The search for biological antitumor agents has been pursued for over half a century. Snake venom has been shown to possess a wide spectrum of biological activities. The objectives of the present review are to evaluate the existing controversies on this subject published in a number of papers and to propose probable explanations for the phenomena observed. We reported our results obtained in a study, in which we evaluated the action of the venoms of Crotalus durissus terrificus and Bothrops jararaca on Ehrlich ascites tumor cells. We noticed an important antitumor effect, mainly with Bothrops jararaca venom, as well as an increase in the functional activity of macrophages. We also observed an increase in the number of mononuclear and polymorphonuclear cells with Bothrops jararaca venom. Considering these findings, we postulate that both Bothrops jararaca and Crotalus durissus terrificus venoms can act directly on tumor cells. In addition, we propose an indirect mechanism, based on the stimulation of the inflammatory response, to inhibit tumor growth and to promote its rejection.


We investigate the density structure of the interstellar medium using new high-resolution maps of the 8, 24, and 70 μm surface brightness toward a molecular cloud in the Gum Nebula, made as part of the Spitzer Space Telescope Galactic First Look Survey. The maps are correlated with 100 μm images measured with IRAS. At 24 and 70 μm, the spatial power spectrum of surface brightness follows a power law with a spectral index of -3.5. At 24 μm, the power-law behavior is remarkably consistent from the ∼0.°2 size of our maps down to the ∼5″ spatial resolution. Thus, the structure of the 24 μm emission is self-similar even at milliparsec scales. The combined power spectrum produced from Spitzer 24 μm and IRAS 25 μm images is consistent with a change in the power-law exponent from -2.6 at spatial wavenumber k ∼ 2 × 10-3 arcsec-1 to -3.5 at k ∼ 4 × 10-3 arcsec-1. The decrease may be due to the transition from a two-dimensional to three-dimensional structure. Under this hypothesis, we estimate the thickness of the emitting medium to be 0.3 pc.


: The objective of present studies deals with the Pharmacognostic and antioxidant studies of stems of Pyrostegia venusta Pres. Some distinct and different characters were observed with section of young thin stems. Physiochemical parameter ash value and LOD of powder of stem was 1.85% w/w and 6.53 % w/w respectively. The phytochemical investigation of extracts of stem of Pyrostegia venusta shows the presence of sterols, triterpenes, flavonoids and tannins. Total phenolic content of total methanolic extract was determined by using folin Ciocalteu method. The total phenolic content in methanolic extract was found to be 5.55 % w/w equivalent to Tannic acid. Petroleum ether, ethyl acetate soluble, ethyl acetate insoluble and methanol exract was found to be scavenger of DPPH radical. The present study on Pharmacognostical investigation of Pyrostegia venusta Pers. stems might be useful to supplement information in regard to its identification parameters assumed significantly in the way of acceptability of herbal drugs in present scenario lacking regulatory laws to control quality of herbal drugs. triterpenes, flavonoids and tannins. Total phenolic content of total methanolic extract was determined by using folin Ciocalteu method. The total phenolic content in methanolic extract was found to be 5.55 % w/w equivalent to Tannic acid. Petroleum ether, ethyl acetate soluble, ethyl acetate insoluble and methanol exract was found to be scavenger of DPPH radical.


Summary The main objective of this project was to evaluate the ability to estimate reservoir properties directly from broadband seismic without using well information for calibration. This estimation was achieved by using a combination of seismic velocity and pre-stack seismic inversion results. This was followed by a lithology-fluid classification in the pre-stack domain (acoustic impedance and Vp/Vs) and porosity estimation. The results are very encouraging and demonstrate the value of acquired broadband pre-stack data for identifying, delineating, and de-risking prospects and also for accurately characterising reservoirs properties without introducing prior pre-conceived reservoir models to bias the calculations.


This paper discusses the possibilities of detecting geobotanical anomalies using the multizonal remote data of the apparatus of the Landsat-7 satellite when an ore manifestation and anthropogenic emissions act on vegetation in combination. The results of the measurements are interpreted on the basis of a model of how stresses develop in plants. The following parameters (indices) that characterize the status of the vegetation are determined: the total stress index (the inverse vegetation index) and the set of partial stress indices - as the reaction of plants in various spectral channels to inhibiting action. Criteria are proposed for distinguishing different phases of the inhibition of plants and the extent to which a detected geobotanical anomaly is expressed. © 2005 Optical Society of America


The drive to improve power electronic system efficiencies makes the accurate and repeatable determination of power losses ever more important. As operating frequencies, harmonic content and efficiency increase, electrical methods of measuring loss become more uncertain since they are affected by phase-errors and electromagnetic interference among other factors. Alternative calorimetric methods allow system losses, which manifest as heat, to be measured directly with a high degree of accuracy. However, calorimeter facilities tend to be costly bespoke measurement systems which is a barrier to their widespread use. In this paper, an extension to the closed double-jacket type calorimeter topology is presented which offers comparatively low-cost, simplified construction and improved flexibility with the aim of promoting a more widespread use of calorimetry within the power electronics community.


Existing wireless technologies provide communication and information services to all fields of life. The one of the emerging and popular field is vehicular ad hoc networks, with its unique characteristics and highly mobile environment. Different types of routing protocols have been proposed to address the routing issues in network and one of the most efficient types is geographical routing. In this type of protocols, the beacon messages are using to update the node locations and positions. However, these protoocls have been suffered with high channel congestion issue in the network. To this end, we propose a beaconless packet forwarding strategy based on modified handshake messages mechanism. The protocol uses some realistic metrics to select the next forwarder node such as forward progresss and link quality. The protocol performance is evaluated with existing beacon and beaconless geographical routing protocols. The simulation results showed the better performance of the proposed protocol in terms of packet delay and data delivery ratio in realistic wireless channel conditions.


