharyngeal airway after MARPE. A 15-year-old female presented class III skeletal pattern. She had maxillary transverse deficiency with moderate crowding and posterior/anterior crossbites. Maxillary Skeletal Expander (MSE; Biomaterials Korea Inc.) type-2 was used as a MARPE device in this case. After four weeks of maxillary expansion, a significant amount of expansion was achieved and the anterior crossbite was spontaneously corrected. Fixed appliance treatment was commenced four weeks after MARPE with 0.022-slot preadjusted brackets (MBT prescription). Temporary anchorage devices (TADs) were placed over the mandibular buccal shelves for posterior teeth distalization and crowding relief. After 25 months of treatment, the facial profile was improved with maxillary advancement (SNA: 83° to 83.5°) and mandibular backward rotation (SNB: 83° to 82°; SN-MP: 34.5° to 35°). In this case, MARPE not only engenders significant transverse correction but also aids in anteroposterior change. The treatment effects of maxillary advancement and mandibular backward rotation can lead to a more esthetic profile in skeletal class III cases.


Astrology is no longer regarded as a science by many, because its claims are almost impossible to test empirically in controlled laboratory conditions and it can not meet the scientific need to be reproducible. However, the majority of those who read their `star signs' can identify aspects of their personality in what they read and it is possible that this may influence their attitudes and actions. The literature has neglected astrological signs as a possible predictor of suicide ideation. To see whether astrological birth signs are associated with suicide and the method used, data was collected from the Public Health Department in North Cheshire representing all the Cheshire Coroner's verdicts of suicide, and open verdicts, in all deceased aged 60 and above between 1989 and 2000. The observed occurrence of deaths due to natural causes, and suicide, in relation to birth signs did not differ significantly from what would be expected from chance. However, the distribution of suicide by hanging appeared significantly higher in those with a birth sign of Virgo and lowest in Sagittarius and Scorpio. The distribution of violent and non-violent suicides in relation to star signs showed higher occurences of violent death in persons born in the summer months.


The authors describe the clinical investigation and progress of a 13‐year‐old girl diagnosed with hypertension 4 years prior to her admission. A thorough history was taken and physical examination performed. Laboratory analysis and relevant radiological evaluation were obtained in order to determine the etiology for suspected secondary hypertension, and later to differentiate between the possible causes of hyperreninemic hypertension. The patient had an accessory left renal artery, presumptively leading to renin secretion by the underperfused kidney. The patient was treated medically with spontaneous resolution of her hypertension and near normalization of plasma renin activity. On repeat imaging, the artery was not demonstrated. The authors concluded that the diagnosis of hyperreninemic hypertension in young ages should prompt investigation for the etiology. However, cautious observation is a valid option that might lead to spontaneous resolution.


Lung cancer deaths are finally declining in the United States after a nearly century long rise. After a steep increase in cigarette use rates over the first half of the 20th century, smoking prevalence rates started declining from their peak in 1964 and the number of lung cancer deaths followed about 30 years later. Today, less than 20% of adults are current smokers, although there is significant variation from state to state and smoking behavior today, in contrast to 50 years ago, is largely concentrated among the poor and less educated members of society and also among individuals with mental health and substance abuse diagnoses. While some predictions have cigarette consumption dropping to near trivial levels in the US over the next 50 years, others have suggested the rate of decline might be much slower than predicted as the ratio of former to ever smokers has stalled. In other words, while fewer young people are taking up smoking, smoking cessation rates among adult smokers have not changed much in the past decade. While having fewer young people take up smoking means less lung cancer in the long run, in the next decade it means that lung cancer mortality rates will be higher than they might otherwise have to be. This presentation asks the question: Is it feasible to lower lung cancer mortality by 50% in the next decade? The answer to this question is yes, if we want it to make it happen. This presentation describes two complimentary strategies to more rapidly reduce lung cancer mortality in the United States over the next decade. The first strategy includes policies that could realistically be implemented in the next few years to dramatically accelerate a reduction in cigarette consumption. The second strategy focuses on ways to promote lung cancer screening among high risk current and former smokers to change the typical prognosis of lung cancer from one of death sentence to one where lung cancer is detected early enough for cure and improved management. Quite simply, maximizing these two intervention strategies will almost assuredly do more to reduce deaths from lung cancer over the next decade than could possibly be hoped for by investing in high risk biomedical research to try to improve current treatment outcomes, and most likely at a small fraction of the cost. Citation Format: K. Michael Cummings. Reducing lung cancer mortality by 50% in the next decade: Is it feasible? [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the Twelfth Annual AACR International Conference on Frontiers in Cancer Prevention Research; 2013 Oct 27-30; National Harbor, MD. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Can Prev Res 2013;6(11 Suppl): Abstract nr CN04-01.


