Negotiating Implicit Theoretical Agendas Harrison S. Fraker, Jr. Every awards jury goes through a process of trying to understand and interpret the criteria for selecting winners. While this is generally an open discussion and debate about how specific projects fulfill published criteria; invari- ably, the theoretical interests and conceptual biases of each jury member also play a role, implicitly or explicitly. The 2002 EDRA/Places awards jury negotiated a particularly interesting set of theoretical issues, both explicit and implicit, that are worth discussing. Not surprisingly some of the awards were relatively straightforward to select, especially in the Place Research category. The jury was able to arrive at an agreement on questions about whether the research method was clear and rigorous and about whether the findings were signifi- cant and–or transformative, based on empirical evidence in the submissions. For example, "Growing Up in Cities" was chosen as an exemplary extension of Kevin Lynch's early work on how people construct a sense of place, an image of their world, particularly studies he led in the 1970s of chil- dren's environments throughout the world. Through par- ticipatory projects with children, it identifies critical urban design criteria for urban spaces that successfully serve chil- dren's needs. There is evidence that the work is having an important impact on local and national planning policy. Steven Moore's ethnographic and theoretical case study, Technology and Place: Sustainable Architecture and the Blueprint Farm, seemed to avoid any ideological differences among jury members as well. Through his close analysis of the facts of the case as seen by five competing networks of interest at work on the farm, he reveals fundamental disagreements about the role of technology and its objects. To the jury, Moore's message—that sustainable things are only as successful as the social constructs and practices by which they are implemented and maintained—seemed both eloquently argued and of profound significance to both architectural practice and theory. Two of the winners in the Place Planning category also transcended any implicit or explicit theoretical differences among the jury, but more by the shear strength of their ini- tial hypotheses than by careful analysis. "Designing a City of Learning: Patterson New Jersey" harnesses people's interest in the education of their children as a strategy for rebuilding communities. By re-conceiving urban schools as something other than self-contained boxes or isolated cam- puses, the planning hypothesis is to weave them into the urban fabric, to use them to revitalize urban neighbor- hoods, to draw lesson plans from local resources. The pub- lication then presents convincing diagrams for how this can be accomplished in specific locations. The implications of this idea were perceived by the jury to be profound, not only enriching education with an expanded curriculum that is place based, but also creating the means for restoring historic urban fabric and reconstructing the public realm. "New•Land•Marks," was chosen for having an equally compelling first proposition: public art should not just be privately conceived art in public spaces; it should "understand the community, not merely decorate it." The work of the association lays out an innovative and effective program for engaging community involvement. A key mechanism is a tripartite contract between communities, artists and the association in which nothing can be built that is not completely endorsed by the community. While not breaking new ground in the methods of participatory design, its innovation is applying participatory processes to private artistic practice, creating a more meaningful and engaging public realm. All four of these winners, which were the least theoreti- cally problematic for the jury, share a common theoretical interest in discovering and foregrounding activities and social processes of the everyday. The first two used careful analysis and proven methods to uncover important insights. The latter two used hypotheses about everyday activities that re-position them with new meaning and potential for design. The theoretical nuances of these prac- tices have been explored in the writings of Henri Lefebvre, Guy Debord and Frederic Jameson. But all four projects seemed to avoid any ideological controversy, not because of their theoretical underpinnings, but because they did not appear to be promoting any prescriptive aesthetic or design agenda. On the other hand, the selection of the final two win- ners (one in design and one in planning) revealed problem- atic theoretical differences. Different interpretations of the theoretical design agenda represented in the projects caused serious debate, which was further complicated by the fact that for many of the design and planning submis- sions, the grounding in research was ambiguous. What is a meaningful relationship between design and research was a vexing question that recurred throughout the jury. One of the design projects in the final cut, "Car- dada: Revisiting a Mountain," elicited the most explicit and implicit theoretical debate. The project presents a series of exquisitely designed places, constructed episodes, that highlight particular environmental processes or phe- nomena. The architectural elements are highly abstract and minimalist in expression, yet executed in beautiful materials and with careful attention to detail. All the jury members agreed that this was the most hauntingly poetic submission. The problem for the jury was that the project presented no research basis for its Places 15.1


A quantitative steganalyzer is an estimator of the number of embedding changes introduced by a specific embedding operation. Since for most algorithms the number of embedding changes correlates with the message length, quantitative steganalyzers are important forensic tools. In this paper, a general method for constructing quantitative steganalyzers from features used in blind detectors is proposed. The core of the method is a support vector regression, which is used to learn the mapping between a feature vector extracted from the investigated object and the embedding change rate. To demonstrate the generality of the proposed approach, quantitative steganalyzers are constructed for a variety of steganographic algorithms in both JPEG transform and spatial domains. The estimation accuracy is investigated in detail and compares favorably with state-of-the-art quantitative steganalyzers.


A detailed examination of binding thermodynamics is undertaken for the interaction between rubidium ion and a water-soluble cryptophane molecule using isothermal titration calorimetry. The equilibrium binding quotient for this host-guest pair decreases with increasing product formation. When analyzed with a thermodynamic framework that considers water explicitly in the governing equation, the shift in equilibrium is ascribed to an unfavorable change in the free energy of solvation upon formation of the inclusion complex. A van't Hoff analysis of the binding data, as well as an observation of aggregation between inclusion complexes, suggests that charge-charge interactions between rubidium ion and the phenolate groups of the cryptophane host provide the driving force for association in water that overcomes a large and unfavorable change in solvent enthalpy.


In the European Union, as in many parts of the world, there is increasing pressure to demonstrate that environmental projects achieve expected outcomes and are cost-effective. This paper reports on a trial application of an environmental investment framework, the Investment Framework for Environmental Resource (INFFER). The framework, based on benefit:cost analysis principles, was applied to agro-environmental assets in the Mugello and Valdisieve areas of northern Tuscany, Italy. Farmers, environmental and institutional representatives and technical experts took part in the process of identifying agro-environmental assets in the region. A total of 26 assets were identified, and of these, only 2 (the last remaining population of Cistus laurfolius within the natural protected area of local interest ( Area Naturale Protetta di Interesse Locale , ANPIL) of Santa Brigida, and the Sant' Antonio forest were selected as having reasonable prospects of progressing to cost-effective projects (benefit:cost ratio>1). Detailed projects were developed for both assets and found to be cost-effective based on available information. While the mindset of being clear about identifying and valuing natural assets was a new concept to participants, overall the process worked well. The factors considered in calculating a benefit:cost ratio, including technical feasibility, adoption and compliance factors, socio-political risks, costs and the likelihood of obtaining long-term funding to maintain project benefits, were all relevant in Tuscany and required the knowledge of local experts. Overall, INFFER appears relevant and useful in an EU context, and, in particular, is highly compatible with the EU Natura 2000 nature and biodiversity policy.


Napping is essential for human to reduce drowsiness, contribute to improving cognitive function, reflex, short-term memory, and state. Some studies have shown that a certain amount of time for a nap can boost the body's immunity and reduce the danger of cardiovascular disease. Using music for relaxation and enjoyment to fall asleep is an effective solution that earlier studies have shown. There are many genres of music that have been used for stimulation, such as binaural beats or melodic sounds. The aim of the study was to confirm the positive effect of music on sleep quality by analyzing electroencephalography signal. There were four types of music is being used in this study: instrumental music, Ballad music, K-pop music, and Jazz. The study applied the pre-processing include filtering block, features extraction, and clustering steps to analyze raw data. This research calculated the power spectrum of Alpha wave and Theta wave, to detect the transition of wake - sleep stages by K-means clustering algorithm. Sleep latency is one of the factors that determine the quality of sleep. The sleep onset is detected based on the phase shift of the Alpha and Theta waves. The exact timing of the sleep onset was important in this study. The user interface was developed in this study to compute sleep latency in normal and musical experiment. As a result, music is an intervention in helping people fall asleep easier (mean of sleep latency in normal and musical experiment was 9.0714 min and 5.6423 min, respectively) but the standard deviation of this result was rather high due to the little number of experiments. However, the study concludes that listening to music before naptime can improve sleep latency in some participants.


Interpersonal psychotherapy for depressed adolescents (IPT-A) is a brief, evidence-based psychotherapy that has been found to be successful in treating unipolar depression in non-bipolar, non-psychotic adolescents. This article provides an overview of the theoretical principles, developmental adaptations, interpersonal focus and techniques of IPT-A. Treatment specifically targets communication skills and social support in current relationships from a skills perspective. Therefore, the therapeutic focus is on improving the adolescent's relationships with the underlying assumption that this will improve the adolescent's mood. The empirical support for the effectiveness of IPT-A, preliminary findings from clinical trials of adaptations of IPT-A and future directions for research in unipolar adolescent depression are presented briefly.


In event-oriented modeling, designers focus on the events that occur in time and on the causality relationship between events. This practice complements class-oriented, object-oriented, actor-oriented and state-oriented approaches. To facilitate event-oriented modeling, we have extended event graphs to create Ptera (Ptolemy event relationship actors), which we show to be appropriate for modeling complex discrete-event systems. A key capability is that Ptera models conform with an actor abstract semantics that permits hierarchical composition with other models of computation such as discrete-event actors, dataflow, process networks and finite state machines. This enables their use in complex system design, where not every aspect of the system is best described with event-oriented modeling.


