As container terminals aim for more efficient operation and higher productivity, automation is making major breakthroughs all over the world. Container terminals are increasingly adopting automated solutions to meet the challenge of larger ships, taller cranes and bigger call sizes. Having the right design criteria and taking the correct decisions early in the project is crucial in order to meet the expected cost and performance targets. Therefore, designing an automated container terminal is no longer just a matter of acquiring the right port equipment and integrating the equipment with basic terminal operating systems (TOSs), it is becoming more of designing and implementing a complete smart automated system. Smart automation would enable Automated Guided Vehicles (AGVs) used in container terminals to automatically adapt to changing circumstances, optimizing performance and output. Most of existing research work considered pre-defined AGVs paths using different techniques without considering free path AGVs solutions that can potentially increase transportation efficiency This research work uses the concept of Internet of Things (IoT) to increase transportation efficiency of the Automated Guided Vehicles (AGVs) and reduce vessel discharging time in an automated container terminal. In addition, the research paper proposes an algorithm to increase efficiency in the automated container terminal and achieve the research objective. Finally, simulation results were used to prove the positive effects of using the proposed algorithm in decreasing vessel discharging time compared to existing benchmarks and optimum solutions.


Deep neural networks have achieved great success in classification tasks during the last years. However, one major problem to the path towards artificial intelligence is the inability of neural networks to accurately detect novel class distributions and therefore, most of the classification algorithms proposed make the assumption that all classes are known prior to the training stage. In this work, we propose a methodology for training a neural network that allows it to efficiently detect novel class distributions without compromising much of its classification accuracy on the test examples of known classes. Experimental results on the CIFAR 100 and MiniImagenet data sets demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm. The way this method was constructed also makes it suitable for training any classification algorithm that is based on Maximum Likelihood methods.


Purpose To report the efficacy of A Direct Aspiration first-Pass Thrombectomy (ADAPT) technique with evolving ACE aspiration catheter technology as first-line treatment for anterior circulation emergent large vessel occlusions (ELVOs) and assess for the presence of a first pass effect with ADAPT. Methods We retrospectively reviewed 152 consecutive patients with anterior circulation ELVOs treated with the ADAPT technique as first-line treatment using ACE 60, 64 or 68 at our institution. Baseline characteristics, procedural variables, and modified Rankin Scale (mRS) at 90 days were recorded. Results Fifty-seven patients were treated with ACE 60 (37.5%), 35 with ACE 64 (23%) and 60 with ACE 68 (39.5%). Median groin puncture to reperfusion time was 30 min with ACE 60, 26 min with ACE 64, and 19.5 min with ACE 68. Successful reperfusion after the first ADAPT pass was 33% with ACE 60% and 53% with ACE 68 (p=0.04). Of note, successful reperfusion after the first ADAPT pass was achieved in 23 of 33 patients with M1 occlusions treated with ACE 68 in our cohort (69.7%). The stent-retriever rescue rate was 26% with ACE 60, 3% with ACE 64% and 10% with ACE 68 (p=0.004). The rate of embolus to a new territory was 5.3% with ACE 60, 2.9% with ACE 64% and 1.7% with ACE 68 (p=0.5). The rate of intracranial vascular injury was 1.8% with ACE 60, 5.7% with ACE 64% and 5% with ACE 68 (p=0.5). The symptomatic intracranial hemorrhage rate was 1.8% with ACE 60, 5.7% with ACE 64% and 6.7% with ACE 68 (p=0.4). At 90 days, a good clinical outcome, mRS 0–2, was achieved in 70 patients (46.1%), while 27 patients had mRS 3 (17.8%), 22 mRS 4–5 (14.5%), and 33 expired (21.7%). In multivariate logistic regression analysis, use of the ACE 68 aspiration catheter was an independent predictor of successful reperfusion after the first ADAPT pass (p-value 0.016, OR 1.67, 95% CI 1.1–2.54), while successful reperfusion after the first ADAPT pass was an independent predictor of good clinical outcome at 90 days (p-value 0.0004, OR 6.2, 95% CI 2.27–16.8). Conclusion Use of the ACE 68 aspiration catheter was associated with shorter groin puncture to reperfusion times, higher rates of successful reperfusion after the first ADAPT pass, and lower rates of stent-retriever rescue. Further, a first pass effect was demonstrated in our ADAPT patient cohort. Disclosures J. Delgado Almandoz: 2; C; Penumbra, Inc. Y. Kayan: 2; C; Penumbra, Inc. A. Wallace: None. R. Tarrel: None. J. Fease: None. J. Scholz: None. A. Milner: None. P. Roohani: None. M. Mulder: None. M. Young: None.


Summary

Complications following castration are a potential problem in equine practice. Intestinal evisceration is a life-threatening condition requiring immediate correction. The following case report describes a rare condition associated with post castration evisceration in a 3-year-old Thoroughbred. Shortly after the eviscerated small intestine was repositioned in the abdomen, the horse showed signs of colic and at the second surgery a 4.5 m jejunal loop was found incarcerated in the femoral canal. After resection and anastomosis, the femoral canal was obliterated using large moistened gauze sponges. The horse made a complete recovery and returned to race training. The occurrence of femoral hernia, a condition fairly common in man, has been described but no clinical cases have been reported in horses. This is a severe, although rare, complication after castration.


We reported earlier that Fn fragments (Fn-f) added to bovine articular cartilage cultured in serum-free DMEM cause marked elevated release of protease activity within a few days. This results in greatly elevated rates of release of proteoglycan (PG). We have now extended our studies to 4-week cultures of cartilage in the presence of 10% serum. We report here that cartilage cultured with 0.01, 0.1, and 1 microM of an amino terminal 29-kDa Fn-f in 10% serum accelerated the loss of PG from the tissue during the first few days in a concentration-dependent manner. However, beyond this period PG content decreased much more slowly. During this early period, the 29-kDa Fn-f decreased rates of protein and PG synthesis up to 50% in a concentration-dependent fashion. Beyond this period, the synthesis rates began to increase in a mode inversely related to 29-kDa Fn-f concentration, up to 135% of Fn-f free control values. However, during the entire culture period, cartilage cultured with 1 nM 29-kDa Fn-f had higher PG contents and had enhanced rates of protein and PG synthesis. Since 1 nM 29-kDa Fn-f stabilized cartilage against decreases in PG content, we tested its ability to block the activity of higher 29-kDa Fn-f concentrations. Cartilage was preincubated for 7 days with 1 nM 29-kDa Fn-f, and then the culture adjusted to 100 nM 29-kDa Fn-f to cause PG depletion. The preincubated cartilage showed markedly enhanced resistance to PG depletion. Since the protective effect was similar to known properties of IGF-1, the ability of 20 ng/ml IGF-1 to block against the effects of 100 nM Fn-f was tested and shown to be similar in magnitude to that of 1 nM 29-kDa Fn-f. We propose that the initial catabolic effects of higher concentrations of Fn-f, followed by the later anabolic effects, may aid in tissue repair. Also, the continuous anabolic effects of lower concentrations may be involved in tissue homeostasis.


One can construct the model conception of quantum phenomena (MCQP) which relates to the axiomatic conception of quantum phenomena (ACQP), (i.e. to the conventional quantum mechanics) in the same way, as the statistical physics relates to thermodynamics. Such a possibility is based on a new conception of geometry, which admits one to construct such a deterministic space-time geometry, where motion of free particles is primordially stochastic. The space-time geometry can be chosen in such a way that statistical description of random particle motion coincides with the quantum description. Transition from ACQP to MCQP is a result of correction of some mistakes in the foundation of ACQP. Methods of MCQP in investigation of quantum phenomena appear to be more subtle and effective than, that of ACQP. For instance, investigation of the free Dirac equation in framework of MCQP shows that the Dirac particle is in reality a rotator, i.e. two particles rotating around their common center of inertia. In the framework of MCQP one can discover the force field, responsible for pair production, that is impossible in the framework of ACQP.


IMPORTANCE
Ventilator bundles, including head-of-bed elevation, sedative infusion interruptions, spontaneous breathing trials, thromboprophylaxis, stress ulcer prophylaxis, and oral care with chlorhexidine gluconate, are ubiquitous, but the absolute and relative value of each bundle component is unclear.

OBJECTIVE
To evaluate associations between individual and collective ventilator bundle components and ventilator-associated events, time to extubation, ventilator mortality, time to hospital discharge, and hospital death.

DESIGN, SETTING, AND PARTICIPANTS
This retrospective cohort study included all 5539 consecutive patients who underwent mechanical ventilation for at least 3 days from January 1, 2009, to December 31, 2013, at Brigham and Women's Hospital.

EXPOSURES
Head-of-bed elevation, sedative infusion interruptions, spontaneous breathing trials, thromboprophylaxis, stress ulcer prophylaxis, and oral care with chlorhexidine.

MAIN OUTCOMES AND MEASURES
Hazard ratios (HRs) for ventilator-associated events, extubation alive vs ventilator mortality, and hospital discharge vs hospital death. Effects were modeled using Cox proportional hazards regression and Fine-Gray competing risk models adjusted for patients' demographic characteristics, comorbidities, unit type, severity of illness, recent procedures, process measure contraindications, day-to-day markers of clinical status, and calendar year.

RESULTS
Of 5539 consecutive patients undergoing mechanical ventilation, 3208 were male (57.9%), 2331 female (42.1%), and the mean (SD) age was 61.2 (16.1) years. Sedative infusion interruptions were associated with less time to extubation (HR, 1.81; 95% CI, 1.54-2.12; P < .001) and a lower hazard for ventilator mortality (HR, 0.51, 95% CI, 0.38-0.68; P < .001). Similar associations were found for spontaneous breathing trials (HR for extubation, 2.48; 95% CI 2.23-2.76; P < .001; HR for mortality, 0.28; 95% CI, 0.20-0.38; P = .001). Spontaneous breathing trials were also associated with lower hazards for ventilator-associated events (HR, 0.55; 95% CI, 0.40-0.76; P < .001). Associations with less time to extubation were found for head-of-bed elevation (HR, 1.38, 95% CI, 1.14-1.68; P = .001) and thromboembolism prophylaxis (HR, 2.57; 95% CI, 1.80-3.66; P < .001) but not ventilator mortality. Oral care with chlorhexidine was associated with an increased risk for ventilator mortality (HR, 1.63; 95% CI, 1.15-2.31; P = .006), and stress ulcer prophylaxis was associated with an increased risk for ventilator-associated pneumonia (HR, 7.69; 95% CI, 1.44-41.10; P = .02).

