Several problems associated with current approaches to knowledge acquisition have been identified by various workers. These include the lack of an explicit theoretical basis to many existing methodologies and the requirement to be able to integrate the analysis, elicitation and representation of knowledge into a coherent domain model. The purpose of this paper is to address some of these issues. Taking knowledge acquisition itself to be primarily a modelli ng concern, we examine three general kinds of model of this process. Following this we describe an explicit theoretical framework for one of these model types, namely, the characterisation of problem solving domains. The practical application of these ideas are found within an approach called SAAGS which seeks to provide a characterisation of a domain. This approach has and is being applied in a number of applications, and we provide some details of how it works using selected results from an investigation of the industrial application of neural networks. The final section of the paper looks at the scope of the SAAGS approach and suggests how it could complement other knowledge acquisition techniques.


To the Editor.— The article entitled "Foreign Medical Graduates in US Postdoctoral Programs: Concern Rises as Total Declines"1 published in the MEDICAL NEWS & PERSPECTIVES section was informative and interesting. It is surprising and shocking to know that Dr Casterline and Dr Mou of the Educational Commission for Foreign Medical Graduates (ECFMG) are concerned about the declining numbers of foreign medical graduates coming to the United States for clinical training under the category of exchange visitors. They are overlooking the main issue—that of foreign medical graduates who are now living in this country as permanent aliens and who are being forced to do odd jobs. The American people forget that a few years ago, when Americans needed the help of foreign physicians, they encouraged these physicians to come to this country, leaving behind their families to help people who needed medical care. Now, all of a sudden things have changed,


Plant microRNAs (miRNAs) are a class of non-coding RNAs that play important roles in plant development, defense, and symptom development. Here, 547 known miRNAs representing 129 miRNA families, and 282 potential novel miRNAs were identified in Beta macrocarpa using small RNA deep sequencing. A phylogenetic analysis was performed, and 8 Beta lineage-specific miRNAs were identified. Through a differential expression analysis, miRNAs associated with Beet necrotic yellow vein virus (BNYVV) infection were identified and confirmed using a microarray analysis and stem-loop RT-qPCR. In total, 103 known miRNAs representing 38 miRNA families, and 45 potential novel miRNAs were differentially regulated, with at least a two-fold change, in BNYVV-infected plants compared with that of the mock-inoculated control. Targets of these differentially expressed miRNAs were also predicted by degradome sequencing. These differentially expressed miRNAs were involved in hormone biosynthesis and signal transduction pathways, and enhanced axillary bud development and plant defenses. This work is the first to describe miRNAs of the plant genus Beta and may offer a reference for miRNA research in other species in the genus. It provides valuable information on the pathogenicity mechanisms of BNYVV.


A human hepatoma cell line (PLC/PRF/5) contains several copies of hepatitis B virus (HBV) DNA in integrated form and releases hepatitis B surface antigen (HBsAg) in the form of 22 nm particles in culture medium; studies of the supernatant fluid failed to provide evidence of the morphologically intact virion (Dane particle) or hepatitis B infectivity. In this paper we describe the effect of insulin on cell growth and HBsAg production by these cells; moreover we describe the insulin binding to specific cell membrane receptors. Data in our hands point to a different insulin binding related to different incubation conditions.


OBJECTIVE
The study presents an overview of the research activity in Big Data Analytics (BDA) in the field of health and demonstrates the existing knowledge through related examples. The objective is to inform health librarians about the nature and magnitude of the technological innovations in health information analysis tools, its influence, and where and how further material could be searched.

METHODS
We performed a bibliometric and co-citation analysis within a total of 804 papers published between 2000 and 2016 and retrieved from the Web of Science and Scopus databases. Using the NVivo text analysis software, we identified the stakeholders of BDA in health and innovative decision support systems in the field.

RESULTS
Our findings show a tremendous increase in published papers after 2014. Most of them are relevant to neurology and medical oncology. The stakeholders are clinicians, researchers, patients, administrators, IT specialists, vendors and policymakers. New BDA tools in medicine are mostly developed for disease monitoring purposes while they utilise visualisation to identify disease patterns and statistical analysis of past data for making predictions.

CONCLUSIONS
Health analytics provide a unique opportunity for advancing health information research and medical decision making. It provides health information professionals with new tools in problem-solving offering new perspectives in prognosis and diagnosis of diseases.


Photovoltaic solar energy has been gaining market share over the years due to lower prices and to a significant incentive from the government. It is a clean, static and promising energy source, and such technology has been applied to various applications. This paper presents a prototype of an automated irrigation system for later installation on the field. After the prototype development, we analyzed the use of a previously built photovoltaic microgeneration, in order to insert the electricity generated in the automated irrigation system. The photovoltaic microgeneration has an installed capacity of 2.76 kWp and a battery bank with 24 V. The integration of photovoltaic solar energy in the automated irrigation system represented a good application for family farming, minimizing water waste, besides representing the use of a renewable energy source.


Zirconia-based cast refractories are widely used for glass furnace applications. Since they have to withstand harsh chemical as well as thermo-mechanical environments, internal stresses and microcracking are often present in such materials under operating conditions (sometimes in excess of 1700 °C). We studied the evolution of thermal (CTE) and mechanical (Young's modulus) properties as a function of temperature in a fused-cast refractory containing 94 wt.% of monoclinic ZrO2 and 6 wt.% of a silicate glassy phase. With the aid of X-ray refraction techniques (yielding the internal specific surface in materials), we also monitored the evolution of microcracking as a function of thermal cycles (crossing the martensitic phase transformation around 1000 °C) under externally applied stress. We found that external compressive stress leads to a strong decrease of the internal surface per unit volume, but a tensile load has a similar (though not so strong) effect. In agreement with existing literature on β-eucryptite microcracked ceramics, we could explain these phenomena by microcrack closure in the load direction in the compression case, and by microcrack propagation (rather than microcrack nucleation) under tensile conditions.


Abstract The congenital myasthenia syndromes (CMS) are a group of autosomal recessive or autosomal dominant diseases that affect neuromuscular junctions. CMS caused by AGRN mutations is very uncommon typically characterized by ptosis, mild weakness, and proximal limb weakness. We report the case of an 8-year-old female who exhibited the onset of motor development retardation from infancy and slow progression to proximal muscle weakness. Repeated nerve stimulation at 3 Hz showed a clear decrement with 17%. Whole exon sequencing showed an AGRN gene compound heterozygous mutation (c.5009C >T and c.5078T > C). She was treated with salbutamol but without improvement. Then pseudoephedrine was adapted as a treatment choice and obtained remarkable curative effect. We have summarized and analyzed 12 patients who have been reported in the literature. An early age of onset and muscle weakness in the lower limbs are the main feature of an early AGRN gene mutation. Both types of AGRN-related CMS respond favorably to ephedrine. This is the first report showing that pseudoephedrine is effective as a choice for the treatment of AGRN-related CMS.


Context: Autoimmune Addison's disease (AAD) is a rare but highly heritable condition. The BACH2 protein plays a crucial role in T lymphocyte maturation, and allelic variation in its gene has been associated with a number of autoimmune conditions. Objective: We aimed to determine whether alleles of the rs3757247 single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) in the BACH2 gene are associated with AAD. Design, Setting, and Patients: This case-control association study was performed in two phases using Taqman chemistry. In the first phase, the rs3757247 SNP was genotyped in 358 UK AAD subjects and 166 local control subjects. Genotype data were also available from 5154 healthy UK controls from the Wellcome Trust (WTCCC2) for comparison. In the second phase, the SNP was genotyped in a validation cohort comprising 317 Norwegian AAD subjects and 365 controls. Results: The frequency of the minor T allele was significantly higher in subjects with AAD from the United Kingdom compared to both the local and WTCCC2 control cohorts (58% vs 45 and 48%, respectively) (local controls, P = 1.1 × 10−4; odds ratio [OR], 1.68; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.29–2.18; WTCCC2 controls, P = 1.4 × 10−6; OR, 1.44; 95% CI, 1.23–1.69). This finding was replicated in the Norwegian validation cohort (P = .0015; OR, 1.41; 95% CI, 1.14–1.75). Subgroup analysis showed that this association is present in subjects with both isolated AAD (OR, 1.53; 95% CI, 1.22–1.92) and autoimmune polyglandular syndrome type 2 (OR, 1.37; 95% CI, 1.12–1.69) in the UK cohort, and with autoimmune polyglandular syndrome type 2 in the Norwegian cohort (OR, 1.58; 95% CI, 1.22–2.06). Conclusion: We have demonstrated, for the first time, that allelic variability at the BACH2 locus is associated with susceptibility to AAD. Given its association with multiple autoimmune conditions, BACH2 can be considered a "universal" autoimmune susceptibility locus.