Towards the end of the 1970s, mainly US-American proponents of the still young medical anthropology reassessed perspectives of the anthropology of religion on ritual responses to misfortune and affliction and replaced them with a more focused concern with personal and social responses to illness and healing. Twenty years later, the AC Medical Anthropology of the Deutsche Gesellschaft filr Volkerkunde organized several meetings and workshops to reconsider critical challenge and thematic shift of these medical anthropologists from hindsight. This led to two insights: (1) As a product of a relatively young European differentiation between "religion" and "medicine", this analytical separation can neither be presumed nor applied in non-European or historical societies, and the critical view of developments in industrial nations of the West also shows the impossibility of a strict distinction between a "rational" healing practice and an expectation of salvation. (2) The question about the divisibility of religion and medicine can thus at best be read as a justified claim for a distinction between the anthropology of religion and medical anthropology, but this clearly requires further conceptual work on the themes of both sub-disciplines. A first step in this direction is the concept of social suffering which re-integrates the broader religious and social dimensions into the analysis of illness and affliction.


The reionization of the hydrogen in the universe represents an important but poorly understood epoch in the evolution of our universe. The most promising explanation is that radiation emitted from young hot stars in the first generation of galaxies drove the reionization. However, this theory relies on the assumption that the fraction of escaping ionizing radiation from these galaxies was high enough to sustain reionization. The upcoming James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) will enable observations of large samples of spectra from reionization-epoch galaxies. The escape fraction of ionizing photons can not be directly measured from these observations, but is predicted to have an indirect effect on the spectra of these galaxies at observable wavelengths.In this thesis we train a machine learning algorithm known as the LASSO on simulated JWST observations, in order to obtain models which can predict escape fractions. The method studied in this thesis predicts the escape fraction with an absolute mean prediction error of 0.11 when applied to low resolution spectra with signal-to-noise ratio = 5. This prediction accuracy represents a significant improvement over previous similar methods. Our results indicate that a few spectral features exhibit the strongest effect on the escape fraction. The method shows a high level of robustness to the effects of varying levels of interstellar dust and spectral noise. A discussion which highlights some of the more problematic areas with the method is also included in this report, as well as proposed directions for future work.


The purpose of this research is to find out how college students in Saudi Arabia utilize their smartphones in their learning and to find out the effect of its use in their learning and investigate ways that are more effective for such use. In order to achieve this goal, a researcher developed questionnaire was distributed to 93 college students. The study utilized a mixed-methods approach in collecting data. Investigation Results are analyzed and demonstrated with charts, followed by a discussion of the main findings.


Abstract Recent field research has indicated that deficit irrigation is appropriate for supplying water to crops under the problem of water scarcity. Deficit irrigation is to control the moisture content above some tolerable value without affecting crop yields. Sprinkler irrigation, one of the deficit irrigation, is considered in this research. The objectives of this study are to determine the minimum sprinkler irrigation time of the studied field—Taidong, Taiwan, to satisfy deficit irrigation and to identify the tested sprinkler irrigation characteristics about moisture content variation using numerical simulations. In this study, precipitation rate tests for the three different sprinklers were performed. A soil characteristic curve in the studied field was conducted and an axial-symmetric finite element model was modified from a verified model. The moisture content development versus time owing to sprinkler irrigation was simulated. The results indicated that the tested sprinklers sufficiently supply water within a 6-m long and 1-m deep domain during an irrigation period of 86,400's when the initial moisture content is larger than that of the permanent wilting point. The results are helpful for the rotational irrigation policy making in Taidong, Taiwan.


Five million years passed before humans evolved into what we are today. Therefore, more than 99.99% of our evolutionary history was spent in natural environments, assuming that urbanization can be defined as a postindustrial revolution development. We have become the species we are today, living in a modern civilization, through a process of evolution within a natural environment. Human bodies are made so as to adapt to nature. However, terms that we hear today, such as "technostress (Brod, 1984)," indicate that artificialization, which is the process of society and our lives being intruded by technologies of different types, is occurring so rapidly that we now experience stressful situations and are forced to deal with the resultant pressures.


A full-order, voltage-behind-reactance synchronous machine model has recently been proposed in the literature. This paper extends the voltage-behind-reactance formulation for the electromagnetic transient program (EMTP)-type solution, in which the rotor subsystem is expressed in qd coordinates and the stator subsystem is expressed in abc phase coordinates. The model interface with the nodal-analysis network solution is non-iterative and simultaneous. An example of a single-machine, infinite-bus system shows that the proposed model is more accurate and efficient than several existing EMTP machine models


Understanding non-random patterns in the taxonomic composition of communities occurring in insular or fragmented habitats remains a major goal of ecology. Nested subset patterns are one possible departure from random community assembly that has been reported for communities of both free-living and parasitic animals. Here, we investigate the effects of extrinsic factors on the occurrence of nestedness among the assemblages of fleas found in different populations of the same host species, using data on 25 mammalian host species. The patterns of flea species composition among host populations spanned the entire spectrum from significantly nested to significantly anti-nested. After controlling for host phylogeny, we found that across host species, the tendency for flea assemblages to approach nestedness increased with increasing host geographic range size and with decreasing latitude of the host's geographic range. This tendency also decreased with an increase in a composite variable combining data on mean January and July temperature. The number of closely-related mammalian species living in sympatry with a given host species had no influence on whether or not the structure of flea assemblages among its populations departed from randomness. We propose explanations for these results that include: the possible gradual loss of flea species as a host expands its range from its initial area of origin, the lack of specific flea faunas in narrowly-distributed host species, interspecific differences in the dispersal abilities of flea species becoming amplified in hosts with broad geographical ranges, and the effect of latitude, climate and environment on the probabilities of host-switching and extinction in fleas. Overall, our results suggest that the structure of flea assemblages in mammalian hosts may be driven by features of host biology.


The ECOnirman Whole Building Performance tool was funded by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) under the Energy Conservation and Commercialization Project - Phase-III (ECO-III). This tool is the first of its kind, an online simulation-based code compliance tool, made available through the Bureau of Energy Efficiency. It eliminates or minimizes the requirements for special software, building science or simulation expertise. It assists developers and building designers in demonstrating performancebased compliance with the Energy Conservation Building Code. With a minimal learning curve, a user with knowledge equivalent to that of a final-year architecture student, having access to about one hour of an HVAC engineer's time, can use the tool to demonstrate compliance with ECBC. The tool runs energy simulations in the cloud using parallel computing, and DOE-2 as the simulation engine. A total of 1,294 city locations in India are currently supported. ECOnirman WBP shows great promise for the future in India: it enables developers to meet code by installing only those measures that benefit their building; it promotes innovation in design and technologies; with validation of inputs, it enables a large user base to do energy simulations and results in true capacity building; and the database of inputs and results enables easier policy analysis.


Background: The Netherlands traditionally has a strong civil society. This has had an impact on the education system through the relatively high degree of autonomy for schools on moral and didactical choices as well as on the curriculum. Such freedom provides ample room for citizenship to develop at alocal level. The large degree of curricular autonomy allows schools to shape education according to their own vision and values in partnership with those in civil society. Purpose: This article explores how citizenship education, cultural diversity and human rights education are implemented within such a context. The main aim is to analyse how societal and political ideals are laid down at the policy level (intended curriculum), how they are implemented at the school level (implemented curriculum), and how they impact on student learning (attained curriculum). Sources of evidence: Formal educational policy documents are analysed to gain insight into the intended curriculum. Insights in the implemented and attained curriculum are gathered through analysis of research studies into classroom practice. Main argument: The article argues that although citizenship education, cultural diversity and human rights education are prominent themes in political and societal debates and expectations of schools' contribution to these themes are high, the intentions are formalised only briefly in the intended curriculum. The freedom of education is mentioned as the main reason for the lack of policy commitment. The article argues, however, that local empowerment cannot do without school leadership to develop a school-specific vision and approach, aswell as a coherent long-term vision on the way forward at the macro level. Conclusions: This curriculum analysis shows that cross-curricular socialisation themes do not play a prominent role in curriculum policy and that implementation in classroom practice is varied, but generally limited. With ambiguity in educational policy and limited implementation support, it is a complex challenge for schools to make strategic choices in interaction with civil society and to set their own social agenda. Given the current political and societal context, with itsfocus on freedom of education, it is necessary, but not realistic, to expect moredetailed curricular regulations on these curriculum domains. Moreover, the current emphasis on basic skills in literacy and numeracy also limits the room for these societal issues, in both curriculum policy and practice. The article concludes that schools need more support to make autonomous choices as well as more clarity on what is expected from them. Also more insight is needed about feasibleand coherent approaches to incorporate citizenship education in a core curriculum that has a strong emphasis on the basic skills.


Solar fuel production through the so-called artificial photosynthesis has attracted a great deal of attention to the development of a new world energy matrix that is renewable and environmentally f ...


The eastern hellbender (Cryptobranchus alleganiensis alleganiensis) is a fully aquatic giant salamander whose habitats are commonly defined as swift running, fairly shallow, highly oxygenated waters. Hellbenders have been previously established as a sentinel species for water quality and aquatic ecosystem health.  Unfortunately, populations have undergone a century long decline due to various anthropogenic influences.  Measuring hellbender populations can be challenging and extremely invasive, which can be injurious for the individuals being sampled.  Recent advances in non-invasive genetic sampling allows for the processing and analysis of environmental DNA (eDNA) from water samples; which has proven effective for detecting low population density aquatic macroorganisms.  In this study, we sought to identify hellbender populations along the West Fork Greenbrier River in West Virginia.  We utilized an aqueous filtering approach in conjunction with chloroform-isoamyl extractions to isolate eDNA.  To positively identify sites with hellbender presence we utilized PCR to test for two hellbender specific regions of the mitochondrial gene, cytochrome-b; final results were compared to a traditional hellbender survey which had been conducted simultaneously with the eDNA sample collection.


