Time as a source for competitive advantage has been widely acknowledged, yet the motor industry struggles to provide quick response to customer demand. Current new vehicle supply is still based on large inventory in the market-place, and customers are left with the choice of either taking a vehicle from stock—often compromising on specification—or waiting an average 6 weeks for a custom-built vehicle. This study investigates the reasons for this lack of responsiveness in UK new vehicle supply systems. Taking a holistic approach, all key subsystems—component supply, vehicle manufacturing and logistics—are investigated regarding their ability to support responsive order fulfilment at system level. The findings clearly show that the current vehicle supply systems are misaligned to external customer needs. Specifically, four key inhibitors could be identified, and based on further empirical evidence a set of principles is proposed as to how these inhibitors could be overcome in order to implement a build-to-order strategy.


Pakistan is one of the countries in South Asia ranking high in maternal mortality rate. Though, a signatory of Agenda 2030, the country still lags behind considerably in achieving Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The ratio of maternal mortality is, even higher in rural areas of the country. Lack of health care facilities, education, malnutrition, poverty, high prevalence of violence against women in rural areas, and socioeconomic factors are some of the major contributing elements for elevated levels of maternal mortality and morbidity rate in Pakistan. By making inclusive policies at the national level to improve the reach of the rural population to healthcare facilities, educating women and eliminating gender-based disparities, introducing family planning interventions, accountability, and continuity of democracy are essentially needed to improve maternal health in Pakistan's rural areas. This chapter focuses on challenges to maternal health in rural areas and possible options to resolve these issues.


In an effort to enhance the organization's image and increase its revenues, sport managers should incorporate the concept of brand equity, the strength of a team/university name in the marketplace, into strategic marketing efforts. This article, building on Aaker's (1991) theoretical structure, develops a conceptual framework of brand equity applied to Division I college athletics. The brand equity framework provides a closed-ended system whereby antecedents (team-related, university-related, and market-related) create brand equity that then results in marketplace consequences (e.g., national television exposure, ticket sales). These consequences then feed into a marketplace perception that impacts the antecedents of brand equity through a feedback loop. Directions for future research efforts that address evaluating the validity of the model, implications for different sports within Division I athletics, and relationships to other popular marketing concepts are offered.


The external and internal factors influencing the entrepreneurship education of the personnel in the TNCs of Poland were revealed. The national peculiarities of the economic behaviour of Polish personnel in companies, in particular, the intensive development of all competencies and rapid entrance to the international arena were revealed. A comparative analysis of entrepreneurship education of personnel in TNCs in Germany and Poland has been carried out according to three criteria: the system of training and regulatory support; the system of corporate education of TNCs, scientific and methodological support of this system.


ABSTRACT Objectives The remarkable effect of arsenic trioxide (ATO) was verified, but elevated gamma-glutamyltransferase (GGT), aminotransferases (ALT and AST) are generally observed in acute promyelocytic leukemia (APL) patients undergoing ATO treatment. However, utilization of hepatoprotective agents or discontinuation of ATO may inhibit ATO efficacy. In order to maintain ATO effect from hepatoprotective agents' influence so we investigate relationships between single elevation in GGT and hepatocellular injury in this study. Methods Correlation of GGT variation and leukocyte counts were analyzed in all 81 APL patients, correlations among liver enzymes (ALT, AST and GGT) were also analyzed in patients without prophylactic hepatoprotective agents. In following study, we take the clinical observation of changes in aminotransferases in patients with single elevation in GGT without hepatoprotective agents. Results The average elevated GGT in the WBC abnormal group was more than the normal group (53.86U/L vs. 31.03U/L, P = 0.008), a positive Pearson's correlation of GGT variation and changed leukocyte counts in patients without prophylactic hepatoprotective agents. There are no significant correlation between aminotransferases (ALT and AST) and GGT but correlation between ALT and AST was statistically significant (R = 0.649, P = 0.000). For APL patients with single elevation in GGT, ALT and AST levels were normal throughout the ATO treatment without hepatoprotective agents. Conclusion Single elevation in GGT without elevated aminotransferases can't be identified as hepatotoxicity, and the elevated levels of GGT are associated with increasing leukocyte counts. Continue single-agent ATO without prophylactic hepatoprotective agents is recommended in APL patients with single elevation in GGT, in order to maintain ATO effect.


The mechanism by which the physical vacuum can be different from the perturbative vacuum in the light-cone representation is described and illustrated.


Gestational Diabetes Mellitus is a metabolic disorder during pregnancy. It is defined by WHO as carbohydrate intolerance resulting in hyperglycemia of variable severity with onset or first recognition during pregnancy. The entity usually present late in second and third trimester. The factors which constitute good health, i.e. balanced Dosha, Dhatu and Mala, optimally functioning Indriyas or sense organs, a happy contented soul and a balanced mind are the very factors that go towards a smooth pregnancy, labour and healthy progeny and this is what Ayurveda treatment focuses on. Pregnancy is a particular time for all women. This condition becomes even more delicate when there is diagnosis of GDM which makes necessary controls and therapies that will inevitably affect the women's life. GDM can lead to potential risk for mother, fetus and child's development. There is no direct reference of GDM in Ayurveda. But we get reference of Garbhavriddhi excessive increase in size of abdomen and perspiration. Garbhavriddhi or macrosomia condition can be interpreted as complication of GDM. In current scenarINTERNATIONAL AYURVEDIC MEDICAL JOURNAL Namrata B. Khose et: Comparative Study Of Treatment Of Gestational Diabetes Mellitus Cited In Various Ayurvedic And Modern Research Papers Published In Last 5 Years doi:10.46607/iamj.1808112020 | IAMJ November 2020 | www.iamj.in 5082 io GDM in pregnancy is one of the major complications during pregnancy. Overt maternal diabetes mellitus can adversely influence intrauterine development. Spontaneous abortions and major congenital anomalies may be induced in the first trimester. Excessive foetal growth, neonatal hypoglycemia, still birth may be induced during second and third trimester. Gestational Diabetes may lead to gangrene, damage of retina, kidneys. If diabetes is not properly controlled, then in the long run fat gets deposited on inner layer of arteries and the possibilities of occurrence of paralysis increase. Complications of diabetes include eye problems and blindness, heart disease, stroke, neurological problems, amputation, and impotence It is needed to cure maternal diabetes as soon as it is diagnosed. Adopting pre-conceptional and thorough antenatal care through Ayurveda; this aims that a woman enters pregnancy in healthy state of body and mind. While describing Garbhadhan vidhi acharyas have advised certain body purifying measures (Sanshodhana karma) followed by special dietetics and mode of life for the couple. Ayurveda focuses on change in lifestyle of the Garbhini which helps in maternal health and fetal growth minimizing the complications related to pregnancy. Ayurveda efforts of having healthy baby commences with preconception care and management. Pre-conception counselling, Diet, Herbs, Yoga, Asanas are useful as a supportive therapy together with modern medication under supervision. The best way to improve your diet is by eating a variety of healthy foods. Various vegetables, pulses, spices, cereals, fruits, dry fruits are helpful in GDM patients. Daily 20 mins walk is also helpful. Ayurvedic herbs like Guduchi, Amalaki, Haritaki, Haridra, Bilva, Neem, Jamun are also useful in GDM. They are having antidiabetic, antioxidant properties. Tinospora Cordifolia are potential therapeutics that act as anti-diabetic drug in the prevention and treatment of GDM. Metformin is safe and effective drug in treatment of GDM. Combination of metformin, diet, Ayurvedic herbs, preconception counselling, Yoga, Pranayama and meditation can give best result in GDM.


The Quality of earning is element that is often used by investors to take investment decisions. But the financial scandals that occurred, causing investors have crisis confidence in capital markets. Therefore, the necessary existence of a good corporate governance is very importance to create a financial statement that reflects the real condition of the company. The purpose of this study is to analyze the influence of independence board of commisioners on earnings quality which are moderated by the concentration of family ownership. This study aims to analyze the role of independent board and managerial ownership on the quality of earnings is moderated by concentrated ownership. Earnings quality is proxied by discretionary accrual and concentrated ownership is calculated with F-PEC Score. Meanwhile, to measure independent commissioners use the proportion of commissioners who have no relationship with the company and for the managerial ownership is measured by the number of ownership shares held by the management of the total number of outstanding shares.Manufacturing firms listed in Indonesian Stock Exchange is the object of this study. Based on purposive sampling technique, it gets 96 firms. Multiple regression analysis using SPSS program. The result of the hypothesis test indicates that manajerial ownership and corporate size have significantly effect on discretionary accruals. This study also found a concentration of family ownership has insignificantly moderates the effect on an independent board to discretionary accruals.


In this work, Aurivillius-phase Bi8Fe4-xCoxTi3O24 (7-BFCT, 0 ≤ x ≤ 0.4) powders and ceramics were successfully prepared by the combination of citrate combustion and hot-press methods. X-ray diffraction (XRD) and high-resolution transmission electron microscopy (HRTEM) indicate a successful synthesis of the pure phase of the 7-BFCT ceramics, and all the samples showed a good seven-layer structure of the Aurivillius phase. Partial Fe substituted by Co was found to be effective to enhance both ferromagnetic and ferroelectric properties at room temperature, and the largest remnant magnetization (2Mr) of ~0.69 emu/g was revealed at the composition of x = 0.4. Zero field cooling and field cooling (ZFC-FC) magnetization measurement confirmed its magnetic transition occurring at a high temperature of ~750 K. Correspondingly, the enhanced ferroelectric properties of such Co-substituted ceramics were also investigated.


Due to the pressure by the straps of brassieres, lichen sclerosus-like lesions have been observed on the shoulders of obese women with hyperplastic mammae. Histologically the lesions are characterized by hyperkeratosis, acanthosis and pseudoangionatous proliferation of the capillaries in the dermis. Elastic fibers are sparse, but there is no marked edema and only a moderate perivascular infiltrate of mononuclear cells.


