Cirrus clouds have an important influence on the climate since the ice crystal size, concentration and distribution of the clouds determine their radiation properties and effects in the atmosphere. Aviation activities in the high troposphere impact cirrus cloud formation indirectly and significantly, due to aviation contrail evolution and aviation soot particles acting as potential ice nucleating particles (INPs). Soot particles have varying ice nucleation (IN) abilities. In cirrus cloud formation conditions, pore condensation and freezing (PCF) is an important ice formation pathway for soot particles, which requires the particle to have appropriate morphology properties and mesoporous structures. In this study, the morphology and pore size of two kinds of soot were changed by a physical agitation method without any chemical modification. The IN activities of both fresh and agitated soot particles with aggregate sizes, 60, 100, 200 and 400 nm, were tested by the Horizontal Ice Nucleation Chamber (HINC) under mixed phase and cirrus cloud conditions.

In general, the IN results show clear size dependence for particles with the same agitation degree both tested soot samples at all tested temperatures (T) from 218 K to 243 K with a step of 5 K. In addition, all soot particles do not form ice at T > 235 K (homogeneous nucleation temperature, HNT) but ice nucleation was observed well below homogeneous freezing relative humidity (RH) for T < HNT, suggesting PCF as the dominating mechanism rather than deposition nucleation. Furthermore, there are significant differences between agitated and fresh soot particles for both soot samples studied. We observed that all agitated soot particles reach a higher particle activation fraction (AF) value at the same T and RH condition, compared to the same size fresh soot particles. Moreover, 200 and 400 nm agitated soot particles require much lower ice saturation values to reach AF = 0.001 than their fresh counterparts. The enhanced IN abilities of agitated soot particles are attributed to soot aggregate structure compaction thus increasing mesopore occurrence probability induced by physical agitation. Preliminary evidence obtained from the mass measurements of the single aggregates show that agitated soot particles are more dense than fresh soot particles of the same size. Furthermore, soot aggregate morphology comparisons from HR-TEM (high resolution transmission electron microscopy) images, soot-water interaction ability results from DVS (dynamic vapor sorption) tests and micro-pore size distribution results from argon desorption tests will be used to explain the soot particle IN ability promotion induced by compaction.


In the gospel of Mark (6:14-29) the death of John the Baptist is reported in the most detailed fashion, compared to its synoptic parallels. In fact, this is the only extended story in the second gospel that interrupts the gospel's linear narrative flow by referring to a past event. On the basis of stylistic, structural and narratological observations the present study attempts to illuminate the narrative function and the christological significance of this story by examining the relationship of Mk 6:14-16 to 8:27-29 and 9:9-13, as well as the relationship of 6:17-29 to the Marcan passion narrative. The study concludes that from a narrative, as well as a christological perspective, the second evangelist presents the death of John the Baptist as decisively pointing towards Jesus' passion.


Proteus anguinus is a neotenic cave amphibian endemic to the Dinaric Karst and represents a symbol of Slovenian natural heritage. It is classified as 'Vulnerable' by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) and is one of the EU priority species in need of strict protection. Due to inaccessibility of its natural underground habitat, scientific studies have been primarily conducted on Proteus in captivity where amphibians may be particularly susceptible to opportunistic microbial infections. In this case report, we present the results of an analysis of an individual that had been kept in captivity for 6 yr and then developed clinical symptoms, including ulcers, suggesting opportunistic microbial infection. Pigmented fungal hyphae and yeast-like cells were present in the dermis and in almost all other sampled tissues. Sampling of the ulcer allowed the isolation of a diverse array of bacterial and fungal species. We identified the water-borne, polymorphic black yeast Exophiala salmonis, an opportunistic pathogen of fish, as the cause of the primary infection. This is the first report on a fungal infection of Proteus and on cave salamanders in general.


INTRODUCTION:
Intertrochanteric fractures continues to be a challenge for all orthopaedic surgeons.
A variety of implants of internal fixation have been employed to achieve this goal
with variable success.The Diversity of fixation devices available for the treatment
of trochanteric fractures illustrates the difficulties encountered in the actual
treatment,and the discussion about ideal implant still continues.In Recent years the
use of DHS in Unstable trochanteric fractures has been associated with significant
medial displacement of the shaft resulting from excessive sliding of screw within
the barrel and a higher incidence of srew cut out.Morever 12% of unstable
intertrochanteric fractures shows radiologically identifiable rotation of proximal
fragment when fixed with DHS, as DHS provides single point fixation over which
the proximal fragment rotates on hip movements.This leads to more malunions and
nonunions. Hence stabilization of lateral wall in unstable fractures by addition of
TSP to DHS prevents the excessive collapse and varus malpositioning.
BACK GROUND:
To emphasis the importance of the modular trochanter stabilizing plate (TSP) in
addition to the dynamic hip screw (DHS) prevents excessive telescoping/varus
malposition and limb shortening in all unstable trochanteric fractures with lateral
communitions.
MATERIAL AND METHOD:
In our study conducted in Government Kilpauk Medical College and Hospital
Chennai, 20 consecutive patients of unstable intertrochanteric fractures with lateral
wall communition were treated with trochanteric stabilization plate between
August 2013 and August2015. The fractures were classified according to AO/OTA
classification and fractures of AO Type 31A2.1 to 31A2.3 were included in our
study.All cases were followed up for a minimum of 9 months and were assessed
for clinical, radiological and functional outcome. The results were analysed
RESULTS:
The postoperative radiological outcome was assessed by taking serial X rays of
affected hip in anteroposterior and lateral view. All patients achieved union
radiological and clinical union. 6 patients underwent radiological union by 16
weeks, 4 patients underwent by 18 weeks, 5 patients underwent union by 20 weeks
and 3 patients underwent union by 22 weeks.Two patients had varus malunion,
Average limb length discrepancy was 1.4 cm with 7 patients having <1cm
shortening, 11 had shortening of 1.5 to 2 cm and 2 had shortening of more than 2
cm (1 patient had shortening of 2.5 cm and another had shortening of 2.9
cm).Average time for radiological union was 23.5 weeks. The postoperative
functional outcome was assessed by Harris Hip Score at 20 weeks. Average Harris
hip score was 83.2. We had 3 excellent results, 14 good results and 3 fair results.
CONCLUSION:Trochanteric stabilization plate with sliding hip screw is a
biomechanically stable construct allowing reconstruction of lateral wall to maintain
adequate lever arm and abductor strength (power arm) in unstable intertrochanteric
fractures with lateral wall communition. Additional anti rotation screw provides
enhanced rotational stability to the proximal fragment. Lateral wall buttress effect
reduces the chance of varus collapse and screw cutout. The operative technique
being similar to sliding hip screw.Overall in patients with unstable
intertrochanteric fractures with lateral wall communition, trochanteric stabilization
plate can give a superior functional and radiological outcome.


Simulation may serve to assess the consequences of operational decisions in a complex hybrid Supply Chain (HSC) that connects an unlimited number of continuous (CP) and discrete processes (DP). Modelling and simulation of such HSC cannot be adequately achieved using commercially available software based on Discrete Events Simulation (DES), System Dynamic Simulation (SDS) or Agent-Based simulation (ABS). The hybrid simulation path (HS), which combines two of these simulation approaches, has not been found to deliver adequate modelling of a HSC and simulation of the impact of a set of operational decisions whose consequences are felt in the short term (within a few weeks). This diagnosis, supported by a review of many recent papers and surveys, led us away from the HS path. To overcome the modelling issues to be addressed, as further discussed below, we developed an extension of DES comprising a set of four generic components, made up of basic components (stocks and processors). These are easily implemented in most commercial DES software. To best describe the methodological issues involved and our proposed solution, we provide an example of a major chemical plant where our solution was successfully implemented.


Eruptive vellus hair cyst (EVHC) is a benign epithelial tumor. Clinically, it usually presents as grouped or scattered yellowish to reddish-brown papules. It predominantly appears on the anterior part of the chest and extremities. Facial involvement is uncommon and 4 cases with facial involvement have been reported in the Korean dermatologic literature. However, involvement of the face coexistent with involvement of the trunk and extremities has never been reported in the Korean dermatologic literature. Herein, we report on a 10-year-old girl with multiple asymptomatic papules on her face, back and upper arms. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first report of EVHC that involves not only the face, but also the trunk and extremities in the Korean dermatologic literature. (Korean J Dermatol 2009;47(10):1154∼1157)


Hydraulic stability is one of the key problems during the design stage of hydraulic turbines. Despite of modern computational tools that help to define dangerous operating conditions and optimize runner design, hydraulic instabilities may fortuitously arise during the turbine life, as a consequence of variable and different operating conditions at which a hydraulic turbine can be subject.In general, the presence of unsteady flow reveals itself in two different ways: at small flow rate, the swirling flow in the draft tube conical inlet occupies a large portion of the inlet and causes a strong helical vortex rope; at large flow rate conditions the unsteady flow starts midway and causes a breakdownlike vortex bubble, followed by weak helical waves.In any case, hydraulic instability causes mechanical effects on the runner, on the whole turbine and on the draft tube, which may eventually produce severe damages on the turbine unit and whose most evident symptoms are vibrations. This notwithstanding, condition monitoring systems seldom are installed on this purpose in hydraulic power plants and no examples are reported in literature about the use of model-based methods to detect hydraulic instability onset.In this paper, by taking the advantage of a testing campaign performed during the commissioning of a 23 MW Kaplan hydraulic turbine unit, a rotordynamic model-based method is proposed. The turbine was equipped by proximity and vibration velocity probes, that allowed measuring lateral and axial vibrations of the shaft-line, under many different operating conditions, including also some off-design ones. The turbine mechanical model, realized by means of finite beam elements and considering lateral and axial degrees of freedom, is used to predict turbine unit response to the unsteady flow. Mechanical system response is then compared to the measured one and the possibility to detect instability onset, especially in real-time, is discussed.Copyright © 2012 by ASME


Ewing sarcoma (ES) is a common primary malignancy in children and adolescents. Progression of treatment methods hasn't contributed a lot to the imrovement of prognosis. To identify potential prognostic biomarkers, a meta-analysis pipeline of multi-gene expression datasets for ES from the Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO) was performed. Three datasets were screened and differential expression genes (DEGs) in ES samples compared with normal tissues were identified through limma package and subjected to network analysis. As a result, 1,470 DEGs were obtained which were mainly involved in biological processes associated with immune response and transcription regulation. Network analysis obtained 22 core genes with high network degree and fold change. Kaplan-Meier analysis based on ES datasets from The Cancer Genome Atlas identified five genes, including glycogen phosphorylase, muscle-associated, myocyte-specific enhancer factor 2C, tripartite motif containing 63, budding uninhibited by benzimidazoses1 and Ras GTPase-activating protein 1, whose altered expression profiles are significantly associated with survival. Changes of their expression values were further confirmed through RT-qPCR in ES cell and normal cell lines. Those genes may be considered as potential prognostic biomarkers of ES and should be helpful for its early diagnosis and treatment.


