Background: The pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 has emerged as one of the biggest health threats of our generation. Since its outbreak, COVID-19 has been showing many typical and some atypical manifestations. One of the common complications in COVID-19 is delirium. Delirium should be detected at the earliest to reduce mortality in COVID-19. Methods: We prospectively studied hospitalized adult (age ≥ 18 years) patients with confirmed COVID-19 from May 1 to May 31, 2021, at GMERS Medical College and Civil Hospital, Sola, Ahmedabad, India. We included all patients suffering from COVID-19 and diagnosed with delirium in the study. Delirium was assessed using the Confusion Assessment Method and Richmond Agitation Sedation Scale. Follow-up was done for delirium patients on days 0, 5, 10, and 30. Results: We included 1,233 patients in the analysis. The incidence of delirium was found 2.43% in which 63.3% were hypoactive delirium while 36.7% were hypoactive delirium presentation. The mean age ± standard deviation of delirium patients was 68.33 ± 14.67 years (range = 46-92) years, and 20 (66.7%) were male and 10 (33.3%) were female. The result of the study also showed statistical significance between deaths in patients of confirmed cases of COVID-19 with delirium (93.33%) than patients of confirmed cases of COVID-19 without delirium (12.38%, p < 0.001). Conclusion: The presence of delirium was associated with increased risk of mortality in hospitalized adults with COVID-19.


A method of inducing sustained airway eosinophilia and airway hyperresponsiveness in primates has been developed. Our method utilizes a series of intratracheal instillations of Ascaris suum-coated sepharose 4B beads (3 x 10(5] administered once a week for four weeks. Five cynomolgus monkeys (Macaca fascicularis) demonstrating a naturally occurring skin and respiratory sensitivity to Ascaris suum extract were studied. Airway cell composition was measured by bronchoalveolar lavage (BAL), and airway responsiveness was determined as the bronchoconstrictor response to inhaled methacholine. Ascaris suum bead administration resulted in a transient increase in total cells recovered by BAL (2.4 +/- 0.4 to 8.7 +/- 2.5 x 10(5) cells/ml, p less than 0.05) and a selective increase in BAL eosinophils (17 +/- 6 to 916 +/- 158 x 10(3) cells/ml, p less than 0.05). Increases in airway responsiveness were concurrent with the increase in airway eosinophils. These observations show that airway eosinophilia is associated with airway hyperresponsiveness in primates. Furthermore, this new model is a novel experimental system in which the underlying mechanisms in the pathogenesis of airway hyperresponsiveness can be investigated.


As the sole issuer of bank notes, the Bank of Canada conducts Methods-of-Payment (MOP) surveys to obtain a detailed and representative snapshot of Canadian payment choices, with a focus on cash usage. The 2017 MOP Survey is the third iteration. This paper finds that the overall cash volume and value shares are 33 per cent and 15 per cent, respectively. These results highlight the ongoing decrease of cash usage in terms of volume and value compared with 2009 (54 per cent and 23 per cent, respectively) and 2013 (44 per cent and 23 per cent, respectively). Consumers still rate cash as an easy-to-use, low-cost, secure and widely accepted payment method, and it is commonly used among respondents who are aged 55 and above, have an income of less than $45,000, have only a high school education, or have a low rate of financial literacy. The paper also provides comprehensive details on Canadians' adoption and use of payment innovations such as contactless credit and debit cards, as well as mobile and online payments.


Objective: To determine the growth characteristics in children with congenital adrenal hyperplasia visiting tertiary care hospital Karachi.
Study Design: Cross-Sectional study.
Place and Duration of Study: Paediatrics Department, National Institute of Child Health, Karachi Pakistan, from Nov 2018 to May 2019.
Methodology: All patients who visited the OPD were included in the study. Growth characteristics like underweight, normal BMI, overweight, obese and short stature were recorded. This information, along with the age of diagnosis, family history of CAH, parental consanguinity, family history of CAH or any abortion or prenatal death, were noted.
Results: The mean age of the patients was 7.40±2.34 years. Out of 69 congenital adrenal hyperplasia patients, 41(59.4%) were males, and 28(40.6%) were females. The short suture was noted in 53(76.8%) patients. 19(27.5%) were underweight, 6(8.7%) were normal weight, 10(14.5%) were overweight, and 34(49.3%) patients w ere obese.
Conclusion: A significant effect of congenital adrenal hyperplasia was documented in the children.


After centuries of use in obstetrics, have forceps and vacuum deliveries become a dying art? Contemporary trends in operative vaginal delivery show increasing numbers of vacuum deliveries and decreasing numbers of forceps deliveries worldwide. Primary drivers of such trends include concerns over neonatal and maternal safety as well as fewer clinicians skilled in forcep use. Current literature reports a comparable efficacy rate for the two instruments, as well as a decrease in maternal morbidity compared with cesarean section. It has also been suggested that the neonatal morbidity once associated with operative vaginal delivery may actually be a function of an abnormal labor process itself, rather than a consequence of an operative vaginal intervention. Both the American College and the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists continue to support the use of both vacuum and forceps and strongly encourage residency programs to incorporate the teaching of these skills into their curricula.


Molecularly imprinted uniform-sized poly(4VP-co-EGDMA) microgels were prepared from 4-vinyl pyridine (4VP) monomer and ethylene glycol dimethacrylate (EGDMA) as crosslinking agent using monodisperse linear polystyrene seed particles by multi-step swelling polymerization method.The polymerization conditions were chosen in such a way that the formation of solution complexes between 4VP and the template (N-protected amino acid) prior to polymerization would be favored. The effects of polymerization parameters such as weight ratio of the monomer/seed and diluent/monomer, the concentration of crosslinking agent on the average particle size and pore size distribution were investigated.The molecularly imprinted polymer microgels were utilized as a stationary phase in HPLC. In the chromatographic mode, resolution of the enantiomers of Cbz-L,D-aspartic acid (Cbz: carbobenzoxy) were resolved with the imprinted polymer.


Background US president Joe Biden signed an executive action directing federal agencies to combat hate crimes and racism against Asians, which have percolated during the COVID-19 pandemic. This is one of the first known empirical studies to dynamically test whether global societal sentiments toward Asians have become more negative during the COVID-19 pandemic. Objective This study aimed to investigate whether global societal sentiments toward Asians across 20 countries have become more negative, month by month, from before the pandemic (October 2019) to May 2020, along with the pandemic (incidence and mortality rates) and cultural (Hofstede's cultural dimensions) predictors of this trend. Methods We leveraged a 12-billion-word web-based media database, with over 30 million newspaper and magazine articles taken from over 7000 sites across 20 countries, and identified 6 synonyms of "Asian" that are related to the coronavirus. We compiled their most frequently used descriptors (collocates) from October 2019 to May 2020 across 20 countries, culminating in 85,827 collocates that were rated by 2 independent researchers to provide a Cumulative Asian Sentiment Score (CASS) per month. This allowed us to track significant shifts in societal sentiments toward Asians from a baseline period (October to December 2019) to the onset of the pandemic (January to May 2020). We tested the competing predictors of this trend: pandemic variables of incidence and mortality rates measured monthly for all 20 countries taken from the Oxford COVID-19 Government Response Tracker, and Hofstede's Cultural Dimensions of Individualism, Power Distance, Uncertainty Avoidance, and Masculinity for the 20 countries. Results Before the pandemic in December 2019, Jamaica and New Zealand evidenced the most negative societal sentiments toward Asians; when news about the coronavirus was released in January 2020, the United States and Nigeria evidenced the most negative sentiments toward Asians among 20 countries. Globally, sentiments of Asians became more negative—a significant linear decline during the COVID-19 pandemic. CASS trended neutral before the pandemic during the baseline period of October to November 2019 and then plummeted in February 2020. CASS were, ironically, not predicted by COVID-19's incidence and mortality rates, but rather by Hofstede's cultural dimensions: individualism, power distance, and uncertainty avoidance—as shown by mixed models (N=28,494). Specifically, higher power distance, individualism, and uncertainty avoidance were associated with negative societal sentiments toward Asians. Conclusions Racism, in the form of Anti-Asian sentiments, are deep-seated, and predicated on structural undercurrents of culture. The COVID-19 pandemic may have indirectly and inadvertently exacerbated societal tendencies for racism. Our study lays the important groundwork to design interventions and policy communications to ameliorate Anti-Asian racism, which are culturally nuanced and contextually appropriate.


This paper presents a case study in the development of a business simulation designed around the currently available Business Management Laboratory (BML). The paper explores the background of using BML, discusses systems modifications required and describes the results obtained so far from transforming BML into a new generation model.


The impact of the source resistance (RS) on the linearity of AlGaN/GaN high electron mobility transistors (HEMTs) measured by the two-tone test was investigated. The theoretical analysis of the third-order intermodulation (IM3) and the third-order intercept point (IP3) of the devices was performed based on the equivalent circuit approach and the polynomial curve fitting technique. The results revealed that the suppression of IM3 level and thus the improvement of IP3 were achieved for the device with a larger RS. For the experimental verifications, three types of AlGaN/GaN HEMTs were fabricated with different layout structures and air-bridge architectures corresponding to different RS values, which were then extracted by the cold-FET method. It is concluded that a device with a shorter length of middle source pad (LMS) and a side-type air-bridge architecture tends to have a larger RS value. In this study, the 4×50-20 device with LMS of 20 um and a side-type air-bridge architecture demonstrated the best-measured linearity performance at 30 GHz due to the largest RS.


Simultaneous-masked psychophysical tuning curves were measured with narrow-band noise maskers varying in bandwidth from 40 Hz to 800 Hz to determine the masker bandwidths at which combination-band detection cues no longer influence tuning-curve shapes. Tuning curves were obtained at 1000 and 4000 Hz from normal-hearing listeners using high-level (60 dB SPL) probe tones in quiet and in the presence of a broadband background noise to eliminate combination bands and other off-frequency listening cues that exist at high levels. High-level tuning curves revealed notches on the low-frequency sides. Those notches were eliminated with broad-band background noise, which indicates that combination bands can strongly influence the shapes of high-level tuning curves obtained with narrow-band maskers, primarily by steepening the low-frequency and tail slopes. Combination-band detection cues had a stronger influence at 4000 Hz than at 1000 Hz. As masker bandwidth increased, combination bands had less influence on tuning-curve shapes. These results suggest a possible relation between masker bandwidth and auditory critical bandwidth: combination bands affected the low-frequency sides of the tuning curves only when the masker bandwidth was less than the auditory critical bandwidth.