INTRODUCTION
Cardiac involvement by light-chain (AL) amyloid occurs in up to 50% of patients with primary AL amyloidosis. The prognosis of amyloid heart disease is poor with 1-year survival rates of 35 to 40%. Historically, heart transplantation was considered controversial for patients with AL amyloid cardiomyopathy (CM) given the systemic nature of the disease and poor survival. We present a case report of an active duty service member diagnosed with advanced cardiac amyloid who underwent total artificial heart transplant as a bridge to heart transplant and eventual autologous stem cell transplant.

CASE REPORT
A 47-year-old active duty male initially evaluated for atypical chest pain was found to have severe concentric left ventricular hypertrophy on echocardiogram but normal voltage on electrocardiogram. Cardiac magnetic resonance imaging, laboratory studies, and bone marrow biopsy established the diagnosis of cardiac amyloidosis. At the time of diagnosis, the patient's prognosis was very poor with a median survival of 5 months on the basis of the Mayo Clinic revised prognostic staging system for amyloidosis. The patient developed rapidly progressive left ventricular dysfunction and heart failure leading to cardiac arrest. The patient received a total artificial heart as a bridge to orthotopic heart and kidney transplantation and eventual stem cell transplant. He continues to be in remission and has a fair functional capacity without restriction in activities of daily living or moderate exercise.

DISCUSSION
Amyloid CM is a rare and devastating disease. The natural course of the disease has made heart transplant in these patients controversial. Modern advancements in chemotherapies and advanced heart failure treatments have improved outcomes for select patients with AL amyloid CM undergoing heart transplantation. There is ongoing research seeking improvement in treatment options and outcomes for patients with this deadly disease.


Few years ago National Centre for Agricultural Mechanization (NCAM) launched melon sheller to reduce burden of obtaining melon oil and cake, and to enhance rural women's productivity. This study looked at the productivity of promoted melon shelling technology and preference by rural women in Nigeria. Data were gathered from the NCAM workshop and survey of melon processors in Niger State. In the workshop, it was found that time allowed for soaking melon and covering with piece of clothes contributed to the productivity of the sheller. Results from survey revealed that 95.1% of the respondents' preferred Internal Combustion technology and 90.2% liked electric-driven melon shellers over the manual one. Also, 69.5% obtained the shellers from local fabricators rather than NCAM. The technology led to increased turnout of melon (378kg/hr) and reduced wastages to 1.26kg out of 75.6kg. The study concluded that the promoted melon sheller is efficient and have positive implication on the rural women's productivity and revenue. The study recommends that the rural women should put the melon sheller into its maximum capacity use. The NCAM should extend training to the local fabricators so that they can improve on the technology most especially in the areas of winnowing and washing of melon kernels.


HTS is a key component of pharmaceutical lead identification process. Over recent years, the pharmaceutical industry has experienced significant increases in the throughput capabilities of its HTS functions. In those companies where HTS has been effectively deployed, it is now possible to screen the entire corporate compound collection against a pharmacological target within a timescale of several weeks to a few months. This capability has been realized, not as a result of the purchase of any one particular piece of hardware, but rather through the development of a truly effective HTS infrastructure that matches the needs of the parent organization. Central to this is the need to understand how to effectively combine the use of the different types of hardware available to the HTS specialist. The use of both modular workstations and single-arm robotic systems have underpinned most HTS groups operations. Recent advances in the field of multiple-arm robotic systems and dedicated automation systems offer even further potential for increasing productivity. This article describes our experience with the use of a dedicated automation system for HTS applications.


The putative complexity of Combretaceae and lack of information on phylogenetic relationships within the family led us to explore relationships between genera of Combretaceae by means of combined analyses of plastid and nuclear sequences. We collected DNA sequence data from the nuclear ribosomal internal transcribed spacer region and plastid rbcL, psaA-ycf3 spacer and psbA-trnH spacer for 14 of the 17 genera of Combretaceae. The current classification of the family into two subfamilies, Strephonematoideae and Combretoideae, is corroborated. Within Combretoideae, division into two tribes, Laguncularieae and Combreteae, is strongly supported. Within Combreteae subtribe Terminaliinae, relationships between genera are largely unresolved. Terminalia is not supported as monophyletic and two groups were identified, one containing mainly African species and another of mostly Asian species. Pteleopsis, Buchenavia and Anogeissus are embedded within Terminalia, and we suggest that all genera of Terminaliinae, with the exception of Conocarpus, should be included in an expanded circumscrition of Terminalia. Within subtribe Combretinae, a clade formed by the two monotypic genera Guiera and Calycopteris is sister to the rest of the subtribe. Groupings in Combretinae are consistent with recent results based on morphological data. Combretum is currently divided into three subgenera: Apethalanthum, Cacoucia and Combretum. The last two were included in this study and supported as monophyletic if Quisqualis is included within subgenus Cacoucia. Meiostemon is sister to subgenus Combretum. We recommend that subgenus Combretum should be expanded to include Meiostemon and subgenus Cacoucia to include Quisqualis. The sectional classification within Combretum proposed in earlier morphological studies is confirmed except for the exclusion of C. imberbe from section Hypocrateropsis in a separate and monotypic section and the inclusion of C. zeyheri (section Spathulipetala) in section Macrostigmatea. In order to accommodate C. imberbe, a new section is suggested. The reinstatement of previously recognized sections Grandiflora and Trichopetala, both of which had been sunk into subgenus Cacoucia section Poivrea, is proposed. © 2010 The Linnean Society of London, Botanical Journal of the Linnean Society, 2010, 162, 453–476.


