It is commonplace to use a linear transform to map device RGBs to XYZs. Two particular types of transforms have been developed based on the assumptions that we either maximally ignorant or maximally prescient about the world. Under the maximum ignorance assumption, it is assumed that nothing is known about the spectral statistics of the world and so the best correction transform is the one that maps device spectral sensitivities so they are as close to observer sensitivities as possible. Under maximum prescience, we know the spectral statistics that we will observe and so the maximally prescient transform maps, with minimum error, the RGBs (that we know we will see ) onto corresponding XYZs. In general the two assumptions lead to quite different color corrections. In previous work we have argued against total ignorance or prescience and have instead developed compromise transforms. Our work is based on two observations. First, one is never completely ignorant about the world— color signal spectral power distributions are everywhere all positive. Second, it is accepted that it is much more important to correct some colors than other. In particular, white is central to color vision and color imaging, so it is imperative that white should always look right. However, to date these two compromise solutions have been studied in isolation. Surely, it would be advantageous to combine the constraints of whiteness and positivity? In fact we show that this is not the case: by preserving white we enforce positivity. This is an important result. Not only does it add to our understanding of color correction, but it helps explain color correction results published in the literature (the assumptions of positivity and white-preservation lead to very similar results). Moreover, it helps us to derive a new measure for assessing the goodness (color correctability) of camera sensors that is strictly less pessimistic (and more accurate) than the existing Vora Value.


In this paper the characterisation and portrayal of northern europeans in Roman late Republican and Imperial literature is examined. It looks specifically at the employment by Roman authors of animal comparisons and analogies as part of this characterisation and explores the reasons for which they are used, including the choice of vocabulary and imagery. This also involves a broader examination of the attitude of Classical authors towards wild animals and of the historical context of Rome's relations with its northern neighbours, as well as a survey of some of the past scholarship relevant to this topic.


Spores of Bacillus subtilis are encased in a protein coat composed of ∼80 different proteins. Recently, we reconstituted the basement layer of the coat, composed of two structural proteins (SpoVM and SpoIVA) around spore-sized silica beads encased in a lipid bilayer, to create synthetic spore-like particles termed 'SSHELs'. We demonstrated that SSHELs could display thousands of copies of proteins and small molecules of interest covalently linked to SpoIVA. In this study, we investigated the efficacy of SSHELs in delivering vaccines. We show that intramuscular vaccination of mice with undecorated one micron-diameter SSHELs elicited an antibody response against SpoIVA. We further demonstrate that SSHELs covalently modified with a catalytically inactivated staphylococcal alpha toxin variant (HlaH35L), without an adjuvant, resulted in improved protection against Staphylococcus aureus infection in a bacteremia model as compared to vaccination with the antigen alone. Although vaccination with either HlaH35L or HlaH35L conjugated to SSHELs similarly elicited the production of neutralizing antibodies to Hla, we found that a subset of memory T cells was differentially activated when the antigen was delivered on SSHELs. We propose that the particulate nature of SSHELs elicits a more robust immune response to the vaccine that results in superior protection against subsequent S. aureus infection.


BACKGROUND
Resistant starch (RS) has been studied for its ability to serve as a substrate for the microbiota present in the human large intestine and for its beneficial physiological effects. The aim of this study was to screen and select novel strains of lactic acid bacteria (LAB) in the genus Bifidobacterium isolated from human fecal samples for further application as probiotics relying on their utilization of RS3, a prebiotic.

RESULTS
LAB were isolated from human fecal samples, based on their ability to utilize RS3 as a carbon source. Consequently, two LAB were identified as Bifidobacterium adolescentis based on morphological, physiological and biochemical properties, and molecular biological analysis. The RS3-utilizing ability of these isolates was shown by the rapid decrease in pH of RS3-MRS media and by the pinhole traces on the surface of RS3 particles. Isolated B. adolescentis JSC2 was shown to be negative for β-glucuronidase, suggesting that it would be safe for human use, and was found to be tolerant towards the acidic, bile-salt environment.

CONCLUSION
This synbiotics approach of B. adolescentis JCS2, an RS-utilizing probiotics, coupled with RS utilization, is expected to enhance RS utilization in the food industry and be beneficial for the promotion of human health. © 2018 Society of Chemical Industry.


This paper examines body-building as a result of the corporal technologies of early XXI th century, and also as a popular practice that erases social borders between the walls of the gym. My purpose is to interrogate the bodybuilding magazines, and particularly, the publicity dedicated to products for instructors, in order to investigate the bond between body and popular culture in a post-Hiroshima and post-clonation World.


This study followed the communication and motor development of 3 profoundly deaf infants who underwent cochlear implantation. All infants were receiving auditory habilitation at the Sydney Cochlear Implant Centre, Australia, with the view to acquiring oral language skills and had English-speaking, hearing parents. Their progress was tracked with a battery of measurement tools before and after cochlear implantation. The results indicated noticeable growth in receptive language and motor skills after operation. Although expressive language improved, the rate of growth was much slower than changes in other areas. Although some areas of the subjects' communication skills remained delayed, the importance of tracking their progress according to their hearing age, as well as the chronological age, was evident.


Microspheres containing Salbutamol sulphate was prepared by emulsion solvent evaporation technique using two types of surfactant s, Tween 80 (polysorbate 80) and Span 80 (sorbitan monooleate 80). Infrared Spectros copy, Differential Scanning Colorimetry and X-Ray Diffraction Spectroscopy studies were carried out to study whether the surfactants have any impact on the phys icochemical properties of the microspheres. Scanning Electron Microscopy was done to study the surface topography of the microspheres. When Span 80 was used, the microspheres were smaller in size as compared to those obtained using Tween 80 while there was a higher release rate when Tween 80 was used.


The reported incidence of Johne's disease has been increasing in the east of Scotland since 1993. A postal questionnaire survey was sent to 127 farms to identify potential risk factors for Johne's disease in relation to wildlife and farm management practices, and 86 returns were obtained. Of 22 farms which had been assumed to be free of the disease, on the basis of information held by local veterinary centres, seven (32 per cent) reported cases of Johne's disease in the 1990s, indicating that the disease is under-reported. Logistic regression analyses showed that eight of 63 potentially explanatory variables were significant at the 5 per cent level in affecting the likelihood of farms reporting Johne's disease. Of these, large numbers of livestock and rabbits, and access of wildlife to feed stores were the clearest and most consistent risk factors associated with the disease. The application of manure to grazing pasture, the type of water supply for the cattle and the numbers of crows were also related to the presence of Johne's disease but the nature of these relationships was less clear. Only 38 per cent of the farms reported taking any control measures to combat Johne's disease, but three of the control measures were relevant to risk factors identified as significant by the survey, namely maintaining a clean water supply, controlling rabbits and not spreading manure on to grazing pasture.


Background & Objectives
 Formation of hybrid layer is thought to be the main mode of adhesion between dentin and resin. But, the longetivity of this hybrid layer is questionable as it is subjected to hydrolytic degradation over time. Hence, the concept of reverse hybrid layer on application of NaOCI is contemplated to bring about better bonding. Studies till date, have focused on the effects of NaOCI on sound tooth structure. Hence, this comparative study evaluated the effect of NaOCI on shear bond strength of two fifth generation single bottle adhesive agents on demineralized and remineralized dentin surfaces.
 Method
 88 humans premolars were taken and divided into two main groups (group 1 and 2) and bonded with two fifth generation bonding agents Adper Single Bond 2 and Excite respectively.. Each of these groups were further divided into three subgroups Control, Demineralizing and reminerlizing group. The specimens in each subgroups were subjected to either acid etching alone or acid etching and NaOCI pretreatment. The teeth were then stored in distilled water for I month and subjected to shear bond testing. Stereomicroscopic evaluation of the fracture mode at debonded interfaces was done. SEM was used to evaluate the resin-dentin interface.
 Result
 No statistically significant difference existed between the two bonding agents (group I and 2) when the three subgroups were compared either without or with NaOCI application. A statistical significant difference existed for each of the bonding agents between the demineralized and remineralized subgroups. The subgroups subjected to NaOCI pretreatment showed better bond strength values, though statistically not significant.
 Interpretation and conclusion
 Bond strength values to demineralized dentin surface was higher than remineralized dentin surface both without and with NaOCI application.
Sodium hypochlorite is an effective deproteinizing agent and its application results in the formation of a Reverse Hybrid Layer. This formed a more stable interface and would delay the process of hydrolytic degradation overtime.


Purpose: As genome-scale technologies begin to unravel the complexity of the equivalent tumors in adults, we can attempt detailed characterization of high-grade gliomas in children, that have until recently been lacking. Toward this end, we sought to validate and extend investigations of the differences between pediatric and adult tumors. Experimental Design: We carried out copy number profiling by array comparative genomic hybridization using a 32K bacterial artificial chromosome platform on 63 formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded cases of high-grade glioma arising in children and young people (<23 years). Results: The genomic profiles of these tumors could be subclassified into four categories: those with stable genomes, which were associated with a better prognosis; those with aneuploid and those with highly rearranged genomes; and those with an amplifier genotype, which had a significantly worse clinical outcome. Independent of this was a clear segregation of cases with 1q gain (more common in children) from those with concurrent 7 gain/10q loss (a defining feature of adults). Detailed mapping of all the amplification and deletion events revealed numerous low-frequency amplifications, including IGF1R, PDGFRB, PIK3CA, CDK6, CCND1, and CCNE1, and novel homozygous deletions encompassing unknown genes, including those at 5q35, 10q25, and 22q13. Despite this, aberrations targeting the "core signaling pathways" in adult glioblastomas are significantly underrepresented in the pediatric setting. Conclusions: These data highlight that although there are overlaps in the genomic events driving gliomagenesis of all ages, the pediatric disease harbors a distinct spectrum of copy number aberrations compared with adults. Clin Cancer Res; 16(13); 3368–77. ©2010 AACR.