The article proves that a systematic approach to the urban organization of coastal areas includes complex environmental and recreational tasks. The study examines in detail the need to create a comprehensive strategy for the restoration of the coastal zone. The complex of measures is substantiated, among which the activation of water protection functions of coastal areas, rehabilitation of disturbed territories, use of recreational and town-planning potential of coastal territories for formation of recreational base along water area, development of integrated system of management of processes of coastal zones and integration of ecosystems.
The work separately highlights the possibility of creating a recreational cluster that will ensure the continuity of the natural framework, given the multi-vector formation of the urban environment. It is established, that the connection of the recreational cluster with the suburban green strip and water area will create a pedestrian recreational corridor in the city and beyond, as well as contribute to the greening of the city and influence the modeling of ecological infrastructure.


Community of Practice, a community-engagement method that encourages a group of people to interact regularly towards a common goal, may promote satisfying experiences in patient-outcomes research among marginalized populations. Peer support specialists are increasingly being involved in peer-informed mental health research due to their lived experiences of mental illness and are an asset in co-designing healthcare programs along with researchers. In 2015, ten scientists and ten mental health service users joined as a Community of Practice that trained to engage in patient-centered outcomes research. The group has so far has presented at 20 conferences, published three book chapters and 30 peer-reviewed publications, and developed two smartphone applications. Of note are the co-production of a smartphone application, a digital peer support certification program, an app decision support tool, and an instrument to assess the value of patient-research partnerships. Future research will assess the feasibility of incorporating more stakeholders to enhance research outcomes.


Purpose To summarize the clinical characteristics, treatment and outcomes of transplant recipients infected with Talaromyces marneffei (TM). Materials and Methods A retrospective analysis was performed on 2 patients with Talaromycosis marneffei (TSM) and transplants at the First Affiliated Hospital of Guangxi Medical University, and a systematic literature review was conducted simultaneously. Results This article reported two patients after kidney transplantation who developed fever, cough within 3–4 months. Their haemoglobin was decreased. Their chest computed tomography (CT) showed nodules. TM was detected in their blood or bronchoalveolar lavage fluid samples by next-generation sequencing (NGS). After antifungal treatment with voriconazole (VOR), one patient worsened, the other patient died. A total of 21 patients with TSM after transplants were reported in the literature review. Fourteen underwent kidney transplantation, 4 underwent liver transplantation, 2 underwent lung transplantation, and 1 underwent bone marrow transplantation. The median time from initiating the postoperative immunosuppressive therapy to the onset of symptoms or disease changes was 18 (0.5–140) months. Among them, 9 patients developed fever, 7 patients developed cough or expectoration and 4 patients developed dyspnoea. Haemoglobin was decreased in 10 patients. Pulmonary nodules were found in 7 patients. Among the 21 patients, 7 were diagnosed by positive culture, 6 by biopsy, 5 by culture and biopsy. Of the 21 patients, 13 patients improved by antifungal therapy, 8 patients worsened or died. Seven patients who received amphotericin B followed by itraconazole (ITR) therapy all improved. Regarding the use of immunosuppressants in 12 patients, 9 patients had to discontinue or reduce their medications (6 patients improved, 3 patients worsened or died). Conclusion Patients with TSM after transplant often have disseminated infections, involving the respiratory, hematopoietic and so on. Fever, cough, decreased haemoglobin and pulmonary nodules often occur approximately 18 months after surgery. The combined applications of culture, biopsy, NGS are helpful for an early diagnosis. Antifungal therapy with amphotericin B followed by itraconazole is recommended, and the dosage of the immunosuppressant should be adjusted timely.


BACKGROUND
The aim of this longitudinal study was to try and improve the specificity of carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA) and carbohydrate antigen (CA) 19-9 in monitoring tumor recurrence in patients with resectable gastric adenocarcinoma by setting suitable elevation levels.

METHODS
One hundred eighty-one patients with resectable gastric adenocarcinoma were considered. Serum samples were obtained preoperatively and every 3 months postoperatively.

RESULTS
Preoperative CEA and CA19-9 positivity rates were 19.9% and 18.2%. The specificity and sensitivity of CEA elevation to monitor recurrence were 92.9% and 23.4% versus 76.5% and 78.9% in CEA-negative versus CEA-positive patients, respectively. For CA19-9 the specificity and sensitivity were 95.0% and 18.8% versus 60.0% and 83.3% in CA19-9-negative versus CA19-9-positive patients, respectively. When we set the elevation level of CEA at 5 ng/mL, the specificity of CEA elevation to monitor recurrence increased to 94.1% for CEA-positive patients. The specificity increased to 93.3% for CA19-9-positive patients when the CA19-9 elevation level was set at 100 U/mL.

CONCLUSIONS
For CEA- or CA19-9-positive patients with resectable gastric adenocarcinoma we can increase the specificity of CEA and CA19-9 by setting the elevation level of CEA at 5 ng/mL and CA19-9 at 100 U/mL.


We introduce a learning-based method to reconstruct objects acquired in a casual handheld scanning setting with a depth camera. Our method is based on two core components. First, a deep network that provides a semantic segmentation and labeling of the frames of an input RGBD sequence. Second, an alignment and reconstruction method that employs the semantic labeling to reconstruct the acquired object from the frames. We demonstrate that the use of a semantic labeling improves the reconstructions of the objects, when compared to methods that use only the depth information of the frames. Moreover, since training a deep network requires a large amount of labeled data, a key contribution of our work is an active self-learning framework to simplify the creation of the training data. Specifically, we iteratively predict the labeling of frames with the neural network, reconstruct the object from the labeled frames, and evaluate the confidence of the labeling, to incrementally train the neural network while requiring only a small amount of user-provided annotations. We show that this method enables the creation of data for training a neural network with high accuracy, while requiring only little manual effort.


We introduce a new model for elliptic fibrations endowed with a Mordell-Weil group of rank one. We call it a Q$_7(\mathscr{L},\mathscr{S})$ model.
It naturally generalizes several previous models of elliptic fibrations popular in the F-theory literature. The model is also explicitly smooth, thus relevant physical quantities can be computed in terms of topological invariants in straight manner. Since the general fiber is defined by a cubic curve, basic arithmetic operations on the curve can be done using the chord-tangent group law. We will use this model to determine the spectrum of singular fibers of an elliptic fibration of rank one and compute a generating function for its Euler characteristic. With a view toward string theory, we determine a semi-stable degeneration which is understood as a weak coupling limit in F-theory. We show that it satisfies a non-trivial topological relation at the level of homological Chern classes. This relation ensures that the D3 charge in F-theory is the same as the one in the weak coupling limit.


3. According to the United Nations, there were 703 million persons aged 65 or over in the world in 2019. That number is projected to double, to 1.5 billion, by 2050. Globally, the share of the population aged 65 years or over increased from 6 per cent in 1990 to 9 per cent in 2019. That proportion is projected to rise further and, by 2050, it is expected that 16 per cent of the global population, or one in six people, will be aged 65 or over.1 In 2018, it was projected that, in 2020, the number of people over the age of 60 would be greater than the number of children under the age of 5, for the first time ever.2


This paper presents a power-smoothing scheme of a variable-speed wind turbine generator (VSWTG) that employs separate control gains for the over-frequency section (OFS) and under-frequency section (UFS). In the proposed scheme, an additional proportional control loop based on the system frequency deviation operating in conjunction with maximum power point tracking operation is used. In the OFS, to improve the energy-storing capability, the scheme suggests the gain of the frequency deviation control loop, which is set to be monotonously decreasing with the rotor speed while being significantly larger than that in the UFS. In the UFS, to improve the energy-releasing capability while preventing over-deceleration, the gain of the frequency deviation control loop is set to be a linear function of the rotor speed. The simulation results under continuously varying wind speeds with different wind patterns and wind speeds clearly demonstrate that the proposed scheme significantly mitigates the output power fluctuations of a VSWTG. The proposed scheme keeps the frequency within a narrow range, thereby reducing the required primary frequency control reserve for regulating the frequency under normal operations.


Relationships between speed choice and crash occurrence have been difficult to identify. This work examines vehicle speeds (and their variations) derived from single loop detectors for several Southern California freeways, within and across freeway lanes, together with corresponding crash data. While a variety of factors clearly influence speed and speed variance, there is no evidence in these crash data sets, and observations of their corresponding series of 30-second traffic conditions, that speeds or their variation trigger crashes.


Using density functional
theory, the adsorption of CO, CO2, NO and CO2 gas
molecules on different chiralities and diameters of single carbon nanotubes is
investigated in terms of energetic, electronic properties and surface
reactivity. We found that the adsorption of CO and CO2 gas molecules
is dependent on the chiralities and diameters of CNTs and it is vice versa for
NO and NO2 gas molecules. Also, the electronic character of CNTs is
not affected by the adsorption of CO and CO2 gas molecules while it
is strongly affected by NO and NO2 gas molecules. In addition, it is
found that the dipole moments of zig-zag CNTs are always higher than the
arm-chair CNTs. Therefore, we conclude that the zig-zag carbon nanotubes are more
preferred as gas sensors than the arm-chair carbon nanotubes, especially for
detecting NO and NO2 gas molecules.