CONCLUSIONS AND RELEVANCE
Standard ventilator bundle components vary in their associations with patient-centered outcomes. Head-of-bed elevation, sedative infusion interruptions, spontaneous breathing trials, and thromboembolism prophylaxis appear beneficial, whereas daily oral care with chlorhexidine and stress ulcer prophylaxis may be harmful in some patients.


Background: Obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) and its features, such as chronic intermittent hypoxia, may differentially affect specific molecular pathways and processes in the pathogenesis of coronary artery disease (CAD) and influence the subsequent risk and severity of CAD events. In particular, competing adverse (eg, inflammatory) and protective (eg, increased coronary collateral blood flow) mechanisms may operate, but remain poorly understood. We hypothesize that common genetic variation in selected molecular pathways influences the likelihood of CAD events differently in individuals with and without OSA, in a pathway-dependent manner. Methods: We selected a cross-sectional sample of 471 877 participants from the UK Biobank, with 4974 ascertained to have OSA, 25 988 to have CAD, and 711 to have both. We calculated pathway-specific polygenic risk scores for CAD, based on 6.6 million common variants evaluated in the CARDIoGRAMplusC4D genome-wide association study (Coronary ARtery DIsease Genome wide Replication and Meta-analysis [CARDIoGRAM] plus The Coronary Artery Disease [C4D] Genetics), annotated to specific genes and pathways using functional genomics databases. Based on prior evidence of involvement with intermittent hypoxia and CAD, we tested pathway-specific polygenic risk scores for the HIF1 (hypoxia-inducible factor 1), VEGF (vascular endothelial growth factor), NFκB (nuclear factor kappa-light-chain-enhancer of activated B cells) and TNF (tumor necrosis factor) signaling pathways. Results: In a multivariable-adjusted logistic generalized additive model, elevated pathway-specific polygenic risk scores for the Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes VEGF pathway (39 genes) associated with protection for CAD in OSA (interaction odds ratio 0.86, P=6×10-4). By contrast, the genome-wide CAD PRS did not show evidence of statistical interaction with OSA. Conclusions: We find evidence that pathway-specific genetic risk of CAD differs between individuals with and without OSA in a qualitatively pathway-dependent manner. These results provide evidence that gene-by-environment interaction influences CAD risk in certain pathways among people with OSA, an effect that is not well-captured by the genome-wide PRS. This invites further study of how OSA interacts with genetic risk at the molecular level and suggests eventual personalization of OSA treatment to reduce CAD risk according to individual pathway-specific genetic risk profiles.


A contractual concept of wages has been introduced by the latest amendment of labor law in the Czech Republic. Preparations for EU accession require that the wage and salary act shall emphasize the principle of identical wage for work of identical value. The inequality of men and women with respect to their remuneration is determined by noneconomic factors. Women are predetermined by their education to segregation to lower-wage jobs. Currently, the women's share in labor force at productive age is approximately 43 %. Women with primary education account for about 16 %, those with secondary education for 75 % and with university-level education for 8.5 %. Women mainly do less qualified administrative work, they work in operations in the service sector and outlet network, and do auxiliary unqualified work. Wage analysis on the basis of a sample survey documents that the average women's wage in 1997 made 76 % of the men's wage. The largest differences exist in women-employees not included in wage tariff classification (71) and with nontariff remuneration (70). Wages of women working in the nonbusiness sector are higher than those of women working in the business sector. But their from-year-to-year increase is slower. The gender differences in wages are expected to be augmented as a result of unfinished transformation and stagnation.


Nanoparticles (NPs) have great potential for use in the fields of biomedicine, building materials, and environmental protection because of their antibacterial properties. However, there are few reports regarding the antifungal activities of NPs on plants. In this study, we evaluated the antifungal roles of NPs against Botrytis cinerea, which is a notorious worldwide fungal pathogen. Three common carbon nanomaterials, multi-walled carbon nanotubes, fullerene, and reduced graphene oxide, and three commercial metal oxidant NPs, copper oxide (CuO) NPs, ferric oxide (Fe2O3) NPs, and titanium oxides (TiO2) NPs, were independently added to water-agar plates at 50 and 200-mg/L concentrations. Detached rose petals were inoculated with spores of B. cinerea and co-cultured with each of the six nanomaterials. The sizes of the lesions on infected rose petals were measured at 72 h after inoculation, and the growth of fungi on the rose petals was observed by scanning electron microscopy. The six NPs inhibited the growth of B. cinerea, but different concentrations had different effects: 50 mg/L of fullerene and CuO NPs showed the strongest antifungal properties among the treatments, while 200 mg/L of CuO and Fe2O3 showed no significant antifungal activities. Thus, NPs may have antifungal activities that prevent B. cinerea infections in plants, and they could be used as antifungal agents during the growth and post-harvesting of roses and other flowers.


A study was conducted to assess patients' acceptance of a new insulin injection system, Novolin Prefilled, and to record their opinions about its use during a 4-week study period. Sixty-four patients, aged 20 to 69 years, with type I (n = 19) or type II (n = 45) diabetes mellitus entered and completed the study; 22 were new insulin users and 42 had been treated previously for 6 months to 43 years. Patients received insulin treatment via a prefilled syringe that was designed to provide a convenient alternative method for injecting insulin. The syringe is prefilled with 150 U of insulin and can deliver up to 58 U per dose. After 2 to 4 days of using the new system, patients reported no major problems when asked about mechanical difficulties, and the percentage reporting mild hypoglycemic events was comparable to baseline. During the 4-week study, no patients reported moderate or severe hypoglycemic episodes. The results of attitude questionnaires revealed that after treatment significantly more patients (P < 0.05) reported feeling energetic and full of pep, in good control, and not worried about giving themselves insulin injections. The increase in positive attitudes was most apparent among the patients new to insulin use. Most of the study patients (98%) reported that the prefilled syringe was convenient and easy to use, 95% found it took less time to use at home, and 91% wished to continue using it for insulin delivery.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)


MXenes, an emerging class of two-dimensional materials, are recently gaining significant attention for numerous environmental applications owing to their superior hydrophilicity and unique surface functionalities, which are suitable for adsorptive removal of various aqueous contaminants. However, it has recently been shown that MXenes have poor colloidal stability in both synthetic or natural waters containing small amounts of salt ions, which will limit the potential uses of MXenes in remediation of subsurface environments that might sometimes contain considerable amounts of salt ions, and other relevant environmental applications. Herein, we develop Ti3C2-MXenes grafted with highly salt-resistant polyelectrolytes (PEs), MXene-g-PEs, which are colloidally stable in extreme salinity aquatic environments and have low adsorption to soil mineral substrates. The MXenes grafted with zwitterionic PEs are found to have superior mobility properties to those with anionic PEs, which are attributed to the anti-PE behavior of the grafted polymer brushes. The MXene-g-(zwitterionic) PEs show long-term colloidal stability over 6 months in American Petroleum Institute (API) brine with extreme salinity (ionic strength of 2 M with 182.2 mM Ca2+), and little adsorption (0.5 mg m−2) against α-alumina surfaces (2.3 m2 g−1). Furthermore, the MXene-g-PEs retained the excellent adsorption capacity for methylene blue as a model aqueous organic pollutant. The results suggest the great potential of the MXene-g-PEs as an aqueous pollutant scavenger for various environmental applications including the combined ex situ/in situ remediation, and other relevant subsurface applications.


Linear and nonlinear theories of amplified spontaneous emission in longitudinally-pumped semiconductor lasers have been developed. Spatial inhomogeneity in three dimensions and spectral inhomogeneity of gain and spontaneous emission are taken into account. Experiments to investigate the dependency of lasing threshold and differential efficiency of electron-beam-pumped semiconductor lasers on excited region diameter have been performed. The results of threshold measurements have agreed well with the linear theory calculations, while accounting for the results of differential efficiency measurements has required the development of a nonlinear theory. The data for non-linear calculations were provided by experiments on saturation of spontaneous emission. The results of experiments have definitely proved the inhomogeneity of gain. Based on the data obtained from experiments, the nonlinear calculations have explained the dependence of differential efficiency on the excited region diameter.


Elevated blood levels of low-density lipoprotein cholesterol are a major cardiovascular risk factor, and cholesterol-lowering drugs are among the most prescribed drugs worldwide. Cancer is the second leading cause of death after cardiovascular diseases. The relationship between cancer development and statins intake is controversial, and there are no clear studies in Lebanon and the Middle East concerning this topic. Hence, our study aimed to search for any possible association of statin intake as well as other medications (proton pump inhibitors [PPI], metformin, Aspirin, Angiotensin-Converting Enzyme inhibitors, and fenofibrate) with lung, colorectal cancer (CRC), and bladder cancer development in the Lebanese population. A retrospective study was performed on 709 subjects divided into 2 main groups: control (no cancer ± statin intake), and cases (either lung, or colorectal, or bladder cancer ± statin intake). Collected data included the age and gender of the patient, socioeconomic status, presence of cardiovascular disease and comorbidities, cancer risk factors, and the intake type, dose, and duration of statins. Bivariate, multivariate, and binary logistic analyses were enrolled. Out of 709 participants, 63.2% were males and 75% were cancer-positive (24.1%: lung cancer, 26.7%: CRC, 24.1%: bladder cancer). The overall intake of statins was not shown to significantly affect cancer development. However, a duration-response relationship was established between Simvastatin and lung cancer (odds ratio [OR]=1.208) as well as bladder cancer (OR=1.189). No significant association was found between each statin and CRC. Although PPIs intake was associated with a possibly harmful effect on lung cancer development (OR=3.42), it revealed a protective association with CRC development (OR=0.38). Other risk factors such as smoking and age were strongly associated (harmful) with lung and bladder cancer development. Physical inactivity and a family history of CRC were each associated with a harmful effect on CRC development. A harmful association with the development of lung and bladder cancer was found with the increasing duration of intake of Simvastatin. Other drugs such as PPIs and specific risk factors were also associated negatively or positively with the development of these 3 cancers. These findings should be validated by further investigations to guide clinicians on optimal treatment options for their patients.