The atmospheric nitrogen deposition in the cold region(especially in the glacier region) of Northwest China,which takes a vital role during the nitrogen cycle,may influence the regional ecology and environment.And the long-term systemic observation on nitrogen deposition in the glacier region is helpful for quantitative modelling of typical drainage basins in the High Asia.According to the continues sampling of wet deposition(fresh snow) on the eastern branch of Glacier No.1(43°06′N,86°49′E,4130 m above sea level) at the headwaters of Urumqi River in the eastern Tianshan Mountains from January 2004 to December 2006,the characteristics of atmospheric nitrogen wet deposition in the glacier region of Northwest China were discussed,and the annual nitrogen wet/dry deposition of both inorganic and organic types was estimated.The results indicated:(1) The nitrate nitrogen(NO-3-N),ammonium nitrogen(NH+4-N) and total inorganic nitrogen(TIN) in the wet deposition varied seasonally.The nitrogen wet deposition from January to April was relatively low,and it increased significantly from April to May.With a little fluctuation,the nitrogen wet deposition was high from May to September,and the minimum of monthly deposition was 0.17 kg/hm2,0.04 kg/hm2,0.13 kg/hm2,for TIN,NO-3-N and NH+4-N,respectively.The nitrogen wet deposition decreased markedly after October,and kept at a low level from October to December.In the seasonal classification,the nitrogen wet deposition was highest in summer(June,July and August),and lowest in winter(November,December and January).The percentage of nitrogen wet deposition in summer was 54%,52% and 55%,for TIN,NO-3-N and NH+4-N,respectively.The nitrogen wet deposition correlated with precipitation amount significantly,and more than 93% of which occurred during the wet season(from April to October,with abundant precipitation in this period).(2) The NO-3-N / NH+4-N ratio of wet deposition ranged from 0.3 to 1,which was influenced by both the regional emission and atmospheric transportation.The spatial transportation was calculated by the HYSPLIT(Hybrid Single-Particle Lagrangian Integrated Trajectory,which was developed by the Air Resources Laboratory,National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration of USA) model 4.9 at 8:00 and 20:00 in Beijing Time(0:00 and 12:00 in Coordinated Universal Time) during all the precipitation days from 2004 to 2006 in different starting heights.(3) The inter-annual variation was not obvious during the study period of three years,so the mean annual deposition was representative at the sampling site.The mean annual wet deposition of TIN was 1.51 kg/hm2 with 69% of NH+4-N and 31% of NO-3-N.Considering the dry/wet deposition in total,the mean annual deposition of TIN was 1.56 kg/hm2,with 1.07 kg/hm2 of NH+4-N and 0.49 kg/hm2 of NO-3-N.In addition,the estimated annual dry/wet deposition of total nitrogen(TN),including TIN and TON(total organic nitrogen),was 3.85 kg/hm2.The simulant value in this study corresponded well with the reported data of nitrogen deposition around the cold region in the West China.


ABSTRACT IMAB362/Zolbetuximab, a first-in-class IgG1 antibody directed against the cancer-associated gastric-lineage marker CLDN18.2, has recently been reported to have met its primary endpoint in two phase 3 trials as a first-line treatment in combination with standard of care chemotherapy in CLDN18.2-positive Her2 negative advanced gastric cancer. Here we characterize the preclinical pharmacology of BNT141, a nucleoside-modified RNA therapeutic encoding the sequence of IMAB362/Zolbetuximab, formulated in lipid nanoparticles (LNP) for liver uptake. We show that the mRNA-encoded antibody displays a stable pharmacokinetic profile in preclinical animal models, mediates CLDN18.2-restricted cytotoxicity comparable to IMAB362 recombinant protein and inhibits human tumor xenograft growth in immunocompromised mice. BNT141 administration did not perpetrate mortality, clinical signs of toxicity, or gastric pathology in animal studies. A phase 1/2 clinical trial with BNT141 mRNA-LNP has been initiated in advanced CLDN18.2-expressing solid cancers (NCT04683939).


In order to investigate the relationship between the primary structure of Orpotrin, a vasoactive peptide previously isolated from the freshwater stingray Potamotrygon gr. orbignyi, and its microcirculatory effects, three Orpotrin analogs were synthesized. The analogs have a truncated N‐terminal with a His residue deletion and two substituted amino acid residues, where one Nle is substituted for one internal Lys residue and the third analog has a substitution of a Pro for an Ala (Orp‐desH1, Orp‐Nle and Orp‐Pro/Ala, respectively). Only Orp‐desH1 could induce a lower vasoconstriction effect compared with the natural Orpotrin, indicating that besides the N‐terminal, the positive charge of Lys and the Pro residues located at the center of the amino acid chain is crucial for this vasoconstriction effect. Importantly, the suggestions made with bioactive peptides were based on the molecular modeling and dynamics of peptides, the presence of key amino acids and shared activity in microcirculation, characterized by intravital microscopy. Moreover, this study has demonstrated that even subtle changes in the primary structure of Orpotrin alter the biological effects of this native peptide significantly, which could be of interest for biotechnological applications. Copyright © 2010 European Peptide Society and John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.


This research paper examines the relationship between various factors that affect the consumer behavior towards online shopping. Online shopping refers to the recent trends of being able to buy everything from home. The focus of this research is to explain the influence of five major variables that were derived from literature. These variables are trust, time, product variety, convenience and privacy, which determine how consumer-buying behavior is reflecting online shopping trends. Data was collected through the use of a specified measuring instrument. This instrument was a completely self-developed and standardized questionnaire that comprised of two sections. The statistical analysis of the data reflects that trust and convenience will have great impact on the decision to buy online or not. Trust is been considered as the most relevant factor affecting the customer's buying behavior towards online shopping when it comes to younger generation.


The fine specificity of virus recognition by influenza A/PR8/34(H1N1)-specific cytolytic T lymphocyte (CTL) clones was analyzed with the use of a panel of syngeneic target cells infected with five heterologous influenza A strain viruses. Forty-five H-2 D-end-restricted CTL clones from B10.A(5R) responders (Dd,Ld) demonstrated 14 different patterns of recognition. Many of these clonotypes were able to distinguish between closely related viruses of the same subtype. Such discriminatory capacity, however, was often accompanied by cross-reactivity against a distantly related viral subtype. This supports the contention that virus-specific CTL see different structures than do virus-specific antibodies. A similar analysis of the fine specificity of 60 Db-restricted clones from C57BL/6 responders was performed. The vast majority of this response was composed of clonotypes not observed in the B10.A(5R) response. In addition, the hierarchy of relatedness between the virus strain used for immunization and the various heterologous viruses was different in C57BL/6 and B10.A(5R). In contrast, the D-end-restricted response of Balb/c (Dd,Ld) demonstrated clonotypes similar to those found in B10.A(5R). These data suggest that determinant recognition in an anti-viral CTL response is a function of the H-2 restricting elements, and this is discussed in the context of determinant selection by class I molecules.


Institutions and economic growth: The theoretical models of Thorstein Veblen and Douglass North. The aim of this work is to analyse the role of institutions in the economical growing. It searches for propose two theoretical models that explain the development, one is according to Thorstein Veblen and the other one is based on Douglass North. Thus, it summarises and compares the effects of the institutions growing and at the same time emphasizes the deviations and approximation on both theoretical chain. Beside the differences still exist, there is a research agenda that is approaching. In both theoretical models there are important concepts to analyse the effects of the institutions in the development.


Background Kawasaki disease (KD) is the commonest acquired heart disease in the western world. The incidence is rising in all countries, doubling every 20 years. The last BPSU survey was 25 years ago and we wished to update the data and find if there was a link between phenotype, ethnicity, location, and outcome. Methods The survey covered all children in the UK and Ireland who had a new diagnosis of KD between February 2013 and February 2015. Using BPSU 'orange card' methodology, patients were registered anonymously by their paediatrician who then completed a study questionnaire. Ethical and national information governance board approval was obtained avoiding need for patient consent. Results 600 children with KD were notified, of whom 552 satisfied inclusion criteria, 322 boys and 215 girls (15 unknown), age range 2 months to 15.5 years. 389 had complete, 119 incomplete and 42 atypical disease. In those under 1 year of age, 48% had atypical disease (all with coronary artery changes by definition). 21% had incomplete disease. 355 (68%) were Caucasian, 47 (9%) were black African, 8% Indian Asian, 4% were Chinese/Japanese. One third of children were older than 5 years at presentation. Peak incidence in both years was February-March. 80% were seen by the GP at median (range) 2 (0–27) days from first symptom. Median time from onset to diagnosis was 7 (0–36) days and median time from admission to diagnosis was 1 (0–25) days. 24% of 523 had one or more dilated coronary arteries, the left in 90, the right in 64 and the circumflex in 17. 503/532 received immunoglobulin, 360/389 with complete KD, 42/42 with atypical and 101/119 with incomplete. 472/513 received high dose and 460/495 had low dose aspirin. There were 3 deaths and 49/549 children who survived had sequelae. Conclusion The population-based data on this rare disease are presented for a 2 year period from the UK. This shows new information on ethnicity, phenotype, management and outcomes. There is a high rate of coronary artery disease suggesting an under-diagnosis or under-treatment of this important condition.


Abstract. Technology development really reaches its highest point when it becomes a tool to facilitate life to people, especially to those more disadvantaged groups. This is the case of people with disabilities, who find lots of barriers to cope with the most usual and simplest things in their day-to-day. This fact is even more significant when they happen to face heritage buildings or environments. For instance, blind people or people with reduced mobility too often come upon architectural barriers that stop them from enjoying sites and monuments. Focused on people that have to use wheelchairs, a VR experience have been developed in order to provide them with the most realistic sensations while virtually touring on their wheelchairs some archaeological sites. This paper presents the steps forder the users to have the same sensations as if they were wheeling on the floor while visiting the site: irregularities, slopes and narrowness. The VR application has been developed to traverse one of the most monumental buildings of the whole Spanish Protohistory, the site of Cancho Roano (Zalamea de la Serena, Spain). The procedure to generate its digital 3D model from real data acquired with a laser scanner is also dealt with in it.


Passive transfer of monoclonal antibodies specific for herpes simplex virus type 1 (HSV-1) glycoproteins gC or gD resulted in the generation of highly potent HSV-specific and H-2-restricted primary cytotoxic T-lymphocytes (CTL) in the lymph nodes of recipients provided they were injected at 12 h post-infection. When the same antibody was injected at 3 h before HSV infection, the recipients failed to generate primary anti-HSV CTL. Rather, lymph node cells from such donors proved unsuitable for the initiation in vitro of a secondary anti-HSV CTL response by restimulation.


OBJECTIVE
To investigate the effects and mechanisms of sodium ferutate (SF) in treating diabetic nephropathy (DN).

METHODS
Eighty patients of diabetes mellitus type 2 with DN were randomly divided into two groups, 40 cases in each group. The routine group treated with conventional treatment including dietary therapy and hypodermic injection of insulin, and the SF group treated with intravenous dripping of SF 300 mg/d additionally besides the conventional therapy, the therapeutic course for both groups was 4 weeks. And 40 healthy volunteers were allocated in a group for normal control. Before and after therapy, levels of fasting blood glucose (FBG), hemoglobin A1c(HbA1c), triglyceride (TG), total cholesterol (TC), high-density lipoprotein (HDL-C), serum creatinine (SCr), blood urea nitrogen (BUN), mean arterial pressure (MAP), urinary albumin excretion rate (UAER), serum collagen type IV (CIV) and endothelin (ET) were detected.

