The contributions of monotic intelligibility to the right ear advantage for speech presented dichotically were examined in 3 experiments. The first experiment was mainly a replication of an earlier study by Speaks and Bissonette (5). Signal level in the right ear (RE) was attenuated and, separately, signal level in the left ear was amplified relative to 4 different reference intensities. Dichotic performance was not sensitive to absolute interaural-intensitive differences, but rather to something approaching an absolute sound pressure level. Thus, the RE advantage was affected only when signal level in one ear was sufficiently low (less than 60 dB SPL) to be near or below the "knee" of the monotic intelligibility function. That contention received support from the second experiment in which RE attenuation was introduced in both quiet and noise. Noise shifted the monotic intelligibility function, and, as a consequence, less RE attenuation was required to cancel the RE advantage in noise than in quiet. The third experiment was conducted on a listener whose monotic intelligibility functions for the 2 ears were separated by 20 dB. The size and direction of the dichotic ear advantage, even though assessed at intensities that yielded 100% monotic intelligibility for both ears, depended on the proximity of the test intensity to the knees of the 2 monotic intelligibility functions. The results of all 3 experiments suggest that performance on a dichotic task does not involve central-level interactions exclusively.


* ABSTRACT This paper investigates the diachrony of the verbs of volition ai and beh in Southern Min (SM). The data include historical SM texts (16 th -19 th century), folk songs in the late 19 th to early 20 th century, and contemporary natural Taiwanese Southern Min conversations. The results mainly mark two stages of the development of ai and beh: historical (before 1900) and contemporary SM. Since the 16 th century (Ming Dynasty), ai has been used as a verb of volition indicating love, intention or hope. As for historical ai, it marked future, specialized however for predicting an adverse future. In contemporary SM, a sense of necessity emerged with the use of ai denoting general agreement among people. Seven senses are attributed to historical beh: want/intention/hope, future, excessiveness, necessity, proximity and conditionality. In contemporary SM, the indication of the want of an entity has become a less preferred use, and necessity is only preserved when indicating puzzlement and helplessness. The diachronic developments of ai and beh demonstrate an interplay of metaphorization and metonymization (Traugott and Dasher 2002:27). Metaphorization contributes first to the semantic shift of ai and beh from "to want; to love" to "to intend to" and a concurrent categorical change from lexical verb into auxiliary, and second, to the evolution of future. Metonymization activates an even wider range of uses


This research is conducted in Kartasura-Surakarta s area especially from an area that relatively does not grow (recharge area) to an area growing to became a city (discharge area). The area is phisiographically restricted by a groundwater contour (i.e. 200 m from sea level) and by three rivers (i.e. Pepe, Wiro, and Bengawan Solo). This research has one objective to know the distribution of groundwater quality in Kartasura-Surakarta that is located between Pepe river and Wiro river. This research uses survey model and description comparative model completed by cheking the field. On the one hand, survey model measures physical data and density population data, and on the other hand, description comparative model is used to know the influence of physical factors and density population factors on groundwater quality. Physical data and density population data collected by using purposive proportional random sampling are analyzed with trend analysis model, statistical analysis model (i.e. parsiil correlation and one-way variant analysis). The result of this research shows that the groundwater quality in the field declines. The trend analysis proves that most of the parameter concentrations of groundwater quality increase from the recharge area to the discharge area. Furthermore, the conclusion is also supported by the result of parsiil correlation analysis that shows a positive correlation between the distance and the most of the parameters, although the positive correlation between the depth of groundwater and the parameters of groundwater quality is weak. Moreover, the results of one-way variant analysis to the selected factors (i.e. geology formation, density groundwater contour, and density population) with the parameters of water quality show that there is a strong difference on the most of the parameters.


A BSTRACT .—The San Luis Basin has been characterized as an east-tilted, northerly trending rift basin containing a narrow deep graben on the east and a largely buried, intrarift basement horst on the west. We refine these concepts for the southern San Luis Basin by revisiting existing gravity and aeromagnetic data using modern methods. In the New Mexico portion of the basin, the narrow (6-12 km) Taos graben follows a general north-south trend from Costilla near the state line to the Embudo fault at the southern end of the basin. West of the Taos graben, the intrarift basement horst changes orientation from north-south in Colo- rado to southwestward south of the state line, merging with the Tusas Mountains in a complicated manner that is not entirely understood. At the state line, the Taos graben widens northward to reach 25-30 km wide in the Culebra reentrant in Colorado, accompanied by en echelon stepping of the western graben border to the west. For nearly the entire length of the graben, the gravity-defined western border coincides with Quaternary faults and is followed or paralleled by the course of the Rio Grande. In the southernmost basin, the intrarift horst is absent. Instead, a broad semi-circular gravity low (Tres Orejas gravity low) of ambiguous origin lies west of the geophysically defined Taos graben. Along the southern border of the San Luis Basin, a strong gravity gradient follows the Embudo fault farther westward than previously proposed for a scissors fault configuration. South of the Embudo fault, north-south gradients in both gravity and aeromagnetic data correspond to the Picuris-Pecos fault system and suggest a related, parallel fault exists about 20 km to the west. Prominent circular aeromagnetic anomalies in the Taos Plateau can be associated with individual volcanoes and are used to infer the remanent magnetic polarities the rocks acquired when they cooled. A circular aeromagnetic anomaly near the Gorge bridge suggests a previously unknown volcano lies beneath the Servilleta Basalt. This information can be used to aid future geologic mapping of the Plateau and, in certain circumstances, can help constrain uncertain or multiple age dates for the volcanoes.


Security is imperative knowledge for the designer, yet little integration currently exists between security and interior design. Further, the retail environment has been recognized as holding great potential for crime reduction through enhanced design solutions. The purpose of this study was to explore perceptions of 24 expert and novice shoplifters using verbal protocol analysis, a methodology for eliciting verbal reports of thought sequences. The study objectives were to examine shoplifters' perceptions of the retail environment, investigate potential deterrents to crime, and explore the relationship between physical design features and security techniques. The results revealed significant differences between expert and novice shoplifters. Findings indicated that shoplifters focused attention on the evidence of design and security devices, including formal surveillance, product positioning, security tagging, employee positioning, access control, and store layout. Finally, the study also supported three profiles of shoplifters: low, medium, and high environmental deterrence. Overall, the study illustrates the potential of the physical environment to deter shoplifting, and proposes appropriate design solutions.


Although the first travel books in the Turks correspond to the 16th century, they have been subjected to a lot of examination both because they are the first travel books written on Cathay and for the period they were written. However, it has not gone unnoticed that there are very few studies on the work called Seyahatü'l Kübra, written by Karçınzade Süleyman Şükrü in the 20th century. Şükrü, who travelled after being dismissed from his official duty in the Ottoman Empire in the 20th century, travelled from Anatolia to many countries such as Greece, Iran, Austria, France, Africa, Egypt, India and China and took notes of everything he observed and experienced during his travels. Although it is not as valuable as Evliya Çelebi's "Seyahatname" in Turkey and around the world, Şükrü's "Seyahatü'l Kübra" is one of the most comprehensive travel books that should be examined in terms of its rich content. The Chinese travel chapters in the travelogue are divided into eleven titles including Hong Kong, Shanghai and the details of the outer seas that the traveller crossed before reaching Taku Port, the Pier of Beijing, Pacific Ocean, Tianjin, Beijing, Cancaku, Lancosın, Hoço, Hami, Urumqi. The aim of this study is to examine the impressions of the traveller's journey to China in Seyahatü'l Kübra and to try to analyse the situation in the Qing period according to the work. Therefore, in this study, the historical developments in China in the 20th century will be emphasized and the similar points of the period will be tried to be revealed by giving quotations about how the periodic features of the Qing Dynasty are reflected in Seyahatü'l Kübra.


The focus of experiments presented in this dissertation is to determine how signals created by exposure to environmental stimuli are integrated at the level of transcription, resulting in the generation of specific patterns of gene expression. The model system used was expression of the neurotensinl neuromedin N (NT/N) neuropeptide gene in the neuroendocrine PC12 cell line. This gene is synergistically activated in PC12 cells in response to nerve
growth factor, lithium, glucocorticoids, and activators of adenylate cyclase. Several cis -regulatory elements were identified within a 200 bp regulatory region, including AP-1, CRE, and GRE-like elements. Mutational analysis
confirmed the importance of these elements for responses to inducer combinations. The primary objective was to identify proteins that interact with NT/N promoter sequences and determine if they are important in
mediating responses to inducer combinations.

The first set of experiments was designed to investigate changes in AP-1 binding activity. Previous analysis had shown that mutation of the AP-1 site severely curtails responses to all inducer combinations indicating that AP-1 plays a pivotal role in NT/N gene activation. DNA binding studies using in vitro synthesized AP-1 proteins revealed that all heterodimeric combinations could bind both the AP-1 and JARE sites; however, these complexes displayed a higher affinity for the AP-1 site. c-Jun homodimers were also found to bind both these sites albeit with a lower affinity and with a preference for the JARE site. These studies revealed that specificity is probably not at the level of DNA binding. Therefore, it was possible that only a subset of AP-1 proteins were activated upon stimulation. DNase I footprint analysis using nuclear extracts from PC12 cells showed changes in protection at the consensus AP-1 site upon treatment with inducers suggesting changes in AP-1 binding activity. It was found that AP-1 binding activity was increased upon stimulation, with the major component being Jun B. However, substantial levels of c-Fos and c-Jun
were also detected at some time points. These results coupled with transfection data demonstrating that forced expression of c-Jun and c-Fos result in potent synergistic activation of the NT/N promoter support the hypothesis that c-Jun and c-Fos are also involved in NT/N gene activation.