As part of the international MENU collaboration, variability in temporal patterns of recruitment and spawning stock were compared among functionally analogous species from four marine ecosystems including the Gulf of Maine/Georges Bank, the Norwegian/Barents Seas, the eastern Bering Sea and the Gulf of Alaska. Variability was characterized by calculating coefficients of variation for each time series and by representing the time series as anomalies. Patterns of synchrony and asynchrony in recruitment and spawning stock indices were examined among and between ecosystems and related to observed patterns in biophysical properties (e.g. local trophodynamics, local hydrography and large scale climate indices) using a wide range of time series analyses, autocorrelation corrections, autoregressive processes, and multivariate cross-correlation analyses. Of all the commonalities, the relatively similar cross-ecosystem and within-species magnitude of variation was most notable. Of all the differences, the timing of high or low recruitment years across both species and ecosystems was most notable. However, many of the peaks in these indices of recruitment were synchronous across ecosystems for functionally analogous species. Yet the relationships (or lack thereof) between recruitment anomalies and key biophysical properties demonstrated that no one factor consistently caused large recruitment events. Our observations also suggested that there was no routine and common set of factors that influences recruitment; often multiple factors were of similar relative prominence. This work demonstrates that commonalities and synchronies in recruitment fluctuations can be found across geographically very distant ecosystems, but biophysical causes of the fluctuations are difficult to partition.


The relationship between educational theories, game design and game development are used to develop models for the creation of complex learning environments. The Game Object Model (GOM), that marries educational theory and game design, forms the basis for the development of the Persona Outlining Model (POM) and the Game Achievement Model (GAM). POM provides researchers with a means to more easily match software development with the intended audience and expected outcomes. The concrete GOM interfaces are realized in GAM which provides a convenient way to develop and document educational games. These models were developed to better understand the relationships between story, play and learning. Both qualitative data collected from group workshops and qualitative data obtained from interviews with people closely associated with the game design process were used to evaluate GAM. Results indicate that GAM is an efficient, well conceptualised and supportive model that can easily contribute to successful development and writing of stories for complex learning environments. South African Journal of Higher Education Vol.17(2) 2003: 206-217


Background: Pulmonary tuberculosis (PTB) is one of the most common infections worldwide, more commonly among the developing countries like Bangladesh. So its early detection and prompt treatment was a challenge and the burden of diagnostic challenge was higher if the patients smear negative for Acid Fast Bacilli (AFB).
Objective: Evaluate the diagnostic value of Bronchoalveolar lavage (BAL) for diagnosis of suspected Pulmonary Tuberculosis (PTB) whose sputum for AFB smear neagtive.
Materials and Methods: A cross-sectional observational reserach was undertaken where 50 patients were included on the basis of specific inclusion and exclusion criteria. All patients who had negative smear for AFB but highly suspected for PTB underwent fibreoptic bronchoscopy to collect Bronchoalveolar lavage (BAL) fluid for diagnostic testing in the form of BAL for AFB and mycobacterial culture in Lowenstein Jensen medium.
Results: The Male predominacy 29 (58%) was obserevd among the smear negative PTB patients. Clinically more than seventy percent (72%) presents with fever then cough with sputum and haemoptysis 62% and 32% respectively. Radiological cavitation 33 (66%) was the most common x-ray findings. After analysis of BAL for AFB about 31 (62%) patient found positive and on culture about mycobacterial growth found in 29 (58%) patients.
Conclusion: Bronchoalveolar lavage had a superior diagnostic value in patients with smear negative suspected pulmonary tuberculosis.
KYAMC Journal.2021;12(02): 84-87


if any UK city can be described as a Millenium city it is Cardiff. The capital of Wales is undergoing a programme of regeneration, spearheaded by the £121m Millenium Stadium project. The size and variety of the projects has presented South Wales Fire Service and Cardi County Council Building Control with many challenges.


Compared with conventional films digital radiography allows a wide range of exposure and scanner settings. The aim of this study was to investigate the diagnostic accuracy of the evaluation of tooth fractures depending on variations of exposure dose, scanner settings and surrounding tissues. Extracted human teeth were exposed separately and in a pig bone phantom before and after artificial fracture at 70 kV (Gendex Oralix DC) and three exposure settings using the Vistascan System I at three different resolution settings. Five dental observers evaluated 432 radiographs of 12 adequately fractured teeth under randomized conditions for the existence of a tooth fracture on a five-point scale. The highest value of true ratings (76.7%) with pig bone vicinity was achieved at 56 micro Gy (160 ms) and 20 lp mm(-1), followed by 71.7% at 27 micro Gy (80 ms) and 20 lp mm(-1). The worst diagnostic accuracy of 56.7% true ratings resulted from 6 micro Gy (20 ms) and 10 lp mm(-1). With radiographs of teeth in empty surroundings the rate of true decisions was in some cases significantly higher. For the diagnostics of tooth fractures with the Vistascan System I the diagnostic value seems to depend on, besides radiographic projection, the scanner resolution setting, the surrounding tissues and the exposure dose.


We examined beta-cell function and replication in spontaneously hypertensive rats (SHR) and age-matched Wistar-Kyoto rats (WKY). Rats were subjected to 90% pancreatectomy (Px) or sham operation at the age of 8 weeks, and islet function and regeneration were examined 4 weeks after surgery. Plasma glucose levels were higher in SHR than in WKY (509 +/- 38 v 325 +/- 109 mg/dL, P < .0001) 1 week after Px and throughout the experimental period. Plasma glucose responses to intravenous injection of glucose (0.5 g/kg body weight) were not different in the sham-operated animals of the two strains, whereas plasma insulin responses were greater in SHR than in WKY. No insulin responses to glucose were observed in either strain of Px rats. The insulin content of the remnant equivalent (6.7 +/- 2.1 v 4.2 +/- 0.4 micrograms, P < .05) and whole pancreas (156.7 +/- 10.7 v 123.8 +/- 23.5 micrograms, P < .01) in sham-operated rats was greater in SHR than in WKY. However, insulin content was lower (P < .05) in Px-SHR (1.0 +/- 0.2 microgram) than in Px-WKY (3.9 +/- 1.7 micrograms). Histological examination showed that fibrotic degeneration of islets was much greater in Px-SHR than in Px-WKY. These data strongly suggest that the beta cells of SHR were more vulnerable to reduction of islet mass than those of WKY. Our data also suggest that hyperinsulinemia and/or insulin resistance in SHR has a deleterious effect on beta-cell replication.


Background Infants requiring surgical intervention are at high risk of complications. Peri-operative checklists have demonstrated reduction in morbidity and mortality in many patient groups by maintaining high standards of care provided. Objectives We audited compliance with current perioperative protocols on a surgical neonatal intensive care unit at King's College Hospital, London, UK and identified deficits in documentation and clinical practices. A perioperative checklist was then formulated as a quality improvement activity to standardize care which was re-audited to demonstrate significant improvisation of deficiencies. Various new variables were introduced with the implementation of peri-operative check list to provide an extended and comprehensive health care package to infants undergoing surgical interventions. These included post-operative examination, IV antibiotics, replacement of ongoing fluid losses, identity bands and COVID swabs results prior to theatres. Methods Review of case notes were undertaken pre and postoperatively. Documentation of clinical examination, laboratory investigations, imaging, ventilation plan, consent, communication, prescriptions of fluids, antibiotics and analgesia were assessed. Results The case records of 48 infants (birth weight 460 – 4600 grams) with gestational ages ranging from 23–41 weeks were analysed (shown in table 1) both pre and post introduction of peri-operative checklist (shown in figure 1). The surgical interventions included laparotomy (32), neurosurgery (10), thoracotomy (4) and central venous line insertion (2). Conclusions Introduction of a structured peri-operative checklist as a standard practice, significantly improved the compliance with most protocol recommendations and optimized safety during surgical care of infants.


Rutin is quercetin heteroside widely present in plants that exhibit many health-beneficial effects, such as strengthening the capillary walls, reducing the harmful effects of LDL cholesterol, and reducing the risk of cardiovascular diseases. Rutin was determined from three Allium species (A. cepa, A. sativum, and A. ursinum) collected in Bosnia and Herzegovina by the HPLC method associated with electrochemical detection. The analysis was performed from methanol extracts of bulb and leaf of garlic, bulb and leaf of onion, and leaves of wood garlic. Rutin was present in all of the examined samples. The highest rutin content was found in garlic leaves (0.78 ± 0.09 mg g–1), and the lowest in onion bulbs (0.04 ± 0.10 mg g–1). The contents of rutin were higher in leaf samples, suggesting that leaves of onion and garlic are recommended as a better natural source of this glycoside.


The incidence of early recurrence in 32 patients who had had a transient ischaemic attack or stroke in the anterior circulation was studied. Patients with a potential cardiac source of embolism were excluded from the study. All patients had transcranial Doppler (TCD) monitoring of the symptomatic middle cerebral artery for microembolic signal detection within seven days from the onset of symptoms. Four patients had early recurrence during a mean follow up of 15 (SD11) days. All early recurrences occurred in the same arterial territory as the initial ischaemic event. Three of the four patients with early recurrence had prior microembolic signals. The incidence of early recurrence was 50% (3/6) in patients with microembolic signals and 3.8% (1/26) in patients without microembolic signals (P=0.02). The findings suggest that TCD monitoring of patients with recent cerebral ischaemia of presumed arterial origin allows recognition of a subset of patients at high risk for early recurrence.