Two bovine hydroxyapatites (BHAs), one with granule size of 150 to 200 microm and one with granule size of 300 to 329 micro, and 2 synthetic hydroxyapatites (SHAs), with granule size of 150 and 300 microm, respectively, were compared for effectiveness in repairing circumferential bone defects in dogs. The hydroxyapatites (HAs) were characterized through powder x-ray diffraction (XRD) analysis and scanning electron microscopy (SEM). Three trephined bone defects (5.0 mm wide x 4 mm long) were created in the humeruses of 8 dogs. In a random manner, the defects on each side were treated with either BHA with small granules (BHA[s]), BHA with large granules (BHA[L]), SHA with small granules (SHA[s]), SHA with large granules (SHA[L]), or left to heal unaided (bilateral control). Four dogs were sacrificed after 6 and 12 postoperative weeks, respectively. Ground sections of each defect were submitted to histologic and histomorphometric analysis (percentage of area occupied by bone, bone marrow, and biomaterial). As a rule, the HA granules exhibited direct bone contact, regardless of the origin and the size of the granules. Control sites were related and had an increased amount of connective tissue infiltration. At 12 weeks, BHA(s) exhibited improved bone formation compared with SHA(s) and SHA(L). The SHA(s) delivered reduced amounts of bone compared with the remaining groups (control included). The area of bone measured in BHA(s) sites was significantly higher at 12 weeks than 6 weeks. The XRD revealed the tested HA samples to be highly crystalline, while BHA appeared with rougher surface at SEM analysis. The BHA(s) performed better than the SHA(s) and SHA(L), as assessed by the amount of bone measured in both implantation sites at 12 weeks. The BHA's material characteristic itself rather than granules size accounted for the distinctive biological behavior. The increased roughness of the BHAs' surface, as assessed through SEM, seemed to benefit the osteoconduction process.


PURPOSE
The aim of this systematic review was to determine the most effective alveolar augmentation technique for vertical bone gain.

MATERIALS AND METHODS
A systematic search to select clinical trials and retrospective studies done on patients with reduced vertical bone height was conducted. The intervention of interest was autogenous block graft done compared to procedures such as distraction osteogenesis (DO), particulate grafting, block plus particulate grafting with titanium mesh, and tent pole technique in systematically healthy adult patients age 18 and older. The following electronic databases were explored: PubMed, CINAHL, and Dental and Oral Science. A supplementary manual search of published full-text articles from January 2005 to December 2017 was done using Google Scholar. Grey literature was also sought using greylit.org. The review protocol was registered at the Prospero registry (CRD # 42017072432). The risk of bias of the included studies was assessed using EPOC criteria. Meta-analysis was performed using Review Manager for studies with quantitative data on mean values of vertical bone gain and bone resorption achieved with various bone augmentation techniques. Random effect model was used. Heterogeneity among studies was evaluated using the I2 statistic.

RESULTS
A total of 2322 articles were found. After excluding the irrelevant papers, only 8 papers were finally selected for the detailed evaluation. Of these 8, 5 were clinical trials, and 3 were retrospective studies. Four studies were on DO, 2 on particulate grafting, 1 on autogenous block grafting plus particulate grafting, and 1 on tent pole grafting. The control group in all studies were autogenous block graft. Meta-analysis revealed no significant difference between DO and autogenous block grafting for vertical bone gain (mean difference 0.82 [-1.28, 2.91]). Similarly, no significant difference was observed in the 2 techniques for bone resorption (mean difference 0.38 [-0.23, 0.99]).

CONCLUSIONS
DO was not superior to autogenous block grafting for vertical bone augmentation. Both techniques were associated with a number of complications. There was no difference in the bone resorption observed in the 2 techniques. No conclusive results can be drawn on other techniques on account of limited data.


ABSTRACT Using coimmunoprecipitation and glutathioneS-transferase pulldown experiments, we found that polyomavirus large T antigen binds to p300 in vivo and in vitro. The N-terminal region of the viral protein, including the pRB binding motif, was dispensable for this interaction, which involved several regions within the C-terminal half of the large T antigen. Interestingly, anti-T antibody coimmunoprecipitated a subspecies of p300 which has high histone acetyltransferase activity.


Field-level inference is emerging as a promising technique for optimally extracting information from cosmological datasets. Previous analyses have shown field-based inference produces tighter parameter constraints than power spectrum analyses. However, estimates of the detailed quantitative gain in constraining power differ. Here, we demonstrate the gain in constraining power depends on the parameter space being constrained. As a specific example, we find that lognormal field-based analysis of an LSST Y1-like mock data set only marginally improves constraints relative to a 2-point function analysis in ΛCDM, yet it more than doubles the constraining power of the data in the context of wCDM models. This effect reconciles some, but not all, of the discrepant results found in the literature. Our results suggest the importance of using a full systematics model when quantifying the information gain for realistic field-level analyses of future data sets.