Cyclodextrins are widely used as carriers of small molecules for drug delivery due to their remarkable host properties and excellent biocompatibility. However, cyclic oligosaccharides with different sizes and shapes are limited. Cycloglycosylation of ultra-large bifunctional saccharide precursors is challenging due to the constrained conformational spaces. Here we report a promoter-controlled cycloglycosylation approach for the synthesis of cyclic α-(1→6)-linked mannosides up to a 32-mer. Cycloglycosylation of the bifunctional thioglycosides and (Z)-ynenoates was found to be highly dependent on the promoters. In particular, sufficient amount of gold(I) complex played a key role in the proper preorganization of the ultra-large cyclic transition state, providing a cyclic 32-mer polymannoside, which represents the largest synthetic cyclic polysaccharide to date. NMR experiments and computational study revealed that the cyclic 2-mer, 4-mer, 8-mer, 16-mer, and 32-mer mannosides adopted different conformational states and shapes.


Efficiency of railguns will ultimately determine the scale of their use since it determines the size of the power source. Equations are derived for the losses and efficiencies of breech supplied, segmented and distributed energy store guns and evaluated for a 5 gram mass accelerated to 10 km/s under various conditions. Constant current is assumed.


Cell counting plays a vital role in biomedical researches. However, manual cell counting is time‐consuming, laborious, and low efficiency and has a high counting error rate problem. An automatic counting approach for Hela cells of phase‐contrast microscopic images is proposed based on the combination of Otsu and watershed segmentation methods to solve the mentioned issues. Firstly, image preprocessing is performed. Secondly, the Otsu method was used to obtain an automatic global optimal threshold for segmentation to achieve batch counting of images. Thirdly, the marker watershed was performed to separate adherent cells and to avoid over‐segmentation simultaneously. Finally, cells in phase‐contrast microscopic images were counted by detecting the numbers of connected domains in the binary image. Taking the manual counting result as the counting standard and MIS, INC, and ACC are used as evaluation indicators. The experimental results showed that the average values of MIS, INC, and ACC of the proposed method are only 3.31%, 3.49%, and 96.69%, respectively. Additionally, each cell image was counted only takes 0.65 s on averagely. To further test the performance of the proposed method, a comparative experiment was carried out by Image J, and the result shows that the proposed method has a better counting performance with a higher average accuracy of 96.55% to Image J with 93.39%.The proposed method for cell counting is simple, feasible, fast and high accurate, and it can be used as an effective method for cell counting of the phase‐contrast microscopic images.


Given a linear system ${\bf A} {\bf x} \approx {\bf b}$ over the real or complex field, where both ${\bf A}$ and ${\bf b}$ are subject to noise, the total least squares (TLS) problem seeks to find a correction matrix and a correction right-hand side vector of minimal norm which makes the linear system feasible. To avoid ill posedness, a regularization term is added to the objective function; this leads to the so-called regularized TLS problem. A further complication arises when the matrix ${\bf A}$ and correspondingly the correction matrix must have a specific structure. This is modeled by the regularized structured TLS (RSTLS) problem. In general this problem is nonconvex and hence difficult to solve. However, the RSTLS problem arising from image deblurring applications under reflexive or periodic boundary conditions possesses a special structure where all relevant matrices are simultaneously diagonalizable (SD). In this paper we introduce an algorithm for finding the global optimum of the RSTLS problem with this SD structure. The devised method is based on decomposing the problem into single variable problems and then transforming them into one-dimensional unimodal real-valued minimization problems which can be solved globally. Based on the uniqueness and attainment properties of the RSTLS solution we show that a constrained version of the problem possesses a strong duality result and can thus be solved via a sequence of RSTLS problems.


The aim of this paper is to carry out a qualitative and quantitative analysis of the semantic and pragmatic aspects of a translation from Spanish into Swedish. Taking advantage our extensive knowledge of the local area we selected a book about the cultural heritage of Seville. Owing to the differences in the two cultures we expected to find numerous foreign cultural words – that we call culturemes – throughout the book that have no direct equivalence in Swedish. Our intention was to detect them and describe by means of several examples the translation techniques we used in order to adapt the target text to the Swedish reader. At the end we also carried out a quantitative analysis of the 252 culturemes we found, with a table showing which translation techniques dominate, and the frequency of occurrence of other techniques. We aimed to transfer as many culturemes as possible in order to give the target text some local color. This is the strategy called foreignization, recommended by Venuti. Throughout the translation and analysis process we concluded that the translator must have a sound linguistic and cultural knowledge of both the source and target languages in order to successfully resolve cultural differences and create an idiomatic and pragmatic translation.


The influence of inhalation of near lethal quantities of toluene on some ECG parameters, as well as the possible cardiac sensitizing effect of the solvent, were determined in chloralose-anesthetized rats. These actions were compared with those of its close analogue benzene. Both solvents produced tachycardia; toluene increased the duration of QRS and specially PR, while benzene decreased P wave duration. No other systematic changes in ECG morphology or evidence of arrhythmia were observed. Toluene appeared to decrease the number of ectopic beats induced by epinephrine, in contrast to benzene, which increased it markedly. These results suggest that toluene administered by inhalation up to near lethal doses is devoid of untoward ECG effect in the chloralose-anesthetized rat, its only action being a decrease in intraventricular and particularly AV conduction. It does not share the myocardial sensitizing properties of benzene and in fact appears to elicit some protection from the arrhythmogenic effects of epinephrine, although no definite conclusions as to this action can be derived due to limitations in the experimental model used.


The resolution of the images obtained from the eye fundus are limited by the ocular aberrations. As most of the aberrations are due to the eye optics, they do not affect the light intensity measured in the eye iris plane. By illuminating the retina with a laser and collecting the light in a pupil plane conjugate, it is possible to apply the imaging correlography technique. From processing series of pupil plane images, this technique gives information about the retina in the form of the squared modulus of the Fourier transform or, equivalently, the autocorrelation of the diffraction-limited image intensity. Two factors make this technique suitable for retinal imaging: 1) For this technique to work, changes of phase distribution in the retinal plane are necessary between each frame. Small eye movements naturally provide these changes; 2) This method does not provide directly the phase of the Fourier transform. Therefore it is of most use for centro-symmetric objects like the retina's photoreceptor mosaic. Preliminary data have been obtained in vivo showing the feasibility of applying such a technique in the eye. Experimental results are compared against simulation based on retinal scattering model.


Keep current in your field. Guide to print and on-line professional and discipline books and periodicals available through the library and the web.


In the arts and humanities, research applications play a central role in securing and presenting digital results. However, due to their steadily increasing number and their heterogeneity, it is difficult to ensure the sustainability and durability of this kind of living systems from an organizational point of view. This paper describes a project for the preservation of specialized web-based research applications in the humanities. The SustainLife project investigates to what extent methods and technologies of professional cloud deployment and provisioning strategies can be applied to problems of long-term availability of research software as they are omnipresent in humanities data centers such as the Data Center for the Humanities (DCH) at the University of Cologne. Technological basis of the project is the OASIS standard TOSCA and the Open Source implementation OpenTOSCA, respectively, which was developed at the Institute for Architecture of Application Systems (IAAS) at the University of Stuttgart. In the course of the project selected use cases from the field of Digital Humanities (DH) will be modeled in TOSCA to be able to automatically deploy them upon request at any time. The TOSCA standard enables a portable description of the modeled systems independent of specific providers to facilitate their long-term availability. The aim is to provide system components described in the use cases in a component library, as well as in the form of TOSCAcompliant application templates to make them available for reuse in other DH projects.


Abstract The effect of a treadmill running program on physical performance and morphofunctional adaptations was investigated in control and malnourished rats. Male 4-week old Wistar rats were randomized in groups of 12 animals: control trained (CT), control sedentary (CS), malnourished trained (MT) and malnourished sedentary (MS). Control and malnourished animals received chow with 12% protein or 6% protein, respectively. Trained groups were subjected to a treadmill running program for 8 weeks. Physical performance, biochemical parameters, cardiomyocytes morphology and biomechanics were determined. Malnourished animals presented reduction in body mass, serum levels of total protein, albumin and hemoglobin compared to the control groups. At 1 and 3 Hz cardiomyocytes from CT and MT showed higher cell shortening, speed of contraction and relaxation compared to the other groups. At 3 Hz cardiomyocytes from MS showed reduction in cell shortening and speed of contraction compared to CS. Protein restriction does not prevent the improvement in physical performance or cardiomyocytes biomechanical efficiency and growth in response to exercise. These findings could represent a modulatory effect of exercise to maintain cardiomyocyte growth at the expense of reducing the rate of body growth in order to ensure proper cellular function in conditions of cardiovascular overload imposed by exercise.


BACKGROUND
A single bolus of dalteparin at the start of haemodialysis (HD) may prevent clot formation, but subclinical activation of platelets and coagulation may still occur. Consequently, the relationship between clinical clotting events and activation markers of platelets and coagulation before and during HD is of interest.

METHODS
The effect of tapered doses of dalteparin during 84 HD sessions (4-4.5 h) was prospectively examined in 12 patients. Six of the patients were treated with warfarin. The initial dalteparin dose was reduced to 50% if no clotting was observed. Clinical clotting was evaluated by inspection of the air trap every hour and by inspection of the dialyser after each session. Anti-FXa activity was measured for assessment of dalteparin activity. Markers of activated plasma coagulation, (thrombin-antithrombin (TAT) and prothrombin fragment 1+2 (PF1+2)) and a marker of platelet activation (beta-thromboglobulin, beta-TG), were measured before the start of and after 3 and 4 h of dialysis. Ten pre-dialytic patients with chronic renal failure served as a control group. A total of 230 measurements of each parameter were performed.