Regulation of horizontal relations (that is, relations between individuals) at the constitutional level is a phenomenon that is commonly found at the present time in democratic countries. To some extent this is a departure from the traditional model of the constitution as the legal act that regulates relations between an individual and the state (vertical relations), although of course this latter issue is still the main subject of constitutional regulation. Next to vertical relations, as if in parallel, contemporary constitutions increasingly regulate completely different categories of legal relations, to which the state is not a party, such as the relations between employers and employees, parents and children, and entrepreneurs and consumers. This kind of horizontal relationship is also the subject of regulation under the Constitution of the Republic of Poland adopted by the National Assembly on 2nd April 1997. I would therefore like to consider the type of horizontal relations that are covered by constitutional regulation, the extent to which regulation affects these relations, and the significance of regulation. However, the text of the Constitution of the Republic of Poland will only be the starting point for the formulation of more general conclusions that – I strongly believe – are also suitable for many other European constitutional regulations. [...]


The optimization of Bragg-confined double quantum wells with respect to resonant second harmonic generation and electro-optic coefficients is considered. The method of optimization relies on solving a system of nonlinear equations which involve the geometric parameters of the structure and bound state energies. Advantage is taken of the above-the-barrier bound states in Bragg-confined structures, in order to extend the range of allowable incident photon energies. Numerical results are given for Al0.48In0.52As/Ga0.47In0.53As based structure and the incident photon energy ℏω = 240 meV.


The chiral crossover of QCD at finite temperature and vanishing baryon density turns into a second order phase transition if lighter than physical quark masses are considered. If this transition occurs sufficiently close to the physical point, its universal critical behaviour would largely control the physics of the QCD phase transition. We quantify the size of this region in QCD using functional approaches, both Dyson-Schwinger equations and the functional renormalisation group. The latter allows us to study both critical and non-critical effects on an equal footing, facilitating a precise determination of the scaling regime. We find that the physical point is far away from the critical region. Importantly, we show that the physics of the chiral crossover is dominated by soft modes even far beyond the critical region. While scaling functions determine all thermodynamic properties of the system in the critical region, the order parameter potential is the relevant quantity away from it. We compute this potential in QCD using the functional renormalisation group and Dyson-Schwinger equations and provide a simple parametrisation for phenomenological applications.


Vacuolar sorting receptors (VSRs) are type I integral membrane family proteins that in plant cells are thought to recognize cargo proteins at the late Golgi or trans-Golgi network (TGN) for vacuolar transport via the pre-vacuolar compartment (PVC). However, little is known about VSR cargo proteins in plants. Here we developed and tested an in vivo expression system for the identification of VSR cargos which is based on the premise that the expressed N-terminus of VSRs will be secreted into the culture medium along with their corresponding cargo proteins. Indeed, transgenic Arabidopsis culture cell lines expressing VSR N-terminal binding domains (VSRNTs) were shown to secrete truncated VSRs (BP80NT, AtVSR1NT and AtVSR4NT) with attached cargo molecules into the culture medium. Putative cargo proteins were identified through mass spectrometry. Several identified cargo proteins were confirmed by localization studies and interaction analysis with VSRs. The screening strategy described here should be applicable to all VSRs and will help identify and study cargo proteins for individual VSR proteins. This method should be useful for both cargo identification and protein-protein interaction in vivo.


: A case of idiopathic fetal hydrops is reported which was diagnosed by ultra-sound scan. The course of the pregnancy and the neonatal course are described. The case is compared to identical reports in the literature.


Proof of work schemes use client puzzles to manage limited resources on a server and provide resilience to denial of service attacks. Attacks utilizing GPUs to inflate computational capacity, known as resource inflation, are a novel and powerful threat that dramatically increase the computational disparity between clients. This disparity renders proof of work schemes based on hash reversal ineffective and potentially destructive. This paper examines various such schemes in view of GPU-based attacks and identifies characteristics that allow defense mechanisms to withstand attacks. In particular, we demonstrate that, hash-reversal schemes which adapt solely on server load are ineffective under attack by GPU utilizing adversaries; whereas, hash-reversal schemes which adapt based on client behavior are effective even under GPU based attacks.