Purpose: Combined organ resection is a common operation in gastric cancer surgery. The aim of this study is to investigate the risk of combined minor organ resection (GB, gynecologic organ, appendix etc) in gastric cancer surgery. Methods: The clinical data from 673 consecutive patients who underwent gastrectomy for gastric cancer at a single center were retrospectively analyzed. We investigated clinical data between open groups (OG) and laparoscopy groups (LAG), and we divided the patients into 3 groups: no resection group, minor organ resection group and major organ (spleen, pancreas, and colon) resection group. Results: There were higher complication rates in major organ resection group (59.3%, 53.8%) than no resection (32.3%, 19.1%) or minor organ resection groups (38.7%, 20%) both in OG and LAG (P<0.05). However, there were longer hospital stays in minor (22.2 days) and major resection groups (24.1) than no resection group (16.2) in OG, but stays were longer in major resection group (30.9) than minor (14.5) and no resection group (16.2) in LAG (P<0.01). Operative times were longer in minor (287 min) and major organ resection group (310) than no resection group (243) in OG (P<0.00). However, operation time was longer in major resection group (505) than minor (415) and no resection group (370) in LAG (P=0.00). Conclusion: Combined minor organ resection with gastrectomy does not increase morbidity, and there is no statistical difference in hospital stay and op time than no resection group in LAG.


Provided is an optical fiber branching cable, which is provided with a branching portion disposed stably relative to a multicore optical cable of a trunk line to be branched and which is excellent in handling as the cable and satisfactory in wiring workability. The optical fiber branching cable (1) is provided with a branching portion (11) midway of the multicore optical fiber cable (2) of the trunk line. The branching portion (11) includes a base member (16) mounted to cover a tensile strength wire (9) of that portion of the multicore optical fiber cable (2), from which a sheath (10) was removed, a multicore optical connector (30) connected with the leading end of a tape unit (4) extracted from the multicore optical fiber cable (2), an excess length housing portion (18) for housing the excess of the tape unit (4) connected with the multicore optical connector (30), and a connector mounting portion (19) capable of mounting the multicore optical connector (30) in plurality.


Right atria from rats were analyzed for chronotropic responses to phenylephrine in face of various drugs and procedures. Propranolol, 10(-8) M, produced a competitive antagonism against the agonist which concentration-effect curve was closely similar to that obtained from reserpinized animals. Prazosin, but not phentolamine (both 10(-6) M) showed inhibition of the phenylephrine-induced changes in heart rate, as judged by their -log EC50. Either of the alpha-adrenoceptor antagonists exhibited a greater steepness in the curve slope with respect to control. The simultaneous exposure of tissues to phentolamine and propranolol proved to effectively antagonize the chronotropic effect of the agonist. This held true for phentolamine assayed in atria from reserpine-pretreated rats. Previous incubation of tissues with papaverine, 10(-5) M, brought about supersensitivity to phenylephrine which was thoroughly inhibited by either phentolamine or propranolol. These results strongly suggest that beta-adrenoceptor stimulation of heart rate by phenylephrine takes place indirectly via norepinephrine release. There is also alpha 1-adrenoceptor stimulation (blocked by prazosin). Finally, it is hypothesized that supersensitivity develops by papaverine-enhanced Ca2+ influx, since numerous evidences are against a phosphodiesterase inhibition-dependent cAMP accumulation mechanism triggered by papaverine in the presence of phenylephrine.


The purpose of this community service activity is to overcome the problems that are being faced by traders in Tanah Abang regional market, where their turnover dropping drastically during pandemic. The solution offered to solve this problem is by selling on the digital market through social media such as Instagram and Facebook. However, due to their lack of knowledge about digital marketing, learning is needed so that they can use the features that exist in social media applications, including creating marketing content. The activity was carried out by involving one of the communities, namely Tanah Abang Traders Association (HIPTA). The method implementing the activities carried out with a community development model approach is provided in the form of assistance. The results of the activity show that this assistance can be received by participants effectively and participants are being ready to adapt to the digital market.


Energy Storage System (ESS) is a facility that can store electricity and supply power when needed, and is a very necessary element for new and renewable energy generation. Thermal runaway fires can occur due to various causes in ESS. These fires can cause different damage depending on the building structure and other building disaster prevention facilities. Therefore, it is necessary to evaluate the fire risk by deriving the frequency of occurrence of the cause of fire in the ESS and checking the severity factor that determines the damage scale. In this study, fire risk assessment of ESS was performed using risk matrix method. The risk assessment was conducted based on data collected based on fire cases and field investigations. Through risk assessment, it was confirmed that the main causes of ESS fires were EMS/BMS errors and battery abnormalities. In addition, as the structure of the ESS building is fire-resistant, the fire compartment is set, and the separation distance between battery facilities is larger, the damage caused by a fire is smaller.


Electronic knowledge repositories represent one of the fundamental tools for knowledge management (KM) initiatives. This research examines organizational and dyadic factors that determine the effectiveness of knowledge refinement, the process of evaluating, analyzing and optimizing the knowledge object to be stored in a repository. A survey study with a matched,triad design was cond ucted with 318 authors, validators and users of a global knowledge repository system. Results revealed that perceived procedural justice, expertise gap, communication frequency, and shared understanding significantly influenced the quality of refined knowledge, while perceived procedural justice also positively influenced the quality of initial knowledge contributions. These findings are discussed with respect to future research and managerial practices.


Some sound changes seem to proceed at different rates depending on lexical frequency; these are often interpreted as reflecting phonetically detailed exemplar memories, with changes spreading via lexical diffusion (Pierrehumbert 2002; Bybee 2012). However, such patterns do not necessarily require word-specific phonetic details. Variation associated with lexical frequency also exists when there is no evidence for a change in progress, which might be explained by the process of lexical access: Higher lexical frequency facilitates activation, causing faster and more reduced productions (Gahl et al. 2012, Kahn & Arnold 2012, Jurafsky et al. 2002). This work examines how repeated exposure to particular words influences listeners' category boundary between aspirated and unaspirated stops in those words. Listeners' VOT category boundary is lowered after exposure to shortened VOT stimuli and also after exposure to lengthened VOT stimuli. These results suggest that frequency-related sound change can largely be explained by frequency directly influencing reduction in phonetic implementation and perceptual access. The size of the effect differed based on the acoustic characteristics of the exposure stimuli; this may suggest a role of word-specific phonetic details, but could also reflect different levels of activation due to the prototypicality of the stimuli.


We introduce a simple time-homogeneous Markov embedding of a class of time-inhomogeneous Markov chains widely used in the context of Monte Carlo sampling algorithms, such as systematic-scan Metropolis-within-Gibbs samplers. This allows us to establish that systematic-scan samplers involving two factors are always better than their random-scan counterparts, when asymptotic variance is the criterion of interest. We also show that this embedding sheds some light on the result of Maire et al. (2014) and discuss the scenario involving more than two factors.


Among children in the third year of life, late talkers comprise from 9% to 20%. This range seems to increase when addressing preterm children. This study examined video-recorded child spontaneous speech during parent–child book sharing as well as linguistic skills reported through the MacArthur Bates Communicative Development Inventories (MB-CDI) Short Form in 61 late talkers aged 30 months old (26 low-risk preterm, 8 females; 35 full-term, 12 females). Differences between low-risk preterm and full-term late talkers in child language measures and parental speech input were tested, as were the roles of child and parent factors on child language. Low-risk preterm and full-term late talkers showed similar speech and language skills. Similarly, no differences were found in measures of parental speech between groups. Child cognitive score, chronological age, and low-risk preterm status were positively associated with lexical diversity, rate, and composition of child speech production, whereas family history for language and/or learning disorders as well as parent measures of lexical diversity, rate, and grammatical complexity were negatively associated with the above child variables. In addition, child cognitive score and low-risk preterm status were positively associated with the MB-CDI measures of word and sentence production. Findings are discussed in terms of the need of good practices when following up on low-risk preterm children and of interventions targeting parents' input to preterm and full-term late talkers.


We deal with a consensus control problem for a group of third order agents which are networked by digraphs. Assuming that the control input of each agent is constructed based on weighted difference between its states and those of its neighbor agents, we aim to propose an algorithm on computing the weighting coefficients in the control input. The problem is reduced to designing Hurwitz polynomials with real or complex coefficients. We show that by using Hurwitz polynomials with complex coefficients, a necessary and sufficient condition can be obtained for designing the consensus algorithm. Since the condition is both necessary and sufficient, we provide a kind of parametrization for all the weighting coefficients achieving consensus. Moreover, the condition is a natural extension to second order consensus, and is reasonable and practical due to its comparatively decreased computation burden. The result is also extended to the case where communication delay exists in the control input.


Although order statistics have been studied for several decades, most of the results are based on the assumption of independent and identically distributed (i.i.d.) random variables. In the literature, how to compute the mth order statistics of n correlated random variables is still a problem. This article proposes a recursive algorithm based on statistical min/max operations to compute order statistics for general correlated and not necessarily identically distributed random variables. The algorithm has an O(mn) time complexity and O(m + n) space complexity. A binary tree-based data structure is further developed to allow selective update of the order statistics with O(nm2) time. As a vehicle to demonstrate the algorithm, we apply it to the path selection algorithm in at-speed testing. A novel metric multilayer process space coverage metric is proposed to quantitatively gauge the quality of path selection. We then show that such a metric is directly linked to the order statistics, and our recursive algorithm can thus be applied. By employing a branch-and-bound path selection algorithm with these techniques, this article shows that selecting an optimal set of paths for a multimillion-gate design can be performed efficiently. Compared to the state of the art, experimental results show both the efficiency of our algorithms and better quality of our path selection.


The discharge process is experimentally studied from measurements of the temporal evolution of potential formation when a pulsed electron beam is injected into a DC field in a low-pressure argon gas ((3-5)*10-4 Torr). The V-shaped axial potential profile is found to be formed instantaneously at the moment of beam injection and then collapses at the start of the discharge development. The effective depth of the potential minimum exceeds the ionisation voltage at this moment, resulting in the acceleration of beam electrons with energy enough to ionise the gas. The measured two-dimensional structure of the potential profile reveals that the potential minimum forms a negative potential well in front of the beam source on the central axis.