RESULTS
An anti-FXa activity above 0.4 IU/ml at the end of HD inhibits overt clot formation for 4 h. This was obtained by an intravenous dalteparin dose of about 5000 IU. TAT and PF1+2 correlated to clinical clotting episodes (r=0.50 and 0.47, P<0.001). beta-TG was not significantly correlated to clinical clotting. All parameters increased during the sessions (TAT, PF1+2, beta-TG, P<0.001). When measurements during clinical clotting episodes were disregarded, all parameters were still markedly increased. Warfarin-treated patients had lower TAT and PF1+2. Dialysis patients had higher beta-TG values than pre-dialytic patients.

CONCLUSION
Despite clinically effective anticoagulation, obtained by dalteparin administration, platelets and coagulation are activated by HD, resulting in a potentially thrombophilic state. Warfarin treatment reduces clinical clot formation and subclinical activation of coagulation.


Background: OMA is an effective treatment option in SAA. However, little data are available on the long-term-efficacy oft the drug. Objective: To determine the long-term efficacy of OMA in respect to clinical parameters and IgE serum levels. Methods: This was a retrospective, open-label, uncontrolled, multi-center observational study according to the definition of non-interventional studies. 22 non-smoking patients (10 m, 12 f; mean age 47,9 yrs) with SAA were enrolled. Pat were treated with OMA up to for 4 years and total serum IgE levels were assessed at initiation of therapy, after 2-6 ms and 3-5 yrs. Data were recorded on standardized CRFs by the treating physician. Results: The average duration of therapy was 3.5 +/-1.2 (3–7) years. The total serum IgE levels accounted for 307.0 IU/ml (median) at baseline, increased to 816.5 IU/ml after 1 year and decreased to 435.0 IU/ml after 4 yr therapy. Asthma symptoms declined from 95.5% at baseline to 9.1% at the the third yr. Lung function (FEV1; median 70.5% predicted at baseline) did not deteriorate over the treatment period. Physicians9 global evaluation of treatment effectiveness (GETE) was denoted 9excellent9 or ´good´ in 87, 92, 86, and 77% of the cases after 1 to 4 yrs treatment. The number of Pat with concomitant allergic diseases decreased (atopic dermatitis from 27 to 9%; food allergy from 36 to 27%) after 4-year therapy. No drug-related SADRs were observed. Conclusion: OMA induces and maintains long-term remission in SAA over a period of at least 4 yrs. After the initial increase, serum IgE levels tend to decrease over time.


Background: In this study, we investigated the antibacterial and nitric oxide (NO) production inhibitory activities of 75% ethanol extract of Prunus sargentii branches and its fractions against acne pathogens. Methods and Results: The antibacterial activity against acne causing pathogens was determined using the disc diffusion assay. The ethyl acetate fraction showed higher activities against Propionibacterium acnes, Staphylococcus aureus and Staphylococcus epidermidis than those shown by other fractions. In the DPPH radical and NO scavenging assays, the butanol fraction showed strong DPPH radical and NO scavenging abilities. These activities were related to the total polyphenol and flavonoid contents of butanol fraction. On the other hand, the chloroform and ethyl acetate fractions exhibited the highest NO production inhibitory activity in Lipopolysaccharide (LPS)-stimulated Raw 264.7 cells compared to those exhibited by other fractions. Conclusions: The extract and its ethyl acetate fraction from the branches of P. sargentii exhibited antibacterial activity and could be used as functional materials in antimicrobial related fields. Moreover, the chloroform and ethyl acetate fractions are potential antiinflammatory agents and butanol fraction acts as an effective radical scavenger.


The role of somatic JAK2 mutations in clonal myeloproliferative neoplasms (MPNs) is well established. Recently, germ line JAK2 mutations were associated with polyclonal hereditary thrombocytosis and triple-negative MPNs. We studied a patient who inherited 2 heterozygous JAK2 mutations, E846D from the mother and R1063H from the father, and exhibited erythrocytosis and megakaryocytic atypia but normal platelet number. Culture of erythroid progenitors from the patient and his parents revealed hypersensitivity to erythropoietin (EPO). Using cellular models, we show that both E846D and R1063H variants lead to constitutive signaling (albeit much weaker than JAK2 V617F), and both weakly hyperactivate JAK2/STAT5 signaling only in the specific context of the EPO receptor (EPOR). JAK2 E846D exhibited slightly stronger effects than JAK2 R1063H and caused prolonged EPO-induced phosphorylation of JAK2/STAT5 via EPOR. We propose that JAK2 E846D predominantly contributes to erythrocytosis, but is not sufficient for the full pathological phenotype to develop. JAK2 R1063H, with very weak effect on JAK2/STAT5 signaling, is necessary to augment JAK2 activity caused by E846D above a threshold level leading to erythrocytosis with megakaryocyte abnormalities. Both mutations were detected in the germ line of rare polycythemia vera, as well as certain leukemia patients, suggesting that they might predispose to hematological malignancy.


Abstract Antibiotic pollution is an emerging environmental challenge. Residual antibiotics from various sources, including municipal and industrial wastewater, sewage discharges, and agricultural runoff, are continuously released into freshwater environments, turning them into reservoirs that contribute to the development and spread of antibiotic resistance. Thus, it is essential to understand the impacts of antibiotic residues on aquatic organisms, especially microalgae and cyanobacteria, due to their crucial roles as primary producers in the ecosystem. This review summarizes the effects of antibiotics on major biological processes in freshwater microalgae and cyanobacteria, including photosynthesis, oxidative stress, and the metabolism of macromolecules. Their adaptive mechanisms to antibiotics exposure, such as biodegradation, bioadsorption, and bioaccumulation, are also discussed. Moreover, this review highlights the important factors affecting the antibiotic removal pathways by these organisms, which will promote the use of microalgae-based technology for the removal of antibiotics. Finally, we offer some perspectives on the opportunities for further studies and applications. Graphical Abstract


A constrained Kalman filtering approach for the restoration of images blurred by random point-spread functions (PSFs) is proposed. The effects of the blur model uncertainties are treated as image-dependent correlated noise, and they require the formulation of an augmented-state Kalman filter. Additional a priori image information, including deterministic information, is incorporated into the augmented-state Kalman filter as convex set constraints. Efficient constrained optimization of the augmented-state Kalman gain is achieved by projecting the unconstrained optimal gain onto the convex sets. The proposed constrained filter is useful in cases of image restoration where the degrading PSF is only partially known, such as in the presence of error in blur model parameters.<<ETX>>


There are a large number of chemical and thermal methods for increasing the production of high sticky, high paraffinic oil and bitumen, which undoubtedly enhance oil recovery considerably. However, these methods require large financial investments, whether for equipment, new technology or the coolant itself or with chemical additives. Take the case of several existing methods used in domestic heavy oil. According to the report of the Director General of JSC KazNIPImunaygaz Kurbanbayev M.I. and others in the JSC "Russian Oil and Gas Research Institute named by academician A. P. Krylov (JSC" VNIIneft") at the 3rd International Scientific Symposium": Theory and practice of application of enhanced oil recovery was held on the 20 th


Cerebral vasospasm is one of the major complications of subarachnoid hemorrhage (SAH). The prevention and treatment of cerebral vasospasm thus plays a critical role in the management of SAH patients. However, the mechanism of cerebral vasospasm still remains elusive, while effective therapeutic strategies also remain to be established. The role of thrombin and its receptor proteinase-activated receptor 1 (PAR(1)) in cerebral vasospasm was investigated using a rabbit double hemorrhage SAH model. The expression of PAR(1) was up-regulated and the contractile response to thrombin was markedly enhanced in the basilar artery of SAH models. The intrathecal administration of a PAR(1) antagonist prevented the up-regulation of PAR(1) and the enhancement of the contractile responses to thrombin in SAH. These observations thus suggest that PAR(1) may play a pivotal role in post-hemorrhagic cerebral vasospasm in SAH. Following SAH, thrombin activates PAR(1), thereby up-regulating the expression of PAR(1), which culminates in the increased contractile response to thrombin in the basilar artery. PAR(1) antagonists are thus anticipated to be a novel therapeutic strategy for cerebral vasospasm. However, further studies are needed before establishing the clinical usefulness of PAR(1) antagonists.


The purpose of this cross-sectional retrospective study was to evaluate the cost of managing cardiovascular emergencies in the Emergency Department of the Brazzaville University Hospital in the Republic of the Congo. This study included 197 patients admitted for stroke in 90 cases, heart failure in 65 and hypertensive emergency in 42 from July to December 2006. The mean duration of hospitalization was 45.2 +/- 18.3 hours (range, 6 to 72 hours). Cost calculation took into account consultation fees, blood tests, imaging, medication, therapeutic procedures and the first day of hospitalization. The overall cost of stroke care ranged from 147.000 to 177.000 CFA francs (220.50 to 265.50 euros), i.e., a mean per-patient cost of 158.120 +/- 6.900 CFA francs (237.18 +/- 10.35 euros). The overall cost of heart failure care ranged from 69.000 to 99.600 CFA francs (104.4 to 149.4 euros), i.e., a mean per-patient cost of 81.900 +/- 10.474 CFA francs (122.85 +/-15.71 euros). The overall cost of hypertension emergency care ranged from 74.600 to 18.4600 CFA francs (111.90 to 276.90 euros), i.e., a mean per-patient cost of 159.600 +/-44.107 CFA francs (239.40 +/- 66.20 Euros). Most people living in Brazzaville cannot afford emergency care for stroke, cardiac failure or hypertensive emergency. These findings underline the urgent need to implement a health insurance system and to encourage the use of generic drugs.


OBJECTIVE
To improve the outcomes after pancreas transplantation complicated by pancreatitis using percutaneous drainage and endoscopic stenting of the main pancreatic duct.

MATERIAL AND METHODS
There were 64 transplantations of the pancreatoduodenal complex between January 1, 2012 and December 31, 2021 at the Sklifosovsky Research Institute for Emergency Care. In 11 (17.2%) cases, early postoperative period was complicated by acute pancreatitis and parapancreatic fluid accumulations. Of these, 7 patients underwent ultrasound-guided percutaneous drainage of focal destructions. This procedure was effective and did not require additional treatment. In 4 patients, debridement and drainage were ineffective and required additional endoscopic stenting of the main pancreatic duct.