We examine firm profitability in the food economy and determine the source of variance of firm profitability in family-owned and non-family-owned food processing firms. The results indicate firm effects dominate in explaining the variance in the business-segment performance in the food economy. More specifically, we find family-owned firms compared to non-family-owned firms have a higher percentage of total variance in the business-segment performance explained by yearly effects, industry effects, and firm effects for both the random-effects and fixed-effects models.


This paper uses conjoint analysis to examine the social influence (e.g., social group recommendations) of an individual consumer's immediate social circle on his/her financial product preferences. It proposes that social influence from individuals with whom the consumer has strong ties is stronger than that from those with whom he/she has weak ties in choosing financial products through word-of-mouth referral or recommendation. The importance of social influence on financial product preference is associated with consumers' familiarity with the product and their susceptibility to interpersonal influence. Results reveal that recommendations from social groups with strong ties are influential when forming preferences on financial products. Moreover, social influence becomes significant in financial product selection when consumers are less familiar with the product and are more susceptible to interpersonal influence. While this kind of social influence shows a contributory effect, it has a marginal estimated utility compared with the more explicit attributes of financial product choices (e.g., risks and returns). Despite the expected observation, the study shows a tendency to defer to the value of social influence in contexts where consumers are not familiar with a financial product.


A detailed first-principles study of the α phase of copper pyrovanadate is carried out to understand the magnetic and multiferroic properties of this material. The crystal geometry of the material is found to have a crucial impact on the magnetic interactions of the material. The relevant spin Hamiltonian derived from the calculated isotropic exchange interactions is found to be three-dimensional. In addition to the isotropic interactions, the asymmetric Dzyaloshinski-Moriya (DM) interaction, driven by spin-orbit coupling (SOC) in absence of inversion symmetry, is also found to be appreciable resulting in the canting of the Cu-spins. The magnetism in the material is closely related to the ferro-orbital ordering driven by the polar distortion of the CuO5 pyramids. The predicted magnetic ground state of the system from the structures allowed by symmetry, is in agreement with the experimental observations. The calculation of the ferroelectric polarization in the symmetry allowed magnetic structures indicate that the giant ferroelectric polarization observed in the system is primarily driven by the symmetric exchange-striction mechanism and is corroborated by temperature-dependent X-ray studies.At the request of all authors of the paper, an updated version of this article was published on 22 August 2018. The original article supplied to AIP Publishing was found to have missing information in Figure 2. In the Y axes in Fig. 2 (a) and (b) the letter 'V' was excluded and in the label of X axes in Fig. 2(b) the letters Z and X are missing. These errors have been corrected in the updated and re-published article.A detailed first-principles study of the α phase of copper pyrovanadate is carried out to understand the magnetic and multiferroic properties of this material. The crystal geometry of the material is found to have a crucial impact on the magnetic interactions of the material. The relevant spin Hamiltonian derived from the calculated isotropic exchange interactions is found to be three-dimensional. In addition to the isotropic interactions, the asymmetric Dzyaloshinski-Moriya (DM) interaction, driven by spin-orbit coupling (SOC) in absence of inversion symmetry, is also found to be appreciable resulting in the canting of the Cu-spins. The magnetism in the material is closely related to the ferro-orbital ordering driven by the polar distortion of the CuO5 pyramids. The predicted magnetic ground state of the system from the structures allowed by symmetry, is in agreement with the experimental observations. The...


There are four incompatible sets of guidelines for describing and communicating data for products ranging from components to systems. Representatives from the bodies governing the various standards have been trying to decide how to make the standards work together, a process they call harmonization. The standards involved are the Electronic Design Interchange Format (EDIF), the Initial Graphics Exchange Specification (IGES), some standards developed by the Institute for Interconnecting and Packaging Electronic Circuits (IPC), and the Very High-Speed IC Hardware Description Language (VHDL). A subcommittee has been set up, under the sponsorship of the American National Standards Institute, to bring about the harmonization. The tasks facing the subcommittee are examined.<<ETX>>


Products from the protected East Sea/Sea of Japan ('J' stock) minke whales (Balaenoptera acuturostrata) are sold widely on the commercial markets of Japan and Korea despite the protection of this stock since 1986. To determine the minimum number of individual whales for sale, genotypes from six microsatellite loci were used to profile North Pacific (NP) minke whale products purchased on these markets between December 1997 and October 1999. Genotype differences showed that 99 NP minke whale products from the Japanese market represented 86 unique individuals. Of these, 33.7% were of likely J‐stock origin based on mitochondrial (mt) DNA haplotypes. In Korea, genotyping showed that 23 NP minke products from March 1999 represented 18 individuals, and 19 products from October 1999 represented 16 individuals. No matches were found between the two sampling periods, giving a total of 34 unique individuals. A frequency‐of‐capture model suggests that 98 minke whales were present on the Korean market over the two brief sampling periods. No genotype matches were confirmed between the two countries, indicating that undocumented exploitation of this depleted stock must be additive, and greater than previously assumed.


Pneumococcal infections remain a major public health issue in aging people. The recent publication of the CAPITA trial evaluating the efficacy of 13-valent pneumococcal conjugate vaccine (PCV13, Prevenar 13®) in elderly subjects has brought several countries including Belgium to modify their vaccinal recommendations. These new developments have motivated us to write this brief review about the burden of pneumococcal disease, the mechanism of action of conjugate vaccines, the clinical efficacy of PCV13 with a special emphasis on CAPITA data. The questions of herd protection and serotype substitution are also introduced as well as a summary of the more recent guidelines.


ABSTRACT In one of the few places in which musical experience is discussed in Spinoza's Ethics, it is used as a means of exemplifying the ways in which an entity, in itself, is not 'good or evil': it is neither, or both, depending on the relations into which it enters with other bodies. In this article, I consider what a Spinozist theory of musical power might entail. I argue that the particular, immanent and materialist notions of 'good' and 'bad' that can be found in Spinoza's work and are exemplified via music enable a departure from both 'aesthetic moralism' and 'aesthetic relativism'. With reference to contemporary discourses of musical violence, as well as Pauline Oliveros' praxis of Deep Listening, I assert that Spinoza makes space for music's ethico-affective ambivalence. Drawing attention to Spinoza's citation of deaf experiences of music, I also consider the extent to which a Spinozist model of musical power allows for 'auraldiversity'. In doing so, I aim to demonstrate the ways in which musical experience might exemplify some of the key tenets of Spinoza's thought.


Emerging in December, 2019, SARS-CoV-2 is spreading worldwide, endangering the citizens of the globe The authors sought to develop a feasible real-time RT-PCR method to detect RNA of the virus The fluorescent probe the authors designed proved its potency and utility, by detecting in vitro transcribed RNA sequence at an estimated concentration approximating a single copy per reaction, used along with 3 sets of primers that flank the probe sequence Though not tested against actual viral RNA, or clinical specimens, this method can serve as another choice of rapid detection of the plague-causing virus


To define fundamental mechanisms for sympathoexcitation could provide a therapeutic opportunity to interrupt the specific site linking sympathetic activation with heart failure. Central sleep apnea is characterized by apnea, hypoxia, sleep fragmentation, and increased sympathetic nerve activity. Since this sympathoexcitation is directly related to the frequency of arousals from sleep and the degree of apnea-related hypoxia, but not to left ventricular ejection fraction, it is therefore not simply a compensatory response to hemodynamic derangement but is excessive and pathologic sympathoexcitation with aftereffects that persist into wakefulness. Thus, central sleep apnea could participate in a vicious pathophysiologic cycle involving the cardiovascular, respiratory, and autonomic nervous system.


In terms of music's influence upon our daily lives, it is important to account for musical identity, and especially musical preferences. When we give music a role in the promotion of our health, it is our music—the music we like, that we choose ourselves—that works most effectively. In the present text then, I will introduce the concept of musical habitus as a means of approaching the general phenomenon of musical taste and preferences. I will examine some popular notions regarding how music is appropriated in daily life via the results of a research project conducted at the University of Gothenburg by Thomas Bossius and myself titled Musik i Människors Liv, or Music in People's Lives.1 I will not deal explicitly with health musicking in everyday life, with a few exceptions, but by presenting narratives from everyday acts of musicking, I hope to demonstrate the importance of considering sociological and ethnographic evidence when we discuss music in relation to health. Factors such as gender, age, class, and ethnicity, that is, may all have some relevance to the discussion of music's healthful influence. I will conclude this text with a discussion of the notion of existential health and music. When we talk about musical preferences, we often meet the following conceits:


Aims. Radiative feedback from massive stars is a key process for understanding how HII regions enhance or inhibit star formation in pillars and globules at the interface with molecular clouds. We aim to contribute by modelling the interactions between ionization and gas clouds to better understand the processes at work. We study in detail the impact of modulations on the cloud-HII region interface and density modulations inside the cloud. Methods. We ran 3D hydrodynamical simulations based on Euler equations coupled with gravity using the HERACLES code. We implemented a method to solve ionization/recombination equations and took into account typical heating and cooling processes at work in the interstellar medium that are caused by ionization/recombination physics. Results. UV radiation creates a dense shell compressed between an ionization front and a shock ahead. Interface modulations produce a curved shock that collapses on itself, which leads to stable growing pillar-like structures. The narrower the initial interface modulation, the longer the resulting pillar. We interpret pillars resulting from density modulations in terms of the ability of these density modulations to curve the shock ahead of the ionization front. Conclusions. The shock curvature is a key process for understanding the formation of structures at the edge of HII regions. Interface and density modulations at the edge of the cloud have a direct impact on the morphology of the dense shell during its formation. Deeper inside the cloud, structures have less influence because of the high densities reached by the shell during its expansion.