DNase I footprinting studies using PC12 nuclear extracts also revealed substantial areas of protection surrounding the CRE element. This result, along with the high degree of conservation of these sequences between human and rat, suggested they play a role in the regulation of the NT/N gene in PC12 cells. Mutational analysis of this region showed that sequences upstream of the CRE were important for full activation of the NT/N promoter. Specific mutation of the CRE resulted in a 75% decrease in activity upon induction, a level similar to that observed previously with less precise linker scanner mutations. This site had also been shown to be critical for c-Jun…


We assessed whether heritable thrombophilia was more common in cases with symptomatic venous thromboembolism (VTE) after total hip replacement (THA) than among asymptomatic controls without VTE. After THA, 20 cases with deep venous thrombosis (DVT) documented by magnetic resonance venogram (MRV), and 23 with pulmonary embolism (PE) documented by ventilation/perfusion or spiral CT scan, were compared to 43 controls without VTE, matching cases to controls by age, gender, BMI, hip diagnosis, clinical predisposing factors, and VTE prophylaxis. Five of 42 cases (12%) and 0/43 controls (0%) had antithrombin III deficiency (ATIII) (< 75%) (p = .026). Nine of 42 cases (21%) and 2/43 controls (4.7%) had protein C deficiency (< 70%) (p = .021). Ten of 43 cases (9 heterozygous, 1 homozygous) (23%) and 1/43 controls (heterozygous) (2%) had the prothrombin gene mutation (PTG) (p = .004). VTE cases were more likely to have ≥ 1 abnormality of ATIII, protein C, or PTG (21/42 [50%] vs 3/43 [7%]) controls (p<0.0001), with sensitivity 50% and specificity 93% distinguishing cases from controls. For our 1769 cohort prevalence of VTE (2%), the predictive value of a positive test (≥ 1 abnormality of ATIII, protein C, PTG) was 12.8% and for a negative test 98.9%. ATIII deficiency had 11.9% sensitivity and 100% specificity distinguishing cases from controls; the predictive value of a positive test for ATIII deficiency was 100%, the predictive value of a negative test was 98.2%. The PTG mutation had 23.3% sensitivity and 97.7% specificity distinguishing cases from controls; the predictive value of a positive test was 16.9%, the predictive value of a negative test was 98.4%. Deficiencies of ATIII (r = .25, p = .02), protein C (r = .25, p = .021), and PTG (r = .31, p = .003) correlated with postoperative VTE. Having ≥ 1 abnormality of ATIII, protein C, or PTG correlated with VTE status, r = 0.48, p<.0001. Cases with VTE after THA were more likely than controls to have heritable thrombophilia (ATIII or protein C deficiency, PTG homo-heterozygosity). Pre-THA screening for these 3 heritable thrombophilias should improve identification of cases with reduced risk of VTE, who may only need mild thromboprophylaxis, and those with heritable thrombophilia in whom prophylaxis should be more aggressive.


This paper describes the development of the pilot plant of distributed intelligent management system for a microgrid. For optimal control and management of microgrids, intelligent agents area applied to the microgrid management system. Each agent includes intelligent algorithms to make decisions on behalf of the corresponding microgrid entity such as distributed generators, local loads, and so on. To this end, each agent has its own resources to evaluate the system conditions by collecting local information and also communicating with other agents. This paper presents key features of the data communication and management of the developed pilot plant such as the construction of mesh network using local wireless communication techniques, the autonomous agent coordination schemes using plug-and-play functions of agents and contract net protocol (CNP) for decision-making. The performance of the pilot plant and developed algorithms are verified via real-time microgrid test bench based on hardware-in-the-loop simulation systems.


BACKGROUND
Antibiotic-associated diarrhea (AAD) is the most frequent side effect of antibiotic therapy. Clinical signs and symptoms comprise mild and self-limiting courses of diarrhea as well as life threatening courses like pseudomembranous colitis or toxic megacolon. Therapy is symptomatic, antidiarrheal drugs like Saccharomyces boulardii are the therapy of choice.

METHOD
Available studies on S. boulardii in the prevention of AAD are presented as a review.

RESULTS
In 14 out of 17 studies including 4,627 patients the administration of S. boulardii achieved a protective effect between 43.7% and 87.3%. A meta-analysis (5 studies, 1,076 patients) showed a significant reduction of the risk to develop an AAD from 17.2% to 6.7%,in a furthermeta-analysis (4 studies on eradication of H. pylori, 1,215 patients) the significant reductionwasfrom 12.2% to 5.6%.

CONCLUSIONS
There is very good evidence for the yeast S. boulardii to be effective in the prevention of AAD especially in hospitalized adults. The simultaneous administration of S. boulardii to antibiotics resulted in a significant reduction to develop AAD by more than half.


In forthcoming deuterium-tritium (DT) experiments on JET a significant population of alpha-particles will be produced. For operating alpha-particle diagnostics at high DT neutron fluxes, specific improvements have to be made. Proposed new detectors for gamma-ray measurements will be based on CeBr3 and LaBr3:Ce scintillators. They are characterized by a good energy resolution, a relatively high detection efficiency for a few MeV gamma-rays and a fast response time. An overview of scintillator parameters is presented. A description of the properties of photodetectors is given to indicate optimal setups. Results of measurements, using gamma-ray sources with energies up to a few MeV, are discussed with relation to the DT campaign requirements.


Purpose. Development of the operational numerical model to compute contamination of the atmosphere over Pavlograd city in the case of solid rocket propellant ignition at the storage. Methodology. To simulate the toxic chemical dispersion (product of the solid rocket propellant firing) the equation of convective-diffusion transfer is used. This equation takes into account the toxic chemical dispersion in the atmosphere by wind and the atmosphere diffusion. To calculate the process of the indoor contamination in the case of the contaminated air infiltration a balance model is used. This model takes into account the ventilation flow rate, volume of the room, concentration of toxic chemical in the inlet air. To compute the ventilation flow rate the empirical model was used. The implicit change–triangle difference scheme was used for the numerical integration of the governing equation. FORTRAN language was used to develop code on the basis of the created numerical model. On the basis of the developed numeral model numerical experiment was carried out which allowed to estimate the level of atmosphere contamination in Pavlograd city. Findings. The operational model allows predicting quickly the hitting zone dimensions. The developed model was used to estimate risk of people toxic hitting in the residential districts of Pavlograd city. Originality. A numeral model allows to estimate the risk of toxic hitting of people in Pavlograd city in the case of an accident at the of solid rocket propellant storage. Practical value. The developed numeral model can be used for the quick estimation of risk for people in the city after toxic chemical release at the solid propellant storage. The developed numerical model solves the problem to assess the consequences for the population at ignition of solid rocket propellant in storage.


SUMMARY Little is known about the effects of infection with Borrelia burgdorferi, the bacterium that causes Lyme disease, on its tick vectors. The purpose of this study was to determine the behavioural and ecological effects of infection by the bacterium in nymphal and adult black-legged (Ixodes scapularis) ticks. We found that the effects of infection were more pronounced in adults than in nymphs. Compared to uninfected adults, infected adults were less able to overcome physical obstacles, avoided vertical surfaces, were less active and quested at lower heights. Infected nymphs showed increased phototaxis and attraction to vertical surfaces. Infected nymphs also showed trends toward increased questing height and a greater tendency to overcome physical obstacles although these trends were not statistically significant. These altered behaviours in an infected tick may affect survival or pathogen transmission and may reflect kin selection in the bacterial pathogen.


This article describes some important non-textual or "under the hood" aspects which are generally unknown to researchers and users of web archives. It argues that providers of web archives should in future make available such information and consider this as an integral part of web archives. This article was written for and accepted by RESAW Conference, "Web Archives as Scholarly Sources: Issues, Practices and Perspectives", 8 – 10 June 2015, Aarhus University, Denmark.


Collective processes involving neutrinos in unmagnetized and magnetized electron–ion plasmas are discussed. It is shown that the ponderomotive force of the neutrinos can create inhomogeneities and magnetic fields. The nonlinear coupling between the neutrinos and the plasma is attributed to the weak Fermi interaction force. The relevance of our investigation to the inhomogeneities and the primordial magnetic fields in the early universe, as well as to the anomalous absorption of neutrino energy and to the origin of super strong magnetic fields in supernovae explosions is discussed.


Beginning with the assumptions that genetic technology will make possible the enhancement of some significant human capacities and that our society will have self-evident reasons to pursue such enhancements, this essay suggests less evident reasons to proceed with extreme caution. The essay asks: Will we, in our attempts to enhance humans by reducing their subjection to chance and change, inadvertently impoverish them? It explores how technologies aimed at enhancement might affect the good that is our experience of some forms of the beautiful and the excellent, the good that is relationships of care, and the good that is diversity across the life span. In the end, it speculates about the fundamental philosophical difference that underlies the disagreement between those who would tend to embrace a project to enhance human capacities and those who would tend to criticize such a project.


Silicone rubber insulators are replacing the conventional ceramic and porcelain insulators rapidly in power transmission and distribution industry. Very limited field knowledge is available about the performance of silicone rubber insulators in polluted and contaminated environments and therefore need further investigation. A comprehensive analysis of silicone rubber sheets (intended for coating outdoor insulators) was carried out in this paper based on experimental results. The main performance parameters analyzed were arc inception voltage and flashover voltage. Dependence of these parameters on equivalent salt deposit density (ESDD), non-soluble salt deposit density (NSDD), relative humidity, ambient temperature, fog rate, dry band formation, dry band location and number of dry bands were investigated extensively. Insulator orientation and its effect on performance were also studied. The authors believe that this paper will provide a comprehensive knowledge about the flashover characteristics of silicone rubber insulators under humid, contaminated and dry band conditions. These results could be used in the selection and design of silicone rubber insulators for polluted environments.


