MAIORANO, ALEXANDRE CRISTOVÃO. Joint modeling of longitudinal and survival data to evaluate clinical outcomes of labor. 2019. 110 p. Tese (Doutorado em Estatística – Programa Interinstitucional de Pós-Graduação em Estatística) – Instituto de Ciências Matemáticas e de Computação, Universidade de São Paulo, São Carlos – SP, 2019. As most pregnancy-related deaths and morbidities are clustered around the time of child birth, the quality of care during this period is crucial for mothers and their babies. To monitor the women at this stage, the partograph has been the central tool used in recent decades and, motivated by its simplicity, is frequently used in low-and middle-income countries. However, its use is highly questioned due to lack of evidence to justify a contribution to labor. To improve the quality of labor in these circumstances, the BOLD project has been developed in order to reduce the occurrence of pregnancy-related problems and in order to develop a modern tool, called SELMA, which is projected as an alternative to partograph. Aiming to associate fixed and dynamic characteristics evaluated in the delivery and to identify which elements can be used as triggers for performing an intervention, and thus preventing a bad outcome, this thesis proposes the use of survival models with time dependent covariates. Initially, we consider the joint modeling of survival and longitudinal data using flexible parametric hazard functions. In this sense, we propose the use of five generalizations of Weibull distribution, the Nagakami model and an inedited framework to discriminate usual parametric models via the generalized Gamma distribution, performing an extensive simulation study to evaluate the maximum likelihood estimations and the proposed discrimination criteria. Indeed, by its own nature, the birth leads us to a context of multiple events, referring to the use of multi-state models. These are models for a stochastic process which at any time occupies one of a few possible states. In general, they are the most common models to describe the development of longitudinal failure time data and are often used in medical applications. Considering this context, we proposed the inclusion of a time dependent covariate in the multi-state model using a modified version of the input data, which gave us satisfactory results similar to those expected in clinical practice.


Neural oscillations are observed across a variety of temporal and spatial scales, and are believed to play a key role in brain function. In addition to specific functional roles ascribed to isolated frequencies, it is likely that the interplay between activity at different frequencies plays an essential role in cognition and behavior (Canolty and Knight, 2010). As such, cross-frequency interactions have become the focus of a large literature exploring different types of coupling across a multitude of brain regions and states (Jirsa and Muller, 2013). Coupling between low and high frequency signal components may occur in different forms involving either the phase, amplitude or frequency of the signals. The best studied form is phase-amplitude coupling, in which the amplitude of higher frequency activity is modulated with the phase of activity in a lower frequency band. Most work to date has, however, focused on local cross-frequency interactions, leaving coupling between brain regions relatively little explored. These non-local interactions are interesting because they provide a means by which neuronal activity can be coordinated across both space and time. The paper by Roux et al. (2013) stands out because it addresses this issue non-invasively in humans.

Using magnetoencephalography (MEG), Roux et al. (2013) analyzed data collected from 45 healthy participants during quiet wakefulness with eyes shut. Time series for left and right thalamus, and all other cortical and subcortical locations, were extracted by projecting band-pass filtered data through beamformer spatial filters. The instantaneous phase of thalamic alpha band activity (8–13 Hz) and the instantaneous amplitude of cortical gamma activity (30–70) were used to test for phase-amplitude coupling by computing the modulation index (Tort et al., 2008). This revealed a significant thalamo-cortical cross-frequency coupling with the posterior medial parietal cortex (PMPC), one of the hubs in the default mode network.

These results are exciting, but raise an obvious concern. The thalamus is deeply located close to the center of the head and it can, therefore, be doubted whether its signal-to-noise ratio is sufficient for reliable alpha phase estimation. Furthermore, spurious thalamo-cortical coupling might have been introduced by leakage from sources elsewhere in the brain. It is vital to rule this out, and in general assess the plausibility of estimating thalamo-cortical coupling using MEG. Recently, Attal and Schwartz (2013) showed that significant thalamic sources could be detected when contrasting alpha power between eyes open and eyes closed. In addition, thalamo-cortical alpha band synchronization has been reported previously (Pollok et al., 2005). The prima facie plausibility of cross-frequency coupling between subcortical structures and the cortex on the other hand, is demonstrated by studies reporting thalamo-cortical phase-amplitude coupling using data collected invasively from the thalamus (Fitzgerald et al., 2013) and subthalamic nucleus (de Hemptinne et al., 2013). Taken together, existing literature provides some support for both the approach pursued by Roux et al. (2013) and the findings they present, however without obviating the need for careful supplementary analysis to support their findings.

To this end, the authors report three extra analyses. Firstly, the transfer entropy between the raw signals from thalamus and cortex was estimated at different time lags. This indicated that information flow was directed from thalamus to cortex, and was maximal at a lag in line with physiologically plausible conduction delays. Secondly, to verify that coupling was specific to the thalamus, the authors took the gamma amplitude at PMPC as a seed and tested for coupling with the phase at all other source locations. Significant coupling was confined to the thalamus and did not appear in other regions except that gamma amplitude was also significantly coupled to alpha phase within the PMPC. Finally, correlations between spatial filters at the thalamus and all other locations in the brain supported the absence of leakage from signals at cortical locations into those of the thalamus.

These analyses mitigate concerns that thalamo-cortical coupling resulted from volume conduction artefacts although further analyses could have been performed to establish this more definitively. In particular, as the authors also report phase locking between the thalamus and PMPC within the alpha band, a non-zero phase delay for this locking would argue against volume conduction. An alternative approach would have been to orthogonalize the thalamic and cortical time series as demonstrated by Hipp et al. (2012). Here, before analysing dependencies between two signals all zero-phase correlated activity is regressed out of one signal, ensuring that the time series no longer share any activity picked up from common sources.

From a broader perspective, a key question is how best to understand different types of cross-frequency coupling functionally and neurophysiologically. One possibility is that activity at the frequencies of interest plays clearly defined functional roles as a pair of oscillations, such as segregating and maintaining neuronal representations of different items in working memory (Lisman and Jensen, 2013). However, an equally plausible alternative is that cross-frequency coupling is a data feature that arises as an epiphenomenon due to particular neuronal firing patterns without functional significance in itself. This would not decrease the interest of results like those reported by Roux et al. (2013), but simply change their interpretation.

This discussion motivates the use of neurobiologically plausible models as a means to understand the generative mechanisms behind observed activity. Such models could include a detailed description of the neural dynamics of the different layers within a cortical column (Bastos et al., 2012). Cross-frequency phenomena might emerge by linking the layer-specific intrinsic firing frequencies (Spaak et al., 2012). It may turn out to be possible to explain complex changes in cross-frequency coupling patterns by adjusting a single parameter in the underlying neuronal model. This approach could also, in principle, support deductions about the causal relationships between sources underlying the observed coupling.

Understanding interactions between neuronal dynamics at different spatial and temporal scales, both within and between regions, is likely to be critical for characterizing normal and pathological brain function. The paper of Roux et al. (2013) represents a step toward this, and suggests that MEG can play a useful role in characterizing cross-frequency coupling between deep sources and the neocortex.


Introduction Different disciplines have different concepts of "design," so our understanding of design varies according our particular field. The development of the design concept in the Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) field has inherited approaches, methodologies, and theories coming mainly from Information Systems (IS), Software Engineering (SE), Behavioral and Social Sciences and, more recently, from Design Studies. The rationalist tradition has dominated thinking regarding the design of interactive systems in the Information Systems and Software Engineering fields. As discussed by Ehn and Löwgren,1 the first approaches to IS development can be characterized by a strong belief in systematic design methods founded in mathematical-logical theories. Research interests in accuracy and technical control guided these approaches. The main assumptions behind them, as suggested in some methods of SE, seem to be that the users (end-user, client, customer, stakeholder, or problem owner) are supposed to give complete and explicit descriptions of their demands in terms of the system to be developed. Within the rationalist view of IS development, reality is objectively ascertained, is the same for everyone and is composed of entities, their properties, and relationships. Data is understood as a means of representing the truth about reality, and truth is the correct correspondence between some real entities. An information system is a kind of "plumbing" system through which data flow and, within this perspective, the role of the designer is to specify the truth data structure and functions of the system needed by users.2 According to this view, interface design is just a matter of providing access to the underlying system functionality. In the 1990s, this picture changed and one of the major sources of inspiration was the theoretical discussion on the actual nature of the phenomenon of designing computer artifacts. A reframing of the rationalistic understanding of computer systems started to consider reality as a social construction based on the behavior of its participating agents. Within this view, the role of the designer is to assist users to articulate their problems; discover their information requirements; and evolve a systemic solution. In other words, "design" is understood by Winograd and Flores,3 and Adler and 1 Pelle Ehn and Jonas Löwgren, "Design for Quality-in-Use: Human-Computer Interaction Meets Information Systems Development" in Handbook of HumanComputer Interaction, Martin G. Helander, Thomas K. Landauer, and Prasad V. Prabhu, eds. (Amsterdam, The Netherlands: Elsevier Science, second completely revised edition 1997), 299–314. 2 Kecheng Liu, Semiotics in Information Systems Engineering (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000). 3 Terry Winograd and Fernando F. Flores, Understanding Computers and Cognition—A New Foundation for Design (Reading, MA: Addison Wesley Publishing Company, 1986).


ing and Indexing Services The Journal is indexed by Accounting and Tax Index, Emerald Management Reviews (Online Edition), Environmental Science and Pollution Management, Risk Abstracts (Online Edition), and Banking Information Index. Disclaimer The Publisher, Morgan Stanley, its affiliates, and the Editor cannot be held responsible for errors or any consequences arising from the use of information contained in this journal. The views and opinions expressed in this journal do not necessarily represent those of the Publisher, Morgan Stanley, its affiliates, and Editor, neither does the publication of advertisements constitute any endorsement by the Publisher, Morgan Stanley, its affiliates, and Editor of the products advertised. No person should purchase or sell any security or asset in reliance on any information in this journal. Morgan Stanley is a full-service financial services company active in the securities, investment management, and credit services businesses. Morgan Stanley may have and may seek to have business relationships with any person or company named in this journal. Copyright © 2011 Morgan Stanley. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form or by any means without the prior permission in writing from the copyright holder. Authorization to photocopy items for internal and personal use is granted by the copyright holder for libraries and other users registered with their local Reproduction Rights Organization (RRO), e.g. Copyright Clearance Center (CCC), 222 Rosewood Drive, Danvers, MA 01923, USA (www.copyright.com), provided the appropriate fee is paid directly to the RRO. This consent does not extend to other kinds of copying such as copying for general distribution, for advertising or promotional purposes, for creating new collective works or for resale. Special requests should be addressed to: firstname.lastname@example.com. This journal is printed on acid-free paper.