Background and objectives One of the most frequently reported symptoms by patients with axial spondyloarthritis (AxSpA) is disease-related fatigue. The role of fatigue and its degree during the course of AxSpA still remains a challenge. The objective of this study was to characterise the patients with AxSpA accordingly to the evaluation of disease-related fatigue. Materials and methods 120 patients were included in the cross-sectional study fulfilling the Assessment of Spondyloarthritis international Society (ASAS) classification criteria for AxSpA. Fatigue was evaluated using the first item of the Bath Ankylosing Spondylitis Disease Activity Index (BASDAI) questionnaire. Patients were divided into two groups: with the evaluation of fatigue ≤5 and >5. The following variables were chosen for characteristics of the groups: age, duration of the disease, the age of AxSpA onset, duration of morning stiffness, Ankylosing Spondylitis Disease Activity Score (ASDAS) (using c-reactive protein (CRP)), functional (BASFI) and metrological (BASMI) indices, the evaluation of enthesitis using the fourth item of the BASDAI questionnaire. Results The mean BASDAI fatigue score was 5.0 (SD 2.59). In our data, 44.2% of patients experienced severe fatigue (score >5). The mean value of age, duration of morning stiffness, ASDAS, BASFI, BASMI and evaluation of enthesitis in the group with lower fatigue level was respectively 37.4 years (SD 9.63), 41 min (SD 37.97), 2.3 (SD 1.32), 2.2 (SD 2.09), 2.8 (SD 2.39) and 2.7 (SD 2.89). In the group with severe fatigue expression the mean age was 41.5 years (SD 10.09), duration of morning stiffness – 66.2 min (SD 43.06), ASDAS – 3.7 (SD 0.94), BASFI – 5.0 (SD 2.34), BASMI - 4.4 (SD 2.54), evaluation of enthesitis – 5.2 (SD 2.99). These variables were statistically different between groups. There was no difference between groups on duration of the disease and age of AxSpA onset. Conclusions Patients with severe fatigue had a higher level of the disease activity, functional disability and spinal mobility impairment. These results suggest that the level of fatigue can be used as one of the clinical signs which show the expression of systemic inflammation and induced impairment of mobility in the course of the disease independent of the disease duration.


We for the first time present a new fabrication technique of ZnO-based FBAR devices using a multi-layered Bragg reflector. To improve the resonance performance, 0.03¿m-thick chromium (Cr)-adhesion layers were inserted into the Bragg reflector and also thermal treatments were made to the devices. At operating frequency of about 2.75 GHz, very high return loss values and quality factor (Q) were observed under an optimum thermal annealing condition.


A family of novel titanasiloxanes containing the structural unit ([Ti(eta 5-C5Me5)O]3) were synthesized by hydron-transfer processes involving reactions with equimolecular amounts of mu3-alkylidyne derivatives [(Ti(eta 5-C5Me5)(mu-O))(3)(mu3-CR)] (R=H (1), Me (2)) and monosilanols, R3'Si(OH), silanediols, R2'Si(OH)2, and the silanetriol tBuSi(OH)3. Treatment of 1 and 2 with triorganosilanols (R'=Ph, iPr) in hexane affords the new metallasiloxane derivatives [(Ti(eta 5-C5Me5)(mu-O))(3)(mu-CHR)(OSiR3')] (R=H, R'=Ph (3), iPr (4); R=Me, R'=Ph (5), iPr (6)). Analogous reactions with silanediols, (R'=Ph, iPr), give the cyclic titanasiloxanes [(Ti(eta 5-C5Me5)(mu-O))(3)(mu-O2SiR'2)(R)] (R=Me, R'=Ph (7), iPr (8); R=Et, R'=Ph (9), iPr (10)). Utilization of tBuSi(OH)3 with 1 or 2 at room temperature produces the intermediate complexes [(Ti(eta 5-C5Me5) (mu-O))(3)(mu-O2Si(OH)tBu)(R)] (R=Me (11), Et(12)). Further heating of solutions of 11 or 12 affords the same compound with an adamantanoid structure, [(Ti(eta 5-C5Me5)(mu-O))3(mu-O3SitBu)] (13) and methane or ethane elimination, respectively. The X-ray crystal structures of 3, 4, 6, 8, 10, 12, and 13 have been determined. To gain an insight into the mechanism of these reactions, DFT calculations have been performed on the incorporation of monosilanols to the model complex [(Ti(eta 5-C5H5)(mu-O))3(mu3-CMe)] (2 H). The proposed mechanism consists of three steps: 1) hydron transfer from the silanol to one of the oxygen atoms of the Ti3O3 ring, forming a titanasiloxane; 2) intramolecular hydron migration to the alkylidyne moiety; and 3) a mu-alkylidene ligand rotation to give the final product.


This paper introduces a general and flexible design method for the inverse modal optimization of undamped vibrating systems, i.e., for the computation of mass and stiffness linear modifications ensuring the desired system eigenstructure. The technique is suitable for the design of new systems or the optimization of the existing ones and can handle several design requirements and constraints. Paramount strengths of the method are its capability to modify an arbitrary number of parameters and assigned vibration modes, as well as the possibility of dealing with mass and stiffness matrices with arbitrary topologies. To this purpose, the modification problem is formulated as a constrained inverse eigenvalue problem and then solved within the frame of convex optimization. The effectiveness of the method is assessed by applying it to two different test cases. In particular, the second investigation deals with a meaningful mechanical design application: the optimization of a system recalling an industrial vibratory feeder. The results highlight the generality of the method and its capability to ensure the achievement of the prescribed eigenstructure.


Alvin O. Thompson, Unprofitable Servants: Crown Slaves in Berbice, Guyana 1803-1831, Kingston, Jamaica: University of the West Indies Press, 2002, xiv + 338 pp.It is encouraging to read a micro-analytical examination of the historiography of slavery, amelioration and emancipation in a colony that laid the foundations for their implementation in more diverse slave societies. The scholarship of the work is very high, well structured and argued. This study is focused on government-owned enslaved labourers in Berbice. They were acquired during the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars in 1796 and then 1803, and were retained in the Treaty of Paris in 1815. One group of enslaved labourers, known as the winkel ("shop") people, remained in the possession of the Lords Commission of the Treasury from 1803 to 1831. The main thesis of the book is "that the imperial government . . . [was] highly delinquent in overseeing the properties and often in appointing the right persons to administer them, and that it was only" shortly before abolition "that the government addressed the issue of the winkel people in any sustained manner" (pp. 1-8). Its decision to free them was for reasons other than humanitarian, moral or religious.Caribbean states had always acquired enslaved servants for specific activities, such as public works and servicing the needs of officials in government employment; but it was only in Berbice that the imperial government captured, retained and maintained control of them for a specific period of time. Alvin Thompson's study initiates a detailed examination of the state's role as slave owner in terms of its management of estates and its perception of enslaved persons as human beings with rights. The British government's role came at a critical historical juncture in British politics when, following on the heels of the planter class, the government, inspired by a group of so-called humanitarians, not only became involved in adopting laws to implement abolition, amelioration and emancipation, but also to implement its own laws and policies on government properties. At the same time, the government sought to avoid conflict with its slaveholding citizens abroad, while demonstrating that it was committed to the upholding the humanity of the enslaved people and the abolitionist cause in England.Thompson sets out to make the following contribution to the general historiography of slavery and emancipation. He chronicles and analyses the discussion of the management of the enslaved people which the Crown held in the period of amelioration; looks at the British government's notion of the readiness of enslaved Africans for freedom (the views of some of its members were no better than those of rabid slaveholders); assesses the government's tardiness to advance emancipation of its own people, estimated at 300 in the 1820s, and those of the colony at large; and posits that this reluctance resulted from the British government's fear of upsetting the plantocracy. The author's goals also illustrate that the reluctance to free the enslaved servants was puzzling since they were not considered valuable or economically important to the Crown or to the local government and economy.A major contribution of Unprofitable Servants is that it is one of the rare studies that elucidate the voices of the enslaved people in several categories of plantation life. In cases where there were profiles, Thompson employed them to demonstrate aspects of the lives of the enslaved people in areas of food, clothing, housing, self-hire, management of the plant and slavery itself. Much of this information was obtained from the enslaved people themselves and provides a view of slavery that is rarely available in other documents. Another major contribution of the book is its assessment of the work of the Commission of Management (headed by William Wilberforce) to run the properties between 1811 and 1816. The commission, appointed by the Lords of the Treasury, consisted of William Wilberforce, Zachary Macaulay, James Stephen, Charles Long, Nicholas Varsittart, James Gordon and William Smith, all noted humanitarians and members of the Clapham Sect. …


A highly reliable high-performance liquid chromatography method was developed and validated for determining quality of extracts from the leaves of Dipsacus sativus (Linn.) Honck. Under optimum conditions, the chromatography profile of eight compounds was collected, with compound saponarin as marker. The analysis results indicated that saponarin and isovitexin were the main active components. Pharmacological experiments proved that extracts from the leaves showed significant antioxidant activity. This work could serve to validate the usefulness of high-performance liquid chromatography analyses in traditional Chinese medicine.


OBJECTIVE
To determine the relationship between arterial stiffness measured in different aortic segments and the presence and extent of ascending thoracic aortic aneurysm (ATAA).

METHODS
Patients at a Thoracic Aortic Diseases clinic at a University teaching hospital were compared to patients attending a Cardiology outpatient Clinic at the same institution. A non-invasive measure of vascular stiffness was performed using pulse wave velocity (PWV) measurement of several vascular segments-carotid-femoral pulse wave velocity (cfPWV), heart-femoral pulse wave velocity (hfPWV) and brachial-ankle pulse wave velocity (baPWV). Aortic dimensions were measured on echocardiogram.

RESULTS
Patients with ATAA (N = 32) were 66 years and the same age as those without ATAA (N = 46). There was no significant difference between those with or without aortic aneurysm with respect to cfPWV, hfPWV or baPWV. In ATAA, there was a significant (p <0.05) inverse correlation between aortic diameter at the sinuses of Valsalva and cfPWV, as well as hfPWV, but not with baPWV. This relationship was not evident in persons without ATAA.