Active Network Management (ANM) presents an effective approach to facilitating the connection of renewable generation onto increasingly congested networks. Estimating the severity of constraint experienced by managed generators is a key requirement in order to successfully evaluate the impact of implementing ANM solutions. This paper describes an established method of constraint analysis, its requirements, and outcomes. This approach to constraint analysis is developed further, introducing a probabilistic method for the estimation of curtailment volumes. Examples are provided illustrating the outcomes from such studies. (4 pages)


A Thesis submitted to the school of Business, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology in partial fulfillment of the requirement for the degree of Master in Business Administration (MBA), 2008


Seasonal variation imparts environmental stress in dairy animals, and impairs animal health and productivity. In order to measure the performance ability of a particular breed/animal towards heat stress, it is imperative to determine its thermotolerance ability. Heat shock proteins (HSPs) are molecular chaperons that maintain native conformation of proteins and cell viability during stress period. The peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) have been widely utilized as a cellular model to understand the differential heat shock response across livestock species. The present investigation was attempted with the assumption that seasonal variation can lead to changes in the level of heat shock protein transcripts in dairy breeds. Therefore, this study aimed at assessing the transcriptional stability of heat shock protein family genes and cell proliferation rate in Sahiwal cows (Bos indicus), Holstein cows (Bos taurus) and Murrah buffaloes (Bubalus bubalis). The basal expression level of heat shock protein family genes (HSP27, HSP40, HSP60, HSP70 and HSP90) were analysed in PBMCs during peak summer and winter seasons. In comparison to Sahiwal cows and Murrah buffaloes, relative expression data showed significant induction of HSP70, HSP40, HSP60 and HSP90 mRNA in HF cows during summer stress. The cell proliferation data further indicated significant (p<0.05) inhibition of cell proliferation in Holstein cows during summer stress. Overall data on transcriptional stability of HSPs mRNA and cell proliferation suggested better survivability of Sahiwal cows PBMCs to summer stress in comparison to HF cows.


We conducted field experiments manipulating lichens, shrubs, and herbs along a time-since-fire gradient and assessing effects on three endemic herbaceous species of Florida scrub: Eryngium cuneifolium, Hypericum cumulicola, and Polygonella basiramia. Responses included seed germination, survival, biomass, and fecundity. Transplants into recently burned patches generally had higher survival, larger biomass, and greater reproductive output than transplants into long-unburned patches. Open areas and sites near oaks frequently were more favorable than sites near Florida rosemary. Ground lichens did not affect germination but increased mortality rate of seedlings. Neighboring small shrubby and herbaceous species did not affect the performance of these species. Of the three species, naturally occurring E. cuneifolium were farthest from large shrubs, and their microhabitats had the least ground lichens and shrubs. Eryngium cuneifolium and H. cumulicola are capable of forming persistent seed banks and their recruitment after fire depends mostly on these dormant seeds. Polygonella basiramia relies on seed dispersal and immediate seed germination to colonize recently burned patches. Management for these species should involve variable fire regimes to allow all three species to persist along with many other scrub endemics.


ABSTRACT This viewpoint reflects on the challenges of promoting affordable and innovative medicines while fostering a competitive environment for research and development in developing countries. We explore the life sciences industrial policies of Brazil and the United Kingdom in order to identify mechanisms and conditions that could serve as lessons to practitioners in other countries. We suggest three crucial design attributes: a strategic collaboration between a health system and the private sector, coordination and accountability mechanisms, and a network of support (that is, embeddedness).


We propose a THz imaging system based on self-mixing (SM) interferometry in a Quantum Cascade Laser (QCL) to map the distribution of free charges on a semiconductor surface. In our experiment a free electron plasma is photo-generated in a high resistivity n-type silicon wafer using a near infrared (NIR) continuous wave (CW) pump laser. A model based on Drude theory correctly reproduces the experimental results and in prospective promises a quantitative evaluation of free charges densities.


Public systems of higher education have recently attempted to cut costs by providing financial incentives to institutions who reduce the diversity of their programs. We study the profit and welfare effects of reducing product diversity in higher education, against the background of a funding system reform in Flanders (Belgium). We find that dropping duplicated programs at individual institutions tends to be socially undesirable, due to the limited fixed cost and variable cost savings and the students' low willingness to travel to other institutions. Furthermore, we find that the financial incentives offered to drop programs may be very ineffective, leading to both undesirable reform and undesirable status quo. These findings emphasize the complexities in regulating product diversity in higher education, and serve as a word of caution towards the various decentralized financial incentive schemes that have recently been introduced.


Although immobilization of growth factors (GFs) on culture substrates has been investigated as a cell culture technique, quantification of the bioactive stability of immobilized GFs has not been studied in detail. We developed a system of measuring GF stability using heparin-immobilized collagen substrate, vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF). and human umbilical vein endothelial cells (HUVECs). VEGF solution was added to a heparin-crosslinked substrate and immobilized on the substrate. HUVECs were cultured on the VEGFimmobilized substrate, and the mitochondrial activity of the cells was assessed. A calibration curve showing the relation between HUVEC mitochondrial activity and immobilized VEGF density was constructed. Next, immobilized VEGF and VEGF solution were pre-incubated at 37°C, and the pre-incubated VEGF was added to heparin-crosslinked substrate. HUVEC mitochondrial activity declined as the pre-incubation period increased. Density of active immobilized VEGF was derived from HUVEC mitochondrial activity using the calibration curve, and the effect of pre-incubation of VEGF at 37°C was demonstrated quantitatively. Even after culture for 16 days, immobilized VEGF in culture medium at 37°C retained 43% of the initial bioactivity. Immobilized VEGF retained activity better than VEGF solution for at least 12 days of pre-incubation. The present results indicate that immobilization improves the stability of VEGF.


Objectives: The natural course of native kidneys after hemodialysis initiation in patients with autosomal dominant polycystic kidney disease (ADPKD) remains poorly understood.Methods: We measured the total volumes of native kidneys in 12 patients who had at least one enhanced computed tomography (CT) image both before and after initiation of hemodialysis (group 1) and in 18 patients who had no image before dialysis but more than two images after dialysis (group 2). In patients with images, the last image was used for analysis only after dialysis.Results: The mean total kidney volume (TKV) (± SD) before hemodialysis initiation was 3132 ± 1413 mL and the mean TKV of the last image was 3047 ± 1323 mL in group 1. The mean TKV change rate (%) was - 5.2 ± 27.4% (P > 0.05) during follow-up of 3.9 ± 1.9 years in group 1. The mean TKV change rate was 2.8 ± 34.4% (P > 0.05) in group 2. The follow-up period after dialysis initiation ranged from 4.2 ± 4.7 to 8.0 ± 5.2 years.Conclusions: The results suggest that the TKV of native polycystic kidneys decreases substantially after hemodialysis initiation. This reduction occurs mainly during the early post-hemodialysis period and followed by a slow enlargement of TKV.


Renal dysfunction caused by calcineurin inhibitor (CNI) nephrotoxicity occurs often and contributes significantly to late mortality after heart transplantation (HTx). Over the last decades, this has prompted many clinical studies in an effort to develop kidney‐protecting immunosuppressive strategies including delayed CNI start, minimization, withdrawal, or even de novo CNI avoidance. In the past, these strategies often failed due to the lack of efficacy. Since 2009, novel CNI‐reducing strategies have been under investigation. These strategies minimize renal damage using induction agents such as antithymocyte globulin and alternative immunosuppressive agents such as the mechanistic target of rapamycin inhibitors (sirolimus or everolimus) or mycophenolate. This review outlines the recent results of using these renal protection strategies including their drawbacks. We also discuss alternative approaches to optimize individual immunosuppressive therapies after HTx.


Purpose - The increasing provision of timely financial information through web-based technology is expected to improve the quality of communication between a company and its stakeholders. However, the information asymmetry problem still exists since almost all "web-releases" usually remain unaudited. The purpose of this paper is to propose conceptual and technical frameworks of continuous auditing to provide a solution for this problem. This solution could also move the traditional auditing forward to the new e-auditing generation. Design/methodology/approach - This paper develops a conceptual framework to present why continuous auditing would dominate other auditing approaches in examining web-based financial information. Using a 3?×?2?×?2?×?1 design, this study compares the economic efficiency of three auditing approaches under the joint-combination of various disclosure types, materiality perceptions and information environments. A technical framework, the external continuous auditing machine, is derived from the conceptual framework to specify the generic procedures to perform the online control testing and the continuous substantive testing over web-releases. Findings - Continuous auditing issues are scrutinized both theoretically and technically. Two main conclusions arise. First, the behavior model simulates various information disclosing and auditing environment and argues that the continuous auditing would be the most appropriate approach for web-releasing assurance. Although the hypothesis derived from that model still needs further empirical supports, the anticipated sustaining is quite reasonable under the emergent web-release practice. Originality/value - Given the new era of online, real-time business reporting, constructing a theoretical model and applying it to develop a technical model for implementing continuous audits for web-releases provide significant contributions to the accounting/auditing professionals as well as researchers.


Modern solid state drives (SSDs) unnecessarily confine applications to the conventional block I/O interface, which under-utilizes SSD's internal resources, leading to suboptimal performance and unsatisfactory lifetime.This thesis first presents the key-addressable, multi-log SSD (KAML), an SSD with a key-value interface that uses a novel multi-log architecture and stores data as variable-sized records rather than fixed-sized sectors. Exposing a key-value interface allows applications to remove a layer of indirection between application-level keys and data stored in the SSD. KAML also provides native support for fine-grained atomicity and isolation. We have implemented a prototype of KAML on an SSD development platform, and results show that KAML outperforms conventional systems by up to 4.0X.Existing SSDs also provide flash-based out-of-band (OOB) data that can only be updated on a conventional write. Consequently, the metadata stored in their OOB region lack flexibility due to the idiosyncrasies of flash memory, incurring unnecessary flash write operations detrimental to device lifetime. This thesis also presents PebbleSSD, an SSD with byte-addressable metadata, or BAM, as a mechanism exploiting the nonvolatile, byte-addressable random access memory (NVRAM) inside the SSD. With BAM, PebbleSSD can support a range of useful features to improve its lifetime by reducing redundant flash writes. We have implemented a prototype of PebbleSSD on an SSD development platform, and experimental results demonstrate that PebbleSSD can reduce the amount of data written by log-structured file systems during log cleaning by up to 99%, and reduce file-system-level write amplification by up to 33% for a number of workloads.Finally, previous proposals for SSDs with new interfaces suffer from the limitation caused by one-at-a-time design approach. To overcome this limitation, the thesis presents Willow, a user-programmable SSD with programmability as a central feature. Willow allows programmers to augment and extend the semantics of an SSD with application-specific features without compromising file system protections. We demonstrate the effectiveness and flexibility of Willow by implementing support for atomicity as an example. We find that defining SSD semantics in software is easy and beneficial, and that Willow makes it feasible for database transaction processing workload to benefit from a customized SSD interface.