The argument tu quoque is widely called a logical fallacy. The aim of this study is to show, that this theorem is ill-considered. The text is focused on the analysis of various examples of tu quoque . This analysis leads to the conclusion that there are logically correct tu quoque . There are giv-en some examples of such tu quoque . Main theorem of the article is that tu quoque is correct if it' s used as some kind of mental shortcut refer-ring to other arguments.


This report presents the methodology and outcomes of an evaluation of the Chemical Dependency Recovery Program (CDRP) of Southern California Kaiser-Permanente, a large group model HMO. CDRP treatment includes specialized detoxification inpatient facilities, day treatment and outpatient services. Substance use outcomes in a population of 1,986 patients consecutively entering treatment were obtained via telephone at six and twelve months post intake. For patients who consumed only alcohol at baseline (N = 621), significantly higher six month point prevalence abstinence rates were found among those who remained in treatment for a minimum of three months (89%), compared to those patients who failed to return for treatment after their intake (31%). For polydrug users (N = 1365), as contrasted with patients who utilized services only on their intake date, significantly higher six month point prevalence rates were restricted to those who remained in treatment for a minimum of six months (74% versus 21%). The evaluation documented the need for CDRP services, validated program effectiveness and highlighted areas for systematic improvement.


Mercury concentrations in the Laurentian Great Lakes waters are among the lowest reported in the literature, while game fish concentrations approach consumption advisory limits, particularly in Lakes Superior, Huron, and Michigan, indicating efficient methylmercury transfer from water to game fish. To determine if increased transfer efficiency is evident within the lower food web, we measured (2010-2018) mercury and dissolved organic carbon (DOC) in water, and in size-sieved seston, dietary tracers (carbon and nitrogen isotope ratios), phytoplankton methylmercury bioaccumulation, and methylmercury biomagnification between increasing seston size fractions. We observed consistently low filter-passing methylmercury (<0.010 ng L-1) and comparatively variable DOC (1.1 to 3.4 mg L-1) concentrations. Methylmercury biomagnification factors between size-sieved seston were similar between lakes. Bioaccumulation factors in phytoplankton were among the highest in the literature (log 5.5 to 6.1), exceeding those in oceans, smaller lakes, and streams, and was influenced by DOC. Higher bioaccumulation rates increase the susceptibility of methylmercury accumulation into the food web. Because mercury is dominantly delivered to the Great Lakes through the atmosphere and the biota therein is highly susceptible to methylmercury uptake, we propose that the Laurentian Great Lakes are excellent sentinels to trace the success of efforts to decrease global mercury emissions (e.g., Minamata Treaty) in the future.


Safety exploration can be regarded as a constrained Markov decision problem where the expected long-term cost is constrained. Previous off-policy algorithms convert the constrained optimization problem into the corresponding unconstrained dual problem by introducing the Lagrangian relaxation technique. However, the cost function of the above algorithms provides inaccurate estimations and causes the instability of the Lagrange multiplier learning. In this paper, we present a novel off-policy reinforcement learning algorithm called Conservative Distributional Maximum a Posteriori Policy Optimization (CDMPO). At first, to accurately judge whether the current situation satisfies the constraints, CDMPO adapts distributional reinforcement learning method to estimate the Q-function and C-function. Then, CDMPO uses a conservative value function loss to reduce the number of violations of constraints during the exploration process. In addition, we utilize Weighted Average Proportional Integral Derivative (WAPID) to update the Lagrange multiplier stably. Empirical results show that the proposed method has fewer violations of constraints in the early exploration process. The final test results also illustrate that our method has better risk control.


Time series of mean wind speeds at several sites in Denmark have been used to estimate the power loss for wind turbines in the wind speed interval from where the operation has to stop at high winds to where a lower wind speed allows the operation to resume. For inland wind turbines the fractional loss is less than 0·25%. For offshore wind turbines it may be as high as about 1·5%. To facilitate the estimation of 'dead zone' power loss for offshore wind turbines, an engineering model for the sea surface state has been developed on the basis of a generalization of Charnock's roughness model and the geostrophic drag law. This model predicts the surface friction velocity and the surface roughness as functions of the geostrophic wind speed and the length of the water fetch. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.


Proposes a futuristic approach to managing information. The 1960s and 1970s have seen a growth in structuring information flows. The 1980s saw the advent of management information systems (MIS). In the 1990s, computer integrated manufacturing (CIM) is picking up, and towards 2000, we are heading for enterprise integration systems (EIS). The ingredients of EIS, i.e. the information integration platforms and the technologies of televirtuality, object-oriented databases, hypertext and high-speed data networking, are discussed, and it is explained how these can be used in a synchronized and integrated manner to achieve EIS.<<ETX>>


Background The use of chest CT for COVID-19 diagnosis or triage in healthcare settings with limited SARS-CoV-2 PCR capacity is controversial. CO-RADS categorization of the level of COVID-19 suspicion might improve diagnostic performance. Purpose To investigate the value of chest CT with CO-RADS classification to screen for asymptomatic SARS-CoV-2 infections and to determine its diagnostic performance in individuals with COVID-19 symptoms during the exponential phase of viral spread. Materials and Methods In this secondary analysis of a prospective trial (Clinical Trial Number: IRB B1172020000008), from March 2020 to April 2020, we performed parallel SARS-CoV-2 PCR and CT with categorization of COVID-19 suspicion by CO-RADS, for individuals with COVID-19 symptoms and controls without COVID-19 symptoms admitted to the hospital for medical urgencies unrelated to COVID-19. CT-CORADS was categorized on a 5-point scale from 1 (very low suspicion) to 5 (very high suspicion). AUC were calculated in symptomatic versus asymptomatic individuals to predict positive SARS-CoV-2 positive PCR and likelihood ratios for each CO-RADS score were used for rational selection of diagnostic thresholds. Results 859 individuals (median 70 years, IQR 52-81, 443 men) with COVID-19 symptoms and 1138 controls (median 68 years, IQR 52-81, 588 men) were evaluated. CT-CORADS had good diagnostic performance (P<.001) in both symptomatic (AUC=.89) and asymptomatic (AUC=.70) individuals. In symptomatic individuals (41.7% PCR+), CO-RADS ≥ 3 detected positive PCR with high sensitivity (89%, 319/358) and 73% specificity. In asymptomatic individuals (5.3% PCR+), a CO-RADS score ≥ 3 detected SARS-CoV-2 infection with low sensitivity (45%, 27/60) but high specificity (89%). Conclusion CT-CORADS had good diagnostic performance in symptomatic individuals, supporting its application for triage. Sensitivity in asymptomatic individuals was insufficient to justify its use as first-line screening approach. Incidental detection of CO-RADS ≥ 3 in asymptomatic individuals should trigger testing for respiratory pathogens.


1. Lee SO, Chun JY, Nadiminty, N, and Gao AC. Selenium inhibits growth of LNCaP human prostate tumor accompanied by a decrease in the expression of androgen receptor and prostate-specific antigen (PSA). Innovative Minds in Prostate Cancer Today (IMPaCT) meeting. Proceedings P18-14, p206, Atlanta, GA, September 5-8, 2007.


Over a series of 158 cases of anorectal manometry the authors describe the technique used in a general pediatric surgery department. Results are reported in Hirschsprung's disease specially in the neonatal period, chronic constipation, fecal incontinence after anorectal malformations and meningomyelocele, encopresis. Biofeedback was performed in 28 patients. Technique varies with the etiologies and results are reported. Anorectal manometry to be effective must be simple, reliable, safe and non invasive. The reported technique seems effective for this goal.


In this study, the association between dietary pattern and lifestyle in predicting hypertension (HTN) among 425 overweight and obese children and adolescents aged 6 to 18 years was evaluated. In the current cross-sectional study, the lifestyle-scoring algorithm was developed considering the Iranian Health Reform Plan (HRP) criterion. HTN was defined according to standard protocols. Hierarchical linear regression models were used for the analysis. The prevalence of overweight/obesity was 5.82%. The results showed that systolic and diastolic blood pressure (SBP, DBP) had significant positive correlation with age (p < 0.001 and p < 0.001) and body mass index (BMI) (p < 0.005 and p < 0.007), respectively. Moreover, DBP had a significant correlation with fruit consumption of less than 2 servings per day versus no consumption (p = 0.014, B = 0.444), fruit consumption of more than 2 servings per day versus no consumption (p = 0.014, B = 0.480), and vegetable consumption less than 3 servings per day versus no consumption (p = 0.045, B = −0.374). Moreover, DBP had a significant correlation with fast foods/junk foods consumption of 1–2 items per week versus almost daily consumption (p = 0.047, B = −0.177). The final model could predict 32.1% of HTN by SBP and DBP (R2 = 0.32). According to our findings, lower intake of vegetables and fruits, higher amounts of fast foods, higher age and BMI could be potent predictors of high blood pressure among Iranian children and adolescents.