Phytohormones are signaling molecules that control plant growth and development. Recent studies revealed that non-coding small RNAs play critical roles in plant development and stress responses via phytohormone signaling pathways. In this review, we summarize the present knowledge on the microRNAs (miRNAs) and secondary short interfering RNAs (siRNAs) involved in phytohormone signaling pathways, which include auxin, gibberellic acid, brassinosteroid and abscisic acid pathways. We also discuss their possible implications in phytohormone crosstalk during specific developmental processes.


A quantitative model which takes into account the temperature dependence of magma viscosity is developed to describe the distribution of cumulate crystals in a sill after its solidification, and is compared with natural examples. A precise comparison is not possible as data on the size-distribution and concentration of the cumulate crystals are not available. However, a preliminary analysis suggests that although several major features can be explained the simple model of crystal settling cannot account for the details of the olivine distribution in the Palisades sill and the Uwekahuna laccolith.


In contrast to the traditional wireless sensor network (WSN) applications that perform only data collection and aggregation, new generation of information processing applications, such as pursuit-evasion games, tracking, evacuation, and disaster relief applications, require in-network information storage and querying. Due to the network dynamics that are typical of WSNs, it is challenging to implement in-network information storage and querying in a resilient, energy-efficient, and distributed manner. To address these challenges, we exploit location information and geometry of the network and present an in-network querying infrastructure, namely distributed quad-tree (DQT) structure. DQT satisfies efficient in-network information storage as well as distance-sensitive querying: the cost of answering a query for an event is at most a constant factor (in our case 2 2 ) of the distance "d" to the nearest event in the network. In addition, DQT can handle range query and complex query effectively. DQT construction is local and does not require any communication. Moreover, due to its minimalist infrastructure and stateless nature, DQT shows graceful resilience to the face of


Norepinephrine is frequently elevated in postural tachycardia syndrome (POTS), a syndrome of heterogeneous etiology characterized by a >30 beats/min increase in heart rate with standing. Norepinephrine is synthesized from dopamine by dopamine-beta-hydroxylase (DBH). The results of a preliminary study suggested that the T allele frequency of the DBH -1021C-->T polymorphism is elevated in POTS. This allele correlates with low DBH activity and might predict reduced serum DBH activity in patients with POTS. To test the hypothesis that low DBH activity and the underlying -1021C-->T polymorphism are associated with increased susceptibility to POTS, we measured serum DBH activity in POTS and determined its relationship to the DBH genotype and plasma norepinephrine. Serum DBH was similar for 83 normal volunteers and 42 patients with POTS: median (range) = 22.5 (0.5-94.2) and 19.6 (0.1-68.8) nmol.min(-1).ml(-1), respectively (P = 0.282). The genotype frequencies for 254 control and 157 POTS patients were not different between groups ( approximately 63% CC genotype and approximately 5% TT genotype, P = 0.319). The T allele associated with lower serum DBH in both groups [control serum DBH = 15.7 (SD 12.3) and 35.1 nmol.min(-1).ml(-1) (SD 18.6) for T carriers and noncarriers, respectively; POTS serum DBH = 8.2 (SD 5.6) and 28.5 nmol.min(-1).ml(-1) (SD 14.7) for T carriers and noncarriers, respectively]. High DBH in POTS was linked to elevated plasma levels of norepinephrine. Although DBH activity and genotype are unlikely to be primary determinants of susceptibility to POTS, differences in DBH activity in POTS may reflect differences in the level of sympathetic activation.


Real time monitoring of hadrontherapy beam intensity and profile is a critical issue for the optimization of the dose delivery to the patient carcinogenic tissue, the patient safety and the operation of the accelerator complex. For this purpose an innovative beam monitor, based on the secondary emission of electrons by a non-perturbative, sub-micron thick Al target placed directly in the extracted beam path, is being proposed. The secondary electrons, accelerated by an electrostatics focusing system, are detected by a monolithic silicon position sensitive sensor, which provides the beam intensity and its position with a precision of 1 mm at 10 kHz frame rate. The conceptual design and the engineering study optimized for hadrontherapy, together with the results of the preliminary tests of the first system prototype, will be presented.


The annual testicular cycle of the tree sparrow (Passer montanus saturatus) has been studied by histochemical and biochemical techniques.

The spermatogenetic cycle has two clearly defined peaks of activity. Throughout the winter the gonads are sexually regressed, but a recrudescence of spermatogenetic activity begins in the spring and the gonads rapidly develop into full breeding condition by April. In late April and early May a rapid testicular regression takes place as spermatogenetic activity terminates. Then, in July, a second seasonal spermatogenetic wave begins and gonads once again develop into a breeding condition. By August the testes have become fully regressed into their sexually quiescent post-nuptial phase and remain this way until the following spring. The seasonal rehabilitation of the interstitial tissue, which is a characteristic part of many avian cycles, does not occur until this latter regressive phase.

The seasonal fluctuations in the in vitro production of testosterone from A5-pregnenolone-16T shows the same annual bimodal pattern as the spermatogenetic cycle, being high at times when the seminiferous tubules are spermatogenetically active, and low during times of sexual quiescence. There is a close correlation between the level of testicular androgen synthesis and the seasonal fluctuations in the interstitial cell lipid cycle. Thus, testosterone synthesis builds up in the spring at a time when small sudanophilic lipid droplets are present in the interstitial Leydig cells, and reaches a peak at a time when this material is becoming rapidly depleted from the cell cytoplasm. During the first period of testicular regression, the Leydig cells become markedly sudanophilic, possibly as a result of the accumulation of precursor material at a time of low testosterone synthesis, then again become depleted of this material as secretory activity builds up once again.

The possible interrelationship between the histochemical and biochemical cycles, and also the spermatogenetic cycle and the daily photoperiods, are discussed.


While simulations have been utilized in diverse domains, such as urban growth modeling, market dynamics modeling, etc; some of these applications may require validations based upon some real-world observations modeled in the simulation, as well. This validation has been categorized into either qualitative face-validation or quantitative empirical validation, but as the importance and the accumulation of data grows, the importance of the quantitative validation has been highlighted in the recent studies, i.e. digital twin. The key component of quantitative validation is finding a calibrated set of parameters to regenerate the real-world observations with simulation models. While this parameter calibration has been fixed throughout a simulation execution, this paper expands the static parameter calibration in two dimensions: dynamic calibration and heterogeneous calibration. First, dynamic calibration changes the parameter values over the simulation period by reflecting the simulation output trend. Second, heterogeneous calibration changes the parameter values per simulated entity clusters by considering the similarities of entity states. We experimented the suggested calibrations on one hypothetical case and another real-world case. As a hypothetical scenario, we use the Wealth Distribution Model to illustrate how our calibration works. As a real-world scenario, we selected Real Estate Market Model because of three reasons. First, the models have heterogeneous entities as being agent-based models; second, they are economic models with real-world trends over time; and third, they are applicable to the real-world scenarios where we can gather validation data.


Wauwatosa, Wis., July 13, 1899. To the Editor. —Your journal does me an injustice in reporting a paper (Journal, xxxii, p. 105) read by me on "Contagion and Infection in Nervous and Mental Diseases," at the late meeting of the American Medico-Psychological Association in New York. Your words are, "Incidentally he advocated the somewhat radical measure of judicially ending the lives of the hopelessly insane." It would scarcely be necessary to explain that this was an error to those versed in these matters, but as many readers may be misled, I wish to say that in my paper I proposed to inquire whether various radical measures frequently advocated, among them electrocution for incurable insane, castration, etc., were practicable measures and the conclusion at which I arrived, distinctly given in my paper, was that such measures were not practicable. Please make this correction and oblige, Yours truly,


Environmental issue is a sizzling topic nowadays as almost every country's government and society has started to be more aware about these issues. This leads to a trend of green marketing used by the firm as one of the strategies in order to gain profit and protect the environment. This paper will be discussing the green marketing and its sustainability as well as the tools and marketing mix of green marketing. Other than that, the green consumer and branding will be discussed in further in this paper as this will attract more consumers. Lastly, firm will be benefited once green marketing strategy is applied


Drawing from the scholarship on states and illegal practices and the author's fieldwork at the Mexico-Guatemala border, this article posits new directions in the study of legitimacy, legality, and morality in borderlands. By making illegality central, the article reveals the politics and power dynamics that shape how people differentially experience the law. The article uses illegality as a theoretical lens to reexamine what constitute worthy subjects of research and standards for ethical and methodological practice.