This paper introduces a new approach to the problem of simultaneously localizing a team of mobile robots equipped with proprioceptive sensors able to monitor their motion and with exteroceptive sensors able of sensing one another. The method is based on a series of extended Kalman filters hierarchically distributed. In particular, the team is decomposed in several groups and, for each group, an extended Kalman filter estimates the configurations of all the members of the group in a local frame attached to one robot, the group leader. Finally, at the highest level of the hierarchy, one single filter estimates the locations of all the group leaders. The key advantage of this approach is its ability to distribute the computation necessary to perform the multi robot localization under limited computation and communication capabilities. In particular, the approach significantly outperforms an optimal approach based on a single estimator. This is shown by analytically computing the precision on the localization of each robot in the case of one single degree of freedom. In particular, the best hierarchy is analytically determined by deriving the dependency of the localization precision on the communication and computation capabilities and on the sensors accuracy.


Tinea capitis (scalp ringworm) is a common paediatric infection usually affecting school-aged children. The commonest causative organisms are dermatophytes from the genera Trichophyton or Microsporum. Dermatophytes are keratinophilic and invade the stratum corneum, hair and nails.


Since being introduced to North America at the Miami Boat Show in 2005, Volvo Penta Inboard Performance System, or IPS has established itself as a leading propulsion choice among pleasure boat owners and builders. Other suppliers are following suit including the Cummins Mercruiser Zeus system. Pod propulsion offers benefits like increased efficiency, better performance, nimble handling, and low noise levels while allowing more people to successfully operate their vessel due to a friendly operator interface. Features of these commercial pod systems that also benefit builders include ease of installation and the integral underwater exhaust which helps to meet CE requirements, for both exhaust and noise levels.
 Both IPS and Zeus are fully integrated pod propulsion systems. Existing vessels can be retro-fitted with these systems while many new vessels are being designed specifically for IPS or Zeus. Donald L. Blount and Associates provides consulting in regards to IPS integration with existing and new designs and has also been involved with designs employing the Zeus system.
 The first portion of this paper discusses pod drives, particularly IPS itself. (Because the author has substantially more experience and background with IPS, much of the information herein is IPS specific). General information on IPS and Zeus is offered as well as some operational specifics. The paper then focuses on the application of pod drives in existing and new vessel designs. The discussion includes how hull forms can be evaluated for use with pod drives. A look at the integration of pod systems into various types of pleasure boats (cruiser, day boat, fishing yacht, etc) is also covered including the challenges which exist for each specific vessel type.


A significant fraction of cancers have a heritable component, and require an interplay between somatic and germline variants. Common and rare germline variants have been investigated by previous GWAS and family based studies. However, a comprehensive analysis of both somatic and germline variants in cancer using high throughput sequencing data to discover genetic variants of functional relevance is lacking. Herein, we investigated the potential role of somatic and germline variants from over 20 major cancer types from large-scale studies such as TCGA and ICGC and discovered thousands of somatic and germline variants in cancer genomes. To link these genetic variants to cancer phenotypes, we analyzed the proteomics data in breast, ovarian and colorectal cancers generated by the Clinical Proteomic Tumour Analysis Consortium (CPTAC) using a PepScan pipeline that can detect whether a genomic variant is observed at the peptide level. The pipeline incorporated QUILTS to construct patient-specific protein database and MS-GF+ to identify peptide sequences in the database from MS spectra. Our analysis validated roughly 2% of non-synonymous genetic variants in peptides with matched spectra. We correlated the effect of genetic mutations on proteomic subtypes based on global protein expression levels. Additionally, we assessed the role of genetic variations in kinase genes using phosphoproteome profiles, and identified downstream markers that may be candidate targets for diagnosis or treatment. This analysis also helped us prioritize kinase variants that are likely functional candidates for experimental validation. In conclusion, the comprehensive study of genetic variants utilizing an integrated proteogenomic approach revealed genetic variants with potential functional impacts in cancer. Citation Format: Kuan-lin Huang, Jaiyin Wang, Song Cao, Mingchao Xie, Reyka Jayasinghe, Jie Ning, Michael McLellan, Michael Wendl, Adam Scott, Kimberly Johnson, Sherri Davies, David Fenyo, Reid Townsend, Feng Chen, Jeffrey Parvin, Matthew Ellis, Li Ding. Discovery and proteogenomic investigation of genetic variants in human cancers. [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the 106th Annual Meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research; 2015 Apr 18-22; Philadelphia, PA. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2015;75(15 Suppl):Abstract nr 1939. doi:10.1158/1538-7445.AM2015-1939


detected. Four cases showed a rise in alkaline phosphatase, three in transaminase, and five in bromsulphalein retention. Of the histological changes the most frequent was a diffuse increase of lymphocytes in the sinusoids, seen in five cases, and periportal fibrosis associated with lymphocytic infiltration in addition to the sinusoidal infiltration in another three. Subsequent open biopsy on one of the latter revealed a fully developed multilobular cirrhosis. A unique feature present in one of the 12 cases, but seen also in two others not of this series, was a curious nodularity not associated with cirrhosis but due to variation in cell size, the centrilobular zones being composed of large cells compressing the peripheral columns of small cells. With the possible exception of the patient with multilobular cirrhosis it is probable that the hepatic changes follow those in the spleen. But their pathogenesis is obscure and adds one more to the list of unsolved problems of hepatosplenic relations.


Solid-state diffusion often controls the evolution of the structure and properties of engineering materials, during both processing and the working lifetime of the engineered product. Diffusion characteristics of crystalline materials are critical for the manufacturing and operation of an enormous range of advanced products, from microelectronic devices to gas turbine blades. Although a large number of diffusion data has been accumulated over the years, many fundamental issues remain unresolved. This volume focuses on experimental and simulation techniques that provide access to atomic-scale mechanisms of diffusion in different classes of crystalline materials. Recent advances in the understanding of microscopic mechanisms of diffusion are reviewed and future research directions are discussed. more importantly, the volume features an exchange of ideas among the communities of diffusion scientists working with metals and metallic alloys, intermetallic compounds, semiconductors, ceramics and ionic materials. Topics include: diffusion mechanisms in metals and alloys; diffusion in intermetallic compounds; grain boundary and surface diffusion--diffusion in quasicrystals; diffusion in semiconductors; and diffusion in ionic conductivity and ionic materials.


The Authors are examining the electrogenetic and vectorial alterations during pulmonary embolism and the consequent more frequent electrocardiographic patterns according to the literature data. The analysis of the electrocardiograms of 37 patients with proved pulmonary embolism confirms that ECG is not of absolute diagnostic value but may be extremely useful especially if subsequent records are compared.


To study trap models related to the variable retention time (VRT) phenomenon in dynamic random access memory (DRAM), we derived equations to calculate the data retention time tret of DRAM and the activation energy for two trap models, i.e., the metastable and oxide trap models. Measuring the tret of VRT cells for various bias and temperature conditions, the dependence of activation energy differences in tret on bias at high and low retention states was extracted. Furthermore, the dependence of the electric field on bias at high and low retention states was also extracted. Using those parameters, we successfully distinguished the two types of trap models.


In this paper we extend the random walk example of Sutton and Barto (1998) to a multistage dynamic programming optimization setting with discounted reward. Using Bellman equations on presumed action, the optimal values are derived for general transition probability rho and discount rate gamma, and include the original random walk as a special case. Temporal difference methods with eligibility traces, TD(A), are effective in predicting the optimal values for different rho and gamma; but their performances are found to depend critically on the choice of truncated return in the formulation when gamma is less than 1


Pocket milling has long been a popular means for machining pocket features in structural parts and skins in the aviation industry. Recent advanced milling technologies pose new challenges for pocket milling path which existing contour-parallel path generation schemes cannot overcome. For high-speed machining, pocket milling path is desired to be smooth and with no tool retractions during the process, while the path stepover should be kept within a prescribed range to achieve relatively constant cutting load. These geometric constraints are also vital in the application of aircraft skin mirror milling in order to guarantee a correct and consistent thickness signal reception for real-time adjustment of the process. Traditional path optimization based on local modification can only meet a few of these constraints while others are being violated. Therefore, we propose a novel contour-parallel path generation scheme that respects all these process constraints by utilizing the idea of image morphology. The two-step scheme first generates an initial path by propagating from the rectified medial curve of the pocket shape. The initial path is then treated as a binary image being iteratively deformed and projected back into the pocket region via quadratic optimization. Experimental results show that our developed scheme can generate a smooth, tool retraction free and stepover-guaranteed path for various shapes of pocket.


The integrity of turbine blade roots and attachments is fundamental to the power infrastructure. Therefore, it requires the adoption of appropriate wedges with an effective ultrasonic testing system. Turbine components have complicated geometry which ordinarily impedes proper coupling to the wedge. However, different configurations of the ultrasonic wedge have been developed to obviate this constraint. In this paper, the various types of ultrasonic wedge are reviewed vis-a-vis their conformability to the turbine blade root geometry. Also, the possible application of cylindrical multiple flat-faced wedges is discussed.