We present a single shot low coherence white light Hilbert phase microscopy (WL-HPM) for quantitative phase imaging of Si opto-electronic devices, i.e., Si integrated circuits (Si-ICs) and Si solar cells. White light interferograms were recorded by a color CCD camera and the interferogram is decomposed into the three colors red, green and blue. Spatial carrier frequency of the WL interferogram was increased sufficiently by means of introducing a tilt in the interferometer. Hilbert transform fringe analysis was used to reconstruct the phase map for red, green and blue colors from the single interferogram. 3D step height map of Si-ICs and Si solar cells was reconstructed at multiple wavelengths from a single interferogram. Experimental results were compared with Atomic Force Microscopy and they were found to be close to each other. The present technique is non-contact, full-field and fast for the determination of surface roughness variation and morphological features of the objects at multiple wavelengths.


For a molecular identification and typing tool, we developed a specific polymerase chain reaction (PCR) based on the gyrB gene sequence and a subsequent restriction fragment length polymorphism (RFLP) analysis using the products amplified from the specific PCR to facilitate discrimination of biotypes of Pasteurella pneumotropica from laboratory mice. Appropriate PCR products, a 1039-basepair fragment for biotype Jawetz and a 1033-basepair fragment for biotype Heyl, were amplified by use of the primers CZO-1 and NJO-2 from all 105 P. pneumotropica isolates tested and the 2 reference strains but not from other bacterial species tested. MspI digestion of PCR-generated products showed 3 RFLP patterns among the 105 isolates, and these patterns correlated with the biotype of the isolate (RFLP pattern 1, biotype Jawetz; RFLP pattern 2, biotype Heyl; and RFLP pattern 3, biotype Jawetz with Beta-hemolytic activity). Our procedure identifies and biotypes isolates of P. pneumotropica from laboratory mice, using simple PCR and enzymatic restriction techniques. Therefore, this procedure is useful as a rapid identification and biotyping tool for isolates of P. pneumotropica from laboratory mice.


Numerous genome-wide association studies (GWASs) have been conducted for the identification of genetic variants involved with human height. The vast majority of these studies, however, have been conducted in populations of European ancestry. Here, we report the first GWAS of adult height in the Taiwan Biobank using a discovery sample of 14 571 individuals and an independent replication sample of 20 506 individuals. From our analysis we generalize to the Taiwanese population genome-wide significant associations with height and 18 previously identified genes in European and non-Taiwanese East Asian populations. We also identify and replicate, at the genome-wide significance level, associated variants for height in four novel genes at two loci that have not previously been reported: RASA2 on chromosome 3 and NABP2, RNF41, and SLC39A5 at 12q13.3 on chromosome 12. RASA2 and RNF41 are strong candidates for having a role in height with copy number and loss of function variants in RASA2 previously found to be associated with short stature disorders, and decreased expression of the RNF41 gene resulting in insulin resistance in skeletal muscle. The results from our analysis of the Taiwan Biobank underscore the potential for the identification of novel genetic discoveries in underrepresented worldwide populations, even for traits, such as height, that have been extensively investigated in large-scale studies of European ancestry populations.


Background: Endothelin-1 (ET-1) is involved in some diseases, including renal disease. Recently, the role of ET-1 in postrenal transplantation has been demonstrated in experimental and clinical studies. A new endothelin receptor antagonist, TAK-044, blocks both, ETA and ETB receptors, and was useful in treating acute renal failure in rats. In this study, we evaluated the effect of TAK-044 on autotransplanted kidneys with 18 h of perfusion. Materials and Methods: TAK-044 was injected subcutaneously at 15 mg/kg/day for 2 weeks in one group of dogs, and blood analysis and renal function, were evaluated. A control group was given saline in the same manner as that used for the TAK-044 group. Histopathological examination and immunohistochemistry for ET-1 were performed in the two groups. Results: In the control group, 5 of the 7 dogs died of renal failure within 2 weeks after autotransplantation of the kidney. In the TAK-044 group, 5 of the 7 dogs survived and 2 died of renal failure within the same period. Although the histological changes in the tubules in both groups were severe due to the 18 h of perfusion, TAK-044 ameliorated these changes. Immunohistochemical staining for ET-1 was seen in tubules in the control group. Conclusion: These findings suggest that TAK-044 effectively reduces damage in autotransplanted perfused kidneys in dogs, and may be useful in limiting damage to the kidney by acute tubular necrosis after renal transplantation in humans.