Bank consolidations have globally affected banking firms' market structures. Whenever market structures change, both the consolidating and non-involved performances in the local banking market could be co-impacted in the same or different direction at different degrees. Taking evidence from Nigeria changing market structures, we examined how banks and other micro financial institutions concurrently respond in terms of lending to changes in market structures. To have achieved this, we purposively sampled 845 financial institutions, which comprised 24 commercial banks and 821 Micro-Finance Banks (MFBs). We made use of secondary data, which were collected between 2001 and 2010 from the Central Bank of Nigeria Data Base. We analyzed the data by multivariate regression analysis method. The result shows that fall in bank loans to small businesses (β= - 0.817) due to changes in bank size of merged commercial banks positively affected microfinance bank lending (β = 0.955, p-value= 0.086). MFBs increase their loans to small businesses by 0.955% for every 0.817% fall in banks' loans. Dynamic changes in bank equity affected commercial banks' and MFBs propensities to supply loans to small businesses negatively (β=- 0.699) and positively (β=0.727) respectively. This means that as increment in merged bank equity reduced banks' credits to small business borrowers by 0.699% significantly (p-value=0.023 0.05). Moreover, increases in bank deposits negatively but significantly affected credits commercial banks supply to small business borrowers (β= - 0.725, p-value= 0.012), but positively although insignificantly affected MFBs loan to borrowers (β= 0.776, p-value=0.107) implying that MFBs increase their loans by 0.776% for every 0.725% fall in commercial bank loans. Finally, changes in bank market share negatively and positively affected commercial banks' and MFBs propensities to supply small credits (β = -0.018) and (β= 0.03) respectively implying that MFBs banks' increase their loans by 0.03% for every 0.018% fall in merged banks' loan to small credit consumers. On average therefore, credit availability to small businesses has not decreased due to the offsetting lending role of MFBs in the Nigerian banking sector contrary to general opinion. We strongly recommended that the maximum lending volume of MFBs should be reviewed upward to further strengthen them for this emerging role. Keywords: Bank Consolidation, Small Businesses, Bank Lending, Micro-Finance Banks and Market Structures


Despite the increased use and considerable cost of using supplemental nursing services, almost nothing is known about agency nurses or how they might differ from their hospital counterparts. The purpose of this study was to examine recruitment-, retention-, and compensation-related differences between agency and hospital staff nurses. The authors discuss implications for nurse administrators and provide recommendations for maximizing the work force participation of less costly part-time hospital staff nurses.


A contactor is an electronically controlled switch used for switching a power circuit. The
principles have been the same for a hundred years, i.e. there is a contact system that
does the job. The contactor is operated by a control voltage that causes it to open
or close. Common applications include starting and stopping of short-circuited motors,
purely resistive loads, and bypass applications. These are all usually AC applications.
The recent emergence of solar energy applications has increased the demand for
products that can also handle DC. The difficulty with DC is to break the current.
Unlike a direct current, an alternating current will have a zero-crossing point at every
half cycle. During this period of low current, the arc can be extinguished with relative
ease by preventing re-ignition of the arc. For DC however, the current remains constant
over time and the breaker needs to attenuate the
ow of current. When the contacts
are separated an electric arc occurs between them which has to be extinguished in some
way for the current to be broken. This makes DC breaking extra difficult and special
features need to be implemented in order to extinguish the arc and break the current
ow.
High voltage electric arcs causes significant damage to the electrodes and shorten the
lifetime of the contactor. Therefore, minimizing the arc duration time is an important
engineering challenge.
This thesis is a pre-study of arc extinguishing techniques for a DC contactor. The
goal is to be able to break 1500VDC using 4-poles connected in series. This thesis projet
is divided into two parts.
In the first part of the project, permanent magnets were used to suppress the arc and
the simulations were performed in ANSYS Maxwel
This report deals with the choice of material for a thermal management product at
Molnlycke Health Care. The aim with the product is to prevent hypothermia during
surgery. The goal with this project was to investigate which material parameters that
was of interest. The material parameters that were found most interesting were the
thermal conductivity, the thermal diffusivity and the ability to keep a stable temperature
over time. A model was built in Comsol to study the impact of different materials
on the temperature on and in human skin. The simulations showed that water based
materials could not spread the heat outside of the heater. In an environment that was
not thermally and water isolated, the use of a water based material even led to a decrease
in skin temperature. Measurements showed that different types of heaters had different
requirement on the interface material. Some different commercial materials were tested
and Hollywog, Medema and T
ex were found to be most suitable on an iron heater and
Hollywog, Medema and Heat sink were found to be most suitable on a an electrical heater.
A hydrogel containing 67% water could also be used on the electrical type of heater if
the water was not allowed to evaporate. Different types of conductive particles could
be used to increase the thermal conductivity and thermal diffusivity in the material.
Of the evaluated conductive particles, Carbon Black and Potassium Chloride were most
suitable.l. The method considered all possible
wirings of the contactor and compared the results to an existing 3-pole DC contactor.
The proposed optimal solution uses steel plates surrounding the magnet and contact
system to increase the magnetic
ux density. Results show an increased efficiency of the
magnets used by 164.8%.
In the second part of the projects, a DC arc model was implemented in the computer
program ANSYS Simplorer using theory found in literature. The model was extended
to a model of 4-pole 1500VDC contactor. The model successfully simulates the currentvoltage
characteristics of the contactor during the breaking process and predicts critical
currents.


To study the cellular mechanism of vascular responsiveness by vasoactive hormones, such as catecholamines and angiotensin (A), the vascular smooth muscle cells (VSMC) of two clonal cell lines (A7r5 and A10) from rat embryo, and of adult rat aorta were established in culture. Binding studies using 125I-labeled-hydroxyphenylethylaminoethyltetralone as an alpha-adrenergic ligand and 125I-labeled-iodocyanopindolol as a beta-adrenergic ligand, revealed that cultured VSMCs contain both alpha- and beta-adrenergic receptors; the binding was specific, rapid, reversible, and saturable. alpha-Adrenergic receptors appear to be a single class of high-affinity binding sites with an apparent dissociation constant (Kd) of approximately 2 X 10(-10) M and a maximal binding capacity (Bmax) of approximately 300,000-400,000 sites/cell, and exclusively of alpha 1-subtype that is responsible for smooth muscle contraction. On the other hand, beta-adrenergic receptors show almost comparable characteristics with the apparent Kd of approximately 0.7-1.1 X 10(-10) M and Bmax of approximately 50,000-130,000 sites/cell, and consist predominantly of beta 2-subtype that mediates smooth muscle relaxation. Furthermore, beta-adrenergic receptors are coupled to adenylate cyclase system, of which activation by beta-agonists induces intracellular cyclic AMP formation. In contrast, the binding of 125I-labeled-AII was demonstrated only in A7r5. The binding declined rapidly during incubation possibly due to faster degradation of AII by proteolytic enzyme(s). AII receptors appear to be a single class of high-affinity binding sites with the apparent Kd of approximately 0.9 X 10(-10) M and Bmax of approximately 11,000 sites/cell, of which affinity is higher than any of vascular AII receptors previously reported.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)


This review covers the petroleum exploration and production activities in 45 countries or provinces of Africa, excluding Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, Egypt, and Sudan. Surface exploration work increased 23% to 485.8 party-months of which seismograph was 299.4, surface geology 73.8, gravimeter 63.8, photogeology 22.5, magnetometer 21.5, and structural drilling 2.8. Exploratory drilling increased from 112 to 120 wildcats with 29% success, slightly less than in 1973. New-field discoveries were reported in Angola, Cameroon, Congo, Gabon, Ghana, Ivory Coast, and Nigeria. A total of 22 unsuccessful wildcats was drilled in 7 other countries. Development drilling amounted to 277 wells in Angola, Congo, Gabon, and Nigeria, with an 89% success ratio. Total wildcat and development footage was 3,537,519 (1,078,236 m). Average well depth was 8,910 ft (2,716 m) compared to 8,763 ft (2,670 m) in 1973. At year-end 51 rigs were operating. Total annual oil production increased 11.4% from 878.3 to 951.8 million bbl, with an average rate of 2.6 million BOPD. Production increases were recorded in Angola 7.6%, Congo 19.8, Gabon 1.1, and Nigeria 8.7. Total annual gas production was up 4.7% to 799,669 MMcf (2,191 MMCFD).


Despite the large number of foods that may cause immunoglobulin E (IgE)-mediated reactions, most prevalence studies have focused on the most common allergenic foods, i.e. cow's milk, hen's egg, peanut, tree nut, wheat, soya, fish and shellfish. Food allergy peaks during the first two years of life, and then diminishes towards late childhood as tolerance to several foods develops. Based on meta-analyses and large population-based studies, the true prevalence of food allergy varies from 1% to >10%, depending on the geographical area and age of the patient. The prevalence of food allergy in South Africa (SA) is currently being studied. The prevalence of IgE-mediated food allergy in SA children with moderate-to-severe atopic dermatitis is 40%; however, this represents a high-risk population for food allergy. Preliminary data from the South African Food Sensitisation and Food Allergy (SAFFA) study, which is investigating food allergy in an unselected cohort of 1 - 3-year olds, show a prevalence of 11.6% sensitisation to common foods. Food allergy was most common to egg (1.4%) and peanut (1.1%). Food allergy appears to be the most common trigger of anaphylactic reactions in the community, especially in children, in whom food is responsible for ≥85% of such reactions. In adults, shellfish and nut, and in children, peanut, tree nut, milk and egg, are the most common triggers of food-induced anaphylaxis.


A better understanding of the biology and biochemistry of the cancer cell has led to the development of various promising new antineoplastic compounds that are now undergoing phase I, II, and III clinical testing. These drugs include topoisomerase I inhibitors, such as camptothecin and its analogs 9-aminocamptothecin, irinotecan, and topotecan; and the paclitaxel analog docetaxel. The authors discussed these new agents last month. In Part 2 of their article, they describe gemcitabine, an antimetabolite structurally related to cytarabine; fluorouracil prodrugs and other thymidylate synthase (TS) inhibitors, and new approaches to anticancer therapy, such as angiogenesis inhibitors, differentiating agents, signal transduction inhibitors, and gene therapy.


A method for the determination of the yield force (F g y ) is defined in Annex D of the Draft Standard for impact Testing of Sub-Sized Charpy Specimens [1]. The procedure describes an iterative method for finding the straight line (Hooke's line) in the initial part of the force-displacement curve. F g y is then taken as the point of intersection of this line with a fitted line through the fully plastic range of the data. This method is applied to force-time data collected during Phase 1 of a Round-Robin [2] to validate the Proposed Standard. Analysis of the results shows that a modification to the procedure improves the reliability of the method for finding the F g y values.