Reflexivity has been a common theme in the literature on the history of psychology in recent years. Reflecting on the history of psychology is for historians of psychology the ultimate reflexive step. Germany is widely regarded as the homeland of "modern" or "scientific" psychology. It is here that the oldest surviving work with the word "psychology" in the title was published in 1590. It was also here that the first book with the title History of Psychology [Geschichte der Psychologie] was published in 1808. This reflects the fact that a substantial literature on psychology had already been published in Continental Europe by the end of the 18th century. Several other works on the history of psychology were published in German-speaking countries in the 19th century and in the years leading up to the First World War. English-speaking countries were relatively late in adopting psychology, but it grew rapidly in the United States when it was adopted, and the country was already the dominant power in the field by the outbreak of the First World War. Several works on the history of psychology were published in the United States around the same time, suggesting that disciplines and disciplinary history tend to appear simultaneously. This is because disciplines use their history to create a distinct identity for themselves. The history of psychology was widely taught in American psychology departments, and several textbooks were published to support these courses. E. G. Boring's A History of Experimental Psychology (1929, 1950) was by far the most influential of these textbooks, and it has profoundly shaped the understanding of psychologists of the history of their field. For example, it was Boring who traced the history of the discipline to the establishment of Wilhelm Wundt's laboratory for experimental psychology at the University of Leipzig in 1879. In 1979–1980, was widely celebrated as the "centennial" of psychology and the XXII International Congress of Psychology was held in Leipzig to mark the occasion. Prior to the 1960s, the history of psychology was mainly a pedagogical field, and it still is as far as many psychologists are concerned. However, it also became an area of specialization during this decade. This was partly due to a few psychologists adopting it as their main area of interest and partly due to historians of science becoming more interested in the field. A large body of scholarly literature has been produced, including some scholarly textbooks, but this literature exists side by side with more traditional textbooks for which there is still a significant demand. There are signs that the history of psychology has been facing difficulties as a branch of psychology in Europe and North America in recent years. However, interest in the field has been growing among psychologists in other parts of the world and among historians of science. This situation will inevitably have implications for the content of the field.


The estimation problem for a class of non-uniform sampling linear stochastic systems with missing measurements is considered, where the state is updated uniformly and the sensor non-uniformly samples the measurement once at most in a state update period. By using innovation analysis approach, the optimal state estimators are designed at the state update points and measurement sampling points based on the received measurements. A simulation example is given to show the effectiveness of the algorithms.


The studies were performed basing on the experimental model of acute pulmonary tissue injury. Papain in a dose of 2 mg/ml PBS/100 g b.w. was administered once, intratracheally, on the 21st day of the experiment. Besides, female Wistar rats were injected twice with BCG vaccine in a dose of 4 x 10(8) microorganisms. BCG vaccine was administered intraperitoneally on the 1st and 14th day of the experiment to activate the system of mononuclear phagocytes. Control rats were intratracheally or/and intraperitoneally given PBS solution. All the animals were killed on the 28th, 35th and 42nd day of the experiment. A single intratracheal papain injection induced emphysematous changes in the animal lungs. The changes were accompanied by basement membrane rebuilding and focal collagen and elastin cumulation. An increase in the number of type II alveolar epithelial cells was observed. Anchorage of collagen fibres and microfibrillary structures in the cytoplasm of type II pneumocytes was observed in the BCG- and papain-treated animals. There, the cytoplasmic membrane of type II cells was completely indistinct and the cytoplasm formed processes to penetrate into the connective tissue fibres. The results obtained indicate possible contribution of type II pneumocytes to fibroplasia processes during lung parenchyma rebuilding and suggest the necessity to include fibroplasia elements in the existing definition of emphysema.


Inorganic compounds are regularly present in aqueous streams. To understand their influence and behavior on these streams at supercritical conditions, little to no property data is available, which can be used as starting point for further research or application design. Since inorganic compounds tend to precipitate at these conditions, scaling, blocking and erosion can occur as a consequence. Furthermore, a separation of (precious) compounds from the bulk stream due to the precipitation is possible. Here, phosphate compounds are regarded as interesting for further investigation since resources are assumed to be depleted in future. As phosphate is present in many waste streams, these could be used as sources for recoverable phosphate. Resulting from these facts and options, a proper understanding and knowledge of these systems is important for later industrial applications. Therefore, the authors have investigated the behavior of salts (e.g. NaCl, NaNO3 and MgCl2) in supercritical water in previous works. To extend this knowledge, the solubilities of the sulfate salts MgSO4 and CaSO4 in a range of 18.8 23.2 MPa and 655 675 K as well as of the phosphate salts Na2HPO4, NaH2PO4 and CaHPO4 in a range of 20.5 24.2 MPa and 665 690 K were investigated in this work with a continuous flow method in continuation of former work of the authors. The solubilities were compared with existing data available from open literature. A quantitative correlation on base of a phase equilibrium between the present phases was used to describe the behavior and to compare it with previous results. For the investigated calcium salts, CaSO4 and CaHPO4, it was found that a significant solubility decrease already happens at subcritical conditions resulting in precipitation in unwanted locations. For the remaining compounds, a parallel hydrolysis reaction was found as could be seen from a change in pH in the effluent stream.


Tissue engineering (TE) is a multidisciplinary science, which including principles from material science, biology and medicine aims to develop biological substitutes to restore damaged tissues and organs. A major challenge in TE is the choice of suitable biomaterial to fabricate a scaffold that mimics native extracellular matrix guiding resident stem cells to regenerate the functional tissue. Ideally, the biomaterial should be tailored in order that the final scaffold would be (i) biodegradable to be gradually replaced by regenerating new tissue, (ii) mechanically similar to the tissue to regenerate, (iii) porous to allow cell growth as nutrient, oxygen and waste transport and (iv) bioactive to promote cell adhesion and differentiation. With this perspective, this review discusses the options and challenges facing biomaterial selection when a scaffold has to be designed. We highlight the possibilities in the final mold the materials should assume and the most effective techniques for its fabrication depending on the target tissue, including the alternatives to ameliorate its bioactivity. Furthermore, particular attention has been given to the influence that all these aspects have on resident cells considering the frontiers of materiobiology. In addition, a focus on chitosan as a versatile biomaterial for TE scaffold fabrication has been done, highlighting its latest advances in the literature on bone, skin, cartilage and cornea TE.


The Computer Science Department of Shippensburg University has recently embarked on the pursuit of ABET accreditation. While our existing curriculum was supported by the ACM curriculum guidelines, our assessment tools were insufficient for accreditation. In addition, since Shippensburg is a small teaching school, accreditation poses some significant logistical issues in the areas of teaching load and faculty development. As a result, we completely re-designed the structure of our program to meet these challenges. Our goal was a program where all of our students learn traditional computer science topics and basic software engineering principles and where they are allowed the opportunity to specialize in areas like software engineering, computer graphics, and real-time systems. Our required teaching load is 24 credits per year which makes professional development difficult. We significantly modified the structure of the program to allow each of our faculty members to teach no more than three courses and two preparations in a semester. This paper outlines the challenges, the process we used to address those challenges, and the resulting curriculum and assessment plan.


ABSTRACT Intermolecular interaction between hPrP and αS was investigated using high-speed atomic force microscopy, dynamic light scattering, and nuclear magnetic resonance. We found that hPrP spontaneously gathered and naturally formed oligomers. Upon addition of monomer αS with a disordered conformation, poly-dispersive property of hPrP was lost, and hetero-dimer formation started quite coherently, and further oligomerization was not observed. Solution structure of hPrP-αS dimer was firstly characterized using hetero-nuclear NMR spectroscopy. In this hetero-dimeric complex, C-terminal helical region of hPrP was in the molten-globule like state, while specific sites including hot spot and C-terminal region of αS selectively interacted with hPrP. Thus αS may suppress amyloidogenesis of hPrP by trapping the hPrP intermediate by the formation of a stable hetero-dimer with hPrP. Abbreviations: hPrP, human prion protein of amino acid residues of 23-231; PrPC, cellular form of prion protein; PrPSc, scrapie form of prion protein, HS-AFM; high speed atomic force microscopy; αS, α-synuclein; DLS, dynamic light scattering


The paper aims at connecting the concepts of beauty and possession, traditionally coupled with the male gaze, with eros as felt by women, by homosexuals, and by those who do not identify with a defined gender (transgender, intersexual, and other non-binary people). First, I will outline the concepts of beauty and possession according to "male thinking", well formulated by Freud, Plato, Levinas, and Sartre. I will show that, in Western tradition, beauty is seen from a masculine perspective, as a set of charms arousing the subject and stimulating his will to possess. The erotic relationship is consequently considered in a dualistic way: the subject is masculine and active, and desires his "object", who can be either a man or a woman. However, the mentioned authors also highlight a crucial point: desire is doomed to be unfulfilled, because the transcendence of the other person is ungraspable. I will argue that, despite the latter point, such authors bring forward a reductionist view of eros and relationships between genders. I will suggest a solution to this reductionism, taking inspiration from the concepts of gender performativity, theorized by Butler, and queer orientation, developed by Ahmed. I will also propose to rely on Merleau-Ponty's idea of the flesh, especially as it concerns its features of reversibility and divergence, in order to give account of every gender identity, including non-binary ones. The concepts of beauty and possession, together with the impossibility to grasp the transcendence of the other person, will not be rejected, but reconfigured through a different way of conceiving subjectivity.


