Mesostructured silica is a material consisting of a silica matrix with an organization in the meso range of 2-50 nm. The silica matrix is most often amorphous while the organization, induced by a structure directing agent, may generate a long-range mesoorder.

The main objective of this project has been to investigate syntheses of mesostructured silica using non-ionic block co-polymers as structure directing agent. The polymers used have a central poly(propylene oxide) segment surrounded on each side by a poly(ethylene oxide) (PEO) segment. Special emphasis has been directed towards the use of inorganic silica sources. The studies included in this thesis therefore focus on topics such as, the silica-PEO interaction, the condensation of silica in aqueous solution, development of a synthesis method of mesostructured silica based on an inorganic silica source, and the formation mechanism of mesostructured silica. These issues have all been important in order to obtain an improved understanding of the formation of mesostructured silica using non-ionic interactions.

The focus towards inorganic silica sources resulted in the development of a new synthesis method for mesostructured silica based on a sodium silicate solution. The synthesis gives a stable colloidal suspension and it is shown that the particle size can be controlled by the electrolyte concentration of the solution. This was explained by the electrostatic interactions stabilizing the particles and that this stabilization is size dependent. The results presented in this thesis also demonstrate that the interaction between silica and PEO is dependent on the state of the silica species, referring to their size, molecular weight, and degree of condensation. This is explained by the dependence of the interaction on the possibility to form multiple bonds between the silica and PEO. The silica-PEO interaction is described by hydrogen bonding with an additional strong contribution from entropic effects. It is further shown that the silica source used as starting material in the syntheses of mesostructured silica is very important for the properties of the final material. This is mainly due to differences in the state of the silica in the various silica solutions used.


Abstract Mistletoes are considered keystone species on woodlands and savannas worldwide, providing a food resource for a diversified fauna, as well as a nutrient-enriched litter. Infections can be large (∼1–3 m) and, in some parts of the Amazonian savannas, parasitize up to 70% of hosts locally. Despite these facts, biomass of mistletoes is rarely investigated. Here we constructed allometric models to predict the biomass stock of the shrubby mistletoe Psittacanthus plagiophyllus in an Amazonian savanna. In addition, we determined whether host size could be used as a proxy for mistletoe biomass. Finally, we compared the biomass of mistletoes with that of trees, to evaluate their relative importance. We have shown that: (1) biomass of leaves (46.1% ± 13.5%) are as important as of stems (47.8% ± 13.5%), and relative contribution of stems increases as plant grows; (2) the model including width, breadth and vertical depth was the best (SE = 0.39, R2 = 0.9) for predicting individual mistletoe biomass; (3) mistletoe load and biomass per host had a positive, but weak (R2 = 0.11 and 0.09, respectively), relationship with host size, and thus such host information is a poor predictor of mistletoe biomass; and (4) in comparison with trees, mistletoes constituted less than 0.15% (0.5–22 kg ha−1) of the total above-ground biomass, suggesting that this life-form is irrelevant to the local biomass stock despite its unequivocal biological importance.


The  Global Research Journal of Education (GRJE)  ISSN  2408-6894 is a peer-reviewed, open access journal that provides rapid publication (monthly) of articles in all areas  of  Education  and related disciplines. The objective of this journal is to provide a veritable platform for scientists and researchers all over the world to promote, share, and discuss a variety of innovative ideas and developments in all aspects of  Education .  The Journal welcomes the submission of manuscripts that meet the general criteria of significance and scientific excellence. Papers will be published shortly after acceptance. All articles published in  GRJE are peer-reviewed.


PURPOSE
The purpose of this investigation was to compare the pain responses of children during local anesthetic infiltration at bilateral palatal sites prepared with the topical application of benzocaine 20% oral adhesive (Orabase-B) versus benzocaine 20% gel (Hurricaine) or EMLA 5% oral adhesive (EMLA 5% cream in Orabase Plain).

METHODS
Forty subjects, aged 7-15 years old, received bilateral palatal injections following topical application of anesthetic agents applied in a randomized, crossover design. Pain responses were compared based upon subject self-report using a visual analogue scale (VAS), changes in the subject's heart rate, and operator assessment using a modified Children's Hospital of Eastern Ontario Pain Scale (CPS) that rated behavioral changes in children. Following the injections, the subjects were asked to choose which agent was preferred based on comfort and taste acceptance.

RESULTS
All the agents tested were equivalent in injection pain response comparisons, but Hurricaine had a slight advantage in expressed subject preference and taste acceptance over the other topical anesthetic agents tested.

CONCLUSIONS
The selection of EMLA 5% oral adhesive over other commercially available products containing benzocaine 20% is not recommended for palatal site preparation in children. The lack of demonstrated superiority in efficacy and subject preference, the necessity to custom mix the cream into an oral adhesive paste, the extended duration of time required for onset of action, the greater potential for complications associated with systemic absorption, and product cost preclude the use of EMLA 5% oral adhesive as an intraoral topical anesthetic agent.


Journal of Environmental Hydrology Volume 19 Paper 9 April 2011 1 Groundwater recharge is an essential hydrologic property that must be considered while determining potential zones for groundwater storage and protection. However, concerns in groundwater assessment are often given to other hydrologic elements, such as the fracture systems and stratigraphic characterizations of the existing lithologies. In Lebanon, karstification is a dominant geomorphologic phenomenon that occurs either on-surface or subsurface, and plays in both cases a major role in the water flow regime and accumulation. Sinkholes are one of the surficial karst features that are widespread landforms in the mountainous regions of Lebanon, notably at higher altitudes, where hard carbonate rocks exist in a region with a high precipitation rate exceeding 1500 mm and covered by snow for more than nine months a year. The regular melting of snow cover results in considerable amounts of surface water that percolate downward into sinkholes and feed the Cenomanian limestone formation, the major groundwater reservoir in Lebanon. This study discusses the formation and geomorphologic orientation of sinkholes, with a special emphasis on the mechanism of groundwater recharge. The study benefits from field observations and testing. It aims, in a broad sense, to focus on the role of sinkholes in recharging groundwater to aquifers in Lebanon, and it highlights the necessity to protect these features from human interference. THE ROLE OF SINKHOLES IN GROUNDWATER RECHARGE IN THE HIGH MOUNTAINS OF LEBANON


Africa has traditionally had a marginal and decreasing role in international affairs. Since the attacks of 11 September 2001, however, the continent has taken center stage in the emerging security discourse, and access to African oil is now a strategic priority for the United States, which now trades more with Africa than Central Europe and the former Soviet Union combined. This fact, and the potential threat from global terrorism, are reflected in emerging security regimes on the continent, bolstered by increased U.S. military assistance. Thus, global forces have penetrated not only African economic policymaking, but also security; however, increased military assistance and the suppression of human rights are further distancing society from the African state, worsening long-term instability and jeopardizing U.S. access to African oil. The creation of genuine security in Africa and the United States will depend on the reconceptualization of security as human security, and the addition of a substantive social-welfare dimension to globalization.


We benchmark two tracking methods developed in the INRIA Lagadic team with a TrakMark dataset. Since these methods are based on a 3D model based approach, we selected a dataset named ''Conference Venue Package 01'' that includes a 3D textured model of a scene. For the evaluation. we compute the error of 3D rotation and translation with the ground truth transformation matrix. Through these evaluations, we confirmed that the provided dataset was suitable for quantitative evaluations of 3D visual tracking.


The special issue entitled "Transfer Phenomena in Fluid and Heat Flows XIII" of Defect and Diffusion Forum continues a series of themed volumes and presents a collection of works associated to heat transfer and fluid flow phenomena. These topics can be understood in a wider sense as classical diffusion-related topics. The continuous need for improved machines and higher efficiencies, as well as more detailed and accurate theoretical modeling approaches makes it necessary to showcase the latest trends on a regular basis with small intervals between the different volumes in this topical series.


Serum retinol, retinyl palmitate, beta-carotene, cryptoxanthin, lutein, alpha-tocopherol and gamma-tocopherol were measured in 18 captive Humboldt penguins (Spheniscus humboldti) prior to and following the removal of Columbia River (CR) smelt (Thaleichthys pacificus) from the diet. Dietary vitamin A was reduced from 59.8 to 13.5 IU g-1 (dry matter basis) when CR smelt was removed from the diet. Minimal changes were noted in dietary vitamin E. Serum samples Without-CR smelt had significantly lower circulating retinol (1.19 +/- 0.09 vs. 1.94 +/- 0.08 micrograms ml-1) and retinyl palmitate (0.033 +/- 0.012 vs. 0.105 +/- 0.004 microgram ml-1) compared to samples With-CR. The Without-CR smelt diet resulted in increased serum alpha-tocopherol from 26.4 +/- 0.94 to 39.1 +/- 3.72 micrograms ml-1. More serum samples taken Without-CR smelt had detectable levels of gamma-tocopherol than those With-CR smelt. Serum lutein was higher for the samples taken Without versus With-CR smelt. Serum cryptoxanthin did not differ. beta-Carotene was not detected. Data indicate that high levels of dietary vitamin A can affect circulating levels of retinol, retinyl palmitate and vitamin E. Thus, dietary vitamin A and the interrelationship between vitamins A and E should be considered when assessing captive penguins.


The purpose of this study is to explore how the audit of building societies changed in the late 1950s in a reversion of audit objective from 'fraud detection' to 'statement verification' (Chandler et al., 1993: 452). Of particular interest is the analysis of the extended negotiations between the ICAEW and the Treasury over the reform of the form of the auditors' report for building societies, which was implemented through the enactment of the Building Societies Act 1960 (BSA60) We show how change implemented through the BSA60 relieved chartered accountants from 'out of tune' (T233/1652) practice established by nineteenth century legislation, but to do so required them to take an alternative duty to report on internal control.