In experiments with mixed cultures of Staphylococcus aureus and Candida albicans both in the absence and in the presence of 5-fluorocytosine (5-FC), we have observed that (1) there is an inhibition of S. aureus growth in mixed cultures with C. albicans in media supplemented with 1 microgram/mL of 5-fc and that 5-FC has no effect on staphylococci in pure cultures; (2) this inhibition occurred with clinically isolated and laboratory strains and could be reversed by specific metabolites; (3) Staphylococcus aureus was inhibited by filtrates of C. albicans cultures treated with 5-FC and this seemed to be favored by some C. albicans filterable product which can affect the cell wall and the permeability of the staphylococcal cells since they become sensitive to 5-FC; (4) nine other commonly used antimicrobials showed an increased inhibitory activity against S. aureus in mixed cultures with C. albicans; and (5) there is a decrease in the number of precipitating antigens of S. aureus and of the activity of alpha toxin when this species was grown with both C. albicans and 5-FC. Our results indicate that the susceptibility of some species to antimicrobials could be significantly modified in the presence of other species. One cannot exclude that a similar phenomenon could happen in hosts under treatment with antibiotics against infection.


In this study; use of "Frequency Ratio" method for dangerous road section determination was investigated. In this method, instead of using the accident number or accident ratio, a relationship between the environmental properties of the road and accident proneness of the road was established, by using past accident data. This relation can also be used for accident proneness of the sections which are on the same road and exposed to similar traffic effects but have no past accident data. Moreover, possible remedies and their effects can be guessed by trying different variable values. Developed method was tested on Tokat-Niksar (D850) State Highway. Seven variables related to road and its environment was used. 66 out of 94 sections (70,21%) were defined as accident prone, whereas 174 out of 206 accidents (84,46%) were recorded in these sections. That is, great percentage of the accidents were captured in a relatively low percent of sections. It is concluded that developed method may be used in accident prone road section determination studies.


The purpose of this study was to evaluate the accuracy of dose calculation based on Cone Beam Computed Tomography (CBCT) as adaptive planning for lung cancer. Dose calculation based on CBCT images was compared to Computed Tomography (CT) simulator images as references. Treatment planning was generated for 7 patients of lung using Intensity Modulated Radiotherapy (IMRT) technique and Volumetric Arc Therapy (VMAT) technique. Eclipse v13.6 Treatment Planning System (TPS) with Analytical Anisotropic Algorithm (AAA) and Acuros External Beam (AXB) algorithm were used to calculate the dose. This study was divided into three major parts: (1) Hounsfield Unit (HU) calibration for CBCT images by using CIRS 002LFC phantom; (2) analysis of Dose Volume Histogram (DVH); (3) analysis of Passing Rate Gamma with criteria Dose Difference (DD) 2%/Distance To Agreement (DTA) 2mm and DD 3%/DTA 3mm using Electronic Portal Imaging Device (EPID). The DVH analysis for D98%, D50% and D2% deviation was evaluated and compared to the DVH for CT images with AAA algorithm as reference. The deviation of D98%, D50% and D2% for lung cancer was less than 2%. The range of conformity index based on CBCT images for all planning was 0,923-0,999 and the homogeneity index was in the range of 0,042-0,197. The gamma criteria (DD/DTA) of dose difference and distance to agreement for 2%/2mm are 87% - 94% and for 3%/3mm were 96% -98% for IMRT techniques. Passing Rate Gamma for VMAT with 2%/2mm criteria were 87% -96% and 3%/3mm criteria were 96% - 98%. The results of this study showed that dose calculation based on CBCT image was similar to dose calculation using CT image with descrepancy less than 2%.


Epoxy/BaTiO3 composites have been of great interest as embedded capacitor materials, mainly due to high dielectric constant of ceramic powders, and good process compatibility of epoxy with printed circuit boards (PCBs). However, one of the potential problems of epoxy/BaTiO3 composite is the dielectric relaxation at GHz range. In this paper, epoxy/SrTiO3 composite ECFs were fabricated for high frequency applications. Dielectric constants of epoxy/SrTiO3 composite embedded capacitor films with various SrTiO3 particles loading for three different commercial SrTiO 3 powders were measured from 100 Hz to 1 MHz, and experimental data at 100 kHz were fitted to the Lichtenecker equation for the prediction of the effective dielectric constant of SrTiO3  powders in epoxy/SrTiO3 composite ECFs. Using a rectangular cavity resonator method, dielectric constants of epoxy/SrTiO 3 composite ECFs were measured at GHz range (1-10 GHz). At GHz frequencies, dielectric constants of epoxy/SrTiO3 composite ECFs were nearly constant. In contrast, epoxy/BaTiO3 composite ECFs showed significant decrease of dielectric constants above 5GHz. Therefore, it is concluded that epoxy/SrTiO3 composite ECFs cab be more effectively to be applied for high frequency applications.