Most research into deception detection in written accounts has been conducted on transcripts instead of written messages, and has focused on identifying valid verbal deception correlates instead of also examining untrained readers' spontaneous lie-detection attempts (accuracy rates, the cues they use, and so on). Also, the question of whether good liars are also good detectors has not been examined using written accounts. In Study 1, 78 participants handwrote a story and then judged the veracity of another participant's story. Accuracy was at chance level. Good liars were not better detectors than poor liars, but participants who thought they were good liars also thought they were good detectors. The higher the participants' fluidity scores on a standardized test, the poorer liars they were and the better liars they thought they were. The cues participants said they used were related to their judgments but unrelated to actual veracity. In Study 2, some Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count (LIWC) categories (with the Spanish-language dictionary) permitted a 68% classification rate of the written accounts of Study 1.


This paper examines access to ICTs, particularly Internet and broadband in isolated countries and developing regions with small populations. Because of their isolation, people in these countries are highly dependent on telecommunications for contact with citizens overseas, finding markets for their products and competitive suppliers for necessary imports, and developing new employment opportunities to increase local income and reduce emigration and dependency on external aid. Access to services and information located in "the cloud" is also becoming increasingly important. Yet this very isolation, coupled with their small size, makes these countries unattractive markets for ICT providers. The paper analyzes access Internet and broadband services in these countries in terms of availability and price. It also analyzes the structure of the sector including privatization and degree of competition. It then identifies strategies that could be adopted to increase access.


Branched-chain α-ketoacid dehydrogenase is regulated by reversible phosphorylation of serine 293 (site 1) on the E1α subunit. Alanine-scanning mutagenesis was used to examine the roles of residues surrounding serine 293 in catalysis by the dehydrogenase and in substrate recognition by branched-chain α-ketoacid dehydrogenase kinase. Alanine substitution of serine 293 resulted in a 10-fold increased K for α-ketoisovalerate, a less increased (2.8-fold) Kfor α-ketoisocaproate, but no change in V or the K for thiamine pyrophosphate. Alanine substitutions of arginine 288, histidine 292, and aspartate 296, residues highly conserved among α-ketoacid dehydrogenases, resulted in inactive enzymes. Each of the inactive E1 mutants bound to the E2 core subunit with equal affinity as wild-type E1, and each produced circular dichroism spectra identical to that of wild-type E1. Two mutations, H292A and S293E, abolished the ability of E1 apoenzyme to reconstitute with thiamine pyrophosphate. Each alanine-substituted E1 was phosphorylated at site 1 by branched-chain α-ketoacid dehydrogenase kinase with similar rates, with the exception of the R288A mutant, which displayed no detectable phosphorylation. Thiamine pyrophosphate inhibited the phosphorylation of all mutant enzymes with the exception of H292A, the mutant E1 that did not bind thiamine pyrophosphate.


Operable in liquid helium, liquid hydrogen or liquid nitrogen, high temperature superconductor (HTS) cables are investigated as future alternatives to low temperature superconductor (LTS) cables in magnet applications. Different high current HTS cable concepts have been developed and optimized in the last years each coming with its own benefits and challenges. As the Roebel Assembled Coated Conductor (RACC) is the only fully transposed HTS cable investigated so far, it is attractive for large scale magnet and accelerator magnet applications, where field quality and alternating current (AC) losses are of highest importance. However, due to its filamentary character, the RACC is very sensitive to Lorentz forces. In order to increase the mechanical stability of the RACC, each of the HTS strands was covered by an additional copper tape. After investigating the maximum applicable transverse pressure on the strand composition, the cable was clamped into a stainless steel structure to stabilise it against Lorentz forces. A comprehensive test has been carried out in the FBI facility at 4.2 K in a magnetic field of up to 12 T. This publication discusses the maximum applicable pressure as well as the behaviour of the RACC cable as a function of an external magnetic field.


An increasing research effort has been made on spatially disaggregated safety analysis models to meet the needs of region-level safety inspection and recently emerging transportation safety planning techniques. However, without explicitly differentiating exposure variables and risk factors, most existing studies alternate the use of crash frequency, crash rate, and crash risk to interpret model coefficients. This procedure may have resulted in the inconsistent findings in relevant studies. This study proposes a Bayesian spatial model to account for county-level variations of crash risk in Florida by explicitly controlling for exposure variables of daily vehicle miles traveled and population. A conditional autoregressive prior is specified to accommodate for the spatial autocorrelations of adjacent counties. The results show no significant difference in safety effects of risk factors on all crashes and severe crashes. Counties with higher traffic intensity and population density and a higher level of urbanization are associated with higher crash risk. Unlike arterials, freeways seem to be safer with respect to crash risk given either vehicle miles traveled or population. Increase in truck traffic volume tends to result in more severe crashes. The average travel time to work is negatively correlated with all types of crash risk. Regarding the population age cohort, the results suggest that young drivers tend to be involved in more crashes, whereas the increase in elderly population leads to fewer casualties. Finally, it is confirmed that the safety status is worse for more deprived areas with lower income and educational level and higher unemployment rate in comparison with relatively affluent areas.


Background Physical activity (PA) is important for preventing falls in older age. However, most older people in Iran have not been involved in any exercise program. The aim of this study was to assess the determinants of physical activity to prevent falls using protection motivation theory (PMT) in Iranian older people.Methods The cross-sectional study was conducted in Qom, Iran, from May to October 2018. Three hundred older people were selected from retirement centers via stratified sampling method. Data was collected using the Rapid Assessment of Physical Activity, and PMT constructs scale. Data analysis was performed using multiple linear regression and descriptive statistical analysis.Results The mean (SD) age of the participants was 64.6 (5.5) and the majority were male (77.7%). Level of perceived self-efficacy of participation was low. Perceived costs and perceived rewards were negatively associated with motivation. Furthermore, protection motivation (β=0.38, P<0.0001), fear (β=0.21, P=0.001), and efficiency of response (β=0.13, P=0.026), significantly predict PA behavior. The study model explained approximately 32% of the variance in PA behavior.Conclusion The results indicated that reducing barriers to exercising might increase PA intention. Also, protection motivation and efficiency of response and fear are considered as the strongest predictors of PA behavior among older people. The results can help health care providers to develop appropriate interventions for promoting PA among older people.


This paper concerns the optimization and comparison of six different axial-flux permanent magnet (AFPM) machine topologies for an in-wheel direct drive application. The objective of the optimization is to reach maximum power density, which is of essence for an in-wheel motor. The machine topologies are optimized using the 3D analytical charge model in combination with a thermal equivalent circuit model for calculation of the temperature rise and thermal dependency of the main electromagnetic losses. All investigated AFPM machine topologies are variations of the internal stator twin external rotor AFPM machine. The resulting designs are compared based on their power density, weight, efficiency, and permanent magnet volume. The distributed winding topology with a quasi-Halbach magnet arrangement shows the best performance within the optimization problem.


The International Roadmap for Semiconductor Devices calls for transistors that will extend into the low-dimensional regime. As electronic devices are shrunk to increasingly lowered dimensions, the restricted geometry and extremely low carrier density results in an extraordinary sensitivity to interfaces, defects and disorder. This sensitivity is a significant barrier to their use in future technologies as it sufficiently alters their electronic properties so that their transport physics is no longer well understood. In this work, electronic scattering due to contacting electrodes, supporting substrates, defects and disorder is investigated in the case of field effect transistor (FET) devices composed of one-dimensional, single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWNTs). In order to investigate the various mechanisms of electronic scattering in SWNT FETs, scanning probe microscopy (SPM) techniques are developed in order to spatially resolve and distinguish each scattering mechanism. This dissertation gives a brief introduction to low-dimensional conductors in Chapter 1 and outlines basic experimental methods for characterizing SWNT FETs in Chapter 2. Next, the development of SPM techniques are described in Chapters 3-4, 6 and their application to understanding transport in SWNTs is described in Chapters 5-7.The SPM techniques described in this dissertation are based upon Kelvin probe force microscopy (KPFM) and scanning gate microscopy (SGM). Chapter 3 describes modifications to an existing atomic force microscope (AFM) electronics to increase the imaging speed of KPFM in order to extend it into a transport spectroscopy. Next, Chapter 4 describes a new KPFM technique, Parameterized-KPFM, that was developed to quantitatively measure the voltage gradients associated with electronic scattering in SWNT FETs. Finally, Chapter 6 describes extending the SGM technique into a spectroscopy called scanning gate spectroscopy (SGS) in order to investigate a SWNT's local sensitivity to electric fields. Both the KPFM and SGS techniques were used to investigate FETs with pristine SWNTs, and those with SWNTs containing a single defect site.In the first study, described in Chapter 5, KPFM was used to measure voltage gradients associated with diffusive electronic scattering along pristine SWNTs. The KPFM technique allowed for an accurate separation of SWNT resistance from the contact resistance that was greatly improved compared to previous work. The voltage gradients directly determined the inelastic mean free path (lambda) as a function of applied bias. At a temperature of 185 K, lambda was found to decrease from nearly 1 micron at low bias to 100 nm at high bias. Fitting the lambda to established transport models determined the relative roles of substrate induced, surface polar-phonon scattering and SWNT optical phonon scattering. The optical phonon mean free path for spontaneous emission was found to be 62 +/- 20 nm at 300 K, significantly longer than observed in previous experimental studies and in much better agreement with theoretical predictions.In another study, described in Chapter 7, KPFM was used to investigate SWNTs with defects. Single, covalent type defects were incorporated into pristine SWNTs by the method of electrochemical point-functionalization. Electronic scattering at defect sites was characterized by a combination of two-terminal transport spectroscopy and KPFM over a wide range of temperature and bias. Both transport measurements and KPFM were used to independently confirm high-resistance depletion regions that can extend to 1.0 micron in width surrounding a single defect. Fitting transport measurements to models demonstrated that conductance through such wide depletion regions occurs via a modified, 1D version of Poole-Frenkel emission. The Poole-Frenkel model suggests that conduction through the depletion region is mediated by at least one or more localized defect trap states. The Poole-Frenkel trapping potential was found to be relatively weak with effective barrier heights measured to be 10-40 meV.Finally, Chapter 6 discusses the use of SGS to investigate similar types of covalent defects. Point-functionalization of SWNTs in water, sulfuric acid, or hydrochloric acid produced single defect sites with different chemistries. Using SGS, the defect's sensitivity to electric fields was measured and used to extract the energy-dependent transmission function. The three defect chemistries were distinguished by a spectroscopic fingerprint found in each transmission function.