Zoonotic leishmaniasis caused by Leishmania infantum is distributed worldwide and affects humans and domestic and wild mammals. In Europe, specifically in the Mediterranean basin, leishmaniasis is endemic due to the concurrence of the phlebotomine vectors and reservoir mammals, including carnivorous wildlife species and other less studied wild species. In this article, spleen, skin, and eye or oral swabs taken from 134 wild mammals admitted to five wildlife recovery centers in Spain were used. PCR employing fragments of the Repeat region, ITS1, and SSUrRNA were used for detection, and positive samples were processed for sequencing. L. infantum was detected in three out of the nine species analyzed, including European hedgehog, European badger, and red squirrel, with percentages ranging from 11.53 to 35.71%, depending on the species. Most of the species showed higher percentages of positivity in spleen samples than in skin samples. A small number of animals from the remaining six species tested negative, including Algerian hedgehog, stone marten, least weasel, garden dormouse, western polecat, and Egyptian mongoose. Hedgehogs and badgers are good candidates for consideration as epidemiological sentinels and pose a higher risk as potential reservoirs of leishmaniasis based on their percentage of infection and wide distribution.


This paper describes the development of an electronic sleep diary and outlines its advantages over the traditional paper based approach still used by many sleep centres throughout the world. A sleep diary is a record of sleep details filled in by a patient normally over a period of two weeks. This information is then used by a physician as a diagnostic tool for identify sleep disorders in the patient. The development method used was convergent interviews with sleep specialists in order to establish initial requirements. This was followed by a rapid prototyping approach in order to produce the final specification. This paper concludes that an online sleep diary is a low cost, viable alternative offering benefits to both patients and physicians. The benefits to patients include the ability to perform functional analysis of their own sleep habits (referred to as sleep hygiene) and to determine factors affecting their sleep patterns. This knowledge leads to greater patient understanding of their circumstances and can lead to a potential increase in patient, physician collaboration. The physician gains access to timely accessible patient information as well as to an evidence database that will allow for greater analysis of sleep disorders throughout the general public over time. https://doi.org/10.34105/j.kmel.2010.02.014


Architecture Description Languages (ADLs) allow embedded systems to be described as assemblies of hardware and software components. It is attractive to use such a global modelling as a basis for early system analysis. However, in such descriptions, the applicative software is often abstracted away, and is supposed to be developed in some host programming language. This forbids to take the applicative software into account in such early validation. To overcome this limitation, a solution consists in translating the ADL description into an executable model, which can be simulated and validated together with the software. In a previous paper [8], we proposed such a translation of AADL (Architecture Analysis & Design Language) specifications into an executable synchronous model. The present paper is a continuation of this work, and deals with expressing the behavior of complex scheduling policies managing shared resources. We provide a synchronous specification for two shared resource scheduling protocols: the well-known basic priority inheritance protocol (BIP), and the priority ceiling protocol (PCP). This results in an automated translation of AADL models into a purely Boolean synchronous (Lustre) scheduler, that can be directly model-checked, possibly with the actual software.


This paper analyzes how asset prices in a binary market react to information when traders have heterogeneous prior beliefs. We show that the competitive equilibrium price underreacts to information when there is a bound to the amount of money traders are allowed to invest. Underreaction is more pronounced when prior beliefs are more heterogeneous. Even in the absence of exogenous bounds on the amount traders can invest, prices underreact to information provided that traders become less risk averse as their wealth increases. In a dynamic setting, underreaction results in initial momentum and then reversal in the long run.


Purpose To study the relationship between respirable dust, quartz and chemical binders in Swedish iron foundries and respiratory symptoms, lung function (as forced expiratory volume FEV1 and vital capacity FVC), fraction of exhaled nitric oxide (FENO) and levels of club cell secretory protein 16 (CC16) and CRP. Methods Personal sampling of respirable dust and quartz was performed for 85 subjects in three Swedish iron foundries. Full shift sampling and examination were performed on the second or third day of a working week after a work free weekend, with additional sampling on the fourth or fifth day. Logistic, linear and mixed model analyses were performed including, gender, age, smoking, infections, sampling day, body mass index (BMI) and chemical binders as covariates. Results The adjusted average respirable quartz and dust concentrations were 0.038 and 0.66 mg/m3, respectively. Statistically significant increases in levels of CC16 were associated with exposure to chemical binders (p = 0.05; p = 0.01) in the regression analysis of quartz and respirable dust, respectively. Non-significant exposure-responses were identified for cumulative quartz and the symptoms asthma and breathlessness. For cumulative chemical years, non-significant exposure–response were observed for all but two symptoms. FENO also exhibited a non significant exposure-response for both quartz and respirable dust. No exposure-response was determined for FEV1 or FVC, CRP and respirable dust and quartz. Conclusions Our findings suggest that early markers of pulmonary effect, such as increased levels of CC16 and FENO, are more strongly associated with chemical binder exposure than respirable quartz and dust in foundry environments.


During the shutdown of a wind turbine, the turbine blades rotate from their typical operating angle to their typical idling angle (approximately 90 degrees) at a specific speed, called the blade pitch rate. This operation leads to rapid loss of thrust force on the turbine resulting in a corresponding heel response of the floating structure. This rapid variation of loads at the turbine also leads to large nacelle accelerations which are transferred to the bottom of the tower and consequently to the floating structure, making the turbine shutdowns, and specifically emergency shutdowns, of significance in the design and certification of the turbine, tower and floating structure.
 In case of an emergency shutdown (for instance due to a grid loss), the blades typically pitch from 0 degree to 90 degrees in approximately 20–35 seconds, whereas this time period can be more than 100 seconds in the case of a normal shutdown [6]. For fixed-bottom wind turbines, increasing the blade pitch rate leads to an increase of instantaneous loads at the nacelle and tower, leading to the emergency shutdown pitch rate being usually chosen to be as low as possible. In the case of a floating wind turbine, however, water/platform interaction effects such as wave induced damping on the floating platform, challenge this approach. Indeed, increasing the blade pitch rate can increase the effect of wave-induced damping on the floater and therefore reduce the loads on the overall structure. On the other hand, reducing the blade pitch rate during an emergency shutdown can reduce this damping effect and increase those loads, meaning that an optimal blade pitch rate for a fixed bottom turbine is not necessarily optimal for a floating wind turbine.
 This paper will examine the behavior of a floating offshore semi-submersible platform, the WindFloat, during turbine shutdown operations, with an emphasis on the blade pitch rate during an emergency shutdown.


Atmospheric tides—global oscillations in pressure, temperature, and wind that are subharmonics of a solar day—mainly affect the upper atmosphere on Earth, but on Mars they tend to have effects throughout the atmosphere. Tidal variations in Mars's atmosphere are mainly introduced by diurnal variations in surface temperature as the planet rotates. The absorption of radiation by aerosols in the atmosphere provides an additional forcing, which complicates the tidal structure.


The purpose of this study was to analyze the effects of metabolic syndrome on Korean adult periodontal disease and was to investigate the relationship between metabolic syndrome, social factors and periodontal disease and to utilize it as a basis for the effective and systematic prevention and management of oral health policy project. The data of the study were analyzed using the data of the National Health and Nutrition Survey of the 6th year of 2015, which is representative of the national sample survey, and those who are over 19 years old who have completed the metabolic syndrome survey and oral examination The main results of metabolic syndrome's factor of judgment, prevalence of periodontal disease was higher in the order of metabolic syndrome, risk group, and normal group. Metabolic syndrome factors have shown that the distribution of periodontal disease prevalence rate was different. In conclusion, this study suggests that the results of this study can be used as basic data for comprehensive and preventive policy formulation for the development of programs for the improvement of metabolic syndrome, periodontal disease and reduction of social problems caused by chronic diseases.


Accruing to the development of the apical suction device, the improvement of the suction type stabilizer, and the application of the trapezoidal pericardiotomy, we have performed off-pump coronary artery bypass (OPCAB) as the first choice procedure for coronary artery revascularization. In a recent series of coronary revascularization (100 cases), 99% of coronary artery bypass grafting was performed completely under OPCAB technique. The usage of the bilateral internal thoracic arteries under skeletonized technique with Harmonic Scalpel has become one of the standard procedures even in patients with diabetes mellitus, a high risk for cardiopulmonary bypass. There was no cerebrovascular accident, or mediastinitis in the postoperative course. In case of abdominal aortic aneurysm and arteriosclerosis obliterans with coronary artery disease, OPCAB combined with vascular surgery were performed simultaneously with an acceptable mortality rate (2.8%: 1/35). We believe that OPCAB can be the standard procedure for all patients with coronary artery disease.


Painful peripheral neuropathy is a common secondary complication of diabetes. The streptozotocin (STZ)‐induced diabetic rat is the most commonly employed animal model used to study mechanisms of painful diabetic neuropathy and to evaluate potential therapies. A low dose STZ protocol is described for inducing experimental diabetes in the rat. Several behavioral assays are described, which are routinely used to assess different aspects of neuropathic pain in this animal model of diabetes mellitus, including mechanical allodynia and heat hyperalgesia.