ABSTRACT This study examined intergenerational family contact. Three questions were considered: Is there a relationship between parent's class, child's class and family contact? Can class-related differences in family contact be explained by differences in geographical distance between parent and child? Is intergenerational family contact affected by children's social mobility? The questions were explored using data from a nationally-representative level of living survey. The results from logistic regressions showed that parent's class as well as the child's class were associated with intergenerational geographical distance and family contact more often than once a week. Those in or retired from non-manual occupations were less likely than manual workers to live close and to have family contact more than once a week. We found no evidence that a change in class position, upward nor downward, had any effect on family contacts. Rather, class-stable non-manual families socialise less frequently than other families, even when they live relatively close. The results therefore suggest that familial class-cohesiveness is a stronger determinant of inter-generational family contacts than social mobility. Future research should address the complex connection between social mobility and other forms of relations and transfers between generations.


The question of whether bees can take novel short cuts between familiar sites has been central to the discussion about the existence of cognitive maps in these insects. The failure of bees to show this capacity in the majority of previous studies may be a result of the training procedure, because extensive training to one feeding site may have eliminated or weakened memories for other sites that were previously trained. Here we present a novel approach to this problem, by rewarding honey bees, Apis mellifera carnica, at two feeding sites, one (Sm, 630 m southeast from the hive) at which they could feed in the morning, and the other (Sa, 790 m northeast) at which they could feed in the afternoon. We then displaced bees to Sa in the morning and to Sm in the afternoon either from the other feeding site or from the hive. Bees were also displaced to two novel sites, one at a completely unfamiliar location (S4) and another that was located halfway between the two feeding sites (S3). Bees displaced from either of the feeding sites never took novel short cuts; instead, they used the homeward directions that would have been correct had they not been displaced. Bees caught at the hive entrance, however, chose the correct homeward direction not only when displaced to both feeding sites, but also when displaced to S3, although not from S4. Control bees that had been trained to only one of the feeding sites were not able to travel directly home from S3 excluding the possibility that bees used landmarks close to the hive. This is the first evidence that bees take a novel short cut by activating two vector memories simultaneously. The potential mechanisms of integrating the two memories are discussed. Since bees took novel short cuts in only one direction (to the hive) and only when displaced from the hive (not the feeders), we conclude that inference of a cognitive map in bees would be premature. Copyright 1998 The Association for the Study of Animal Behaviour.


A b s t r a c t Particulate matter, one form of air pollution, is a dangerous environmental toxin. Increasing numbers of cars on the road and further industrialization will continue to exacerbate this problem into the future. Particulate matter inhalation has been connected with cancer onset, especially in the respiratory and cardiovascular systems. Alterations in the microRNA (miRNA) pathway may be one factor contributing to the resulting cancer. miRNAs are small non-coding RNAs that act as post-transcriptional gene regulators. They bind to the 3' UTR of an mRNA through nitrogenous base pairing, leading to repression of the target gene. Methylation of the DNA loci encoding miRNAs may explain different levels of miRNA output seen in cancerous cells. Understanding this link is important in determining how cancer can start and in potential therapeutic approaches. However, methylation of miRNA template DNA is only one facet in a very complex epigenetic pathway.


ABSTRACT Today social media represent an essential instrument for exercising a broad range of fundamental rights. The phenomenon of social media exclusion, arising when a user is prevented from using specific social media websites or parts of them, therefore has profound fundamental rights implications. Based on the analysis of recent case law from the US and Germany, the article outlines the essential characteristics of social media exclusion. Preventing individuals from accessing social media does not nullify their constitutional rights. However, without social media one could not enjoy her fundamental rights to such an enhanced level as has become standard in recent years. This article argues that curtailing the possibility of accessing social media should be subject to minimal constitutional safeguards, and examines which measures have been put in place by national courts in the US and Germany to this end. Finally, this article reflects on the role played by national courts from a general perspective, contending that judges represent a main catalyst of the process of constitutionalisation of the social media environment. National courts articulate traditional constitutional principles in the context of social media, in this way solving constitutional collisions between the state constitutional dimension and that of private platforms.


Shortly after the end of the civil war, the Soviet military-economic thought faced a number of military-economic problems. The interests of the country's defense required a deep analysis of the economic problems of the first world war and the civil war, the development of ways and methods of the most painless and rapid transfer of the entire national economy to the military track, the further development of the military-economic science.


The events at the earliest stage of adipocyte differentiation are yet to be fully elucidated. Previously, we cloned the genes that are induced at the beginning of the differentiation of mouse 3T3-L1 preadipocyte cells. We found that the gene expression of regulators of G protein signaling-2 (RGS2) rapidly increased after the addition of inducers and decreased at 3–12 h. The expression pattern of RGS2 mRNAs differed among growth-arrested and proliferating 3T3-L1 cells and NIH-3T3 cells, indicating a specificity for adipogenesis. Here we report that the ectopic expression of RGS2 using a retroviral system in mouse NIH-3T3 cells promotes adipogenesis only in the presence of BRL49653, which is a ligand for the peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor γ (PPARγ). These results strongly suggest that RGS2 play a crucial role in the program of adipocyte differentiation and may contribute to the function of PPARγ.


A statistical evaluation of sediment data from Technical Area 54, Los Alamos National Laboratory, was used to examine the relation of concentrations of a series of inorganic and radionuclide analytes to general geographic setting and sediment texture. Significant differences exist between results from the north and south sides of Mesita del Buey, with analyte concentrations being generally higher to the north. These differences probably result primarily from variations in background levels in the source materials for the sediments, perhaps reflecting finer particle sizes and/or better developed soils on the north side of the mesa.


Bleaching of corals as a result of elevated sea surface temperatures (SST) is rapidly becoming a primary source of stress for reefs globally; the scale and extent of this threat will depend on how the drivers of SST interact to influence bleaching patterns. We demonstrate how the opposing forces of the El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO) and levels of atmospheric aerosols drive regional-scale patterns of coral bleaching across the Caribbean. When aerosol levels are low, bleaching is largely determined by El Niño strength, but high aerosol levels mitigate the effects of a severe El Niño. High aerosol levels, resulting principally from recent volcanic activity, have thus protected Caribbean reefs from more frequent widespread bleaching events but cannot be relied on to provide similar protection in the future.


Offering services in the internet requires a dependable operation of the underlying software systems with guaranteed quality of service. The workload of such systems typically significantly varies throughout a day and thus leads to changing resource utilisations. Existing system monitoring tools often use fixed threshold values to determine if a system is in an unexpected state. Especially in low load situations, deviations from the system's expected behaviour are detected too late if fixed value thresholds (leveled for peak loads) are used. In this paper, we present our approach of a workload-aware performance monitoring process based on performance prediction techniques. This approach allows early detections of performance problems before they become critical. We applied our approach to the e-mail system operated by Germany's largest e-mail provider, the 1&1 Internet AG. This case study demonstrates the applicability of our approach and shows its accuracy in the predicted resource utilisation with an error of mostly less than 10%.


We are experiencing a developing world with the emergence and development of computers and the rapid progress of technology at these days. Computers provide convenience in many areas of our lives. They can make automaticaly people's jobs done more easily and quickly. In addition to the development of computers, people have begun to store the information. They have accessed through the developing techonology. They are available for various databases to store information. Information must be stored in a categorized form to access easily was stored text in databases. At first people were doing the categorization manually. But nowadays, this process is made automatically through machine learning algorithms which are being developed and widely used today. In this study, eight of machine learning classification algorithms were studied on 5200 documents which were previously labelled. The accuracy, recall, precision and F-measure values of the algorithms on the data are compared. According to the test results, GradientBoostigClassifier algorithm has the most successful result.


The natural progression of breast cancer differs greatly between patients; the precise prediction of this disease course will improve the efficacy of therapeutics. Gene expression profiling may elucidate the undiscovered biological variations between seemingly similar cancers, leading to a new cancer classification system valuable in accurate diagnosis. The expression levels of 2412 genes, derived from 98 cancer samples, were precisely recorded by a high throughput RT-PCR technique, adapter-tagged competitive PCR. Subsequent cluster analysis revealed a molecular profile, correlating with estrogen receptor levels and the presence of lymph node metastases. We analyzed 301 cancer samples for the expression patterns of 21 genes critical in this categorization. The classification of the samples into three major groups was verified utilizing principal component analysis. This molecular classification system correlated significantly with early recurrence, independent of lymph node status. This malignant potential is associated with the expression levels of a group of genes, which comprise a set of candidates potentially useful in diagnostic prediction. These genes and the associated control mechanisms may also be effective therapeutic targets.


This paper investigates the use of sample reweighting in a behavioural tax microsimulation model, to examine the implications for government taxes and expenditure of population ageing in Australia. First, a calibration approach to sample reweighting is described, producing new weights which achieve specified population totals for selected variables, subject to the constraint that there are minimal adjustments to the weights. Second, the performance of the Australian Bureau of Statistics' (ABS) weights provided with the 2001 Survey of Income and Housing Cost (SIHC) was examined and it was found that reweighting does not improve the simulation outcomes for the 2001 situation, so the original ABS weights were retained for 2001. Third, the implications of changes in the age distribution of the population were examined, based on population projections to 2050. A 'pure' change in the age distribution was examined by keeping the aggregate population size fixed and changing only the relative frequencies in different age-gender groups. Finally, the effects of a policy change to benefit taper rates in Australia were compared for 2001 and 2050 population weights. It is suggested that this type of exercise provides an insight into the implications of changes in the population on government income tax revenue and social security expenditure, indicating likely pressures for policy changes.