Variety of modern foam extinguishment equipment with coefficient of air filled foam, methods of its obtaining and applying technologies, make foam almost universal method in the sphere of firefighting, including the sphere of Fuel and Energy Complex. However, air filled foam being one of the method of firefighting has a range of unsolved problems. The authors analyze the basic historical facts, scientific researchers and prospects of further development of today's method of fire extinguishment. Foam extinguishing in oil and gas industry is one of the most widespread, effective and even the possible one. In fact, all kinds of air filled foam are applied to protect the objects: low, medium, high expansion foam. By the way, foam generators are applied in accordance with their function, chemical composition and method of foam application.


Optical burst switching (OBS) is a promising switching technology for the next optical transport network. In this paper, we analyze the assembled traffic of the science information network (SINET) by using the fractional Brownian motion (FBM) model. The analytical results show that the general timer-based assembly scheme can not avoid increasing the burstiness (variance in short timescales), which will deteriorate the network performance. Therefore, a novel burst assembly method with traffic shaping function named advanced timer- based is introduced to reduce the burstiness of assembled traffic, in which the traffic rate is smoothed by restricting the burst length to a threshold when bursts are sent out periodically. The simulation results show that the advanced timer-based assembly algorithm is better than existing assembly algorithms in terms of burst loss ratio.


We have constructed a Carmichael number with 10,333,229,505 prime factors, and have also constructed Carmichael numbers with k prime factors for every k between 3 and 19,565,220. These computations are the product of implementations of two new algorithms for the subset product prob- lem that exploit the non-uniform distribution of primes p with the property that p 1 divides a highly composite .


Based on the analysis of 358 articles published by 491 researchers of University of Agricultural Sciences, Dharwad for the year 2017, the study identifies authorship pattern. The study finds that solo research is no more there in the UASD during the specified period. Further, co-authorship is tending towards team research. A small number of researchers are continuously engaged in research. It is recommended that the University should develop institution's 'Publications Encouragement Policy' for the potential authors providing guidelines on giving authorship, authorship coupling, and indicating statement of responsibility. Keywords: Publication pattern, authorship pattern, university of agricultural sciences, Dharwad, teaching fraternity Cite this ArticleDeepthi, P.G. Tadasad. Authorship Pattern in a University Environment: A Study of University of Agriculture Science, Dharwad, Karnataka. Journal of Advancements in Library Sciences. 2019; 6(2): 107–113p.


"This book, produced for use with the third SEG/EAGE Distinguished Instructor Short Course, addresses the practical aspects of multicomponent data acquisition, processing, and interpretation. The first part of the book is devoted to overcoming the difficulties associated with shear-wave acquisition. Converted-mode operation is covered in detail using real-life examples. The particularities of sea-bottom receivers also are examined. The second part reviews the processing and the main challenges of the shear-converted modes: static corrections, gathering, velocity analysis, and compensation for shear-wave splitting in axial anisotropy. The book gives a detailed description of processing sequences, and 2D and 3D results, yielding natural axis orientation of layers, are compared in shear and PS converted modes. The third part is devoted to case histories in which new attributes, such as VP/VS ratio, crack density, or fracture orientation, are illustrated in a reservoircharacterization context. These case histories can guide the geophysicist to decide if a particular geologic situation can be handled best using shear waves."


Obesity and abnormal nourishment are the biggest concerns of developed and developing societies. We analysed the nutritional status using Mini Nutrition Assessment (MNA) and correlated the findings with BMI, Waist – to – Hip (W/H) ratio in elderly population of Dakshina Kannada District of Karnataka. Total of 221 elderly subjects
above the age of 50 years (105 were males and 116 were females) were recruited, who did not have any morbid
diseases. Their Anthropometric parameters namely BMI and W/H were recorded and tabulated. They were grouped
into Underweight, Normal, Over weight and Obese and the respective numbers were segregated and shown in table.
MNA scores of each group were found out and the correlation was done. Results were analysed by using ANOVA and Tukey – Kramer test using SPSS version 16. The results suggested that there is a correlation between the BMI, W/H ratio with the MNA scores. Underweight elderly had low scores while overweight and obese subjects had higher scores. Women showed a higher tendency to become over weight and obese compared to men. This study reiterates that there is a correlation between anthropometric parameters and the nutritional status. A wider study with more number of subjects could yield more insight into the findings and be useful guide for suggesting any lifestyle modification.