RESULTS
After 4 weeks of treatment, FBG and HbA1c reduced obviously in both groups with insignificant difference in comparison of them (P > 0.05). Before treatment, TG, TC, MAP, SCr, BUN, UAER, CIV and ET were markedly higher in DN patients than those in the health control (P < 0.05), these criteria decreased significantly in the SF group (P < 0.05) but insignificantly in the routine group (P > 0.05) after treatment, showing difference between the two groups (P < 0.05).

CONCLUSION
Sodium ferulate could ameliorate lipid metabolic disorder, reduce blood pressure, lower UAER and CIV level, and improve renal function in DN patients, the mechanism might be through decreasing ET production and inhibiting the combining of ET with its receptor.


At the present time researches and doctoral dissertations in architecture generally tend towards perspectives and methods which have been borrowed from other branches of science. The doctoral dissertations resulting from this, scientific-analytical, generally presented in verbal form, have an important and established position in postgraduate studies in architecture. Yet education in architecture still lacks a research model to cater for the special nature of the architects' praxis, especially the creative imparting of form. At the level of the doctoral dissertation there is no form of research within the education in which a direct, reflective connection with the practical business of the field could be achieved, and in which the special nature of architecture somewhere between art and science is duly taken into account. The present paper considers the need for new forms of practice- and architectural design-based researches.


Introduction: Contamination of ground water in Malwa region of Punjab has been in focus for at least last two decades. Higher than national incidence of cancer in Malwa region (107 against a national average of 80 per 100,000 population) is considered due to chemical contamination of ground water in this region . To ensure provision of potable water to rural Punjab, State government installed 1881 Reverse Osmosis (RO) plants in affected districts. Although 180 crores of rupees have been spent on installation of these RO plants, no study has been undertaken to evaluate the project. The present study attempts to fill this knowledge gap by quantifying the extent of utilization of Community RO plants, and assessing knowledge and attitude regarding this scheme of government.
Materials and Method: One thousand rural households in two districts of Malwa region were randomly selected to study the knowledge, attitude and practices of target population towards Community RO plants and their utilization through a cross-sectional study.
Results: The study revealed that 50.7% of households were consuming water from the Community RO plants, although the awareness regarding contaminated non- availability of any family member for fetching the water (32%), un-affordability (18%), distance of RO plant (15%) and disliking the taste of water (17%).ground water in the region, and potential of contaminated water to cause diseases were much higher. The reasons for this knowledge-practice gap are highlighted. Most common of which are
Conclusion: The study shows that any health program to fulfill felt-need of community should be piloted, and planned and implemented with community involvement, otherwise it is doomed to fail as the case of Community RO plants in Punjab where the utilization is mere 50% in spite of positive knowledge and attitude of the people.

Keywords:Water, Reverse osmosis, KAP, Cancer, Punjab.


The liver is a complex organ with metabolic, excretory, and defence functions, so the effect of toxic polymers is often find in disorganisation of hepatic structure and may induce cell damage. In this study it is estimated the influence of recently synthesised multiblock copolymers based on poly/butylene terepthalate) and a dimerized fatty acid. The films of polymers were implanted intra-abdominally in 45 rats of Wistar breed covering the right lobe of liver. The specimens of liver were collected in 1, 3 and 6 day of experiment in order to be evaluated under microscope. The morphology of lobules, size and shape of hepatocytes, size and shape of nuclei's of hepatocytes, any infiltration of plasma cell were taken into account during examination. There have been no difference in morphology between specimens of liver from rats with implanted polymer and control group which could implicate their toxicity.


To prepare for the new surge of interest in foreign languages which is rising across the country, classroom teaching needs to be upgraded. However, with the same old content this will not be sufficient. Five directions foreign language programs can take are outlined with recommendations for classrom teaching: linking foreign languages with international studies; teaching language for career purposes; for intercommunity understanding; for an insight into the process of communication; and, finally, as the key to humanistic experiences. Courses must be designed to attract and retain students, according to the needs of particular school districts. Imagination and willingness to innovate are essential.


The main energy consumers in sewer networks are the sewage pumps. Therefore, to minimize the energy consumption, it is essential that these pumps operate under satisfactory conditions. Knowledge about the efficiency of the pumps and their operating conditions can help the pump station management to operate the system optimal. In the search for innovative solutions that can help the sewer management with this information, we propose a method that provides information on the pump flows, the inflow to a sewage pit, and an online estimate of the efficiency of the pump. All these information are obtained without a flow sensor. We argued that the calculated flow values can be used by the sewer management to optimize the operation on the sewer pumps, and the efficiency estimate can be used for optimal scheduling of maintain procedures. The flow and the efficiency estimations are exemplified on a pumping station of the sewer network in Herning, Denmark.


Most areas in Indonesia are prone to natural disasters. Learning the lessons from the Aceh Tsunami in 2004, areas with high risks of natural disasters are in the process of preparing themselves for such an unexpected event, by increasing their resilience. The objective of this study is to shed more lights on factors affecting the resilience from two sources namely, existing literatures and the application of disaster management in four disaster-prone areas in Indonesia -Padang, Sleman, Cilacap, and Palu. To enrich our analysis, we collect data from the field to compare the preparedness and to get insights on peoplers perceptions towards the factors of resilience in those areas.We employ IDI and FGD to identify the factors of resilience and the preparedness in the areas investigated. Thereafter, a preliminary survey is conducted to identify peoplers perceptions towards the aspects of resilience in the areas. Results from the survey conducted to 800 households in Padang and Cilacap indicates that from the social aspect, communityrs value cohesiveness is one of important factor affecting their resilience towards natural disaster. In addition, when disaster occurred, they heavily relied on the help of debt or selling some of their assets, as well as used cash in hand as emergency funds. In general, respondents in all sample cities are able to re-start their economic activities as soon as two weeks after the event of disaster. In addition, the survey found that most of respondents were aware that the government has programs to educate people on the disaster mitigation.


Abstract Semi-Lagrangian semi-implicit techniques are now well established and used by an increasing number of meteorological centers. However, it is demonstrated by both analysis and numerical integration that there is a serious problem incorporating orographic forcing into semi-Lagrangian models, since spurious resonance can develop in mountainous regions for Courant numbers larger than unity. A solution, consisting of two classes of schemes, is proposed, analyzed, and then evaluated using a global shallow-water model. Simply off-centering the semi-implicit scheme eliminates the spurious resonances. Although this can be achieved with a first-order scheme, it is at the expense of decreased accuracy, and therefore a second-order scheme is recommended.


Many signals that modify plant cell growth and development initiate changes in cytoplasmic Ca2+. The subsequent movement of Ca2+ in the cytoplasm is thought to take place via waves of free Ca2+. These waves may be initiated at defined regions of the cell and movement requires release from a reticulated endoplasmic reticulum and the vacuole. The mechanism of wave propagation is outlined and the possible basis of repetitive reticulum wave formation, Ca2+ oscillations and capacitative Ca2+ signalling is discussed. Evidence for the presence of Ca2+ waves in plant cells is outlined, and from studies on raphides it is suggested that the capabilities for capacitative Ca2+ signalling are also present. The paper finishes with an outline of the possible interrelation between Ca2+ waves and organelles and describes the intercellular movement of Ca2+ waves and the relevance of such information communication to plant development.


Abstract:This article argues that by creating a "Free and Open Indo-Pacific Strategy" (FOIPS) in 2016, Japan has engaged in "tactical hedging" to cope with the strategic uncertainty engendered by China's growing economic power and political influence in Asia and the Trump administration's uncertain foreign policy towards the region. Tactical hedging refers to a declaratory policy doctrine that aims to utilize temporal strategic ambiguity to understand and determine whether any long-term strategy shift is necessary or possible. In doing so, Japan has bided its time in order to understand strategic trends and coordinate policies and principles with allies and partners—especially the United States and ASEAN—and shaped the concept of a "Free and Open Indo-Pacific" (FOIP) in accordance with those consultations since 2016. Nevertheless, the emerging trend—especially the clear division between America's more hardline stance towards China and ASEAN's own conceptualization of the Indo-Pacific which aims to facilitate cooperation with China—indicates that the benefits of tactical hedging are diminishing, and that Japan needs to clarify its political stance if it wants to maintain its own FOIP concept as a viable strategic vision.


Neuromodulation modalities are used as effective treatments for some brain disorders. Non-invasive deep brain stimulation (NDBS) via temporally interfering electric fields has emerged recently as a non-invasive strategy for electrically stimulating deep regions in the brain. The objective of this study is to provide insight into the fundamental mechanisms of this strategy and assess the potential uses of this method through computational analysis. Analytical and numerical methods are used to compute the electric potential and field distributions generated during NDBS in homogeneous and inhomogeneous models of the brain. The computational results are used for specifying the activated area in the brain (macroscopic approach), and quantifying its relationships to the stimulation parameters. Two automatic algorithms, using artificial neural network (ANN), are developed for the homogeneous model with two and four electrode pairs to estimate stimulation parameters. Additionally, the extracellular potentials are coupled to the compartmental axon cable model to determine the responses of the neurons to the modulated electric field in two developed models and to evaluate the precise activated area location (microscopic approach). Our results show that although the shape of the activated area was different in macroscopic and microscopic approaches, it located only at depth. Our optimization algorithms showed significant accuracy in estimating stimulation parameters. Moreover, it demonstrated that the more the electrode pairs, the more controllable the activated area. Finally, compartmental axon cable modeling results verified that neurons can demodulate and follow the electric field modulation envelope amplitude (MEA) in our models. The results of this study help develop the NDBS method and eliminate some limitations associated with the nonautomated optimization algorithm.


By the method of standard linear roentgenodensitometry worked out by M. A. Kornev the effect of boxing on mineralization degree of the hand bones in young boxers has been studied, as well as dependence between dynamic of mineralization and ossification and synostosis processes in the bones mentioned. Boxing has been stated to result in certain adaptive-compensatory changes in the structure and development in the young boxer hand skeleton. They are revealed as an increased mineral component in the hand bones and as delayed ossification and synostosis processes in these bones.