Hidden Markov models (HMMs) are probabilistic models with applications across a large number of fields, most prominently Speech Recognition and Computational Biology. In this paper, we propose a polynomial-time algorithm for learning the parameters of a first order HMM by using a state distribution probability (SD) oracle. The SD oracle provides the learning algorithm with the state distribution corresponding to a query string in the target model. The SD oracle is necessary for efficient learning in the sense that the consistency problem for HMMs, where a training set of state distribution vectors such as those supplied by the SD oracle is used but without the ability to query on specific strings, is NP-complete. The algorithm proposed here is an extension to an algorithm described by Tzeng for learning probabilistic automata (PA) using the SD oracle.


Background
Weight loss in patients with cancer is caused by cancer cachexia and chemotherapy-induced nausea and vomiting (CINV). Recent developments in antiemetic drugs have substantially improved CINV, but nutritional intervention did not improve body weight. This study aimed to investigate the effects of nutrition intervention with appropriate antiemetic treatment in patients with non-small-cell lung cancer during chemotherapy.

Methods
Patients received individualized nutrition counseling by a registered dietitian and were provided with oral supplements for 90 days. Body weight and other parameters were measured at baseline and after 90-day intervention. To evaluate this nutrition intervention, patients were also retrospectively set as control, and then body weight change was compared with inverse probability of treatment weights (IPTW) analysis.

Results
Ten patients received individualized nutrition counseling and were provided with oral supplements for 90 days. Of them, 7 patients consumed nutritional supplements, and the mean intake was 130 kcal/day. After 90-day intervention, the patients did not show significant weight and BMI loss during the course of cytotoxic chemotherapy. A total of 38 patients were retrospectively enrolled as controls. The number of the patients who gain the body weight after 90 days in the study cohort was significantly larger than that in the retrospective controls with the IPTW analysis (Odds Ratio (OR) = 8.4; 95% Confidence Interval (CI): 1.6-42; P = 0.01).

Conclusion
Early intensive nutrition intervention with appropriate antiemetic treatment prevents weight loss. Nutrition interventions might be also beneficial for quality of life, treatment response and survival.


I review the main models of disability and introduce a line of reasoning that has been neglected in the debate concerning disability and disadvantage. My reasoning suggests that while disablism can and should be combated, success will require more challenging transformations than those featured in the literature.


The authors share their experience with cryosurgical treatment of 38 patients with prostatic cancer (stage T3--in 9 patients, T4--in 29). The technic of cryotherapy is described. The former was employed in patients with complete obstruction of the cervico-urethral segment being nonresponsive to the hormone- and radiotherapy, and also for a life cystostome. Three freezing sessions for 5--15 minutes were conducted with natural warming of the prostate between sessions during 10--12 minutes, and forced warming for 3--4 minutes after the third session. The optimum time of cryoeffect was 5--7 minutes. The postoperative period was smooth, uncomplicated. The process of rejection of the frozen tissues lasted for up to 4--6 weeks, after that a suprapubic drainage was withdrawn and uresis was restored. 32 patients were discharged from the clinic, the survival up to 3 months--in 2, up to 6 months--in 6, up to 1 year--in 4, up to 2 years--in 7, up to 3 years--in 7.


We present a detailed study on aluminum‐boron codoping of silicon by alloying from screen‐printed aluminum pastes containing boron additives (Al–B pastes). We derive an analytical model for the formation of the Al–B acceptor profiles by quantitatively describing (i) the composition of the Al–B–Si melt and (ii) the incorporation of Al and B acceptor atoms into the recrystallizing Si lattice. We show that measured Al–B dopant profiles can be excellently described by this model, which therefore offers a straightforward method for the comprehensive investigation of alloying from Al–B pastes. The formation of a characteristic kink in the Al–B dopant profile curve can thus be ascribed to the exhaustion of the B additive dissolution during alloying. By intentionally adding elemental B powder to an Al paste, we demonstrate that only a low percentage of the B powder actually dissolves into the melt. We show that this incomplete dissolution of the B additive strongly affects the recombination characteristics of Al–B–p+ regions and, thus, is an important element of alloying from Al–B pastes. This study therefore provides improved understanding of aluminum‐boron codoping of silicon. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.


OBJECTIVE: To investigate the humoral immune status and the effect of antibiotic treatment in Bulgarian patients with early Lyme disease. METHODS: A total of 34 early Lyme disease patients was examined, 16 with erythema migrans and 18 with non-specific systemic symptoms. Serum samples from all patients and from 12 healthy controls were tested for total immunoglobulins (IgG, IgA and IgM), hemolytic activity of complement (CH50) and immune complexes (ICs). The patients were treated with doxycycline (100 mg orally, twice daily for 10 to 15 days, in one or two courses). RESULTS: The patients showed significantly increased IC levels (P<0.01 for patients with erythema migrans and P<0.001 for patients with non-specific symptoms). There were no significant changes in the levels of total hemolytic complement and total immunoglobulins (IgG, IgA and IgM). The clinical outcome was satisfactory in 21 of the 34 patients (61.8%) after treatment with doxycycline for 10 to 15 days. The rest of the patients (38.2%) failed to respond to the therapy, and continued to report various complaints, such as arthralgia, myalgia, paresthesia, headache, fatigue or recurrent rash. All of these had elevated levels of IC. After a second course of treatment with the same antibiotic regimen these patients had resolution of symptoms (12 patients) or improvement (1 patient). CONCLUSIONS: Immunologic investigation may be useful in determining treatment strategy in Lyme disease. Elevated IC levels may indicate a need for more prolonged antibiotic therapy.


A 50-year-old Caucasian woman presented with a 3-week history of bilateral parotid enlargement, fevers and night sweats. Her symptoms had worsened despite treatment with oral amoxicillin/ clavulanic acid for presumed bacterial parotitis. She was otherwise well, took no medications, was a non-smoker and drinker and had no relevant family history. Clinical examination revealed bilateral parotid enlargement together with tender cervical, axillary and inguinal lymphadenopathy and splenomegaly. There was no rash, xerostomia or xerophthalmia. Apart from mildly elevated lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) of 245 U/L (135–214), all bloods were normal. Autoimmune and viral serology and Mantoux test were also unremarkable. Computed tomography of the chest, abdomen and pelvis showed moderate splenomegaly and generalized axillary, mediastinal, retroperitoneal and inguinal lymphadenopathy, the largest node being 2.7 cm. Axillary lymph node excisional biopsy was diagnostic of angioimmunoblastic T-cell lymphoma (AILT). The patient is currently undergoing CHOP chemotherapy (Cyclophosphamide, Vincristine, Doxorubicin and Prednisolone). Lymphoma affecting the parotid is uncommon, representing either primary parotid lymphoma or extranodal disease. NonHodgkin's lymphoma (NHL) presents with extranodal disease in 25% of patients, often in the head and neck region. AILT represents only 1–2% of all NHL. Patients with AILT are typically middle aged or elderly and present with generalized lymphadenopathy, marked systemic symptoms and skin rashes. There is no gender predominance. AILT presenting with bilateral parotid enlargement is very rare, particularly in the absence of Sjogren's syndrome, a known risk factor for lymphoma. We could identify only one other case in the literature, but unlike our patient, there was a history of Sjogren's syndrome. The other diagnoses considered were autoimmune conditions such as sarcoidosis or infective causes including mumps, HIV and tuberculosis. Differentiating these conditions from lymphoma on clinical grounds is difficult. Appropriate use of autoimmune and viral serology, and usually tissue biopsy, is critical to establishing the diagnosis. The presence of peripheral lymph nodes in our patient avoided the risks associated with parotid biopsy. This unusual case highlights the diagnostic challenge posed by bilateral parotid swelling. A range of local and systemic pathologies, including AILT, must be considered when faced with this clinical scenario.


Zinc (Zn), the second-most necessary trace element, is abundant in the human body. The human body lacks the capacity to store Zn; hence, the dietary intake of Zn is essential for various functions and metabolism. The uptake of Zn during its transport through the body is important for proper development of the three major accessory sex glands: the testis, epididymis, and prostate. It plays key roles in the initial stages of germ cell development and spermatogenesis, sperm cell development and maturation, ejaculation, liquefaction, the binding of spermatozoa and prostasomes, capacitation, and fertilization. The prostate releases more Zn into the seminal plasma during ejaculation, and it plays a significant role in sperm release and motility. During the maternal, labor, perinatal, and neonatal periods, the part of Zn is vital. The average dietary intake of Zn is in the range of 8–12 mg/day in developing countries during the maternal period. Globally, the dietary intake of Zn varies for pregnant and lactating mothers, but the average Zn intake is in the range of 9.6–11.2 mg/day. The absence of Zn and the consequences of this have been discussed using critical evidence. The events and functions of Zn related to successful fertilization have been summarized in detail. Briefly, our current review emphasizes the role of Zn at each stage of human reproduction, from the spermatogenesis process to childbirth. The role of Zn and its supplementation in in vitro fertilization (IVF) opens opportunities for future studies on reproductive biology.