The online learning environment has challenged the educational relationships over the last years. The medical safety has hidden us behind some monitors, devices or platforms that allowed us to continue our studies and our professional activities. From faces with or without associated names, we turned into names that accompany empty icons on the wall. Most often, we had to keep our cameras off. When we turned them on and shared our faces with the audience, we offered and received feedback much easier. The feedback has an important role in any human communication. More than that, in the educational field, the feedback contributes to the adjustments of the teaching – learning – evaluating process. On the positive side, the teacher gives feedback in order to reinforce the appropriate learning behaviour of the student and the student offers feedback to ensure the proper adjustment of the teaching behaviour. The pattern of giving and receiving feedback is simple and visible in all face-to-face communication that develops an educational activity. What happens in the online mediated education? What happens when faces see no faces? Our study investigates the feedback from the perspective of the online mediated educational relationships. Thus, we analyzed the responses of the students to some seminar tasks regarding the use of educational platforms and the role of feedback in the learning process. The target population consisted in 135 students enrolled in the certification program for teaching career. Our findings show that feedback as reinforcement communicative behaviour upgrades the politeness strategy and feedback as a pedagogical principle helps to replace the missing face-to-face interaction in online mediated learning.


Philosophers often defer to intuition when discussing ethics. It is common to evaluate an ethical theory by comparing its suggested action in a dilemma to what intuition suggests. A theory that aligns with intuition is said to be more credible, while one that does not align is said to be less credible. But in other cases, philosophers suggest discarding intuition in favor of what theory prescribes. The trouble with these practices is knowing when to trust intuition and when to trust theory. Philosophers and psychologists give convincing arguments to doubt the reliability of ethical intuitions, but I come to their defense in this paper. I argue that intuitions are reliable enough to use as starting points to form ethical beliefs. I explain how understanding the relationship between intuitions and beliefs can help settle moral disagreement. Lastly, I attempt to improve upon the standard resolution to the intuition versus theory problem, known as reflective


Pathogenic Behaviour Pattern of Colletotrichum falcatum Isolates of Sugarcane in Sub-tropical India
Red rot caused by Colletotrichum falcatum is the most serious disease of sugarcane affecting cane production in different states in India. Since the pathogenic variants very frequently emerge in the field we have assessed pathogenic variation in 12 C. falcatum isolates collected from subtropical India along with previously designated pathotypes on a set of 16 host differentials for the eight seasons. By and large, a variable virulence pattern in C. falcatum isolates was recorded on most of the host differentials. The results showed that the predominant sub-tropical pathotypes (CF09 and CF08) isolated from then the ruling cultivars CoS 767 and CoJ 64, respectively showed less virulence and the pathotype CF02 isolated from Co 7717 showed higher virulence over the period of time on the host differentials. The higher aggressiveness exhibited by CF02 over on the differentials such as Co1148, Co 975 and Khakai and known susceptible differentials Co 997, Co 62399, CoC 671, CoJ 64 and another variety Co 89003 clearly revealed higher virulence of CF11 pathotype. Even though the pathotype CF08 remained virulent on its host cultivar CoJ 64, it could not cause same type of virulence on the recently developed cultivars and it suggests that the pathotype no longer maintains its virulence once a popular cultivar CoJ 64 removed from the cultivation. Among the 11 new C. falcatum isolates evaluated, the isolate Cf8436 Karnal was found to be virulent and the differential CoS 8436 succumbed to this isolate only. Of the different CoJ 64 pathotypes, Cf64-I exhibited higher virulence and showed susceptible to intermediate reaction on different host differentials. This study suggests continuous evolution of red rot pathogen and its adaptation to the new host cultivars in subtropical India....


An integrated intelligent approach may be used for the coordinated operation and control of a multi-robot system. The talk will present a cooperative multi-robot system for providing emergency services such as clearance, cleanup and human rescue in a disaster situation in an urban environment. In this application it is assumed that the available robots are heterogeneous with different types and levels of resources and capabilities and are not specifically designed for the emergency application. The robots will have their regular tasks for which they are designed (e.g., trash clearing, traffic control, providing assistance to the elderly and the disabled, surveillance). Also it is assumed that there is a means for communicating with robots from any location (e.g., wireless sensor network). When called upon to carry out an emergency operation, the available robots in the neighbourhood will quickly navigate to the site and will negotiate the necessary tasks based on the needs, the robot capabilities, and the available material and other resources. Then they will carry out cooperative tasks to provide appropriate assistance (e.g., construction of a carriage or cart, rescuing humans, providing first aid). Demonstrations will be provided during the talk to illustrate the approaches and their application.


The data used to craft neighborhood indicators often come from the records of administrative agencies. These are particularly useful for community indicators because they are timelier or can be applied to smaller areas than government surveys. This monograph describes 42 of these data sources. It begins with a brief section on recent developments in neighborhood indicators work, followed by a discussion of some of the challenges of using administrative records data for these purposes. The main body of the monograph is a catalog that describes the sources and gives examples of the types of indicators that can be constructed from each.


Summary Formalization of a part of [11]. Unfortunately, not all is possible to be formalized. Namely, in the paper there is a mistake in the proof of Lemma 3. It states that there exists x ∈ M1 such that M1(x) > N1(x) and (∀y ∈ N1)x ⊀ y. It should be M1(x) ⩾ N1(x). Nevertheless we do not know whether x ∈ N1 or not and cannot prove the contradiction. In the article we referred to [8], [9] and [10].


Power level control is a critical issue in nuclear power stations due to its nonlinear dynamics. One of the most commonly used controllers is fractional order proportional–integral–derivative (FOPID). The FOPID is an enhanced and modern controlling system that has two additional added parameters. In this paper, comparison between particle swarm, gray wolf and ant lion optimization techniques is performed to determine the FOPID controller parameters. The nuclear reactor is a pressurized water reactor which is a fifth order nonlinear reactor model and is simulated using MATLAB software based on the point kinetic model. The integral square error (ISE) performance index is used to evaluate the performance of the three optimization techniques. The simulation results show that ant lion optimization for tuning the FOPID controller parameters gives the best performance and integral square error index better than the two other optimization techniques.


Late diplotene oocytes are characterized by an essential decrease in transcriptional activity. At this time, chromosomes condense and form a compact structure named a karyosphere. The karyosphere of grass frogs Rana temporaria is surrounded by a fibrillar karyosphere capsule (KC). One of the main protein constituents of R. temporaria KC is actin. In this study, we used antibodies against different actin epitopes to trace different forms of actin in the KC. We also investigated the effect of F‐actin depolymerization on the oocyte nuclear structures and transcription of chromatin DNA and rDNA in the amplified nucleoli. It was determined that disruption of actin filaments leads to chromosome shrinkage, nucleoli fusion, and distortion of the KC structure, but does not inhibit residual transcription in both the karyosphere and the nucleoli.


The effective discharge constitutes a key concept in river science and engineering. Notwithstanding many years of studies, a full understanding of the effective discharge determinants is still challenged by the variety of values identified for different river catchments. The present paper relates the observed diversity of effective discharge to the underlying heterogeneity of flow regimes. An analytic framework is proposed, which links the effective ratio (i.e. the ratio between effective discharge and mean streamflow) to the empirical exponent of the sediment rating curve and to the streamflow variability, as resulting from climatic and landscape drivers. The analytic formulation predicts patterns of effective ratio versus streamflow variability observed in a set of catchments of the continental United States, and helps in disentangling the major climatic and landscape drivers of sediment transport in rivers. The findings highlight larger effective ratios of erratic hydrologic regimes (characterized by high flow variability) compared to those exhibited by persistent regimes, which are attributable to intrinsically different streamflow dynamics. The framework provides support for the estimate of effective discharge in rivers belonging to diverse climatic areas.


Abstract An in‐house trajectory log analysis program (LOGQA) was developed to evaluate the delivery accuracy of volumetric‐modulated arc therapy (VMAT) for stereotactic body radiation therapy (SBRT). Methods have been established in LOGQA to provide analysis on dose indices, gantry angles, and multi‐leaf collimator (MLC) positions. Between March 2019 and May 2020, 120 VMAT SBRT plans of various treatment sites using flattening filter‐free (FFF) mode were evaluated using both LOGQA and phantom measurements. Gantry angles, dose indices, and MLC positions were extracted from log and compared with each plan. Integrated transient fluence map (ITFM) was reconstructed from log to examine the deviation of delivered fluence against the planned one. Average correlation coefficient of dose index versus gantry angle and ITFM for all patients were 1.0000, indicating that the delivered beam parameters were in good agreement with planned values. Maximum deviation of gantry angles and monitor units (MU) of all patients were less than 0.2 degree and 0.03 % respectively. Regarding MLC positions, maximum and root‐mean‐square (RMS) deviations from planned values were less than 0.6 mm and 0.3 mm respectively, indicating that MLC positions during delivery followed planned values in precise manner. Results of LOGQA were consistent with measurement, where all gamma‐index passing rates were larger than 95 %, with 2 %/2 mm criteria. Three types of intentional errors were introduced to patient plan for software validation. LOGQA was found to recognize the introduced errors of MLC positions, gantry angles, and dose indices with magnitudes of 1 mm, 1 degree, and 5 %, respectively, which were masked in phantom measurement. LOGQA was demonstrated to have the potential to reduce or even replace patient‐specific QA measurements for SBRT plan delivery provided that the frequency and amount of measurement‐based machine‐specific QA can be increased to ensure the log files record real values of machine parameters.