CD40 is a TNF receptor (TNFR) superfamily member which is essential for B cell function. Cbl-b, an adapter protein and ubiquitin ligase, has been shown to regulate activation of T and B cells through their antigen receptors. In this study, we report that CD40-induced proliferation is significantly augmented in mice lacking Cbl-b. Furthermore, Cbl-b−/− mice display enhanced thymus–dependent (TD) Ab responses and germinal center (GC) formation, whereas introduction of CD40 deficiency abolishes the hyper-Ab responses and heightened GC formation in response to TD Ag challenge. Mechanistically, Cbl-b selectively down-modulates CD40-induced activation of NF-κB and JNK. Cbl-b associates with TNFR-associated factor 2 (TRAF-2) upon CD40 ligation, and inhibits the recruitment of TRAF-2 to the CD40. Together, our data suggest that Cbl-b attenuates CD40-mediated NF-κB and JNK activation, thereby suppressing B cell responses.


The shapes of relativistic iron lines observed in spectra of candidate black holes carry the signatures of the strong gravitational fields in which the accretion disks lie. These lines result from the sum of the contributions of all images of the disk created by gravitational lensing, with the direct and first-order images largely dominating the overall shapes. Higher order images created by photons tightly winding around the black holes are often neglected in the modeling of these lines, since they require a substantially higher computational effort. With the help of the strong deflection limit, we present the most accurate semi-analytical calculation of these higher order contributions to the iron lines for Schwarzschild black holes. We show that two regimes exist depending on the inclination of the disk with respect to the line of sight. Many useful analytical formulae can be also derived in this framework.


Proceedings: AACR Annual Meeting 2014; April 5-9, 2014; San Diego, CA

Protein Phosphatase 2A (PP2A) is a major serine/threonine phosphatase in cells. It consists of a catalytic (C), structural (A) and regulatory/variable B-type subunits. PP2A has a critical role to play in homeostasis where it functions as a tumour suppressor. Changes in the activity of PP2A have a direct role in maintaining the transformed phenotype in cancer. However, the mechanism of action of PP2A during this process is poorly understood. Our understanding is limited because of the complex nature of PP2A holoenzyme assembly, and because it acts through a wide variety of signalling pathways. We have identified the scaffolding protein RACK1 as a PP2A interacting protein and we showed that RACK1 regulates PP2A activity to mediate crosstalk between growth factor and adhesion signalling by an IGF-I-independent mechanism(1, 2) . Our hypothesis is that RACK1 plays a critical role in determining how PP2A functions in signalling pathways. Using a series of truncation mutations and peptide array technology, we have identified and mapped the binding sites between RACK1 and the catalytic subunit of PP2A. Using a series of specific point mutations of these PP2A sites, we show that the RACK1/PP2A interaction is critical to maintain PP2A activity. Disruption of the RACK1/PP2A interaction has dramatic consequences for cell adhesion, proliferation and migration in MCF-7 cells. Our hypothesis is that RACK1 regulates the cellular distribution of PP2A and scaffolds PP2A to a specific subset of cellular targets. Using 3D in vitro breast cancer models and mass spectroscopy approaches, we have identified several proteins that interact with the RACK1/PP2A complex. One of these proteins, Metadherin has been shown to play a role in drug resistance(3). It has also been linked to the progression of many cancers(4). Using a series of novel approaches we have mapped the Metadherin interaction site on RACK1 and PP2A and confirmed that RACK1 and Metadherin colocalise at the cell membrane. Overexpression of Metadherin promotes IGF-I-mediated cell migration and invasion. Taken together, our data suggest that RACK1 scaffolds PP2A to Metadherin where it regulates Metadherin activity and cell migration in breast cancer.

1. Kiely, PA., et al. "Tyrosine 302 in RACK1 is essential for insulin-like growth factor-I-mediated competitive binding of PP2A and β1 integrin and for tumor cell proliferation and migration." Journal of Biological Chemistry 283.34 (2008): 22952-22961.

2. Kiely, PA., et al. "Insulin-like growth factor I controls a mutually exclusive association of RACK1 with protein phosphatase 2A and β1 integrin to promote cell migration." Molecular and cellular biology 26.11 (2006): 4041-4051.

3. Wei, Yong, Guohong Hu, and Yibin Kang. "Metadherin as a link between metastasis and chemoresistance." Cell Cycle 8.14 (2009): 2131-2137.

4. Brown, DM., and Erkki R. "Metadherin, a cell surface protein in breast tumors that mediates lung metastasis." Cancer cell 5.4 (2004): 365-374.

Citation Format: Maeve L. Kiely, Rosemary O'Connor, Patrick A. Kiely. Identification of metadherin in a complex with RACK1/PP2A in mammary epithelial cells. [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the 105th Annual Meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research; 2014 Apr 5-9; San Diego, CA. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2014;74(19 Suppl):Abstract nr 5287. doi:10.1158/1538-7445.AM2014-5287


This paper presents a simple framework for the analysis, valuation and simulation of several real options in the presence of shadow costs of incomplete information. Information costs can be viewed as sunk costs in the spirit of Merton's (1987) model of capital market equilibrium with incomplete information. We incorporate these sunk costs in standard discounted cash flow techniques and present the basic concepts of real options. The justification of information costs in real projects is based on the observation that R&D needs to be done before investment decisions. These costs account for all the expenses needed to be informed about an investment opportunity and the management of projects. This analysis extends the models in Bellalah (1999, 2001) for the valuation of real options within information uncertainty. We present valuation procedures and simulations for the values of common real options in the presence of shadow costs of incomplete information.


In the sixteenth century, few Europeans wore undergarments; by the nineteenth century, undergarments were commonplace. This change came about through the invention, production, and adoption of a new form of clothing, closely connected to changing concepts of the body as well as evolving social codes of consumption, hygiene, and class. Over the course of the eighteenth century, the people of Europe, and particularly of France, developed an obsession with undergarments. Full court dress began to lose its appeal, and by the end of the century, Queen Marie Antoinette shocked the nation with her Gaulle, an informal gown made to look like an undergarment itself.Through a multitude of sources and interdisciplinary methods of analysis, this study presents an interpretation of undergarments as the limina between public and private, as well as the locus in where changing concepts of the body played out over the long eighteenth century. By analyzing ideas about undergarments and their relationships with the body and society in comparison with social and individual conceptions and uses of undergarments, this study illuminates cultural concepts of outer and under in addition to notions of public and private. Similarly, by interpreting ideas about the outer and under and the role of undergarments for personal, individual use versus public, social use, this study probes evolving concepts of private and public in eighteenth-century France. By incorporating personal sensibilities about undergarments with social and cultural analyses of undergarments as material goods, this project contributes to studies of material culture and material life, as well as to understandings of the body and its relationship with material goods and society. Hence, this study, with its systematic, cultural approach provides a new, historical conceptualization of undergarments, so long unmentionable, as they emerged in the eighteenth century.


The research paper "Eye-tracking technology in automotive industry" describes the implementation of eye-tracking technology into the development of new vehicles and their decision-making process. This objective technology tracks the eye movement of a participant, detects where the subject is looking during an interval of an experiment, and thus offers a wide range of applications. It can be used to detect distractions while driving on a simulator under a certain workload or to record objective data during an otherwise subjective customer-oriented clinic.  In this topic, we evaluate areas of the vehicle which are the most interesting for customers, and therefore provide support and recommendations for new vehicle designs.


Abstract The aim of this study is to analyse the philosophy course which is taught in secondary education in Turkey from the perspective of philosophical anthropology. The emergence of philosophical anthropology in the context of the question "What is man?" as a philosophical discipline is a remarkable process. Besides the importance of the establishment of philosophical anthropology as a discipline by Scheler, it is also required to analyse other views in anthropology in an interactive manner. In this study, different views on anthropology in the history of philosophical anthropology are put forward. Takiyettin Mengusoglu's anthropology is introduced as a philosophical anthropology based on ontological grounds within its own systematic, in line with a critical view on these different opinions. There are also some conclusions about the historical process, development, and content of philosophy courses taught in Turkey. In terms of an analysis of this course, this last philosophical anthropology was preferred as it has a holistic view about man. Some recommendations are presented from the perspective of a philosophical anthropology, first for education and for the philosophy course for high schools.


It is difficult to underestimate the importance of cohesion for armed groups or organizations specialized and engaged in organized violence. This article argues that the recent debate on military cohesion has been far too narrow as it focused on Western state militaries during the 20th and 21st centuries, and even then only on the microlevel. It is necessary to broaden the perspective in order to construct theories that encompass even the vast majority of armed groups—the non-Western, nonstate, and nonmodern. This article advocates two ways of doing so: the investigation of cases that belong to these three types and broadening analysis to two new levels of analysis—the meso-level of armed groups and the macro-level, which contains state and society. Cohesion is established through harmonizing these three levels, which necessitates including them in the analysis in the first place.


Abstract The trend of globalization has provoked a wide discussion with regard to cultural competence. In studies regarding cultural competence, researchers have often focused on the positive aspect in order to acquire insights and implications for other practitioners. However, intercultural dynamics involve multiple individuals with diverse backgrounds, for whom these positive aspects convey only a part of their cultural competence. Whereas, in the literature, individuals' negative feelings are often treated as problems that need to be solved and cured, the purpose of this article is to elaborate on the need to include individuals' reactions and emotional feelings in research regarding cultural competence.


In bioinformatics systems, the study of genetics is a popular research discipline. These systems depend on the amount of similarity between the biological data. These data are based on DNA sequences or raw sequencing reads. In the preprocessing stage, there are several methods for measuring similarity between sequences. The most popular of these methods is the alignment method and alignment-free method, which are applied to determine the amount of functional matching between sequences of nucleotides DNA, ribosome  RNA, or proteins. Alignment-based methods pose a great challenge in terms of computational complexity, In addition to delaying the time to search for a match, especially if the data is heterogeneous and its size is huge, and thus the classification accuracy decreases in the post-processing stage. Alignment-free methods have overcome the challenges of alignment-based methods for measuring the distance between sequences, The size of the data used is 1000 genomes uploaded from National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI), after eliminating the missing and irrelevant values, it becomes 860 genomes, ready to be segmented into words by the k-mer analysis, after which the frequency of each word is counted for each query. The size of a word depends on a value of k. In this paper we used a value of k =3 ….8, for each iteration will count times of frequencies words.