CONCLUSION
Reduced aortic stiffness (increased compliance), assessed by cfPWV or hfPWV, correlates with larger aortic size of ATAA at the level of the sinuses of Valsalva but not at the ascending aorta, suggesting cfPWV may be a useful method to assess the size of ATAA at the level of the sinuses of Valsalva. Overall aortic stiffness assessed by PWV did not differentiate persons with or without an ATAA, in individuals who do not have a genetic or inheritable cause of their ATAA.


This paper analyzes C?e d'Ivoire's experience with telecommunications liberalization and privatization. C?e d'Ivoire privatized its incumbent operator in 1997, and granted the newly privatized firm seven years of fixed-line exclusivity while introducing"managed competition"in the cellular market and free competition in value-added services (VAS). By March 2001, three cellular operators and a number of VAS providers had entered the market. Reform has thus significantly changed the landscape of C?e d'Ivoire's telecommunications sector and has brought with it tremendous improvement in sector performance. Between 1997 and 2001, fixed-line telephone penetration grew from 1.03 to 1.80 per hundred people, while mobile penetration skyrocketed from 0.26 to 4.46. But it is still too early to assess the validity of granting exclusivity to the incumbent operator. While penetration increased, the operator did not meet objectives regarding rural telephony and service quality. Moreover, fixed-line penetration increased in areas where the operator faced competition from mobile providers.


The calibration accuracy of the intrinsic and extrinsic parameters of the vision system greatly affects the performance of visual servoing. We address the problem of controlling a planar manipulator using a fixed single camera without calibrating its intrinsic parameters and the transformation matrix between the robot base frame and the camera frame, and without measuring manipulator's depth. Based on an important observation that the unknown parameters can be separated from the unknown composite image Jacobian matrix, we propose an adaptive algorithm to estimate the unknown and mixed parameters on-line. It is proved with a full consideration of dynamics of the system by Lyapunov approach that the feature points of planar manipulator approach asymptotically to the desired ones on image plane and the estimated parameters are bounded under the control of the proposed visual servo controller. The performance has been confirmed by simulations and experiments.


AIM
To investigate the effect of iontophoresis on skin permeation of defibrase.

METHODS
Iontophoresis was carried out in side-by-side chambers, excised rat skin membrane (RSM) or human epidermis membrane (HEM). The effects of electrode polarity, permeation medium pH and ionic strength were evaluated.

RESULTS
Permeation of defibrase caused by anodal iontophoresis was more effective [the apparent permeability coefficient was (1.2 +/- 0.4) x 10(-4) cm x h(-1)] than that of cathodal iontophoresis [(4.3 +/- 1.4) x 10(-5) cm x h(-1)]. The amount of permeated defibrase caused by anodal iontophoresis in pH 7.4 medium was (25 +/- 5) x 10(-14) mol x cm(-2), which was higher than that of in pH 6. 4 permeation medium [(15 +/- 4) x 10(-14) mol x cm(-2)].

CONCLUSION
Iontophoresis could enhance skin permeation of defibrase. Electroosmotic flow effect played an important role.


Introduction: The covering of spinal cord is same as that of brain. The pia mater, arachnoid and dura mater covers the spinal cord from inside out. The pia mater extends from cephalic end of spinal cord upto terminal portion i.e., conus medullaris. Beyond the conus, the pia mater extends in the form of filum terminale. The filum terminale extends beyond the conus medullaris and attaches upto dorsal aspects of coccyx to stabilise the spinal cord in its position. Aim: To study the length of filum terminale in the foetuses of third trimester gestational age. Materials and Methods: The present cross-sectional observational study was carried out in 30 foetuses collected from museum of Department of Anatomy and Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology. The permission and approval from university ethical committee was taken before starting the study. The foetuses were divided into three groups taking into consideration their gestational age (four foetuses in 1st group 28- 31 weeks, 12 foetuses in 2nd group 32-35 weeks and 14 foetuses were in 3rd group 36-40 weeks gestational age). Also, the gender wise variation (11 male and 19 female foetuses) was also taken into account. All the data were recorded in Microsoft excel sheet and Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) 23.0 software was used for statistical analysis. Numerical values were reported as the mean±standard deviation. Student's t-test or one way ANOVA was used to analyse quantitative variables. Two tailed p-values were considered significant (p<0.05). Results: In this study, the mean length of filum terminale was 4.35±1.04 cm with range minimum 2.31 cm to maximum 5.90 cm. The length of spinal cord and length of filum terminale measurements significantly increased with increasing gestational age (p<0.001). The length of spinal cord, length of filum terminale measurement and ratio of length of filum terminale to length of spinal cord (FT/SC) were significantly higher in male foetuses (p<0.05). Conclusion: The association between gestational age (weeks), length of filum terminale, and length of spinal cord among all foetuses, and male and female separately were statistically significant


ABSTRACT Cassava processing in Republic of Benin, which is used to produce different food products, discharges a large amount of polluting organic matter into the environment in the form of peels and wastewater. Besides, water hyacinth a rich nitrogen plant invades Benin water streams leading in aquatic ecosystem asphyxia and blocks the navigation. Both cassava wastes and water hyacinth show a high biodegradable content enable to be treated through anaerobic digestion. According to the literature, the main challenge in cassava wastes anaerobic digestion is early inhibition caused by a rapid acidification linked to low nitrogen and high biodegradable sugars content. This paper focused on the theoretical and biochemical methanogenic potential determination which is an essential step of recovery energy on large scale of both substrates. Stoichiometric methanogenic potentials of cassava wastes are close to the biochemical methanogenic potentials. However, it was necessary to treat cassava peels with potash «akanwu» and phosphate buffer pH 7.2. Average cumulative methane yield was 368 mL/gVS; 309 mL/gVS and 178 mL/gVS respectively for cassava wastewater (CWW), cassava peels (CP), water hyacinth (WH). Co-digestion of cassava peels with water hyacinth yielded on average 211 mLCH4/gVS. Despite that methane yield of co-digestion was lower than the summative methane yield of each substrate, the process has removed the chemicals products then improved cassava peels treatment. In addition, methane yield of water hyacinth increased by 10% when co-digested with cassava peels. GRAPHICAL ABSTRACT


Our newly devised immunofluorometric sandwich assay for measuring plasma concentrations of activated protein C (APC) in complex with protein C inhibitor (PCI) was compared with testing for conventional markers of myocardial damage CKMB (creatine kinase MB), TNI (troponin I) and hypercoagulability (D-dimer, TAT) in 76 patients with suspected myocardial infarction (MI). APC–PCI complex levels in samples drawn on admission did not correlate with CKMB in the simultaneously drawn sample but correlated closely with maximal CKMB, which reflects MI size (r = 0.52). The areas under the receiver operating characteristics (ROC) curves calculated for the APC–PCI complex results obtained upon admission did not differ significantly from the corresponding values for CKMB, TNI or TAT. Our results show that in patients at risk for MI, the APC–PCI concentration is a sensitive and independent marker that can identify a subgroup of MI patients with normal CKMB but an increased APC–PCI level upon admission. It remains to be determined whether these patients would benefit from early intensive anticoagulant treatment.


A false aneurysm, or pseudoaneurysm, is a hematoma that occurs after injury of all layers of the arterial wall and that may occur secondary to trauma or to infection or as a complication of arterial bypass reconstruction. The presence of a pulsatile mass is usually the initial finding on physical examination that leads to more definitive testing and diagnosis. Treatment traditionally has been surgical repair. Recently, observation of stable false aneurysms and ultrasound-guided compression have proved to be effective and less invasive in a select group of patients. This article focuses on the incidence, causes, diagnosis, and various treatment modalities used today. The role of the nurse in caring for these patients is also addressed.


ABSTRACT Research on previvors, individuals with a genetic predisposition to develop hereditary breast and ovarian cancer but who have not yet been diagnosed with breast or other cancers, examines online information gathering and community support to alleviate uncertainty. However, research exploring online content published by previvors themselves is limited. We examined content published to Instagram and TikTok to explore how breast cancer previvors discussed their lived experience which included, but was not limited to, genetic testing, diagnosis with a BRCA1/2 pathogenic (i.e. risk-increasing) variant, the decision to undergo preventative measures like surgery and/or reconstruction, and how they cope after diagnosis and surgical procedures. In the findings, we explicate how many previvors feel a responsibility to share their authentic experience on social media in order to help others and mitigate their own feelings of uncertainty. This study offers a snapshot of how women are sharing breast cancer previvorship and building social connections with each other online.


The aims to of cooperative to promote the welfare of members in particular and society in general. cooperative must have the ability to realize the business services that can enhance the added value and benefits to members and still consider to acquire the remaining good results. financial statements can be used as one of the parameters to measure the financial performance of cooperatives. Profit growth is one of the parameters used to measure the financial performance of cooperatives. The performance used in the calculation of financial performance over 5 years ago, by using the concept of calculating Economic Value Add (EVA). EVA calculation produces the positive EVA > 0 indicates the performance Kopsa UM is quite good because the rate of return that exceeds the average cost of capital, and is able to create value to investors. Keywords: Financial Performance, Economic Value Add (EVA)


Introduction: Chikungunya fever is a viral disease caused by an alphavirus from the Togaviridae family, that is transmitted by mosquitoes of the genus Aedes. It is manifested by fever, skin rash and joint pain. A high percentage of patients develop a persistent polyarthritis that can last for months or even years.
Objectives: To describe the clinical and epidemiological characteristics of patients diagnosed with arthritis after Chikungunya fever.
Materials and methods: A retrospective, cross-sectional study of patients who were seen at the District Hospital of Villa Elisa during the first semester of 2015, and were diagnosed with Chikungunya fever.
Results: A total of 26 patients from Asuncion were included, of which 92% were women, with an average age of 47.2 years. The predominant symptoms were arthralgia (92.3%) and headache (76.9%). Joint symptoms started on average 14 days after the onset of fever. The proximal metacarpophalangeal and interphalangeal joints were affected in 73% of the patients, the radiocarpal and knee joints in 76.9%, shoulders in 50% and feet in 92.3%. All patients were treated with NSAIDs and 76.9% received treatment with prednisone, with partial or total improvement of symptoms in 92.3% of the cases. Two patients (7.6%) required Methotrexate due to the persistence of arthritis after corticosteroids were discontinued.
Conclusion: Chikungunya fever is a major health issue in our country, especially due to its ability to generate rheumatological complications in the medium and long run. We must pay special attention to this pathology since the chronic joint compromise can lead to disability and labor absenteeism, which would translate into overload of the public health system.