Purpose - – Faced with the financing problem of small-medium enterprises (SMEs), China has attempted to establish as many as third party's collateral institutions. The paper aims to study the design of collateral arrangements including collateral fee rates, risk sharing, collateral capital requirements, types of collateral institutions and recollateral institution, etc. Design/methodology/approach - – The paper extends the model of Holmstrom and Tirole to develop the analytic framework of the theory of financing collateral. From the perspective of contract design, the paper establishes a moral hazard model focusing on the minimum capital requirement of the borrower under the condition of risk neutral and limited liability, while considering the structure of lender-collateral institution-borrower. Findings - – According to the research, only under certain conditions can third party's collateral arrangements tackle the financing problems of SMEs. Diversification, anti-collateral and linked-transactions are three means to improve financing conditions, but the most important way is efficient monitoring by collateral institutions, especially when it has relative advantage over the lender. In order to improve financing conditions of SMEs, China should rely more on efficient monitoring by banks not on excess development of collateral institutions, meanwhile relax rigid collateral supervision policies. Collateral institutions should be industry-specific, association or transaction-related type. Originality/value - – First, from the perspective of contract design, the paper analyzes the comprehensive institutional arrangements of third party's collateral considering mutual relationships of component elements and develops the analytic framework of the theory of third party's collateral, especially points out necessary conditions of its efficient arrangements. Second, the paper studies various efficient financing mechanisms under the institutional arrangements of third party's collateral and focusing on the role of monitoring and monitors, and the paper also has important policy implications, i.e. the paper should develop specific collateral institutions and promote monitoring role of credit institutions.


Microseismic events associated with shale reservoir hydraulic fracturing stimulation (HFS) are interpreted to be reactivations of ubiquitous natural fractures (NFs). Despite adoption of discrete fracture network (DFN) models, accounting for NFs in fluid flow within shale reservoirs has remained a challenge. For an explicit account of NFs, this study introduced the use of seismology-based relations linking seismic moment, moment magnitude, fault rupture area, and stress drop. Microseismic data from HFS monitoring of Marcellus Shale horizontal wells had been used to derive planar hydraulic fracture geometry and source properties. The former was integrated with associated well production data found to exhibit transient linear flow. Analytical solutions led to linear flow parameters (LFPs) and system permeability for scenarios depicting flow through infinite and finite conductivity hydraulic fractures. Published core plug permeability was stress-corrected for in-situ conditions to estimate average matrix permeability. For comparison, the burial and thermal history for the study area was used in 1D Darcy-based modeling of steady and episodic expulsion of petroleum to account for geologic timescale persistence of abnormal pore pressure. Both evaluations resulted in matrix permeability in the same picodarcy (pD) range. Coupled with LFPs, reactivated NF surface area for stochastic DFNs was estimated. Subsequently, the aforementioned seismology-based relations were used for determining average stress drops needed to estimate NF rupture area matching flow-based DFN surface areas. Stress drops, comparable to values for tectonic events, were excluded. One of the determined values matched stress drops for HFS operations in past and recent seismological studies. In addition, calculated changes in pore pressure matched estimates in the aforementioned studies. This study unlocked the full potential of microseismic data beyond extraction of planar geometry attributes and stimulated reservoir volume (SRV). Here, microseismic events were explicitly used in the quantitative account of NFs in fluid flow within shale reservoirs.


Children's interest in other children begins to emerge around 6 months of age and, with increasing age, their social involvements with individuals and groups become more frequent and multi-faceted, suggesting that such interactions are of considerable importance to them. On this basis, it is plausible that the experience of peer rejection, or even the threat of rejection, would have the potential to impact greatly on their social, emotional, and cognitive functioning. However, although observational and correlational research has confirmed this speculation, many questions remain concerning the impact of particular aspects of rejection episodes (e.g., by whom, where, how, for what reason, how frequently, etc.), over both the short- and longer term. In this chapter, research on the basis of children's social group membership (i.e. similarity, social distinctiveness, acceptance and belonging) is briefly reviewed, as well as findings that have illuminated the important influence exerted on children by their peer group memberships. The nature and effects of both immediate and chronic peer group rejection on children are considered, drawing on both correlational and experimental research. As well, one mechanism that has been proposed to underpin chronic rejection, rejection sensitivity, is considered and research findings are outlined indicating that the rejection sensitivity model might provide an account of the impact of chronic rejection experiences on young children, especially their social withdrawal and solitude. Some potentially fruitful future research directions on the social phenomenon of children's peer group rejection are outlined.


3272 Background: The human ribosomal protein gene (RPL9) is approximately 5.5 kb in length and contains 8 exons. It is located in chromosome 4p13. This gene encodes a ribosomal protein that is a component of the 60S subunit and it has been localized in the cytoplasm. The possible function of this gene is in cell growth and development as the highest expression levels of this gene has been observed in cells undergoing growth and development and that the level of expression declines as the tissue reaches developmental maturity. Aim: The objective of this study was to determine the expression pattern of RPL9 in various lung cancers. Materials and Method: Wax embedded tissue sections for the normal lung and lung cancer (small cell lung carcinoma, adernocarcinoma, large cell carcinoma and squamous cell carcinoma) were used to investigate the expression of RPL9. Antisense and sense RNA probes were synthesized by in vitro transcription and labeled with Digoxygenin. Anti-sense RNA probe complimentary to the RPL9 mRNA was used to localize RPL9 mRNA transcript in tissue sections by in situ hybridization. Results: RPL9 was found to be accumulating in the cytoplasm and was found to be up-regulated in lung cancer tissue sections as compared to normal lung tissue sections. The expression pattern for RPL9 in lung cancer was found to be significantly higher in small cell lung carcinoma, followed by Adernocarcima, Large cell carcinoma and least expressed in squamous cell lung carcinoma. Conclusion: The up-regulation of RPL9 in cancer tissues as compared to normal tissues suggest that RPL9 might be playing a crucial role in cell growth, development and cell proliferation. Determination of RPL9 expression in cancer can serve as a potentially useful marker to future studies for drug development aimed against cancer cells.