We present an experiment examining effects of gaze on speech during three-person conversations. Understanding such effects is crucial for the design of teleconferencing systems and Collaborative Virtual Environments (CVEs). Previous findings suggest subjects take more turns when they experience more gaze. We evaluated whether this is because more gaze allowed them to better observe whether they were being addressed. We compared speaking behavior between two conditions: (1) in which subjects experienced gaze synchronized with conversational attention, and (2) in which subjects experienced random gaze. The amount of gaze experienced by subjects was a covariate. Results show subjects were 22% more likely to speak when gaze behavior was synchronized with conversational attention. However, covariance analysis showed these results were due to differences in amount of gaze rather than synchronization of gaze, with correlations of .62 between amount of gaze and amount of subject speech. Task performance was 46% higher when gaze was synchronized. We conclude it is commendable to use synchronized gaze models when designing CVEs, but depending on task situation, random models generating sufficient amounts of gaze may suffice.


An approximation to the UNESCO equation of state for sea water is obtained in the form of a polynomial that is cubic in potential temperature, quadratic in pressure, and linear in salinity. The polynomial represents a reasonable compromise between accuracy and computational economy; it also allows potential temperature to be obtained analytically from given values of density, salinity and pressure.


Introduction: Bellafill (Suneva Medical Inc) is a semipermanent injectable soft tissue filler composed of smooth and uniform polymethylmetacrylate (PMMA) microspheres suspended in a bovine collagen gel. It is a third generation PMMA filler, with more uniform shapes and sizes of the PMMA microspheres, which has been purported to decrease the incidence of granuloma formation. Methods: We performed a retrospective review of our clinical experience from 2014 to 2017 with Bellafill as a soft tissue injectable filler in the following clinical scenarios: deep nasolabial folds, depressed facial acne scars, malar volume loss, temporal wasting, tear trough deformity, chin augmentation, angle of jaw augmentation, and lip augmentation. The primary outcome is the rate of adverse events, and the secondary outcome is subjective patient satisfaction. Results: From 2014 to 2017, 842 syringes of Bellafill were administered to 212 patients, for a total of 417 procedures. Of the 417 procedures, 96 (23.0%) were for acne scars, 82 (19.7%) malar volume restorations, 65 (15.6%) nasolabial fold augmentations, 45 (10.8%) chin augmentations, 42 (10.1%) tear trough volume restorations, 28 (6.7%) temple volume restorations, 25 (6.0%) rhinoplasty touch-ups for small areas of nasal depression, 22 (5.3%) lip augmentations, and 12 (2.9%) jaw angle augmentations were performed. A range of 1 to 12 syringes were injected into each patient, over 1 to 3 sessions; 6 cases of adverse events occurred (1.4%). There were 4 cases of solitary nodules in the injection site, 1 case of lower eyelid oedema which persisted for 3 months and 1 case of lower lip oedema which resolved within hours. Patient satisfaction rates ranged from 83.3% for angle of jaw augmentation to 99.0% for improvement of acne scars. Conclusion: Bellafill is a safe and effective option for a semipermanent soft tissue filler, with high patient satisfaction and a good safety profile.


A micromechanical finite element model was developed to predict the initial events of failure in the constrained 90° ply of a [0/90/0] unidirectional cross-ply laminate under in-plane tensile loading. Common manufacturing induced defects, including non-uniform fiber spatial distribution and voids, were considered in the explicit representation of the full thickness multi-fiber 90° ply, while the constraining 0° plies were treated as effectively homogeneous orthotropic materials. The inelastic behavior of the polymeric matrix in the 90° ply was modeled via a pressure-dependent yield criterion, while the carbon fibers were assumed to deform linear elastically. Two metrics for representing failure were considered in the assessment, including distortional and dilatational energy densities that are respectively responsible for local yielding and cavitation in the fiberconstrained matrix. The influence of in-situ effect was studied by comparing the local stress state of the constrained and unconstrained transverse ply. It was observed that the local response of the polymer depends on the fiber spatial distribution. Furthermore, it was found that the in-situ ply constraining effect appears subsequent to the formation of local cracks and not prior. Dissimilar constraining effects were observed in different regions, e.g., resin-rich zone versus fiber-cluster zone, suggesting that inconsistent stress distributions will directly influence the evolution of cracks in the 90° ply.


Thanks to its non-volatility, fast data access, low power and infinite endurance, Spintronics (Nobel Prize 2007) is considered as one of the major technologies beyond CMOS to overcome the power and speed bottlenecks of advance computing systems. This topic is under intense study from device to system levels by both academics and industries. This session brings together the worldwide leading experts to share their recent results and discuss future challenges.


Convolutional neural networks (CNN) is a powerful technology for classification of visual inputs. However, both the scale and quality of the training set are an important factor to the performance of a learned system. In real applications, it is generally difficult to obtain a high-quality and large-scale handwritten Chinese characters sample set. Insufficient samples of handwritten Chinese characters would cause poor recognition performance. In this paper, we propose a handwritten Chinese character recognition method based on dataset expansion and CNNs. Firstly, the topology of proposed Convolutional neural networks model is addressed. Then, several dataset expansion techniques are utilized to expand the scale of available samples, which include random elastic deformation, shear transformation and rotation within a small range, etc. A series of experiments on the HCL2000 Chinese character handwriting database have shown that our method can effectively improve the recognition performance, with a reduction in error rate of 35.01%, verified the effectiveness of our proposed approach.


The genus Actaea (including Cimicifuga) has been the source of ∼200 cycloartane triterpenes. While they are major bioactive constituents of complementary and alternative medicines, their structural similarity is a major dereplication problem. Moreover, their trivial names seldom indicate the actual structure. This project develops two new tools for Actaea triterpenes that enable rapid dereplication of more than 170 known triterpenes and facilitates elucidation of new compounds. A predictive computational model based on classification binary trees (CBTs) allows in silico determination of the aglycone type. This tool utilizes the Me (1)H NMR chemical shifts and has potential to be applicable to other natural products. Actaea triterpene dereplication is supported by a new systematic naming scheme. A combination of CBTs, (1)H NMR deconvolution, characteristic (1)H NMR signals, and quantitative (1)H NMR (qHNMR) led to the unambiguous identification of minor constituents in residually complex triterpene samples. Utilizing a 1.7 mm cryo-microprobe at 700 MHz, qHNMR enabled characterization of residual complexity at the 10-20 μg level in a 1-5 mg sample. The identification of five co-occurring minor constituents, belonging to four different triterpene skeleton types, in a repeatedly purified natural product emphasizes the critical need for the evaluation of residual complexity of reference materials, especially when used for biological assessment.


With the rapid development of computer technology, computer music has begun to appear in the laboratory. Many potential utility of computer music is gradually increasing. The purpose of this paper is attempted to analyze the possibility of integrating multimodal interaction such as vision-based hand gesture and speech interaction into musical conducting education. To achieve this purpose, this paper is focus on discuss some related research and the traditional musical conducting education. To do so, six musical conductors had been interviewed to share their musical conducting learning/ teaching experience. These interviews had been analyzed in this paper to show the syllabus and the focus of musical conducting education for beginners. ——————————  ——————————


Tournament solution concepts, selecting winners based on a pairwise dominance relation are an important structure often used in sports, as well as elections, and argumentation theory. Manipulation of such choice rules by coalitions of agents are a significant problem in most common rules. We deal with the problem of the manipulation of randomized choice rules by coalitions varying from a single agent, to two or more agents. We define two notions of coalitional manipulations of such choice rules based on whether or not utility is transferable. We show useful choice rules satisfying both notions of non-manipulability, and for the transferable utility case provide bounds on the level of Condorcet consistency.


In proton therapy, the spot scanning method is known to suffer from the interplay effect induced from the independent movements of the proton beam and the organs in the patient during the treatment. To study the interplay effect, several investigators have performed four-dimensional (4D) dose calculations with some limited temporal resolutions (4 or 10 phases per respiratory cycle) by using the 4D computed tomography (CT) images of the patient; however, the validity of the limited temporal resolutions has not been confirmed. The aim of the present study is to determine whether the previous temporal resolutions (4 or 10 phases per respiratory cycle) are really high enough for adequate study of the interplay effect in spot scanning proton therapy. For this study, a series of 4D dose calculations were performed with a virtual water phantom moving in the vertical direction during dose delivery. The dose distributions were calculated for different temporal resolutions (4, 10, 25, 50, and 100 phases per respiratory cycle), and the calculated dose distributions were compared with the reference dose distribution, which was calculated using an almost continuously-moving water phantom (i.e., 1000 phases per respiratory cycle). The results of the present study show that the temporal resolutions of 4 and 10 phases per respiratory cycle are not high enough for an accurate evaluation of the interplay effect for spot scanning proton therapy. The temporal resolution should be at least 14 and 17 phases per respiratory cycle for 10-mm and 20-mm movement amplitudes, respectively, even for rigid movement (i.e., without deformation) of the homogeneous water phantom considered in the present study. We believe that even higher temporal resolutions are needed for an accurate evaluation of the interplay effect in the human body, in which the organs are inhomogeneous and deform during movement.


PURPOSE
The present a novel adenocarcinoma model in athymic mice.

METHODS
Seven athymic mice were used. Colon diversion and distal fistula were made. Adenocarcinoma cells were inoculated in the submucosa of fistula. Tumor growth was monitored daily. Scintigraphy with 99mTc-MIBI was performed to identify the tumor.

RESULTS
The model of distal colon cancer is feasible. Tumor detection was possible by both, macroscopically and molecular imaging. All resections demonstrated poorly differentiated tumors. Colon obstruction occurred in one case, similarly to evolution in human tumors of distal colon.

CONCLUSION
The proposed model of distal colon cancer is feasible, allows for easy monitoring of tumoral growth by both, macroscopically and molecular imaging, and is suitable for studying the evolution of tumor with implementation of cytotoxic therapy in vivo.