The antigen-presenting capacity of cells within mouse decidual tissue and the fetal placenta was assessed using the antigen-presenting cell assay to measure immune T cell proliferation stimulated by a second presentation of antigen. Cells within decidual tissue bind and present the soluble antigen dinitrophenylated ovalbumin in an antigen-specific and major histocompatibility complex-restricted manner. Antigen-presenting cells (APCs) were detected in decidual tissue from day 8 until day 15 of pregnancy, in deciduoma and in fetal placental tissues. These findings show that cells within decidual tissue may serve as APCs with the ability to process and present fetal antigens to the maternal immune system and may therefore determine the direction of the maternal immune response of pregnancy.


Summary Some of the misconceptions which have figured in discussions of Variscan geology are analysed. Subduction (but not in the obvious sense), strike-slip movement and sole thrusts may all have a part to play, but none of these alone explains the Variscides. Kossmat's scheme of tectonic zones still deserves attention. So, too, do questions concerning the pre-Variscan geology, especially the prevalence of rift-structures, in central and western Europe. The problem of integrating the pattern of Palaeozoic tectonism in Europe with that in eastern North America is briefly explored. It is suggested that Caledonian and Variscan be treated as parts of one chapter of tectonism and that much of the early tectonic history of central and western Europe be regarded as Pan-African. It is argued that western Europe is unlikely to produce evidence of structural transpositions on the scale recently revealed by seismic reflection profiling in the southern Appalachians. It is also suggested that the idea of a Variscan front is largely illustory.


The objective of this study is the use of date syrup varieties Hmira like substrate for the growth of Saccharomyces cerevisiae. The study of the optimization of method extraction show that the mode of hot extraction increases the concentrations of sugars, dry matter, tannins and pectin relative to the cold extraction which promotes the extraction of vitamin C and proteins. The different physicochemical and biochemical analyzes show the richness of date syrup in nutritional elements that makes them favorable to the alcohol fermentation. Kinetic study of the growth of Saccharomyces cerevisiae shows that perfect adaptation of strain to the medium (date syrup) and the concentration of 60% of date syrup is favouring to the growth of this strain.


The European eHealth Strategies study analyzed policy development and strategy planning, implementation measures as well as progress achieved with respect to national and regional eHealth solutions in 34 European countries, with emphasis on barriers and enablers beyond technology. The focus was on infrastructure elements and selected solutions emphasized in the European Union eHealth Action Plan of 2004. At the governance level, issues around administrative responsibility and competence centers, stakeholder engagement, legal and regulatory facilitators, financing and reimbursement, and evaluation activities were surveyed. Solutions analyzed included patient summaries and electronic health records, ePrescription, telehealth, electronic identifiers, eCards as well standardization aspects. Results indicate that across Europe eHealth has matured from a policy debate to a very tangible, implementation oriented endeavor.


With the success of machine learning, integrating learned models into real-world systems has become a critical challenge. Naively applying predictions to combinatorial optimization problems can incur high costs, which has motivated researchers to consider learning augmented algorithms that can make use of faulty or incomplete predictions. Inspired by two matching problems in computational sustainability where data is abundant, we consider the learning augmented min weight matching problem where some nodes are revealed online while others are known a priori, e.g., by being predicted by machine learning. We develop an algorithm that is able to make use of this extra information and provably improves upon pessimistic online algorithms. We evaluate our algorithm on two settings from computational sustainability -- the coordination of unreliable citizen scientists for invasive species management, and the matching between taxis and riders under uncertain trip duration predictions. In both cases, we perform extensive experiments on real-world datasets and find that our method outperforms baselines, showing how learning augmented algorithms can reliably improve solutions for problems in computational sustainability.


Background: In patients with ischemic stroke of non-cardioembolic origin, acetylsalicylic acid, clopidogrel, or a combination of acetylsalicylic acid and dipyridamole are recommended for the prevention of a recurrent stroke. The purpose of this study was to examine the risk of bleeding or recurrent stroke associated with these three treatments. Methods: Patients who were discharged with first-time ischemic stroke from 2007–2010, with no history of atrial fibrillation were identified from Danish nationwide registries. Hazard ratios (HRs) and 1-year risks of recurrent ischemic stroke and bleeding were calculated for each antiplatelet regimen. Results: Among patients discharged after first-time ischemic stroke, 3043 patients were treated with acetylsalicylic acid, 12,295 with a combination of acetylsalicylic acid and dipyridamole, and 3885 with clopidogrel. Adjusted HRs for clopidogrel versus the combination of acetylsalicylic acid and dipyridamole were 1.02 (95 % confidence interval [CI]: 0.89–1.17) for ischemic stroke and 1.06 (95 % CI: 0.83–1.35) for bleeding. Adjusted HRs for acetylsalicylic acid versus the combination of acetylsalicylic acid and dipyridamole were 1.48 (95 % CI: 1.31–1.67) for stroke and 1.47 (95 % CI: 1.18–1.82) for bleeding. Clopidogrel versus acetylsalicylic acid yielded HRs of 0.69 (95 % CI: 0.59–0.81) and 0.72 (95 % CI: 0.55–0.96) for stroke and bleeding, respectively. The 1-year predicted risks associated with acetylsalicylic acid, the combination of acetylsalicylic acid and dipyridamole, and clopidogrel were 11.1 (95 % CI: 10.2–12.2), 7.7 (95 % CI: 7.3–8.3), and 8.0 (95 % CI: 6.9–8.7) for ischemic stroke, respectively; while, the risks for bleeding were 3.4 (95 % CI: 2.8–3.9), 2.4 (95 % CI: 2.1–2.7), and 2.4 (95 % CI: 1.9–2.9), respectively. Conclusion: Clopidogrel and the combination of acetylsalicylic acid and dipyridamole were associated with similar risks for recurrent ischemic stroke and bleeding; whereas acetylsalicylic acid was associated with higher risks for both ischemic stroke and bleeding. The latter finding may partially be explained by selection bias.


ABSTRACT In 1854, the Crystal Palace reopened at Sydenham. Significantly, it featured a court of natural history. Curated by the philologist and physician, Robert Gordon Latham, it was designed to provide the public with an ethnological education. Understanding Latham's project is of particular importance for broader understandings of the scientific importance of displayed peoples and mid-nineteenth-century debates on the nature of human variation. Recent scholarship has shown considerable interest in the relationship between exhibitions of foreign peoples and anthropology, particularly within the context of world fairs. Nevertheless, anthropologists are routinely claimed to have used fairs merely to display or publicly validate, rather than to make, scientific knowledge. Meanwhile, the 1850s and 1860s are often seen as having witnessed the emergence of a new 'harder-edged' scientific racism as, older, elastic definitions of 'race' were successfully overthrown by one rooted in biological difference (most commonly exemplified by the anatomist Robert Knox). By examining how Latham produced and used his museum of human types, this article proposes an alternative approach. It suggests that displayed peoples were used as ethnological specimens and that Latham's work is at a particularly significant crossroads for the mid-nineteenth-century remaking of 'race'.


Perennial shrub-annual plant interactions play key roles in desert regions influencing the structure and dynamics of plant communities there. In the present study, carried out in northwestern Saudi Arabia, we examined the effect of Haloxylon salicornicum shrubs on their associated understory annual species across four consecutive growing seasons, along with a record of the seasonal rainfall patterns. We measured density and species richness of all the annual species in permanent quadrats located beneath individual shrubs, as well as in the spaces between shrubs. During wet growing season H. salicornicum shrubs significantly enhanced the density and species richness of sub-canopy species, whereas in the relatively dry seasons they exerted negative effects on the associated species. In all growing seasons, the presence of shrubs was associated with enhanced soil properties, including increased organic carbon content, silt + clay, and levels of nutrients (N, P and K). Shrubs improved soil moisture content beneath their canopies in the wet growing season, while in the dry seasons they had negative effects on water availability. Differences in effects of H. salicornicum on understory plants between growing seasons seem due to the temporal changes in the impact of shrubs on water availability. Our results suggest the facilitative effects of shrubs on sub-canopy annuals in arid ecosystems may switch to negative effects with increasing drought stress. We discuss the study in light of recent refinements of the well-known "stress-gradient hypothesis".


Knowledge management requires changes in processes, organizational structure and corporate culture. These changes are very often accompanied by the introduction of knowledge management systems that manage digital documents or facilitate unstructured co-operation in distributed teams. Although the technology very often plays the important role of an enabler, its main functions are in many cases limited to knowledge retrieval which is supported for example by full text search mechanisms. The acquisition and classification phase of the knowledge life cycle, i.e. the systematic collection of new knowledge and its integration into a pre-defined structure, are not facilitated in general.In this paper, a system is presented that in addition to knowledge retrieval also supports the acquisition and classification phases of the knowledge life cycle. It is aligned to the requirements of consulting companies and is based on a model of a knowledge network thatincorporates not only explicit knowledge but also relevant objects of its context.


The irradiation damage to a GaAs etched by an ion beam was experimentally investigated by using different inert gases such as argon and neon. Etching damage was evaluated by measuring the current-voltage (I-V) characteristics of Schottky diodes fabricated on the etched surfaces. Surface roughness was observed by replica transmission electron microscopy. The I-V curve of a diode fabricated on an Ar-etched surface was found to be much more degraded than that of one on an Ne-etched surface. The Ne-etched surface was also found to be smoother than the Ar-etched surface. The reflectance of LD etched mirrors fabricated by both Ne and Ar ion beam etching was measured to examine the etched sidewall striation. The reflectance of Ne-etched mirror was 0.22 and that of the Ar-etched mirror was 0.07, whereas the ideal reflectance for a cleaved facet is 0.32. Ne ion beam etching can thus produce smoothly etched surfaces and sidewalls with low damage at a practical etch-rate.