Verrucous carcinoma is a rare variant of cervical carcinoma, usually occurs in postmenopausal group. Aetiology is still not understood but it is thought to be associated with chronic irritation and inflammation. Histological diagnosis is usually difficult since the pathologic findings may be benign especially if biopsy specimen contains only surface epithelium. Prognosis of this histological subtype is better compared to the well-differentiated Squamous Cell Carcinoma (SCC) of cervix. Author present a case of verrucous carcinoma where patient came for routine check-up and on pelvic examination; cervix was replaced by friable, cauliflower like warty growth, clinically staged as stage 1B. Punch biopsy was taken from the growth and it reported benign pathology but due to high index of suspicion, repeat biopsy was taken and second histopathology also reported benign pathology. Contrast Enhanced Computed Tomography (CECT) whole abdomen was advised as clinical picture and Histopathological Examination (HPE) was not matching. CECT reported mass confined to the cervix, features consistent with carcinoma cervix. So, the patient underwent radical hysterectomy with pelvic lymphadenectomy. Final histopathology reported verrucous carcinoma of cervix. Patient is under regular follow-up and free of disease since 1 year.


Using autobiographic experiences gained from my qualitative doctoral research into the place of race in equality discourses and equal opportunities policies in higher education, this chapter focuses on the ways in which the researcher's gender impacts on the antiracist research project.

The first part of the chapter traces the rise of the antiracist and feminist critiques of social research, charting their points of connection and their points of difference. The chapter then moves on to reflexively analyse my own research, focusing on negotiating the complexities between claiming research as antiracist and feminist and the research actually being antiracist and feminist.


In this paper, we selected primary cutting parameters that influence on surface roughness of cut bottom surface in end-milling for SM25C material. Those are overhang, depth of cut, feed rate and spindle speed. And then performed orthogonal array experiment and ANOVA by Taguchi method to determine that improved level combination of cutting parameters for betterment of working efficiency and surface roughness one of quality characteristics. And we verified a advisability of prediction model by verification test about level combination. From the results, main cutting parameter influences on surface roughness is spindle speed and the next is feed rate.


Roman stamp on barrel-staves.—An interesting discovery in the City is reported by Mr. Waddington, Local Secretary for London and Middlesex, and the accompanying illustration of the steened well (pi. XXXV, fig. i), for which barrel-staves were used, below the Bank of England is reproduced by permission from the Bank periodical (The Old Lady of Threadneedle Street, Dec. 1925). The discovery was made last September at a depth of 25 ft. below street level, immediately under the doorway from the old Rotunda to the Shutting, and the well was lined with 17 staves formed by cutting in two a barrel 6 ft. long. On the inner face of one was the stamped inscription (pi. xxxv, fig. 2) which is read T. C. PACA+ perhaps for T. C. PACATI. There is a similarly marked stave in the Guildhall Museum, which was found in iai4on the site of the old General Post Office (Archaeologia, lxvi, 246). Associated pottery on the Bank site suggests a date about 100 A. D. for the well, and possibly Pacatus was a leading cooper of Londinium in the first century. The practice of lining wells with barrels is confirmed by the discovery at Silchester in 1897 (Archaeologia, lvi, pi. Vlii, p. 121).


Anthracnose caused by Colletotrichum musae is the most important postharvest disease of banana fruit. The present study was conducted to evaluate the sensitivity of C. musae isolates to hot water treatment in vitro. The effect of hot water treatment (HWT) in vitro was determined by placing conidial suspensions and plugs of agar with mycelia of 12 single spore isolates of C. musae in hot water bath at 45, 50 and 55°C for 2, 5, 8, 11, 14 and 17 min. Percent inhibition of conidial germination and colony growth increased with increased temperature and time combinations. HWT at 55°C for 5 min had an equivalent inhibition of conidial germination and reduction of mycelial growth to that of HWT at 50°C for 17 min in the 12 C. musae isolates. Remarkable variability in thermo-tolerance was found among 12 isolates of C. musae and isolate HC2 and HC3 were found to be the most sensitive, while DL1 and DL2 were comparatively heat tolerant isolates.

 Key words: Banana anthracnose, Colletotrichum musae, hot water treatment, sensitive, tolerant.