Data were obtained from a survey of clients of family planning clinics in the city of Mmabatho/Mafikeng Bophuthatswana which was undertaken in 1992-93. 500 Black female clients were interviewed at four government and two family planning clinics between June 1992 and February 1993 regarding the practice of family planning and the formation and dissolution of families. There was a clear tendency for women to have small families especially urban residents. They averaged 1.5 children. In addition there was a drastic intergenerational fertility decline of 72.85% compared with their mothers. There was a positive association between age and fertility: women aged 34-52 had a mean of 3.85 children ever born while the mean number of children was 0.50 for women aged 14-23. Education was negatively associated with fertility even when socioeconomic factors were controlled for as women with more than middle school education had fewer children than their counterparts with education up to middle school. Women earning over R1000/month had an average of 0.75 fewer children than women who earned below R1000/month. Single never married women had the fewest number of children ever born followed by those who were cohabiting. Women who were widowed had the highest mean number of children ever born (3.50) followed by women currently in their first marriages (2.83) and those who were remarried (2.75). Women adhering to traditional African religions had the highest number of children ever born (2.20) followed by believers of the Zionist Apostolic and other Pentecostal churches. The knowledge of contraception was negatively associated with the number of children ever born. The injection (99.6%) the pill (95.4%) and the condom (90.1%) were the three most commonly known methods while vaginal methods (20.6%) and the rhythm method (24.4%) were the least known. There is clear evidence that in African societies transformations are taking place in the family.


The tomato processing industry generates large amounts of waste, mainly tomato peels which create environmental problems. These residues are attractive sources of bioactive ingredients and pigments. Lycopene is one of the carotenoids, a fat-soluble pigment that has antioxidant properties. This study was conducted to evaluate the stability of lycopene and its antioxidant properties and its impact on these treatments. The degree of stability of lycopene was also studied during storage. After total lycopene compounds were assessed and determined by HPLC. When the colors were separated in tomato husks, it was found to contain two major components, lycopene and beta-carotene.  Total phenolic compounds and total flavonoids contents were 3.75 and 0.97 mg/g, lycopene content was 3.75 mg/100g. As well as, antioxidant activity of tomato peels was 38.31% (as DPPH). In some lycopene treatments it was observed that the rate of degradation was increased by increasing pH, temperature and light by increasing the exposure time and the length of storage. The proportion of antioxidant activity of lycopene was close to the known industrial BHT. Where, the levels of crude lycopene extract 100, 200 and 300 ppm had an antioxidant activity were 0.96, 0.98 and 0.99, respectively, compared with those of BHT (1.09). In the sensory evaluation, the best percentage of natural lycopene added was 1% was preferred by the consumer. Storage for beef burger 12 weeks, the amount and remained of lycopene pigments decreased from 0.470 to 0.416 mg/100g, or from 100 to 88.51% during storage period. Meanwhile, lycopene degradation rate increased from 0.0 to 11.49%


Database system performance is directly related to the efficiency of the system at storing data on primary storage (for example, disk) and moving it into CPU registers for processing. For this reason, there is a long history in the database community of research exploring physical storage alternatives, including sophisticated indexing, materialized views, and vertical and horizontal partitioning. In recent years, there has been renewed interest in so-called column-oriented systems, sometimes also called column-stores. Column-store systems completely vertically partition a database into a collection of individual columns that are stored separately. By storing each column separately on disk, these column-based systems enable queries to readjust the attributes they need, rather than having to read entire rows from disk and discard unneeded attributes once they are in memory. The Design and Implementation of Modern Column-Oriented Database Systems discusses modern column-stores, their architecture and evolution as well the benefits they can bring in data analytics. There is a specific focus on three influential research prototypes, MonetDB, MonetDB/X100, and C-Store. These systems have formed the basis for several well-known commercial column-store implementations. Their similarities and differences are described and they are discussed in terms of their specific architectural features for compression, late materialization, join processing, vectorization and adaptive indexing (database cracking). The Design and Implementation of Modern Column-Oriented Database Systems is an excellent reference on the topic for database researchers and practitioners.


Ten years ago, it was assumed that disease risk prediction and personalised nutrition based on genetic information would now be in widespread use. However, this has not (yet) transpired. The interaction of genetic make-up, diet and health is far more complex and subtle than originally thought. With a few notable exceptions, the impact of identified common genetic variants on phenotype is relatively small and variable in their penetrance. Furthermore, the known variants account for only a fraction of what we believe to be the total genetic contribution to disease risk and heterogeneity in response to environmental change. Here, the question 'how far have we progressed and are we likely to get there' (Rimbach and Minihane, 2009) is revisited with regard to the translation of genetic knowledge into public health benefit. It is concluded that progress to date has been modest. It is hoped that recent technological developments allowing the detection of rarer variants and future use of more hypothesis-driven targeted data analysis will reveal most of the currently 'hidden' significant genetic variability.


A new class of phosphate and phosphonate prodrugs, called HepDirect™ prodrugs, has been developed to deliver drugs to the liver while simultaneously diminishing drug exposure to extra-hepatic tissues. The technology combines liver-selective cleavage and kinase by pass with high plasma and tissue stability to achieve increased drug levels in the liver. Lamivudine (LMV), a nucleoside analogue, is a currently approved treatment for hepatitis B infection, but shows modest efficacy and significant drug resistance due to inefficient phosphorylation. LMV is inadequately phosphorylated to the corresponding nucleoside triphosphate in rat and human hepatocytes. A HepDirect prodrug of LMV monophosphate generated 34-fold higher levels of the triphosphate in rat hepatocytes and 320-fold higher triphosphate levels in the liver of treated rats relative to LMV.


The feeding behaviour of extinct sabretoothed predators (machaeroidines, nimravids, barbourofelids, machairodonts and thylacosmilines) is investigated using beam theory. Because bite force applied along the mandible should be proportional to the external dimension of the mandibular corpus, patterns of variation in these dimensions at interdental gaps will reflect the adaptation of the jaw to specific loads, related to killing methods. Comparison of the mandibular force profiles of sabretooths to those of extant conical-toothed carnivorans of known feeding behaviour reveals that sabretooths had a powerful bite, as strong or stronger than extant felids of similar mandibular length. Loads exerted at the lower canine were better constrained in the sagittal plane than in extant conical-toothed carnivorans, indicating that prey was efficiently restrained when the sabre bite was delivered. The mandibular symphysis is generally better buttressed dorsoventrally in dirk-toothed sabretooths than in scimitar-toothed sabretooths, implying different killing strategies for the two ecomorphs: dirktooths delivered powerful sabre bites on prey they restrained with their forelimbs, while scimitartooths delivered slashing sabre bites and may have used their incisor battery to subdue their prey. The mandibular symphysis of Smilodon fatalis is less buttressed dorsoventrally than that of other dirk-toothed sabretooths, possibly as a consequence of the greater torsional stresses induced while feeding rapidly on carcasses in response to intense competition. The mandibular symphysis of Thylacosmilus atrox is better buttressed dorsoventrally in juveniles than in adults, suggesting that young marsupial sabretooths underwent an extended period of parental care as typically observed in modern felids and inferred for eutherian sabretooths. Finally, machaeroidines and the nimravid Nimravus brachyops are exceptional in exhibiting a degree of dorsoventral buttressing of the mandibular symphysis that is intermediate between advanced sabretooths and conical-toothed felids but similar to the extant Neofelis nebulosa, suggesting that the latter taxon may be close to the ancestral condition of a new sabretooth radiation. © 2005 The Linnean Society of London, Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society, 2005, 145, 393–426.


Two distinct projects involving carbohydrates in bioinorganic chemistry are discussed in this thesis. In one study, several gallium and indium complexes with pendant carbohydrates were prepared and examined for potential use in radiopharmaceutical applications. Carbohydrate-bearing 3-hydroxy-4-pyridinone ligand precursors and their tris(ligand)gallium(III) and indium(III) complexes were synthesized and characterized by mass spectrometry, elemental analysis, ] H and l 3 C NMR spectroscopy, and in the case of one intermediate, by X-ray crystallography. With three equivalents of ligand, neutral complexes formed with the pyridinone moiety (as expected) complexing the gallium(III) and indium(III) metal centers. In the other study, a series of 3-hydroxy-4-pyridinones and their glycoside pro-drugs (pyridinone glycosides) were prepared and studied. The pyridinones have the potential to be used in metal chelation therapy to aid in the treatment of neurodegenerative disorders such as Alzheimer's disease. The pyridinone glycosides were synthesized via a Mitsunobu coupling and characterized by mass spectrometry, elemental analysis, ! H and 1 3 C NMR spectroscopy, and in one case by X-ray crystallography. The glycoside pro-drugs mask the metal chelation portion of the pyridinones by protecting the 3hydroxy position. The glycosidic cleavage of the pyridinone glycosides was studied (and kinetic parameters determined for one compound) with Agrobacterium sp. P-glucosidase. This enzyme cleaves the pyridinone glycosides unmasking the pyridinones and making them available for metal chelation. A series of the 3-hydroxy-4-pyridinones also displayed significant antioxidant protection in a radical quenching assay.


Since Fe3O4 was reported to mimic horseradish peroxidase (HRP) with comparable activity (2007), countless peroxidase nanozymes have been developed for a wide range of applications from biological detection assays to disease diagnosis and biomedicine development. However, researchers have recently argued that Fe3O4 has no peroxidase activity because surface Fe(III) cannot oxidize tetramethylbenzidine (TMB) in the absence of H2O2 (cf. HRP). This motivated us to investigate the origin of transition metal oxides as peroxidase mimetics. The redox between their surface Mn+ (oxidation) and H2O2 (reduction) was found to be the key step generating OH radicals, which oxidize not only TMB for color change but other H2O2 to produce HO2 radicals for Mn+ regeneration. This mechanism involving free OH and HO2 radicals is distinct from that of HRP with a radical retained on the Fe-porphyrin ring. Most importantly, it also explains the origin of their catalase-like activity (i.e., the decomposition of H2O2 into H2O and O2). Because the production of OH radicals is the rate-limiting step, the poor activity of Fe3O4 can be attributed to the slow redox of Fe(II) with H2O2, which is two orders of magnitude slower than the most active Cu(I) among common transition metal oxides. We further tested glutathione (GSH) detection on the basis of its peroxidase-like activity to highlight the importance of understanding the mechanism when selecting materials with high performance.