Abstract A technique for estimating surface albedo feedback (SAF) from standard monthly mean climate model diagnostics is applied to the 1% yr−1 carbon dioxide (CO2)-increase transient climate change integrations of 12 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) fourth assessment report (AR4) climate models. Over the 80-yr runs, the models produce a mean SAF at the surface of 0.3 W m−2 K−1 with a standard deviation of 0.09 W m−2 K−1. Relative to 2 × CO2 equilibrium run estimates from an earlier group of models, both the mean SAF and the standard deviation are reduced. Three-quarters of the model mean SAF comes from the Northern Hemisphere in roughly equal parts from the land and ocean areas. The remainder is due to Southern Hemisphere ocean areas. The SAF differences between the models are shown to stem mainly from the sensitivity of the surface albedo to surface temperature rather from the impact of a given surface albedo change on the shortwave budget.


Computer vision applications have heavily relied on the linear combination of Lambertian diffuse and microfacet specular reflection models for representing reflected radiance, which turns out to be physically incompatible and limited in applicability. In this paper, we derive a novel analytical reflectance model, which we refer to as Fresnel Microfacet BRDF model, that is physically accurate and generalizes to various real-world surfaces. Our key idea is to model the Fresnel reflection and transmission of the surface microgeometry with a collection of oriented mirror facets, both for body and surface reflections. We carefully derive the Fresnel reflection and transmission for each microfacet as well as the light transport between them in the subsurface. This physically-grounded modeling also allows us to express the polarimetric behavior of reflected light in addition to its radiometric behavior. That is, FMBRDF unifies not only body and surface reflections but also light reflection in radiometry and polarization and represents them in a single model. Experimental results demonstrate its effectiveness in accuracy, expressive power, image-based estimation, and geometry recovery.


ABSTRACT This study was conducted to investigate the stream network formed in Hanyang and the topographic features of the surrounding areas for the purpose of identifying the impact of Hanyang's stream network on its city formation. To this end, three substudies were conducted: (i) Topographic restoration of late Joseon using a digitized map including the stream network of the Joseon period and a cadastral map; (ii) Identification and explanations of the discrepancies between the digitally restored stream network and the real stream network by superposing the former upon the latter; (iii) Identification of the Hanyang's stream network on its urban structure. The results of this study can be summarized as follows: First, the waterways derived by GIS analysis and those on the 1912 Cadastral Map were verified to general coincide with each other, but some changed waterways were observed. Second, the watershed and administrative boundaries general coincided. Graphical Abstract


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 An attempt has been made to examine the dynamical role (if any) played by the Western Ghats (WG), in the distance effect of vortex over the Bay of Bengal (BOB) on the rainfall enhancement over Pune, during southwest monsoon season (SWMS). To examine it, a dynamical model of airflow over a meso-scale barrier has been used. Six cases have been studied, in which enhancement of rainfall over Pune in presence of vortex over the Head Bay are noticed. Out of these six cases, in four cases it is found that the dynamical model can capture, at least qualitatively, the observed fluctuation (rise and fall) of rainfall over Pune. In these four cases westerly along west coast was strong with considerable depth in vertical. In one of the other two cases, the model has been able to capture, at least qualitatively, the observed rise in rainfall but failed to capture the observed fall in rainfall. In the other case the model has failed completely to capture, even qualitatively, the fluctuation in observed rainfall over Pune. In the last two cases, westerly along west coast station was weak and shallow.


The aim of this research is to examine the new landscape that is taking shape in the tourism economy, due to the adoption of technological innovations. The technologies and systems used to make the most of the resulting interdisciplinary and multilingual big data, the methods by which heterogeneous elements from different sources are incorporated to bring new knowledge, and the modern services that are ultimately implemented and provided to the public, as well as the people involved in this process, and those who benefit from the new services are among the issues analyzed. The work is not limited to a simple mapping of space but concludes with an evaluation of the systems already implemented and the various methods of analysis and exploitation of large-scale data for this industry, which is based on detailed research of the current literature to identify the potential gaps for future research. This is a literature review. The authors have identified the content of this research on well-known online databases which include scholar, google and Scopus. They used the appropriate keywords such as "big data" & "tourism innovation" to reach the publications used in this research, also given attention on using recent papers which are derived from reliable journals. The research has concluded that the use of big data in the tourism sector is a rising trend. Big data creates expectations for a better understanding of tourism demand and the adjustment of supply by tourism companies to meet the demands of tourists and the profitable activity of tourism businesses. There is a need to examine how can big data help the hotels to deal with Covid-19 pandemic, which can be a topic for future research. Big data is one of the most recent trends on innovation, Information Communication Technologies (ICT) and knowledge management. Hence, there is a need to gather and analyze the existing publications which concern the tourist industry. The originality of this research stems from making an analysis of the current situation as well as it is a bridge to the future by making suggestions on how future research can be shaped. The key limitation of this research resides on that it focuses on the existing literature and used secondary data. However, it gives directions for the future research which can take place with primary data collection.

Received: 3 July 2021 / Accepted: 19 August 2021 / Published: 5 September 2021


This paper introduces a novel form of representing musical durations (which we will call chronota) of melodies in from of chains based on atomic beats. This is, a melody consisting of quarter, eighth and sixteenth notes fetches the sixteenth as its atomic beat, where all other durations are represented as multiples of the sixteenth notes. This form of representation makes it possible to depicted musical durations geometrically in a 2dimensional space. Depicting two rhythms (sequences of durations called chains here) in this representational system, rhythmic similarity (called chronotonic similarity here) is seen as being correlated to how much two rhythms deviate in shape via a transformation mechanism. A similarity model based on this form of representation predicts specifically the following scenarios. (A) a quarter note compared to two eighths notes (split ratio 1:1) fetches smaller similarity ratings than a quarter note compared to a dotted eighth note and a sixteenth note (split ratio 1:3), (b) reversing two sequences produces the same similarity rating as the original sequences (c) longer sequences fetch higher similarity ratings, (d) tempo change affects similarity ratings, (e) comparison order has no effect, and (f) complex sequences compared with simple sequences fetch low similarity ratings. The model was put to its test within an experiment. It was found that the model appears to be supported by the results as obtained in this experiment. In fact inputting all data of the experiment into the model, produced a high correlation. Moreover, all predictions of the model were supported by the experiment except of one trial (comparison order) which fetched small negative significance.


BACKGROUND
Laparoscopy is believed to result in possible clinical benefits for the patient. We report our experience with renal laparoscopy in dialysis patients and compare the results with those from non-dialysis patients.

METHODS
Between December 1994 and April 1997, 19 dialysis patients underwent laparoscopic nephrectomy or nephroureterectomy at our hospital. The group consisted of 11 female and eight male patients (mean age 45 years). In nine patients the indication for nephrectomy was chronic pyelonephritis. Nephroureterectomy for vesicoureteral reflux with recurrent episodes of pyelonephritis or analgesic nephropathy for exclusion of transitional cell carcinoma of the upper urinary tract was considered in nine other patients. Laparoscopic bilateral nephrectomy for drug-resistant hypertension was performed in one patient. In comparison, a consecutive group of non-dialysis patients who had undergone renal laparoscopy was reviewed.

RESULTS
In the dialysis group, one patient had to be converted to open nephrectomy due to bleeding. Six dialysis patients required blood transfusions compared with none in the non-dialysis group. There were four complications in the dialysis group and two in the non-dialysis group. Both groups had comparable results for operative times, analgesic consumption, postoperative start of oral intake and mobilization, and duration of hospitalization and convalescence.

CONCLUSIONS
Laparoscopic nephrectomy in dialysis patients has acceptable results. The higher transfusion rate is probably due to a lower preoperative haemoglobin and is not aggravated by possible affects of the clotting system in patients with chronic uraemia.


OBJECTIVE
To identify predictors of human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccination initiation by girls at high risk for HPV infection.

METHOD
Participants were 2,098 girls enrolled in the ongoing Pittsburgh Girls Study, who were between the ages of 12 and 15 years in 2008, and their primary caregivers. The study was conducted in the 2 years after the deployment of the first HPV vaccine approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. Primary caregivers were asked about HPV vaccine uptake. Girls were interviewed about pubertal development and sexually intimate behavior.

RESULTS
Approximately 60% of the girls had initiated the HPV vaccine in the past year. Among the hypothesized predictors of initiation, African-American race decreased the likelihood and level of sexually intimate behavior in the previous year increased the likelihood of uptake. Controlling for receipt of public assistance, African-American girls were close to 40% less likely to be vaccinated than European-American girls.

CONCLUSION
Racial disparities in use of preventive interventions such as the HPV vaccine exist. Lack of information about public financing of the vaccine, timing of vaccination relative to sexual activity, and perceptions of preventive value may limit uptake among those at highest risk for infection and negative sequelae from infection. Further research to probe knowledge and attitudes toward HPV vaccination and the impact of the media on vaccine initiation and uptake may reveal specific targets of intervention.


When a disaster occurs, the normal commutation routes are disrupted. People get stuck at these disaster points and would be in trouble, hence people in those areas find it difficult to communicate and evacuation route to safe area is unknown. The aim of the paper is to predict safe routes to reach the refuge point from the disaster point. The prototype was developed using Arc geographic information system runtime SDK for Java Application and APIs in Eclipse. The system was developed with digital elevation model layer, and route layer for India basemap focused to Tamil Nadu. The safe route is found based on the elevation values of the area from the disaster point to a safe point. The developed system could be used by the relief providers to reach the disaster point and rescue victims.