A molecular cytogenetic study has been performed in three species of the genus Artemisia , complementing previous works on two subgenera that had been scarcely studied from this standpoint, Artemisia ( A. chamaemelifolia, A. vulgaris ) and Absinthium ( A. absinthium ). Chromomycin A3 and 4',6-diamidino-2-phenylindole (DAPI) banding have been carried out, as well as fluorescent in situ hybridization (FISH) of 5S and 18S-5.8S-26S ribosomal DNA. Morphometrical data of karyotype characters were calculated and idiograms with the position of the AT- and GC-rich regions as well as rDNA loci were constructed. Colocalization of most of these regions has been observed, confirming previous findings in this genus. Both ribosomal DNA appear always colocalized, which is a distinct feature with respect to most angiosperms surveyed. Regarding the differential characteristics of each species, a symmetrical karyotype has been found in the species studied. Artemisia absinthium shows long chromosomes and absence of centromeric banding signals that, conversely, are absent in A. vulgaris and A. chamaemelifolia . The last species also presents B-chromosomes in which ribosomal DNA and heterochromatin have been detected. Despite these differences, karyotype morphology and signal pattern of the three species are quite coincidental. This might reflect a close phylogenetic relationship between both subgenera, which is consistent with the available molecular phylogenies presenting species of the subgenera Artemisia and Absinthium intermixed.


OBJECTIVE: To report the effect of cigarette smoking on the blood flow velocity of the ophthalmic artery (OA), central retinal artery (CRA), and posterior ciliary artery (PCA) in patients who smoke at least 20 cigarettes a day. METHODS: The color duplex scanner was used to measure the systolic and diastolic flow velocity of the OA, CRA, and PCA in 10 smokers and 11 nonsmokers. RESULTS: Both the systolic and diastolic flow velocity decreased in the OA, CRA, and PCA in smokers compared with nonsmokers. The systolic flow decreased by as much as 36% and the diastolic flow by as much as 52%. This decrease was significant for the flow velocity of the CRA and PCA but not for the OA. An increase in the resistance index was also found. CONCLUSION: The authors believe that the decrease in the flow velocity of these vessels may be due to an increase in the vascular resistance of the vessels of the retina and optic nerve head in smokers. This may be important in patients with eye disease in whom altered blood flow already contributes to the ocular or orbital pathology.


Active network is a new framework where network nodes not only forward packets, but also perform customized computation on the packet flowing through them. It provides a programmable interface to the user where users dynamically inject services into the intermediate nodes. This paper analyses the structure and mechanism of the active network management system (ANMS), studies the problems in active network management system, such as the structure of the node, transmitting mechanism and algorithm of the message, the time complication of all kinds of algorithms, etc


Title of Dissertation: THE ULTRAFAST NONLINEAR RESPONSE OF AIR MOLECULES AND ITS EFFECT ON FEMTOSECOND LASER PLASMA FILAMENTS IN ATMOSPHERE Yu-hsin Chen, Doctor of Philosophy, 2011 Directed by: Professor Howard M. Milchberg Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering The nonlinear propagation of an intense ultrafast laser pulse in atmosphere or other gas media leads to filamentation, a phenomenon useful for applications such as remote sensing, spectral broadening and shaping of ultrashort laser pulses, terahertz generation, and guiding of electrical discharges. Axially extended optical filaments result from the dynamic balance between nonlinear self-focusing in the gas and refraction from the free electron distribution generated by laser ionization. In the air, self-focusing is caused by two nonlinear optical processes: (1) the nearly-instantaneous, electronic response owing to the distortion of electron orbitals, and (2) the delayed, orientational effect due to the torque applied by the laser field on the molecules with anisotropic polarizability. To study their roles in filamentary propagation as well as influences on plasma generation in atmosphere, these effects were experimentally examined by a sensitive, spaceand time-resolved technique based on single-shot supercontinuum spectral interferometry (SSSI), which is capable of measuring ultrafast refractive index shift in the optical medium. A proof-of-principle experiment was first performed in optical glass and argon gas, showing good agreement between the laser pulse shape and the refractive index temporal evolution owing to pure instantaneous n2 effect. Then the delayed occurrence of the molecular alignment in the temporal vicinity of the femtosecond laser pulse, as well as the subsequent periodic "alignment revivals" due to the coherently excited rotational wavepacket were measured in various linear gas molecules, and the results agreed well with quantum perturbation theory. It was found that the magnitude of orientational response is much higher than the electronic response in N2 and O2, which implies that the molecular alignment is the dominant nonlinear effect in atmospheric propagation when the pulse duration is longer than ∼ 40 fs, the rotational response timescale of air molecules. Realizing the possibility of manipulating plasma generation by aligning air molecules, the molecular orientational effect was further investigated by a technique developed to directly measure, for the first time, the radial and axial plasma density in a meter-long filament. The experiment was performed using both ∼ 40 fs and ∼ 120 fs laser pulse durations while keeping the peak power fixed under various focusing conditions, and the alignment-assisted filamenation with∼ 2–3 times plasma density and much longer axial length was consistently observed with the longer pulse, which experienced larger refractive index shift and thus stronger self-focusing. Simulations reproduced the axial electron density measurements well for both long and short pulse durations, when using a peak magnitude of instantaneous response as < 15% of the rotational response. THE ULTRAFAST NONLINEAR RESPONSE OF AIR MOLECULES AND ITS EFFECT ON FEMTOSECOND LASER PLASMA FILAMENTS IN ATMOSPHERE


Projected levels of nitrogen availability resulting from seven different harvesting regimes in northern hardwoods were used as inputs to a forest growth model. Results were analysed in terms of differences in net production and total yield by treatment. Production was highest under long (90-year) rotations and was reduced under short (45- and 30-year) rotations. Intensive harvesting (whole tree and complete forest cutting) removed a greater percentage of net production than clear-cutting. Complete forest utilization on a 90-year rotation produced the greatest total yield assuming that all harvesting treatments had the same effect on rates of regeneration and successional changes in litter input to the forest floor.