RESULTS
All patients underwent percutaneous drainage of peripancreatic fluid collections and subsequent fistulography. All patients had inhomogeneous cavities with irregular shape and volume of 19.6±1.8 cm3. In 3 (75%) out of 4 patients, there was a passage of contrast agent into the main pancreatic duct of the graft and donor duodenal stump. We did not find contrast enhancement of ductal system in 1 (25%) patient since filling of the cavity with a contrast agent was not tight. Sensitivity of this method for detecting pancreatic ductal defects was 75%. Indications for stenting of the main pancreatic duct were established in 22.5±9.6 days after transplantation. Drainage and debridement were ineffective in 2 (50%) patients. In other 2 (50%) patients, peripancreatic fluid collections enlarged. All patients underwent endoscopic stenting of the main pancreatic duct.

CONCLUSION
Endoscopic stenting of the main pancreatic duct of the donor pancreas combined with percutaneous drainage of peripancreatic fluid accumulations is a highly effective and minimally invasive approach for fluid collections after transplantation of the pancreatoduodenal complex. This method also minimizes the incidence of postoperative complications. Thanks to this method, we avoided redo open surgeries in all cases.


Building on the work of mission theologians in the twentieth century like David Bosch, Harvie Conn and Leslie Newbigin, the contributors to the essays in this book present us with their rationale for insisting missional hermeneutics should be taken seriously within the fields of biblical and theological studies. The book is laid out in five sections. The first examines what a missional hermeneutic is and does. The second and third sections demonstrate what a missional reading of the Old and New Testaments respectively, might look like. The fourth section explains how such a reading might positively reform the task of preaching and the fifth suggests how the same might reshape the current paradigms of training for pastoral ministry. The authors of these essays work from a number of premises. Two negative premises are that a missional reading (MR) does not interpret the Bible as a call to readers to get involved in mission, nor is it a manual with instructions on good mission practice. Positively speaking, a missional reading of the Bible works from the premise that the meta-narrative of the Bible is the redemptive mission of God to the world, through Israel, which climaxes in Jesus Christ and continues through the church. Israel and church live out their existence within the larger story of the mission of God and, through their obedience to law and gospel, live 'missionally' before the nations. Mission is the identity, not a task, for Israel and church. This angle on Israel's existence is particularly well presented in Mark Glanville's essay on a MR of Deuteronomy (Chapter 7), a book which he defines as a 'covenant charter for a contrast society.' Israel's very uniqueness would be its message to neighbouring nations, demonstrating the good news of God's rule through a nation that was transforming, not expansionist. Another vital premise is that the books of Scripture are more than just records of God's mission to the nations. Each book was written from within a missional context and with a missional purpose, i.e., to equip communities of faith to live out the implications of the law and gospel in their time and place. Chapters in which this principle is illustrated, by application to specific bible books, are particularly refreshing reads. A shortcoming of the book is the lack of diversity among the authors. It is ironic that in a book where one writer declares that we need the 'mutually correcting and enriching voices of Christians from other settings' if our theologies are not to become parochial and idolatrous (p. 306), the contributors are all from the West, based in academic institutions or churches in Canada, the United States and the United Kingdom.


We report on gain-saturated operation of the 4d → 4p, J = 0-1, 11.4-nm soft-x-ray laser line in Ni-like antimony (Sb) at a pump energy of only 2.5 J. The driving laser used was a 1054-nm Nd:glass CPA laser system with a pulse duration of 7 ps (FWHM). The pump beam was focused with a tilted on-axis parabolic mirror in a grazing-incidence (GRIP) pumping configuration at a grazing angle of 45°. For this angle, the length of the line focus attains a value of 19.6 mm (FWHM) for the 120-mm beam diameter used in these experiments. In addition, the excitation velocity of the intrinsic traveling wave increases to 1.41c and results in a temporal mismatch of ∼20 ps at the output end of the target. As a consequence, care must be taken in interpreting the usual gain measurements (intensity-vs.-target length). A novel method to distinguish the different effects causing roll-off based on the second derivative of the intensity curve will be discussed.


We have known of the interaction between music and mood for many years. In this paper, I present a series of case vignettes to illustrate a method using music to affect mood. In hypnosis, I suggested that subjects imagine hearing a piece of music appropriate to a desired emotion, rather like a sound track for a movie. I suggested that the patients vividly recall this music and the accompanying feelings outside of trance when it would be desirable to help them to change their behavior by influencing their emotional state. In this way, music can be used to shape emotion.


The main goal of the current study is to examine differences across
 perfectionists? profiles regarding implicit theories of intelligence,
 morality and the world. The sample included 202 Russian students, age-range
 18?24 (M = 19.62, SD = 1.15), 40% male. Short Almost Perfect Scale and
 Implicit Theories of Intelligence, Morality, and the World Questionnaire was
 used for data collection. Correlation and regression analysis, latent
 profile analysis, and the Student's t-test were conducted. The study results
 show that adaptive perfectionists tend to hold the entity theory about the
 world and the incremental theory of intelligence. The world for them is a
 structured place with fixed rules in which they can improve their cognitive
 skills, correct mistakes and grow up in experiences. Maladaptive
 perfectionists tend to hold only the entity theory of morality, so they
 believe in rigid moral principles. Non-perfectionists tend to hold the
 entity theory of intelligence and incremental theory of morality and the
 world. They believe that intelligence has limits, the world is a chaotic and
 unexpected place and morality is fluid and unstable. The findings are
 presented in the context of defining the differences between three types of
 perfectionists in terms of their views on the ability to modify cognitive
 capabilities, moral principles, and the world in general.


Background. Acute mastoiditis is reported to occur 2 or 3 times annually in the largest children's hospitals. We encountered an average of 1 case annually at our hospital from 1986 to 1991. During an 8‐year period ending October 31, 1999, 22 patients were diagnosed and treated at our hospital. Of these, 17 presented during the last 34 months. Methods. Retrospective chart review from office and hospital records of children from infancy to age 12 years with a discharge diagnosis of acute mastoiditis who were treated from 1992 through 1999. Results. All children were referred to one of the two pediatric otolaryngologists in our community because of forward protrusion of the auricle and retroauricular cellulitis. Eleven (50%) were <14 months old. Ninety‐five percent had a concomitant ipsilateral, inflamed, bulging, immobile eardrum. Computerized tomographic imaging, performed on all patients, revealed universal cortical destruction, subperiosteal abscess or bone destruction in four and dural venous thrombosis in two. Mastoidectomy was necessary for eight children (36%) because of complications of mastoiditis (n = 4) or for failure to improve with antibiotics and myringotomy drainage (n = 4). Streptococcus pneumoniae or Streptococcus pyogenes was recovered from 10 of 17 children (59%) from whom cultures were obtained. Conclusion. Cases of acute mastoiditis have markedly increased in our suburban children's hospital. The disease was most common during infancy. Serious complications of mastoiditis occurred in four (18%) of the children in this series.


Behavioral economics and happiness research have many important implications for the conduct of benefit-cost analysis as well as for policy design and implementation. By identifying ways in which we may act irrationally and providing new perspectives on the relationship between our circumstances and our sense of well-being, this research raises numerous questions regarding the evaluation of individual and societal welfare and the desirability of alternative policies. In this special issue, we present a series of articles that explore these concerns and provide significant new insights.


Time-critical applications require known worst-case execution times to ensure that system timing constraints are met. Traditional cache memory arrangements, however significantly impede the determination of tight upper bounds on these worst-case execution times (WCET). The difficulty comes in adequately predicting the cache miss ratio for a task in a preemptable multi-tasking environment. Caches thus increase the complexity of calculating WCET. To resolve this, caches have simply been excluded from WCET calculations. Each task must then be provided greater time in which to execute leading to lower throughput and performance. In this paper we present a cache management scheme that allows WCET calculations to more easily reflect the timing effects of caching. This is done through the appropriate selection of preemption points within a task's execution. The scheme focuses on the WCET component that is due to preemption overhead. An added benefit is a reduction in execution time of up to 10% for some tasks over traditional cache management.<<ETX>>


To achieve accurate strain measurements using fibre Bragg gratings (FBGs), both the sensing and wavelength demodulation accuracy are worth considering. Due to the indispensability, influences of bonding materials on the measurement accuracy need to be clarified. To analyze the sensing accuracy of the FBG strain sensor, a simplified longitudinal strain transmission model is established to discuss the transfer coefficient issue. Results indicate that hard bonding materials can enhance the sensing accuracy by high strain sensitivity. But on the other hand, asymmetric transversal stress model reveals that hard bonding materials can lead to the distortion of the spectrum in a large load condition. Then, effects of distorted spectra on the wavelength demodulation accuracy are studied by the simulation. The simulation shows that distorted spectra can reduce the wavelength demodulation accuracy markedly. It can be concluded that to improve the accuracy of strain measurements, hard bonding materials are suitable for small strain measurements, and relatively soft bonding materials are better options for large strain measurements.


In 2008, a number of iron artefacts were recovered from an interior courtyard on the DGB-1 site during fieldwork in 2008. DGB-1 is a large multi-function site located in the northeastern Mandara Mountains of Cameroon, and dating to the mid-second millennium AD. The iron artefacts recovered included a cache of spear/arrow points found buried under a living floor, as well as a local hoe and a chain and a 'barrette' probably not of local provenance. This discovery has a number of points of interest: (1) ethnoarchaeological reenactments of iron smelts in the 1980s in the same region provide a rare opportunity for comparison of iron-working techniques over about five centuries in sub-Saharan Africa; (2) the variability in different forms of iron (including eutectoid steel) used in these artefacts; and (3) the welding of different forms of iron to produce composite artefacts.


Terrell (38) and Gough (16) summarized the factors influencing mathematical attitudes and made relevant recommendations. Poffenberger and Norton (30) asked 16 college freshmen what had influenced their attitudes toward arithmetic and mathematics. Parental attitudes, teachers, and school environment were identified as strong influencing factors. Malone and Freel (21) constructed an instrument to measure the attitudes of highschool students toward mathematics. They found that students generally realized its practical value.