This paper presents an automated desktop procedure for delineating river longitudinal profiles into macro-reaches for use in Ecological Reserve assessments and to aid freshwater ecosystem conservation planning. The procedure was developed for use where there are limited data and/or where a repeatable, statistically defensible regional or national assessment is required. The delineation of longitudinal profiles into macro-reaches between 'controls' or 'break points' such as exposed resistant rock formations, knick points, or significant changes in lithology provides the initial coarse filter for further assessment of lower levels of organisation, channel type for example. The division is necessary, as research has demonstrated that not all macro-reaches respond in the same way to disturbance or stress, nor do they have the same biotic assemblages. Four statistical
methods (Von Neumann mean square error, CUSUM plots or unweighted values and the Worsley Likelihood Ratio Test (WLRT)) were used to define macro-reach breaks for four South African rivers (Crocodile, Olifants, Mhlathuze and Seekoei
Rivers) and were compared to previously defined macro-reach delineations based on expert-driven approaches. Results
indicate that the CUSUM and WLRT approaches most closely match the macro-reach breakspoints as defined by the expert-driven approach. An automated desktop procedure was developed for computing statistically defensible, multiple change points along profiles using an adaptation of the WLRT method. The adapted approach does not require an a priori knowledge of the break points, as is the case in other applications of the WLRT. It is concluded that the adapted WLRT approach can be used with a reasonable degree of certainty where there are insufficient data and/or where a regional or national assessment is required that is repeatable and statistically defensible. Where possible, however, there is no substitute for primary data collection,
field work and a detailed expert-driven approach. Water SA Vol.32 (3) 2006: pp.395-402


— Thermal fatigue in a T-junction is of crucial importance issue for the coolant system of nuclear energy plants. The dynamic mode decomposition (DMD) is employed to analyze the snapshot data from simulation results with applying large eddy simulation (LES). The thermal mixing flow in a square T-junction is simulated at the impinging jet ( M R = 0.2). The temperature difference of hot and cold fluids is 15 K. The corresponding Reynolds number is about 20000. The results show that the frequency of the velocity modes is not equal to that of the temperature mode. The frequency of the temperature mode 1 is more than 40% higher than that of the velocity mode 1. The main spatial structures of the temperature field and the velocity field are alternately arranged along the trajectory of the branch fluid entering the main duct. The main coherent structure of the velocity field arrives at the bottom wall of x / D m = 1, whereas for the temperature field, it basically appears in the region of x / D m = 0.6 - 0.8. The negative structures of the velocity mode 1 induces the positive structures of the temperature mode 1. Also, the coherent structures of Modes 1 and 2 grow along the normal direction during downstream propagation.


Abstract As the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission considers appropriate "ESG" disclosure mandates, the Financial Economist's Roundtable contributes to the debate with a statement summarizing its policy discussion. The FER believes financial regulators should limit mandates to matters that directly affect the firm's cash flows. Further, when issuer filings include ESG ratings, those filings should include information about the raters, the factors used, and the weights on the factors. The FER recommends that the SEC should not mandate disclosure of the firm's impacts on environmental and social (E&S) outcomes.


The exploitive and inequitable management of natural resources has exacerbated ethnic divisions and the struggle to capture the benefits of finite resources. Conflicts are caused by competition for scarce resources (economic, political and social). Policies adopted have ushered in partial settlements, reflecting compromises between parties - mainly states - over territorial issues. This paper interrogates the challenges and opportunities in the management of the Kenya- Ethiopia Cross border resource conflict. This is achieved through the analysis of the challenges and opportunities experienced by core actors involved in the management of the Kenya- Ethiopia cross border resource-use conflict. The key focus of this study was to analyze the contribution to the creation of conditions of positive peace through conflict transformation. This promotes a series of strategies which go beyond the statecentered dynamics of negative peace. The paper seeks to elaborate the structural problems and inequalities which are often the sources of tensions that can escalate into destructive conflict.


This doctoral project investigates the design, fabrication and testing of Germanium implanted gratings in silicon on insulator waveguides. Integrated Bragg gratings are an interesting candidate for telecommunication applications, optical filtering, and for the fabrication of integrated photonic sensors, and this work demonstrates how it is possible to use well established microelectronics manufacturing technologies such as ion implantation to reinterpret the fabrication and applicability of these specific devices. In this work we demonstrate that a periodic change in the refractive index can be introduced on a silicon waveguide by ion implantation induced amorphization to produce integrated Bragg gratings compatible with CMOS processing techniques. Germanium implanted gratings can be also erased by an appropriate thermal treatment, opening the way to a range of new applications such as optical wafer scale testing. An extinction ratio up to 30dB has been demonstrated in transmission for the fabricated implanted Bragg gratings with lengths up to 2mm. Eras ability results are also presented, demonstrating how the grating effect can be selectively eliminated by either rapid thermal annealing or UV pulsed laser annealing. The possibility of employing erasable grating structures in optical wafer scale testing schemes is also discussed. This thesis contains no material which has been accepted for a degree or diploma by the University of Surrey or any other institution, except by way of background information and duly acknowledged in the thesis, and to the best of my knowledge and belief no material previously published or written by other authors except where due acknowledgement is made in the text of the thesis.


Moderation of calcium perturbations has been implicated in ischemic preconditioning. As mitochondria possess an effective Ca(2+)transporting system driven by the mitochondrial membrane potential, experiments were performed to study time-averaged intracellular free calcium and the mitochondrial membrane potential during preconditioning and ischemia-reperfusion. Isolated rat hearts were subjected to 5 min of preconditioning, a 9-min intervening reperfusion and 21 min of ischemia with subsequent reperfusion. The hearts were preloaded with the Ca(2+)indicator Fura-2 or the mitochondrial membrane potential probe safranine. A method was devised for correction for NADH autofluorescence in time-averaged Ca(2+)probing with Fura-2. The pH dependence of the apparent dissociation constant of the Ca(2+)complex of Fura-2 was determined. Intracellular free Ca(2+)increased during the 5-min ischemia, and this was reversed upon reperfusion. During protracted ischemia a continual Ca(2+)rise was observed when the fluorescence data were corrected for changes in pH. An initial sharp Fura-2 fluorescence spike upon final reperfusion was caused by a pH-dependent change in the dissociation constant of the Ca(2+)complex of Fura-2. In preconditioned hearts the free Ca(2+)was somewhat lower during reperfusion, but a major effect of preconditioning was observed during the prolonged ischemia. The decrease in mitochondrial membrane potential during prolonged ischemia was faster in the preconditioned heart with no difference during the final reperfusion. The effect of preconditioning on cell survival was reflected in a decrease in the post-ischemic washout of creatine kinase. The moderation of the ischemic and post-ischemic intracellular Ca(2+)increase, and the acceleration of the ischemic mitochondrial membrane potential decrease by ischemic preconditioning is in accord with the notion of the involvement of mitochondrial ATP sensitive K(+)channels in preconditioning. In studies on ischemia it is absolutely necessary to correct for the pH-sensitivity of the apparent dissociation constant of the calcium complex of Fura-2 to obtain reliable data for intracellular free calcium.


Alveolar type II cells constitute a small fraction of the total lung cell mass. However, they play an important role in many cellular processes including trans-differentiation into type I cells as well as repair of lung injury in response to toxic chemicals and respiratory pathogens. Transcription factors are the regulatory proteins dynamically modulating DNA structure and gene expression. Transcription factor profiling in microarray datasets revealed that several members of AP1, ATF, NF-kB, and C/EBP families involved in diverse responses were expressed in mouse lung type II cells. A transcriptional factor signature consisting of Cebpa, Srebf1, Stat3, Klf5, and Elf3 was identified in lung type II cells, Sox9+ pluripotent lung stem cells as well as in mouse lung development. Identification of the transcription factor profile in mouse lung type II cells will serve as a useful resource and facilitate the integrated analysis of signal transduction pathways and specific gene targets in a variety of physiological conditions.


Covering: up to 2019This review covers the current status of the quantum mechanical prediction of chiroptical properties, such as electronic CD and optical rotation, as needed for stereochemical assignments in new natural products. The reliability of the prediction of chiroptical properties is steadily increasing, with a parallel decrease in the required computational resources. Now, quantum mechanical calculations for a medium-sized natural product can be reliably performed by natural product chemists on a mainstream PC. This review is aimed to guide natural product chemists through the numerous steps involved in such calculations. Through a concise, but comprehensive, discussion of the current computational practice, enriched by a few illustrative examples, this review provides readers with the theoretical background and practical knowledge needed to select the most appropriate parameters for performing the calculations, to anticipate possible problems, and to critically evaluate the reliability of their computational results. Common reasons for mistakes are also discussed; in particular, the importance of the correct evaluation of conformational ensembles of flexible molecules (an aspect often overlooked in current research) is stressed.


Maize is an important food and feed crop in many countries. It is also one of the most important target crops for the application of biotechnology. Currently, there are more biotech traits available on the market in maize than in any other crop. Generation of transgenic events is a crucial step in the development of biotech traits. For commercial applications, a high throughput transformation system producing a large number of high quality events in an elite genetic background is highly desirable. There has been tremendous progress in Agrobacterium-mediated maize transformation since the publication of the Ishida et al. (1996) paper and the technology has been widely adopted for transgenic event production by many labs around the world. We will review general efforts in establishing efficient maize transformation technologies useful for transgenic event production in trait research and development. The review will also discuss transformation systems used for generating commercial maize trait events currently on the market. As the number of traits is increasing steadily and two or more modes of action are used to control key pests, new tools are needed to efficiently transform vectors containing multiple trait genes. We will review general guidelines for assembling binary vectors for commercial transformation. Approaches to increase transformation efficiency and gene expression of large gene stack vectors will be discussed. Finally, recent studies of targeted genome modification and transgene insertion using different site-directed nuclease technologies will be reviewed.


Marriage registration carried out by marriage registrar employees is often not in accordance with the rules set out in the Act. The law requires that the marriage record be carried out if it has fulfilled the legal requirements for marriage. There are cases of marriages that do not meet the legal requirements of marriage and there are also marriages that meet the legal requirements of marriage but are not stated. State apparatus in various service sectors, especially those concerning the fulfillment of civil rights and basic needs of the community, must be carried out in accordance with the mandate of the 1945 Constitution. Marriage records, such as the making of National Identity Cards or Driving Permits, actually discuss public services that are the responsibility of the state. So that it should pay attention to the principle of good governance, one of which is to establish costs that are in accordance with the standard of living of the people and procedures that are not user-friendly.