R. Herzog (1931) proposed that a fragment from Epidaurus (IG IV 2 1 255) was part of a votive inscription that contained an epigram attributed to the Athenian orator Aeschines preserved in the Anthologia Graeca (AG VI, 330). Herzog's tentative hypothesis was reinforced by W. Peek in 1962, but scholars, hindered by an imperfect understanding of each other's languages, have not reached agreement over the attribution. With the assistance of the Archaeological Museum of Epidaurus, which has provided me with a hotograph of the fragment, I have come to the conclusion that the inscription was probably not dedicated by Aeschines and does not contain the epigram in question.


Purpose Depression is a leading cause of disability and premature mortality in the United States. Depression is also highly underdiagnosed and undertreated in African Americans and Latinos. More research is needed on the mental health and mental health needs of ethnic minority groups. This study examined the differences in symptomatology for major depression among African Americans and Latinos in a low-income, primary care clinic setting. Methods This is a cross-sectional study using data gathered from three county clinics in Los Angeles, CA. Subjects completed a survey that assessed sociodemographic characteristics and their level of depression using a Patient Health Questionnaire Depression Scale (PHQ-9). Logistic regression models were used to compare depressive symptoms between African Americans and Latinos. Results A total of 411 subjects were recruited, with an 83% response rate, of which 334 were African American or Latino. In general, the difference in depression symptoms, as characterized by items in the PHQ-9 scale, was not significant between the two groups. However, relative to Latinos, African Americans were more likely to be diagnosed with major depression (PHQ ≥ 10, p = 0.06, OR = 2.03) and suffer from changes to their appetite (p = .012, OR = 2.58). Conclusions We found that most depression symptoms were similar between African Americans and Latinos but differed with regard to changes in appetite. Results also suggest a higher prevalence of major depression among African Americans when compared with Latinos. More research is needed to see if these results are generalizable and to develop interventions that can successfully detect and treat depression among Latinos and African Americans attending public sector clinics.


Farrowing rate can be defined as: 1) the number of mated females that farrow within a contemporary group per total number of MATED females for this group or 2) the number of females that farrow within a contemporary group per total number of EXPOSED females for this group. Generally, the first definition is used when hand-mating, whereas the second definition has to be used when pen-mating. Regardless of the definition, farrowing rate can be maximized only by taking total control of the breeding herd. High farrowing rates will result when fertility is high in boars, sows, and gilts; however, excellent management must be used to maintain high fertility in males and females. North Carolina State University data have shown a high correlation between farrowing rate and live pigs born per bred sow per year (Figure 1). Their data show that for each 10% increase in farrowing rate of bred sows, there is a corresponding increase of 2.63 live pigs born per sow per year. In light of these data, pork producers should strive to maximize farrowing rate. This can be done by providing good management during prebreeding, breeding, and gestation phases. The purpose of this article is to provide information on possible management practices to use during each of these phases.; Swine Day, Manhattan, KS, November 16, 1989


Skin cancer incidence is increasing in fair-skinned populations. The three most common skin cancers are basal cell carcinoma (BCC), squamous cell carcinoma (SCC) and malignant melanoma (MM). A correct diagnosis is crucial for an efficient and tailored treatment for the skin cancer patient. The purpose of this thesis was to evaluate different aspects of the preoperative diagnosis of skin cancer. The studies making up this thesis were based on analysis of data from a register including all skin tumour excisions at the Department of Dermatology in Helsingborg, Sweden, from March 2008 to January 2015. The registered data included e.g. sex and age of the patient, tumour site and size, dermoscopic features of the tumour, the preliminary preoperative and final postoperative (histopathological) diagnosis as well as tumour cells at surgical margins. The preliminary preoperative clinical diagnosis was compared with the final histopathological diagnosis in 2,953 excised tumours, whereof 1,626 (55.1%) were malignant, showing high diagnostic accuracy for the diagnosis of malignant tumour and for the diagnosis of basal cell carcinoma (BCC). A total of 96.0% of all excisions had tumour-free margins. The number needed to excise (NNE) for melanoma (the number of pigmented lesions excised to find one melanoma) was calculated for 1,717 cases of excised skin tumours (252 melanomas, 1,395 naevi and 70 seborrhoeic keratoses (SK)). The overall NNE value during the study period was 6.5 (SKs not included). When SKs were included in the calculations the NNE was 6.8. The NNE value decreased with increasing age of the patient and varied for different body locations, with the highest values found for the trunk and the lowest for the arms. When the ABCD rule of dermoscopy was used preoperatively at the bedside in 309 cases (46 melanomas and 263 naevi), use of the algorithm achieved 83% sensitivity and 45% specificity for melanoma diagnosis. A sensitivity of 74% and specificity of 91% were seen for the clinical diagnosis. A considerable percentage (19.6%) of very early melanomas were preoperatively not expected to be melanomas by the dermatologist. The prediction of histopathological subtype of BCC is important for choosing optimal treatment in BCC patients and was assessed in 1,501 cases with pre- or postoperative diagnosis of BCC. The prediction of superficial BCC (sBCC) significantly improved after an educational update on dermoscopic criteria for sBCC in cases assessed by dermoscopy. In conclusion, these studies have shown high accuracy of the preoperative diagnosis of malignant tumour and BCC. With increasing age of the patient, a higher rate of excised pigmented skin lesions was melanomas. Bedside use of the ABCD rule of dermoscopy achieved high sensitivity but low specificity for melanoma diagnosis; however, clinical information seemed to add to specificity. Prediction of sBCC was enhanced after a dermoscopy training session and when dermoscopy was mandatory. (Less)


Detecting and identifying individuals with high body temperature can be critical for preventing the spread of diseases with high body temperature as a symptom like COVID-19. Thermal cameras or manual temperature inspection methods are widely used to identify elevated body temperature. In this work, we propose a novel method to identify and track people with higher disease risk, including the body temperature change of each person in a specified community and other risk factors like family backgrounds, habits, and social life. Results show that each person's body temperature can be tracked and recorded with the user's ID number every time the user passes from specific locations equipped with RFID readers. By using an artificial intelligence-supported risk scoring system, a risk factor is evaluated based on the parameters defined accordingly. If the evaluated risk score of the user is above a specific value, the system generates an alarm to isolate the person with a high-risk score. Therefore, isolating any potentially infected individual helps health professionals reduce the spreading speed of infections through isolated communities.


ABSTRACT How are candidates without official party affiliation able to succeed in authoritarian elections? We analyzed 1,101 independents who took part in city council elections in Russia's regional capitals between 2014 and 2018. We found that independent candidates' electoral fortunes depended both on their personal resources enabling them to attract voters' support and pre-electoral deals with the regime. We also discovered that the chances of being elected were higher for those formally independent candidates who were the regime's hidden representatives. For the latter group, the chances to win the race were boosted mostly by pre-electoral deals, rather than their personal resources.


Objective: This study was to clarify the prevalence of do-not-resuscitate (DNR) and identify the factors related to critically ill patients who have DNR directives or not in a medical Intensive Care Unit (ICU) in Taiwan. Materials and Methods: A retrospective chart review of 100 critically ill patients expired between January and December 2012 were included. The outcome was DNR or not when patient expired. Other variables regarding patient′s demographics, disease-and DNR-related information were recorded. Logistic regression model was used to assess the related factor about DNR. A P < 0.05 was considered statistically significant. Results: DNR rates were 87%, and the mean interval from DNR signature to death was 3.9 days. Compared with the patients without DNR signature, the patients with DNR signature had no statistical significance of cancer diagnosis (odds ratio [OR] = 3.41, 95% confidence interval [CI] = 0.88-13.25, P = 0.076), and frequency of ICU admission (OR = 4.17, 95% CI = 0.92-18.86, P = 0.063). In addition, there were 4.22-fold (95% CI = 0.90-19.89) but no statistical significance (P = 0.068) of the frequency of ICU admission by patients with DNR directives compared to those without DNR directives after adjusting the variables of age, gender, economic status, primary diagnosis, and level of consciousness. Conclusion: Although this study indicated no statistical significance, we found that a patient with a cancer diagnosis and more frequency of ICU admissions tended to influence on family members concerning DNR directives in clinical setting. Early initiation of palliative care and DNR discussion may enhance the quality of care for dying patients.


Aim
The aim of this study is to examine temporal trends in the use oral anticoagulants (OAC) as stroke prophylaxis in patients with atrial fibrillation (AF) and to examine factors associated with OAC initiation.

Methods and results
From Danish nationwide registries, we identified patients diagnosed with AF at Danish hospitals and outpatient clinics between January 2005 and June 2015. OAC initiation was assessed from prescription fills ±180 days from date of AF diagnosis. We identified a total of 108 410 patients with newly diagnosed AF. Before 2010, 40-50% initiated OAC treatment. From 2010, OAC initiation rates increased (P < 0.0001 for trend) and by June 2015, 66.5% of the incident AF patients were initiated on OAC (74.5% increase since December 2009). Increased OAC prescription was especially seen among females and 'fragile' patients (age > 75 years and high risk of stroke). The increased OAC initiation was accompanied by introduction and increased uptake of the NOACs. By the end of the study, NOACs accounted for 72.5% of all OACs prescribed in newly diagnosed AF patients. OAC initiation was associated with male gender, age 65-74 years, few comorbidities and increased risk of stroke.

Conclusion
Since 2010, more incident AF patients in Denmark were initiated on OAC therapy with predominant NOAC prescription. The increase was pronounced among females, among patients at high risk of stroke, and among older patients.


Both research and police guidelines acknowledge the value of rapport-building in police interview with suspects
 (ISs) and provide some insight into how 'rapport' may be defined and built in this context. Rapport is, however, difficult to
 operationalise and assess in practice, other than for the routine legal clarification offered to suspects at the beginning of the
 interview. This paper takes an original discourse-pragmatic and ethnographic approach to investigating the forms that rapport
 takes in a sample of authentic ISs, with particular reference to two dimensions, empathy and face. The article discusses the value
 and suitability of the identified empathic and 'face'-relevant expressions with respect to current interview aims and practice.
 The discussion highlights the underlying bi-functionality of rapport in ISs, demonstrating how the two functions may be reconciled in police interview training and practice.