Background: The prognosis is poor for children and adolescents with recurrent osteosarcoma (OS). Glycoprotein non-metastatic B (gpNMB) is a glycoprotein highly expressed in OS cells. We conducted a Phase II study of Glembatumumab vedotin (GV), a fully human IgG2 monoclonal antibody (CR011) against gpNMB conjugated to the microtubule inhibitor, monomethyl auristatin E (MMAE). Patients and Methods: Patients ≥ 12 years and < 50 years with relapsed or refractory OS were eligible. GV 1.9 mg/kg/dose was administered on Day 1 of each 21 day cycle. Pharmacokinetics (PK) were mandatory in patients < 15 years. gpNMB expression was measured by immunohistochemistry. The primary endpoint was disease control at 4 months and RECIST response. A 2-stage design was used to determine efficacy. Results: Twenty-two patients were enrolled, and all were evaluable for response. Antibody drug conjugate levels were detectable in patients, although small numbers limit comparison to adult data. The toxicities observed were similar to the previous studies with GV. The most common Grade 3 adverse event was rash. One death from end organ failure occurred possibly related to GV. Of the twenty-two patients, 1 patient had a partial response and 2 had stable disease. There was no correlation between gpNMB expression and response to GV. Conclusions: GV was well tolerated in this population. Although there was some antitumor activity, the extent of disease control in Stage 1 did not meet the level required to proceed to Stage 2.


Objectives The aim of this study was to determine patient specific perceptual and practical barriers to adherence to phosphate binders. The second stage aimed to determine the effectiveness of an adherence enhancing strategy trialled by patients. Methods A prospective, cross sectional study of patients attending a dialysis unit at a specialist centre, in central London, over a 6-month period (April–September 2013). Through patient questionnaires, an initial assessment was performed of specific barriers to adherence for each individual. Following this, an unintentional barrier to adherence was targeted: transportation of medication when away from home. Small pill pots were trialled by patients as an adherence enhancing strategy. Results 13% patients admitted to not being adherent to their phosphate binders on a daily basis. The most common reasons reported were forgetting and difficulty in transportation of the medications when away from home. 94% patients claimed benefits to their adherence to phosphate binders as a result of the pill pot intervention. Conclusions Non-adherence to phosphate binders continues to be an issue. With 94% patients claiming improved adherence with a smaller transportable pill pot, a potential patient-centred intervention has been explored to overcome an unintentional barrier.


. The relevance of research on the concept of flexible management at the enterprise in terms of digitization and lean production is of considerable novelty and great practical importance, because it is implemented at the production of the Toyota plant. In addition, this study is based on the conditions of the Internet, digitalization, which introduces an analysis of new problems. The main purpose of the research is to formulate the concept of flexible management at the enterprise in terms of digitalization and lin-production and conditions for achieving its competitiveness. The following tasks have been solved: to reveal the essence of the Internet as a basis for digitalization, development of digital technologies based on computer technology, software, networks and augmented reality; to find out the essence of Agile Management 3.0, which is developing in the conditions of digitalization and lin-production; provide an analysis of self-organization in the context of Agile Management 3.0 and the impact of self-organization on the development of complex organizations, within a certain field and rules. Research Methods: Complexity theory and methodology were used to solve new problems, based on synergistic principles of self-organization, which contribute to the unification of the team, teams, management, employees and their empowerment to achieve a high level and status of the organization as a complex self-organized system. Results of the research. Agile management concept is formed, which focuses on people and teams, frequent and high quality products, close cooperation with customers and quick reaction to changes; Mechanisms of flexible management at the enterprise in terms of digitalization and rope-production are grounded and Toyota's experience is revealed. The issue of lin-production is one of the most important issues of the modern economy, its competitiveness and quality of production. The best proof of the validity of Agile management and lean ideas is the quality of Toyota cars. Practical recommendations - to develop and improve the concept of Agile management and lean-production in the conditions of digitalization.


BACKGROUND
Findings of observational studies investigating the impact of transfusions are at odds with those of randomised controlled trials, raising concern that observational studies may be inappropriate to inform transfusion decisions. We examined whether observational data could replicate evidence from randomised controlled trials on restrictive transfusion in cardiac and orthopaedic surgery, and be generalised to broader specialties as well as to a lower haemoglobin transfusion threshold (7 g/dL).

MATERIAL AND METHODS
A multicentre, prospective cohort study was performed at three representative regional hospitals in China between 2015 and 2016. Participants were surgical inpatients (≥18 years; hospital stay ≥24 h) in six specialties: cardiac, cerebral, vascular (CCV), and orthopaedic, general, thoracic (non-CCV). Patients with a stable haemoglobin (7-10 g/dL) constituted the primary analytic sample, while patients with ≥500 mL intra-operative bleeding were analysed separately to avoid haemoglobin instability. The association of transfusion with surgical outcomes (death, in-hospital complications) was evaluated.

RESULTS
The transfusion rate was 10.7% in 36,607 patients (mean age, 52.5±14.3 years; 52.3% female). After restriction, stratification, and propensity score matching to reduce patients' heterogeneity, transfusion was unrelated to death (CCV: odds ratio [OR]=0.74, 95% confidence interval [CI]: 0.16-3.39; non-CCV: OR 0.83, 95% CI: 0.36-1.94) and the composite complication (CCV: OR 1.31, 95% CI: 0.63-2.72; non-CCV: OR=1.24, 95% CI: 0.81-1.90). The results were consistent in subgroups (elderly, coronary heart disease, malignant tumour, severe illness) and applicable to patients with significant bleeding after restoration of a stable haemoglobin.

DISCUSSION
Transfusion at a stable haemoglobin concentration of 7-10 g/dL did not alter surgical outcomes. Our results show the feasibility of observational data to expand restrictive transfusion to broader specialties and a lower transfusion threshold in surgical practice.


Background: breast cancer is one of the leading causes of cancer mortality worldwide. 5-fluorouracil (5-FU) is one of the chemotherapy drugs to treat breast cancer, but it is associated with several side effects. Combination therapy is a way to increase the effectiveness of chemo drugs and decrease their usage dose. Quercetin (Quer) is one of the natural polyphenols with anti-cancer properties. This study investigated the apoptotic effect of 5-FU in combination with Quer compared with 5-FU alone on MCF7 breast cancer cells.Method and Results: Different single and combined concentrations of 5-FU and Quer were applied to MCF 7 cells for 48 hours. Cell viability, apoptosis, gene expression of Bax and Bcl2, and colony number were assessed using MTT assay, flow cytometry, quantitative real-time PCR, and Colony formation assay, respectively. The combination of 5-FU and Quer compared to 5-FU alone improved apoptosis by increasing and decreasing the gene expression of Bax and Bcl2, respectively, and decreased colony formation in MCF7 cells.Conclusion: Quer potentiates the sensitivity of breast cancer to 5-FU so that this combination may be proposed as a treatment for breast cancer. Therefore, this combination can be suggested for future in vivo studies.


Abstract A robust throttle valve control has always been a attractive problem since throttle by wire systems were established in the mid-nineties. Often in control strategy, a feedforward controller is adopted in which an inverse model is used. Mathematical inversions of models imply a high order of differentiation of the state variables and consequently noise effects. In general, neural networks are a very effective and popular tool mostly used for modeling. The inversion of a neural network produces real possibilities to involve the networks in the control problem schemes. This paper presents a control strategy based upon an inversion of a feed forward trained local linear model tree. The local linear model tree is realized through a fuzzy neural network. Simulated results from real data measurements are presented in which two control loops are explicitly compared.


Neurodegenerative diseases, characterized by progressive loss in selected areas of the nervous system, are becoming increasingly prevalent worldwide due to an aging population. Despite their diverse clinical manifestations, neurodegenerative diseases are multifactorial disorders with standard features and mechanisms such as abnormal protein aggregation, mitochondrial dysfunction, oxidative stress and inflammation. As there are no effective treatments to counteract neurodegenerative diseases, increasing interest has been directed to the potential neuroprotective activities of plant-derived compounds found abundantly in food and in agrifood by-products. Food waste has an extremely negative impact on the environment, and recycling is needed to promote their disposal and overcome this problem. Many studies have been carried out to develop green and effective strategies to extract bioactive compounds from food by-products, such as peel, leaves, seeds, bran, kernel, pomace, and oil cake, and to investigate their biological activity. In this review, we focused on the potential neuroprotective activity of agrifood wastes obtained by common products widely produced and consumed in Italy, such as grapes, coffee, tomatoes, olives, chestnuts, onions, apples, and pomegranates.


We investigate the hydraulic fracturing process by analysis of the associated microseismicity. In part 1, we recognized double-couple and hybrid microseismic events and their fault plane orientations. Critical stress (instability) and stress inversion techniques were used to assess fracture activation conditions. In part 2, we apply results from the tensile source model to investigate how activated faults relate to the stress state and geologic setting. We assess potential mechanisms for induced microseismicity including leakoff and diffuse pressurized fracture network flow, stress shadowing adjacent to large parent hydraulic fractures, and crack tip stress perturbations. Data are from the Mississippian Barnett Shale, Texas, and include microseismic events from sequential pumping stages in two adjacent horizontal wells that were recorded in two downhole monitor wells, as well as operations, wellbore-derived stress, and natural fracture data. Results point to activation of inclined faults whose orientation is dominantly northeast–southwest and vertical north–south faults. The activation stress states for a range of modeling scenarios show stress rotation, decreased mean stress, and increased deviatoric stress. This stress state cannot be explained by sidewall leakoff in the stress shadow region adjacent to hydrofractures, but is consistent with hybrid and shear activation obliquely ahead of pressurized fractures. Information about hydrofracture evolution and operationally related dynamic stress change is obscured by geomechanical heterogeneity that is likely geologic in nature. The most compelling observation is that the most highly misoriented microseismic faults occur in the same vicinity as a carbonate-dominated submarine fan feature that was previously expected to act as a minor fracture barrier.