The evolution of binary systems leading to a supernova explosion and the nature of the thermonuclear flame propagating through the white dwarf are the two most uncertain aspects of the standard model of Type Ia Supernovae. Both aspects are connected by the transition from the accretion phase to the thermonuclear runaway. In this communication a scenario is investigated from the onset of the accretion phase up to the explosion and disruption of the white dwarf. Starting from a 0.8 M⊙ CO white dwarf accreting C+O at a constant rate of 5 10−7 M⊙/yr, explosive ignition of carbon occurs in the center at a rather low density, 1.8 109 g/cm3. The thermal conditions set up by the accretion process, nuclear energy generation, and convection turn out to be critical for determining the runaway properties. A detonation or a deflagration result for slightly different treatments of the transition from the hydrostatic evolution to the hydrodynamic one. The nucleosynthesis has been computed for both solutions.


The vibration phenomenon during pulsed laser heating of micro-beams is investigated. The beam is made of silicon and is heated by a laser pulse with a non-Gaussian temporal profile and with an ultrashort pulse duration of 2 ps, which incites vibration due to the thermoelastic damping effect. This coupled thermoelastic problem is solved using an analytical–numerical technique based on the Laplace transformation. The damping ratio and resonant frequency shift ratio of beams due to the air damping effect and the thermoelastic damping effect are also examined and discussed.


Steganography is the art and science of writing messages which is to be hide behind original cover file which may be audio, video or image. In this paper we are working on audio-video steganography which is the combination of Audio steganography and Image steganography, in this we are using computer forensics technique for authentication purpose. In this paper our aim is to hide secret information behind audio and image of video file. As we know that video is the combination of many still frames of images and audio. We can select any frame of video and audio for hiding our secret data. This paper proposed an algorithm for hiding image in selected video sequence is an image-hiding technique based on Discrete Wavelet Transform (DWT) and Singular Value Decomposition (SVD) and random LSB (Least Significant Bit) audio steganography method for hiding secret text information inside audio of the audio-video file, it reduce embedding distortion of the host audio. This paper focuses the idea of computer forensics technique which is use as a tool for authentication and data security purpose and its use in video steganography in security manner.


The fundamental objective of water treatment is the protection of consumers from pathogenic microorganisms. Chlorination of drinking water is essential to prevent waterborne disease. However, chlorine reacts with organic matter present in surface waters to form various by-products suspected of being carcinogenic. In the last decade, several epidemiological studies have been conducted to determine the connection between exposure to these chlorination by-products and human health defects. The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the genotoxicity of drinking water of Annaba city. The study have been carried out in different points of water distribution and in the station of treatment, using two tests of determination of genotoxic risk by means of SOS chromotest (using the strain Escherichia coli PQ37). SOS chromotest showed genotoxic effect of the sample collected from the exit of treatment station.


The pharmacological action of glyceryl trinitrate (GTN), a widely used drug for the treatment of angina pectoris, is thought to be mediated through release of nitric oxide (NO) during its biotransformation. Since glutathione S-transferases (GST) can utilize GTN as substrate and GST inhibitors can attenuate GTN-induced relaxation of rabbit aorta in vitro it has been suggested that these enzymes are involved in the bioactivation of GTN in rabbit aorta. Because GSTs are multifunctional enzymes and a multitude of GST isozymes with varying substrate preferences are present in mammalian tissues, the role of specific GST isozymes in bioactivation of GTN in rabbit aorta needs to be established. Therefore, during the present studies we have purified and characterized GST isozymes from rabbit aorta and evaluated their possible roles in the biotransformation of GTN. The results of these studies showed that rabbit aorta contained three GST isozymes having pI values of 9.4, 7.7, and 5.4. Structural, immunological, and kinetic studies showed that GST 9.4, GST 7.7, and GST 5.4 belonged to the alpha-, pi-, and mu-classes, respectively. The relative abundance of these enzymes in rabbit aorta was alpha > pi > mu. The alpha- and mu-class GST isozymes had similar activities toward GTN (0.71 U/mg and 0.86 U/mg, respectively) while the pi-class GST showed much lower activity toward GTN. The catalytic efficiency k(cat)/Km of the mu- and alpha-class GSTs toward GTN were similar but these activities were differentially inhibited by ethacrynic acid, its GSH conjugate, bromosulfophthalein (BSP), and hematin. These results suggest that in rabbit aorta GSTs may be involved in bioactivation of GTN, and because of their higher abundance the alpha-class GSTs may be more important for the pharmacological effects of GTN than the mu-class GSTs. The results on kinetics of inhibition by various inhibitors suggest that hematin may be an effective inhibitor to delineate the role of specific GST isozymes in the bioactivation of GTN.


Sequence analysis of a Paenibacillus sp. BP-23 recombinant clone coding for a previously described endoglucanase revealed the presence of an additional truncated ORF with homology to family 48 glycosyl hydrolases. The corresponding 3509-bp DNA fragment was isolated after gene walking and cloned in Escherichia coli Xl1-Blue for expression and purification. The encoded enzyme, a cellulase of 1091 amino acids with a deduced molecular mass of 118 kDa and a pI of 4.85, displayed a multidomain organization bearing a canonical family 48 catalytic domain, a bacterial type 3a cellulose-binding module, and a putative fibronectin-III domain. The cloned cellulase, unique among Bacillales and designated Cel48C, was purified through affinity chromatography using its ability to bind Avicel. Maximum activity was achieved at 45 degrees C and pH 6.0 on acid-swollen cellulose, bacterial microcrystalline cellulose, Avicel and cellodextrins, whereas no activity was found on carboxy methyl cellulose, cellobiose, cellotriose, pNP-glycosides or 4-methylumbeliferyl alpha-d-glucoside. Cellobiose was the major product of cellulose hydrolysis, identifying Cel48C as a processive cellobiohydrolase. Although no chromogenic activity was detected from pNP-glycosides, TLC analysis revealed the release of p-nitrophenyl-glycosides and cellodextrins from these substrates, suggesting that Cel48C acts from the reducing ends of the sugar chain. Presence of such a cellobiohydrolase in Paenibacillus sp. BP-23 would contribute to widen up its range of action on natural cellulosic substrates.


1. We have previously shown that atrial natriuretic peptide causes bronchodilatation and reduces bronchial reactivity when administered intravenously or by inhalation to asthmatic patients. We wished to determine the direct effect of exogenously applied atrial natriuretic peptide on isolated airway and the role of proteases important in atrial natriuretic peptide degradation in other organ systems. 2. The ability of atrial natriuretic peptide (alpha-human atrial natriuretic peptide 28-amino acid) to relax precontracted tissues and to protect against methacholine-induced contraction was studied in human and bovine tissue. The role of neutral endopeptidase-24.11 and other proteases in regulating the effect of atrial natriuretic peptide on bronchial smooth muscle was also examined by studying the influence of phosphoramidon, a protease inhibitor, whose actions include the inhibition of neutral endopeptidase-24.11, and the protease inhibitors leupeptin, aprotinin and soybean trypsin inhibitor on the airway response to atrial natriuretic peptide. 3. In human and bovine tissue atrial natriuretic peptide (10(-6) mol/l) caused a slight relaxation of methacholine-contracted tissue [mean (SEM) percentage inhibition of contraction of 13.2 (3.02)% and 9.41 (2.63)% respectively] and evoked a significant rightward shift of the cumulative concentration-response curve to methacholine [pD2 5.15 (0.23) and 4.85 (0.1) compared with control values of 6.14 (0.1) and 5.85 (0.16), respectively]. 4. Phosphoramidon potentiated atrial natriuretic peptide-induced relaxation of methacholine-induced tone and the ability of atrial natriuretic peptide to protect against methacholine-induced contraction. The combination of leupeptine, aprotinin and soybean trypsin inhibitor did not significantly alter the bronchial response to atrial natriuretic peptide in either human or bovine tissues.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)


1. The rotation of the plane of polarisation of light by a magnetic field provides perhaps one of the easiest approaches to a study of the spectroscopic behaviour of ordinary substances. The present work is an analysis of the available measures of the dispersion of this magnetic gyration. Several formulae have been proposed for it, and these will be reviewed below, but it has proved most convenient to take one of them and use that; afterwards testing, to the rather limited extent possible, how far others would fit the facts. The test is made with the formula given by Becquerel in 1897, V = e /2 mc 2 λ dn/d λ , (1.1) where n is the refractive index, λ the wave-length and V is Verdet's constant, the rotation of the plane of polarisation per centimetre per gauss. If this formula fits, and we shall find that it does, it should give the value of e/m . A few values were worked out by Becquerel himself on the rather meagre data available at that time, and later Siertsema obtained more accurate values for some other substances. All these gave e/m roughly of the right order of magnitude, and this fact was duly noted in the text-books and has been copied from one to another ever since, but usually without giving any numerical values at all. Since Larmor's theorem fails to hold for molecules we should hardly expect to find the ordinary value, but nevertheless it seemed useful to analyse all the experimental measures available, so as to discover if any regularity would emerge. In the physical journals there are several results of this type for particular substances, but they are very much scattered, and it should prove convenient to collect together an analysis of all the substances for which the gyration has been measured. We are not attempting any deep theory of the matter, but merely a convenient summary which may prove useful when the time comes for a proper theory of the spectroscopic behaviour of ordinary substances of the type that has been so successful for monatomic gases and vapours. It is outside the scope of the present work to discuss the behaviour of the gyration of light of frequency very close to opaque bands ; this has been the subject of many experiments, but they are not by any means concordant, and take us deeper into the unknown theory than it is possible at present to go. To avoid this trouble we have limited ourselves to transparent substances, that is, to regions of the spectrum far from the bands which cause the optical effects. The data have been extracted from Landolt and Bornstein's tables (edition 1921), in some cases supplemented from the original sources, and it has not, of course, been possible to assess the merit of each of the individual measures recorded. In a few cases there are measures of the gyration but not of the refraction; and we are greatly indebted to Dr. I. C. Somerville of the Chemical Department of the University of Edinburgh for measuring some of these refractive indices for us.