This research aims to develop novel technologies to efficiently integrate
 wireless communication networks and Underwater Acoustic Sensor Networks
 (UASNs). Surface gateway deployment is one of the key techniques for
 connecting two networks with different channels. In this work, we propose an
 optimization method based on the genetic algorithm for surface gateway
 deployment, design a novel transmission mechanism-simultaneous transmission,
 and realize two efficient routing algorithms that achieve minimal delay and
 payload balance among sensor nodes. We further develop an analytic model to
 study the delay, energy consumption and packet loss ratio of the network. Our
 simulation results verify the effectiveness of the model, and demonstrate
 that the technique of multiple gateway deployment and the mechanism of
 simultaneous transmission can effectively reduce network delay, energy
 consumption and packet loss rate.


The strong ground shaking of the 23 November 1980 earthquake in southern Italy seems to have been conditioned by the dimension of the source, its focal mechanism, and by the distance from the shallow portion of the source. There was only a low, and doubtful, directivity effect.
 These results come from a comparison of the azimuthal distribution of the recorded peak ground horizontal accelerations with that of the total, dimensionless, radiation pattern of S waves in the horizontal plane at each site (radiation from the closest point of the fault, and appropriate azimuth and take-off angles were considered).
 The recorded maxima were obtained from hodogram plots of each couple of automatically digitized horizontal components in 13 stations with negligible local site effects at a distance of up to 78 km from the epicenter.
 The analysis indicates the strong influence of the strike-slip component on the azimuthal distribution of motion. The fault mechanism best fitting the recorded maxima is as follows: strike 318°, dip 64°, rake 317°. This picture does not change if acceleration maxima in the frequency bands 0.1 to 5 Hz, 1 to 5 Hz, or 1 to 2 Hz are used.
 In a segment of the southern Apennines, where the strong-motion energy radiation in the near/intermediate field of a repetitive series of shocks from the seventeenth century up to 1980 seems to be controlled by the gross features of the source, it could be useful to include radiation patterns into algorithms for regional seismic hazard calculations. Conversely, because of the fact that drawing isoseismal lines results in a smoothing of at least the very local site effects, it might be possible to infer information about the gross features of the sources of historical earthquakes from macroseismic data.


A new video watermarking scheme against geometric distortions is proposed, which is most suitable for DCT-encoded compressed video, like MPEG-2, MPEG-4, H.264, etc. To lower the computational cost, 2-D DFT coefficients are constructed directly from the block DCTs by exploiting a fast inter-transformation. Then a watermark is embedded in a RST (rotation, scaling, and translation) invariant domain generated by performing the Fourier-Mellin transform (FMT) on the 2-D DFT magnitudes. For resisting different video format conversion, the watermark detection is performed in the spatial domain. The experimental results show that the proposed scheme is transparent and robust to typical signal processing attacks, lots of commonly geometric distortions including scaling, rotation and some combination of several attacks, and frame dropping.


We have calculated the radial non-adiabatic p-mode oscillations of the solar models. Based on a statistical theory of non-local convection, both the thermodynamic and kinetic couplings between convection and oscillations are finely treated. The turbulent pressure, turbulent viscosity, turbulent thermal flux and turbulent kinetic flux are all self-consistently included in the equations. The departure from the radiative equilibrium is treated exactly in the Eddington's approximation. The radiation field and gas are separately considered throughout, and they are coupled by the gaseous absorption and radiation. The generalized Mihalas' radiative hydrodynamic equations, and the dynamic equations of the auto-and the cross-correlations of the turbulent temperature and velocity fluctuations together form a set of self-consistent complete equations. It is shown by numeric calculation that all p-modes with n = 0 – 13 are pulsational unstable when the coupling between convection and oscillations was neglected, and the p-modes with n = 6 – 32 are unstable while that coupling was included. The thermodynamic coupling between convection and oscillations is the chief excitation mechanism, which occurs predominantly in the superadiabatic convection region. Turbulent pressure is always a destabilization factor. With increasing frequency, the turbulent viscosity increases more rapidly than the turbulent pressure does and becomes a dominate damping factor. The non-adiabatic effects on oscillation frequencies are not negligible, they caused a change of the frequencies up to several microhertzs. The departure from the radiative equilibrium has significant effects on stability of the solar p-modes. But these effects usually only alter the value of the stability coefficient but not its sign. The influence of the non-adiabatic effects and non-radiative equilibrium increases with increasing frequency of p-mode oscillations.


Second Life is a computer mediated 3D virtual world imagined and created by its residents. Virtual world is a simulated environment where residents can interact with each other through different communication media. The purpose of this study is to investigate why people communicate in Second Life and the importance of communication to generate real business value. The major theoretical backgrounds used in this study were the communication theory and social systems, theory of intrinsic motivation and word of mouth communications. A case study from Second Life users in the form of online interview was performed to learn communication behaviour of people, their attitude towards communication technology and experience of performing online business. The result was focused on effectiveness and superiority of web 2.0 communication and its effect on real world companies and organisations. The outcome of the findings has real world implication for policy makers, managers and leaders with respect to sharing information and decision making.


1. Human selection, changes in environmental conditions and management practices drove the phenotypic trajectory of crops during domestication. The characterization of the crop domestication syndrome lies mostly on reproductive characters. However, biophysical and ecophysiological constraints during vegetative growth are also at play and can strongly impact crop phenotypes. It has been argued that a broadened examination of crop phenotypes through a functional trait-based lens should improve our understanding of the domestication syndrome. 2. We used a collection of 39 genotypes representative of key steps during tetraploid wheat domestication and grew them in a common garden experiment. We quantified the vegetative phenotype of each genotype through the measurements of 13 functional traits related to root, leaf and whole-plant dimensions. 3. In modern cultivars, compared to ancestral forms, leaf longevity was shorter, while net photosynthetic rate, leaf production rate and nitrogen content were higher. Modern cultivars had a shallower root system and exhibited a larger proportion of fine roots, preferring to invest biomass above-rather than below-ground. We found ancestral forms to be integrated phenotypes characterized by coordination between above-and below-ground functioning. Conversely, in modern forms, human selection appeared to have broken this coordination and to have generated a new type of network of trait covariations. 4. Synthesis and applications. The examination of leaf, root and whole-plant traits of wheat accessions indicated a strong shift in plant functional strategies over the course of domestication. Elite genotypes tended to better optimize resource-use acquisition strategies than ancestral ones. The characterization of the crop phenotype based on vegetative traits thus suggests a much more complete domestication syndrome. Our findings highlight the benefits of using a functional trait-based characterization of crop phenotypes to document the extent of domestication syndrome and to further advance the agroecological management of cereals.


We present our work on developing fifteen Hierarchical Phrase Based Statistical Machine Translation (HPBSMT) systems for five Indian language pairs namely Bengali-Hindi, EnglishHindi, Marathi-Hindi, Tamil-Hindi, and Telugu-Hindi, in three domains each, HEALTH, TOURISM and GENERAL. We named them PanchBhoota, as these systems are elemental in nature. We used a very simple approach to train, tune, and test them using cdec toolkit. We hope that this work will motivate Indian Language Machine Translation researchers to look deeper into the field of HPBSMT which is known to perform better than Phrase Based Statistical Machine Translation.


The validation of analytical methods plays an influential role in quality assurance in the chemical and pharmaceutical industries, particularly in the regulated sector. Here the right software supports the user in determining statistical parameters and in drawing up a validation report. For example, the software Validat from the Frechen software firm headwork-consulting shows what such validating software is able to do.


Corporate governance and corporate social responsibility In recent decades, the field of corporate governance has increasingly recognized corporate social responsibility (CSR)—the responsibility of firms to serve the interests of a broader set of stakeholders beyond their shareholders—as an important part of the corporate goal. This dissertation includes three empirical studies that are designed to advance our knowledge about the role of corporate governance in shaping a firm's CSR practices. Findings from these studies highlight two issues regarding the intersection between corporate governance and CSR. First, in some cases, corporate governance mechanisms that should stimulate socially responsible behavior merely play a symbolic role. As demonstrated in Chapter 2, NGO directors are more prevalent among firms with lower prior year CSR performance. Yet, their presence on boards is not associated with subsequent improvements in CSR performance. Second, institutions manifest their influence on the relationship between corporate governance mechanisms and CSR over time and across space. Chapter 3 explores the time dimension, revealing that transient institutional investors and quasi-indexers have become more important in reducing executive-to-worker pay dispersion as this issue becomes more salient since the 2007-2008 financial crisis. Chapter 4 focuses on the space dimension and shows that the effectiveness of board gender diversity policies in increasing women on boards varies across countries due to the different legislative, cultural, and economic institutions.


Two Infectious bursal disease virus (IBDV) isolates, NP1SSH and NP2K were obtained from a severe infectious bursal disease (IBD) outbreak in Nepal in 2002. The hypervariable (HV) region of VP2 gene (1326 bp) of the isolates was generated by RT-PCR and sequenced. The obtained nucleotide sequences were compared with those of twenty other IBDV isolates/strains. Phylogenetic analysis based on this comparison revealed that NP1SSH and NP2K clustered with very virulent (vv) IBDV strains of serotype 1. In contrast, classical, Australian classical and attenuated strains of serotype 1 and avirulent IBDV strains of serotype 2 formed a different cluster. The deduced amino acid sequences of the two isolates showed a 98.3% identity with each other and 97.1% and 98.3% identities, respectively with very virulent IBDV (vvIBDV) isolates/strains. Three amino acids substitutions at positions 300 (E-->A), 308 (I-->F) and 334 (A-->P) within the HV region were common for both the isolates. The amino acids substitutions at positions 27 (S-->T), 28 (I-->T), 31 (D-->A), 36 (H-->Y), 135 (E-->G), 223 (G-->S), 225 (V-->I), 351 (L-->I), 352 (V-->E) and 399 (I-->S) for NP1SSH and at position 438 (I-->S) for NP2K were unique and differed from other IBDV isolates/strains. NP1SSH and NP2K showed highest similarity (97.8%) with the BD399 strain from Bangladesh as compared with other vvIBDV isolates/strains. We conclude that the NP1SSH and NP2K isolates of IBDV from Nepal represent vvIBDV of serotype 1.