The cellular precipitation microstructure of 2:17-type magnetic compound was studied at various states of aging by transmission electron microscopy. It was shown that, the initial supersatuated solid solution phase (1175eC, 50 hours) exerts a great influence on the precipitation behavior in the subsequent isothermal aging process. When the supersaturated phase was a TbCu7-type disordered structure, it gives rise to a fine-sca}e continuous cellular precipitation microstructure which corresponds to a relatively high coercivity state. The cell interior is a Th2Zni7type 2:17 phase which is separated by a thin continuous 1:5 boundary phase. On the other hand, when the supersaturated phase was Th2Zni7-type ordered structure, it only produces particle-like 1:5 phase precipitates along the large grain boundary of the Th2Zni7-type 2:17 phase, which corresponds to a very low coercivity state. An addition of copper stabilizes the TbCu7-type disordered phase, and therefore increases the coercivity. The coercivity due to the fine-scale cellular precipitation microstructure in 2:17-type magnetic compound is found to be strongly dependent upon the coherency between the Th2Zni7-type cell interior and the 1:5 cell boundary phase. When the boundary interface was maintained in a coherent state, the coercivity increases steadily with the width of1:5 cell boundary phase. However, when the coherency of the boundary interface is lost and the cellular precipitation microstructure breaks up, the coercivity falls rapidly.


ABSTRACT From the perspective of sociological theory, Foucault's concepts of power, power-knowledge, and discipline are one-sided. While Foucault contends that there is no center of power, his account of power remains top-down or structural, missing the interactive and enabling aspects of power. A more balanced view would suggest that all exercises of power include meaningful agency (the ability to do something); social structures (not simply as constraints but as interactive creations); social knowledge (including both reifying truth claims and enabling truth or knowledge); and social-ontological being-in-the-social-world (both as enabling and dominating).


1. The influence of a fixed heart rate and cardiac output on the cardiovascular response to isometric handgrip at one third of maximal voluntary contraction has been studied by means of atrial pacing. 2. At rest, atrial pacing with a mean heart rate of 109 beats/min increased cardiac output and forearm blood flow while total systemic and forearm vascular resistance decreased. 3. During handgrip, total systemic resistance increased both with and without pacing. A slow lowering of forearm vascular resistance was noted in the former situation, no change in the latter. 4. It is concluded that atrial pacing per se increases cardiac output in healthy, young volunteers. Handgrip elicits a vasoconstriction on other vascular beds than the resting forearm.


In the ATLAS and CMS experiments the RPC detector covers a large surface of about 4000 m2 equivalent to 14 m3 of gas volume for each system. RPCs are operated using a C2H2F4 (R134a) based humidified gas mixture. A flow of the order of one volume exchange per hour is needed for the detector operation. These characteristics make the closed-loop circulation unavoidable. Nowadays the gas systems are operated with a 90–95% re-circulation factor. Results from tests performed over the past few years have shown how the molecules in the gas mixture are broken up under the action of the high electric field and the high radiation background during LHC operation. Several RPCs were operated at the CERN Gamma Irradiation Facility in a high radiation environment in order to observe the production of typical impurities and to find an optimal purifiers configuration for their absorption. During the test, the detector performances were monitored in terms of current stability and HPL resistivity.


Social Work in today's world has established itself as a significant full-fledged professional at par with any other profession.  As the world is become a materialistic; the devoid of the human sentiments and with emotions, diseas and illness with people are largly growing more and more self-centred.  It is understood a sick and happy child cannot learn, and cannot produce.  Good health is very important both to the nation and an individual.  Health is  state of complete physical, mental and social well being and not merely an absence of disease or infirmity.  It is the yardstick of measuring an individual progress and devlopment.  Among other factors, social factors create a predisposition to disease, directly cause disease, transmit the cause of disease and influence the course of disease.  Therefore the medical social workers helps the patients from the moment they enters he hospital, up to the adjustment with the past normal life.  The main aim of medical social worker is to helps us prevention of disease and rehabilitation treatment plan.  The scope of social workers is widely bigger in nature but simentanously lots of difficulties and challenges they have been facing  in the field of health.  The cirriculum of the social work was carefully developed to attain the needs of the society. This Paper examines the methodology of appointment of Social Worker, challenges, roles in the hospitals (scope of Practice in hospital social work), department where the social workers enhance their services.


The degree of individualism or collectivism in a culture has observable effects on cognitive processing. Participants from collectivist cultures are less able to identify a previously displayed object when presented with a novel background than participants from individualist cultures, interpreted as collectivist cultures more likely to process information field dependently. We tested explicitly whether collectivist or individualist cultures are more likely to bind foreground and background features and whether such binding is differentially affected for object-scene and action-scene combinations. 117 participants from the UK (individualist culture) and 121 from Malaysia (collectivist culture) viewed 40 action-scene or 40 object-scene pairs, and then completed a forced choice recognition task, where the presence or absence of the action/object and scene were systematically varied. The UK group more accurately recognised object-scene pairs than the Malaysian group, but there was no difference for action-scene pairs. The object-scene effect indicates that the Malaysian culture were less able to isolate foreground and background features for comparison with the original object-scene pair, but contrary to previous interpretations of cultural effects, this seemed to be due to greater binding of memory in the UK group.


Video games often populate their in-game world with numerous ambient non-playable characters. Manually crafting interesting behaviors for such characters can be prohibitively expensive. As scripted AI gets re-used across multiple characters, they can appear overly similar, shallow and generally uninteresting for the player to interact with. In this paper we propose to evolve interesting behaviors in a simulated evolutionary environment. Since only some evolution runs may give rise to such behaviors, we propose to train deep neural networks to detect such behaviors. The paper presents work in progress in this direction.


Based on an annulled circle structure metamaterial absorber (MMAb), a floral structure MMAb design is proposed for performance improvement especially on absorptivity. Since the initial purpose of designing the MMAb is for hiding one's existence from electromagnetic motion detector, it is expected that the MMAb will has flexibility as one of its characteristics. The MMAb composes of textile-based substrate in between floral structure at the top and ground plane at the bottom, based on metallic plate. The targeted center frequency is 10.525 GHz and through series of simulation done in CST Microwave Software, the MMAb can reach up to 97.03% of absorptivity. The operating angle can be extended at least 68o before its absorptivity deteriorated below 80%. In addition, the proposed MMAb has a high absorptivity regardless of the polarization angle of the electromagnetic waves.


A novel printed antenna resembling a truncated SINC function is proposed for wireless communications. The proposed antenna functions either as a twisted dipole or two twisted back-to-back connected L-shape dipoles depending on the current mode. Due to the symmetry, the antenna supports an even or odd mode of current on the antenna and results in different design and performance considerations. The SINC antenna is suitable for WLAN single or dual frequency operation. Several examples of the design are discussed.


This paper investigates the effects of age and gender on the frequency of the evidentiality
categories 'sensory', 'hearsay' and 'inferential' in spontaneous spoken British English. The findings from
the main data sample from the British National Corpus (BNC) are also compared to patterns in a smaller
data set from the Diachronic Corpus of Present-day Spoken English (DCPSE) in order to estimate the
relative effects of age-grading versus historical change. The results confirm statistically significant
differences between men and women in their use of evidentiality, but show no significant effect of age or
the interaction of age and gender. The comparison of the findings from the BNC data and the DCPSE data
suggests that age-related patterns in evidentiality use are more diachronically stable than gender-related
patterns.


Flacherrie, the bacterial disease is the most significant parameter associated with the loss of silk yield. The loss of appetite; discharge watery feces and vomiting are the common symptoms of infection of bacteria to the larval instars of silkworm, Bombyx mori (L). The present attempt is dealing with utilization of antibiotic compound for the control of bacterial disease: flacherrie in the larval instars of silkworm, Bombyx mori (L) (Race: Bivoltine Double Hybrid). For the bacterial pathogens, the diseased black thorax septicemia infected larvae of silkworm, Bombyx mori (L) were crushed through the use of using mortar and pestle; the solution was filtered; the filtrate was centrifuged (at 4000-5000 rpm) for ten minutes; the precipitate (in the form of pellet) was used for bacterial inoculum. The bacterial sample (inoculum) was streaked in Luria Agar under aseptic conditions and processed for incubation (at 37oC overnight). After 24 hours, the growth of bacteria was noticed, and it was further processed for sub culture. A bacterial sample was taken through the use of loop; centrifuged for 15 minutes at 4000 rpm and the precipitate (in the form of pellet) was dissolved in distilled water. Soon after the second moult, larval instars were divided into four groups (Untreated control group; Water treated group; Bacterial inoculum treated (infected) group and the group treated with Garamycin antibiotics, each with hundred individuals. The larvae of bacterial inoculum treated (infected) group and the group of larvae for antibiotics treatment were infected (treated) with the aqueous solution of bacterial inoculum. This treatment was carried out through smearing the solution bacterial solution onto the surface of leaves of mulberry, Morus alba (L) (M.5 Variety) leaf surface. The treated leaves were allowed for draining. The treated leaves were fed four times to the third instar larvae on the first day (100 grams of leaves for the group of hundred larvae for each time). For the second day and third day, the larvae were fed with normal untreated mulberry leaves. The water treated group of larvae was fed with mulberry leaves smeared with distilled water. The larvae of untreated control and antibiotics treated group were fed with normal untreated leaves for the days: first, second and third. The antibiotics treatment was followed on the fourth day of the third instar. Hundred grams of mulberry leaves were immersed in four hundred milliliter aqueous solution of Garamycin (40 microgam/ml distal water) for half an hour. The leaves were drained completely. The Garamycin treated leaves were used for the feeding on the fourth day (four feedings at the rate of 100 grams of leaves for the group of hundred larvae for each time). Thereafter, the larvae were fed with untreated mulberry leaves to all the groups of larvae of third, fourth and fifth instars. The haemolymph from the larvae (ten larvae from each group) was collected on the fifth day of the fifth instar and processed for electrophoresis. The hundred percent effective rate of rearing (ERR) were reported for the Garamycin treated group. Single female cocoon weight: 1.564 (±0.429) units with the shell ratio: 24.744 units and single male cocoon weight: 1.193 (±0.055) with the shell ratio: 22.967 units were reported for the Garamycin treated group. The variation was detected in the pattern of banding of the protein with significant polymorphism (88.3 percent) with two bands of monomorphic nature; twelve bands of polymorphic nature and three bands of "unique" nature.