Gigabit home networks represent a key technology to make the future Internet success a reality. The OMEGA European project aims to define and demonstrate such networks. Consumers will require networks to be simple to install, without the need of any new wire. To achieve this, gigabit radio links and wireless optics communications will provide wireless connectivity within the home and its surroundings. Power-line communications potentially combined with robust RF will provides a home backbone ldquowithout new wires.rdquo To make this network ubiquitous, seamless and robust a technology-independent MAC layer will ensure its global control and provide connectivities to any number of devices the user wishes to connect to it in any room in a house or a flat. In order to make this vision come true, substantial progress is required in the fields of optical-wireless and RF physical layers, in protocol design, and in systems architectures.


The relative frequency of pediatric gliosarcoma (GSM) is 1.9% among glioblastomas and 0.5% among pediatric central nervous system tumors. A 5-year-old female child came to us with history of fever and loss of appetite since 2 weeks and right sided weakness since 4 days. Magnetic resonance imaging showed a large heterogeneously enhancing space occupying lesion in the left parieto-occipital region. A parieto-occipital craniotomy with radical excision of tumor was performed. The patient was given adjuvant therapy following surgery and survived until 9 months following surgery. The etiopathogenesis, treatment modalities and prognosis of GSM is discussed.


In this paper, an approach to compress Chinese text is proposed. This approach first extends the alphabet to include those Chinese characters in Big-5 code. Then, an adaptive Markov model is used to model the contextual dependency, and arithmetic coding is used to encode the data more compactly. In the case of large alphabet size, a practical implementation method for adaptive Markov model is studied, and a data structure for fast arithmetic coding is proposed. Furthermore, to demonstrate its credibility, this approach has been programmed into a ready-touse software package. A series of experiments have been conducted. The two example texts used are CX1 (from Chinese textbooks of primary school) and CX2 (from newspaper editorials). The experiments show that the compression ratios (output file length divided by input file length) obtained from our approach to be 42.3% and 48.4% for CX1 and CX2 respectively, which are considerably better than 52.8% and 60.6%, from the popular software package ARJ, and 53.0% and 60.8% from the package PKZIP. And for shorter files, our approach is still capable of obtaining a much improved compression ratios.


The spectrum of four-times-ionized vanadium has been observed by using a 5-m grazing-incidence and a 3-m normal-incidence spectrograph. The light sources have been a vacuum sliding spark and an open vacuum spark. This paper presents some additions to the analysis by C. H. H. Van Deurzen. 42 lines have been classified as ground-term transitions and 6 lines as combinations between excited terms. These transitions have established the levels of the nf-series up to 9f as well as 10 levels of 3p53d2 and 4 levels of 3p53d4s. By applying the polarization formula to the hydrogen-like terms 5g, 6g, 7g, 6h, 7h and 7i as given by Van Deurzen the ionization energy has been determined to 526 530±4 cm-1 (65.280 eV).


Abstract. Many companies are concerned about the problem of increasing average dwell time for their import containers at the port of the final destination and therefore incurring additional shipping costs in form of demurrage charges for the port administration and detention charges for the shipping line. Previous studies have addressed this topic by analyzing terminal operations and evaluated its effects on port productivity and competitiveness; however few studies have explicitly explored long container dwell time causes from a consignee perspective. This research aims to identify the causes of long dwell time for the import containers at port storage yards for one of the leading FMCG companies in Jordan. To that end, the data of import containers whose stay at the terminal exceeded the free storage days in the period between 2019 and 2020 were collected by referring to the set of shipping documents and reviewing the correspondences between the consignee and other parties in the supply chain. Based on the timelines that have been analyzed for each case of delay to the collection of shipping documents in consideration with the payment terms, as well as the clearance and delivery timelines, ten causes for the long container dwell time have been identified and classified into three main categories according to the types of flow in the supply chain; five causes related to information flow, two causes related to cash flow, and three causes related to physical flow. The impact of these causes has been evaluated using the demurrage and detention charges as a measure indicator and the findings of this research have also revealed that the causes related to cash flow have a greater impact than the other types of causes.


Retiming, introduced by Leiserson and Saxe (1983, 1991), is a powerful transformation of circuits that preserves functionality and improves performance. The ASTRA algorithm proposed an alternative view of retiming using the equivalence between retiming and clock skew optimization and also presented a fast algorithm for minimum period (minperiod) retiming. Since minperiod retiming may significantly increase the number of flip-flops in the circuit, minimum area (minarea) retiming is an important problem. Minarea retiming is a much harder problem than minperiod retiming, and previous techniques were not capable of handling large circuits in a reasonable time. This work defines the relationship between the Leiserson-Saxe and the ASTRA approaches and utilizes it for efficient minarea retiming of large circuits. The new algorithm, Minaret, uses the same basis as the Leiserson-Saxe approach. The underlying philosophy of the ASTRA approach is incorporated to reduce the number of variables and constraints generated in the problem. This allows minarea retiming of circuits with over 56 000 gates in under 15 min.


The main purpose of this article is to discuss the potential role of storytelling in the teaching and learning of physics. I first present the main historical events concerning the discovery of current electricity by focusing on the Galvani–Volta controversy and the work of Michael Faraday. Then I outline a planning framework for teaching through storytelling. This framework consists of the following components: Idea(s) to incite wonder, main plot of the story, ideas to be learned by the pupils, content knowledge, human values and the moral of the story.


BACKGROUND
Thrombus removal using aspiration-thrombectomy (AT) may improve outcomes in Acute Myocardial Infarction (AMI). We performed a meta-analysis of randomized trials evaluating AT during primary Percutaneous Coronary Intervention (PCI) to determine its impact on mortality and morbidity.

METHODS
Studies were included if they were randomized trials evaluating AT versus control in patients with AMI undergoing primary-PCI. Databases were searched for eligible studies (1990-February 2008). Efficacy outcomes including death as a primary and composite of death, re-MI, stroke and repeat revascularization as a secondary outcome were evaluated at follow-up. Trials were combined using a fixed effects model and heterogeneity was evaluated.

RESULTS
18 trials involving 3871 patients were included. At average follow up of 8.9 months, mortality was significantly reduced in favour of AT (2.9% vs. 4.2%, OR 0.70, CI 0.49-0.99, P=0.04). The secondary outcome of composite of death, MI or stroke at average follow up of 8.9 months was not significantly reduced (5.6% vs. 7.1%, P=0.08) while the secondary outcome of death, MI, stroke, TVR & bleeding was significantly reduced (11% vs. 13.6% OR 0.77, CI 0.63-0.99, P 0.01) in the AT group. Thrombectomy devices were associated with a higher rate of thrombolysis in myocardial infarction 3 flow (OR 1.42; CI 1.17-1.72), Myocardial Blush Grade 3 flow (2.01; 1.74-2.31) and ST resolution (2.40; 2.08-2.78). There was no significant heterogeneity in any of the outcomes.

CONCLUSIONS
In primary PCI, the addition of AT reduces both mortality and recurrent ischemic events at follow up. These benefits are associated with improved early infarct-related artery patency.


The author evaluates the extent to which colleges and universities of varying degrees of selectivity engage in racial, ethnic, and socioeconomic affirmative action for cohorts of students who graduated high school in 1972, 1982, and 1992. The author finds that a much wider range of institutions engage in affirmative action for African‐American students than previous analysts reported, and that a growing number of institutions extend the benefits of affirmative action to Hispanic students. Colleges and universities are markedly less enthusiastic about engaging in affirmative action for socioeconomically disadvantaged students. To understand why postsecondary institutions prefer students from particular minority groups over otherwise comparable white students, the author introduces the concept of compensatory sponsorship (building on Turner's ideal‐type of sponsored mobility). In a contest system perceived by many to disadvantage some competitors unfairly, college personnel engage in affirmative action both to right a perceived wrong and to preserve the legitimacy of the contest. The beneficiaries of compensatory sponsorship, however, are determined by historical and social forces that constrain how postsecondary institutions recruit, admit, and fund potential matriculants.


Fisheries globally are facing multiple sustainability challenges, including low fish stocks, overcapacity, unintended bycatch and habitat alteration. Recently, fuel consumption has joined this list of challenges, with increasing consumer demand for low-carbon food production and the implementation of carbon pricing mechanisms. The environmental impetus for improving fishery fuel performance is coupled with economic benefits of decreasing fuel expenditures as oil prices rise. Management options to improve the fuel performance of fisheries could satisfy multiple objectives by providing low-carbon fish products, improving economic viability of the industry, and alleviating pressure on overfished stocks. We explored the association of fuel consumption and fuel costs in a wide range of Australian fisheries, tracking trends in consumption and expenditure over two decades, to determine if there is an economic impetus for improving the fuel efficiency e and therefore carbon footprint e of the industry. In the years studied, Australian fisheries, particularly energy-intensive crustacean fisheries, consumed large quantities of fuel per kilogram of seafood product relative to global fisheries. Many fisheries improved their fuel consumption, particularly in response to increases in biomass and decreases in overcapacity. Those fisheries that improved their fuel consumption also saw a decrease in their relative fuel expenditure, partially counteracted by rising oil prices. Reduction in fuel use in some Australian fisheries has been substantial and this has resulted not from technological or operational changes but indirectly through fisheries management. These changes have mainly resulted from management decisions targeting ecological and economic objectives, so more explicit consideration of fuel use may help in extending these


This article is not intended as a complete review of this subject, nor as a detailed report or analysis of all the examples of the condition treated at the West End Hospital for Nervous Diseases. It seemed, however, that a short note on the subject might be of interest, as many of the conditions included in this group are amenable to treatment by moder neurosurgery, though they may be somewhat rare. It further appeared that it would be of interest to Members of the Fellowship of Medicine to illustrate it by brief reference to some of the cases which have been discussed with them from time to time at the M.R.C.P. courses at the West End Hospital, without, however, prejudicing any full report or analysis of such cases, which may be published elsewhere at a later date.