Biolubricants are being developed more frequently as a result of environmental issues, which also improve performance and lessen friction and wear. This study seeks to examine the effects of commercial compressor oil-SAE30, and its blend with pentaerythritol ester (PE) derived from vegetable oil on tribological properties. Two sequential transesterification processes were used to create the pentaerythritol ester made from vegetable oil utilizing the ultrasonic irradiation method. Using an air compressor lubricant, load, and sliding speed for each experimental run, a pin-on-disc tribometer is utilized to examine the friction and wear characteristics of the material. According to the experimental findings, PE 75 (75 vol.% - PE and 25 vol.% - SAE30) performs better than PE and SAE30 in terms of minimum coefficient of friction (COF) and specific wear rate (SWR) under high loads and high sliding speeds. Furthermore, scanning electron microscope (SEM) and Energy Dispersive Analysis of X-Ray (EDAX) analyses were used to examine the morphology behavior of the pin surfaces. Due to the coating that covers the specimen's surface, PE 75 compressor oil displays smoother surfaces than other lubricated surfaces.


Duct pressure and salivary flow were recorded in submaxillary glands of anaesthetized dogs, to study whether parasympathetic stimulation caused effects referable to activity in myoepithelial cells. At fairly low frequency of stimulation, e.g. 3 Hz, the pressure curve had two distinct components, with initial steep and a secondary gradual rise. It resembled that obtained on sympathetic stimulation, where the first phase is ascribed to myoepithelial contraction, the second phase to secretion. When parasympathetic stimulation ceased, there was first a steep fall, then a more gradual decline of the pressure. The steep fall was of the same magnitude as the steep rise; both increased with the frequency of stimulation. The size of the initial fall was fairly independent of the pressure level from which it started. Such a steep fall did not occur subsequent to parasympathetic stimulation if the myoepithelial cells were already in a state of strong contraction caused by sympathetic impulses or bradykinin. The phase of steep fall was inferred to be due mainly to relaxation of contracted myoepithelial cells, the following decline to back-flow of fluid into the gland. The salivary flow rate was highest at the beginning of a period of parasympathetic stimulation, particularly if the duct system was well filled and the saliva thin. It was concluded that myoepithelial contraction had initially expelled saliva. A brief period of parasympathetic stimulation while a slow basal secretion at constant rate was going on was found to accelerate this flow, and afterwards there was a transient deceleration of the flow. Acceleration was attributed partly to myoepithelial contraction, mainly to superimposed secretion; retardation to myoepithelial relaxation. The effect appeared independently of the way in which the basal flow was evoked, and the retardation resembled that seen after sympathetic stimulation or bradykinin.


Many performance inefficiencies such as inappropriate choice of algorithms or data structures, developers' inattention to performance, and missed compiler optimizations show up as wasteful memory operations. Wasteful memory operations are those that produce/consume data to/from memory that may have been avoided. We present, JXPerf, a lightweight performance analysis tool for pinpointing wasteful memory operations in Java programs. Traditional byte code instrumentation for such analysis (1) introduces prohibitive overheads and (2) misses inefficiencies in machine code generation. JXPerf overcomes both of these problems. JXPerf uses hardware performance monitoring units to sample memory locations accessed by a program and uses hardware debug registers to monitor subsequent accesses to the same memory. The result is a lightweight measurement at the machine code level with attribution of inefficiencies to their provenance --- machine and source code within full calling contexts. JXPerf introduces only 7% runtime overhead and 7% memory overhead making it useful in production. Guided by JXPerf, we optimize several Java applications by improving code generation and choosing superior data structures and algorithms, which yield significant speedups.


The tutorship in the training of the new engaged Biomedical Technician in the Microbiology Laboratory The training period for a new engaged laboratory technician in the microbiological laboratory is considered in this work. Experience and reflective practice are the key elements in order to develope professional skills and new knowledge in adults. Learning occurs through the interaction between persons and their concrete experience. The main subject, acting as a training developer, is the mentor: he/she is the expert colleague that create an ad personam relationship with the neophyta, to support the development of professionals skills and to psychologically sustain the new member in such a difficult period. The high complexity of the laboratory framework requires an intense and articulated tutorship, in order to link the learning times of the new technician with the working times and priorities, managing the learning incentives by a careful planning. In the tutorial function is particulary important the use of methods that facilitate the experential learning reflective practice, e.g. contract, briefing, practice and debriefing. In the working agreement the needs are taked in account, the training objectives and the time for the final skills are defined. The main operating instrument is the training plan, where the specific goals are divided in professional activities that will enable the acquisition of the final skills in a well defined working period, also taking into account a specific progressive control. Regarding the specific framework of the microbiology lab, eight points have been identified in the training plan to reach the main professional skills, while the activities, that are necessary to reach the desired results in a specific time period, have been defined.


BACKGROUND: Perioperative outcomes of children depend on the skill and expertise in managing pediatric patients, as well as integration of surgical, anesthesiology, and medical teams. We compared the types of pediatric patients and inpatient surgical procedures performed in low- versus higher-volume hospitals throughout the United States. METHODS: Retrospective analysis of 323,258 hospitalizations with an operation for children age 0 to 17 years in 2857 hospitals included in the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) Kids' Inpatient Database (KID) 2016. Hospitals were categorized by their volume of annual inpatient surgical procedures. Specific surgeries were distinguished with the AHRQ Clinical Classification System. We assessed complex chronic conditions (CCCs) using Feudtner and Colleagues' system. RESULTS: The median annual volume of pediatric inpatient surgeries across US hospitals was 8 (interquartile range [IQR], 3–29). The median volume of inpatient surgeries for children with a CCC was 4 (IQR, 1–13). Low-volume hospitals performed significantly fewer types of surgeries (median 2 vs 131 types of surgeries in hospitals with 1–24 vs ≥2000 volumes). Appendectomy and fixation of bone fracture were among the most common surgeries in low-volume hospitals. As the volume of surgical procedures increased from 1 to 24 to ≥2000, the percentage of older children ages 11 to 17 years decreased (70.9%–32.0% [P < .001]) and the percentage of children with a CCC increased (11.2%–60.0% [P < .001]). CONCLUSIONS: Thousands of US hospitals performed inpatient surgeries on few pediatric patients, including those with CCCs who have the highest risk of perioperative morbidity and mortality. Evaluation of perioperative decision making, workflows, and pediatric clinicians in low- and higher-volume hospitals is warranted.


An important factor for healthy eating is the availability of healthy as well as sensory acceptable food. An increased consumption of rye bread would be beneficial from a health promoting perspective. Previous studies in the present project showed that rye, sourdough and whole grain were perceived as very healthy by consumers. The intake of bread, rich in rye was however low, especially among younger consumers who also had a negative expectation towards the taste. The characteristics of rye bread in Sweden are however not well investigated.The aim of the present study was to describe sensory and health related characteristics of rye bread in relation product labels.Twenty-four rye bread samples were chosen to represent a wide variety of rye bread on the Swedish market. Sensory descriptive analysis was performed with a trained panel (n=11). Total titratable acidity and pH were measured in all samples as well as fluidity index as an indication of glycemic response on a subset of samples (white wheat bread as reference). Principal Component Analysis (PCA) was used to analyze the sensory space of the products. Front-of-package (FoP) labelling was compared to the characteristics of the products.The bread samples sensory characteristics were described for appearance, smell, texture and flavor. According to the PCA, six main groups of rye bread were identified. The rye content of bread with a FoP rye labelling varied from 20 to 100 %. The pH in bread with a FoP sourdough labelling varied from 4,25-5,3. The fluidity index of a subsample of five bread types varied from 51-97 with white wheat bread as a reference (100).According these results, the next step is to investigate the consumers' drivers of rye bread liking.


Web services composition technology is promising technology to efficiently integrate heterogeneous, distributed and legacy software system. Performance becomes the key issue when web services composition model complex and mission-critical application. The defect of design can result in the performance bottleneck problem in the running time. In this paper, we propose a simulation-based model for the business process defined by WS-BPEL. Our model takes advantage of General Stochastic Petri Net to simulate the control flow and the transaction behavior of WS-BPEL through constructing the state transition space of composite web service. Therefore, our simulation model can accurately obtain the performance prosperities with the smaller cost in contrast to building experimental system.


• The tumor-associated antibody (TAA) levels in two patients with choroidal melanomas who were undergoing xenon arc photocoagulation therapy were determined by indirect immunofluorescence with allogeneic tumor cells. The TAA titers rapidly increased after each photocoagulation session and then fell to previous levels. Even after 11 months, TAA levels rose after as many as five photocoagulation therapy sessions. Variations in the TAA titers probably occurred as an immune response to the release of sequestered tumor-associated antigens after the initial photocoagulation or necrosis following the reduction of the tumor's blood supply. The persistence of changes in the TAA level after many photocoagulation sessions and spanning nearly a year suggests that even though the tumor appears clinically resolved, sequestered tumor-associated antigens have remained in the area.