This paper proposes an allocation control scheme to maximize resource sharing of grid connected inverters. Grid connected inverters with diverse capabilities are increasingly present in the utility grid and are regarded as key components in future Smartgrids and microgrids. Due to the aggregation of grid connected inverters in the power network, allocation of their available resources is a new challenge. The focus of this paper is the allocation of reactive power because more economical power distribution systems can be designed through increased flexibility. Thus, reactive power compensation through resource allocation results in deferrals of phased investments for power networks. Additional benefits include minimized transmission losses, enhanced energy efficiency, and improved power quality. In order to effectively allocate resources, selection of the control and communication methods for the inverters are critical because investment costs are relative. A virtual power management system with token ring communication is proposed to increase allocation capabilities. The proposed method acquires the load data of each inverter sequentially. During each turn, reactive power reference values are calculated so that each inverter's resources are properly allocated based on load conditions. A simulation based on the actual load data is used to validate the performance and additional benefits.


The Cayley-Dickson Construction is a generalization of the familiar construction of the complex numbers from pairs of real numbers. The complex numbers can be viewed as two-dimensional vectors equipped with a multiplication.
The construction can be used to construct, not only the two-dimensional Complex Numbers, but also the four-dimensional Quaternions and the eight-dimensional Octonions. Each of these vector spaces has a vector multiplication, v_1*v_2, that satisfies:
1. Each nonzero vector has a multiplicative inverse.
2. For the Euclidean length of a vector |v|, |v_1 * v_2| = |v_1| |v2|.
Real numbers can also be viewed as (one-dimensional) vectors with the above two properties.
ACL2(r) is used to explore this question: Given a vector space, equipped with a multiplication, satisfying the Euclidean length condition 2, given above. Make pairs of vectors into "new" vectors with a multiplication. When do the newly constructed vectors also satisfy condition 2?


To support large-scale live Internet broadcasting services in the content delivery networks (CDNs) efficiently, we consider a cost-effective multicast approach among the CDN servers in the backbone. This way, the access bandwidth demand can be reduced. The problem is to optimize routing paths among the service nodes in the multicast overlay backbone, and it has been proved to be NP-Hard. We will minimize the accumulative weighted latency from the source to the service nodes according to the number of clients served by each service node. We proposed an algorithm to optimize the multicast tree directly different from the traditional solutions to find paths and integrate them into a multicast tree. Simulation results showed that our algorithm performs well in seeking, converging speed and adaptability scale.


An aeroelastic analysis based on finite elements in space and time is used to model the helicopter rotor in forward flight. The rotor blade is represented as an elastic cantilever beam undergoing flap and lag bending, elastic torsion and axial deformations. The objective of the improved design is to reduce vibratory loads at the rotor hub that are the main source of helicopter vibration. Constraints are imposed on aeroelastic stability, and move limits are imposed on the blade elastic stiffness design variables. Using the aeroelastic analysis, response surface approximations are constructed for the objective function (vibratory hub loads). It is found that second order polynomial response surfaces constructed using the central composite design of the theory of design of experiments adequately represents the aeroelastic model in the vicinity of the baseline design. Optimization results show a reduction in the objective function of about 30 per cent. A key accomplishment of this paper is the decoupling of the analysis problem and the optimization problems using response surface methods, which should encourage the use of optimization methods by the helicopter industry. # 2002 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.


Statistical measures for group fairness in machine learning reflect the gap in performance of algorithms across different groups. These measures, however, exhibit a high variance between different training instances, which makes them unreliable for empirical evaluation of fairness. What causes this high variance? We investigate the impact on group fairness of different sources of randomness in training neural networks. We show that the variance in group fairness measures is rooted in the high volatility of the learning process on under-represented groups. Further, we recognize the dominant source of randomness as the stochasticity of data order during training. Based on these findings, we show how one can control group-level accuracy (i.e., model fairness), with high efficiency and negligible impact on the model's overall performance, by simply changing the data order for a single epoch.


We apply a surface thermal fluctuation spectroscopy technique to investigate the liquid nature of ionic liquid (IL) thin films and micro-droplets. While the spectrum for bulk IL was well explained by a simple Newtonian fluid model, a significant contribution of viscoelasticity was suggested for the vacuum-deposited thin films and micro-droplets. For a sample of IL micro-droplets with statistical distributions of their size and thickness, the scanning surface fluctuation spectroscopy was demonstrated to spatially map out the thickness and viscoelasticity values for effectively investigating the correlation between them, successfully reproducing a typical surface morphology of the sample as well.


In this paper, we consider the filtering of distributed parameter systems (DPS), i.e., systems governed by partial differential equations (PDE). We adopt a reduced order model (ROM) based strategy to solve the problem. We propose a randomly perturbed iterative version of the snapshot proper orthogonal decomposition (POD) technique, termed RI-POD, to construct ROMs for DPS that is capable of capturing their global behaviour. Further, the technique is entirely data based, and is applicable to forced as well as unforced systems. We apply the ROM generated using the RI-POD technique to construct reduced order Kalman filters to solve the DPS filtering problem. The methodology is tested on the 1-dimensional heat equation.