Despite being a frequent cause of arthritis and bone erosions, the underlying cellular and subcellular reaction in gout is insufficiently understood. The inflammasome as intracellular sensor for crystals plays an important role, notably resulting in interleukin (IL)-1 production. Morphologically, hyperplasia of the synovial membrane with joint effusion, along with fibrinogen deposition and influx of neutrophils and lymphocytes are observed. Extracellular NET formation by neutrophils is involved in the regulation of inflammatory tissue reaction. Furthermore, the release of IL-10 and tumor necrosis factor (TNF)-receptors along with lymphocyte proliferation induce the natural resolution of acute gouty arthritis which typically occurs after several days. In contrast to acute gout, tophi consisting of urate crystals are surrounded by histiocytes and multinucleated cells, resembling a foreign body reaction. The deposition of extracellular matrix by fibrocytes is usually observed around tophi. This fibrotic reaction is likely enhanced by Th2-lymphocytes. Bone erosions in gout occur around tophi and are triggered by osteoclast activation through RANK-ligand expression by lymphocytes. In conclusion, understanding the orchestration of inflammation in gout might help to identify new therapeutic targets.


Several existing laser diffractometric methods of measuring red cell deformability are analysed and their disadvantages are identified. By establishing the mathematical model of the diffraction image of a red cell group, a new method is presented—measurement of the greyscale of diffraction images. With numerous experiments, this method allows us to statistically obtain the deformation indices of both normal and abnormal red cells, as well as the composition of red cells in the blood and the characteristic values of specific red cells. It is demonstrated that abundant information including characteristics of red cells can be obtained with this method. This method is expected to be promising in both blood disease research and clinical application.


In today's fiercely competitive FMCG industry, brand managers have attempted to tackle consumers increasing price sensitivity by creating stronger brands. Marketers are aware that most FMCG consumer purchase decisions are made at the point-of-purchase. As on-pack promotions
are considered particularly effective in influencing the consumer, sponsorship by FMCG organisations may provide a point of differentiation.

In the last decade sponsorship spending increased with large corporations now including some sponsorship spend in their marketing budget, with worldwide sponsorship spending approaching US$45 billion. One widely used form of sponsorship, particularly in the fast moving consumer
goods industry (FMCG) is sponsorship leveraged packaging (SLP). SLP involves depicting the sponsored property's image and logos on the sponsoring brand's packaging. Despite its widespread use, little empirical research exists to explain whether sponsorship leveraged
packaging (SLP) impacts consumer behaviour in low involvement settings. This paper provides empirical evidence of the relationship between SLP and loyalty to the sponsoring brand.


The Black Men of Labor is a local social club whose parade marks the beginning of New Orleans' parading season on Labor Day weekend. Coincidentally, the homosexual, predominantly White male Southern Decadence party and parade is that same weekend—hosted by a large gay community living primarily in New Orleans' French Quarter. Although these two parading groups appear outwardly different, both parades make claims to the same street at different times. We call their politics 'parallel politics' because the parades have similar political motivations, yet they literally parade in parallel, and therefore fail to connect and protest their socio-spatial marginalization together. This missed opportunity led us to consider how these two parades territorialize space and project a unified community identity. Territoriality, according to Sack (1983), is an attempt to control a geographic area and establish differential access to it. Moving beyond previous work on parades as observed performances, boundary markers or negotiated representations, we show how parades create a territorially-based identity through cultural nodes, and how their exclusivity is both a process and outcome of territoriality. We argue that territoriality and identity are fused, which forecloses the possibility of collective action between these two communities. We find that parade territorialities simultaneously and complexly establish both social and spatial claims.


We compared analgesic effects of a lidocaine tape (Penles) and the eutectic mixture of lidocaine and tetracaine (LT ointment) during local infiltration before epidural block. Ninety-six patients were randomly assigned to 3 groups. In groups 1 and 2, lidocaine tape was applied on the skin of the epidural puncture site 30-60 min before epidural block. In group 3, 1 g of LT ointment was applied on the same place 1-2 h before block. Additionally, patients in groups 2 and 3 were medicated intramuscularly with midazolam 5 mg. Although no significant difference in pain relief in 5 pin prick tests was observed among the three groups, there was a significantly greater decrease in the pain score during the infiltration of local anesthetics in groups 1 and 2, compared with group 3. There was no significant difference in the pain score between groups 1 and 2. We concluded that lidocaine tape is more useful than LT ointment in decreasing pain of local infiltration anesthesia, and midazolam did not exert any supplementary analgesic effect.


We developed GridMACS, a grid-enabled web portal with the aim of providing GUI for GROMACS and running a molecular dynamics simulation in a grid environment. The portal is developed according to the basic grid system architecture by integrating the main grid layers such as the Gridsphere Portal Framework, Vine Toolkit (grid service) and Globus Toolkit (grid middleware). The integration with the computing resources was achieved by the deployment of the main grid layers on a cluster grid environment. Creation of this portal will provide a GUI based user-friendly environment that will assist biologist in providing them the availability and usability. GridMACS will serve as an initial proof of concept and in the future will subsequently become a platform for other bioinformatics tools to be implemented on a grid platform as a port let application. The portal is easily accessible via the internet on any browsers at www.gridmacs.fbb.utm.my:8080/gridsphere/gridsphere.


Recent studies have reported that a subset of obese individuals who were metabolically healthy but obese had more favorable clinical outcomes than obese subjects with metabolic disturbances. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the distribution and agreement of obesity subtypes according to body mass index (BMI) and metabolic syndrome (MS). Furthermore, we examined the differences of nutrient intake among the groups. Data was analyzed for 1,095 female subjects older than 40 years using Korean National Health and Nutrition Survey in 2008. The degree of obesity was classified by two methods, using BMI (obese ≥ 25 kg/m, not obese < 25 kg/m) and MS (meet ≥ 3 criteria among 5 index: waist circumference, triglyceride, glucose, HDL-cholesterol and blood pressure). Subjects were divided into 4 groups according to 2x2 cross table: non-obese without MS, non-obese with MS, obese without MS and obese with MS. Nutrient intakes were compared among 4 groups. The results showed that the proportions of non-obese without MS, non-obese with MS, obese without MS and obese with MS were 47.6%, 13.6%, 16.6%, and 22.2% of total subjects, respectively. The agreement (kappa value) of two methods was 0.354 (fair) in total subjects, 0.365 (fair) in 40-60 year old subjects and 0.304 (fair) in ≥ 61 year old subjects. In ≥ 61 years old subjects, intakes of percentage energy from carbohydrate, percentage of energy from fat, calcium, phosphorous, sodium, vitamin A, carotene, thiamine, riboflavin and niacin were significantly different among the groups. In contrast, the subjects of 40-60 years old, no differences in nutrient intakes were observed. In conclusion, there were differences in nutrient intakes among the groups subdivided by obesity and MS, especially in elderly female subjects. Individualized dietary guideline for subtype of obesity will be needed to treat metabolic disturbance of obesity. (Korean J Community Nutr 15(5) : 694~703, 2010)


In much of the world, including Britain, the so-called 'neuro-turn' has in recent decades become a predominant narrative accounting for human emotions, cognition and behaviours. The beginning of such an interest can – and has – been located at many different points, ranging from nineteenth-century ideas of heredity and phrenology, to Charles Darwin's writings in and of themselves, to developments in evolutionary psychology of which British geneticists Hilary Rose and Stephen Rose wrote in 2001 that they had "grown dramatically" "[o]ver the last ten years," (1) to American cultural and literary critic Jonathan Kramnick's observation that the "[a]cademic year 2008–2009 was something of a watershed moment for literary Darwinism" (315) due to the twin publication of Denis Dutton's The Art Instinct: Beauty, Pleasure, and Human Evolution and Brian Boyd's On the Origin of Stories: Evolution, Cognition, and Fiction.
In this chapter I explore ways of accounting for the power of the neuro-turn narratives in contemporary Britain through drawing parallels between this widespread interest in cognitivist and neuroscientific approaches in evolutionary psychology and certain investments in childhood. My interest lies primarily not just in analysing the problematic nature of the science that this kind of work claims, but in analysing what is at stake in such approaches. Specifically, I too am puzzled by the popularity of these kinds of claims when both the scientific and the philosophical frameworks they rest on are, at best, questionable and also not in any sense new or original, neither philosophically nor scientifically speaking. I argue here, following theorist Neil Cocks's formulation, that neuroscientific accounts of cognition recover and maintain thought as scan, brain and figure: an object of scrutiny and exchange. Therefore, these cognitivist and neuroscientific studies are about, as theorist Jacqueline Rose puts it in relation to childhood and children's literature specifically, "a conception of both the child and the world as knowable in a direct and unmediated way, a conception which places the innocence of the child and a primary state of language and/ or culture in a close and mutually dependent relationship" (9).
This chapter demonstrates, then, further implications of reading the child as textuality rather than constituting it as a 'merely' textual reflection or representation of a prior and primary sociological or anthropological entity. In these terms, my reading engages with how the child – as with the neuro-turn – is an instance of the capitalist insistence as it operates in Britain today on the object as object, even while the child also is made to police a capitalist market-place which is defined by the child's placement as outside that market. Both in discussing the child as a produced object (and any object as produced) and in reading the child as text, the same drive is here for me at work, in, as Slavoj Žižek puts it, questioning "the properly fetishistic fascination of the 'content' supposedly hidden behind the form; the 'secret' to be unveiled through analysis is not the content hidden by the form (the form of commodities, the form of dreams) but, on the contrary, the 'secret' of this form itself" (2008, 3; emphasis in original). My interest then is not to ask, what is a child, but why and how the question 'what is the child?' persists. As part of this question, finally, I explain in this chapter also how and why children's literature criticism must by definition continue either (advertently or inadvertently) to ignore or misread Jacqueline Rose's famous arguments in her book The Case of Peter Pan or: The Impossibility of Children's Fiction, just as neuroscientific accounts of cognition, whether or not in relation to literature specifically, must ignore or suppress the arguments of previous theorists of science (especially, although not only, feminist theorists of science) such as Donna Haraway.