Background US7 score is the ultrasound scoring system for rheumatic arthritis (RA) with the most clinical evidence so far. Several reports accessed its inter-, intra-observer agreement, its specificity, sensitivity and practical possibility compared to more complex scoring systems such as 72-joints scoring systems, which showed it is an convenient tool for clinical use. Objectives Our goal is to employ US7 to investigate the ultrasonic changes during biological agents plus MTX Treatment in high disease activity refractory RA patients in Yellow people. Methods All cases were diagnosed as RA fulfilling 2009 ACR/EULAR classification criteria and evaluated as high disease activity for DAS28>5.1 with MTX+HCQ+SASP or MTX+LEF invalid therapy for more than 3 months before baseline. Biological agents including TNF-a antagonist or IL-6 antagonist plus with MTX 10mg qw were then given and ultrasound was performed by 2 observers blinded to physicial examinations and blood tests at 0, 4, 12, 24, 48w. US examination referred to US7 scores by Backhaus et al. DAS28 were employed to assess disease activity. Results 1) 26 subjects were enrolled in the program up to now. 22 were given TNF-a antagonists and 4 were given IL-6 antagonists. 17 finished 24 weeks follow-up. 1 withdrew for TB infection at 12 week and 1 withdrew for fungi pneumonia at 8 weeks. Mean age of 17 was 44.3±11.8 years old, female-male ratio was 15:2, and disease duration was 71 months. All were RF and ACPA postIve. 2) DAS28-CRP, DAS28-ESR had prominent decrease from 0 to 24 week (DAS28-CRP: 0w: 4w: 12w: 24w = 6.76, 5.98, 5.09, 4.48, DAS28-ESR: 0w: 4w: 12w: 24w = 6.36, 4.94, 3.99, 3.35, paired Wilcoxon test, all sig<0.05) 3) The same prominent improvement also well reflected by the ultrasonic scores: average sum scores (0w:4w:12w:24w = 22.9:15.6:13:9.3, all sig <0.05 except 4w: 12w, sig=0.126), synovitis grey scale scores (0w:4w:12w:24w = 11.6:9.3:8.1:6.0, all sig <0.05, except 0w:4w, sig=0.068), synovitis Power Doppler scores (0w:4w:12w:24w = 8.5:4.9:3.8:2.7, all sig <0.05, except 4w:12w,4w:24w, 12w:24w, sig = 0.361,0.227, 0.235), tenosynovitis grey scale scores (0w:4w:12w:24w = 0.63:0.25:0.25:0.07, all sig <0.05, except 4w:12w,4w:24w, 12w:24w, sig = 1.0 , 0.26, 0.26), tenosynovitis Power Doppler scores (0w:4w:12w:24w = 1.00:0.19:0:0 all sig <0.05, except 4w:12w,4w:24w, 12w:24w, sig = 0.18, 0.18, 1.0), bone erosion scores (0w:4w:12w:24w = 1.2:1.0:0.94:0.53, all sig <0.05 except 0w:4w, 4w: 12w, 4w:24w, 12w:24w, sig = 0.083, 0.317, 0.102, 0.102). The above data showed the sum scores found biological agents improved thorough the whole course as Das28 did. Synovitis seemed to be eliminiated faster than tenosynovitis and the repair of bone erosion was the latest event compared to decreased synovitis and tenosynovitis. Conclusions It is recommended US7 used in clinic for US7 scoring system could reflect more exquisitely than DAS28 in more refined aspects including the changes of tendon, joint, bone at different phrases during biological agent treatment for RA. However, more samples should be included in our study to illuminate above conclusion with sufficient evidence. Disclosure of Interest None declared


Background Increased cardiovascular morbility and mortality has been observed in several inflammatory rheumatic diseases, namely, rheumatoid arthritis and systemic lupus erythematosus The chronic inflammatory state in these diseases may contribute to accelerated atherosclerosis. ``Ultrasonic biopsy" (U-B) is a described noninvasive screening technique to detect early atherosclerotic plaques and arterial wall changes. Objectives To evaluate the prevalence of subclinical atherosclerosis in patients with Psoriatic Arthritis, examining carotid and femoral arteries and to identify early clinical and biologic markers for these changes in this population. Methods Consecutive PsA patients who fulfilled the CASPAR criteria who were followed at our Rheumatology departmentbwere recruited. Traditional risk factors, biological inflammatory parameters and disease activity scores were checked. We studied 69 patients (39 women and 30 men), with a median age of 53 years (range 23-80yr) and a median disease duration of 96 months (range 18-552months). All patients underwent U-B study of left and right carotid (CA) and femoral artery (FA). The UB features were classified and scored as follows: Class A, normal (score 0); Class B, interface disruption (score 2); class C, intima-media (I-M) granulation (score 4); Class D, plaque without hemodynamic disturbance (score 6); Class E, stenotic plaque (score 8); and Class F, plaque with symptoms (score 10). Results Thirty-three (49%)of the 69 patients had at least a lesion in 1 of the 4 vessels tested (Classe C, D e F), these, 12 (36%) had lesion in 4 vessels. The AF was involved in 27 patients but the CA in only 20 patients. The presence of carotid plaque(classes D-F) correlated significantly with disease duration, LDL and triglyceride levels. Diabetes and hypertension were associated with the presence of plaques (classes D-F). Mean C-reactive protein washigher in classes D-F compared to the class A-B. Conclusions This study evaluates both carotid and femoral arteries in psoriatic arthritis patients looking for subclinical atherosclerosis. The results Our study demonstrates show that patients with PsA may have an increased prevalence of subclinical atherosclerosis. Femoral artery evaluation should be performed and complement the more frequent carotid study as it may show additional information about the atherosclerotic state of the patient. Special attention and strict control of atherosclerotic risk factors in patients with PsA is warranted to prevent future cardiovascular events. Disclosure of Interest None Declared


We prove that the hyperplanes parallel to ${\bf e}_{n+1}$ are the unique examples of translating solitons $C^1-$asymptotic to two half-hyperplanes outside a vertical cylinder in $\R^{n+1}$.


The local structure of the AgPb{sub m}SbTe{sub m+2} series of thermoelectric materials has been studied using the atomic pair distribution function (PDF) method. Three candidate-models were attempted for the structure of this class of materials using either a one- or a two-phase modeling procedure. Combining modeling the PDF with HRTEM data we show that AgPb{sub m}SbTe{sub m+2} contains nanoscale inclusions with composition close to AgPb{sub 3}SbTe{sub 5} randomly embedded in a PbTe matrix.


Single-incision thoracoscopic surgery (SITS) is not yet widely used for treating pulmonary sequestration due to the difficulty of manipulating an aberrant systemic artery or working around inflamed tissue. It is also difficult to control massive bleeding if the aberrant artery ruptures during excision. We modified the SITS lobectomy technique so that it was suitable for treating pulmonary sequestration. We changed the order of excision of anatomical structures and introduced two-stage stapling of the aberrant artery for easy, safe stapling in SITS lobectomy. Single-port VATS is an acceptable method for major pulmonary resection for the treatment of intrapulmonary sequestration.


This paper identifies the factors for adopting Enterprise Resource Planning ERP delivered as Software-as-a-Service SaaS among small and medium enterprises SMEs. The authors conducted a two phases' qualitative-methodology: interviews with 20 experts from SaaS vendor Microsoft and a case-study with executives in three organizations which implemented vendor's ERP as SaaS customers. The vendor identified 10 factors for adoption-Costs, Security, Availability, Usability, Implementation, Ubiquity, Flexibility, Compatibility, Analytics and Best-practices, where costs, security and availability were considered the most important factors. The three customers identified 3 additional factors: the trust in the Solution partner, Data integrity, and level of Integration of cloud platforms. Considering all 13 factors, Cost, trust in the Solution partner and Availability were identified as the most important for customers, which gave much less importance to the others factors. These results will help professionals and researchers to improve understanding and accelerate ERP adoption as SaaS among SMEs.


Digital transformation not only helps increase productivity, reduce costs, but also opens up new development spaces, creating new values in addition to inherent traditional values. Digital transformation in Vietnam starts with the vision of businesses, the policy of the government, the experience of the people and is entering the acceleration phase. In the implementation process, the decisive factor is the preparation of human resources. Human resources are the main force to deploy and realize digital transformation in Vietnam. The article analyzes and clarifies the existing problems that need to be resolved in order to develop human resources in digital transformation in Vietnam today. The article also summarizes the views of the Vietnamese Government on human resource development in digital transformation, according to which the policies and views of the Vietnamese Government in recent years have also made an important contribution to the development of human resources. helping Vietnam achieve positive results, including changes in awareness, digital transformation actions, strategy formulation, and improvement of institutions and policies in general, including human resource development in digital transformation. change number. The study also pointed out the shortcomings related to human resource development in digital transformation in Vietnam such as: not adhering to the principles of human resource development; lack of necessary skills to fully master digital transformation programs and other issues related to: quality of training in information technology; fierce competition among digital technology enterprises in attracting human resources; have not yet attracted high-quality human resources; lack of human resources for information security. The limitation of this study is that it has not yet analyzed the tasks and solutions for human resource development in digital transformation in Vietnam.


Multiple regression approach has been used to forecast the crop production widely. This study has been undertaken to evaluate the performance of stepwise and Lasso (Least absolute shrinkage and selection operator) regression technique in variable selection and development of wheat forecast model for crop yield using weather data and wheat yield for the period of 1984-2015, collected from IARI, New Delhi. Statistical parameters viz. R2, RMSE, and MAPE were 0.81, 195.90 and 4.54 per cent respectively with stepwise regression and 0.95, 99.27, 2.7 percentage, respectively with Lasso regression. Forecast models were validated during 2013-14 and 2014-15. Prediction errors were -8.5 and 10.14 per cent with stepwise and 1.89 and 1.64 percent with the Lasso. This shows that performance of Lasso regression is better than stepwise regression to some extent.


Peroxiredoxins (Prxs) are thiol-specific antioxidant proteins that exhibit peroxidase and peroxynitrite reductase activities involved in the reduction of reactive oxygen species. The peroxiredoxin Prx4 from the large yellow croaker Pseudosciaena crocea is a typical 2-Cys Prx with an N-terminal signal peptide. We solved the crystal structure of Prx4 at 1.90 Å and revealed an N-terminal antiparallel β-sheet that contributes to the dimer interface. Deletion of this β-sheet decreased the in vitro peroxidase activity to about 50% of the wild-type. In vivo assays further demonstrated that removal of this β-sheet led to some impairment in the ability of Prx4 to negatively regulate nuclear factor-κB (NF-κB) activity and to perform its role in anti-bacterial immunity. These results provide new insights into the structure and function relationship of a peroxiredoxin from bony fish.