N, et al. Early administration of vapreotide for variceal bleeding in patients with cirrhosis. N Engl J Med 2001;344:23-28. 3. Abid S, Jafri W, Hamid S, Salih M, Azam Z, Mumtaz K, et al. Terlipressin vs. octreotide in bleeding esophageal varices as an adjuvant therapy with endoscopic band ligation: a randomized double-blind placebocontrolled trial. Am J Gastroenterol 2009;104:617-623. 4. Lo GH, Perng DS, Chang CY, Tai CM, Wang HM, Lin HC. Controlled trial of ligation plus vasoconstrictor versus proton pump inhibitor in the control of acute esophageal variceal bleeding. J Gastroenterol Hepatol 2013;28:684-689. 5. Lo GH, Lai KH, Cheng JS, Lin CK, Huang JS, Hsu PI, et al. Emergency banding ligation versus sclerotherapy for the control of active bleeding from esophageal varices. HEPATOLOGY 1997;25:11011104.


After the eruption of Mount Merapi in October-November 2010, at least 140 million m3 volcanic material piled on the back of Merapi and some flows shortly on and after the eruption through the rivers that disgorge on peak of Merapi. To date, the impact from the silting of the river and falling volcanic material from the top of Merapi cause lahar flood which swept through areas far enough from the peak of Merapi. Given the dangers and impact caused by the lahar flow, as well as the limitations of existing data, the simplest method by perform rainfall data analysis is expected to predict lahar flow events in Gendol river. The analysis method performed by setting of standard rainfall for warning and evacuation were used for prediction of sediment disasters based on Guidelines for Development of Warning and Evacuation System Against sediment Disasters in Developing Countries, published by the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport, Infrastructure Development Institute - Japan, namely: (1) specifies serial rain which total amount of rain ≥ 80 mm, (2) Calculations on working rainfall (RW) and working antecedent rainfall (RWA), (3) Calculation on effective rainfall (RE), effective time, and effective rainfall intensity (IE), (4) Make a graph of effective rainfall intensity and working rainfall, (5) Predict the potential for debris flow by calculating the probability of debris flow occurrence on Gendol river. The research results showed that the number of reviewed serial rain with total value ≥ 80 mm is 9.28% of the whole serial rain, and 12.5% of them caused lahar flow in Gendol River. Debris flow occurrence probability on total rainfall amount of ≥ 80 mm that may occur on Gendol River amounted to 1.89%. This value represents less possibility of debris flow in Gendol River, this is due to the rain conditions in the Gendol Watershed different from the situation in Japan as well as the limitations of the available data. It is recommended for further research on the limitation of total rainfall in accordance with the conditions in Gendol Watershed by considering other parameters becoming the lahar flow controller factor. Further, it is necessary to perform the analysis using rain catchment method by averaging rainfall values on each of serial rain.


We examine the dependence of information stability on certain medium parameters, namely mean Curie temperature, grain height, and anisotropy constant ratio in 4 Tbpsi heat-assisted magnetic recording, for 10 years of archiving. We introduce a minimum normalized readout field H 0 after 10 years of archiving and an information degradation rate R 0 during 10 years of archiving. To interpret the results, we investigate whether there is a correlation between H 0 or R 0 and an effective thermal stability factor for 9 and 6 grains/bit. We find that there is a strong correlation since the anisotropy constant is much larger than the shape anisotropy. The H 0 and R 0 values are functions of the effective thermal stability factor and grain number, and are independent of grain number per bit. The effective thermal stability factor necessary for no information degradation is more than about 120. Furthermore, there is a weak correlation between the initial readout field or minimum readout field after 10 years of archiving and the effective thermal stability factor.


In the latter half of the 1990s there was a long-running but unreported conflict over use of a coastal rock platform on the Central Coast of New South Wales, just to the north of Sydney. This multifaceted dispute was between poor Korean Australians from the inner suburbs of Sydney and locals. The source of this conflict was the manner in which the rock platform was being used, how its resources were exploited and the type of social life that accompanied these activities. Different peoples brought different understandings to the rock platform, and they acted in accordance with those understandings.For many older settler Australians, and for the diminishing number of those 'on the land', the essence of what it is to be Australian is found outside of urban environments. Colloquially referred to as 'the bush', this can mean virtually any rural, remote, regional, or non-urban setting. For those living in cities, and for more recent immigrants to Australia, national parks are one site that provides ready access to 'the bush'. As with the coastal rock platform, different peoples bring different understandings to their encounters with national parks and 'the bush', and their use of these places changes accordingly.This paper begins with a description of the rock platform incident, before moving on to discuss the response of different immigrant groups to national parks and other open public spaces.


This paper presents the results of the observations of the detectors participating in the International Gravitational Event Collaboration (IGEC) from 1997 to 2000 and reviews the data analysis methods. The analysis is designed to search for coincident excitations in multiple detectors. The data set analysed in this article covers a longer period and is more complete than that given in previous reports. The current analysis is more accurate for determining the false dismissal probability for a time coincidence search and it optimizes the search with respect to a target amplitude and direction of the signal. The statistics of the accidental coincidences agrees with the model used for drawing the results. The observations of this IGEC search are consistent with no detection of gravitational wave burst events. A new conservative upper limit has been set on the rate of gravitational wave bursts with Fourier component H > 2 · 10 − 21 Hz − 1 , both for searches with and without a filter for the Galactic Center direction. This study confirms that the false alarm rate of the observation can be negligible when at least three detectors are operating simultaneously.


Understanding of inferences and non-literal language, such as idioms, is critical for successful communication and academic learning. Assessment of inferential and idiom comprehension is essential for children who are showing difficulties in these areas so that appropriate intervention and support can be provided. There is very little information on the typical development of these specific areas of verbal comprehension in the literature and there are very few current assessments of inferential and idiom comprehension for British school-aged children. While many assessments that do exist have face validity, very few are standardised. Some children with comprehension difficulties do well on existing picture-based assessments of verbal comprehension but they demonstrate significant difficulties with more abstract language comprehension. There is a gap in the current battery of assessments available to paediatric speech and language therapists for assessing inferential and idiom comprehension in detail.

The primary aims of this thesis were to develop a robust standardised British assessment of inferential and idiom comprehension for 5:00 to 9:11 year-old children, to provide supporting validity and reliability data for the newly devised assessment, to provide normative and statistically significant data for inferential and idiom comprehension in typically developing children aged 5:00 to 9:11, to provide qualitative information on the typical development of these areas of verbal comprehension and to carry out exploratory studies using the new assessment with children with communication impairments. Secondary aims of the study were to examine if there was any relationship between gender and test performance and between socio-economic status and test performance.

A new assessment, the Hewitt Inferential Comprehension and Idioms Test (HICIT) was created following a review of the literature and of the existing assessments in these areas of verbal comprehension. A pilot study was carried out with sixty-two 4:06 to 10:06 year-old children in two primary schools in the North West of England. The fourteen section, 210 item pilot test was reduced to the twelve section, 140 item final version of the HICIT. This was then trialled with a further 200 children, aged 5:00 to 9:11, making an overall standardisation sample of 250 children.
Normative data were provided from the application of descriptive and inferential statistics to the results. A two-way ANOVA examined the effects of age group and gender on test scores and a one-way ANOVA and post-hoc independent T tests looked at the relationship between socio-economic status and test performance.

The construct validity of the test was examined with exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses. These demonstrated a single factor loading and good model fit measurements. The reliability of the test, as assessed by Cronbach's Alpha was moderate, similar to an existing published British standardised verbal language assessment. Rasch analysis indicated that the internal consistency of the test was good. The inter-rater reliability of 98.6% was excellent.
The descriptive and inferential statistics demonstrated that there was a developmental progression between the age groups for inferential and idiom comprehension but that there was no effect for gender. The idioms sub-section was the only section not to reach ceiling scores by 9:11.
The results for the relationship between socio-economic status and test scores were inconclusive.
Quantitative analysis of the HICIT data demonstrated that the test is a robust assessment of inferential and idiom comprehension. Some sub-tests of the test are more robust with different age groups so different versions of the test could be used with different age groups.
Qualitative analysis of the test responses, exploratory case studies using the HICIT to assess four children with communication impairments and feedback from practising speech and language therapists produced useful information on the possible applications of the test and suggested that it could be very useful to assist in differential diagnosis of different types of communication impairments.


Abstract Freshwater fungi play an important role in the decomposition of organic matter of leaf litter in rivers and streams. They also possess the necessary mechanisms to endure lower temperatures caused by habitat and weather variations. This includes the production of cold-active enzymes and antifreeze proteins. To better understand the physiological activities of freshwater fungi in their natural environment, different methods are being applied, and genome sequencing is one in the spotlight. In our study, we sequenced the first genome of the freshwater fungus Filosporella fistucella (45.7 Mb) and compared the genome with the evolutionary close-related species Tricladium varicosporioides (48.2 Mb). The genomes were annotated using the carbohydrate-active enzyme database where we then filtered for leaf-litter degradation-related enzymes (cellulase, hemicellulase, laccase, pectinase, cutinase, amylase, xylanase, and xyloglucanase). Those enzymes were analyzed for antifreeze properties using a machine-learning approach. We discovered that F. fistucella has more enzymes to participate in the breakdown of sugar, leaf, and wood than T. varicosporioides (855 and 719, respectively). Filosporella fistucella shows a larger set of enzymes capable of resisting cold temperatures than T. varicosporioides (75 and 66, respectively). Our findings indicate that in comparison with T. varicosporioides, F. fistucella has a greater capacity for aquatic growth, adaptability to freshwater environments, and resistance to low temperatures.