Introduction: Lung ultrasound (LUS) implementation in patients with COVID-19 can help to establish the degree of pulmonary involvement, evaluate treatment response and estimate in-hospital outcome. Objective: To evaluate the application of LUS in patients with COVID-19 infection to predict in-hospital mortality. Methods: The study was carried out from April 1 to August 1, 2020 in patients with COVID-19 infection admitted to the Intensive Care Unit. Lung evaluation was carried out by physicians trained in critical care ultrasonography. Results: Most patients were males, median age was 56 years, and 59 % required mechanical ventilation. In-hospital mortality was 39.4 %, and in those with a LUS score >= 19, mortality was higher (50 %). The multiple logistic regression model showed that a LUS score >= 19 was significantly associated with mortality (hazard ratio = 2.55, p = 0.01). Conclusions: LUS is a safe and fast clinical tool that can be applied at bedside in patients with COVID-19 infection to establish the degree of parenchymal involvement and predict mortality.


Abstract Saddle systems have been used on recent projects to support the cables in cable-stayed and extradosed bridge structures. A major design consideration for these anchorage systems is the in-service fretting fatigue behaviour of the cables within the pylon saddle. In order to better understand the fatigue behaviour of these anchorage systems, a research project was undertaken, wherein fatigue tests were performed on saddle test specimens, analytical models for calculating displacements and contact forces were developed, and a multiaxial stress-based fretting fatigue model was developed for calculating fatigue life. In the current paper, it is shown how the developed models can be used to perform probabilistic analysis of fretting fatigue life for the purpose of assessing the fatigue reliability of saddle systems, using two approaches – fretting maps, in conjunction with Monte Carlo simulation (MCS) or the multiplicative dimensional reduction method (MDRM).


FM4 Fig. 2. XRD patterns of (a) Yb: YAG, @) Cr YAG [the concentration of Ca is 10 mol%], and (c) Cr:YAG [the concentration of Ca is 2 mol%]. The 300 nm-thick thin films were deposited on the (111)-GGG substrate at 300°C and then post-annealed at 970°C for 3 hours. oxygen pressure of 10 mTorr, not only the oxidation of Cr" to Cr4but also Cr"to Cr". was observed due to the excessive charge compensation by CaZA.4 The valence of Cr depended on both the ratio of Cr and Ca, and oxygen gas pressure during the growth. Hence, it is anticipated that there is an optimum ratio of Ca/Cr and the oxygen gas pressure for fabricating Cr47. In summary, we have demonstrated the epitaxial growth of Yb:YAG and Cr: YAG thin films by PLD technique. The valence of Cr could be controlled by changing the ratio of Ca/Cr and the oxygen pressure. It is also found that this technique is particularly suited to control the valence state of Cr in YAG crystal. 9nstitufe of Physical and Chemical Research (RKEN) , 2-1 Hirosawa, Wako, Saitama 35101, JAPAN


Early stimulation, detection and intervention for growth and development of children is a shared responsibility of health and community officials, including cadres of posyandu (integrated service post). The research that has been done is aimed at developing Posyandu cadre, with Role Play approach based on Maternal and child book (MCH book). This study was the classroom action research. The population were posyandu cadres in Bendo Sub-district. The sample size was 33, taken by simple random sampling. Instruments used were questionnaire and observation sheet. Descriptive and multivariate analyzes were used. The 38% of posyandu cadres were of late adulthood, the majority of senior high school (52%). Knowledge before role play: majority enough (88%), after role play, good (73%). Able to measure weight: good (70%). Measuring height: good (51.5%). Ability to measure head circumference well (84.8%). Able to detect developments well 82%. Able to perform vision tests with 94% good. Able to perform hearing test well (100%). Statistical analysis was no relationship between age and education with pretest knowledge. Conclusion: it was necessary to do coaching to Posyandu cadre continuously, with the use of variation of method to make lesson easier to understand.

Keywords: role play; education; children; growth; development


Introduction : Job life is an important part of a person's daily life. There are many aspects of a job. A person may be satisfied with one or more aspects of his/her job but at the same time may be unhappy with other things related to the job. Objective : To evaluate the sources of job stress (stressful aspects of work) among the staff of a super specialty hospital & to suggest measures to decrease level of job stress. Methodology : Descriptive study employing 381 staff members of a super specialty hospital using a structured personal interview questionnaire consisting of 21 sources of stress. The hospital staff was asked to rate each item according to the extent to which it had contributed to their stress as experienced in their jobs in the past few months on a scale of 0 (not at all), 1 (a little), 2 (quite a bit), 3 (a lot). A global rating of stress was also obtained Result : The prime sources of stress were found to be underpayment (76%), excessive workload (70.3%), inadequate staff (48.6), and being involved in the emotional distress of patients (46.7%). Conclusion : The staffs of the hospital were in moderate stress due to the prime stressors. Adequate measures should be taken to alleviate these stressors. This could be achieved through workload management, job redesign and by offering Occupational health education.


When vortex shedding is locked-on to a single frequency oscillatory flow, the variations of vortex dynamics are investigated using a time-resolved PIV system. Wake regions of recirculation and vortex formation, dynamic behavior of the shed vortices and the Reynolds stress fields are measured in the wake-transition regime at the Reynolds number 360. In the lock-on state, reduction of the wake region occurs and flow energy distributed downstream moves upstream being concentrated near the cylinder base. To observe the dynamic behavior of the shed vortices, the trajectory of the vortex center extended to the inside of the wake bubble is considered, which describes well the formation and evolution processes. The Reynolds stresses and their contributions to overall force balance on the wake bubble manifest the increase of the drag force by the lock-on.


In the Gulf of Mexico, gas hydrate mounds form along intersections of faults with the sea floor. The mounds can change greatly within a matter of days or weeks. A project to install a multisensor station to monitor the sea floor and water column in the vicinity of a gas hydrate mound in the northern Gulf of Mexico has been initiated. The intention is to assemble a station which will monitor physical and chemical parameters of the sea water and bottom sediments on a more-or-less continuous basis over an extended period of time. The result will be a time varying computer model of the station's environment from which stability of the sea floor and factors associated with the formation and dissociation of gas hydrates may be assessed. Also, the data collected will be available for planning hydrate exploration and, eventually, for analyzing the impact of mining hydrates from the ocean floor.


In this paper we present an approach for classifying the activity performed by a group of people in a video sequence. This problem of group activity recognition can be addressed by examining individual person actions and their relations. Temporal dynamics exist both at the level of individual person actions as well as at the level of group activity. Given a video sequence as input, methods can be developed to capture these dynamics at both person-level and group-level detail. We build a deep model to capture these dynamics based on LSTM (long short-term memory) models. In order to model both person-level and group-level dynamics, we present a 2-stage deep temporal model for the group activity recognition problem. In our approach, one LSTM model is designed to represent action dynamics of individual people in a video sequence and another LSTM model is designed to aggregate person-level information for group activity recognition. We collected a new dataset consisting of volleyball videos labeled with individual and group activities in order to evaluate our method. Experimental results on this new Volleyball Dataset and the standard benchmark Collective Activity Dataset demonstrate the efficacy of the proposed models.


The neuromodulator dopamine plays an important role in synaptic plasticity. The effects depend on receptor subtypes, affinity, concentration level, and the kind of neuroplasticity induced. In animal experiments, dopamine D2-like receptor stimulation revealed partially antagonistic effects on plasticity, which might be explained by dosage dependency. In humans, D2 receptor block abolishes plasticity, and the D2/D3, but predominantly D3, receptor agonist ropinirol has a dosage-dependent nonlinear affect on plasticity. Here we aimed to determine the specific affect of D2 receptor activation on neuroplasticity in humans, because physiological effects of D2 and D3 receptors might differ. Therefore, we combined application of the selective D2 receptor agonist bromocriptine (2.5, 10, and 20 mg or placebo medication) with anodal and cathodal transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS), which induces nonfocal plasticity, and with paired associative stimulation (PAS) generating a more focal kind of plasticity in the motor cortex of healthy humans. Plasticity was monitored by transcranial magnetic stimulation-induced motor-evoked potential amplitudes. For facilitatory tDCS, bromocriptine prevented plasticity induction independent from drug dosage. However, its application resulted in an inverted U-shaped dose–response curve on inhibitory tDCS, excitability-diminishing PAS, and to a minor degree on excitability-enhancing PAS. These data support the assumption that modulation of D2-like receptor activity exerts a nonlinear dose-dependent effect on neuroplasticity in the human motor cortex that differs from predominantly D3 receptor activation and that the kind of plasticity-induction procedure is relevant for its specific impact.


In the progress of any country, a Chemical Industry has a great importance. At the present time a country cannot be prospered and progressed without the support of Chemical Industrial Development. Chemical Industrial revolution has updated the fortune of several western countries. This work specifies a set of software tools for the site or chemical laboratory operator to manage and control the various chemical processes readings and the lab environment status like temperature, air pressure, sunlight etc. The common problems of such chemical industrial laboratories are the management issues like fault, manpower, configuration and performance. The proposed system may helpful to minimize the fast intensifying equipments' cost and complexities by offering improved set of simple GUI software tools to the labs manager or supporting workers to rapidly resolve or identify the chemical processing lab problems. Since it is a significant requirement for the chemical lab operator and personnel resources management to control and manage the chemical industrial plant from a central locality. So, i t can also be used in critical industrial units where it is very difficult to manually control the plant or machinery. We hope this work will be found useful by both chemical engineers and researchers, and will be used to design strategies for chemical industrial plant management system based on the presented strategies, or at least as a reference.