While in vitro experiments have contributed much to our understanding of protein folding, we know much less about how proteins fold in the more complex environment of the cell. This review summarizes our current knowledge of the earliest in vivo folding intermediates: the conformations adopted by nascent polypeptides during synthesis by the ribosome. The challenges related to successful folding in the cellular environment, including off-pathway aggregation and macromolecular crowding, are also discussed.


IMPORTANCE
All intravenous (IV) iron products are associated with anaphylaxis, but the comparative safety of each product has not been well established.

OBJECTIVE
To compare the risk of anaphylaxis among marketed IV iron products.

DESIGN, SETTING, AND PARTICIPANTS
Retrospective new user cohort study of IV iron recipients (n = 688,183) enrolled in the US fee-for-service Medicare program from January 2003 to December 2013. Analyses involving ferumoxytol were limited to the period January 2010 to December 2013.

EXPOSURES
Administrations of IV iron dextran, gluconate, sucrose, or ferumoxytol as reported in outpatient Medicare claims data.

MAIN OUTCOMES AND MEASURES
Anaphylaxis was identified using a prespecified and validated algorithm defined with standard diagnosis and procedure codes and applied to both inpatient and outpatient Medicare claims. The absolute and relative risks of anaphylaxis were estimated, adjusting for imbalances among treatment groups.

RESULTS
A total of 274 anaphylaxis cases were identified at first exposure, with an additional 170 incident anaphylaxis cases identified during subsequent IV iron administrations. The risk for anaphylaxis at first exposure was 68 per 100,000 persons for iron dextran (95% CI, 57.8-78.7 per 100,000) and 24 per 100,000 persons for all nondextran IV iron products combined (iron sucrose, gluconate, and ferumoxytol) (95% CI, 20.0-29.5 per 100,000) , with an adjusted odds ratio (OR) of 2.6 (95% CI, 2.0-3.3; P < .001). At first exposure, when compared with iron sucrose, the adjusted OR of anaphylaxis for iron dextran was 3.6 (95% CI, 2.4-5.4); for iron gluconate, 2.0 (95% CI 1.2, 3.5); and for ferumoxytol, 2.2 (95% CI, 1.1-4.3). The estimated cumulative anaphylaxis risk following total iron repletion of 1000 mg administered within a 12-week period was highest with iron dextran (82 per 100,000 persons, 95% CI, 70.5- 93.1) and lowest with iron sucrose (21 per 100,000 persons, 95% CI, 15.3- 26.4).

CONCLUSIONS AND RELEVANCE
Among patients in the US Medicare nondialysis population with first exposure to IV iron, the risk of anaphylaxis was highest for iron dextran and lowest for iron sucrose.


There is a clinical need to develop safe therapeutic strategies to mitigate bleeding. Previously, we found that a novel zymogen-like factor Xa variant (FXa-I16L) was effective in correcting the coagulation defect in hemophilic mice. Here we expand the mutational framework to tune the FX(a) zymogen-like state. Alteration of FXa zymogenicity yields variants (V17M, I16L, I16M, V17T, V17S, and I16T) with a wide range (≤1000-fold) of reduced function toward physiologic substrates and inhibitors. The extent of zymogen-like character, including resistance to antithrombin III, correlates well with plasma half-life (<2 minutes to >4 hours). Importantly, biologic function, including that of the most zymogen-like variant (FXa-I16T), was greatly enhanced when bound to FVa membranes. This resulted in improvement of clotting times and thrombin generation in hemophilic plasma. The FXa variants were remarkably effective in mouse injury models. In these systems, the data show that the more active the protease, the more difficult it is to overcome the protective mechanism of circulating inhibitors to achieve a therapeutic benefit. Depending on the treatment situation, the more zymogen-like variants (V17S and I16T) were most useful when given before injury whereas variants exhibiting greater activity but shorter half-lives (I16L and I16M) were most effective when administered after injury. This new class of FXa variants provides a useful and flexible platform for selectively bioengineering biologic function and half-life to target different clinical bleeding scenarios.


Finally, we did not detect a specific gene expression signature for GATA2 mutated vs. non-mutated cases. Overall, CR was achieved in 113 patients (88%), of whom 36 relapsed (estimated CIR at 3 and 5 years, 39%). Neither age nor karyotype or gene mutations (including NPM1, FLT3, of GATA2 and type CEBPA mutation) significantly influenced CIR in multivariate analysis. Five-year OS was estimated at 58% in the whole cohort, with longer OS in cases with normal karyotype (P5 0.05) and CEBPA biallelic mutations (dm vs. sm, P5 0.03). In multivariate analysis, younger age (P5 0.020) and normal karyotype (P5 0.029) remained the only factors significantly associated with better overall survival. Of note, CEBPA bi-allelic mutations occur more frequently in younger patients. More specifically, the presence of GATA2 mutations did not affect OS in CEBPA mutated AML in general and not within CEBPA dm mutated AML neither. In conclusion, we confirmed a strong association of GATA2 mutations with CEPBA biallelic-mutations, which was not exclusive. However, we confirmed no prognostic impact of GATA2 mutations (n5 25) compared to wild-type (n5 62) in our cohort of CEBPA dm AML [8,9] (22 vs. 58 and 10 vs. 16) with a trend similar of better outcome in CEBPA dm with GATA2 mutations compared to wild-type [5,6] (18 vs. 62). Furthermore, our study provided first evidence that homozygous CEPBA mutations have a similar gene expression signature as CEPBA dm and thus may be considered as equivalent. Acknowledgments. Authors acknowledge the contribution of Nicolas Duployez PharmD, Olivier Nibourel PharmD PhD, Nathalie Helevaut, C eline Rodriguez, Karine Celli-Lebras, C eline Berthon MD PhD, Guy Leverger MD, Nicolas Boissel MD PhD, Christine Terr e PharmD, Xavier Thomas MD, and Aline Renneville PharmD PhD.


In the last decades, adverse food reactions have increased considerably in dogs and cats. In this study we report on the possible onset of food intolerances symptoms, including otitis, diarrhoea, generalised anxiety, and dermatitis in a cohort of 8 dogs consuming commercial diets. All dogs received an organic chicken-based diet for 15 days. We performed analysis of blood biochemical parameters, kibble composition, and oxytetracycline (OTC) serum concentration before and after 15 days of organic chicken-based diet supplementation. We hypothesised that a chronic intake of contaminated food enhanced by the presence of nanoparticle aggregates might be at the base of the onset of pharmacologic or idiopathic food intolerances. At the end of the evaluation period, an overall significant reduction of otitis, diarrhoea, generalised anxiety, and dermatitis was observed. Biochemical analyses indicate a significant increase in the alkaline phosphatase, from 41 to 52.5 U/L, after 15 days (••p <0.01), while a significant decrease in Gamma-glutamyl transferase and urea, from 9.37 to 6.25 U/L and from 32.13 ± 8.72 to 22.13 ± 7.8 mg/dL, respectively, was observed (•p <0.05). A significant decrease, from 0.22 to 0.02 μg/mL, in mean OTC serum concentration was also observed (••p <0.01). Composition analysis revealed the presence of OTC, calcium, aluminium, silicon, and phosphorous nanoparticle aggregates. Further research on a wider sample size would help to confirm the hypothesis proposed here.


This paper examines organizational adaptations to an environmental jolt--a sudden and unprecedented event (in this case, a doctors' strike)-- that created a natural experiment within a group of hospitals. Although adaptations were diverse and appeared anomalous, they are elucidated by considering the hospitals' antecedent strategies, structures, ideologies, and stockpiles of slack resources. Assessments of the primacy of the antecedents suggest that ideological and strategic variables are better predictors of adaptations to jolts than are structural variables or measures of organizational slack. Although abrupt changes in environments are commonly thought to jeopardize organizations, environmental jolts are found to be ambiguous events that offer propitious opportunities for organizational learning, administrative drama, and introducing unrelated changes.


Formation of meiotic DNA double-strand breaks (DSBs) by Spo11 is tightly regulated and tied to chromosome structure, but the higher-order assemblies that execute and control DNA breakage are poorly understood. We address this question through molecular characterization of Saccharomyces cerevisiae RMM proteins (Rec114, Mei4 and Mer2)—essential, conserved components of the DSB machinery. Each subcomplex of Rec114–Mei4 (2:1 heterotrimer) or Mer2 (homotetrameric coiled coil) is monodisperse in solution, but they independently condense with DNA into dynamic, reversible nucleoprotein clusters that share properties with phase-separated systems. Multivalent interactions drive condensation, which correlates with DSB formation in vivo. Condensates fuse into mixed Rec114–Mei4–Mer2 clusters that further recruit Spo11 complexes. Our data show how the DSB machinery self-assembles on chromosome axes to create centers of DSB activity. We propose that multilayered control of Spo11 arises from recruitment of regulatory components and modulation of biophysical properties of the condensates.


In order to study the movements and activities at sea of jackass penguins rearing chicks, a radio telemetry study was undertaken. Twenty five transmitters were attached to breeding adult penguins at their nest sites. These penguins were tracked for a total of 414 hours using a system of antennae on a motor–boat, the island and land–based stations. The foraging paths, foraging duration, foraging distances and swimming speeds were studied. The penguins' foraging patterns were similar; they generally left the island at night and travelled towards their foraging area, actively foraging from first light until they swam back to the island. The foraging durations and distances varied, as did the swimming speeds, according to availability of food.