The Lapp-Powers fault tree synthesis algorithm is applied to an electrical power distribution network and the cut sets are derived for a sustained loss of power on one busbar. This algorithm is based on a directed graph (digraph) representation of the system, in contrast with the method of Camarda, et al. which is based on a reliability graph. The digraph model forces an explicit evaluation of the corrective actions (negative feedback and negative feed forward) that are taken to counteract disturbances which enter the network. The presentation is tutorial and shows the disciplined application of fault-tree synthesis operators.


One of the CMA's smallest affiliated societies appears to be getting its message about sun awareness and skin cancer prevention across to the Canadian public. Dr. Jason Rivers, national director of the Canadian Dermatology Association's National Sun Awareness Program, credits the work of the association's membership and the interest of the media in helping to get the message across.


Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and depression are highly comorbid within the veteran population. Research studies have yielded divergent findings regarding the effect of depression on PTSD treatment outcomes. The present study investigated the influence of pretreatment depression severity on PTSD and depression symptom trajectories among 85 older (i.e., ≥ 60 years) male veterans with military-related PTSD who received either prolonged exposure or relaxation training as part of a randomized controlled trial. Participants were categorized as having no/mild depression (n = 23) or moderate/severe depression (n = 62). The PTSD Checklist (PCL-S) and Patient Health Questionnaire (PHQ-9) were completed at pretreatment, each of 12 therapy sessions, posttreatment, and 6-month follow-up, for a total of up to 15 data points per participant. Multilevel modeling (MLM) was used to evaluate the impact of pretreatment depression severity on piecewise symptom trajectories (i.e., active treatment and follow-up periods) over time and to determine whether treatment condition moderated the trajectories. The final MLM results showed significant main effects of depression severity on PCL-S scores, B = 10.84, p = .043 and PHQ-9 scores, B = 7.09, p = .001, over time. No significant interactions emerged for either the PCL-S or PHQ-9, indicating that although older veterans with more severe depression endorsed higher PTSD and depression scores across time, the symptom trajectories were not moderated by depression severity, treatment condition, or their interaction.


Cellular therapies Abstract. Transfusion medicine and allogeneic stem cell transplantation are well known and established cellular therapies in hematology. Since decades many efforts have been made, in order to re-program the patient's own immune system in order to clear malignancies. A breakthrough was achieved with the manufacturing and optimizing of so-called chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cells, genetically engineered cells, specifically directed against tumor antigens. In this review we discuss the structure of CAR T-cells, their manufacturing and the different steps of a CAR T-cell treatment according to the current licensing. Furthermore, we give an outlook on future prospects of cellular therapies including the major issues in the field.


AC–DC three-phase converters are very well known for having enhanced power quality with unity displacement power factor, low total harmonic pollution in the AC side, and controllable DC output with unidirectional or bidirectional power flow. The second part of this paper presents a review of several three-phase AC–DC converters with active current injection circuits, including some hybrid configurations, detailing their respective topologies and characteristics.


Ovarian cancer the deadliest gynecologic disease and despite the significant role of the tumor-associated stroma in cancer progression, little research has been done on the specific role of the tumor-associated stromal microenvironment on ovarian cancer progression. Our objective was to identify genes that are differentially regulated in the stromal component of high-grade late-stage serous ovarian cancer and illustrate direct and specific effects of their differential expression on ovarian cancer progression. Microarray analysis performed on RNA isolated from 10 microdissected normal ovarian fibroblasts, and the epithelial and stromal component of 16 high-grade late stage serous ovarian cancers revealed more than 40 secreted proteins that are overexpressed more than 5 fold by cancer-associated fibroblasts (CAFs) exclusively. Quantitative RT-PCR validated the overexpression of several genes, including sFRP2, by the CAFs. Clinical data correlated stromal sFRP2 overexpression with poorer overall survival and chemoresistance in patients with high-grade late stage serous ovarian cancer, suggesting that sFRP2 promotes ovarian cancer progression. In vitro functional studies illustrate increased ovarian cancer cell proliferation rates in response to recombinant sFRP2 as well as CAF-conditioned medium and pathway analysis via transcription-reporter assays revealed that recombinant sFRP2 signals through the NFκB and Wnt pathways in ovarian cancer cells, both of which affect cell growth. While not affecting cell proliferation, recombinant sFRP2 increased endothelial signaling to the NFAT pathway, which affects endothelial tubal branching. These results were corroborated in vivo such that microenvironments expressing higher levels of sFRP2 exhibited significantly higher microvessel density compared with microenvironments with lower sFRP2 expression. Our results illustrate a direct and specific signaling linkage from the tumor microenvironment to tumor cells and endothelial cells that contributes to tumor progression. In this case, sFRP2 exhibited significant influence on characteristics of tumor progression (i.e. tumor proliferation, microvessel morphology) suggesting that other differentially expressed genes identified by the microarray in CAFs may also play significant roles in this process. Citation Format: {Authors}. {Abstract title} [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the 101st Annual Meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research; 2010 Apr 17-21; Washington, DC. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2010;70(8 Suppl):Abstract nr 1426.


A novel cross-coupled bipolar transistor-based non-autonomous chaotic oscillator is proposed. The derivation methodology of this novel chaotic oscillator is based on integrating two of existing chaotic oscillators symmetrically and employing a differential-pair stage. Simulation and experimental results, verifying the feasibility and the correct operation of the circuit are also given.


Abstract The Partnership for Modernisation (P4M) launched by Russia and the European Union (EU) in 2010 was expected to promote reform and give renewed momentum to their relationship, develop cooperation on trade, economy and energy security, to support growth and contribute to the global economic recovery. Four years and seven summits after its birth the P4M is established as an institution with a capacity for coordination and governance of priorities and interests, a catalysing effect for advancing investment and a potential to contribute to building the Common Spaces (CSs). But the progress has been uneven. The P4M has not served to help transform the EU–Russia relations into a truly strategic partnership. This article explores different dimensions of the P4M genesis, development and impact on the partners' relations in several steps. First, it briefly introduces Russia's modernisation initiative. Second, it has a look at the expectations of the P4M at its launch. Third, it focuses on the progress the P4M has made so far and its relationship with the EU–Russia CSs by comparing the narratives of both. It explores in particular how the P4M has advanced by sectors and whether it has helped advance or has the potential to advance the EU–Russia CS dialogues. The article concludes with reflections on whether the P4M has had an impact on the EU–Russia strategic partnership.


Many addition compounds of the α-amino acid betaine with different adducts display interesting structural phase transitions. Ferroelectric, antiferroelectric, ferroelastic and modulated phases were found in these materials. Recent experiments clearly show a specially rich variety of different commensurate and incommensurate phases in betaine calcium chloride dihydrate. Some aspects of the theoretical models used to describe the observed phase transitions sequence will be presented.


This research is aimed at observing teaching writing recount text using
YouTube video at SMP SUNAN AMPEL PORONG. The objectives of the study
are 1. To Explain the teacher technique before implementing YouTube video in
writing recount text at eight grade students of SMP Sunan Ampel Porong 2.To
describe the implementation of YouTube video as media in writing recount text at
eight grade students of SMP Sunan Ampel Porong.
The researcher used the descriptive qualitative study. This research described
the teaching process of using YouTube Video and Interview with english teachers
The data was taken from interview, observation, and questionnaire to students
Based on the on the observation, interview the researcher concluded that
The teacher tehnique in learning english using picture and the the rearcher find
high score in learning activity from writing task


The major problem facing world research for new antimalarials lies in encountered difficulties in the search for new promising paths. The past 20 years have witnessed a very impressive increase in our understanding of the biochemistry and molecular biology of malaria parasites, with attention focused on specific parasite molecules that are keys to the parasite life cycle or the induction of its pathogenesis. Directed pharmacology research has involved the identification and characterization of targets that can be specifically pharmacologically affected, including the replicating machinery of the parasites, various metabolisms such as the purine salvage pathway, and biosynthesis of pyrimidines or phospholipids. Protease inhibitors (e.g. those degrading haemoglobin), the use of iron chelators or inhibition of heme polymerization, induction of oxidative stress or inhibition of antioxidant enzymes are also investigated. Some pathways have already been validated with current antimalarials but, due to the development of resistance, complete characterization of the molecular structure of the target should allow attack of these exceptional molecules at novel and distinct sites with new drug concepts. The problem in the quest to develop new antimalarials is the fact that the results are not being materialized, but there is no lack of pharmacological targets.


Physicalist epiphenomenalism is the conjunction of the doctrine that tokens of mental events are tokens of physical events and the doctrine that mental events do not exert causal powers by virtue of falling under mental types. The purpose of the paper is to show that physicalist epiphenomenalism, contrary to what many have thought, is not subject to the objections that have been raised against classic epiphenomenalism. This is argued with respect to five such objections: that introspection shows that our mental properties are causally efficacious; that concrete existents and their properties necessarily possess causal powers; that the explanatory and predictive success of psychology implies that psychological properties exist and are causally efficacious; that epiphenomenalism cannot deal with the other minds problem, and that it is unlikely that our mentality does not endow us with evolutionary advantages and therefore it is unlikely that mental properties are not causally efficacious.


Most of the gene regulation pathways data from biochemical and molecular experiments are drawn from humans or from species commonly used as experimental animal models. Accordingly, the software packages to analyse these data on the basis of specific gene identification codes (IDs) or accession numbers (AN) are not easy to apply to other organisms that are less characterized at the genomic level. Here, we have developed the Gene2Path programme which automatically searches pathway databases to analyse microarray data in an independent, species-specific way. We have illustrated the method with data obtained from an immune targeted rainbow trout microarray to search for orthologous pathways defined for other well known biological species, such as zebrafish, although the software can be applied to any other case or species of interest. The scripts and programme are available and free at the "GENE2PATH" web site http://gene2path.no-ip.org/cgi-bin/gene2path/index.cgi. A user guide and examples are provided with the package. The Gene2Path software allows the automated searching of NCBI databases and the straightforward visualization of the data retrieved based on a graphic network environment.