The review article examines the medical, psychological and social problems that older people face due to the pandemic. The article contains the analysis of the mortality rate in the older age group in different countries. It also demonstrates the negative impact of the pandemic stress on the formation of psychopathological disorders (anxiety, asthenia, panic, cognitive dysfunction). The authors carried out an analysis of psychological support methods for various psychopathological disorders among the elderly, based on both the results of their own clinical experience in the treatment and psychological correction of the disorders of older people experiencing the pandemic, and similar results of other researches in other countries. The results of the presented research during the pandemic suggest that the frequency of asthenia and psychosomatic disorders in patients was increased. The paper presents algorithms for the differential diagnosis and treatment of asthenia as part of the post-covid syndrome. The article contains an objective scientific and practical assessment of the experience of self-isolation for the elderly, as well as the analysis of the reasons for mental maladjustment and the formation of addictions. The algorithm and the results of psychological support, provided to older people by a psychosocial support organization, are demonstrated.


The aim of this research was to be able to understand the meaning of the Pura Agung Surya Bhuvana (PASB) for the harmony of religious life in Jayapura in the global era. Lately, people's lives in Jayapura had been highlighted by frequent turmoil. The research problems were (1) why did non-Hindus in Jayapura often visit the Pura Agung Surya Bhuvana? (2) How did they understand the Agung Surya Bhuvana temple in this global era? This research used a qualitative method. The data source of this research was the life of a multicultural society in the Agung Surya Bhavana temple in the global era. The selected informants included the chairperson of Parisada Hindu Dharma Indonesia Jayapura, chairperson of Parisada Hindu Dharma Indonesia Papua, stakeholders, pengempon, penyungsung, and temple visitors both Hindus and non-Hindus who often come to visit the temple. All data collected through observation techniques, interviews, FGDs, and documentary studies that were analyzed descriptively interpretatively using religious theory, symbol theory, and structural-functional theory. The results show that (1) Non-Hindus in Jayapura often visit the Agung Surya Bhuvana temple because Hindus at the temple are very kind, friendly welcoming them, often involved in religious activities at the temple, for sightseeing, for meetings between residents. (2) The people in Jayapura in this global era interpret Agung Surya Bhuvana temple as a place of worship, a meeting place for religious followers, a place of art, a place to strengthen multicultural life (multiculturalism), and as a vehicle to strengthen national integration.


This chapter is concerned with relationships between governance arrangements and environmental citizenship, and with the challenges of establishing and sustaining governance conducive to this citizenship. The significance of this concern is illustrated by Australian experiences with governance arrangements seeking to promote citizenship among rural landholders in natural resources conservation. In considering this concern we take our lead from a line of thinking about polycentric governance that was developed by Vincent Ostrom, who drew in turn from de Tocqueville's early 19th century analysis of the American democratic 'experiment'. Ostrom identified 'the way people think and relate to one another' (pertaining to the meta-constitutional level of analysis in the Institutional Analysis and Development framework) as fundamentally significant for meeting the challenges of achieving polycentric governance capable of promoting citizenship, and also the citizenship required to sustain polycentric governance. Key insights drawn by Ostrom regarding the meta-constitutional conditions required for forms of polycentric governance conducive to citizenship are reviewed in this chapter to suggest areas for continuing research into the viability of self-governing polycentric orders. Progress in empirical investigation of relationships between polycentric governance and environmental citizenship is reviewed. One relationship of this kind is illustrated with reference to attempts at policy reform towards environmental watering in Australia's Murray-Darling Basin.


Aims: To evaluate the distribution of atherosclerosis at bifurcations with computed tomography coronary angiography (CTCA) and propose a novel CT-Medina classification for bifurcation lesions. Methods: In 26 patients (age 55 6 10 years, 81% male) imaged with CTCA, 39 bifurcations were studied. The bifurcations analysis included the proximal main vessel, the distal main vessel and the side branch (SB). Plaque contours were manually traced on CTCA; the lumen, vessel and plaque area were measured, as well as plaque burden (%). The carina cross-sections were divided into four equal parts according to the expected wall shear stress (WSS) to assess circumferential plaque distribution. All the bifurcation lesions were classified using the Medina classification and a novel CT-Medina classification combining lumen narrowing and plaque burden 70%. Results: Presence of severe plaque (plaque burden 70%) by CTCA was demonstrated in 12.8% (5/39) of the proximal segments, 15.4% (6/39) of the distal segments and 7.7% (3/39) of the SB segments. The thickest plaque was located more often in low WSS parts of the carina cross-sections, whereas the flow divider was rarely affected. Although in the majority of bifurcations plaque was present, based on the Medina classification 92% of the assessed bifurcations were identified as 0,0,0. Characterization of bifurcation lesions using the new CT-Medina classification provided additional information in seven cases (18%) compared to the Medina classification Conclusion: Atherosclerotic plaque is widely present in all bifurcation segments, even in the absence of coronary lumen stenosis. A CT-Medina classification combining lumen and plaque parameters is more informative than angiographic classification of bifurcation lesions and could potentially facilitate the decision-making on the treatment of these lesions. VC 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.


The purpose of the paper is to describe the study that is being conducted in the Polytechnic Institute of Braganca (IPB). The main objective of this study is to determine the total economic impact of the institution in the hosting regions. To achieve that, we used the traditional or economic-base approach and the skill-base approach. From the traditional approach, based in the Caffrey and Isaacs's impact model, we obtained the direct economic impact of the IPB. From the skill-base approach we are currently estimating the human capital that is directly linked to the IPB. We expect to determine the total economic impact of the IPB and how a change in its local demand will affect the economy of the surrounding regions, and also what is the higher education institutions' impact on the individuals and how it will affect their lifelong earnings.


The cloacal sacs of Leptotyphlops dulcis are nonglandular, posterior evaginations of the cloaca. The median cloacal gland is tubuloalveolar. Similar unpaired cloacal glands as well as paired sacs are noted in certain colubrid snakes. Terminology applied to these cloacal derivatives is discussed, and a standardization of names is provided.


Purpose

This paper is the third part of a series of works investigating the top 100 knowledge management (KM) citation classic articles. The purpose of this paper is to understand why KM citation classics are well-cited.

Design/methodology/approach

The results of a survey of 58 KM citation classic authors were reported as descriptive statistics and subjected to content analysis.

Findings

An archetype of a KM citation classic author was constructed including demographics, personal characteristics, motivation and work preferences. There is a need for developing novel ideas in KM research. Timeliness of a publication is directly linked to its future impact. Editors should involve citation classics authors as reviewers, and KM researchers should improve their citation practices. Serendipity played a very important role in early KM research, especially from the perspective of discovering new and interesting phenomena.

Research limitations/implications

Whereas the importance of serendipity is not questioned, future KM researchers should rely more on a formal, meticulous and well-planned research approach rather than on the hope of making a discovery by accident or luck. KM citation classics authors relied on serendipity to form the foundation of the discipline, but extending their work requires formal and structured inquiries.

Practical implications

Many authors conducted research to solve a problem to serve the needs of both practice and academia, rather than being overly theoretical.

Originality/value

Because KM researchers can no longer rely on past bibliometric theories, this paper helps understand why specific articles are highly cited and recommends how to conduct and develop future KM research that has impact.


Environmental dissemination caused by widespread use of antibiotics has been regarded as a possible hazard to aquatic ecosystem and human health. The increasing misgivings make it imperative to develop a novel catalyst with remarkable visible-light-driven activity to remove antibiotics, especially for their simultaneous decontamination. Herein, C/BiOCl composites were successfully prepared by decorating BiOCl nanosheets on food wastes biochar (C) by a simple hydrolysis strategy. Not only the binary system of tetracycline antibiotics, but also the ternary mixture could be simultaneously photodegraded over 25% C/BiOCl within 15 min irradiation. The improved photocatalytic activities could be ascribed to the introduction of biochar, endowing increased surface area, enhanced separation of photo-generated charge carriers, and better light absorption. The as-prepared 25% C/BiOCl also demonstrated satisfactory stability and positive removal effect in actual water samples. The present work provides new insights into the development of biochar-based photocatalysts for simultaneous degradation of multiple antibiotics.


The Shoul oak grove is a forested ecosystem inherited from a Holocene phase of ecological optimum; its evolution, through the double geologic and human temporality, and in relation with several processes of degradation, led to the progressive loss of its environmental equilibrium and further to the reduction of its economic contributions. The fragility of these forests is the consequence of the convergence of two main factors, i) the intrinsic fragility of the forested environment based on an unstable balance between the tree, the leached soils and their moisture content ; ii) the anthropological action on the forest environment and its degradation with the change of its floristic composition. During the colonization the new context was at the origin of the new social and economic relation between the forest and the surrounding populations. The current use of this oak grove is in a classic scheme of the reports society / forest in Morocco. The population is especially of pastoral main activity in the bordering communes. But the oak groves of Mamora-Sehoul are integrated into the area of influence of several cities, what exposes the forest to the risks of uncontrolled urbanization. These oak groves are thus in the centre of interest of several stakeholders with opposite behaviour and a new paradigm of relation rural/urban. Through a double approach, environmental and socio-economic, this paper will try to bring elements of answer by analyzing the interactions between a forest which reached an alarming threshold of degradation and a society affected by important changes in its modes of intervention and exploitation.


Environmental monitoring at the Hanford Site, located in southeastern Washington State, is conducted by Battelle Memorial Institute, Pacific Northwest Division, as part of its contract to operate the Pacific Northwest Laboratory (PNL) for the U.S. Department of Energy. The data collected provide a historical record of radionuclide and radiation levels attributable to natural causes, worldwide fallout, and Hanford operations. Data are also collected to monitor several chemicals. Pacific Northwest Laboratory publishes an annual environmental report for the Hanford Site each calendar year. The Hanford Site Environmental Report for Calendar Year 1993 describes the Site mission and activities, general environmental features, radiological and chemical releases from operations, status of compliance with environmental regulations, status of programs to accomplish compliance, and environmental monitoring activities and results. The report includes a summary of offsite and onsite environmental monitoring data collected during 1993 by PNL`s Environmental Monitoring Program. Appendix A of that report contains data summaries created from raw surface and river monitoring data. This volume contains the actual raw data used to create the summaries.