The purpose of this paper is to write about insights and special considerations for researchers who are, to some degree, "insiders" to the communities they study by expanding on the concept of representational ethics as applied to research in community psychology with diverse and marginalized groups. Representational ethics refers to the ways that researchers, artists, or corporations represent the identities of the people they portray in their communications. As community psychologists we generate and disseminate knowledge about the communities we work with, and in that process, create narratives about the people who participate in our studies. In preparing a report on psychological issues among Evangelical Christian refugees from the former Soviet Union, Dina Birman struggled with her portrayal of this group and her own status of being both an insider and an outsider to this community. When investigating academic aspirations and psychological distress among Muslim high school students, Ashmeet Oberoi was forced to acknowledge the one-sidedness of the discourse on autonomy and cultural socialization of Muslim adolescents. In her research with Cuban-educated doctors in Miami, Florida, Wendy Moore encountered similar issues as she considered how to represent gender dynamics among her participants.


Abstract Here, we present a catalogue of known Fast Radio Burst sources in the form of an online catalogue, FRBCAT. The catalogue includes information about the instrumentation used for the observations for each detected burst, the measured quantities from each observation, and model-dependent quantities derived from observed quantities. To aid in consistent comparisons of burst properties such as width and signal-to-noise ratios, we have re-processed all the bursts for which we have access to the raw data, with software which we make available. The originally derived properties are also listed for comparison. The catalogue is hosted online as a Mysql database which can also be downloaded in tabular or plain text format for off-line use. This database will be maintained for use by the community for studies of the Fast Radio Burst population as it grows.


Background: We aimed to investigate the prevalence of erectile dysfunction (ED) in patients with lower urinary tract symptoms (LUTS) and to explore the correlation of ED with LUTS and its clinical features. Methods: Overall, 400 outpatients and inpatients with LUTS diagnosed in Zhengzhou Central Hospital, Zhengzhou University, Zhengzhou, Henan Province, China from June 2015 to June 2017 were collected. LUTS degree was assessed by the International Prostate Symptom Score (IPSS), and ED degree was assessed by the International Index of Erectile Function (IIEF-5). The correlation of ED with LUTS degree, age, blood lipids, homocysteine (Hcy) and other factors was analyzed. Results: The prevalence of ED in patients with LUTS was 82.25%. With the increase in age, the prevalence of ED was significantly elevated, and ED degree gradually became higher (P<0.01). The higher the degree of LUTS was, the higher the prevalence of ED would be. The degree of ED was highly correlated with the combination with hypertension, diabetes mellitus and coronary heart disease (P<0.05). The prevalence of ED was positively correlated with LUTS degree and the levels of total cholesterol (TC), low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C) and Hcy (P<0.05 or P<0.01). Conclusion: ED prevalence of patients with LUTS is high, and ED is significantly related to LUTS degree, age and the levels of TC, LDL-C and Hcy in patients with LUTS.


: The responses of inspiratory and expiratory neurons of the ventral respiratory nucleus to stimulation of postero-lateral hypothalamus at different phases of respiratory cycles, were studied in anesthetized cats. The stimulation in the first half of the inspiratory cycle evoked excitatory responses in 72% of inspiratory neurons and an inhibitory type of responses in 28%. The stimulation during the second half of the inspiratory phase did not change significantly the patterns of inspiration. The stimulation of the hypothalamus during expiratory phase depressed the activity of expiratory neurons and reversed the phases of the respiratory cycle. Recording of the unit activity of inspiratory neurons revealed an extra burst of spikes in response to stimulation of the hypothalamus in different moments of expiratory phase. Possible neuronal mechanisms of hypothalamic influence on switching off of the expiration and switching on of the inspiration, are discussed.


This study identifies a specific multimodal practice that patients use during medical encounters with a team of doctor in an Italian specialized centre for prosthesis construction and application. Focusing on the early stages of these encounters, the paper analyses the way in which patients delicately orchestrate their gaze, gesture and verbal behaviour to gain some extra speaking space, beyond that of mere respondents to doctors' questions. By using Conversation Analysis, we show that patients produce this recurrent multimodal pattern, in methodically produced and recognizable ways. Patients manage to acquire the interactional role of "action initiators"; thus constraining doctors to respond: for instance, by producing unrequested information about their health status, by correcting implicit assumptions in the doctors' questions, or by producing independent assessments. The paper contributes to previous research on patients' agency and initiative, revising the notion of asymmetry in medical settings and highlighting the active role of the patient in every stage of these encounters.


Within the same group as the USA and India Indonesia is one of the largest democracies in the world. After experiencing authoritarian rule for a few decades since its independence the country finally at the beginning of the twenty first century managed to chart along its new direction along democratic course and values. More than a decade has passed since the democratic transition begun  yet the country still faces various constitutional dilemmas and enigmas. One of organs of the government which has been entrusted to transform the country into a democratic nation is the Constitutional Court. The objective of  this  paper is to provide critical analyses of the role of the Constitutional Court of Indonesia in the process of consolidating local democracy. The scope of analysis is confined to a number of important cases heard by the court on local election disputes from the year 2008  to 2013. The rationale to focus on local election  is because local government provides the second layer of government for this unitary country making the governance more democratic and more in touch with local population. The result of the study is the Constitutional Court through its decisions has created conducive political situation and has provided significant contributions in the process of consolidating local democracy. In spite of limited number of judges and short period of settlement to disputes brought before it the Court have settled all disputes regarding local elections without much delay and complaint. Nevertheless there are some areas  that  need  to  be addressed by the court to enhance its efficiency and effectiveness. A few  factors  have  been identified to be the cause of the problems namely problem of design of structure of the Court, extension of the scope of authority, period of settlement, over-dosis of authority and the breach of  code of  ethics of  the judges.Thus it  is recommended that in order to perpetuate the excellent achievements of the court the institution need to be strengthened by addressing the problems.


The charts of 46 patients who underwent ECT in a teaching hospital between 1980 and 1986 were reviewed. All patients were suffering from major depression, with or without psychotic features, and were resistant to pharmacotherapy. Response to ECT was compared between those with psychotic features (N = 27) and those without psychotic features (N = 19). Both groups had equal and effective response to ECT. Therefore, the presence of psychotic features was not significant in predicting response to ECT.


There was an effort to create a universal organization-administrative workbench, which, on the one hand, execute the function of primary and dynamical valuation of this process, revelation of difficult situations and, on the other hand, permits identify the causes of theirs rise and the ways of resolving these situations. At that the optimization of training military-medicine personnel is organized by the way of realization it's principles, in the network of correct normatively - juridicial field, on the base of modern agents, forms and methods of professional military education, as well as the realization of peculiarities of system of military-medical education, of multi-criterion diagnostics of activity of military-medicine academy and of teaching of several subjects, of predicting of success of professional education of hearer, of efficient restructuring of educational-methodological complex with the aim of method of branches and frontiers for the purpose of ground and choice such administrative solutions, that are the beast from the point of view of efficiency of result of functioning.


Wrightia tinctoria R.Br. (Apocyanaceae) is considered to be therapeutically very effective jaundice plant in Indian indigenous system of medicine. The juice of the tender leaves is used efficaciously in jaundice. The plant is known to be used for psoriasis and other skin diseases. In the present study, the chemical composition of the essential oil from the leaves of Wrightia tinctoria was analyzed by GC-MS (Gas ChromatographyMass Spectrometry). GC-MS analytical technique provides conclusive confirmatory evidence for the identification and characterization of essential oil components. Thirty seven known compounds have been identified and quantified from the leaf essential oil of Wrightia tinctoria by GC-MS analysis. The major compounds present in the leaf essential oil are urs-12-en-24-oic acid-3-oxo-methyl ester (34.28%), hydroquinone (13.24%), 1, 6-cyclodecadiene,1-methyl-5-methylene- 8- (1-methylethyl) (9.70%), 3methyl-2-(2-pentenyl)- 2-cyclopentene-1-one (6.76%) and 9, 12, 15-octadecatrienoic acid (4.52%). This is the first report of extraction of essential oil from the leaves of Wrightia tinctoria.


Abstract:Nitza Ben-Dov's Ḥayyei milḥamah, a study of ten literary works depicting the wars of Israel over the past one hundred years, was awarded the 2018 Yitzhak Sadeh Israeli Prize for Military Literature. This article, taken from that study and translated by eminent literary scholar and biblical translator Robert Alter, examines Yehuda Amichai's Not of this Time, Not of this Place (1963) and its dual treatment of the legacies of World War II and the Israeli War of Independence. The bifurcated hero of Amichai's sprawling novel lives out two parallel but contradictory plots, one takes him to the Germany of his childhood, the other unfolds in Jerusalem. For the attentive reader, these seemingly oppositional stories coalesce through a network of wordplays, perceptions, recurrent images (skulls, amputated limbs), and intertextual references to Hillel the Elder and to Agnon's classic 1939 novel on the impossibility of returning home, A Guest for the Night.


The five-year national project in Japan for R&D of coated conductors and applications, named as the Materials and Power Applications of Coated Conductors (M-PACC) project, was finished at the end of FY2013. The project consists of four sub-themes as cable, transformer, SMES and coated conductors. In the theme of coated conductors, the fabrication process had been developed to satisfy the requirements from the applications such as in-field Ic performance, low AC loss in the long tapes etc. Through the project, the remarkable progress was achieved as follows; a high in-field minimum Ic value over 54A/cm-width under 3T at 77K was realized in a 200m long EuBCO tape with artificial pinning centers of BaHfO3 by the pulsed laser deposition (PLD) technique on the IBAD template. On the other hand, the AC loss reduction was confirmed in the tapes fabricated by both PLD and the metal organic deposition (MOD) techniques by scribing 100m tapes into 10-filamments. Additionally, the mechanism of the delamination phenomenon was systematically investigated and the strength was improved by eliminating the origins of the weak points in the films. Through the development, all targeted goals were accomplished and the several results were appreciated as a world champion data.