The temperature distribution in InGaN-MQW light emitting diodes was examined during operation with spatially resolved micro-Raman and micro-Electroluminescence measurements. The experimental results were compared to finite element simulations. A good agreement between the different experimental and calculated data is found. Maximum operation temperatures up to 140 °C at a moderate forward currents of 30 mA are revealed by all three independent methods. Influences of substrate thickness, different substrates, and even bond-wires are shown.


The value of mechanical engineering patents often lies in innovative graphic designs and detailed complementary context. Therefore, without having the contents of a patent thoroughly examined by experts, we cannot understand its true innovation value by using the current information analysis technology. Since, the process of qualitative research, on the other hand, is a complicated and time-consuming task, this paper proposes a Key Patent Analysis Process (KPAP). KPAP uses the "focusing first, and then finding the details" idea to prove the feasibility of this method by giving a specific case. Firstly, we propose using a patent family to effectively retrieve the key patents to meet the requirements of the innovation design; then we propose proceeding to the next step using a patent citation to broaden the search field to thoroughly comprehend the development in a specific technology field. Finally, we use TRIZ to create a technology performance map and technology development niche, and to effectively solve the possible engineering obstacles that may come to mind at the detail designing stage. The model suggested by this research can indeed promote the effectiveness of patent technology to extract useful patent intelligence; moreover, it improves the overall efficiency of new product designs.


To determine the anatomic basis for spinal instabilities, 16 porcine cervical spine specimens were subjected to a well‐defined sagittal plane trauma. The multidirectional instability of each specimen was measured before and after trauma. Detailed anatomic dissections were performed on each traumatized specimen to quantitate the extent of injury to several distinct anatomic structures and columns. Multiple regression models were constructed to determine which anatomic structures and columns correlated best with each multidirectional instability. Flexion instability correlated best with injury to the interspinous/supraspinous ligaments and the ligamentum flavum. Extension instability correlated best with anterior longitudinal ligament and pedicle injury. Axial rotation instability correlated best with anterior disc–end‐plate and capsular ligament injuries, while lateral bending instability correlated best with posterior disc–end‐plate injuries. Anterior column injuries correlated best with extension, axial rotation, and lateral bending instabilities, while posterior column injuries correlated best with flexion instability. Finally, individual anatomic structural injuries had higher correlations with multidirectional instabilities than did the injuries defined by the anatomic columns.


Mutations in PTEN-induced kinase 1 (PINK1) gene cause PARK6 familial Parkinsonism, and loss of the stability of PINK1 may also contribute to sporadic Parkinson's disease (PD). Degradation of PINK1 occurs predominantly through the ubiquitin proteasome system (UPS), however, to date, few of the proteins have been found to regulate the degradation of PINK1. Using the yeast two-hybrid system and pull-down methods, we identified bcl-2-associated athanogene 5 (BAG5), a BAG family member, directly interacted with PINK1. We showed that BAG5 stabilized PINK1 by decreasing the ubiquitination of PINK1. Interestingly, BAG5 rescued MPP+- and rotenone-induced mitochondria dysfunction by up-regulating PINK1 in vitro. In PINK1-null mice and MPTP-treated mice, BAG5 significantly increased in the substantia nigra pars compacta (SNpc) although PINK1 was decreased. Our findings indicated that BAG5, as a key protein to stabilize PINK1, is a promising therapeutic tool for preventing mitochondrial dysfunction following oxidative stress.


Inhomogeneous magnetization transfer is becoming an important tool in the detection of demyelinating pathologies, as well as in the understanding of the molecular mechanisms engaged in demyelinating/remyelinating processes. Although ihMT ratio delivers a reproducible index sensitive to the dipolar order underpinning the ihMT effect, advanced approaches analogous to quantitative MT could allow estimation of quantitative parameters directly related to the underlying biophysical model of myelin. This study proposes a general framework based on the Matrix Exponential Model allowing fast fitting of ihMT data. Demonstration of qihMT is performed ex-vivo on rat spinal cord specimen and in-vivo on mouse brain.


Texas is subject to severe droughts, including the record-breaking one in 2011. To investigate the critical hydrometeorological processes during drought, we use a land surface model, Noah-MP, to simulate water availability and investigate the causes of the record drought. We conduct a series of experiments with runoff schemes, vegetation phenology, and plant rooting depth. Observation-based terrestrial water storage, evapotranspiration, runoff, and leaf area index are used to compare with results from the model. Overall, the results suggest that using different parameterizations can influence the modeled water availability, especially during drought. The drought-induced vegetation responses not only interact with water availability but also affect the ground temperature. Our evaluation shows that Noah-MP with a groundwater scheme produces a better temporal relationship in terrestrial water storage compared with observations. Leaf area index from dynamic vegetation is better simulated in wet years than dry years. Reduction of positive biases in runoff and reduction of negative biases in evapotranspiration are found in simulations with groundwater, dynamic vegetation, and deeper rooting zone depth. Multi-parameterization experiments show the uncertainties of drought monitoring and provide a mechanistic understanding of disparities in dry anomalies.


While Western medical ethics has ancient roots in the teachings of Hippocrates, its standing in the undergraduate medical curriculum is a distinctly modern development. Today, all of the 127 accredited U.S. medical schools offer formal biomedical ethics instruction, and nearly all offer instruction in the related discipline of health law. This article describes how biomedical ethics and health law are taught at the University of Iowa College of Medicine, one of 12 medical schools that offers separate required courses in both ethics and law. Often ethics and law overlap; often, to act ethically is to act legally. But medical students and practicing physicians also regularly confront dilemmas that pose the question, "It's ethical, but is it legal?" This article discusses the goals, methods, and core themes of teaching issues at the intersection of medicine, ethics, and law, and how the approach to this instruction is designed to offer students a tool kit to begin to deal effectively with these complex issues in professional life. Anat Rec (New Anat) 265:5–9, 2001. © 2001 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.


Background and aim Desmoid tumors are mainly treated by surgical excision and radiotherapy, but the failure to achieve complete response has given rise to the need for investigating the role of possible target therapy. The aim of this study was to evaluate the immunohistochemical detection of cyclooxygenase-2 (COX-2) and estrogen receptor-β (ERβ) in desmoid tumors and to assess their correlation with available clinicopathologic variables. Materials and methods A total of 17 desmoid tumor cases (11 abdominal, five extra-abdominal, and one intra-abdominal) were examined for immunohistochemical detection of COX-2 and ERβ using monoclonal antibodies. Toluidine blue staining was performed to confirm or exclude that COX-2 immunostained cells coincide with mast cells in co-localized sections. Correlation of results with available clinicopathologic variables was done and a P value less than 0.05 was considered significant. Results COX-2 was expressed in tumor cells in 92% of examined desmoid cases (16/17). Toluidine blue staining has shown that COX-2 immunostained cells do not coincide with the few metachromatically stained mast cells in co-localized sections. ERβ was expressed in 67.1% of tumor cells in desmoid cases (11/17); eight cases displayed high ERβ expression and three cases displayed low ERβ expression. No significant correlation was detected between ERβ or COX-2 immunohistochemical expression and patient's age, sex, tumor size, site, margins status, and recurrence history (P>0.05). Conclusion This study confirmed the immunohistochemical expression of COX-2 and ERβ in tumor cells of the majority of studied desmoid cases. These results introduce COX-2 and ERβ as potential therapeutic targets in desmoid tumors. Further studies with a large sample size and follow-up are recommended to validate the current results.


For $N \geq 5$ and $a>0$, we consider the following semipositone problem \begin{align*} \Delta^2 u= g(x)f_a(u) \text { in } \mathbb{R}^N, \, \text{ and } \, u \in \mathcal{D}^{2,2}(\mathbb{R}^N),\ \ \ \qquad \quad \mathrm{(SP)} \end{align*} where $g \in L^1_{loc}(\mathbb{R}^N)$ is an indefinite weight function, $f_a:\mathbb{R} \to \mathbb{R}$ is a continuous function that satisfies $f_a(t)=-a$ for $t \in \mathbb{R}^-$, and $\mathcal{D}^{2,2}(\mathbb{R}^N)$ is the completion of $\mathcal{C}_c^{\infty}(\mathbb{R}^N)$ with respect to $(\int_{\mathbb{R}^N} (\Delta u)^2)^{1/2}$. For $f_a$ satisfying subcritical nonlinearity and a weaker Ambrosetti-Rabinowitz type growth condition, we find the existence of $a_1>0$ such that for each $a \in (0,a_1)$, (SP) admits a mountain pass solution. Further, we show that the mountain pass solution is positive if $a$ is near zero. For the positivity, we derive uniform regularity estimates of the solutions of (SP) for certain ranges in $(0,a_1)$, relying on the Riesz potential of the biharmonic operator.


Market air quality is very important to the economic lives of the people which is rarely researched, however, market activities particularly pedestrian traffic releases particulates which is detrimental to the health of the users and stakeholders. Thermo scientific MIE pDR-1500 particulate was used to monitor the quality of air within the market for eight (8) weeks, air pollutant of concern is PM2.5. ten (10) sample points were located in the market which covers ten (10) sample points for pedestrian traffic to represent the entire market environment spectrum. The analysis of PM2.5 measured daily during dry and wet season shows a clear seasonal variation of this particular pollutant as elevated concentration was measured during the dry season than the wet season. The assessment of PM2.5 concentration shows exceedances of the standards stated by WHO and NAAQS during the dry season which ranges from 47.9 μg/m3231.88 μg/m3 in the morning and 65.17 μg/m31806.33 μg/m3 in the afternoon. From the findings, pedestrian traffic contributes immensely to air pollution in an open market, with this elevated concentration, prolonged exposure is highly detrimental to health. This study creates awareness to the pedestrians in an open market about air pollution and informs policy changes.