Quinolinium cations and quinolinium betaines were investigated in the representative solvents water and acetonitrile at room temperature using stationary and time-resolved fluorescence spectroscopy (Single-Photon-Counting-method). Experimental results reveal that sulfoalkyl- and carboxyalkyl-quinolinium compounds display a strikingly different behavior in the two solvents. Furthermore, the fluorescence lifetime depends on the length of the spacer for the sulfoalkyl compounds in acetonitrile and the carboxyalkyl compounds in water, respectively. This suggests an intramolecular interaction of the anionic headgroups with the quinolinium system in the excited state. To support this idea, different positions at the chromophore are substituted by a methylgroup in order to perturb the proposed interaction. With the intention to understand the dynamics of the postulated photoinduced electron transfer from the anionic group onto the excited quinolinium chromophore, semiempirical quantum chemical calculations were performed on the species using the PM3 hamiltonian including solvent effects by a self consistent reaction field (SCRF). We show that the Marcus theory of electron transfer may serve as a theoretical basis for a natural interpretation of the dynamic fluorescence quenching behavior.


This article forms a response to issues raised by Prins (1999) concerning the claimed influence of San related beliefs and rites on those of Nguni diviners, specifically Prins's main diviner informant, Togu Sipani. It is argued that, whatever paradigm one may adopt with respect to the interpretation of oral data, the gross inconsistencies in Sipani's testimony to Prins and myself cannot be explained without concluding that this diviner provided information concerning San influence on his rites and beliefs which he believed Prins would like to hear. The claim by Prins that I failed to provide Sipani with a small fee or present to be directed towards his ancestors, supposedly causing him to mislead me with incorrect information, is dismissed as false. Evidence is also provided to support the thesis, disputed by Prins, that central beliefs and rites associated with diviners would have been transmitted from black farmers to some south-eastern San, both in the recent and in the more distant past, and that the imagery associated with the altered states of diviners, as well as other imagery derived in whole or part from the cultures of black farmers, is likely to be represented in San art. To cite this article: Jolly, P. 2000. Nguni diviners and the south-eastern San: some issues relating to their mutual cultural influence . Natal Museum Journal of Humanities 12 : 79-95.


We study the nested model averaging method on the solution path for a high‐dimensional linear regression problem. In particular, we propose to combine model averaging with regularized estimators (e.g., lasso, elastic net, and Sorted L‐One Penalized Estimation [SLOPE]) on the solution path for high‐dimensional linear regression. In simulation studies, we first conduct a systematic investigation on the impact of predictor ordering on the behaviour of nested model averaging, and then show that nested model averaging with lasso, elastic net and SLOPE compares favourably with other competing methods, including the infeasible lasso, elastic, net and SLOPE with the tuning parameter optimally selected. A real data analysis on predicting the per capita violent crime in the United States shows outstanding performance of the nested model averaging with lasso.


Cancer is a group of related diseases in which there is uncontrolled cell growth that spreads to the surrounding tissues and damages them. Cancer remains the disease with the leading cause of death worldwide, and incidence and mortality are increasing rapidly. The main cancer treatment is chemotherapy; however, the compounds used in this treatment have serious side effects for this reason, is necessary to develop new therapeutic strategies. Natural products are an excellent pharmacological alternative for the treatment of cancer and infections. In search of new compounds with cytotoxic and antimicrobial activity, we have found quinones that have a high pharmacological potency in the treatment of these health problems. Quinones are an aromatic system of one or diketone and are mainly isolated from plants, fungi, bacteria, and other organisms. These compounds are secondary metabolites derived from the oxidation of hydroquinones; they include benzoquinones, naphthoquinones, anthraquinones, and polyquinones. This review summarizes the activity of 152 anticancer and 30 antimicrobial quinones.


The performance of eighteen strawberry clones was evaluated in relation to resistance to the two-spotted spider mite Tetranychus urticae Koch. In greenhouse, plants of lineage T-0104 and cultivars 'Blakemore', 'Raritan' and 'IAC Princesa Isabel' had significantly lighter damage symptoms than cultivars 'Cruz' and 'Oso Grande'; under the same conditions, the number of mites per unit area was significantly lower on 'IAC Princesa Isabel' than in 'Cruz', 'Dover' or 'Fern'. In a no-choice experiment conducted in laboratory, average daily oviposition was similar in the different cultivars, although a tendency for lower oviposition was observed on 'IAC Campinas' than on 'Floridabelle', 'Oso Grande' and 'Toyonoka'. An apparent preference of T. urticae for 'IAC Guarani' in relation to 'Floridabelle', 'IAC Campinas' and 'New Jersey 7335-5' was observed in a laboratory multiple-choice experiment involving clones with the highest and lowest oviposition rates in the previous test. Only 'IAC Guarani' of the Brazilian cultivars included in the present work was susceptible to T. urticae, whereas 'IAC Campinas' and 'IAC Princesa Isabel' seem to have levels of resistance similar to the best cultivars developed for this purpose.


This study was carried out to develope a flow control system using to supply PR(photo-resist) in the semi-conductor manufacturing process. The features of this system are to be able to measure the high viscosity and micro-flow. To meet above study object some ideas was induced to design a new concept valve with new material, multi-cross wheel, and new sealing method etc.. As the evaluations on the developed micro-flowmeter it was enough satisfied to use at the IT industries such as photo-resist process.


The conformational restriction switch concept has been adopted as a major tool for structural optimization of pharmaceuticals in order to expand the chemical structure scope and improve therapeutic activity against specific proteins. Several of the 1-aminocyclobutanecarboxylic acid derivatives produced in this way exhibited satisfactory antifungal activity in vitro compared with positive control boscalid. In vitro antifungal tests revealed that compound A21 had comparable, even higher antifungal activity against Rhizoctonia solani (R.s., EC50 = 0.03 mg/L) and Botrytis cinerea (B.c., EC50 = 0.04 mg/L) than fluxapyroxad (R.s., EC50 = 0.02 mg/L; B.c., EC50 = 0.20 mg/L) and boscalid (R.s., EC50 = 0.29 mg/L; B.c., EC50 = 0.42 mg/L). Furthermore, compound A20 was successfully screened and exhibited good inhibitory activity against porcine SDH, its IC50 value was 3.73 μM, which has considerable potency compared with fluxapyroxad (IC50 = 3.76 μM). The mode of action was determined using SEM and membrane potential research. The effects of the substituent steric hindrance, electrostatic property, hydrophobicity, and hydrogen-bond fields on structure-activity relationships were elaborated by the reliable models of comparative molecular field analysis and comparative molecular similarity index analysis. Furthermore, density functional theory simulations, molecule electrostatic potential, and molecular docking were also used to study the probable binding mode of target compounds with flexible fragments. The results showed that the scaffold of 1-aminocyclobutanecarboxylic acid derivatives could be used as lead for discovering new succinate dehydrogenase inhibitors.


Detection of small moving objects is an important research area with applications including monitoring of flying insects, studying their foraging behavior, using insect pollinators to monitor flowering and pollination of crops, surveillance of honeybee colonies, and tracking movement of honeybees. However, due to the lack of distinctive shape and textural details on small objects, direct application of modern object detection methods based on convolutional neural networks (CNNs) shows considerably lower performance. In this paper we propose a method for the detection of small moving objects in videos recorded using unmanned aerial vehicles equipped with standard video cameras. The main steps of the proposed method are video stabilization, background estimation and subtraction, frame segmentation using a CNN, and thresholding the segmented frame. However, for training a CNN it is required that a large labeled dataset is available. Manual labelling of small moving objects in videos is very difficult and time consuming, and such labeled datasets do not exist at the moment. To circumvent this problem, we propose training a CNN using synthetic videos generated by adding small blob-like objects to video sequences with real-world backgrounds. The experimental results on detection of flying honeybees show that by using a combination of classical computer vision techniques and CNNs, as well as synthetic training sets, the proposed approach overcomes the problems associated with direct application of CNNs to the given problem and achieves an average F1-score of 0.86 in tests on real-world videos.


With the increase in environmental awareness, competitions and government policies, implementation of green supply chain management activities to sustain production and conserve resources is becoming more necessary for different organizations. However, it is difficult to successfully implement green supply chain (GSC) activities because of the risks involved. These risks alongside their resources disrupt the normal functioning of the GSC and affect its environmental and economic performance. The pharmaceutical industry in particular, is crucial to providing life-saving products and services to the society. The products and services provided in this industry, have several impacts on the environment in different ways. These include expired or unused medicines, inappropriate distribution by pharmacies or drug companies, disposal of surplus medicines in household sewage and improper disposal of pills or capsules by patients. This study represents a GSC risk network model that considers the interrelationships between risks in order to achieve an optimal level of performance measures defined in the supply chain by Bayesian Belief Networks (BBN). The model is empirically implemented through a case study conducted in Imam Reza hospital of Mashhad medicine supply chain involving structured and semi-structured interviews and workshop sessions with experts. This work uses a literature review and a causal map BBN approach in finalizing the risks and also uses the BBN inference system and scenario analysis for prioritization and analysis of the risks through the network under probability conditions. According to the findings, inefficient logistics network design, supplier quality issues and green raw material supply disruption are highly prioritized.


In high dimension, stability and uniqueness of periodic orbits in nonlinear smooth systems are difficult properties to establish in general. In a previous work, we proved the existence of periodic oscillations inscribed in an invariant torus for a class of negative feedback systems in ${\mathbb{R}}^n$, where the regulation functions defining these systems are supposed to be nonlinear (and possibly nonmonotonic) in a small window and constant outside this window. Here, under some symmetry assumptions on the parameters of these models, we establish uniqueness and stability of the periodic orbit inside this invariant torus. The method used is based on the analysis of the spectrum of the monodromy matrix associated with the periodic orbit considered. Under the same assumptions, an approximation of the period of the orbit in terms of the parameters is also provided, and all results are illustrated with several examples from circadian rhythms.