AbstractMy essay is about pupils with difficulties in mathematics. I have choosed to do a literaturestudy and interviews of teachers to get some answers to my framing of the questions.· What is mathematical difficulties?· How do we discover pupils with mathematical difficulties?· What can a teather do to facilitate for pupils with mathematical difficulties?· What resources is there to help pupils with mathematical difficulties?I have done my investigationin two schools to be abel to see if the schools are working in the same way and have the same prerequisite of pupils with mathematical difficulties.By doing an interview with both teachers and remedial teachers I have got a better insight how to help pupils in the best way. Both of this schools are putting the pupils in the middle and give them wath they need to get to the destinations that claims. The procedure are not the same between the schools. The bigger school have more resources while the smaller school have more material.


By its judgment of 10 February 2009 in Allianz and Generali Assicurazioni Generali (C-185/07, EU:C:2009:69), the EU Court of Justice declared anti-suit injunctions issued by Member States' courts in support of an arbitration contrary to the Brussels I Regulation if proceedings between the same parties and on the same matter had been commenced before the courts of a Member State. However, in its judgment of 13 May 2015, Gazprom (C-536/13, EU:C:2015:316), the Court ruled that the said Regulation posed no obstacle to the recognition and enforcement of such injunctions when issued by arbitral tribunals. Since then, the Brussels I Regulation (recast) has come into force. Its recital 12 removes the foundation on which the Court based its judgment in Allianz and Generali Assicurazioni Generali, paving the way for Member States' courts to issue anti-suit injunctions in support of arbitrations.


OBJECTIVE
To analyze the relationship between the degree of displacement and Baumann angle in pediatric supracondylar humeral fractures by using Excel, and to guide treatment for humeral fractures of children.

METHODS
From July 2010 to July 2011,56 children with humeral supracondylar fractures were collected (34 boys and 22 girls, 15 patients with radial deviation and 41 patients with ulnar deviation,ranging in age from 3 to 14 years). The data of the patients about fracture displacement and the Baumann angle measured by MB-Ruler were input in Excel and then were analyzed to obtain data fitting curve.

RESULTS
There were close results between two methods, and the tangent of the radial deviation was more than tangent of ulnar deviation, which indicated that the influence of ulnar deviation was stronger than that of the radial deviation in pediatric supracondylar humeral fractures,so the correction should be paid attention to in clinic. When the radial deviation coefficient was less than -0.18 and ulnar deviation coefficient was more than 0.50,the Baumann angle would change to the reverse trend, so the angle range of Baumann in clinic should be between 65.70 and 96.77 degree. When the ulnar deviation factor was more than 0.15(including 0.15) and Baumann angle more than 82 degrees(including 82 degree), cubitus varus deformity occurred inevitably,so the practices and surgical reduction should be focused on in clinic.

CONCLUSION
According to data curves analysis results,the influence of ulnar deviation is stronger than that of the radial deviation in pediatric supracondylar humeral fractures. When the ulnar deviation factor is more than 0.15 (including 0.15), correction should be focused on in order to prevent cubitus varus deformity.


We present a method to efficiently find winding-constrained loops in the plane that are optimal with respect to a minimum- cost objective and in the presence of obstacles. Our approach is similar to a typical graph-based search for an optimal path in the plane, but with an additional state variable that encodes information about path homotopy. Upon finding a loop, the value of this state corresponds to a line integral over the loop that indicates how many times it winds around each obstacle, enabling us to reduce the problem of finding paths satisfying winding constraints to that of searching for paths to suitable states in this augmented state space. We give an intuitive in- terpretation of the method based on fluid mechanics and show how this yields a way to perform the necessary calculations efficiently. Results are given in which we use our method to find optimal routes for autonomous surveillance and intruder containment.


Development of more current atoms is not a matter of chance. To minimize this lacuna of being blessed to become a professional, mathematical chemistry is the best solution. Mathematical chemistry is the exploration region visualized with novel utilizations of math and insights into science to add to a scientific model to fulfill the different wonders of science and organic components. Mathematical chemistry is an interdisciplinary subject as science gets to be more agreeable to numerically thorough study; it is likely that science will likewise turn into a ready and requesting consumer of new mathematical results. The level of intricacy of chemical problems is often very high, and modeling molecular behavior and chemical reactions does require new mathematical approaches [1]. Chemistry is witnessing an important shift in emphasis: simplistic models are no longer satisfactory, and more detailed mathematical understanding of complex chemical properties and phenomena are required. From theoretical chemistry and quantum chemistry to applied fields such as molecular modeling, drug design, molecular engineering, and the development of supra molecular structures, mathematical chemistry is an important discipline providing both explanations and predictions. Computational chemistry and effect of quantum chemistry are the two essential mainstays of mathematical chemistry. Mathematical chemistry invade into the major research areas such as chemical graph theory which deals with topochemical and topological descriptors to justify a chemical structure along with its electronic configuration, connectivity indices and the study of isomerism [2]. Major applicable area of mathematical chemistry is quantitative structure activity relationships (QSAR), quantitative structure property relationships (QSPR), quantitative structure toxicity relationships (QSTR) and many more.


Using the positional-orientational propagator of a semiflexible filament in the weakly bending regime, we analytically calculate the probability densities associated with the fluctuating tip and the corners of a grafted system of connected quadrilaterals. We calculate closed analytic expressions for the probability densities within the framework of the worm-like chain model, which are valid in the weakly bending regime. The probability densities give the physical quantities related to the elasticity of the system such as the force-extension relation in the fixed extension ensemble, the Poisson's ratio and the average of the force exerted to a confining stiff planar wall by the fluctuating tip of the system. Our analysis reveals that the force-extension relations depend on the contour length of the system (material content), the bending stiffness (chemical nature), the geometrical angle and the number of the quadrilaterals, while the Poisson's ratio depends only on the geometrical angle and the number of the quadrilaterals, and is thus a purely geometric property of the system.


Abstract A survey was conducted of deaf children in the Glasgow area diagnosed between 1965 and 1979 to assess the relative incidences of the known aetiological factors. This took the form of a review of case records supplemented by the use of questionnaires. The results showed small variations from earlier published figures but were broadly similar. The effectiveness of rubella and anti-Rhesus immunization were also evaluated. It was found that more than half of all cases of profound deafness in childhood are acquired rather than inherited and are therefore potentially preventable


Background: The proportion of elderly people in the Indian population is increasing, thereby making dementia a major public health concern. The behavioral and psychological symptoms of dementia (BPSD) are deleterious to the illness course in dementia. The characteristics and sociodemographic and clinical correlates of BPSD is an understudied area. Materials and Methods: This was a retrospective cross-sectional observational descriptive study conducted in a public hospital. Hospital records of 97 dementia patients who visited the geriatric clinic in the time span of 20 months were analyzed using appropriate descriptive and inferential statistics. Results: The mean age of the patients was 69.9 ± 8.50 years, majority being males (72%). Sleep disturbance (75.3%), changes in psychomotor activity (55.7%), and irritability (45.3%) were the most common behavioral and psychological symptoms associated with dementia. Apathy was seen in 39% of patients, whereas the proportion of patients with depression and anxiety was 26% and 35%, respectively. Psychotic symptoms such as delusions and hallucinations were seen in approximately 24% and 15.5% of patients, respectively. The psychotic symptoms showed a significant association with lower levels of education, whereas apathy was negatively associated with age. Females had a higher likelihood of having psychotic symptoms as compared to males. Conclusion: In the present study, the frequency and association of neuropsychiatric symptoms with demographic variables have been described in dementia patients visiting a public hospital in rural India. Among BPSD, sleep and motor disturbances were most frequent whereas agitation/aggression was least frequent. The age, education level, and gender differences noted in the individual symptoms need to be confirmed in further studies with better design.


The main issue of this paper is to present the communication in the broader context as natural activity and the process of intervention of the meaning through interaction between the creator and the recipient. In narrower sense, the work researches the possibilities and the competences of material objects, particularly prehistoric artifacts, entities within the frame of reference and their abilities to integrate into the communication process. The article puts paradoxical approach of art theorists, aestheticians and semioticists looking for the "language" of arts in contradiction through the parallels and continuities to structure of verbal language, at the expense of disinterested research of expression means of selected arts.


Automating warehouse operations can be a very alluring proposition. However, it is vital that a decision to progress with such substantial investment is taken only after the deliverable benefits are thoroughly understood. This is especially important when the business environment is changing rapidly. Describes the approach taken by BQ explains how, through a process of establishing good performance through manual processes, it has created a sound base against which it can evaluate automation, and how its new supply chain strategy has exposed further opportunities to improve business performance. Also describes how B&Q Distribution has renewed its focus on serving the customer (the B&Q retail store), and how this experience has affected the automation project. Finally, covers B&Q's approach to supplier selection.


The aim of this article is to examine the impact of the actions of Chinese capital on limiting the influence of the Russian Federation in Kazakhstan. The preliminary analysis allowed for the formulation of the research question: Does Kazakhstan still take political considerations into account when choosing between Russian and Chinese capital? It was possible to answer this question due to the analysis of the main investments implemented by the Pekin and Mosocow in terms of their compliance with the Kazakhstan2050 development plan, initiated by President Nursultan Nazarbayev in 2012. The main research methods used in the article included: the analysis of literature on the subject, comparison, inference and induction. Finding the relationship between the development plan and investments made it possible to formulate a research hypothesis that the evaluation was reversed in the Kazakh development strategy. The primary objective when choosing a strategic partner became the economic calculation and its benefits. Political considerations came only in second place.