This report is exploring the advantages and disadvantages with some common sensors needed when positioning a mobile robot with Ackerman steering. Both absolute and relative methods are explored. Odometry based on measuring traveled distance and steering angle is tested and adjusted to obtain the best performance. A Kalman filter is constructed to improve steering angle measurements. The tests are based on an agricultural robot tended to follow a row of sugar beets while weeding it. Best position estimate was obtained with the Kalman filter filtering the steering angle information from the steering motor and the information from the difference in velocity on the rear wheels. The average error in this measurement was 6.84%/m.


Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats (CRISPR) and CRISPR associated (cas) genes conform the CRISPR-Cas systems of various bacteria and archaea and produce degradation of invading nucleic acids containing sequences (protospacers) that are complementary to repeat intervening spacers. It has been demonstrated that the base sequence identity of a protospacer with the cognate spacer and the presence of a protospacer adjacent motif (PAM) influence CRISPR-mediated interference efficiency. By using an original transformation assay with plasmids targeted by a resident spacer here we show that natural CRISPR-mediated immunity against invading DNA occurs in wild type Escherichia coli. Unexpectedly, the strongest activity is observed with protospacer adjoining nucleotides (interference motifs) that differ from the PAM both in sequence and location. Hence, our results document for the first time native CRISPR activity in E. coli and demonstrate that positions next to the PAM in invading DNA influence their recognition and degradation by these prokaryotic immune systems.


Azo dyes are a source of water contamination in many parts of the world. All the dyes in common use are similar in having multiple aromatic rings conjugated together, with various substituents that alter the visible absorption spectrum. Plants normally deal with aromatic allelochemicals, and also do lignin synthesis and degradation reactions using peroxidases and laccases. Therefore, we are systematically investigating the abilities of hydroponically grown sunflowers to decolorize a wide range of azo dyes, at concentration 20 mg l-1. Very different responses are obtained with dyes that have very similar structures. Although some azo dyes inhibited the growth of sunflowers, no symptom and adverse effect of sunflowers, which grown in 20 mg l-1 azo dye solution, were observed. The decolorization rate and the pathways of declorization of the 7 azo dyes by sunflowers varied greatly. The maximum, minimum and average value of the decolorization rate of those dyes in 6 days was 100%, 33.2% and 77. The values for the apparent TSCF with sunflower for the 7 azo dyes varied greatly, from minimum 0.28 to maximum 1.05. The experiment showed that sunflowers can efficiently decolorize wastewater containing azo dyes.


A study of structural and superconducting characteristics of YBa{sub 2}Cu{sub 3}O{sub 7-x} ceramics sintered after and in the course of gamma-irradiation is reported. Using X-diffraction and SEM analyses and transport measurements, it has been shown that mainly the subsurface layer of crystallites and intergrain contacts are affected by the irradiation by means of sorption/desorption of oxygen and ordering/disordering in oxygen sublattice, which depends on gamma dose rate and dose. The irradiation provides the sintering process with an additional superthermal energy to form the orthorhombic well-ordered structure and to obtain dense ceramics possessing strong intergrain contacts and improved and stable superconducting properties.


Purpose: The majority of incarcerated individuals have experienced traumatic events in their lifetime, contributing to related behavioral health issues, including post-traumatic stress, mood, anxiety, and substance use disorders. The purpose of this article is to understand the existing state of the literature through a scoping review on correctional-based programs that address both trauma and behavioral health. Methods: Proquest and EBSCO databases were searched to identify studies focused on trauma and behavioral health that focused on incarcerated adults in the United States. Results: A total of 25 studies evaluating correctional-based programming on trauma and behavioral health problems. Most included studies reported improvement of behavioral health symptoms as a result of the intervention. Discussion: The findings indicated a need for additional research on behavioral health interventions for incarcerated adults with a history of trauma. Specifically, future research should focus on increasing the methodological rigor of intervention studies and expanding the diversity of included samples.


We move beyond antibody-antigen binding systems and demonstrate that short peptide ligands can be used to efficiently capture Bacillus subtilis (a simulant of Bacillus anthracis) spores in liquids. On an eight-cantilever array chip, four cantilevers were coated with binding peptide (NHFLPKV-GGGC) and the other four were coated with control peptide (LFNKHVP-GGGC) for reagentless detection of whole B. subtilis spores in liquids. The peptide-ligand-functionalized microcantilever chip was mounted onto a fluid cell filled with a B. subtilis spore suspension for approximately 40 min; a 40 nm net differential deflection was observed. Fifth-mode resonant frequency measurements were also performed before and after dipping microcantilever arrays into a static B. subtilis solution showing a substantial decrease in frequency for binding-peptide-coated microcantilevers as compared to that for control peptide cantilevers. Further confirmation was obtained by subsequent examination of the microcantilever arrays under a dark-field microscope. Applications of this technology will serve as a platform for the detection of pathogenic organisms including biowarfare agents.


From the Publisher:
What happens when the Internet is used as a forum for public debate? Do the speed and power of computer-mediated communication foster democratic discourse and protest? This fascinating book examines two examples of social action on the Internet - the organized protests against Lotus MarketPlace and the Clipper chip - in order to evaluate the impact of the net on our social and political life. In 1990, Lotus Development Corporation announced the forthcoming production of a direct-mail marketing database that would contain the names, addresses, and spending habits of 120 million American consumers. A grassroots outcry on the Internet resulted in decision by Lotus to cancel the project. In 1994, the U.S. government proposed a new encryption standard called the Clipper chip, which, for the purposes of national security, could decrypt any message on any telephone in which it was installed. This encryption standard was implemented, despite opposition in the form of an online petition of more than forty thousand signatures. Laura J. Gurak tells the full stories of these protests, analyzes the resulting rhetoric and the reasons for the different outcomes, considers positive and negative aspects of computer-mediated communication, and challenges claims about cyberspace as a bastion of free speech by pointing out problems of access, structure, and gender bias on the Internet. In addition, because both cases involved technologies that raised concerns about the right to privacy on the Internet, she discusses issues of privacy in cyberspace.


Purpose We reviewed the cases of 33 patients from our clinic and 142 patients from the literature with congenital bronchopulmonary vascular malformations (BPVM), systematically analyzed the bronchopulmonary airways, pulmonary arterial supplies, and pulmonary venous drainages, and classified these patients by pulmonary malinosculation (PM). Materials and Methods From January 1990 to January 2007, a total of 33 patients (17 men or boys and 16 women or girls), aged 1 day to 24 years (median, 2.5 months), with congenital BPVM were included in this study. Profiles of clinical manifestations, chest radiographs, echocardiographs, esophagographs, computer tomography (CT), magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), magnetic resonance angiography (MRA), cardiac catheterizations with angiography, contrast bronchographs, bronchoscopies, chromosomal studies, surgeries, and autopsies of these patients were analyzed to confirm the diagnosis of congenital BPVM. A total of 142 cases from the literature were also reviewed and classified similarly. Results The malformations of our 33 patients can be classified as type A isolated bronchial PM in 13 patients, type B isolated arterial PM in three, type C isolated venous PM in two, type D mixed bronchoarterial PM in five, type F mixed arteriovenous PM in one, and type G mixed bronchoarteriovenous PM in nine. Conclusion Dysmorphogeneses of the primitive foregut system and the primitive aortic arch system may lead to haphazard malinosculations of the airways, arteries, and veins of the lung. A systematic classification of patients with congenital BPVM is clinically feasible by assessing the three basic bronchovascular systems of the lung independently.


In this study, a superefficiently flame-retardant bioplastic poly(lactic acid) was developed by incorporating gas–solid biphase flame-retardant N,N′-diallyl-P-phenylphosphonicdiamide (P-AA), into PLA matrix. The flame retardancy of PLA/P-AA was investigated by limiting oxygen index (LOI), vertical burning test (UL94), and cone calorimeter test. Surprisingly, it was noted that only 0.5 wt % loading of P-AA increased LOI value of PLA from 20.5 to 28.4 and passed UL 94 V-0 rating at 3.2 mm thickness. In order to understand the effect of P-AA on the thermal decomposition behavior of PLA, a comprehensive study was investigated in this paper, including (i) adopting modified Coats–Redfern method to study the thermal decomposition kinetics of PLA and PLA/P-AA systems, and (ii) characterizing the evolved gaseous products and the residues in the condensed phase by thermogravimetry linked Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (TGA–FTIR) and variable temperature Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (VT-FTIR) tec...


We investigate the possibility to improve the noise performance of a chaotic digital communication scheme by utilizing further dynamical information. We show that by encoding the initial information of the chaotic carrier according to the transmitting bits, extra redundance can be introduced into the segments of chaotic signals corresponding to the consecutive bits. Such redundant information can be exploited effectively at the receiver end to improve the noise performance of the system. Compared to other methods (e.g., differential chaos shift keying), straightforward application of the proposed modulation/demodulation scheme already provides significant performance gain in the low signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) region. Furthermore, maximum likelihood precleaning procedure based on the Viterbi algorithm can be applied before the demodulation step to overcome the performance degradation in the high SNR region. The study indicates that it is possible to improve the noise performance of the chaotic digital communication scheme if further dynamics information is added to the system.