Optical properties of V thin films deposited on MgO substrates have been obtained from spectrophotometric measurements. The V films were coated with a thin Pd layer to protect them from oxidation and to favor absorption of atomic hydrogen. Electrical resistance was recorded while hydrogen pressure was increased slowly up to 750 mbar keeping the temperature constant. Simultaneously, visible and near-infrared transmittance spectra of this Pd/V/MgO system were measured. The spectra were numerically inverted to obtain the spectral behavior of the Pd and V dielectric functions at 22 and 140 °C. Hydrogen concentrations were first determined from the combined effect of hydrogen content on the electrical resistance and on the optical direct transmission of the system. Then, determination of these concentrations was improved using retrieved values of the absorption coefficients of the hydrides and taking into account the structural change of V and the volumetric expansion of Pd. Good agreement is established when considering qualitative correlations between spectral features of the optimized PdHy and VHx dielectric functions and band structure calculations and densities of states for these two transition metal hydrides.


Emerging future smart grids will substantially increase the sophistication and diversity of control, communications, and power systems technologies. While many of these technologies are well established in their particular area, the interactions that result when combining them into a fully functioning cyber-physical system can result in many unexpected behaviors. Therefore, appropriate test platforms will become necessary to evaluate the performance of these systems in order to reveal unintended and potentially harmful interactions between subsystems before deploying such technologies in the field. In this paper, we discuss the design and development of a testbed to evaluate various smart-grid based control technologies through the use of controller hardware-in-the-Ioop real-time simulation. In particular, the focus of this testbed is to examine various "intelligent" and distributed control algorithms. The relevance of the testbed is illustrated through a case-study of a smart-grid solution known as the Distributed Grid Intelligence (DGI), which is part of the Future Renewable Electrical Energy Delivery and Management (FREEDM) project. In this case-study, we describe the impacts of various interactions such as communication timings, available computational resources, and distribution and decentralization of higher-level control on a microgrid's operations. Based on the case study, this paper concludes with recommendations for future expansion and improvements to the test bed in order to better serve the smart grid research community.


Despite the substantial software expenditures, and today's sophisticated software development tools and techniques, the successful development of information systems continues to be problematic. Understanding the factors that determine software development outcomes is an important step towards successfully deploying information systems. Software development is a complex process requiring the integration of knowledge from multiple technical and functional domains. The process is cognitively demanding and information intensive. Projects are generally carried out in teams. Previous research has demonstrated that information sharing has a direct positive effect on team performance, however, little is known about key mechanisms which may intervene in the process. The goal of this research is to understand how information sharing influences team performance from a socio-cognitive perspective in the software development context. Specifically, we theorize conflict, collective efficacy and shared mental models as intervening mechanisms in the information sharing and team performance relationship. Data were collected from teams of experienced software development professionals. Four constructs, information sharing, conflict, collective efficacy and shared mental models explained seventy-seven percent of the variation in team performance. The results of the study provide important insight into effectively managing software development activities.


Objectives Rapid initiation of intravenous thrombolysis improves patient's outcome in acute stroke. We analyzed inter-center variability and factors that influence the door-to-needle time with a special focus on process measurements in all Austrian stroke units. Methods Case level data of patients receiving intravenous thrombolysis in the Austrian Stroke Unit Registry were enriched with information of a structured questionnaire on center specific process measures of all Austrian stroke units. Influence of case and center specific variables was determined by LASSO procedure. Results Center specific median door-to-needle time ranged between 30 and 78 minutes. Between April 2004 and November 2012, 6246 of 57991 patients treated in Austrian stroke units with acute ischemic stroke received intravenous thrombolysis. An onset-to-door time >120 minutes, patients with total anterior circulation stroke, recent year of admission, patient transportation with ambulance crew and emergency physician, the use of point of care tests reduced the door-to-needle time, whereas onset-to-door ≤60 minutes, unknown onset-to-door, patients with an NIHSS ≤4 or posterior circulation stroke, initial admission to a general emergency department, a distant radiology department, primary imaging modality other than plain CT and waiting for the lab results were associated with an increase in door-to-needle time. Case level and center specific factors could explain the inter center variability of door-to-needle times in 31 of 34 stroke units in Austria. Conclusions In light of our results it seems crucial that every single stroke center documents and critically reviews possibilities of optimizing practice strategies in acute stroke care.


Ripening of tomato has been widely studied with the main purpose to extend tomato storage. Effects of 250, 500 and 750 nl l -1 doses of ethylene inhibitor 1-methylcyclopropene (1-MCP) on quality of organically grown tomato cv. Zoro were compared to control during 28 days of storage in this research. Open field grown tomato fruits were harvested at pink stage from a local farm that is located in Adana province of Turkey. Harvested fruits were sorted according to size and color and immediately exposed at different doses of 1-MCP at 20°C during 20 h and stored at 13°C and 90-95% relative humidity. Quality measurements started after treatment and analyses of trials were done weekly during storage period. The data showed that all doses of 1-MCP were effective on reducing the weight losses during storage period. Tomato fruit pulp firmness tended to decrease during storage. The higher 1-MCP application dose had the higher firmness mean value at the end of storage, while the firmness decreased dramatically in control fruits. 1-MCP applications also were effective on delaying the losses of titratable acidity, fruit skin colour change and total soluble solid after the storage period. Since tomato is considered as a climacteric fruit, ethylene production has an ample role on maturation stage during the storage period. Fruit initial ethylene production and respiration rate were also decreased by application of 1-MCP comparing to control tomatoes depending on different application doses. Results of this study showed that 500 and 750 nl l -1 doses of 1-MCP application increased the overall quality of tomatoes after 28 days of storage.


This paper explores conditions that allow data to appear, to come into being, in both conventional and more radical approaches in empirical social science research. Conventional qualitative inquiry that uses a positivist ontology—even when it claims to be interpretive—treats qualitative data, words, as brute, existing independent of an interpretive frame, waiting to be "collected" by a human. However, a Deleuzo-Guattarian ontology that does not assume the subject/object binary might not think the concept data at all. The author resists recuperating data in the collapse of the old empiricism and is content to pause in the curious possibilities of a normative ontology that imagines a superior, affirmative, and experimental empiricism in which all concepts, including data, must be re-thought.


This article presents the trends of two indicators measuring fossil resource consumption in the United Kingdom (UK). First, a domestic material consumption (DMC) indicator for fossil resources (DMCfossil) in the mass unit million tonnes is calculated. DMCfossil shows that between 1970 and 2000 UK fossil resource consumption decreased by 10%, which suggests absolute dematerialization for this resource. Investigation into the mix of fossil resources during this period highlighted the shift from the heavy fossil resource coal to the lighter, more energy‐dense natural gas, which resulted in decreased mass of resource required. Second, an alternative indicator, resource consumption by a nation (RCN) for fossil resources (RCNfossil) was calculated, which includes the indirect fossil resources attributable to traded goods and is measured in million tonnes of oil equivalent. RCNfossil shows that between 1970 and 2000 United Kingdom's fossil resource consumption increased by 14%, which emphasizes that even though there has been a decrease in the mass of fossil resources demanded, it has been accompanied by an increase in the volume of resource consumed. Additionally, deconstruction of RCNfossil shows that indirectly used resources attributable to exports and imports for the United Kingdom are significant. RCNfossil indicates that on the basis of past trends, fossil resources attributable to UK imports will overtake fossil resources attributable to its exports, which will make it dependent on imported resources. We conclude that further debate on appropriate aggregate and complementary indicators is needed.


The majority of bacteria, all investigated archaea and plants form the general precursor molecule of all tetrapyrroles 5-aminolevulinic acid by a unique transformation of transfer RNA bound glutamate. Only the alpha-group of the proteobacteria, mammals and yeast synthesize 5-aminolevulinic acid via the well known condensation of succinyl-CoA and glycine. The late steps in tetrapyrrole biosynthesis also contain alternative biosynthetic pathways for the formation and oxidative decarboxylation of coproporphyrinogen III. Unusual enzymatic reactions including the utilization of two substrate molecules as cofactor by the porphobilinogen deaminase and the formation of a spiro intermediate are involved in the formation of uroporphyrinogen III. The biosynthesis of hemes in bacteria is strictly regulated at the formation of 5-aminolevulinic acid and the oxidative decarboxylation of coproporphyrinogen III. The involved heme biosynthetic genes are regulated by the environmental concentrations of oxygen, iron, nitrate, growth phase and intracellular levels of heme. The current knowledge on the various enzymatic reactions and gene regulatory mechanisms is reviewed.


Seaweed plays an important role in aquatic ecosystem. It supplies nutrient and provides the place of life for many kinds of living organism in the sea. In order to control the marine resources reasonably, a study on the growth dynamics of seaweed is necessary. First, effects of solar radiation and water temperature on photosynthetic activity are considered. Secondly, a seasonal effect is introduced as a physiological phenomenon. Finally, a mathematical model of growth dynamics of Sargassum horneri is constructed from the idea of operating these effects multiplicatively. The model, parameters are determined on the basis of the observation data which were measured for Sargassum horneri at Notojima Aquarium, Ishikawa Prefecture. By a computer simulation, the weight of Sargassum horneri is estimated for any change of the environmental conditions.


This paper compares two approaches to designing Kalman Filters for walking systems. The first design uses Linear Inverted Pendulum Model (LIPM) dynamics, and the other design uses a more complete Planar dynamics. The filter based on the simpler LIPM design is more robust to modeling error. The more complex design estimates center of mass height and joint velocities, and tracks horizontal center of mass translation more accurately. We also investigate different ways of handling contact states and using force sensing in state estimation. In the LIPM filter, force sensing is used to determine contact states and tune filter parameters. In the Planar filter, force sensing is used to select the proper measurement equation.


Lithium-oxygen batteries with ultrahigh energy densities have drawn considerable attention as next-generation energy storage devices. However, their practical applications are challenged by sluggish reaction kinetics aimed at the formation/decomposition of discharge products on battery cathodes. Developing effective catalysts and understanding the fundamental catalytic mechanism are vital to improve the electrochemical performance of lithium-oxygen batteries. Here, uniformly dispersed ruthenium nanoparticles anchored on nitrogen-doped reduced graphene oxide are prepared by using an in situ pyrolysis procedure as a bifunctional catalyst for lithium-oxygen batteries. The abundance of ruthenium active sites and strong ruthenium-support interaction enable a feasible discharge product formation/decomposition route by modulating the surface adsorption of lithium superoxide intermediates and the nucleation and growth of lithium peroxide species. Benefiting from these merits, the electrode provides a drastically increased discharge capacity (17,074 mA h g-1), a decreased charge overpotential (0.51 V), and a long-term cyclability (100 cycles at 100 mA g-1). Our observations reveal the significance of the dispersion and coordination of metal catalysts, shedding light on the rational design of efficient catalysts for future lithium-oxygen batteries.