Presents a method for sensor fusion based on adaptive fuzzy Kalman filtering. The method is applied in fusing position signals from Global Positioning Systems (GPS) and inertial navigation systems (INS) for autonomous mobile vehicles. The presented method has been validated in a 3-D environment and is of particular importance for guidance, navigation, and control of flying vehicles. The extended Kalman filter (EKF) and the noise characteristics are modified using the fuzzy logic adaptive system, and compared with the performance of a regular EKF. It is demonstrated that the fuzzy adaptive Kalman filter gives better results, in terms of accuracy, than the EKF.


Anabolic androgenic steroids, a class of steroid hormones related to testosterone, are natural ligands of androgen receptor (AR), a member of the nuclear receptor superfamily of ligand-activated transcription factors. AR binds specific DNA elements, known as androgen–response elements. Testosterone, the main male sexual hormone, binds AR directly and indirectly, through conversion into dihydrotestosterone (DHT), its more active metabolite. Anabolic androgenic steroids are frequently detected in the urine of doped athletes; their consumption is also growing among sport amateurs and adolescents. The effects of androgens can differ depending on the target cells and/or tissues. To gain insight into transcription activation mechanisms of AR, we investigated AR protein signaling in human peripheral blood lymphocytes treated with supraphysiological doses of DHT. We performed a comparative proteomic analysis and we identified about 30 differentially expressed proteins. At least five species contained a consensus androgen–response elements sequence in the promoter region of related coding genes. The analysis also revealed that high doses of DHT activate the drug detoxification process, could stimulate an increase in cell motility and exert a prosurvival effect rather than an apoptotic one. Effect of DHT on apoptosis 7 days after the first treatment.


In recent years, the durability of concrete has been the subject of a few research projects carried out by several scientific and technical centres. As a major cause of concrete degradation around the world, reinforcing steel corrosion requires our full attention. This article analyses one of the phenomena at the origin of these disorders, namely the carbonation of concrete, and proposes some provisions to guard against it. The article is divided into two parts; the first describes the causes and consequences of the chemical process of carbonation as well as the means to protect it. The second deals with the influence factors on carbonation such as the minimum cement dosage, the type of cement, the water-cement ratio (W/C) and the reinforcement coating. Indeed, prismatic specimens (15 x 15 x 60 cm) and cubic specimens (15 x 15 x 15 cm) were made for different mixtures and with a W/C ratio of 0.50, 0.55 and 0.60. The prismatic specimens were subjected to a carbonation test, while the cubic specimens were used to determine the compressive strength, the corresponding density and the immersion water absorption.


The patient, a 77‐year‐old man, was diagnosed with senile depression. He was also diagnosed with depression at other hospitals, and pharmacotherapy by antidepressants was carried out. He was given sulpiride, selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, a serotonin‐norepinephrine reuptake inhibitor, an atypical antidepressant, and tricyclic and tetracyclic antidepressants, but conventional pharmacotherapies using these antidepressant drugs did not alleviate his symptoms. The patient was then administered 0.5 mg/day of clonazepam at bed time. Following 2 weeks of administration, his symptoms were alleviated. The dosage of clonazepam was increased to 0.75 mg/day and remission was facilitated. Four weeks later, the patient displayed further alleviation of his depressive symptoms, so he has been continued on 0.75 mg/day of clonazepam. Essential drug selections for senile depression includes selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, serotonin‐norepinephrine reuptake inhibitors, and atypical antidepressants, but when these are ineffective, tricyclic antidepressants or tetracyclic antidepressants are alternatively selected. When a patient's symptoms are not alleviated by essential drug selection, as occurred in the current case, clonazepam is considered to be another therapeutic candidate. If they fail to alleviate symptoms, however, then early referral to a specialist is crucial. Enhancing primary‐care physicians' understanding of senile depression and coordination with specialists is essential in the medical care of elderly patients with depression.


Abstract Periostin is a microcellular adapter protein. It plays a wide range of essential roles during the development and in immunomodulation. Periostin is a prominent contributor during the process of angiogenesis, tumorigenesis, and cardiac repair. It is expressed in periodontal ligaments, tendons, skin, adipose tissues, muscle, and bone. This is a protein-based biomolecule that has the diagnostic and monitoring capability and can potentially be used as a biomarker to detect physiological and pathological conditions. The aim of the present review was to explore the periostin morphology and associated structural features. Additionally, periostin's immunomodulatory effects and associated biomarkers in context of oral diseases have been discussed.


The main purpose of this survey is to provide an introduction, algebro-topological in nature, to Hirzebuch-type inequalities for plane curve arrangements in the complex projective plane. These inequalities gain more and more interest due to their utility in many combinatorial problems related to point or line arrangements in the plane. We would like to present a summary of the technicalities and also some recent applications, for instance in the context of the Weak Dirac Conjecture. We also advertise some open problems and questions.


Background Effective postoperative pain management is a vital component of orthopaedic surgical care in the pediatric population. In children with cognitive impairments pain management can be difficult, making these children vulnerable to ineffectively managed postoperative pain. This prospective, randomised study evaluated the use of a local anesthetic continuous infusion device (pain pump) to manage postoperative pain in children with cerebral palsy (CP) undergoing lower extremity orthopaedic surgical procedures. Methods Children with a diagnosis of CP who were undergoing select orthopaedic outpatient procedures were enrolled in this study. Postoperatively, patients were randomised to receive either a pain pump in addition to oral analgesics or oral analgesics only. Patient's parents were asked to record the amount of medication administered and assess pain intensity with the use of a modified visual analogue scale for 3 days postoperatively. Parents also completed an overall pain management satisfaction questionnaire at the end of the study participation period. Results Fifty-four patients were enrolled in this study and data were analyzed on 37 patients. The mean daily pain intensity in the pain pump group was significantly lower for the day of surgery and for 2 days postoperatively, and there was an overall significant difference between the groups (P<0.0001). The amount of analgesic medication administered was significantly lower for the first 2 postoperative days, but there was not a significant difference between the 2 groups overall (P=0.29). Parent satisfaction with both pain management techniques was high and responses were similar between the 2 groups. Conclusions Children with CP present unique postoperative pain management concerns that can be effectively addressed through the use of multimodal analgesic techniques. This study found that the pain pump is an effective pain management technique that significantly reduces pain intensity in children with CP after lower extremity orthopaedic procedures. Level of Evidence Therapeutic Level II.


Ruiz Egea, Alfredo, 2018. Understanding physical activity in adolescents with cerebral palsy from a self-determination theoretical perspective: a mixed method case study. Master ́s Thesis in Sport and Exercise Psychology. Faculty of Sport and Health Sciences. University of Jyväskylä. 75 p. The amount of research in cerebral palsy has augmented considerably during last twenty years. Increasing functional capacity in population with cerebral palsy, through physical activity has been the main goal of the research in this field during the past decades. Research sustains its effort in a basic assumption, that an increase in functionality will be followed by an increase in physical activity behavior, consequently health benefits are expected. Unfortunately, positive results are limited to the environment of the intervention and therefore not sustained in time. Recent research has started to explore alternatives to foster sustained physical activity behavior after intervention. It has become one of the main current challenges in the field of cerebral palsy, a challenge that it is still unanswered. Based on self-determination theory (Deci & Ryan, 2000), the aim of the present research was to describe and understand the elements involved in initiating and maintaining a physical activity behavior among three Finnish adolescents with cerebral palsy. This is an abductive (both theory and data driven) mixed method case study. Data was collected during a three-month intervention study (EXECP study) which aimed at increasing functional capacity and physical activity levels among the participants. Participants filled quantitative questionnaires assessing: motivational regulation; perceived competence, autonomy support and social support; physical activity; intentions and perceived limitations to be physically active. In addition, indirect and direct qualitative observation and interviews, were used. Quantitative data was analysed via descriptive analysis using IBM SPSS statistics software, while qualitative data was analysed through narrative and descriptive analyses. According to the results, intrinsic forms of motivation towards physical activity and support of the satisfaction of the psychological basic needs, and high PA were found among two participants. External forms of motivation towards physical activity and lack of support of the satisfaction of the psychological basic needs, and low PA were found in one of the participants. Additionally, the results suggest that perceived internal and external barriers towards physical activity, and intentions towards PA, can be related with the level of physical behavior among participants. These results are in line with the tenets of the Self-Determination Theory. Additionally, the results help in understanding physical activity among persons ́ with CP and help in planning and implementing fitness and physical activity interventions targeting adolescents with cerebral palsy. Further research is needed in the field to study if the results are transferable to other participants.


An undesired or hazardous outdoor sound produced by human activities is referred to as environmental noise. For example, the noise emitted through industrial activities and transportation networks such as road, rail and air traffic. In Malaysia, most of the schools located very close to the roadside and near busy places such as cities, shops, and residential areas. This study aims to analyze the environmental noise in terms of spatial and temporal analysis in two primary schools in Terengganu State. The noise monitoring had conducted in two (2) primary schools with different land use; residential area (Batu Rakit Primary School) and commercial area (Paya Bunga Primary School) on the school and non-school days by using Sound Level Meter (SLM). The spatial mapping had constructed by using SketchUp® 2018 and Surfer® version 11 software. The noise level between both study areas was significantly different based on a p-value of less than 0.05. It also surpassed the Department of Environment (DOE) of Malaysia's permitted limit, with the Equivalent Noise Level (LAeq) in residential areas being greater than in commercial areas due to traffic volume and noise from nearby activities. Lastly, the area near the roadside has higher critical noise pollution compared with the location that furthers from the roadside. In conclusion, this study is useful in creating awareness to the public about the noise pollution effect on primary school students and is also can be used for mitigation measures to have a better place for students to study.