This paper investigates the main challenges experienced in the conservation of cultural materials in Kenya since independence. The study examines the challenges of conservation in view of environmental change, human activities and the organic nature of most of our material culture. The overall goal of this article is to isolate the primary causes of the deterioration of ethnographic materials. The study has been prompted by factors such as the progressive replacement of ethnographic materials with exotic factory substitutes and the deterioration of already stored materials in private and public repositories. Factors influencing the survival of materials in both public and private institutions including museums, galleries and private collections are highlighted. A conservator's ability to anticipate and arrest the process of deterioration helps in the preservation of material culture. This is enhanced by the enactment of laws which are sensitive to cultural heritage conservation thanks to the constitution of Kenya promulgated in 2010.


Machine learning can effectively be used to detect cyberattacks in IoT networks by learning patterns from previous attack datasets. Unfortunately, datasets used for training machine learning models to detect cyberattacks are almost always unbalanced. As training methods usually try to minimise the loss function by correctly classifying the instances of the majority class, the minority class instances are more likely to be misclassified. This paper aims to develop an insight into the effectiveness of two different approaches for handling unbalanced datasets – weighted loss function, and synthetic minority oversampling technique (SMOTE) in enhancing the capacity of two machine learning algorithms – artificial neural network (ANN) and light gradient boosting model (LGBM) to correctly classify minority class instances. The results suggest that both SMOTE and weighted loss function enhance the recall rate for minority classes significantly, however, it comes at the cost of slightly reduced precision. Moreover, it is found that LGBM, being an ensemble classifier, has an inherent capacity of learning from unbalanced data and hence, outperforms ANN in detecting minority class instances.


Color Doppler flow mapping represents the most recent non invasive diagnostic tool for the visualization of intracardiac blood flow. By using the color Doppler flow mapping technique, two independent observers identified the persistence of turbulence in early diastole inside the left atrium in a selected group of 8 patients (3 F and 5 M) with mitral insufficiency. All the patients had moderate or severe mitral insufficiency, due to dilated cardiomyopathy and/or ischemic cardiomyopathy and/or valvular disease. The persistence of early diastolic turbulence inside the left atrium was documented and confirmed by using 30 degrees color sector images, which show the highest possible frame rate. The frame by frame analysis facilitated the identification of two simultaneous flow velocities during early diastole, after the mitral valve was open. The first flow was anterograde and was coded as a red signal; it flowed from the mitral valve into the left ventricle and represented early diastolic left ventricular filling. The second flow was retrograde, and was coded as a blue mosaic signal, due to turbulent aliased jet, extending from the mitral valve into the left atrium, away from the transducer. The interpretation of these two dimensional color Doppler findings is uncertain. We believe, however, that these turbulent velocity signals which persist in early diastole and flow from the mitral valve into the left atrium are probably caused by inertial blood flow due to the impact of regurgitant mitral jets during the previous systole.


The study aimed at finding out any association between vernal keratoconjunctivitis (VKC) and intestinal worm infestations in black children in Nigeria. This is a report of a case-control study of a total of 117 cases of VKC and 198 controls, who were newly presenting to two hospitals in Ibadan. The controls were comparable to the cases in many respects. While 67 (57%) of cases admitted to previous passage of worms, 59 (50.5%) children actually had parasitic infestations. Of these 59 children, 30 (51%) were due to roundworm, 12 (20%) to hookworm, 14 (24%) to protozoal infestation and others, e.g., tapeworms, 13 (5%). Among controls, 36.8% had parasitic infestation, out of which roundworms were responsible for 11.6%, hookworms 7.6%, protozoa 14.1% and others 3.5%. Children with VKC have almost twice (odds ratio = 1.68) the risk of having been infested by worms. Both older age in children and roundworm infestation were not independent risk factors for VKC. There was no significant association among all ages, sex, hookworm and other worms with VKC. Deworming may prove beneficial for children with VKC; however, more studies with appropriate design are required to prove this.


We have used detailed Monte Carlo simulations to study strategies to search for the Standard Model Higgs boson produced in the reactions e+e+ Z"Ho and e+e+ uepeHo at an e+ecenter-of-mass energy of 1 TeV. We show that it is possible to extract a significant signal from all Standard Model backgrounds if the mass of the Higgs is not near the mass of the TV* or 2' and is less than 400 (500) GeV h w en a data sample of 10 (30) fb-l has been collected. Submitted to Physical Review D *Work supported by the Department of Energy, contracts DE-AC03-76SF00515 and DE-AM03-76SFOOOlO.


A summary is presented of the history of Shanghai's population growth and the accompanying problems relative to high density, employment, housing, and transportation. Some suggestions for controlling Shanghai's population growth are made, including the need to accomodate population growth in national economic planning, to adopt effective measures to lower the birth rate in the suburbs, and to establish an organization with city-wide authority to develop population policy and to handle all population-related problems.


An encapsulated metal-dielectric reflective grating is presented for broadband polarization-independent two-port beam splitting under normal incidence at the central wavelength of 800 nm. Different from traditional two-port grating splitters in the resonant region, this grating splitter is capable of separating light energy into ±1st orders with high efficiency in a broad waveband for both TE and TM polarizations. A unified method is proposed here for designing this grating splitter, which enables one to choose a grating structure quickly to realize an ultrabroad working waveband. The simulation results indicate that a bandwidth of 46.4 nm could be achieved for diffraction efficiency (defined as the ratio of the light energy diffracted only at the first order to the incident light energy) over 46% at the central wavelength of 800 nm. Moreover, the parameters of the grating structure can be flexibly adjusted with wavelengths using the unified method for various other applications, such as augmented reality, optical interconnections for computing, coherent beam combination, and complex vector beam shaping.


Many people, like the protagonist of Dorothy Parker's short story "Too Bad," wonder "what did married people talk about, anyway, when they were alone together?" Raymond Carver's short story "What We Talk About When We Talk About Love" is the literary rendition of the ways in which married couples talk. This essay analyses this short story taking into account sociolinguistic aspects related to men's and women's linguistic behaviour and the speech strategies each gender uses, so as to explore if these characters accurately reflect real life speech


Background There are many types of hand tumors, and it is often difficult for imaging diagnosticians to make a correct diagnosis, which can easily lead to misdiagnosis and delay in treatment. Thus in this paper, we propose a deep neural network for diagnose on MR Images of tumors of the hand in order to better define preoperative diagnosis and standardize surgical treatment. Methods We collected MRI figures of 221 patients with hand tumors from one medical center from 2016 to 2019, invited medical experts to annotate the images to form the annotation data set. Then the original image is preprocessed to get the image data set. The data set is randomly divided into ten parts, nine for training and one for test. Next, the data set is input into the neural network system for testing. Finally, average the results of ten experiments as an estimate of the accuracy of the algorithm. Results This research uses 221 images as dataset and the system shows an average confidence level of 71.6% in segmentation of hand tumors. The segmented tumor regions are validated through ground truth analysis and manual analysis by a radiologist. Conclusions With the recent advances in convolutional neural networks, vast improvements have been made for image segmentation, mainly based on the skip-connection-linked encoder decoder deep architectures. Therefore, in this paper, we propose an automatic segmentation method based on DeepLab v3+ and achieved a good diagnostic accuracy rate.


Properties of finite nuclei are evaluated with two-nucleon (NN) and three-nucleon (NNN) interactions derived within chiral effective field theory. The nuclear Hamiltonian is fixed by properties of the A=2 system, except for two low-energy constants (LECs) that parametrize the short range NNN interaction, which we constrain with the A=3 binding energies. We investigate the sensitivity of 4He, 6Li, 10,11B, and 12,13C properties to the variation of the constrained LECs. We identify observables that are sensitive to this variation and find preferred values that give the best overall description. We demonstrate that the NNN interaction terms significantly improve the binding energies and spectra of mid-p-shell nuclei not just with the preferred choice of the LECs but even within a wide range of the constrained LECs. We find that a very high quality description of these nuclei requires further improvements to the chiral Hamiltonian.


Although the ergot alkaloids (ergots) are useful drugs for the acute treatment of migraine headaches, their mechanism of action remains obscure. When administered to rats in clinically relevant doses, ergots blocked the development of neurogenic plasma extravasation in dura mater. Plasma extravasation was induced by depolarization of perivascular axons following capsaicin injection or unilateral electrical stimulation of the trigeminal nerve. The ergot action could not be accounted for by vasoconstriction alone because neurogenic plasma leakage was not blocked by angiotensin or phenylephrine. Furthermore, ergots did not block plasma extravasation induced by administering sensory neuropeptides that mediate enhanced permeability. We propose that the therapeutic effects of ergots in vascular headaches may result from peripheral blockade of small fiber (C or A‐delta)‐dependent neurogenic inflammation within the dura mater.


Aim of Study This study is to design and fabricate a geo probe that is used to determine the basic properties of soft soil. Need of Study Deep foundation on soft is difficult as it is vulnerable to lateral movement when it is subjected to vertical load. Due to this problem, a geo probe is designed and constructed with foam concrete to determine the condition of the soil which is based on the ultimate bearing capacity, qu and the undrained shear strength, Su . Research Approach Designed geo probe comprises a cylindrical hollow PVC pipe of 50mm for internal diameter and 100mm for the external diameter in filled with foamed concrete of 1200kg/m3 density. It was installed on a test site in RECESS and loaded to compute the value of ratio ultimate bearing capacity over undrained shear strength in the particular study of soil. As commonly said ultimate bearing capacity is more than undrained shear strength by five times which only happen in a certain condition. Research Findings This study formed a basis design of a geo probe which can be used to determine basic properties of soft soil. Experimental work showed that at shear strength of 1kpa the ratio of qu/Su is 6.7 and at 19kpa, the ratio of qu/Su is 3.1. Limitations This study is to evaluate and design a scale model to be tested under static loading on soft soil. The study will cover the experimentation of the scaled down the probe for field trials in UTHM at the soft soils that are located at RECESS. It will also consist of determining the ratio of qu/Su from the results that have been obtained from the experiment. Importance and Contribution The result of this study is expected to improve the understanding on the methods of determining the bearing capacity and the ratio of qu/Su of soft soil.