ABSTRACT. This study assessed the effectiveness and tolerability of the selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor citalopram in the treatment of patients with pervasive developmental disorders (PDDs). The medical charts of 15 children and adolescents (aged 6–16 yr) with Asperger syndrome, autism, or PDD not otherwise specified treated with citalopram were retrospectively reviewed. The final dose of citalopram was 16.9 ± 12.1 mg/day with a treatment duration of 218.8 ± 167.2 days. Independent ratings of the Clinical Global Impression (CGI) Severity and Improvement scales allowed comparison between baseline and PDD symptoms at the last visit. Eleven adolescents (73%) exhibited significant improvement in PDD, anxiety, or mood CGI score (z = 2.95;p = .003). Anxiety symptoms associated with PDDs improved significantly in 66% of patients (z = 2.83, p = .005), and mood symptoms improved significantly in 47% of patients (z = 2.78, p = .005). Mild side effects were reported by five patients (33%). These data suggest citalopram may be effective, safe, and well tolerated as part of the treatment of PDDs.


Simulation is becoming the fundamental tool to design the main components of a vehicle. The paper describes the shock absorber model which was implemented by the Vehicle Dynamics Research Team of Politecnico di Torino. It is a modular model which can be adopted both for mono-tube and twin-tube shock absorbers. It can be used at different levels of approximation, as a function of the kind of user and his/her targets. The main data which have to be inserted in the model are fluid properties, the basic dimensions of the component and the characteristics of the orifices of the shock absorber. An experimental test bench was conceived to obtain the diagrams plotting flow rate through an orifice of a shock absorber versus the pressure drop between input and output ports. The test rig and the procedure to perform the experimental tests and insert the results in the shock absorber model are described in detail. The conceived model was experimentally validated through the comparison between the simulation results and the experimental results obtained by testing the whole shock absorber on a second test bench. A sensitivity analysis to evaluate the influence of each design parameter (for example, gas pre-charge, fluid Bulk modulus, friction between piston and the tube, etc…) was performed and the main results are commented. The presented shock absorber model can be inserted in a vehicle model to study the influence exerted by the damper on comfort and handling.


The histopathology of acute poliomyelitis in both man and monkey has been repeatedly and thoroughly discussed, whereas the stage of recovery and repair has received little attention in the literature. Although residual lesions in the central nervous system of human cases of long standing have been described, the necropsy material has been scarce, since the death of patients during that period depended not on the poliomyelitic infection but on intercurrent illness and accident. Many years of investigations on the monkey have shown a close correlation between the clinical manifestations of the experimental disease in these animals and with those in man, but owing to the severity of the infection, death tended to take place in the acute stages or before recovery had proceeded very far. It was possible, in this laboratory, to keep fifteen Macacus rhesus monkeys alive for periods varying from 19 to 309 days after the onset of


Because students are important elements and the main audience of higher education, their satisfaction with how nursing education can be provided can be considered an indicator of student satisfaction. In this regard, a study has been conducted on the satisfaction of undergraduate nursing students with how-to education. This study is a qualitative study conducted with the participation of ten nursing students (second to the fourth year). Data were collected using semi-structured interviews, and the contractual content analysis method was used to analyze the data. The findings of the study showed that the students were dissatisfied with how provided nursing education. The most important causes of student dissatisfaction are academics/educators and educational environments. According to the findings of the study, to reform and upgrade the educational system, the quality of educational environments and professors must be constantly reviewed and evaluated.


Hepatic cell culture on a three-dimensional (3D) matrix or as a hepatosphere appears to be a promising in vitro biomimetic system for liver tissue engineering applications. In this study, we have combined the concept of a 3D scaffold and a spheroid culture to develop an in vitro model to engineer liver tissue for drug screening. We have evaluated the potential of poly(ethylene glycol)-alginate-gelatin (PAG) cryogel matrix for in vitro culture of human liver cell lines. The synthesized cryogel matrix has a flow rate of 7 mL/min and water uptake capacity of 94% that enables easy nutrient transportation in the in vitro cell culture. Young's modulus of 2.4 kPa and viscoelastic property determine the soft and elastic nature of synthesized cryogel. Biocompatibility of PAG cryogel was evaluated through MTT assay of HepG2 and Huh-7 cells on matrices. The proliferation and functionality of the liver cells were enhanced by culturing hepatic cells as spheroids (hepatospheres) on the PAG cryogel using temperature-reversible soluble-insoluble polymer, poly(N-isopropylacrylamide) (PNIPAAm). Pore size of the cryogel above 100 μm modulated spheroid size that can prevent hypoxia condition within the spheroid culture. Both the hepatic cells have shown a significant difference (P < 0.05) in terms of cell number and functionality when cultured with PNIPAAm. After 10 days of culture using 0.05% PNIPAAm, the cell number increased by 11- and 7-fold in case of HepG2 and Huh-7 cells, respectively. Similarly, after 10 days of hepatic spheroids culture on PAG cryogel, the albumin production, urea secretion, and CYP450 activity were significantly higher in case of culture with PNIPAAm. The developed tissue mass on the PAG cryogel in the presence of PNIPAAm possess polarity, which was confirmed using F-actin staining and by presence of intercellular bile canalicular lumen. The developed cryogel matrix supports liver cells proliferation and functionality and therefore can be used for in vitro and in vivo drug testing.


This research dissertation analyses and compares the Ministry of Defence (MOD) Cyber Security Strategy and Police Cyber Security Strategy in the UK. The research employed qualitative and quantitative methods to investigate issues in the partnership by focusing on the police force and the MOD represented by the Armed Forces.

The research objectives were: identifying challenges in police-military partnership and collaboration in cyber security; examine personnel understanding of the cyber partnership and pluralisation of policing in a cyber context and also propose means of facilitating participation and understanding of cyber issues. Questionnaires and telephone interviews were used to gather information on personnel understanding of cyber security strategy and the nature of the partnership that exists between the two forces – military and police. Research findings reveal that despite efforts by Government and the MOD to streamline Cyber into defence and policing, the workforce has not been educated in the whole concept of cyber defence, thereby undermining the implementation of the strategy. The research reveals that to effectively prevent, investigate and prosecute cybercrime in the UK, policing techniques and strategy that will meet the challenges of current crime environment will need to be put in place by the both forces. The research also found that the Cyber Security Strategy is mainly state centric while policing is human centric in approach, this accounts for the challenges in bringing the policing cyber strategy in line with the National cyber strategy. The research concludes that an increase in education and expertise of both forces will help enhance bi-lateral and multi-lateral partnerships in the race to make the UK cyberspace safe.


It is one of important approaches to construct and develop our national socialist educational theory by realizing localization of foreign educational theory. Although it is also a important task for other disciplines of education science to achieve the aim, the comparative education plays most unique role in this process because of its unique disciplinary characteristics and nature, such as referential, comparative, transnational, distance-cultural, intercultural and multi-cultural. Thus, studying localization of foreign educational theory from aspect of disciplinary characteristics and nature of comparative education, on the one hand could explore some new senses for academic world, on the other hand would be helpful to give full play to the value as it ought to be of comparative education in the localization process of foreign educational theory.


Summary The indirect immunofluorescence and immunofluorescence absorption tests were used to determine the presence and intracellular deposition of viral antigens in cells infected with avian, murine, hamster, and feline oncornaviruses. In all instances, viral antigens were restricted to the cytoplasm; nuclear fluorescence was not observed. Screening of murine neoplasms by immunofluorescence and immunofluorescence absorption showed ( a ) that murine leukemia virus and murine mammary tumor virus (MTV) were serologically unrelated; ( b ) that murine leukemia virus was widespread throughout the mouse population and occurred in a variety of tumors and leukemias of mice from both high- and low-leukemia-incidence strains; and ( c ) that MTV was restricted to a few types of neoplastic tissues, which occurred only in mice of high-mammary-tumor-incidence strains. With the immunofluorescence absorption technique, MTV, as well as murine leukemia virus, could be detected in the spleen of individual mice from high-incidence strains. The amount of viral antigen in the spleen of mice from crosses of high-mammary-tumor strains (or high-leukemia strains) with mice of low-incidence strains was intermediate between that of the parental strains. A serological comparison of murine oncornaviruses with those of the chicken, hamster, and cat revealed that ( a ) the avian and mammalian oncornaviruses are serologically unrelated to each other; ( b ) oncornaviruses from the chicken, mouse, hamster, and cat contain species-specific viral antigens that are serologically distinguishable (however, the leukemia and sarcoma viruses within a single species are antigenically indistinguishable); ( c ) the mammalian leukemia-sarcoma viruses share at least one common antigen; and ( d ) the mouse MTV is serologically unrelated to all other oncornaviruses.


The United States Constitution was designed to secure the rights of individuals and minorities from the tyranny of the majority--or was it? Jennifer Nedelsky's provocative study places this claim in an utterly new light, tracing its origins to the Framers' preoccupation with the protection of private property. She argues that this formative focus on property has shaped our institutions, our political system, and our very understanding of limited government.


Hydrolysis of seven N alpha-substituted L-arginine 4-nitroanilides: benzoyl-arginine p-nitroanilide (Bz-Arg-Nan), tosyl-arginine p-nitroanilide (Tos-Arg-Nan), acetyl-leucyl-arginine p-nitroanilide (Ac-Leu-Arg-Nan), acetyl-phenylalanyl-arginine p-nitroanilide (Ac-Phe-Arg-Nan), benzoyl-phenylalanyl-arginine p-nitroanilide (Bz-Phe-Arg-Nan), tosyl-phenylalanyl-arginine p-nitroanilide (Tos-Phe-Arg-Nan), and D-valyl-leucyl-arginine p-nitroanilide (D-Val-Leu-Arg-Nan), and the N alpha-substituted L-arginine ester: benzoyl-arginine ethyl ester (Bz-Arg-OEt), by rat tissue kallikrein was studied throughout a wide range of substrate concentrations. The enzyme showed a bimodal behavior with all the substrates tested except Tos-Arg-Nan. At low substrate concentrations (10 to 170 microM for p-nitroanilides and 50 to 190 microM for Bz-Arg-OEt) the hydrolysis followed Michaelis-Menten kinetics, but at higher substrate concentrations (150 to 700 microM for p-nitroanilides and 200 to 1800 microM for Bz-Arg-OEt) a deviation from Michaelis-Menten kinetics was observed with a significant decrease in hydrolysis rates. At high concentrations of the p-nitroanilide substrates, partial enzyme inhibition was observed, whereas complete enzyme inhibition was observed with Bz-Arg-OEt at high concentration. The kinetic parameters reported here were calculated from data for substrate concentrations range where the enzyme followed Michaelis-Menten behavior. D-Val-Leu-Arg-Nan (Km = 24 +/- 2 microM; Vmax = 10.42 +/- 0.28 microM/min) was the best substrate tested, followed by Ac-Phe-Arg-Nan (Km = 13 +/- 2 microM; Vmax = 3.21 +/- 0.11 microM/min), while Tos-Arg-Nan (Km = 29 +/- 2 microM; Vmax = 0.10 +/- 0.002 microM/min) was the worst of the tested substrates for rat tissue kallikrein. For the hydrolysis of Bz-Arg-OEt (Km = 125 +/- 15 microM; Vmax = 121.3 +/- 7.6 microM/min), the kinetic parameters using a substrate inhibition model can reasonably account for the observed enzyme behavior, with a Ksi value about 13.6 times larger than the estimated Km value.