A novel multi-generation system (MGS) that comprises two absorption cycles, two Rankine cycles (RCs), and a hot water (HW) production chamber is studied in this research. It is designed to utilize the waste heat from the first Rankine cycle as a thermal energy input for the second Rankine cycle and a double-effect absorption cycle (DEAC). The waste heat from the second Rankine cycle serves as heat input to a single-effect Rankine cycle. Regeneration and reheat principles are also applied to the Rankine cycles. The objective of the study is to develop an MGS without a gas cycle that can achieve higher energy and exergy efficiencies. Two concentrated solar technologies, namely, parabolic trough collectors (PTCs) and heliostats are used to power the designed system. The environmental benefit of the system is also analyzed. The energy and exergy efficiencies of the novel MGS presented in this study are 73.11% and 50.72%, respectively. The application of solar thermal technologies to power the system reduces the overall energy and exergy efficiencies, respectively, to 56.12% and 38.39% for the solar PTC and 41.89% and 29.06% for heliostats. The energy and exergy coefficient of performances (COPs) are 0.754 and 0.349 for the single-effect absorption cycle (SEAC), respectively. As much as 752.7 kg/h of CO2, 2.13 kg/h of NOx, and 4.21 kg/h of SOx will be saved from being emitted to the atmosphere.


The National Young Farmer Educational Association, Inc. (NYFEA) is the vocational student organization for those adults enrolled in agriculture classes, usually through the local vocational agriculture/agricultural education program. Since being incorporated as a non-profit, non-political educational association for agriculture in 1982, the organization has developed programs based on assumptions about the membership that may not have been true. This article reports on a doctoral study which sought to: develop a demographic profile of NYFEA members; examine involvement of NYFEA members in farm and off-farm employment; and, identify future plans of NYFEA members. A random sample was drawn of the 17,750 members nationally. A mailed questionnaire provided data for the study. NYFEA were 12 years younger than the national average for farmers; their farms were twice the size and they had a larger investment; NYFEA members sold twice the agricultural products; and, had a higher level of education than the average American farmer. Over one-third of NYFEA members worked off the farm and a majority planned to expand their farm operations. The age limitation on membership should be reexamined based on the findings of the study; demographics should be considered in developing curriculum and activities for the NYFEA.


(GNPs) protected by poly(2-ethyl-2-oxazoline) (POZ) of different molecular weights (M w = 5, 50, 200 and 500 kDa) were synthesised and characterised by dynamic light scattering, nanoparticle tracking analysis, zeta potential measurement and transmission electron microscopy. It was established that the use of POZ with 50 kDa resulted in formation of GNPs with low polydispersity while POZ with greater molecular weights led to formation of more polydisperse GNPs. Fluorescent labelling of these nanoparticles was achieved through their reaction with polyethyleneglycol dithiol (8-12 kDa) as a linker molecule with subsequent reaction with 6-(iodoacetamido) fluorescein. The fluorescent nature of obtained GNPs was confirmed by the appearance of the fluorescence peak at 510 nm that is typical for fluorescein molecules and glowing of the aqueous solution under the UV irradiaton. The fluorescently-labelled GNPs are promising tool in biomedical application to monitor the biological systems using fluorescent microscopy.


double-blind study comparing L-epinephrine and racemic 17. Pagtakhan RD, Bjelland JC, Landau LI, et al. Sex differences in epinephrine aerosols in the treatment of laryngotracheitis growth patterns of the airways and lung parenchyma in children. (croup). Pediatrics 1992;89:302-6 J Appl Physiol 1984;56:1204-10 15. Berg RB. Weight and sex of children hospitalized with infectious croup. An analysis of 850 cases. Pediatrics 1963;31:18-21 16. Kravitz H. Sex distribution of hospitalized children with acute JM, O'Donell R, Ochsenschlager DW. Prospective randomized 1965;4:454-9


Heavy metal concentrations (lead, cadmium, zinc, copper, chromium and manganese) in selected fish species from Eleyele reservoir Ibadan Oyo State South-Western Nigeria were investigated. A sample each of catfish (Clarias gariepinus), Africa pike (Hepsetus odoe) and tilapia fish (Oreochromis niloticus) from Eleyele lake Ibadan Oyo state were collected from fish farmers at the landing site early in the morning using standard procedure and transported to the laboratory within 30 minutes for laboratory analysis. Heavy metal concentration in the flesh of the fish species and water sample were analysed using atomic absorption spectrophotometer. There existed significant difference (p<0.05) in the concentration of heavy  metals in fish flesh of various fish species with that of herbivorous fish (Tilapia fish) being the highest followed by omnivorous fish (catfish), followed by piscivorous fish (H. odoe), while that of the water body was the lowest. It was concluded that fish could be considered bio-indicator of environmental contamination within the aquatic ecosystem; it also indicates that fish could be useful in estimating bioavailability of metal to freshwater biota.

 Key words: Heavy and trace metal, Clarias gariepinus, Hepsetus odoe, Oreochromis niloticus, Eleyele reservoir.


established journal Mitteilungen aus der medizinischen F"acdltat der Kcaiser licher UniversitMt zu Tokyo has in consequience ceased publication after a long and honourable career. The editors of the new journal, which has an Einglish title, Japanese Jour-nal of Medical Sciences, will publish papers written in English as well as German, which is undoubtedly a wise course. The system of dividing the journal into separate parts appears to be so far souind tllat it will make it easier for aniyone to find the papers on a subject in whlich he takes particular interest. Apparently under this scheme a number of a part will be published as soon as a sufficient amount of material has been collected. The success of the scheme will, of course, depend very largely upon the frequency with wlichl it is possible to publish numbers in this large variety of different subjects, for unless tllese can be issued with fair regularity there will be undue delay in publication. We have before us the first number of the first volume (Part IV, Phlarmacology). It is a substantial production, but the danger of the delay in publication is illustrated by the first paper, whiclh is by Dr. Seiji Ogawa, on tetania parathyreopriva; it is dated December, 1924, but duringr the past eighteen months a very large amount of important work lhas appeared on the parathyroids, and the article suffers in some degree from the delay in its publication. The niumber containis six articles, and most of tlhem come from the University of Tokyo. An article of particular interest is by Dr. K. Otsuki on the action of yellow phosplhorus on bone regeneration; he has performed a large number of experiments, and the article is illutstrated with excellenit plates; he finds that doses of pjiosp)horus too small to prodluce intoxication caiise an increase in callus forimation in fractuires and a delay in callus absorption. He concludes, therefore, that the action of phosphorus on the healing of fractures is harmful rather than helpful.


Wound dehiscence is a significant problem faced by surgeons after major abdominal surgery. In this study, it was aimed to select the best incision management system to keep the incision edges together and prevent wound opening, and infection by protecting the incision. In this study, 60 patients who underwent abdominal surgery were evaluated regarding their risk of wound dehiscence. In our clinic, high-risk cases of abdominal surgery are performed, the risk factors being ischemia along the incision line, dirty and contaminated wound, obesity, tension on the suture line, traumatization of the wound site, age at onset (> 65), body mass index (BMI) > 30, diabetes mellitus, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), immunosuppressive drug users. A prospective study protocol was planned after ASA (American Society of Anesthesiologists) physical status class assignment. Patients were divided into three groups: patients who underwent a postoperative negative-pressure therapy dressing, patients who underwent subcutaneous aspiration drainage, and patients who received standard dressing. The aim of this study was to evaluate the decompensation, surgical site infection, seroma, hospital stay and costs and to evaluate the results in the postoperative period. Sixty patients were randomized (n = 20, for each group). Thirty-one (51%) of the patients were male, and the mean age was 64.3 ± 8.9 (46-85). The mean BMI was 30.45 ± 7.2. There was no statistically significant difference (p≥0.05) between groups in terms of sex, age, and BMI. The ASA score and surgical interventions were similar between the groups. Wound dehiscence rate was 25% (n = 8), 20% (n = 6) and 3% (n = 1) for the Standard Dressing (SD), Aspiration Drainage (AD) and Negative-Pressure (NP) groups, respectively (p <0.017). Duration of hospitalization was 16.45 ± 6.6, 14.3 ± 7.4 and 8.95 ± 2.8 days (p <0.001) for SD, AD and NP groups, respectively. No statistically significant difference was found between the groups regarding other variables (p≥0.05 for all variables). Negative-pressure wound treatment is an easy, fast and practical technique which reduces lateral tension and swelling. It provides perfusion support and helps to protect the surgical field against external sources of infection.


The mobilization of workers through unionization has deep historical roots within American society; more so in the northern regions than in the southern region of this country. Despite these historical roots, some sectors of the American population (i.e., minorities in general and African Americans in particular) who have experienced various forms of discrimination have not fully participated in the unionization movement. This is especially true of the faculty in historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs). As a result of the various forms of discrimination that not only denied them meaningful participation in the labor market but restricted their economic success, and the segregation that resulted from the stereotypic views of racial minorities, the fact that HBCU faculty do not mobilize effectively on college campus through unionization is troubling. In fact, on some HBCU campuses, faculty have no mechanism to participate in the governance of their own university. With the survival and destiny of HBCUs at stake, HBCU faculty must be proactive and engaged to create their own representative voice. 2 Journal of Collective Bargaining in the Academy, Vol. 0, Iss. 9 [2014], Art. 6 http://thekeep.eiu.edu/jcba/vol0/iss9/6 Trends in Labor Management Issues 3 TRENDS IN LABOR MANAGEMENT ISSUES AT HISTORICALLY BLACK COLLEGES AND UNIVERSITIES


A new sign for the diagnosis of lipohemarthrosis on vertical beam lateral knee radiographs depends upon visualization of the joint capsule due to the presence of fat lying both within and outside of the joint. Recognition of lipohemarthrosis on routine knee radiographs may aid in the diagnosis of subtle tibial plateau fractures.


The presence of arginine vasopressin (AVP) V1 receptors on neonatal rat cardiomyocytes (NRCs) linked to processes capable of elevating intracellular free calcium ([Ca2+]i) is now firmly established. This study examined the sources and signaling involved in [Ca2+]i elevations evoked by AVP in NRCs. AVP promoted increases in both [Ca2+]i and 1,4,5-inositoltrisphosphate (IP3) levels in NRCs. The degree of [Ca2+]i elevation was less than that of angiotensin II, but greater than that of endothelin-1. Extracellular Mg2+ depletion led to diminution of the maximal [Ca2+]i response, with a rightward shift in the concentration-response curves to AVP. The phospholipase C inhibitors, D-609, NCDC, or U73122, and the IP3 receptor blocker, heparin, abolished the [Ca2+]i response to AVP. Neither cyclooxygenase inhibition with indomethacin nor PKC inhibition with staurosporine had any effect. Neither ryanodine nor caffeine, which deplete sarcoplasmic reticulum (SR) Ca2+ stores, nor ruthenium red, which inhibits both SR and mitochondrial Ca2+ stores, affected [Ca2+]i responses to AVP. The SR Ca2+ pump inhibitor, cyclopiazonic acid, abolished, and removal of extracellular Ca2+ attenuated, the response to AVP. These data indicate that activation of cardiac V1 receptors by AVP results in mobilization of Ca2+ from a distinct, non-SR, nonmitochondrial, intracellular Ca2+ pool that is Ca2+ pump replenished and IP3 sensitive. This process occurs secondary to phospholipase C (PLC)-mediated generation of IP3, requires the presence of Mg2+ and extracellular Ca2+, and occurs in a manner independent of PKC and cyclooxygenase activation. Such mechanisms of Ca2+ mobilization might indicate a distinct role for AVP in cardiac physiology and disease.