Residential school abuse and its intergenerational effects have created devastating impacts on entire Aboriginal communities. Much has been written about the history and experiences of Aboriginal people who attended residential schools, including the impacts on individuals, families, communities and nations. The purpose of this literature review was to examine the area of healing from residential school abuse and intergenerational effects. Important to this exploration was a focus on Aboriginal healing methods. It was found that only a small amount of literature exists in the area of appropriate and effective therapeutic or healing strategies for dealing with residential school abuse. Further, the Canadian residential school system is only one of many forms of oppressive measures that have impacted upon Aboriginal peoples. Therefore it is difficult to separate what form of oppression has caused which impacts. These various forms of oppression exacerbate and intensify each other. Further, rather than tracing the cause of present social conditions of Aboriginal people down to residential schools, most researchers broaden their scope of oppression, going beyond residential schools alone. This paper explores how Aboriginal communities are using Aboriginal healing methods to deal with oppression, colonization and its resulting social conditions, and demonstrates how the emerging body of literature is clearly relevant to our understanding of healing from residential school abuse and its intergenerational effects.


Accelerating the uptake of energy efficiency and renewable energy in the global energy mix is the single biggest contribution to keep global temperature rise under 2 degrees Celsius (°C) and to reap the multiple benefits of an inclusive green economy. Cities account for over 70% of global energy use and, 40 to 50% of greenhouse gas emissions worldwide. In several cities, heating and cooling can account for up to half of local energy consumption. Any solution for the climate and energy transition must explicitly address sustainable urban heating and cooling, as well as electricity. One of the least-cost and most efficient solutions in reducing emissions and primary energy demand is the development of modern (climate-resilient and low-carbon) district energy in cities. This new report from UNEP has surveyed low-carbon cities worldwide to identify the key factors underlying their success in scaling up energy efficiency and renewable energy, as well as in attaining targets for zero or low greenhouse gas emissions. This publication aims to provide concrete policy, finance and technology best practice guidance on addressing the heating and cooling sectors in cities through energy-efficiency improvements and the integration of renewable energy technology. It provides a glimpse into what integration and systems thinking look like in practice when addressing challenges in the energy, transport, buildings and industry sectors. The publication also consolidates data on the multiple benefits that cities, regions and countries have achieved from a transition to modern district energy systems.


In June 2007, in a valley side of a small stream close to Janowice in the Western Outer Carpathians of Poland, a 1.8 m long mammoth tusk was found within loamy-debris solifluction sediments, ca. 1 m thick. These discordantly overlie a 4-m-high strath built up of steeply dipping sandstones of the Krosno beds of the Skole Nappe, being in turn covered by 7.5-m-thick loessial silts and loess-like slopewash sediments. The latter are overlain at the top by another solifluction cover, ca. 1.5 m thick. The mammoth tusk belonged to an adult animal, probably 30-60 years old. The succession of malacofaunistic assemblages within loess-like sediments indicates a cold, polar climate, and an environment resembling tundra developed upon moderately moist substratum during the last glacial stage. The lower part of malacological sequence enriched in mesophile species probably refers to the Vistulian (Weichselian) interpleniglacial period. The middle part, indicative of more dry habitats, can be associated with the younger Pleniglacial, whereas the top part should represent the terminal phase of the latter. Sediments bearing the mammoth tusk were probably deposited at the turn of the Vistulian older Pleniglacial and Interpleniglacial time.


OBJECTIVE
To study the relationship between the expression of dipeptidyl peptidase IV (DPP IV) gene and malignant behavior of cells of ovarian carcinoma.

METHODS
The differences of the malignant behavior of A2780, SKOV-3, HO-8910 and HO-8910PM cell lines were examined by drawing cell proliferative curves, adhesive test, assay of incursion and chemotaxis. The expression of DPP IV among the cell lines and its relationship with the malignant behavior of ovarian carcinoma cell were detected by techniques of DPP IV activity assay, cytometry and reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction.

RESULTS
Among all cell lines, the ability of proliferation, adhesion, incursion and chemotaxis of HO-8910PM were the highest, while those of A2780 were the lowest. The transcription of mRNA in A2780, SKOV-3, HO-8910 and HO-8910PM cell lines were 0.7512 +/- 0.0012, 0.5596 +/- 0.0015, 0.3369 +/- 0.0009, and 0.2777 +/- 0.0006, respectively. The activity of DPP IV were 0.79 +/- 0.02, 0.64 +/- 0.03, 0.21 +/- 0.02, and 0.18 +/- 0.01, respectively; and the protein expression of DPP IV gene were 657.83 +/- 1.14, 538.53 +/- 5.29, 130.50 +/- 1.46, and 33.14 +/- 0.47, respectively, as assayed by cytometry. The correlation coefficients of the transcription of DPP IV gene and the adhesive, incursive and migratory ability of ovarian carcinoma cells were -0.987, -0.983, and -0.991, respectively; the correlation coefficients of the expression of DPP IV and those ability of cells were -0.959, -0.988, and -0.968; the correlation coefficients of the activity of DPP IV and those ability of cells were -0.952, -0.868, and -0.983.

CONCLUSION
There is a negative correlation between the expression of DPP IV gene and the adhesive and incursive capability of cells of ovarian carcinoma.


Software development is a discipline with specific management difficulties. Collecting relevant data during development is a way to overcome these difficulties. Such data collectionfor software development is termed 'Software Measurement'. Software measurement is a poweiful aid to quality improvement ofproducts and processes. A well-known andpopular software measurement approach is the Goal! Question/Metric approach (GQM). This chapter presents available techniques for GQM measurement and a research road-map to enhance GQM into a mature measurement approach. The main conclusion is that GQM promises to become the international standard for software measurement. Howevem the emphasis of the method must be focused on the interpretation process of measurement data and tools must become available that support this interpretation process. Organisations should start to recognise that improved understanding by developers is the only way to continuous improvement. Only bottom-up approaches, such as GQM, provide this understanding. Bottom-up improvement must be applied in practice. It is recommended to apply top-down improvement approaches, such as the Capability Maturity Model, in parallel with software measurement.


ABSTRACT Introduction: Methotrexate (MTX) is the first-line disease-modifying drug of choice in controlling active inflammation of the synovium that characterises rheumatoid arthritis, a chronic autoimmune inflammatory condition. However, many patients do not respond to treatment with MTX or cannot tolerate the medication. Pre-treatment characteristics that predict response to MTX are, therefore, of particular interest and potential clinical utility. Areas covered: This narrative review seeks to cover various genotypic and phenotypic characteristics that have been investigated as predictors of treatment response to MTX in RA. Ovid Medline searches (1946 to January 2018) were carried out for 'methotrexate' and 'rheumatoid arthritis', in combination with relevant terms. All papers identified were English language, with abstracts. Relevant references were also reviewed. Expert commentary: Despite the introduction of biologic medication and targeted therapies, MTX is likely to remain the mainstay of RA treatment, largely due to its much cheaper cost. Development of a multifactorial predictive algorithm for response to MTX may be of clinical utility, as well as routine MTX drug level testing to improve medication adherence and persistence.


This article examines the different ways that lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and intersex (LGBTI) police liaison officers in three states of Australia conceptualized and problematized the public visibility of LGBTI police liaison services. In a climate where LGBTI police liaison services are a prominent model for building relationships between police and LGBTI people, this article considers, through interview data with LGBTI police liaison officers, these officers' perceptions of the role that the visibility of these programs played in their success. Specifically, it explores the tensions and difficulties for officers and LGBTI communities resulting from the general invisibility of liaison officers themselves (and, by extension, these programs), as well as the problems that increased visibility of these programs might bring to officers, to LGBTI communities, and to policing work itself. Although enhancing the visibility of liaison services may be an important goal, this research suggests that careful consideration is required regarding how this visibility is produced and maintained, particularly given the concerns that officers reported about the potential risks posed by adopting new forms of visibility, including the risk of hypervisibility. This article questions the conventional view that increased visibility is unproblematic and is the key to the success of such programs.


Surfactants have been routinely used since 1990 for the treatment of respiratory distress syndrome (RDS). The use of surfactant has coincided with a decrease in mortality in infants due to RDS. This review focuses on clinical aspects of surfactant use. New information, particularly effects of ventilatory styles on surfactant function, is presented.


Feasibility, safety and success of day care laparoscopic cholecystectomy (DCLC) has been well established in advanced countries. The information on (DCLC) is not available from developing nations. All patients of gallstone disease undergoing laparoscopic cholecystectomy under the care of the two participating surgeons at the post graduate Institute of Medical Education & Research were considered for day care laparoscopic cholecystectomy. The selection criteria were: elective cases only, patients less than 70 years, American Society of Anesthesiologists (ASA) grade I and Grade II, living within 20 Kilometers of the hospital, availability of a responsible adult carer at home, access to a telephone and a means of transportation to hospital if needed. Clinical and operative data were recorded prospectively. All patients were discharged 6 to 8 hours after surgery with the advice to contact the surgical team over phone whenever necessary or on the day after discharge. Out of the total 236 laparoscopic cholecystectomy performed over a period of 26 months, 106 patients (44.9%) underwent laparoscopic cholecystectomy as day care procedure. Five patients (4.8%) were admitted after surgery. Four patients were admitted because of conversion and one patient was admitted because of suspected myocardial infarction. Hundred and one patients (95.2%) were discharged on the same day. There was no major morbidity and patient's acceptance was high. Day care laparoscopic cholecystectomy is feasible, safe, and acceptable to patients.


Bellido aus-bellido-J-abs1-he14-oral Fluorescence detectors of the Pierre Auger Observatory have been operating in a stable manner since January 2004. After a brief review of the physical characteristics of the detectors, the associated atmospheric monitoring, the calibration infrastructure and the detector aperture, we will describe the steps required for the reconstruction of fluorescence event data, with emphasis on the shower profile parameters and primary energy.