In conditions of limited financial resources of the state, the task of assessing the appropriateness and choosing rational options for the joint use of traditional and new types of high-tech products is topical. The paper proposes a method for substantiating rational options for the joint use of traditional and new products of high-tech products, based on the criteria of their comparative technical and economic assessment, namely, comparing the achieved efficiency and the required cost of performing a fixed set of tasks. The dialectical foundations of the method are presented, in particular, it is established that the law of development of high-tech products fully corresponds to the well-known classical law of «denial of denial». The structure of the method, the order of formation of the set of Pareto-optimal options for the joint use of traditional and new products, as well as the algorithm for choosing a rational option are considered.


The use of outdoor lighting, particularly through street lights, is a common tool for policy makers attempting to reduce crime. Research on the effect of lights on crime, however, are limited as installing or improving street lighting may affect the community in ways beyond merely increasing outdoor lighting. Welsh and Farrington's (2008) study suggested that improving street lighting may also improve informal social control in the area as it reflects improved street usage and investments in the community. This paper uses moonlight as a unique measure of outdoor ambient lighting that avoids the issue of community cohesion and examines the effect of lighting directly. The amount of actual moonlight a city receives each night is measured using the interaction between the percent of the moon illuminated and the proportion of the night without clouds. This interaction creates significant variation in moonlight between cities and across nights in the same city. Contrary to past research on lighting, this study finds that brighter nights, those with a full moon and no clouds, have significantly more crime than nights without any moonlight. These results suggest that there are heterogeneous effects of outdoor lighting by dosage and that more research on possible criminogenic effects of low dosages of outdoor lights are needed.


This work proposes the implementation of an energy efficient application specific matrix processor for speech enhancement in noisy speech recognition applications. This implementation considers speech enhancement through signal subspace based speech enhancement algorithm based on Frobenius norm constrained Singular Value Decomposition. The Singular Value Decomposition unit is used in time multiplexed fashion to perform noise reduction during feature extraction stage and it is also used for matrix inversion of the block diagonal covariance matrices for the final speech recognition block. This processor along with a 4 state Continuous Hidden Markov Model based hardware speech recognizer achieves a recognition performance improvement of 5% in noisy environments. Word samples from AN4 database is used to test the speech recognizer which has got a recognition accuracy of 96.8%. The FPGA prototyping of the above noise enhancement algorithm using the ASIP accelerator was carried out in Altera FPGA with NIOS processor.


The acceleration voltage dependence of electron probe microanalysis (EPMA) is discussed in relation to the determination of the compositional profile of a thin film. It is shown that the acceleration voltage dependence can be used to estimate the composition of second phase(s) by means of parameter fitting of an analytical model when the composition variation function is simple. The feasibility of the method is demonstrated using the example of molecular beam epitaxy grown CuGaSe2 with a second phase. The composition of this phase is found to be Cu3Se2 consistent with X-ray diffraction results.


. The dwarf planet Haumea is a very interesting celestial body due to the characteristics of its physical form and also the recently observed ring. A Kuiper Belt object, Haumea is a triaxial ellipsoid with dimensions of approximately 513 × 852 × 1161 (km), with a mass of 4 . 006 × 10 21 kg and a rotation period of 3.915341h. The dwarf planet Haumea has its system formed by two natural satellites, the moons Namaka and Hi'iaka. We have presented an analysis of orbits around the dwarf planet Haumea taking into account the influences of the perturbations of its nonsphericity ( J 2 , J 4 , C 22 ). We have found that the C 22 term and the rotation rate of Haumea have contributed strongly to reduce the variation rate of the periapsis radius of the spacecraft. We have calculated the spherical harmonics of Haumea taking into account the most current values for the semi-axes of the ellipsoid and we have presented a comparison with the values of the harmonics found in other works.


Acoustic surface admittance/impedance at domain boundaries is essential for wave-based acoustic simulations. This work applies two levels of Bayesian inference to estimate the order and the parameter values of the multipole admittance model. The frequency-dependent acoustic admittance is experimentally measured. Incorporating the maximum entropy strategy, the unified Bayesian framework is applied to the multipole approximation. Analysis results demonstrate that multipole model-based Bayesian inference is well suited to estimating the arbitrary frequency-dependent boundary condition within a wave-based simulation framework.


Palliative care with terminally ill drug addicts is a major challenge for medical professionals to face. With growing problems of prescription drug abuse in this country, the problem is only going to continue to grow and be faced more often. To date, very little has been done focusing on this special population of end-of-life care patients. This review article attempts to explore the terminology and definitions for identifying addiction in the terminally ill as well as exploring management options for healthcare professionals. As with other opioid treated pain patients, relying on terms such as "physiological dependence" and "tolerance" is inappropriate for use in this population, who are likely to have been on opioids for extended periods of time requiring dose escalation for progressive disease. Thus, these terms have little utility for identifying problem patients. Rather, understanding the context of the drug abuse as it reflects on the concepts of use despite harm and the damage inflicted to the physical, psychological, or social make-up of the patient is necessary. Recommendations include careful monitoring and assessment of patients, utilizing multidisciplinary team approaches, encouraging participation in recovery programs, and utilization of pill counts and urine toxicology screenings as necessary. Implications for the field are discussed.


Dear Editor, Abdominal aortic aneurysm is often asymptomatic, less recognized, and causes considerable mortality and morbidity, if missed. The incidence varies from country to country and the occurrence is influenced by modifiable (smoking, coronary heart disease, hypertension, dyslipidemia, and prolonged steroid therapy) and non-modifiable risk factors (increasing age, male gender, and positive family history). Most of the patients with such aneurysm do not exhibit symptoms and the diagnosis is made accidentally during routine medical investigations, abdominal ultrasonography, or by an astute surgeon during an abdominal procedure. Sometimes the diagnosis is made in an emergency room, if the attending resident/doctor is aware of it. Despite good diagnosis and effective management, the outcomes of complicated cases are poor and the treatment cost is prohibitive. Hence, we reviewed the literature to find out the pathogenesis of such aneurysms and the usefulness of available drugs in its prevention. The pathogenesis for the development of abdominal aortic aneurysm is considered under four headings namely, tissue mechanisms, enzymes related, cellular aspects, and infection-inflammation induced. However, one or a combination of these mechanisms might be involved in its pathogenesis. Tissue mechanisms include proliferation of vascular smooth muscles, angiotensin-II mediated atherosclerosis, rupture of plaques, and abnormal matrix by degradation and suppression of tissue repair through C-junction N-terminal kinase. 1-3 Enzymes such as elastase induce changes in vessel wall layer and remodeling. 1 Human T-lymphocytes activation through activator protein-1, 4 mediates changes at cellular level. Angiotensin converting enzyme (ACE) inhibitors, 1,2 or angiotensin–II receptor blockers, 4 can inhibit the vessel wall changes, and statins, 5 can revert atherosclerotic plaques. Statins inhibit aneurysm development by reducing atherogenic lipoproteins and C-reactive proteins. In experimental models, Janus N Kinase inhibitor (SP 600125), 3 was shown to slow down the degradation and suppression of tissue repair in vessel walls through C-Junction N-terminal kinase. Gadowski and co-workers demonstrated that beta blockers reduced the expansion of un-ruptured abdominal aortic aneurysm, 6 however, another study did not confirm this notion. 7 Hence, further evaluation of the usefulness of beta blockers in such aneurysms need to be conducted. Among drugs currently used in clinical medicine, ACE inhibitors, 1,2 or angiotensin–II receptor blockers were evaluated in abdominal aortic aneurysm. 4 These medications were found to be beneficial by preventing the development and/or retarding the progression of the aneurysm. In addition, patients on long-term steroid therapy should be monitored for abdominal aortic aneurysm and changed over to suitable alternatives, wherever possible. Progression of such aneurysm can be enhanced by secondary infection with Chlamydia pneumoniae, because the bacterium promotes the atherosclerosis in the aortic wall. 8 Hence, the macrolides (Roxithromycin 300mg daily for 4 weeks) may reduce the infection/inflammation-induced changes in vessel walls. 9 Additionally, matrix metalloproteinase (MMP) is closely linked to the aneurysm in animal models and human studies. 10 Hence, MMP inhibitors such as tetracyclines, statins, and ACE inhibitors have shown to reduce the expansion of such aneurysms. Tetracyclines suppresses aortic wall MMP activity, elastin degradation, and aneurysm development in elastase-induced abdominal aortic aneurysm in a rat model. 11 It should be considered that treatment of small abdominal aortic aneurysm (less than 5-5.5 cm) before rupture substantially lowers the mortality and reduces the cost of treatment. However, mechanical intervention is the only treatment shown to be effective in preventing rupture and aneurysm related death. It is reserved for aneurysms ≥5.5 cm in men and ≥5 cm in women, and/or aneurysm of rapid expansion. Because the drug therapy has a preventive effect, regular use of the drugs by susceptible population is likely to lower the onset, progression, or complications of the aneurysm in the years to come. Smoking is the most important and modifiable risk factor contributes to the development of abdominal aortic aneurysm. Clinicians should aim to modify the modifiable risk factors by recommending a healthy life style by considering factors such as diet, regular physical exercise, smoking cessation, and treating co-morbid illnesses including hypertension and dyslipidemia. Likewise, patients at risk of such aneurysm should be screened by ultrasonography in the elder age groups at regular intervals and motivated for regular follow-up.


It is well known, that the presences of children lower parental happiness. That is based on psychological and economical reasons. The effect holds on for micro data of the GSOEP. The number of children affects an inverse u-shaped curve on happiness. Even an enlargement of the dataset with macroeconomic variables offers the same results. The effect disappears only after generating terms of interaction for catching some effects of macroeconomic uncertainty. Children turn to be positive. This result could be interpreted as consumption utility of children. Considering these factors, children might be a source of joy.