OBJECTIVE: This paper aimed to analyze the predictive ability of gait speed in identifying elderly with fear of falling. METHODS: This is a cross-sectional analytical study conducted with a sample of 60 community elders. Data were collected through structured questionnaire, analysis of gait speed to walk a distance of 4.6 m and the fear of falling, which was assessed by the Falls Efficacy Scale. The predictive ability of the gait speed was determined by multiple linear regression, with significance level p <0.05 and CI 95%. RESULTS: In relation to gait speed, the average was 0.71 (± 0.21) m / s, while for scale of self-efficacy of falls the average score was 24.85 (± 6.68). In multiple linear regression analysis, the total score of the Falls Efficacy Scale remained significantly associated (R2 = 0.35) with self-reported depression, functional limitation for basic activities of daily living and gait speed. CONCLUSION: The gait speed beyond depression and self-reported functional limitation in basic activities of daily living, are able to identify elderly people with fear of falling. Thus, the investigation of the health in this population could be useful to detect the fear of falling, and identify what precautions are priority interventions to improve the functionality and quality of life of elderly people.


To obtain a clear understanding of the mode of action of potassium bicarbonate (PB), sodium silicate (SSi) and calcium chelate (CCh) solutions (1%) in inducing resistance to gray mold disease in table grapes, enzymatic and nonenzymatic investigations were carried out. In particular, changes in the activity of the enzymes superoxide dismutase (SOD), ascorbate peroxidase (APX) and peroxidase (POD), total phenolic content and total flavonoid content were studied. As indirect action, PB, SSi and CCh reduced the incidence of gray mold by 43%, 50% and 41%, respectively. The highest activity of SOD was detected at 48 h in SSi-treated tissue, PB-treated tissue and CCh-treated tissue, and it was 1.7-, 1.4- and 1.2-fold higher, respectively, compared to the control. The APX activity was significantly higher in SSi-treated tissue than in the control at 24, 48 and 72 h and showed an increase in activity 2-fold for all times. Additionally, PB, SSi and CCh increased the activity of POD by 1.4-, 1.2- and 2.7-fold at 48 h posttreatment, respectively. The results showed that CCh was the most pronounced salt to increase both total phenol and flavonoid contents by 1.3 and 2.1, respectively. Additionally, the three tested salts induced an increase in total phenols and total flavonoids at 48 h posttreatment. The obtained result is one more movement towards an overall understanding of the mechanism by which salt solutions act as antimicrobial agents against gray mold of table grapes.


Introduction: North Pacific Costa Rica is generally considered rich in marine habitats and species. However, some areas are subject to fishing pressures that could degrade ecosystems. The Gulf of Papagayo comprises protected and unprotected areas with various degrees of impact. Objectives: Our aim was to evaluate the conservation status of fish and invertebrate communities in rocky reefs and sandy areas in two unprotected bays of the Gulf of Papagayo. Methods: The study was conducted at Cabuyal and Zapotillal Bays, south of Santa Rosa National Park. From December 2017 to April 2018, a total of thirty-five transects were done parallel to the coast at 3-10 m depth. We identified fish and invertebrate species and estimated biomass by trophic group in fish, and density in invertebrates. Results: We found a high number of species of fish (81) and invertebrates (70) in rocky reefs, which indicates a biodiverse ecosystem, but few species of fish in sandy areas. Species composition differed between the two bays. Density of juvenile fishes was high in Zapotillal Bay, suggesting that the area could be important for recruitment and breeding. Fish biomass was higher in sandy areas than in rocky reefs and all trophic groups had lower biomass than in other unprotected areas of the region. On average, reef fish biomass was 1.57 ± 0.67 (s.e.) t ha-1, similar to previous reports for Costa Rican North Pacific. By trophic group, piscivorous and planktivorous had the highest biomass in sandy areas and piscivorous and carnivorous in rocky reefs. Mean coral cover was low with 4.09 % ± 2.51 (s.e.), similar to previously reported for the region. Conclusions: Cabuyal and Zapotillal Bays in the Gulf of Papagayo are biodiverse in fish and invertebrates. However, the area may be impacted by local fisheries and other human activities, affecting fish and invertebrate populations, and coral formations. Our study fills some gaps in knowledge of marine biodiversity in the Gulf of Papagayo that can contribute to the conservation of marine life in North Pacific Costa Rica.


The objective of the research is to determine the social and economic factors associated with the consumption of alcoholic beverages and their impact on professional training through the fulfillment of academic activities of university students. It uses the deductive method, and has a descriptive level (factorial and discriminant analysis) and explanatory level (regression analysis). The questionnaire was applied as a data collection instrument, which has an index of Cronbach's alpha of 0.745. It is applied to a sample of 98 students from a total population of 9,194 from the National University of Chimborazo, Ecuador. The results show that the alcohol consumption in university students depends significantly on the age that begins to consume, gender, marital status and frequency of consumption; there are social and economic factors associated with alcohol consumption; a high incidence of alcohol consumption in compliance with academic obligations in the professional training process.


The energy industry is embarking upon an infrastructure transformation that will result in a national power grid that is more intelligent, robust, resilient, and secure. While the final form will not be known for quite some time, clearly a smarter grid will make better use of information. Whether an electric utility is making real-time adjustments in response to changing load conditions, or commercial and private consumers are making better choices, the timely availability of this information will become increasingly critical. Ultimately, the overall efficiency, reliability, and resilience of the grid is inextricably linked to information. Unfortunately, "the electric power sector is second from the bottom of all major U.S. industries in terms of R&D spending as a percentage of revenue, exceeding only pulp and paper [Amin2011]." Moreover, U.S. officials worry that cyber-spies could use their [demonstrated] access to shut down the grid or take control of power plants during a time of crisis or war [CIO09, WSJ09]. Moreover, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) released the results of a two-year study, The Future of the Electric Grid.


Background: We assessed whether detection of stroke underlying acute vertigo using HINTS plus (head-impulse test, nystagmus type, test of skew, hearing loss) can be improved by video-oculography for automated head-impulse test (V-HIT) analysis. Methods: We evaluated patients with acute vestibular syndrome (AVS) presenting to the emergency room using HINTS plus and V-HIT-assisted HINTS plus in a randomized sequence followed by cranial MRI and caloric testing. Image-confirmed posterior circulation stroke or vertebrobasilar TIA were the reference standards to calculate diagnostic accuracy. We repeated statistical analysis for a third protocol that was composed post hoc by replacing the head-impulse test with caloric testing in the HINTS plus protocol. Results: We included 30 AVS patients (ages 55.4 ± 17.2 years, 14 females). Of these, 11 (36.7%) had posterior circulation stroke (n = 4) or TIA (n = 7). Acute V-HIT-assisted HINTS plus was feasible and displayed tendentially higher accuracy than conventional HINTS plus (sensitivity: 81.8%, 95% CI 48.2–97.7%; specificity 31.6%, 95% CI 12.6–56.6% vs. sensitivity 72.7%, 95% CI 39.0–94.0%; specificity 36.8%, 95% CI 16.3–61.6%). The new caloric-supported algorithm showed high accuracy (sensitivity 100%, 95% CI 66.4–100%; specificity 66.7%, 95% CI 41–86.7%). Conclusions: Our study provides pilot data on V-HIT-assisted HINTS plus for acute AVS assessment and indicates the diagnostic value of integrated acute caloric testing.


Reversible phosphorylation of proteins is an important process modulating cellular activities from upstream, which mainly involves sequential phosphorylation of signaling molecules, to downstream where phosphorylation of transcription factors regulates gene expression. In this study, we combined quantitative labeling with multidimensional liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry to monitor the proteome and phosphoproteome changes in the initial period of adipocyte differentiation. The phosphorylation level of a specific protein may be regulated by a kinase or phosphatase without involvement of gene expression or as a phenomenon that accompanies the alteration of its gene expression. Concurrent quantification of phosphopeptides and non-phosphorylated peptides makes it possible to differentiate cellular phosphorylation changes at these two levels. Furthermore, on the system level, certain proteins were predicted as the targeted gene products regulated by identified transcription factors. Among them, several proteins showed significant expression changes along with the phosphorylation alteration of their transcription factors. This is to date the first work to concurrently quantify proteome and phosphoproteome changes during the initial period of adipocyte differentiation, providing an approach to reveal the system-wide association of protein phosphorylation and gene expression.


In old days, miners would bring canaries with them in the mines as a way of detecting dangerous levels of gas, due to birds being hyper-sensitivity to low oxygen levels. Similarly, male honeybees (drones) are likely to be hypersensitive to some types of DNA damaging agents, due to their cells being haploid. Potentially, such hyper-sensitivity, combined with the queen bee's mating behavior, could explain the general decrease in the world's honeybee populations as well as the enigmatic Honeybee Colony Collapse Disorder.


In view of the fast-emerging Internet traffic, this paper propose a distributed traffic management framework, in which routers are installed with intelligent data rate controllers to handle the traffic mass. Unlike other explicit traffic control protocols that have to evaluate network parameters in order to calculate the allowed source sending rate, our fuzzy-logic-based controller can calculate the router queue size directly; hence it avoids various potential performance problems arising from parameter estimations while decreasing much consumption of computation and memory resources in routers. As a network parameter, the queue size can be accurately observed and used to proactively decide if action should be taken to control the source sending rate, thus increasing the resilience of the network to traffic congestion. The communication Quality of Service is assured by the good performances of our scheme such as max-min fairness, low queueing delay and good robustness to network dynamics. Simulation results and comparisons have verified the effectiveness and showed that our new traffic management scheme can attain better performances than the existing protocols that depend on the estimation of network parameters.


BACKGROUND
Despite work on the self-identities of people with intellectual disabilities, research has yet to describe the self-perceptions of people with Prader-Willi syndrome (PWS). The perspectives of those with PWS are also important for rapidly evolving clinical trials aimed at treating symptoms of PWS.

METHOD
Twenty-one young people with PWS were administered a semi-structured interview that assessed how they perceive their syndrome and clinical trials. Transcribed interviews were reliably coded using content-driven, applied thematic analyses.

RESULTS
Five themes emerged: struggles with chronic hunger and food-seeking that impede goals and relationships; struggles with anxiety and outbursts, schedule changes and school; distancing from PWS; needs for clinical trials that cure PWS, reduce hunger or anxiety, and lead to improved outcomes; and needs for advocacy and awareness of PWS.

CONCLUSIONS
Findings shed new light on the self-perceptions of those with PWS and have important implications for current interventions and future clinical trials.