Dynamic Reactive Power Optimization (DRPO) is a large-scale, multi-period, and strongly coupled nonlinear mixed-integer programming problem that is difficult to solve directly. First, to handle discrete variables and switching operation constraints, DRPO is formulated as a nonlinear constrained two-objective optimization problem in this paper. The first objective is to minimize the real power loss and the Total Voltage Deviations (TVDs), and the second objective is to minimize incremental system loss. Then a Filter Collaborative State Transition Algorithm (FCSTA) is presented for solving DRPO problems. Two populations corresponding to two different objectives are employed. Moreover, the filter technique is utilized to deal with constraints. Finally, the effectiveness of the proposed method is demonstrated through the results obtained for a 24-hour test on Ward & Hale 6 bus, IEEE 14 bus, and IEEE 30 bus test power systems. To substantiate the effectiveness of the proposed algorithms, the obtained results are compared with different approaches in the literature.


BACKGROUND
With the rapid development of modern agriculture, high-quality rice production and consumption has become the current urgent demand for the development of rice production. In this paper, the effects of late-stage nitrogen fertilizer application on rice quality were studied under the same genetic background. Wx near-isogenic lines were used as test materials to study the starch composition, amylopectin structure and cooking quality of rice.

RESULTS
Results showed that rice amylose content and gel consistency significantly differed when different Wx genes were tranformed into waxy rice. The law of apparent amylose content in rice is Wxa > Wxin > Wxb > wx at the same nitrogen level, while the trend of gel consistency was opposite to that of apparent amylose content, presenting obvious characteristics of Indica and Japonica varieties. As the amount of fertilizer application increased, apparent amylose content increased, gel consistency decreased, breakdown and peak viscosities dropped and setback viscosity and peak time increased. Moreover, the cooking quality of rice significantly decreased with the use of nitrogen fertilizer, especially under low-level nitrogen fertilizer application. Amylopectin structure varied significantly in different genotypes of the Wx gene, and the degree of branching was as follows: wx > Wxb > Wxin > Wxa . This result indicated that the closer to Indica rice, the fewer short chains of amylopectin. Starch crystallinity and swelling potential were negatively correlated with amylose content but significantly positively correlated with amylopectin branching degree, decreasing with the increase of late-stage nitrogen fertilization.

CONCLUSION
Late-stage nitrogen fertilization reduced the cooking quality of rice by increasing amylose content and reducing amylopectin branching degree, which decreased starch crystallinity and aggravated pasting properties. Obviously, controlling late nitrogen application is essential to optimize rice quality. © 2017 Society of Chemical Industry.


Epithelial cells are typically connected through different types of cell junctions that are localized from the apical membrane to the basal surface. In this way, epithelium cells form the first barrier against pathogenic microorganisms and prevent their entry into internal organs and the circulatory system. Recent studies demonstrate that bacterial pathogens disrupt epithelial cell junctions through targeting junctional proteins by secreted virulence factors. In this review, we discuss the diverse strategies used by common bacterial pathogens, including Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Helicobacter pylori, and enteropathogenic Escherichia coli, to disrupt epithelial cell junctions during infection. We also discuss the potential of targeting the pathogenic mechanisms in the treatment of pathogen‐associated diseases.


Background Maternal smoking during pregnancy has been reported to negatively impact sperm counts of the sons. Sufficient data on the effect of paternal smoking is lacking. Objectives We wished to elucidate the impact of maternal and paternal smoking during pregnancy and current own smoking on reproductive function of the male offspring. Methods Semen parameters including sperm DNA integrity were analyzed in 295 adolescents from the general population close to Malmö, Sweden, recruited for the study during 2008–2010. Information on maternal smoking was obtained from the Swedish Medical Birth Register, and regarding own and paternal smoking from questionnaires. The impacts of maternal, paternal and own smoking were evaluated in a multivariate regression model and by use of models including interaction terms. Totally, three exposures and five outcomes were evaluated. Results In maternally unexposed men, paternal smoking was associated with 46% lower total sperm count (95%CI: 21%, 64%) in maternally unexposed men. Both paternal and maternal smoking were associated with a lower sperm concentration (mean differences: 35%; 95%CI: 8.1%, 55% and 36%; 95%CI: 3.9%, 57%, respectively) if the other parent was a non-smoker. No statistically significant impact of own smoking on semen parameters was seen. Conclusions Prenatal both maternal and paternal smoking were separately associated with some decrease in sperm count in men of whom the other parent was not reported to smoke.


Carbon dots (CDs) are nanomaterials with excellent photoluminescence property, usually used in the field of bioimaging tumor cells. However, its practical applicability in cancer therapeutics is limited by CDs' insensitive surface properties to complicated tumor microenvironment in vivo. Herein, a new type of innovative biomimetic nanoparticles has been formed with HeLa cell membranes (CM) and multifunctional CDs containing antitumor and bioimaging activities. The CDs are prepared by a facile one-step microwave-assisted procedure. Gallic acid is used as carbon resource and antitumor active molecule. Gelatin is treated as the nitrogen resource. Citric acid monohydrate is used as the auxiliary carbon source and the Hela CM is used for tumor targeting. A series of fluorescence analyses has proved its homotypic targeting and ability of diagnosis. Besides, in vitro and in vivo antitumor experiments further indicate their better antitumor efficiency. The findings show the totally new nanoparticles' feasibilities of dealing with the clinical therapy problems as well as applying for the integration of diagnosis and targeting therapy.


Groundwater is one of the most important for human activities. The effects of land use and population changes in Bekasi area cause the degradation of groundwater quantity and quality. The aquifers potential in Cikarang and its surrounding as a study area are studied using geoelectric method. Geoelectric analysis can be measured the geometry of subsurface aquifer (thickness, depth, distribution, and structural geology). The aquifers in the study area are included of Bekasi Groundwater Basin System. The aquifers contain confined aquifer and unconfined aquifer. The thickness of unconfined aquifers less than 30 m, as lenses and bottom depth less than 40 m below of land surface. The thickness of confined aquifers is variation with maximum 80 m and the bottom depth 20-160 m below of land surface. The degradation of groundwater in Cikarang and its surrounding needs better groundwater management for sustainable development.


In this paper we examine a number of recent studies that claim to have obtained a well-defined liquidity effect using structural VAR models based on broad measures of money. These studies can be distinguished in terms of the identifying restrictions, sample periods, and frequency of data used. We show that estimation of the structural coefficients of all these models can be achieved by instrumental-variable methods, where the instruments are predetermined variables and the estimated structural errors from other equations in the system. Overall, our judgment is that the evidence for a liquidity effect from these studies is much less certain than suggested in the original papers, primarily because of the poor quality of the instruments used in estimation and the sensitivity of the estimates to the sample period used.


The study was carried out since 27th April, 2020. The universe of the study was the world. The major objective was to examine corona virus locked down effect on oil prices and its effect on the world economy. Secondary data was used for the present study. Total 20 papers were downloaded from the net and studies in depth and wrote the result. The result indicates that for COVID-2019 control the locked down was imposed in each country of the world. Majority vehicles were locked at their garages in the world. All industries of the world were closed. All aircrafts landing were banned. Majority people of the world were stayed at their houses. Only hospitals were opened for the treatment of sick people in the world because of this the consumption of the oil decreased which have declined the demand of the oil in the world. The price was reached to 2.175 dollars per gallon and it was the below level in the four decades from 1980-2020. Similarly majority people were become unemployed and the remittances from the foreign were stop into developing countries. The GDP growth was highly affected due to corona virus locked down. The corona virus killed many person in the world which increased the locked down period in the world while locked down has decreased the oil consumption of the world which has further wholly solely paralyzed the economic system of the world. Few governments have tried to finish the locked down in their countries but due to high spreading of corona virus infection the locked down period was enlarged. Few countries have controlled the situation while still the locked down have continued in their countries. So corona virus is the big issue of the world. Every country tries to discover the vaccine. China, Germany, UK and Pakistan claimed that they had prepared the vaccine but still the vaccine is not available in the market. The study recommends that Social distance among world community is required for corona virus controlling; Health and food is first requirement of the nation and then the security of others items of the world; Unity in the world for locked down is required; Positive thinking is required for protection of the world economy; Help those countries of the world whose economies are below poverty line in the world; WHO should mostly focus on corona virus in the world; At this time do not think for the economic development of a country; Focus on food only and medical facilities for controlling the corona virus. When the corona virus will be controlled, then automatically the locked down in the world will be ended and then the other business starting possibility is possible in the world; So the main target is the corona virus controlling, otherwise world economy protection is impossible; Strict action should be followed for locked down by all countries in the world; Locked down is the only sources for controlling the corona virus in the world; All world boundaries should be closed ; All airports of the world should be banned; Mostly stay at their home; One formula locked down should be used at world level for corona virus controlling; This is the corona virus which has disturbed the economy of the world, so first is the control of corona virus and then the economic development of the world. So corona virus controlling is first required for the protection of world economy.


In the present study, a novel tubular proton exchange membrane fuel cell with a twisted flow filed is designed to investigate the effect of the channel cross section shapes on the transfer and consumption of reactants and cell performance. Comparisons between three different configurations: rectangular, trapezoidal and triangular cross sections are realized. A complete three-dimensional, isothermal, unsteady and single-phase model is employed. The finite volume method in the cylindrical coordinates is used to discretize the continuity, momentum and species conservation equations. A FORTRAN program is developed to resolve the discretized equations system. The velocity, reactants and water distributions are obtained for the three studied cross sections. The results establish that the triangular configuration shows the best performance relative to the trapezoidal and rectangular cross-sections, this configuration increases strongly in the flow velocity of reactants, enhancing water evacuation process and reactant consumptions. The rectangular cross section has the worst cell performance.