Abstract
Purpose
This chapter deals with the concept of intersectionality with particular reference to the interconnectedness of gender, class and caste discrimination in India. Even though much of the work on intersectionality has been carried out by scholars from the United States with specific emphasis on gender and race, this framework can be applied universally to understand the multiple axes of power within a society that results in further marginalisation of certain groups of women. The 16th December 2012 Nirbhaya rape case forms the core of this chapter as it resulted in one of the biggest gender movements in India.

Design/methodology/approach
In order to develop a critical analysis a case study approach was adopted and data collected by analysing online news reports, videos, articles on blogs and posts on social media outlets such as Facebook and Twitter.

Findings
The findings of the research showed interesting intersections of gender and class with relation to this case, which has not been deeply analysed in order to understand the reasons behind the public uprising which resulted in the government action.

Originality/value
It is important to look at gender violence in India through the lens of intersectionality since often it is the result of multiple levels of discrimination on the basis of class, caste, religion and geography. This is important to recognise in order to ensure that activism, education and changes in policy help to resolve problems related to extreme oppression and violence against women across the country.


Twenty-seven patients were fitted with the Durasoft contact lens and twenty-five of them were successfully wearing the lenses after three months. Evaluation of the fitting nomogram showed it to be reliable in 60% of the eyes. The lens shows excellent potential as an addition to the hydrophilic contact lens field. Of the total number of eyes that were fitted with the lens, 93% of the eyes were fit successfully when deviations from the nomogram are utilized. These deviations are noted in the discussion section.


Background : The prevalence of hookworm infection in Indonesia in 2002 - 2006 amounted to 2,4% ; 0,6% ; 5,1% ; 1,6% and 1,0%. No data reports on de-worming of DHO Purworejo. The results of a preliminary study of the month January 2014 shows the proportion of de - worming of 94,1% of the population of farmers plant nursery albasia 51 people, with the proportion of 41,2% hookworm. Methods : This study is observational analytic study with cross-sectional design. The study sample as many as 101 people, with purposive sampling. Samples taken from population studies that met the inclusion criteria (job as Albasia nursery growers, willing as respondent, place of residence in the territory of the district health center Kemiri, aged 18-64 years) and criteria exclusion (habit of consumption of raw vegetables, travel/resettled in a long time, not willing to be made respondents). Results : The proportion of patients with hookworm infection (64,3 %) or 65 people. The risk factors are shown to affect the incidence of hookworm infection among others ; wash feet after work (OR = 4,41), available toilet at work (OR = 3,77), wash hands after work (OR = 3,74) and wear footwear when working (OR = 3,56). Conclusion : Several risk factors that influence the incidence of hookworm infection in nursery growers in the district albasia hazelnut is to wash the feet after work, lack of latrines in the workplace, wash hands after work and do not use footwear when working with a probability of 99,03%.


5,10,15,20-tetra(4-aminophenyl)porphyrinatocopper(II) [CuTAP] was covalently linked via amide bond with SWCNTs. Notable changes in the FT-IR spectra reveal the covalent linking of the porphyrin chromophore with SWCNTs. Further, covalent functionalization was confirmed by the hypsochromic shift of this nano-hybrid in the UV-visible spectra as compared to that of pristine CuTAP. 38 % weight loss observed in the TGA due to the extent of Cu-TAP functionalization. Morphology study of this nano-hybrid reveals the tubular structure, which is retained even after covalent functionalization. SWCNT-CuTAP nano-hybrid shows the hypsochromic shift and hypochromic shift compared to reported TAP or Zn-TAP due to Cu metal ion substitution.


OBJECTIVE
To compare the cortical mechanisms associated with visual spatial attention directed by location cues and Chinese character cues.

METHOD
Eleven healthy adults (mean age=19) with normal vision served as the subjects. In experiment I, the cue was a circle with black solid line. There were three cue sizes: small, medium and large. In experiment II, three black concentric circles were presented as background, their diameters were the same as the three cues used in experiment I. The cue was one of three Chinese characters small, medium or large respectively. The task of the subjects was to discriminate the target's orientation.

RESULT
RT in experiment II was longer with short ISI. The anterosuperior N1 amplitude elicited by the cue in experiment II was larger than that in experiment I. The inferoposterior P1 latency in experiment II was longer than that in experiment I. Comparing the target evoked ERP, the inferoposterior P1 and N1, latency of experiment II was longer than that in experiment I, the inferoposterior P2 amplitude in experiment II was larger than that in experiment I.

CONCLUSION
The processing of Chinese cue takes place at higher level functional brain regions compared to processing of location cue. The later requires more resource in the earlier stage of cue process and less in the subsequent stage of the task.


There is an opportunity for using digital maps with real-time updates to improve the energy management of vehicles. In this paper, we present research on how this can be achieved in the particular case of plug-in hybrid electric vehicles. With perfect knowledge of the trip ahead, it is possible to find the optimal control of the vehicle. Digital maps, however, provide only averaged information about the future itinerary, such as locations of stops, types of intersection, and average speeds. First, we demonstrate how we can generate naturalistic speed profiles for a given itinerary. We do so by augmenting the information from digital maps by actual recorded speeds from a travel survey and Markov chains. Second, we detail how these speed profiles can be used for control optimization. We use the Pontryagin minimum principle to optimally tune the vehicle energy management and then evaluate the actual fuel savings using the Autonomie simulation tool.


With the rapid development of machine learning in the medical cloud system, cloud-assisted medical computing provides a concrete platform for remote rapid medical diagnosis services. Support vector machine (SVM), as one of the important algorithms of machine learning, has been widely used in the field of medical diagnosis for its high classification accuracy and efficiency. In some existing schemes, healthcare providers train diagnostic models with SVM algorithms and provide online diagnostic services to doctors. Doctors send the patient's case report to the diagnostic models to obtain the results and assist in clinical diagnosis. However, case report involves patients' privacy, and patients do not want their sensitive information to be leaked. Therefore, the protection of patient's privacy has become an important research direction in the field of online medical diagnosis. In this paper, we propose a privacy-preserving medical diagnosis scheme based on multi-class SVMs. The scheme is based on the distributed two trapdoors public key cryptosystem (DT-PKC) and Boneh-Goh-Nissim (BGN) cryptosystem. We design a secure computing protocol to compute the core process of the SVM classification algorithm. Our scheme can deal with both linearly separable data and nonlinear data while protecting the privacy of user data and support vectors. The results show that our scheme is secure, reliable, scalable with high accuracy.


In this paper we develop some connections between the partial metrics of Matthews and the topological aspects of domain theory. We do this by introducing the valuation spaces, which are a special class of partial metric spaces. We develop the natural duality of partial metrics and propose that a natural context in which to view a partial metric space is as a bitopological space. We then see that successive conditions on a valuation can ensure that the pmetric topology is first of all order consistent (with the underlying poser), then equivalent to the Scott topology, and finally that the induced metric topology is equivalent to the patch topology.


Legislative requirements like those in the Sarbanes-Oxley Act have sharply increased the incidence of monitoring of electronic communications, but the consequences of this trend are little understood. This study examines the impact of organizational monitoring of sensitive instant message (IM) discussions with a designed experiment. When their IMs are known to be monitored, individuals are found to sharply curtail their discussion of personally incriminating information and to increase their spontaneous denials of knowledge of sensitive topics. Surprisingly, perhaps, they also increase their discussion of relayed information that may incriminate others or the organization. Qualitative analysis suggests that people are not aware they make these adjustments to their IM communication content when monitored. Given the legislative compliance motivations for some of the monitoring activity in companies, it is ironic that study findings suggest organizations may communicate less firsthand information about potentially curtailable legal liabilities and other sensitive incidents requiring corrective action when communication is monitored. Organizations enacting monitoring of IM should pay heed to the requirements as well as the discretion available to them within those requirements to enact monitoring in a way that suits their organizational goals.


Developing a reliable and practical face recognition system is a long-standing goal in computer vision research. Existing literature suggests that pixel-wise face alignment is the key to achieve high-accuracy face recognition. By assuming a human face as piece-wise planar surfaces, where each surface corresponds to a facial part, we develop in this paper a Constrained Part-based Alignment (CPA) algorithm for face recognition across pose and/or expression. Our proposed algorithm is based on a trainable CPA model, which learns appearance evidence of individual parts and a tree-structured shape configuration among different parts. Given a probe face, CPA simultaneously aligns all its parts by fitting them to the appearance evidence with consideration of the constraint from the tree-structured shape configuration. This objective is formulated as a norm minimization problem regularized by graph likelihoods. CPA can be easily integrated with many existing classifiers to perform part-based face recognition. Extensive experiments on benchmark face datasets show that CPA outperforms or is on par with existing methods for robust face recognition across pose, expression, and/or illumination changes.