Transnational Intellectual Property Law provides students comparative knowledge of intellectual property for today's world. The book provides students a strong understanding of intellectual property law in four important global stakeholders and regions: United States, European Union, Japan and China. Transcending national borders, the students will learn the similarities and differences in these four regions through reading and analyzing valuable primary sources of judicial opinions from the courts. The materials allow the students to identify how culture and traditions influence judges in crafting their opinions, in both common law and civil law countries. The book is organized in six units. Each unit begins with a concise summary of a doctrinal area of intellectual property law in each of the four regions, United States, European Union, Japan and China. Judicial opinions from a particular region follow the doctrinal summaries within each unit.


The St. Johns River watershed, located in Florida, USA, is the focus of planning efforts to improve the resiliency and management of water resources infrastructure from current and future flood threats. These threats are driven by intense urbanization of the basin combined with increased frequency and intensity of coastal storms, made worse by sea level rise. Research efforts have begun to develop a comprehensive system of coupled numerical simulation models of the entire watershed in order to assess the current and long-term risks from flood inundation. This study provides a discussion of the system-wide model design and preliminary development. The study first outlines the project area and various numerical models to be coupled together. Then, the study discusses preliminary model development efforts and challenges. This initial study revealed the overall complexity and size of the undertaking. Overall, the study's primary conclusion is that while an integrated system of coupled models is feasible and potentially very useful for long-term planning, the computational challenges for such an undertaking are extensive.


What is a basic needs approach to development all about? by D.P. Ghai On the principles of quantifying and satisfying basic needs by D.P. Ghai and T. Alfthan Some normative aspects of a basic neeeds strategy by E.L.H. Lee Basic needs targets: An illustrative exercise in identification and quantification by A.R. Khan Production planning for basic needs by A.R. Khan


Detecting rotor position is an important part of work of magnetic suspension spherical reluctance motor. It contains rotor's position and orientation detection. This paper creates three-dimensional coordinate system on spherical reluctance motor, derives the description of the rotor's position and orientation and proposes a method for calculating rotor's position based on radial displacement sensors and angular displacement transducer. It also uses this approach and the spherical geometry relation to calculate orientation matrix of rotor according to the data from the sensors, so we can work out the position of any point through the rotation of coordinate system and position transformation.


Abstract
When a parameter of interest is nondifferentiable in the probability, the existing theory of semiparametric efficient estimation is not applicable, as it does not have an influence function. Song (2014) recently developed a local asymptotic minimax estimation theory for a parameter that is a nondifferentiable transform of a regular parameter, where the transform is a composite map of a continuous piecewise linear map with a single kink point and a translation-scale equivariant map. The contribution of this paper is twofold. First, this paper extends the local asymptotic minimax theory to nondifferentiable transforms that are a composite map of a Lipschitz continuous map having a finite set of nondifferentiability points and a translation-scale equivariant map. Second, this paper investigates the discontinuity of the local asymptotic minimax risk in the true probability and shows that the proposed estimator remains to be optimal even when the risk is locally robustified not only over the scores at the true probability, but also over the true probability itself. However, the local robustification does not resolve the issue of discontinuity in the local asymptotic minimax risk.


The paper provides comparison of properties of 100% cotton yarn with those of two cotton-polyester blended yarns of 50/50 and 20/80 blend ratios. In this regard three types of yarns (i.e. 100% cotton, 50/50 and 20/80 cottonpolyester blends) were produced in the ring frame and for each type two different counts (30 Ne and 40 Ne) were produced. The blending was carried out in the draw frame. During processing, the settings and parameters e.g. spindle speed and twist multiplier were adjusted for optimum performance. After production at each stage (i.e. D/F, Simplex and Ring) samples of draw frame slivers, rovings and yarns were collected and investigated. The properties that were investigated were count, yarn faults, yarn irregularity as U% and strength as CSP. The study shows that, in ring frame it was possible to maintain higher spindle speed and lower twist multiplier for 50/50 and 20/80 blended yarns than 100% cotton yarn. Between 50/50 and 20/80 blended yarns, it possible to maintain higher spindle speed and lower twist multiplier for 20/80 blend than 50/50 bend. It was observed in all cases that as the percentage of polyester increase the U% i.e. the irregularity in the sliver/yarn decreases. It was also observed that yarn faults (IPI) decreased with the increase of % of polyester in the yarns. The yarn strength of 50/50 and 20/80 blended yarns was higher than that of 100% cotton and strength of 20/80 was higher than that 50/50 blended yarn.


Small molecules with DNA-binding affinity within the minor groove have become of great interest. In this paper, new DNA binding molecules; diamino-bistetrahydrofuran (bisTHF) and diamino-bisfuran are reported. The bisTHF ligand with RR configuration at the amino groups and C8 alkyl chains (RR8) stabilized GC-rich duplex. In contrast, bisfuran compounds stabilized AT-rich duplex. The binding affinity of RR8 with 12 mer duplex DNA was determined by isothermal titration calorimetry to be 3.3 x 10(8) M-1.


This paper mentions a method for the detection and correction of films damaged by tear. The method includes estimation of motion vectors between two frames in an image sequence, delineating the tear boundary and restoring the damaged frame using suitable missing data treatment. Thus loss of data along the tear boundary is also corrected. The paper also includes the comparison of performance of different motion estimation methods like exhaustive search, three step search, four step search, diamond search and adaptive rood pattern search. Among these adaptive rood pattern search is found to be the best in performance based on the study of quality measurement and the execution time required.


The measured B-->pipi,piK branching ratios (BRs) exhibit puzzling patterns. We point out that the B-->pipi hierarchy can be nicely accommodated in the standard model (SM) through nonfactorizable hadronic interference effects, whereas the B-->piK system may indicate new physics (NP) in the electroweak (EW) penguin sector. Using the B-->pipi data and the SU(3) flavor symmetry, we fix the hadronic B-->piK parameters and show that any currently observed feature of the B-->piK system can be easily explained through enhanced EW penguin diagrams with a large CP-violating NP phase. This in turn implies in particular an enhancement of the K(L)-->pi(0)nunu rate by 1 order of magnitude, with BR(K(L)-->pi(0)nunu) approximately 4BR(K+-->pi(+)nunu), BR(K(L)-->pi(0)e(+)e(-))=O(10(-10)), and (sin(2beta)(pinunu)<0. We address also other rare K and B decays and B(d)-->phiK(S).


In this research, hydraulic and sorption behavior of geosynthetic clay liners (GCLs) withordinary and modified clay exposed to crude oil were studied. Both modified and ordinary bentonites wereinvestigated to evaluate crude oil adsorption efficiency on the liners. Because soil permeability exposed tocrude oil is a major parameter in measuring the contaminants migration in soils, the permeability tests wereconducted on the clays. X-ray diffraction (XRD) analyses were also carried out to evaluate the adsorption ofcrude oil by bentonites. Following the tests, results of XRD analysis for modified bentonite samples indicatedan average 63.2% interlayer increase after their exposure to the crude oil while that of ordinary bentonite wasrelatively insignificant (0.5 %). In case of permeability tests, modified bentonites showed much lowerpermeability values (5.2 × 10-9 cm/s) compared to ordinary bentonites (1.2 × 10-6 cm/s) when exposed tocrude oil, hence denoting the viability of modified clays, instead of ordinary clays as GCLs materials atpetroleum contaminated sites.


Cardiovascular disorders are the most common reason of morbidity and mortality worldwide. The prevalence of diabetes mellitus, which is strongly associated with cardiac and cerebrovascular events, is increasing during the last decades. Based on the results of clinical studies we summarize in the review article the risk factors and patomechanisms connecting diabetes mellitus to incidence of arrhythmias and sudden cardiac death. The paper analyzes influence of diabetes mellitus on atrial fibrillation and arrhythmogenic effect of antidiabetic drugs.


Background. The aim is to test the reliability and validity of the Hip Inflammation MRI Scoring System (HIMRISS) in assessing hip involvement of AS patients at different stages of the bath ankylosing spondylitis radiology index (BASRI-hip) scoring system.Methods. Fifty-two outpatients with ankylosing spondylitis(AS) were included in this study. The subjects' data includes demographics, clinical characteristics, disease activity score, and functional index. Based on the Harris hip scoring (HHS) of involved hip and BASRI-hip score, we devided these patients into no hip involvement group(HHS≥80 and BASRI≤1)(Group A), mild hip involvement subgroup (BASRI=2 or BASRI≤1 and HHS≤79) (Group B) and moderate to advanced hip involvement subgroup (BASRI≥3) (Group C). Data was analyzed statistically by SPSS software.Results. In total of 44 patients (88 hips), group A consisted of 21 hips, group B consisted of 42 hips and group C consisted of 25 hips. The test-retest intraclass correlation coefficients (ICCs) in four raters were 0.955~0.977 and interrater ICC was 0.993. HIMRISS correlated moderately with the Bath Ankylosing Spondylitis Disease Activity Index (BASDAI) (r=0.540, p<0.001), the Bath ankylosing spondylitis functional index (BASFI) (r=0.581, p<0.001), ASDAS-ESR (r=0.604, p<0.001) and Ankylosing Spondylitis Disease Activity Score(ASDAS)- C reactive protein (CRP) (r=0.575, p<0.001). HIMRISS in group B and C was significantly higher than that in group A: 29.38(17.00,40.94)vs 14.50(11.38,22.25), p=0.009; 38 (31.13,64.38)vs 14.50(11.38,22.25), p<0.001.Conclusions. HIMRISS applied to patients with AS demonstrated a satisfactory reliability, which means it is a reliable quantitive assessment tool for evaluating early hip involvement in patients with AS.