This paper proposes a simple method to evaluate surface ground waveforms using both the natural period of the ground and input earthquake motion. In this research, the "Equivalent Single Degree of Freedom method" is proposed and is based on the results of static push-over analyses of many grounds with various properties. A comparison was made of waveforms of multi-layered ground and that obtained from the proposed method using dynamic analysis. It was then confirmed that these waves are almost identical, and that the proposed method is applicable to the evaluation of the surface motion. Even if only a few data with regard to soil properties property is available, particularly in case of an existing railway facility, the proposed method enables economical dense calculation of trackside surface motion. These sets of waveforms will be utilized to identify locations where devastating damage is will be expected in the case of a strong earthquake.


To examine the role of ROM1, a homologue of peripherin/RDS, in autosomal dominant retinitis pigmentosa (adRP), we screened 224 adRP and 29 simplex RP probands for ROM1 mutations. Four ROM1 alleles were designated as potentially pathogenic because they were found only in RP patients but not in 50-100 controls nor in 249 other RP probands. The substitutions P60T and T108M were present in a single allele in a subject with typical adRP, and this allele cosegregated with the disease in the small family. The putative null allele L114 [1 bp] was present in an individual with atypical RP but not in three unaffected siblings. This insertion has been previously reported to cause RP only when accompanied by a peripherin/RDS mutation, but no peripherin/RDS mutations were found in any of the four probands reported here. Two substitutions (G75D, R242Q) were present in two other probands with simplex RP. These data suggest that potentially pathogenic ROM1 mutations occur in 1% or less of patients with adRP or simplex RP. The absence of detectable peripherin/RDS mutations in these families suggests either that: (i) mutations in other digenic partners are required for pathogenic ROM1 alleles to cause retinal degeneration; (ii) these ROM1 mutations do not cause RP; or (iii) peripherin/RDS mutations are present but were not identified in these patients.


Abstract The influence of base type, temperature, and solvent on regioselective C(9)/C(10) "click" modifications within the tropolone ring of colchiceine (2) is investigated. New ether derivatives of 2, bearing alkyne, azide, vinyl, or halide aryl groups enable assembly of the alkaloid part with heterocycles or important biomolecules such as saccharides, geldanamycin or AZT into hybrid scaffolds by dipolar cycloaddition (CuAAC) or Heck reaction. Compared to colchicine (1) or colchiceine (2), ether congeners, as e.g. 3e [IC50s( 3e) ∼ 0.9 nM], show improved or similar anticancer effects, whereby the bulkiness of the substituents and the substitution pattern of the tropolone proved to be essential. Biological studies reveal that expanding the ether arms by terminal basic heterocycles as quinoline or pyridine, decreases the toxicity in HDF cells at high anticancer potency (IC50s ∼ 1–2 nM). Docking of ether and hybrid derivatives into the colchicine pocket of αGTP/β tubulin dimers reveals a relationship between the favourable binding mode and the attractive anticancer potency. Graphical Abstract


Strategic renewal, although critical for the sustained success of organizations, has received relatively little attention as distinct from the more general phenomenon of strategic change. Like all strategic issues, strategic renewal presents both opportunities and challenges for organizations. In this article, we first define the term "strategic renewal" and elaborate on important characteristics of this phenomenon. We also bring to bear evidence that suggests that strategic renewal has a critical impact not only on individual firms and industries but also on entire economies. We then provide an in-depth example of a company that has successfully renewed itself more than once, namely, IBM. Finally, we examine several different avenues for strategic renewal, involving both content and process, and identify common themes among them.


The vacuolar H(+)-ATPase from mung bean hypocotyls was solubilized from the membrane with lysophosphatidycholine and purified by QAE-Toyopearl column chromatography. The purified ATPase was active only in the presence of exogenous phospholipid and was inhibited by nitrate, dicyclohexyl carbodiimide and Triton X-100, but not by vanadate or azide. Dodecyl sulfate/polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis of the purified ATPase yielded ten polypeptides of molecular masses of 68 kDa, 57 kDa, 44 kDa, 43 kDa, 38 kDa, 37 kDa 32 kDa, 16 kDa, 13 kDa and 12 kDa. All polypeptides remained in the peak activity fraction after glycerol density gradient centrifugation. Nine of them, excluding the 43-kDa polypeptide, comigrated in a polyacrylamide gradient gel in the presence of 0.1% Triton X-100. The 16-kDa polypeptide could be labeled with [14C]dicyclohexylcarbodiimide. The amino-terminal amino acid sequence of the isolated 68-kDa polypeptide generally agreed with that deduced from the cDNA for the carrot 69-kDa subunit [Zimniak, L., Dittrich, P., Gogarten, J. P., Kibak, H. & Taiz, L. (1988) J. Biol. Chem. 263, 9102-9112]. Thus, mung bean vacuolar H(+)-ATPase seems to consist of nine distinct subunits.


A new approach to design Model Reference Adaptive Control (MRAC) for Multi Input Multi Output (MIMO) nonlinear systems is presented. First a nonlinear reference model system is considered whose nonlinear dynamics is controlled by optimal control using Successive Approximation Approach (SAA). In the second step, nonlinear plant dynamics which may have uncertain parameters or unmodeled dynamics is controlled by using MRAC based on recursive approximations of reference model at each iteration. A two-link manipulator model is used to demonstrate the efficiency of the proposed method.


We have shown previously that, in sheep primary pituitary cells, bone morphogenetic proteins (BMP)-4 inhibits FSHb mRNA expression and FSH release. In contrast, in mouse LbT2 gonadotrophs, others have shown a stimulatory effect of BMPs on basal or activin-stimulated FSHb promoter-driven transcription. As a species comparison with our previous results, we used LbT2 cells to investigate the effects of BMP-4 on gonadotrophin mRNA and secretion modulated by activin and GnRH. BMP-4 alone had no effect on FSH production, but enhanced the activinCGnRH-induced stimulation of FSHb mRNA and FSH secretion, without any effect on follistatin mRNA. BMP-4 reduced LHb mRNA up-regulation in response to GnRH (Gactivin) and decreased GnRH receptor expression, which would favour FSH, rather than LH, synthesis and secretion. In contrast to sheep pituitary gonadotrophs, which express only BMP receptor types IA (BMPRIA) and II (BMPRII), LbT2 This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Society for Endo distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is prop Journal of Endocrinology (2008) 196, 497–507 0022–0795/08/0196–497 q 2008 Society for Endocrinology Printed in Great cells also express BMPRIB. Smad1/5 phosphorylation induced by BMP-4, indicating activation of BMP signalling, was the same whether BMP-4 was used alone or combined with activinGGnRH. We hypothesized that activin and/or GnRH pathways may be modulated by BMP-4, but neither the activin-stimulated phosphorylation of Smad2/3 nor the GnRH-induced ERK1/2 or cAMP response elementbinding phosphorylation were modified. However, the GnRH-induced activation of p38 MAPK was decreased by BMP-4. This was associated with increased FSHb mRNA levels and FSH secretion, but decreased LHb mRNA levels. These results confirm 1. BMPs as important modulators of activin and/or GnRH-stimulated gonadotrophin synthesis and release and 2. important species differences in these effects, which could relate to differences in BMP receptor expression in gonadotrophs. Journal of Endocrinology (2008) 196, 497–507


A vital chemical communication can be observed in the Tunesian desert isopod Hemilepistus reaumuri. These crustaceans live in social units which are strictly closed to alien conspecifics. It was attempted to analyze the highly evolved family-specific recognition system by identifying their pheromonal compounds both from the extracts of surface washings of intact animals and from the exuvia.


A quadrangular prismatic tricyclooxacalixarene cage 1 based on tetraphenylethylene (TPE) was efficiently synthesized by a one-pot S(N)Ar condensation reaction. As a result of the porous internal structure in the solid state, cage 1 exhibited a good CO2 uptake capacity of 12.5 wt% and a high selectivity for CO2 over N2 adsorption of 80 (273 K, 1 bar) with a BET surface area of 432 m(2) g(-1). Formation of cage 1 led to the fluorescence of TPE being switched on in solution. The system was employed as a single-molecule platform to study the mechanism of aggregation-induced emission (AIE) by examining the restriction of intramolecular rotation (RIR).


Few American social programs have been more unpopular, controversial, or costly than Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC). Its budget, now in the tens of billions of dollars, has become a prominent target for welfare reformers and outraged citizens. Indeed, if public opinion ruled, AFDC would be discarded entirely and replaced with employment. Yet it persists. Steven Teles's provocative study reveals why and tells us what we should do about it. Teles argues that, over the last thirty years, political debate on AFDC has been dominated by an impasse created by what he calls "ideological dissensus" an enduring conflict between opposing cultural elites that have largely disregarded public opinion. Thus, he contends, one must examine the origins and persistence of elite conflict in order to fully comprehend AFDC's immunity to the reform it truly needs-the kind that unites the elements of order, equality, and individualism central to the American creed. One of the first studies to analyze AFDC from a "New Democrat" position, "Whose Welfare?" sheds new light on the controversial role of the courts in AFDC, the rise of welfare waivers in the mid 1980s, the failure of the Clinton welfare plan, and the victory of block-granting over policy-oriented welfare reform. Teles, however, goes beyond mere critical analysis to advocate specific approaches to reform. His thoughtful call for compromise built around the centrality of work, individual responsibility, and opportunity offers a means for dissolving dissensus and genuine hope for changing an outdated and ineffectual welfare system. Based on interviews with participants in the AFDC policymaking process as well as an unparalleled synthesis of the voluminous AFDC literature, "Whose Welfare?" will appeal to a wide array of welfare scholars, policymakers, and citizens eager to better understand the tumultuous history of this problematic program and how it might fare in the wake of the fall elections."