The prediction of the aero-engine performance parameters is very important for aero-engine condition monitoring and fault diagnosis. In this paper, the chaotic phase space of engine exhaust temperature (EGT) time series which come from actual air-borne ACARS data is reconstructed through selecting some suitable nearby points. The partial least square (PLS) based on the cubic spline function or the kernel function transformation is adopted to obtain chaotic predictive function of EGT series. The experiment results indicate that the proposed PLS chaotic prediction algorithm based on biweight kernel function transformation has significant advantage in overcoming multicollinearity of the independent variables and solve the stability of regression model. Our predictive NMSE is 16.5 percent less than that of the traditional linear least squares (OLS) method and 10.38 percent less than that of the linear PLS approach. At the same time, the forecast error is less than that of nonlinear PLS algorithm through bootstrap test screening.


Made by the method of calculation of the absolute values of the authors of the slip, which provide the desired engine torque at various laws regulating the voltage. The analysis of the results.


Abstract. To date, the transitivity of the global system has been analysed for late Quaternary (glacial, interglacial, and present-day) climate. Here, we extend this analysis to a warm, almost ice-free climate with a different configuration of continents. We use the Earth system model of the Max Planck Institute for Meteorology to analyse the stability of the climate system under early Eocene and pre-industrial conditions. We initialize the simulations by prescribing either dense forests or bare deserts on all continents. Starting with desert continents, an extended desert remains in central Asia in the early Eocene climate. Starting with dense forest coverage, the Asian desert is much smaller, while coastal deserts develop in the Americas which appear to be larger than in the simulations with initially bare continents. These differences can be attributed to differences in the large-scale tropical circulation. With initially forested continents, a stronger dipole in the 200 hPa velocity potential develops than in the simulation with initially bare continents. This difference prevails when vegetation is allowed to adjust to and interact with climate. Further simulations with initial surface conditions that differ in the region of the Asian desert only indicate that local feedback processes are less important in the development of multiple states. In the interglacial, pre-industrial climate, multiple states develop only in the Sahel region. There, local climate–vegetation interaction seems to dominate.


Introduction

Interferon gamma inducible protein-10 (IP-10) has been suggested as an alternative marker to diagnose TB recently. A higher level of IP-10 was observed in antigen or mitogen stimulated TB blood samples. Increased IP-10 activity in response to TB specific antigens in TB patients has also been observed to decrease after successful therapy. This study aims to evaluate the potential of IP-10 values to be used as biomarkers to assess MDR-TB treatment.

Methods

This study recruited a total of 67 patients including 20 tuberculosis (TB), 17 multi-drug resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB) and 30 healthy cases (HC). Blood samples were taken from each subject to measure the IP-10 values at the beginning of the experiment and at 2 weeks, 2 months and 6 months after treatment. The values were compared with the sputum results to evaluate changes in antigen values during treatment.

Results

Higher levels of IP-10 and TB antigen were observed in the TB (458.7±301.9pg/ml, 2.1pg/ml) and the MDR-TB groups (513.7±279.8pg/ml, 1.6pg/ml) than the HC case (131.9±102.8pg/ml, 0.4pg/ml). However, no regular patterns were found for the changes in TB antigen or IP-10 values in the two treatment groups. Nevertheless, after 6 months of anti-TB treatment, significant decrease in IP10 values was noted in both the TB (271.7±254.5pg/ml) and MDR-TB (303.6±273.7pg/m) groups. In addition, the IP-10 levels and the TB antigen values were lower when sputum smear and culture were negative as compared to when both were positive.

Conclusion

A single IP-10 value cannot be used as a biomarker to confirm sputum conversion, however, the IP-10 value can assist to detect a higher risk tuberculosis group and be used to assess treatment outcome.


The "Animation" curriculum is one of the specialized courses in higher vocational computer professional profession-al, because the animation requires students skills strong, let the students in the learning process is quite boring, is more difficultto learn one of the courses. Through the practice of teaching can improve the students' level of professional skills, through the dis-cussion of practice teaching mode of "Animation", "Animation" to higher vocational course teaching provides reference and guid-ance.


This work proposes a novel chemometric methodology for in-line near infrared spectroscopy (NIRS) monitoring of pharmaceutical powder moisture in a fluidised-bed dryer. The collected spectra are analysed by multivariate chemometrics involving the preparation of numerous laboratory samples. A different methodology, using only plant samples, was tested in real-time. A specially designed probe tip, allowing for robust in-situ spectral acquisition, was designed. The results prove that NIRS can be as efficient as traditional quality analyses, e.g. loss-on-drying, in measuring powder moisture content in a fluidised bed dryer with a calibration model based only on plant samples. © 2011 Canadian Society for Chemical Engineering