Background National action plan for injury prevention among children and youth in Finland was launched in 2009. National Institute for Health and Welfare (THL), national research and expert agency under the Ministry of Social Affairs and Health (MSAH), has coordinated the program. National action plan includes 216 objectives and proposed measures to promote and prevent accidental injuries and suicides. Description of the problem Around 122 Finnish children and young people under the age of 25 die annually in accidental injuries and 13,500 are hospitalised (2011–2013). Accidental injuries remain the leading cause of death under the age of 25. Majority of the deaths (83%) occur to 15–24 year olds. Around 25 percent of all 15–24 year-olds who die from accidental injury are intoxicated. Traffic accidents are the most common accidental cause of death in this age group. Accidental falls are causing most of the treatment inpatients periods in hospital, respectively. Results Despite the continuous decrease of deaths from accidental injuries since the 1970's, accidental injuries causes major health losses among children and youth. The objectives, measures and their implementation and responsibilities of the National action plan are divided into a number of different experts and government departments. Legislation and national policy guidelines, as well as statistics and databases are generally at a good level in Finland. The monitoring of the management and implementation should be paid more attention. Conclusions In order to be successful a National action plan requires high level recognition and adequate resources together with systematic coordination. National action plan is essential to be approved by the appropriate ministries and politicians. That made possible and empowered the national level activities and promoted a network of cooperation between the different actors. There is need for targeted accidental injury prevention especially for youth from 15 to 25 years.


OBJECTIVE
The purpose of this study was to determine whether preemptive thoracic epidural analgesia (TEA) initiated before surgical incision would reduce the severity of acute post-thoracotomy pain and the incidence of chronic post-thoracotomy pain.

METHOD
Meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials (RCTs).

SEARCH STRATEGY
MEDLINE, the Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials (CENTRAL) and EMBASE were searched from 1966 to December 2004 for prospective RCTs published in all languages using the following MeSH terms: post-thoracotomy pain, epidural analgesia, chronic pain, and preemptive analgesia.

SELECTION CRITERIA
All RCTs that compared thoracic epidural analgesia initiated before surgical incision (preemptive group) versus thoracic epidural analgesia initiated after completion of surgery (control group) in adult patients undergoing unilateral thoracotomy.

MEASUREMENTS AND MAIN RESULTS
Three authors reviewed all citations and simultaneously extracted data on sample size, patient characteristics, surgical and analgesic interventions, methods of pain assessment, and pain scores at 24 hours, 48 hours, and 6 months postoperatively. Six studies were included with a total of 458 patients. Pooled analyses indicated that preemptive TEA was associated with a statistically significant reduction in the severity of acute pain on coughing at 24 and 48 hours (weighted mean difference -1.17 [95% confidence interval (CI) -1.50 to -0.83] and -1.08 [95% CI -1.17 to -0.99]), respectively. Acute pain was a good predictor of chronic pain. However, there was no statistically significant difference in the overall incidence of chronic pain at 6 months between the preemptive TEA group (39.6%) and the control group (48.6%).

CONCLUSION
Preemptive TEA appeared to reduce the severity of acute pain but had no effect on the incidence of chronic pain.


Economic shale gas production requires hydraulic fracture stimulation and the fracturing effects largely depend on the geo-mechanical brittleness of formation. For this reason, predicting fracture-prone sweet spots is essential for optimizing the development program. The geo-mechanical property of shale can be evaluated by elastic parameters that obtained from three-term AVO inversion. Since pre-stack AVO inversion is an ill-posed problem, the Bayesian framework is employed for its regularization in this paper. Based on normal Bayesian inversion, an edge preserving constraint is introduced on the perturbations of elastic parameters in both vertical and horizontal directions, which could improve the inversion result near geological boundaries and depict the heterogeneity of shale better. The sound anti-noise ability and robustness are fully proved in synthetic data while edge preserving effect is also demonstrated with a 2D model. In practice, this method is also applied on a shale gas play in Sichuan Basin of China and the inverted results show good agreements with well logs. Finally, the brittle sweet spots are discriminated on the basis of elastic property analysis from wells, and an evaluation criterion of gas shale using seismic inverted elastic parameters is established resultantly.


A monospecific antiserum against human corticosteroid binding globulin (hCBG) has been used to identify structural similarities between hCBG and CBG in the blood of other primates and representative species of different vertebrate classes. Double immunodiffusion analysis indicated that only CBG in Old World monkeys and apes cross-react with the hCBG antiserum. This was confirmed by a solid-phase radioimmunoassay for hCBG which also demonstrated that CBG in apes is immunologically identical to hCBG and that Old World monkey CBG comprises most, but not all, of the hCBG epitopes. The electrophoretic mobilities of human, gorilla and gibbon CBG were similar (RF 0.50-0.51), but differed from Old World monkey CBG (RF 0.44-0.49) and chimpanzee CBG (RF 0.47). Although serum/plasma cortisol binding capacities were similar in Old World primates, the dissociation half-times (t 1/2) of cortisol were higher from human and ape CBG (18-25 min) than from Old World monkey CBG (14-18 min). The steroid binding specificities of human and ape (CBG corticosterone greater than cortisol greater than progesterone greater than or equal to testosterone) were also different from those of Old World monkey CBG (corticosterone much greater than cortisol approximately equal to progesterone greater than testosterone). Lemur plasma cortisol binding capacity and CBG dissociation t 1/2 of cortisol were similar to hCBG, but its steroid binding specificity was different (cortisol greater than corticosterone greater than progesterone greater than or equal to testosterone) and it did not cross-react with the hCBG antiserum.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)


Background

Since December 2019, the COVID-19 infection broke out in many parts of the world with confirmed and death cases rapidly increasing, which posed a great threat to human life and health. Current nucleic acid detection and antibody testing for the SARS-CoV-2 were the main methods for diagnosis of COVID-19, but not so sensitive, with high false negative rate and missed diagnosis rate. Imaging changes of COVID-19 not only precede symptomatic changes, but also have different imaging characteristics in different periods. We conducted 74 days of dynamic chest CT imaging observation on COVID-19 patients in Hebei province, aiming to understand the dynamic characteristics of the chest CT changes of COVID-19, so as to find the source of infection early, take early intervention measures, and judge the prognosis. Methods Chest CT examinations at intervals 1 to 4 days were conducted for 11 patients with a diagnosis of COVID-19. On the 74th day after onset, chest CT was reexamined to analyze the characteristics of chest CT in each stage. Results Of the 11 cases, 1 case was imported from Wuhan, 10 cases were infected for family clustering after close contact with confirmed COVID-19 cases. There were 3 ordinary cases, 3 severe cases and 5 critical cases. Among them, 2 critical cases died for old age and complications of underlying diseases, while 9 cases were cured by April 7, 2020. The changes of chest CT imaging in 1 child appeared prior to the clinical symptoms. 1–4 days after onset of the initial symptom were the early stages: Chest CT was mainly characterized by single lung quasi-circular ground glass shadow and fine mesh shadow. 5–10 days were the progressive stages: The lesion spread along the axial interstitium of the bronchi and gradually diffused to the whole lung, and reach the peak on day 6 to 9, which was characterized by consolidation, paving stone sign, halo sign, reversed halo sign, and even 'white lung' for the critical patients. The recovery stages began on day 11 after onset: The fiber cord, ground glass and consolidation shadow were gradually absorbed. After 74 days of follow-up, no serious permanent lung injury was found. Conclusion Chest CT could determine the different stages of COVID-19. Dynamic follow-up chest CT showed a good prognosis of COVID-19 in Hebei Province, China


Image registration is widely used in remote sensing, medical imaging, computer vision etc. In this paper , in the area of panchromatic and multi-spectral fusion, we propose a fast automatic image registration based on SIFT and RANSAC .And the experiment results using this automatic remote sensing registration method based on SIFT and RANSAC indicate that the method is more distinctive and robust, which results in a higher matching performance and a better matching efficiency.


An experimental investigation was conducted of a circular cylinder immersed in a uniform planar shear flow, where the approach velocity varies across the diameter of the cylinder. The study was motivated by some apparent discrepancies between numerical and experimental studies of the flow, and the general lack of experimental data, particularly in the subcritical Reynolds number regime. Of interest was the direction and origin of the steady mean lift force experienced by the cylinder, which has been the subject of contradictory results in the literature, and for which measurements have rarely been reported. The circular cylinder was tested at Reynolds numbers from Re = 4.0×104 − 9.0×104 , and the dimensionless shear parameter ranged from K = 0.02 − 0.07, which corresponded to a flow with low to moderate shear. The results showed that low to moderate shear has no appreciable influence on the Strouhal number, but has the effect of lowering the mean drag coefficient. The circular cylinder develops a small steady mean lift force directed towards the low-velocity side, which is attributed to an asymmetric mean static pressure distribution on its surface. The reduction in the mean drag force, however, cannot be attributed solely to this asymmetry.Copyright © 2002 by ASME


The paper presents a qualitative study of the content-based image query process over the image databases resulting from the standard DICOM files produced by the medical devices used in the diagnosis process. There were implemented and studied several methods of transformation and quantization of the color space (HSV quantized at 166 colors, RGB quantized at 64 colors and CIE-LUV quantized at 512 colors) and also three methods for dissimilitude computing between the query and the target image (Euclidian distance, histograms intersection and quadratic distance between histograms). The algorithms that permit the extraction of the alphanumeric and imagistic information from the standard DICOM files and the algorithms for transforming and quantization of the color spaces are also presented. The experimental results displayed in a tabular and graphical form, permit the formulation of some useful conclusion, because the color medical images are more complex than the usual images