This paper considers a biobjective transportation problem with various fuzzy objective functions coefficients. Fuzzy coefficients can be of different types such as triangular, trapezoidal, (semi) $L-R$, or flat (semi) $L-R$ fuzzy numbers. First, we convert the problem to a parametric interval biobjective transportation problem using $gamma$-cuts of fuzzy coefficients. Then, we consider a fix $gamma$-cut and obtain a necessarily weak efficient solution to the yielded interval biobjective program by a new algorithm. It uses basic feasible solutions and the parametric simplex algorithm. Furthermore, we suggest another algorithm for finding a reasonable solution, called $gamma^*$-necessarily weak efficient, to the main biobjective transportation problem. To illustrate the validity and performance of the proposed algorithms, we present some numerical examples.


The future generation wireless systems target to provide users with high-speed Internet access and multimedia services besides voice. Mobile IP was developed to provide the freedom of mobility to the users with continuous network access. MIPv6 is the grown up version of Mobile IP and eliminates the problem associated with address space of IPv4 and gives extra bit of inherent security (IPSec). To minimize the high location update traffic induced by the frequent location changes, HMIPv6 was introduced with a new agent node called MAP (Mobility Anchor Point). HMIPv6 classifies mobility into global and local mobility and hence reduces the registration traffic flow into the network. This paper presents simulation based performance evaluation and comparison of mobility management protocols in all-IP Networks. The metric which we have used to compare the performance of mobility management protocol is handover latency. Handover latency is an important factor while transferring the call to new access area. We have analyzed the handover latency of MIPv6 and HMIPv6 protocols as a function of MAP domain size. The numerical results are obtained by simulating pico-cellular environments and graphically shown here. We have shown that HMIPv6 does not always outperforms MIPv6 in terms of handover latency and needs optimization techniques for Movement Detection and DAD procedure to shorten this delay.


The measurement of urine albumin now has a well-established role in the monitoring of patients with diabetes mellitus. We have developed a particle-enhanced immunoturbidimetric inhibition assay for urine albumin on the Dade aca analyzer. The inhibition approach removes any of the potential antigen excess difficulties that could be expected from the wide clinical range of urine albumin, but retains the sensitivity advantages of latex-enhanced immunoturbidimetry. Human serum albumin (HSA) is covalently attached to 40-nm poly(chloromethyl)styrene-modified latex particles. This reagent, along with monoclonal antibody to HSA, is aliquoted into the aca reagent pack along with polyethylene glycol 8000 in a tablet form (giving a final reaction concentration of 15 g/L). A 150 mmol/L phosphate buffer, pH 7.8, is used to fill the reagent pack in the instrument and the agglutination reaction is monitored at 340 nm. The sample volume is 100 microL and the calibration curve covers the range 2-250 mg/L. Evaluation of commercial scale reagents against the Beckman Array nephelometric immunoassay system gave a Deming regression correlation of aca = 0.87 x Beckman + 8.5, r = 0.995, n = 145. Mean analytical recovery was 104+/-4.5%, n = 20, and there was no evidence of a lack of parallelism. Interassay precision was 8.8% at 10.0 mg/L and <2.5% at >65 mg/L. Calibrator stability was in excess of 60 days. A small reference range study (24-h urine collections, n = 27) gave a mean of 5.6 mg/L with a range of 0.5-16.2 mg/L. Analytical sensitivity (2.5 SD from zero) was 0.40 mg/L.


In this study, we measured the natural frequencies of aluminum honeycomb sandwich beams using digital image correlation technique. The vibration images were captured using two high speed digital cameras and the images were converted to displacements by the digital image correlation technique. Displacement data in time domain were tranformed to frequency domain data by fast Fourier transform software. To reduce noise invoked by random exitation, a spectrum averaging technique and Savitsky-Golay digital filter were adopted. A conventional vibration measurement using an accelerometer and a finite element analysis were performed to compare the results by high speed digital camera measurement method. In conclusion, new method using high speed digital cameras and digital image correlation technique can measure the vibration of beam structures and can be applied to bio-structures where sensors cannot be attached.


Several olefin metathesis reactions are studied, namely, jojoba oil oligomerization, methyl oleate self-metathesis, ring-closing metathesis (RCM) to form a nitrogen heterocycle, and 1,5-hexadiene acyclic diene metathesis polymerization (ADMET). The catalyst containing the Bertrand–Grubbs cyclic alkyl amino carbene (CAAC) ligand showed high selectivity by diminishing isomerization reactions; this was especially clear at high temperatures where the more widely used nitrogen heterocyclic carbene (NHC)-based catalysts show side reactions. Experimental and computational studies determined that it is much more difficult to produce ruthenium hydrides with CAAC, a property that can explain the improved observed activity. This finding opens a pathway for the development of even more selective olefin metathesis catalysts for reactions that require harsh conditions.


We study the obtainment of closed-form formulas for the distribution of the jumps of a doubly-stochastic Poisson process. The problem is approached in two ways. On the one hand, we translate the problem to the computation of multiple derivatives of the Hazard process cumulant generating function; this leads to a closed-form formula written in terms of Bell polynomials. On the other hand, for Hazard processes driven by L\'evy processes, we use Malliavin calculus in order to express the aforementioned distributions in an appealing recursive manner. We outline the potential application of these results in credit risk.


The dorsal stream in the primate visual cortex is involved in the perception of motion and the recognition of actions. The two topics, motion processing in the brain, and action recognition in videos, have been developed independently in the field of neuroscience and computer vision. We present a dorsal stream model that can be used for the recognition of actions as well as explaining neurophysiology in the dorsal stream.
The model consists of a spatio-temporal feature detectors of increasing complexity: an input image sequence is first analyzed by an array of motion sensitive units which, through a hierarchy of processing stages, lead to position and scale invariant representation of motion in a video sequence. The model outperforms or on par with the state-of-the-art computer vision algorithms on a range of human action datasets.
We then describe the extension of the model into a high-throughput system for the recognition of mouse behaviors in their homecage. We provide software and a very large manually annotated video database used for training and testing the system. Our system outperforms a commercial software and performs on par with human scoring, as measured from the ground-truth manual annotations of more than 10 hours of videos of freely behaving mice.
We complete the neurobiological side of the model by showing it could explain the motion processing as well as action selectivity in the dorsal stream, based on comparisons between model outputs and the neuronal responses in the dorsal stream. Specifically, the model could explain pattern and component sensitivity and distribution [161], local motion integration [97], and speed-tuning [144] of MT cells. The model, when combining with the ventral stream model [173], could also explain the action and actor selectivity in the STP area.
There exists only a few models for the motion processing in the dorsal stream, and these models were not be applied to the real-world computer vision tasks. Our model is one that agrees with (or processes) data at different levels: from computer vision algorithm, practical software, to neuroscience.


Informal socialization is an essential ingredient in effective faculty development, and a necessary component of successful centers for teaching and learning. There is more to assisting faculty than providing workshops, even assuming faculty retain and use the methods discussed at the workshops. Foundational learning theories apply to faculty as well as any learner, and identifying how to create sustainable relationships with faculty is a key component of successful development. Theoretical models of socialization apply partly to this context, but a new model informed by emotional intelligence is needed for authentically connecting faculty with developers.


The flow in a rotating cylinder driven by the differential rotation of its top endwall is studied by numerically solving the time-dependent axisymmetric Navier–Stokes equations. When the differential rotation is small, the flow is well described in terms of similarity solutions of individual rotating disks of infinite radius. For larger differential rotations, whether the top is co-rotating or counter-rotating results in qualitatively distinct behaviour. For counter-rotation, the boundary layer on the top endwall separates, forming a free shear layer and this results in a global coupling between the boundary layer flows on the various walls and a global departure from the similarity flows. At large Reynolds numbers, this shear layer becomes unstable. For a co-rotating top, there is a qualitative change in the flow depending on whether the top rotates faster or slower than the rest of the cylinder. When the top rotates faster, so does the bulk of the interior fluid, and the sidewall boundary layer region where the fluid adjusts to the slower rotation rate of the cylinder is centrifugally unstable. The secondary induced meridional flow is also potentially unstable in this region. This is manifested by the inflectional radial profiles of the vertical velocity and azimuthal vorticity in this region. At large Reynolds numbers, the instability of the sidewall layer results in roll waves propagating downwards.


The objective of this paper is to present an automated segmentation method which allows rapid identification of Tumor tissues/pathological structure with an accuracy and reproducibility comparable to those of manual segmentation. The authors uses the wiener filter for the removal of noise and then applies a new marker based watershed segmentation method using image processing and digital processing algorithms to detect Tumor tissues of Brain. This method is simple and intuitive in approach and provides higher computational efficiency along with the exact segmentation of an image. The proposed technique has been implemented on MATLAB 7.3 and the results are compared with the existing techniques.


One of my concluding assignments as Director of the Division of Scientific Publications of the American Medical Association was the transmission to the Board of Trustees the recommendation of the Editorial Board of theArchivesof Richard Warren, MD, as successor to J. Garrott Allen, MD, Chief Editor. Dr. Allen was appointed to the Editorial Board in 1959. He served as chief editor pro tempore when Waltman Walters, MD, was on a trip around the world and since 1962 has served as chief editor. Throughout this latter period "Rich" has been a member of the Board and is thoroughly experienced in editorial matters. It was my pleasure to have known "Rich" during his medical training at the Harvard Medical School and his internship at the Massachusetts General Hospital. This was followed by residency training at the Peter Bent Brigham Hospital and service during World War II with the 5th and


Catalan rural areas are characterized for having a high percentage of aging population. Rural population is changing in its demography as well as in its values and social dynamics. The "outsiders" arrival implies the need of " building a nucleus of shared meanings", that complicates the continuity of the everyday life based on "face to face" relationships that already exist and in shared meanings socially built. In-depth Interviews to experts, professionals, and older people and two focal groups of professionals and significant social agents were conducted, with a total of 53 participants. In the results section movements of population contributing to the change of the social dynamics are identified and the impact of this social change in older people is defined. Results also show the most significant movements of population for the older people studied and the changes in the social dynamics perceived by them.