A series of high performance carbonaceous mesoporous materials: activated carbon beads (ACBs), have been prepared in this work. Among the samples, ACB-5 possesses the BET specific surface area of 3537 m2 g−1 and ACB-2 has the pore volume of 3.18 cm3 g−1. Experimental measurements were carried out on the intelligent gravimetric analyzer (IGA-003, Hiden). Carbon dioxide adsorption capacity of 909 mg g−1 has been achieved in ACB-5 at 298 K and 18 bar, which is superior to the existing carbonaceous porous materials and comparable to metal-organic framework (MOF)-177 (1232 mg g−1, at 298 K and 20 bar) and covalent-organic framework (COF)-102 (1050 mg g−1 at 298 K and 20 bar) reported in the literature. Moreover, methane uptake reaches 15.23 wt % in ACB-5 at 298 K and 18 bar, which is better than MOF-5. To predict the performances of the samples ACB-2 and ACB-5 at high pressures, modeling of the samples and grand canonical Monte Carlo simulation have been conducted, as is presented in our previous work. The adsorption isotherms of CO2/N2 and CO2/CH4 in our samples ACB-2 and 5 have been measured at 298 and 348 K and different compositions, corresponding to the pre- and postcombustion conditions for CO2 capture. The Dual-Site Langmuir-Freundlich (DSLF) model-based ideal-adsorbed solution theory (IAST) was also used to solve the selectivity of CO2 over N2 and CH4. The selectivities of ACBs for CO2/CH4 are in the range of 2–2.5, while they remain in the range of 6.0–8.0 for CO2/N2 at T = 298 K. In summary, this work presents a new type of adsorbent-ACBs, which are not only good candidates for CO2 and CH4 storage but also for the capture of carbon dioxide in pre- and postcombustion processes. © 2011 American Institute of Chemical Engineers AIChE J, 2011


In this paper we introduce a novel consensus mechanism where agents of a network are able to share logical values, or Booleans, representing their local opinions on e.g. the presence of an intruder or of a fire within an indoor environment. Under suitable joint conditions on agents¿ visibility and communication capability, we provide an algorithm generating a logical linear consensus system that is globally stable. The solution is optimal in terms of the number of messages to be exchanged and the time needed to reach a consensus. Moreover, to cope with possible sensor failure, we propose a second design approach that produces robust logical nonlinear consensus systems tolerating a maximum number of faults. Finally, we show applicability of the agreement mechanism to a distributed intrusion detection system (IDS).


The results of the study of the efficiency of heat treatment of samples of glauconite are presented. Estimated ability of the sorbent to water absorption and retention of petroleum products. It was established by the method of differential scanning calorimetry that thermally activated glauconite samples are practically not saturated with water vapor. Oil capacity decreases after heat treatment of glauconite at 600°C and increases at 1000°C compared with the original sample, which is explained by various structural changes.


Software engineering concerns with wide use of engineering principles to achieve cost-effective software with potentiality to function on real machines. Requirement engineering in software development is more crucial. Everyone agrees that security is difficult. The requirements engineering principles are framed based on an idea that would engage the community overcoming complex problems. Security is about the prevention of several difficulties due to the presence of attackers behaving malicious activities. Software security is incredible due to the intrinsically complex task and the problem happens because of three main reasons such as networks are everywhere, systems are easily extensible and system complexity is rising. The principle objective of requirement engineering research is not just to point out the fact about security risks keep on rising every day, but rather to defeat attack, just as any other system property. Security should be tackled at the beginning of the software lifecycle. This survey planned to concentrate on the requirements phase as security is a system property.


Leber congenital amaurosis (LCA) and retinitis pigmentosa (RP) are retinal degenerative diseases which cause severe retinal dystrophy affecting the photoreceptors. LCA is predominantly inherited as an autosomal recessive trait and contributes to 5% of all retinal dystrophies; whereas RP is inherited by all the Mendelian pattern of inheritance and both are leading causes of visual impairment in children and young adults. Homozygosity mapping is an efficient strategy for mapping both known and novel disease loci in recessive conditions, especially in a consanguineous mating, exploiting the fact that the regions adjacent to the disease locus will also be homozygous by descent in such inbred children. Here we have studied eleven consanguineous LCA and one autosomal recessive RP (arRP) south Indian families to know the prevalence of mutations in known genes and also to know the involvement of novel loci, if any. Complete ophthalmic examination was done for all the affected individuals including electroretinogram, fundus photograph, fundus autofluorescence, and optical coherence tomography. Homozygosity mapping using Affymetrix 250K HMA GeneChip on eleven LCA families followed by screening of candidate gene(s) in the homozygous block identified mutations in ten families; AIPL1 – 3 families, RPE65- 2 families, GUCY2D, CRB1, RDH12, IQCB1 and SPATA7 in one family each, respectively. Six of the ten (60%) mutations identified are novel. Homozygosity mapping using Affymetrix 10K HMA GeneChip on the arRP family identified a novel nonsense mutation in MERTK. The mutations segregated within the family and was absent in 200 control chromosomes screened. In one of the eleven LCA families, the causative gene/mutation was not identified but many homozygous blocks were noted indicating that a possible novel locus/gene might be involved. The genotype and phenotype features, especially the fundus changes for AIPL1, RPE65, CRB1, RDH12 genes were as reported earlier.


This article introduces the results of our recent study on the design conditions for a contact and near-contact slider and friction-induced bouncing vibrations in a near-contact regime, based on computer simulations using a simple dynamical model of slider, air-bearing, and disk systems. Basic design conditions for contact sliding are discussed. The contact force and attractive force in asperity contact with a lubricant layer and bulk deformation are calculated numerically. Flying height hysteresis and bouncing vibration of a flying slider that are experimentally observed in nanometer spacing can be obtained by the simulation.


The effect of medium of low ionic strength on the release of virus from Friend leukemia cells has been studied. The release of infectious Friend leukemia virus is almost completely inhibited in medium of low ionic strength, as measured by a focus-forming assay (XC assay), by endogenous RNA-dependent DNA polymerase activity of released virus particles, and by electron microscope studies of the production of C-type particles. Friend leukemia virus-transformed proerythroblasts undergo extensive morphological changes in low-ionic-strength medium. The cells are viable in this medium, but they can no longer be stimulated with dimethyl sulfoxide to produce hemoglobin and increase virus production. Infectious virus is released between 30 and 120 min of resuspension of inhibited cells in normal medium. The rate of virus release after reversal of the inhibition is much greater than the rate of virus release during normal cell growth. The morphological changes occurring after dimethyl sulfoxide stimulation of Friend leukemia cells are compared with those resulting from resuspension in normal medium of cells inhibited by low ionic strength.


Numerical air quality forecasting suffers from the large uncertainties of input data including emissions, boundary conditions, earth surface properties. Data assimilation has been widely used in the field of weather forecasting as a way to reduce the forecasting errors stemming from the uncertainties of input data. The present study aims at evaluating the effect of input data on the air quality forecasting results in Korea when data assimilation was invoked to generate the initial concentrations. The forecasting time was set to 36 hour and the emissions and initial conditions were chosen as tested input parameters. The air quality forecast model for Korea consisting of WRF and CMAQ was implemented for the test and the chosen test period ranged from November 2 nd to December 1 st of 2014. Halving the emission in China reduces the forecasted peak value of PM 10 and SO₂ in Seoul as much as 30% and 35% respectively due to the transport from China for the no-data assimilation case. As data assimilation was applied, halving the emissions in China has a negligible effect on air pollutant concentrations including PM 10 and SO₂ in Seoul. The emissions in Korea still maintain an effect on the forecasted air pollutant concentrations even after the data assimilation is applied. These emission sensitivity tests along with the initial condition sensitivity tests demonstrated that initial concentrations generated by data assimilation using field observation may minimize propagation of errors due to emission uncertainties in China. And the initial concentrations in China is more important than those in Korea for long-range transported air pollutants such as PM 10 and SO₂. And accurate estimation of the emissions in Korea are still necessary for further improvement of air quality forecasting in Korea even after the data assimilation is applied.


A considerable body of critical literature has analysed how scientific discussions on water-conflict links are picked up in the political, academic, economic, civil society and media domains. By contrast, there are almost no such studies for the domain of education. This void is crucial as school attendance rates and the prevalence of environmental education are on the rise, while school education has privileged access to young people during their political socialisation. We address this void by analysing the depiction of water conflicts in school textbooks from a critical geopolitics perspective. More specifically, we use a combination of quantitative and qualitative methods to analyse the visual and textual content of German geography textbooks published between 2000 and 2017. Our findings reveal that the analysed school textbooks securitise water and overstate the risk of water conflicts, which could yield a range of negative societal effects. The textbooks further reproduce Orientalist stereotypes about the Global South, and about the Middle East in particular, and often promote an uncritical green economy stance towards the privatisation of water. Water conflicts are hence discussed in the context of a crisis discourse and reproduce powerful knowledge that privileges certain political interests at the expense of others.


INTRODUCTION: Our objective was to describe mentoring practices among gynecologic oncologists. METHODS: We conducted a cross-sectional survey of gynecologic oncology physician members of the Society of Gynecologic Oncology. A survey sent to female gynecologic oncologists in 1998 was expanded, piloted, and administered electronically (DataStat Illume). Our 2015 instrument contained 75 fixed response questions in 4 domains: Demographics; Mentoring issues; Work-life Balance; Caregiving Responsibilities. Data was analyzed using Chi-square/Fisher's exact test (Stata 10). RESULTS: We had a 22% response rate (268 of 1246), comprised of 64% women and 36% men. Fifty percent were between the ages of 30–40. 54% were in academic practice and 21% in fellowship. The majority (50%) reported currently having a mentor. Most (54%) had a male mentor, but 25% had both a male and female mentor. 41% of women had only a male mentor, while only 8% of men had only a female mentor. Most classified their mentor as academic (86%), but 29% reported a personal mentor. More women than men felt that it was somewhat important, important or very important that a mentor be the same gender (68.6% vs 41.7%, P<.001). Whether it was important that a mentor have children also differed between genders (37.5% of men vs 64.5% of women, P<.001). Formal mentoring programs were uncommon (28%). The majority (58%) also served as mentors themselves. CONCLUSION: The majority of gynecologic oncologists both receive and provide mentorship, despite few formal programs. Women placed greater value on having a mentor of the same gender and with children.