Telomerase reverse transcriptase (TERT) promoter (pTERT) mutation has often been described as a late event in gliomagenesis and it has been suggested as a prognostic biomarker in gliomas other than 1p19q codeleted tumors. However, the characteristics of isocitrate dehydrogenase (IDH) wild type (wt) (IDHwt), pTERTwt glioblastomas are not well known. We recruited 72 adult IDHwt, pTERTwt glioblastomas and performed methylation profiling, targeted sequencing, and fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH) for TERT structural rearrangement and ALT (alternative lengthening of telomeres). There was no significant difference in overall survival (OS) between our cohort and a the Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) cohort of IDHwt, pTERT mutant (mut) glioblastomas, suggesting that pTERT mutation on its own is not a prognostic factor among IDHwt glioblastomas. Epigenetically, the tumors clustered into classic‐like (11%), mesenchymal‐like (32%), and LGm6‐glioblastoma (GBM) (57%), the latter far exceeding the corresponding proportion seen in the TCGA cohort of IDHwt, pTERTmut glioblastomas. LGm6‐GBM‐clustered tumors were enriched for platelet derived growth factor receptor alpha (PDGFRA) amplification or mutation (p = 0.008), and contained far fewer epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) amplification (p < 0.01), 10p loss (p = 0.001) and 10q loss (p < 0.001) compared with cases not clustered to this group. LGm6‐GBM cases predominantly showed ALT (p = 0.038). In the whole cohort, only 35% cases showed EGFR amplification and no case showed combined chromosome +7/−10. Since the cases were already pTERTwt, so the three molecular properties of EGFR amplification, +7/−10, and pTERT mutation may not cover all IDHwt glioblastomas. Instead, EGFR and PDGFRA amplifications covered 67% and together with their mutations covered 71% of cases of this cohort. Homozygous deletion of cyclin dependent kinase inhibitor 2A (CDKN2A)/B was associated with a worse OS (p = 0.031) and was an independent prognosticator in multivariate analysis (p = 0.032). In conclusion, adult IDHwt, pTERTwt glioblastomas show epigenetic clustering different from IDHwt, pTERTmut glioblastomas, and IDHwt glioblastomas which are pTERTwt may however not show EGFR amplification or +7/−10 in a significant proportion of cases. CDKN2A/B deletion is a poor prognostic biomarker in this group.


Many studies have proven the positive impacts of student mobility on learner development. In general, student mobility may take place in two main forms: (1) learning abroad for a degree; (2) short-term mobility with a duration from some days to some weeks under different activities such as credit transfer, faculty-led study tour, and internship. In reality, the number of short-term mobility programs has dramatically increased globally to meet the needs of those who cannot afford overseas degree programs for financial, medical, family reasons, or the like. While learning abroad for degrees is relatively suitable to some specific learners, the above-mentioned mobility activities are generally easier for schools to organize, more accessible to learners as well as contribute significantly to student holistic development. Students of the University of Economics and Law, especially those in high-quality programs, are expected and encouraged to participate in different kinds of short-term student mobility programs. This paper focuses on presenting the impacts of short-term student mobility on student holistic development, illustrating the best practices from the University of Economics and Law and suggests some implications to foster short-term mobility in higher education institutions.


Despite the fact that reserves still have a small impact on the final electricity price, the rapid irruption of renewable and interruptible technologies has put in the spotlight the value of these services. It seems therefore important to rely on market models able to output realistic energy and reserve prices under imperfect competition. However, few are the authors that have modeled strategic behavior in both commodities. This paper presents an hourly multi-period oligopolistic model for energy and reserve markets, with units' commitment decisions and hydro-coordination, based on the conjectural supply function equilibrium. Its outputs have been compared with real Spanish data from the first weeks of 2011 with satisfactory results.


Surgeons commonly need to treat patients receiving anticoagulant and anti‐platelet therapy. This requires risk assessment and management to balance minimization of bleeding complications and avoidance of further ischaemic or thrombotic events. This review considers the evidence available to guide management of patients on anti‐platelet and anticoagulant therapy, including some of the new classes of anti‐platelets and anticoagulants which clinicians may be less familiar with.


With the rapid proliferation of the DC distribution systems, special attentions are paid to the photovoltaic (PV) generations. This paper addresses the problem of maximum power point tracking (MPPT) for PV systems using a local neuro fuzzy (LNF) network and steepest descent (SD) optimization algorithm. The proposed approach, termed LNF + SD, first identifies a valid an accurate model for the PV system using the LNF network and through measurement data. Then the identified PV model is used for MPPT by SD optimization algorithm. The salient modeling abilities of the proposed LNF network results in a reliable and dependable PV model which takes voltage, temperature and insolation variations into account. The proposed approach is evaluated using several identification and MPPT simulations. The simulation results showed the accuracy of the LNF network in modeling of PV systems. Furthermore, simulations carried out for assessment of the MPPT performance during insolation transients demonstrated the high efficiency of the proposed LNF + SD approach for MPPT applications. Performance of the proposed method MPPT, while the PV array was supplying loads through DC-DC converters was also analyzed. Comparisons to the perturb-and-observe (P&O) and fuzzy logic methods revealed the superiority of the proposed approach.


Background Sustainability of treatment is important to consider when selecting a therapy for chronic conditions such as RA. Sustainability is a useful clinical marker for both long-term efficacy and safety. A recently published randomized controlled trial has demonstrated similar efficacy and safety profiles between abatacept (ABA) and adalimumab over 2 years.1,2 Objectives To assess the long-term sustainability of ABA and anti-TNFs following treatment failure with a conventional synthetic DMARD (csDMARD) in comparable cohorts of patients (pts) with RA. Methods Data from pts with RA seen at two tertiary centres and prescribed either ABA or a TNF inhibitor (adalimumab, certolizumab, etanercept, golimumab or infliximab) as their first biologic (b)DMARD after 1 January 2006 were extracted from the RHUMADATA® registry. The choice of therapy was a joint decision between the pt and the treating physician. Pts were followed until either they discontinued treatment, were lost to follow-up or the cut-off date of 9 January 2017. Pt baseline characteristics were compared using descriptive statistics and the cumulative incidence of biologic agent discontinuation using Kaplan-Meier methods. Overall differences in the discontinuation rates of biologic agents were tested using the log-rank test. Results Overall, 641 pts met study criteria; 82 pts received ABA and 559 TNF inhibitors (adalimumab=136, certolizumab=52, etanercept=226, golimumab=88 and infliximab=57) as first-line treatment following inadequate response to csDMARDs. No clinically significant differences in baseline characteristics were noted between treatment groups. Most pts were diagnosed after January 2000 (72.5%) and were women (77.5%). Average age at diagnosis was 47.1 (SD=13.4) years, with a mean disease duration of 7.2 (7.8) years, and a mean CDAI of 43.1 (32.5) at baseline. No significant differences in retention rates were observed in the ABA and anti-TNF groups (Table, Figure). On average, pts treated with anti-TNFs and ABA maintained their treatment for 1.59 (1.91) and 1.90 (2.08) years, respectively. Lack of efficacy (47.6%) and adverse effects (22.0%) were the most commonly cited reasons for treatment discontinuation.Table 1. Retention of the first bDMARD TNFi Abatacept Biologic retention probability at*:  12 Months 71.66% (1.92%) 70.71% (5.15%)  24 Months 59.85% (2.11%) 62.16% (5.60%)  60 Months 44.28% (2.26%) 48.37% (6.75%)  96 Months 35.29% (2.46%) 41.17% (7.43%) bDMARD retention time (years)  Mean (SE) 4.83 (0.18) 4.71 (0.45)  Lower quartile, (95% CI) 0.86 (0.72–1.00) 0.86 (0.50–1.24)  Median, (95% CI) 3.83 (2.87–4.67) 4.53 (2.34-++) *% (% standard error) survival. Conclusions Abatacept and TNF inhibitors demonstrate similar sustainability at 8-year, supporting studies1,2 that demonstrate that abatacept used after csDMARDs inadequate response is as safe and effective as a TNF targeting agents in the long term. References Schiff M, et al. Ann Rheum Dis 2014;73:86–94. Schiff M, et al. Ann Rheum Dis 2008;67:1096–1103. Disclosure of Interest D. Choquette Consultant for: BMS, Speakers bureau: BMS, L. Bessette Grant/research support from: Amgen, BMS, Janssen, Roche, UCB, AbbVie, Pfizer, Merck, Celgene, Sanofi, Lilly, Novartis, Consultant for: BMS, Janssen, Roche, UCB, AbbVie, Pfizer, Celgene, Lilly, Novartis, E. Alemao Shareholder of: BMS, Employee of: BMS, B. Haraoui Grant/research support from: BMS, Janssen, Roche, Consultant for: Abbvie, Amgen, BMS, Celgene, Janssen, Merck, Pfizer, Roche, Sandoz, UCB, Speakers bureau: Pfizer, UCB, F. Massicotte: None declared, M. Mtibaa Shareholder of: BMS, Employee of: BMS, E. Muratti Employee of: BMS, J.-P. Pelletier: None declared, R. Postema Shareholder of: BMS, Employee of: BMS, J.-P. Raynauld Speakers bureau: AbbVie, Amgen, BMS, Janssen, Pfizer, Roche, Sanofi, Novartis, UCB, M.-A. Rémillard: None declared, D. Sauvageau: None declared, A. Turcotte Consultant for: Amgen, Abbvie, BMS, Celegene, Janssen, Roche, Pfizer, Lilly, Novartis, Merck, Sanofi, UCB, Speakers bureau: Amgen, Abbvie, BMS, Celegene, Janssen, Roche, Pfizer, Lilly, Novartis, Merck, Έ. Villeneuve Consultant for: Celgene, Cimzia, Pfizer, Speakers bureau: Abbvie, Roche, BMS, L. Coupal: None declared


In the cellulosic ethanol process, furfural, 5‐hydroxymethylfurfural (HMF), and acetic acid are formed during the high temperature acidic pretreatment step needed to convert biomass into fermentable sugars. These compounds can inhibit cellulase enzymes and fermentation organisms at relatively low concentrations (≥1 g/L). Effective removal of these inhibitory compounds would allow the use of more severe pretreatment conditions to improve sugar yields and lead to more efficient fermentations; if recovered and purified, they could also be sold as valuable by‐products. This study investigated the separation of aldhehydes (furfural and HMF) and organic acid (acetic acid) inhibitory compounds from simple aqueous solutions by using polyethyleneimene (PEI), a soluble cationic polyelectrolyte. PEI added to simple solutions of each inhibitor at a ratio of 1 mol of functional group to 1 mol inhibitor removed up to 89.1, 58.6, and 81.5 wt% of acetic acid, HMF, and furfural, respectively. Furfural and HMF were recovered after removal by washing the polyelectrolyte/inhibitor complex with dilute sulfuric acid solution. Recoveries up to 81.0 and 97.0 wt% were achieved for furfural and HMF, respectively. The interaction between PEI and acetic acid was easily disrupted by the addition of chloride ions, sulfate ions, or hydroxide ions. The use of soluble polymers for the removal and recovery of inhibitory compounds from biomass slurries is a promising approach to enhance the efficiency and economics of an envisioned biorefinery. Biotechnol. Bioeng. 2011;108:2046–2052. © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.