ABSTRACT Recent literature stresses the increasing importance of global innovation networks (GINs) as a mechanism to organize innovation across geographical space. This paper investigates why and to what extent citizenship diversity of the firm's employees relates to the engagement of small and medium size companies in GINs. Citizenship diversity provides knowledge about the institutional context of other countries, increased capabilities to deal with institutional differences, larger social networks to build GINs and a broader search space. Further, the paper examines how the absorptive capacity of firms mediates the relationship between citizenship diversity and GINs. The empirical study is based on a linked employee-employer dataset with 6,771 observations of innovative small and medium size firms in Sweden. It provides strong evidence that the engagement in GINs is positively related to citizenship diversity, depending, however, on the absorptive capacity of firms.


Most existing Maze-Solving algorithms assume a constant priority for the robot's movement. Thus, each moment, the robot will determine next movement only by the assumed constant priority. As turning would take a lot of time the fastest path and the easiest to go through is the one that has less turns. Because of the fastest path and in some projects the easiest one is preferred, and the constant priority might not lead the robot to the one with less turns, a movement priority that considers non-turning paths engenders less solving-time. In many projects the mechanic of the robot is not high quality so it should move through paths with less turns. In this paper a "variable priority for robot's movement", is introduced. This variable priority besides causing less solving-time is useful in projects that a robot with low quality mechanic is used, as it cause less turning. So, it would increase the solving efficiency a lot. One more advantage is that this manner is general and not just for a specific maze. It is important because in today's projects, most of the time, the environment around the robot is not known.


This article proposes a measurement of the uncertainty used in feature labeling which takes into consideration the similarity between the analyzed characteristic and a prototype, and the dissimilarity between the same characteristic and the nearest neighboring prototype. Using the similarity and not the equivalent relationship, the method is more general, the transitivity not being requested. Key-Words: Fuzzy relation, similarity, rough set, information fusion, uncertainty, featutes extraction


In this letter, we study the impact of quadrature imbalance (QI) on the performance of optical communications systems using polarization-division-multiplexed (PDM) quadrature phase-shift keying (QPSK), with coherent detection and digital signal processing. We compare, via simulation, the performance of three QI compensation algorithms, suitable for PDM QPSK coherent optical receivers, including a novel, blind, adaptive, constrained equalizer, based on the constant modulus algorithm. We show that dedicated QI compensation is mandatory and cannot be substituted by conventional adaptive electronic equalizers designed for intersymbol interference mitigation.


Simple experiments are described which can be interpreted in such a way as to allow the identification of wavelength, frequency and head-to-tape interface effects in the replay process in digital magnetic recording. Increased tape speeds have been shown to result in increased head-to-tape spacings on replay in a way which directly relates to output voltage levels.


Cuan Mhuire, which has provided detoxification and residential rehabilitation services in Ireland since 1966, has won the prestigious CHKS Quality Improvement Award 2010. This international award recognises significant improvements in patient care and patient experience, as well as in staff welfare, safety and morale. Candidate institutions are evaluated by experts representing medical and nursing colleges, healthcare associations and national quality institutes.

It is the first time that this award has been give to a rehabilitation service. Speaking at the award ceremony in London in May, Cuan Mhuire founder Sister Consilio Fitzgerald said: 'This Award shows how vocationally driven organisations such as Cuan Mhuire can deliver cost-effective services with the highest possible standards of care. The intrinsic value of each human being before God demands no less than our committed love.' Cuan Mhuire provides a range of services in its communities in Dublin, Kildare, Cork, Limerick, Tipperary, Galway, Monaghan and Newry. Between them the services had over 3,000 users in 2009. Cuan Mhuire is a voluntary body and charitable trust.


Watermarking techniques have been extensively studied and applied to digital text and image documents for applications such as author and/or content authentication. However, most of these techniques are not designed or intended to be robust to the PS channel and associated distortions. General office/business documents and the associated flow of office information usually, for many different reasons, need to suffer a digital-to-analog conversion through printing and scanning processes, which brings to authentication methods the necessity of robustness to this process.


We measured the concentrations of clomipramine and its metabolites, N-desmethylclomipramine, 8-hydroxy-N-desmethylclomipramine, and 8-hydroxyclomipramine in plasma in 92 Japanese psychiatric patients receiving clomipramine hydrochloride (Anafranil, Ciba-Geigy Japan Limited, Takarazuka, Japan) by high-performance liquid chromatography. Although there were large interindividual variations of total drug concentrations and concentrations of parent or intermediate metabolic compounds in plasma, significant positive correlations were observed between these drug concentrations and daily doses of clomipramine hydrochloride (milligrams per kilogram of body weight). The metabolic ratios for both desmethylation and hydroxylation varied substantially with 30- to 90-fold interindividual variations. Frequency distribution histograms and probit analyses of these parameters identified only one possible poor hydroxylator but no poor desmethylator of clomipramine. These results suggest that there are large interindividual variations of capacities for hydroxylation and desmethylation of clomipramine in the Oriental population and that therapeutic drug monitoring is essential in clinical practice to reduce the adverse effects of clomipramine and to prevent poor response to clomipramine.


Acute respiratory viral infection (ARVI) is one of the most common causes of morbidity in Russia. The incidence rate is high regardless of age or social group [1]. Sore throat is the most common symptom during ARVI, prevalence rate is 95%[2]. Symptomatic treatment of ARVI requires the use of various drugs, including drugs for pain in the throat. Such preparations are widely represented on the market, while they have a different form and different composition. One of the most popular are sprays containing benzydamine hydrochloride. Professional associations recommend using Benzydamine hydrochloridewhile sore throat, also in paediatric practice [3].In connection with a large number of generics, the issue of standardization of such sprays is topical. To compare the range of the actual concentration of the active substance in interchangeable preparations with different trade names, a comparative determination of the concentrations of benzydamine hydrochloride in sprays of 4 trade names was carried out in 6 different series in each. The quantitative determination was carried out by HPLC with a UV detector. As a result, the active substance concentration ranges were determined in 6 batches of the preparation of each trade name, and the coefficient of variation of concentrations was calculated and conclusions were made on the difference in the indicated indices among preparations of various manufacturers.


Recent studies have shown that the use of subscales derived from the Hamilton Depression (HAM-D) rating scale are just as reliable and enhance sensitivity for detecting response and remission after antidepressant treatment. The purpose of the present study was to determine if the responses on two items of the HAM-D scale, Depressed Mood (item 1) and Psychic Anxiety (item 10), were predictive of remission of depression in placebo-controlled studies following treatment with venlafaxine or selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs). Data from eight active- and placebo-controlled studies consisting of 2027 subjects who met the DSM-III-R/-IV criteria for major depressive disorder were analysed. Three treatment groups were compared: venlafaxine (n=843), SSRI (either fluoxetine, paroxetine or fluvoxamine, n=743) and placebo (n=441). Treatment duration was 6–8 weeks. Patients who scored zero on the depressed mood and the psychic anxiety items of the HAM-D17 scale were designated as responders. These two scores were also combined to create an Absence of Depressive and Anxious Mood (ADAM) score. Between-group rate comparisons in outcome measures were carried out using Fisher's exact test and logistic regression models. Venlafaxine treatment improved depressed mood, psychic anxiety and ADAM scores after 2 weeks with greater efficacy than treatment with SSRIs or placebo. ADAM scores could also predict the odds ratio of a patient achieving a clinical remission (defined as total HAM-D17 score ≤ 7). The present results demonstrate that using just two items of the HAM-D17 can be very useful in assessing treatment response, differentiating between treatment groups and predicting remission rates.


Deep Learning (DL) has had an immense success in the recent past, leading to state-of-the-art results in various domains, such as image recognition and natural language processing. One of the reasons for this success is the increasing size of DL models and the proliferation of vast amounts of training data being available. To keep on improving the performance of DL, increasing the scalability of DL systems is necessary. In this survey, we perform a broad and thorough investigation on challenges, techniques and tools for scalable DL on distributed infrastructures. This incorporates infrastructures for DL, methods for parallel DL training, multi-tenant resource scheduling, and the management of training and model data. Further, we analyze and compare 11 current open-source DL frameworks and tools and investigate which of the techniques are commonly implemented in practice. Finally, we highlight future research trends in DL systems that deserve further research.


While the importance of intellectual capital (IC) for organisational value varies across the enterprise continuum, it is commonly accepted that IC has a generally positive effect on firm performance. It has been observed in the literature that certain variables such as the industry sector and the level of economic development play an important mediating role on the effects of IC on firm performance. It is thus accepted that conditions of the environment in which a firm operates may have a tempering effect on the significance of IC for its performance. One of the most important external factors for organisational value is the level of intellectual property (IP) rights protection granted to patents, copyright, trademarks, etc., in its operating environment. The case of Singapore is a specific example of a country where the emergence of a strong IP rights protection environment coincided with the tremendous development of the country. But since Singapore was already one of the top locations in the world for ease of doing business, the question remains whether its innovation ecosystem evolved because of the IP rights protection advance. The objective of this paper is thus to examine the degree to which an IP rights protection system fosters an environment in which IC can be of significance for firm performance. Preliminary second-level analysis of the aggregate results of a meta-study of the relevant bibliography (2003-2013) demonstrates that the significance of IC is severely undermined for manufacturing firms that operate in environments with weak IP rights protection.