The type strain of Pseudomonas cissicola (Takimoto 1939) Burkholder 1948, strain ICMP 8561 (= NCPPB 2982), was examined. The strain has the determinative characteristics and the fatty acid profile of the genus Xanthomonas. The nutritional characteristics of the strain as determined by Biolog microplate screening were also consistent with identification as a Xanthomonas species. Some characteristics of the fatty acid profile and reactions to tests on the Biolog microplate were not consistent with characteristics of known Xanthomonas species, suggesting that the strain represents a previously unreported species.


Blended learning has come off, more or less, as the most logical and natural evolution of our learning systems. It suggests an elegant solution to the challenges of tailoring e-learning environment to face-to-face learning environment. It represents an opportunity to integrate the innovative and technological advances offered by online learning with the interaction and participation offered in the best of traditional learning. It can be supported and enhanced by using the wisdom and one-to-one interaction of personal coaches. Believe it or not, the relevance of the pedagogy used in relaying knowledge cannot be overemphasised. Also, it has long been recognized that specialized delivery technologies can provide efficient and timely access to learning materials. A teacher handling face-to-face students might be able to discern when they are getting the message by their countenances or when they don't seem to by their reactions. How would an e-learning teacher meet the needs of their students psychologically, morally, socially and even academically since they cannot see each other? That brought the needs for the blended knowledge of ensuring that there is a predefined method of transferring idea to online students in such a way that the needs of these students are met. This is to fill such gap. This research considered the following four stages as paramount to the development and practice of blended e-learning which was adapted from IBM 4-tier: learning from information, learning from interaction, learning from collaboration, and learning from collocation. .


To imitate the ability of keeping learning of human, continual learning which can learn from a never-ending data stream has attracted more interests recently. In all settings, the online class incremental learning (OCIL), where incoming samples from data stream can be used only once, is more challenging and can be encountered more frequently in real world. Actually, all continual learning models face a stability-plasticity dilemma, where the stability means the ability to preserve old knowledge while the plasticity denotes the ability to incorporate new knowledge. Although replay-based methods have shown exceptional promise, most of them concentrate on the strategy for updating and retrieving memory to keep stability at the expense of plasticity. To strike a preferable trade-off between stability and plasticity, we propose an Adaptive Focus Shifting algorithm (AFS), which dynamically adjusts focus to ambiguous samples and non-target logits in model learning. Through a deep analysis of the task-recency bias caused by class imbalance, we propose a revised focal loss to mainly keep stability. \Rt{By utilizing a new weight function, the revised focal loss will pay more attention to current ambiguous samples, which are the potentially valuable samples to make model progress quickly.} To promote plasticity, we introduce a virtual knowledge distillation. By designing a virtual teacher, it assigns more attention to non-target classes, which can surmount overconfidence and encourage model to focus on inter-class information. Extensive experiments on three popular datasets for OCIL have shown the effectiveness of AFS. The code will be available at \url{https://github.com/czjghost/AFS}.


Inkjet printing of functional inks on textiles to embed passive electronics devices and sensors is a novel approach in the space of wearable electronic textiles. However, achieving functionality such as conductivity by inkjet printing on textiles is challenged by the porosity and surface roughness of textiles. Nanoparticle-based conductive inks frequently cause blockage/clogging of inkjet printer nozzles, making it a less than ideal method for applying these functional materials. It is also very challenging to create a conformal conductive coating and achieve electrically conductive percolation with the inkjet printing of metal nanoparticle inks on rough and porous textile and paper substrates. Herein, a novel reliable and conformal inkjet printing process is demonstrated for printing particle-free reactive silver ink on uncoated polyester textile knit, woven, and nonwoven fabrics. The particle-free functional ink can conformally coat individual fibers to create a conductive network within the textile structure without changing the feel, texture, durability, and mechanical behavior of the textile. It was found that the conductivity and the resolution of the inkjet-printed tracks are directly related with the packing and the tightness of fabric structures and fiber sizes of the fabrics. It is noteworthy that the electrical conductivity of the inkjet-printed conductive coating on pristine polyethylene terephthalate fibers is improved by an order of magnitude by in situ heat-curing of the textile surface during printing as the in situ heat-curing process minimizes the wicking of the ink into the textile structures. A minimum sheet resistance of 0.2 ± 0.025 and 0.9 ± 0.02 Ω/□ on polyester woven and polyester knit fabrics is achieved, respectively. These findings aim to advance E-textile product design through integration of inkjet printing as a low-cost, scalable, and automated manufacturing process.


NO GREATER MEDICAL problem exists than that of devising improved methods of treating the mentally ill and at the same time formulating effective ways of preventing such illness whenever and wherever possible. The impetus to improve the care of the mentally ill and develop better programs for raising the level of mental health in the nation is probably greater than most physicians realize. The medical profession will either have to assume strong leadership in this rapidly changing field or run the risk of having this role taken over by other disciplines. In view of the central importance of medicine in the diagnosis and treatment of mental illness, it would be most unfortunate if professions with more peripheral interests were to assume the primary positions of leadership, but this is what they may do if medicine does not discharge the responsibilities that so clearly belong to it. Congress on Mental Health


Ship-radiated noise (SN) is one of the most critical signals in the complex marine environment; however, it is inevitably contaminated by the marine environment's noise as well as noise from other equipment. Thus, the feature extraction and identification of SN becomes very arduous. This paper proposes a denoising method for SN based on successive variational mode decomposition (SVMD), the dual-threshold analysis based on fuzzy dispersion entropy (FuDE) and wavelet packet denoising (WPD), termed SVMD-FuDE-WPD. First, SVMD adaptively decomposes SN into certain intrinsic mode functions (IMFs), which can solve the parameter selection problem of variational mode decomposition (VMD) and suppress the mode mixing of empirical mode decomposition (EMD). After that, the FuDE-based dual-threshold analysis is used to accurately classify IMFs into signal IMFs, noise–signal IMFs and noise IMFs. Finally, the denoised signal could be obtained by reconstructing the signal IMFs and noise–signal IMFs that were denoised using WPD. The classical simulation experiments demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed denoising method, which performs better than the other four existing denoising methods. And the measured SN experiments show that the attractor trajectories of the proposed method are smoother and more regular, which verifies the effectiveness of the proposed method.


In order to study the adverse effects of manganese on neuro-endocrine and cardiovascular system, radioimmunoassay (RIA) was used to test the blood prolactin concentration and plasma renin activity among manganese-exposed workers. The result showed that the blood prolactin concentration and Plasma renin activity in manganese exposed workers were significantly higher than those of control group. It suggested that manganese exposure might affect the function at tubero-infundibular area and renin-angiotensin aldosterone system.


Glutathione (GSH) is a potent antioxidant synthesized de novo in cells and helps to detoxify free radicals in the brain and other organs. In vitro NMR studies from various research groups have reported primarily two sets of chemical shifts (2.80 or 2.96 ppm) of Cys-βCH2 depending on GSH sample preparation in either inert or oxygenated environments. A multi-center in vivo MRS human study has also validated the presence of two types of GSH conformer in the human brain. Our study is aimed at investigating the distribution patterns of the two GSH conformers from five brain regions, namely, ACC (anterior cingulate cortex), PCC (posterior cingulate cortex), LPC (left parietal cortex), LH (left hippocampus), and CER (cerebellum). GSH was measured using a 3T MRI scanner using MEGA-PRESS pulse sequence in healthy young male and female populations (M/F = 5/9; age 32.8 ± 5.27 years). We conclude that the closed GSH conformer (characteristic NMR shift signature: Cys Hα 4.40-Hβ 2.80 ppm) is more abundant than the extended GSH form (characteristic NMR shift signature Cys Hα 4.56-Hβ 2.95 ppm). Closed conformer has a non-uniform distribution (ACC < CER < LH < PCC < LPC) in the healthy brain. On the contrary, the extended form of GSH has a uniform distribution in various anatomical regions.


This study investigates the relationship between boardroom gender diversity and corporate cash holdings (i.e., liquidity risk) and excess cash holdings (i.e., agency risk). Using a sample of French firms listed on the SBF 120 index over the period 1998 to 2015, we find a significant positive relation of board gender diversity for two measures of corporate cash holdings (i.e., corporate cash ratio and industry adjusted cash ratio) and a negative relation with excess cash holdings. These results support that feminized boards are associated with lower liquidity and agency risk implying that women directors engage in stricter monitoring and disallow stockpiling beyond the optimal cash level. The study provides significant intermediate results in relation to the Cope-Zimmermann gender quota law that are robust to alternate specifications and tests.


BACKGROUND
Rosai-Dorfman disease, or sinus histiocytosis with massive lymphadenopathy (SHML), is a rare, nonhereditary, benign histiocytic proliferative disorder, affecting mainly the lymph nodes. Orbital involvement in the absence of lymphadenopathy is relatively uncommon.

CASE
A 50-year-old woman presented to our hospital with gradual proptosis of the left eye for 5 years. Physical examination revealed no abnormalities, including lymphadenopathy. Ultrasonography and magnetic resonance imaging showed a soft tissue mass in the intraconal retroorbital region of the left eye. Fine needle aspiration cytology of the mass yielded a good number of mature lymphocytes, a few neutrophils, plasma cells and many histiocytes exhibiting emperipolesis. A provisional diagnosis of SHML was suggested and later confirmed by histology of the excised mass.