Date Presented 04/04/19
 This presentation will share findings from a descriptive, mixed-methods study involving clinical and health services experts, physical rehabilitation practitioners, and patients with limited English proficiency (LEP). The study identified clinical indicators and challenges related to optimal delivery of physical rehabilitation services for patients with LEP. Professional, practice, and policy implications of these findings will be discussed.
 Primary Author and Speaker: Mansha Mirza
 Additional Authors and Speakers: Elizabeth Harrison


In this article the Think-Aloud Method, a method used in problem solving research in Psychology, is used in legal research to gather data on how novices, expert beginners and experts read, structure and analyse legal decisions. In the Dutch legal system decisions by judges are a major source of law. So it is important that law students learn to read, structure and analyse legal decisions. However, reading and understanding a decision does not go without saying, it has to be learned. The data we gather using the Think-Aloud Method are used to improve instruction to support the effective and efficient learning of comprehending legal decisions. We describe the Think-Aloud Method, our experimental design and our approach for analysing the protocols.


Consumers now demand evidence of welfare assurance at all stages of animal production, marketing, transport and slaughter. In response, retailers have increasingly adopted preferred supply chain relationships which preclude sourcing animals via livestock auction markets. One of the criteria dictating this action is a perceived improvement in animal welfare resulting from direct transport from farm to abattoir.A survey of complete journey structures of 18 393 slaughterweight lambs from farm to abattoir was conducted between April and July 1997. Journeys were characterized in terms of distances travelled, duration and the number of discrete components within a whole journey which comprised: transport; trans-shipping (when animals were transferred from one vehicle to another); multiple pickups from a number of farms; and holding at either assembly points, lairages or auction markets. The results identified that journeys in the livestock distribution system are diverse and range in complexity, irrespective of marketing channel. Journey complexity was found to be positively related to distance travelled.The study demonstrates that discussions concerning welfare of livestock in transit should consider the journey structure and not just the marketing channel per se. Furthermore, it also shows that changes taking place in the infrastructure of the marketing and meat processing sectors may result in a reduction in animal welfare.


Community pharmacists' knowledge and behavior regarding the collection of copayments for prescription drugs from Medicaid recipients were studied. In fall 1998 a questionnaire was mailed to a random sample of 1465 community pharmacists (one pharmacist per drugstore) in Maryland, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia. The objectives were to determine the extent to which these pharmacists waived copayments for prescription drugs for Medicaid recipients, to document the pharmacists' knowledge of federal policies on Medicaid copayments, and to evaluate the factors associated with pharmacist copayment collection and knowledge of federal copayment policies. A total of 543 pharmacists (37%) responded. Most respondents indicated that they collected copayments for over 90% of drugs dispensed to Medicaid patients subject to copayment policies. Pharmacists most likely to waive Medicaid copayments practiced in drugstores with a high volume of Medicaid-related prescriptions and a large percentage of customers who were elderly Medicaid recipients. Pharmacists least likely to waive copayments believed that doing so would have a negative financial impact on the pharmacy. Nearly three fourths of the pharmacists exhibited fair or good knowledge of federal Medicaid copayment policies, but this varied widely by state. Many said that they would collect copayments in at least some situations even if this opposed federal policy. Pharmacists in Maryland, Pennsylvania and West Virginia had highly variable behavior patterns and knowledge with respect to the collection of drug copayments from Medicaid recipients.


Electro-optic polymers have unique photonic, electro-optic and mechanical properties that make them attractive to use in a wide range of devices starting from ultra-high bandwidth light modulators for optical communications to miniature low power components for on-chip optical interconnects. The main building blocks of those devices are optical waveguides, that due to versatility of the polymers can be fabricated as either traditional multi-layer polymer structures, silicon nano-slots filled with the polymer, or dynamically created waveguides based on field-induced guiding. In this paper we cover various types of waveguides and analyze their optimum designs depending on application.


Objective The purpose of insulation diagnosis for power apparatus is to avoid failures that may lead to a significant economical loss. Typical inspection is performed with a certain intervat, normally several years. An apparatus may be replaced if a failure before the next inspection is expected with a certain probability or higher. On the other hand, the apparatus may be continuously used if the probability for failure before the inspection is significantly low. The diagnosis may reduce economic losses due to accidential failure; however, we should consider the losses caused by performing diagnosis. ' Secondary, wrong diagnosis would lead to an inappropriate deal with the apparatus and bring an economic loss. For instance, a failure loss is expected when a proper aIert has not been made because of "too loose diagnosis". On the other hand, prematurity loss is expected when the apparatus has been replaced because of too early alert made by "too severe diagnosis". The expected total loss is estimated as a function of risk ratio of the diagnosis. The optimal condition depends on the age and precision of the diagnoses as well. If all other factors are fixed, the minimum cost condition is realized by selecting a proper risk ratio. . The research in asset management is being activated by the requirement of cost reduction these days; however, most of the reports deal with the optimization for interval of replacement or maintenance. Cost assessment considering the reliability of diagnosis itself has not been reported, although some fundamental studies have just started. Based on the above background, the committee deals with the assessment of the lifecycle cost when insulation diagnosis for power apparatus is performed. FirstIy, diagnosis needs some cost.


Modernist Soundscapes questions how early twentieth-century auditory technologies altered sound perception, and how these developments shaped the modernist novel. As the phonograph, telephone, talkie, and radio created new paths for connectivity and intimacy, modernist writers such as Dorothy Richardson and Virginia Woolf were crafting characters intimately connected by the prosody of voice, music, and the soundscape. As headphones piped nonlocal sounds into a listener's headspace, Jean Rhys and James Joyce were creating interior monologues that were shaped by cosmopolitan and bohemian sounds. As the phonograph and tape recorder aestheticized noise through mechanical reproduction, Virginia Woolf and Samuel Beckett were deploying onomatopoeia and repetition to aestheticize words and make them sound out. Modernist Soundscapes encourages us to listen to these auditory narratives in order to grasp how the formal and linguistic experiments we have come to associate with modernism are partially a consequence of this historical attentiveness to sound. This heightened awareness of audition coincided with an emerging skepticism toward vision. Indeed, modernist writers turned to sound perception as a way to complicate the dominance of vision—a sensibility rooted in Greek philosophy that equated seeing with knowledge and truth. Without polarizing vision and audition, this book reveals how modernists tend to use auditory perception to connect characters, shifting the subject from a distanced, judgmental observer to a reverberating body, attuned to the moment.


It is clear that the targeting of PDZ-containing substrates by E6 is important for the normal viral life cycle and for the progression to malignancy. However, which of these PDZ domain-containing proteins is relevant for HPV pathology is still elusive. In this study, we provide the evidence that different PDZ domain-containing proteins are differentially targeted by E6. With these experiments, we identified MAGI-1 as a sensitive proteolytic substrate for both the HPV-16 and HPV-18 E6 oncoproteins. We show that E6 promotes the degradation of membrane-bound and nuclear pools of MAGI-1, and the silencing of E6 expression resulted in the MAGI-1-mediated junctional recruitment of ZO-1. Using a mutant MAGI-1, resistant to E6-mediated degradation, we also show that its expression in HeLa cells also promotes membrane recruitment of the tight junction-associated proteins ZO-1 and PAR3, represses cell proliferation and promotes apoptosis. These findings suggest that E6-mediated inhibition of MAGI-1 function perturbs tight junction assembly, with concomitant stimulation of proliferation and inhibition of apoptosis. We also found that the cell polarity regulator hScrib is differentially targeted by HPV-16 and HPV-18 Ed-mediated degradation. Surprisingly, we found that residual levels of hScrib expression are required for the maintenance of high levels of HPV-18 E6 expression in HeLa cells. This is not due to an effect on E6 stability or transcription, but rather is due to an effect upon E6 translation. We provide evidence that hScrib and E6 both regulate the PI3K/mTORC1 pathway, and that hScrib might regulate cap-dependent translation through the modulation of the mTORCl effector S6 kinase. This provides an unexpected role for hScrib in the regulation of tissue homeostasis, and provides further evidence that E6, by fine-tuning the levels of expression of its different cellular substrates, can impact upon a wide range of biological processes implicated in the pathogenesis of cervical cancer.


Background: Aging is associated with acute and chronic problems that interfere with older adults' mobility and independence. There are several types of walkers available in the market with different functional performance profiles of older people which aim to compensate for physical limitations and prevent falls. Objective: To compare the functional performance profile of institutionalized older adults taking into account the total time, gait speed, heart rate variability, and energy cost during the Expanded Timed Get-up-and-Go test using three types of walkers: fixed, two-wheeled, and four-wheeled walkers. Methodology: One-group pretest and posttest quasi-experimental study in a convenience sample of 40 institutionalized older people. Results: Significant differences were found in the total time (X2 = 15.65; p < 0.001) and gait speed (X2 = 15.80, p < 0.001). Conclusion: There is no unique ideal solution among the types of walkers analyzed in this study, thus a tailored solution is desirable to meet institutionalized older adults' characteristics and specific needs.


Can a human society suffer from illness like a living thing? And if so, how does such a malaise manifest itself? In this thought-provoking book, Fred Neuhouser explains and defends the idea of social pathology, demonstrating what it means to describe societies as 'ill', or 'sick', and why we are so often drawn to conceiving of social problems as ailments or maladies. He shows how Rousseau, Hegel, Marx, and Durkheim – four key philosophers who are seldom taken to constitute a 'tradition' – deploy the idea of social pathology in comparable ways, and then explores the connections between societal illnesses and the phenomena those thinkers made famous: alienation, anomie, ideology, and social dysfunction. His book is a rich and compelling illumination of both the idea of social disease and the importance it has had, and continues to have, for philosophical views of society.