CONCLUSION
Though the orbit is a rare site of extranodal SHML, the disease should be entertained in the differential diagnosis of orbital swellings. To the best of our knowledge, this is the fourth case of SHML involving the orbit exclusively, with no nodal involvement.


Western economic historians have traditionally concentrated on the success stories of major developed economies, while development economists have given most of their attnetion to the problems of the Third World. The authors of this pioneering work study a part of Europe neglected by both approaches. Modernizing patterns in Balkan economic history are traced from the sixteenth century (when the territory was shared by Ottoman and Habsburg empires), through the nineteenth century (when they emerged as independent states), to the end of World War II and its aftermath. Despite present differences in economic systems Greece's private market economy, Yugoslavia's planned market economy, and the centrally planned economies of Romania, Bulgaria, and Albania the authors find that shared origins and common subsequent experiences are ample justifications for treating the area as an economic unit. Balkan Economic History, 1550-1950 will be a major case study for development economists and will provide historians with the first analytical and statistical study to survey the entire region from the start of the early modern period."


BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE
Increasing rates of fluoroquinolone resistance among Escherichia coli have been reported in Taiwan and worldwide. We aimed to identify the risk factors of ciprofloxacin resistance in urinary E. coli isolates.

METHODS
Patients with positive urine culture result for E. coli and resistance to ciprofloxacin between September 1, 1999 and December 31, 1999 were prospectively identified as cases, and compared with ciprofloxacin-susceptible E. coli isolates (controls).

THE CASE
control ratio was 1:2. Data were collected with standardized case record forms.

RESULTS
Sixty one cases and 122 controls were compared. Multivariate analysis indicated that urinary tract catheterization (odds ratio [OR] = 2.631, 95% confidence interval [CI] = 1.058-6.544; p=0.037) and prior exposure to quinolones (OR = 13.072, 95% CI = 3.367-50.75; p<0.001) were independent risk factors for ciprofloxacin resistance in urinary E. coli isolates. Compared with ciprofloxacin-susceptible E. coli isolates, ciprofloxacin-resistant E. coli isolates from urine specimens had a significantly higher rate of resistance to all other tested antimicrobial agents, except amikacin and imipenem.

CONCLUSION
In patients with urinary tract infection, urinary catheterization and prior quinolone exposure are associated with a high risk of ciprofloxacin-resistant E. coli which may cause treatment failure.


Retinal prostheses are being developed to restore vision for the blind with retinal diseases such as retinitis pigmentosa (RP) or age-related macular degeneration (AMD). Since neural prostheses depend upon electrical stimulation to control neural activity, optimal stimulation parameters for successful encoding of visual information are one of the most important requirements to enable visual perception. Therefore, in this paper, we focused on RGC responses to different stimulation parameters in degenerated retina. For this purpose, we used in vitro preparation of rd1 mice retina on microelectrode arrays. When the neural network of rd1 mice retinas is stimulated with voltage-controlled pulses, RGCs in degenerated retina also respond to voltage amplitude or voltage duration modulation as well in wild-type RGCs. But the temporal pattern of RGCs response is very different; in wild-type RGCs, single peak within 100 ms appears while in RGCs in degenerated retina multiple peaks (∼4 peaks) with ∼10 Hz rhythm within 400 ms appear. The threshold charge densities for activation of RGCs in rd1 mouse retinas were on average 70.50 ∼ 99.87 µC/cm2 in the experiment of voltage amplitude modulation and 120.5 ∼ 170.6 µC/cm2 in the experiment of voltage duration modulation.


Blocking NOX1 with the novel small molecule inhibitor GKT771 inhibits tumor growth in mice by targeting tumor lymph/angiogenesis and promoting antitumor immune cells recruitment. GKT771 emerges as a novel and promising anticancer drug worth translating into the clinics. NADPH oxidases catalyze the production of reactive oxygen species and are involved in physio/pathological processes. NOX1 is highly expressed in colon cancer and promotes tumor growth. To investigate the efficacy of NOX1 inhibition as an anticancer strategy, tumors were grown in immunocompetent, immunodeficient, or NOX1-deficient mice and treated with the novel NOX1-selective inhibitor GKT771. GKT771 reduced tumor growth, lymph/angiogenesis, recruited proinflammatory macrophages, and natural killer T lymphocytes to the tumor microenvironment. GKT771 treatment was ineffective in immunodeficient mice bearing tumors regardless of their NOX-expressing status. Genetic ablation of host NOX1 also suppressed tumor growth. Combined treatment with the checkpoint inhibitor anti-PD1 antibody had a greater inhibitory effect on colon carcinoma growth than each compound alone. In conclusion, GKT771 suppressed tumor growth by inhibiting angiogenesis and enhancing the recruitment of immune cells. The antitumor activity of GKT771 requires an intact immune system and enhances anti-PD1 antibody activity. Based on these results, we propose blocking of NOX1 by GKT771 as a potential novel therapeutic strategy to treat colorectal cancer, particularly in combination with checkpoint inhibition.


Supplemental Digital Content is available in the text Abstract Few studies have examined the optimal adjustment indices for predicting low muscle strength or physical performance in hemodialysis (HD) patients. Thus, the present study aimed to identify optimal adjustment indices for predicting strength and/or physical performance in HD patients. Our study was performed at an HD center (n = 84). Appendicular lean mass (ALM; kg) was calculated using dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry. ALM were adjusted to body weight, height2 (Ht2), body surface area, or body mass index. Physical performance tests (sit-to-stand test performed 5 times test, sit-to-stand for 30 second test, 6-minute walk test, timed up and go test, gait speed, hand grip strength, average steps per day (AST), and short physical performance battery) were also evaluated. Participants with a below median value for each physical performance test were defined as the low group. The mean participant age was 55.6 ± 12.8 years; 44 (52.4%) were men. The univariate analysis revealed a significant difference in ALM/Ht2 values between the low and normal physical performance group in all physical performance tests except short physical performance battery. The multivariate analysis revealed a significant difference in ALM/Ht2 between the low and normal physical performance groups in hand grip strength, 5 times sit-to-stand test, sit-to-stand for 30-second test, and AST. In women on HD, most indices were not associated with physical performance or strength. We demonstrated that, in men on HD, ALM/Ht2 may be the most valuable among various variables adjusted for ALM for predicting physical performance or strength.


Over the past decade, bioprinting has emerged as a promising patterning strategy to organize cells and extracellular components both in two and three dimensions (2D and 3D) to engineer functional tissue mimicking constructs. So far, tissue printing has neither been used for 3D patterning of mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) in multiphase growth factor embedded 3D hydrogels nor been investigated phenotypically in terms of simultaneous differentiation into different cell types within the same micropatterned 3D tissue constructs. Accordingly, we demonstrated a biochemical gradient by bioprinting nanoliter droplets encapsulating human MSCs, bone morphogenetic protein 2 (BMP-2), and transforming growth factor β1 (TGF- β1), engineering an anisotropic biomimetic fibrocartilage microenvironment. Assessment of the model tissue construct displayed multiphasic anisotropy of the incorporated biochemical factors after patterning. Quantitative real time polymerase chain reaction (qRT-PCR) results suggested genomic expression patterns leading to simultaneous differentiation of MSC populations into osteogenic and chondrogenic phenotype within the multiphasic construct, evidenced by upregulation of osteogenesis and condrogenesis related genes during in vitro culture. Comprehensive phenotypic network and pathway analysis results, which were based on genomic expression data, indicated activation of differentiation related mechanisms, via signaling pathways, including TGF, BMP, and vascular endothelial growth factor.


Abstract Multiple sclerosis (MS) is a chronic, progressive disease of the central nervous system that is characterised by inflammatory damage to the myelin sheath. Though often neglected, cognitive impairment is a common feature of MS that affects 43–70% of patients. It has a sophisticated neuroanatomic and pathophysiologic background and disturbs such vital cognitive domains as speed of information processing, memory, attention, executive functions and visual perceptual functions. In recent years there has been growing interest in neuroimaging findings with regard to cognitive impairment in MS. The possible options of managing cognitive dysfunction in MS are pharmacologic interventions, cognitive rehabilitation and exercise training; however, not enough evidence has been presented in this field. The aim of our article is to provide current knowledge on cognitive impairment in MS based on the most recent scientific results and conclusions with regard to affected cognitive domains, neuropsychological assessment, underlying mechanisms of this disturbance, neuroimaging findings and therapeutic options.


Clinical viability of powered lower-limb assistive devices requires reliable and intuitive control strategies. Stance and swing are the main phases of the gait cycle across different locomotion tasks. Hence, a reliable method to accurately identify these phases can decrease sensing complexity and assist in enabling high-level control of assistive devices. Ultrasound (US) imaging has recently been introduced as a new sensing modality that may provide a solution for intuitive device control. US images of the rectus femoris and vastus intermedius muscles were collected in humans during level, incline, and decline ambulation tasks. Five low-level static (i.e. time-independent) features of US images were measured with respect to a reference image, including correlation coefficient, sum of absolute differences, structural similarity index, sum of squared differences, and image echogenicity. Time-derivatives of the static features were also calculated as temporal features. Support vector machine classifiers were trained using these static features to identify the gait phase both dependent and independent of the ambulation tasks. The results indicate an accuracy of 88.3% in identifying the gait phases for task-independent classifiers when trained using only the static features. Performance of the classifiers improved significantly to 92.8% after using the temporal features (p $\lt0.01)$. The algorithm was efficient and the average processing speed was faster than 100 Hz. This study is the first demonstration on use of US imaging to provide continuous estimates of ambulation phase, and on multiple surfaces. These findings suggest task-independent approaches may reliably identify the main phases of the gait cycle. Advancements in this area of study may provide simpler intuitive strategies for high-level assistive device control and increase their clinical relevance.