We present a catalog of new impacts on Mars. These craters formed in the last few decades, constrained with repeat orbital imaging. Crater diameters range from 58 m down to <1 m. For each impact, we report whether it formed a single crater or a cluster (58% clusters); albedo features of the blast zone (88% halos; 64% linear rays; 10% arcuate rays; majority dark‐toned; 4% light‐toned; 14% dual‐toned); and exposures of ice (4% definite; 2% possible). We find no trends in the occurrences of clusters with latitude, elevation, or impact size. Albedo features do not depend on atmospheric fragmentation. Halos are more prevalent at lower elevations, indicating an atmospheric pressure dependence; and around smaller impacts, which could be an observational bias. Linear rays are more likely to form from larger impacts into more consolidated material and may be enhanced by lower atmospheric pressure at higher elevations. Light‐ and dual‐toned blast zones occur in specific regions and more commonly around larger impacts, indicating excavation of compositionally distinct material. Surfaces covered with bright dust lacking cohesion are favored to form detectable surface features. The slope of the cumulative size frequency distribution for this data set is 2.2 for diameters >8 m (differential slope 2.9), significantly shallower than the slope of new lunar craters. We believe that no systematic biases exist in the Martian data set sufficient to explain the discrepancy. This catalog is complete at the time of writing, although observational biases exist, and new discoveries continue.


After children were pictured sewing its running shoes in the early 1990s, Nike at first disavowed the"working conditions in its suppliers' factories", before public pressure led them to take responsibility for ethics in their upstream supply chain. In 2023, OpenAI responded to criticism that Kenyan workers were paid less than $2 per hour to filter traumatic content from its ChatGPT model by stating in part that it had outsourced the work to a subcontractor, who managed workers' payment and mental health concerns. In this position paper, we argue that policy interventions for AI Ethics must consider AI as a supply chain problem, given how the political economy and intra-firm relations structure AI production, in particular examining opportunities upstream.


Author(s): Edenberg, Ellen R. | Advisor(s): Toczyski, David P | Abstract: One of the biggest challenges a cell faces is stably maintaining its genome in the face of constant exposure to DNA damage from both exogenous and endogenous sources. Upon DNA damage, cells activate a conserved checkpoint that allows them to activate DNA repair machinery and arrest the cell cycle (checkpoint is reviewed in more detail in Chapter 1). The CLB2 cluster is a transcriptional cluster of thirty-three co-regulated mitotic genes that include many important regulators of mitosis. As such, this cluster is a hub for regulation of mitosis both during the cell cycle and in response to DNA damage. In response to DNA damage, budding yeast cells arrest in metaphase, but transcription of this mitotic gene cluster is low. We find that the checkpoint kinase Rad53 is responsible for inhibiting the transcriptional activator of this cluster, Ndd1, in order to maintain low levels of transcription (Chapter 2). However, since transcription of this cluster is not entirely repressed in response to DNA damage, in the absence of additional regulation, proteins that are transcribed as part of this cluster could accumulate over time. Hst3 is the histone deacetylase for histone H3 lysine 56 acetylation (H3K56-Ac), which is a cell cycle and damage-regulated chromatin mark. As H3K56-Ac must be maintained in response to DNA damage, Hst3 levels must be kept low. In addition to the transcriptional regulation of Hst3 as a member of the CLB2 cluster, Hst3 protein turnover is increased in response to DNA damage (Chapter 3) through SCFCdc4-dependent turnover. Finally, we turn to the transcriptional activator Ndd1, which is itself a hub for regulation of CLB2 cluster transcription and therefore mitosis. We find that Ndd1 is itself regulated by protein turnover during the cell cycle and in response to DNA damage (Chapter 4). Because the CLB2 cluster is composed of so many important mitotic regulators, many transcriptional and post-transcriptional mechanisms impinge on the members of this cluster, enabling fine-tuned control of mitosis during the cell cycle and in response to DNA damage.


In this work, we propose and study a preconditioned framework with a graphic Ginzburg-Landau functional for image segmentation and data clustering by parallel computing. Solving nonlocal models is usually challenging due to the huge computation burden. For the nonconvex and nonlocal variational functional, we propose several damped Jacobi and generalized Richardson preconditioners for the large-scale linear systems within a difference of convex functions algorithms framework. They are efficient for parallel computing with GPU and can leverage the computational cost. Our framework also provides flexible step sizes with a global convergence guarantee. Numerical experiments show the proposed algorithms are very competitive compared to the singular value decomposition based spectral method.


Sclerotinia sclerotiorum is a destructive pathogen and has a wide range of hosts, including sunflower. The fungus produces sclerotia, which is a dormant structure and plays a vital role in the infection cycle of S. sclerotiorum . The initiation and maturation of sclerotia can be influenced by many factors. In this study, S. sclerotiorum isolate X-8, was collected from a diseased sunflower plant, and used to determine the role of H 2 O 2 and cyclic adenosine 3', 5'-monophosphate (cAMP)  in the sclerotia initiation and maturation. Results showed that the transition of S. sclerotiorum from vegetative growth to the initial stage of sclerotia is accompanied by a decrease of H2O2 and exogenously supplying H2O2 or diphenyleneiodonium chloride (DPI), an inhibitor of NADPH oxidase, in the culture medium promoted or inhibited the initiation of sclerotia, respectively. In addition, the cAMP-induced inhibition of sclerotia initiation and maturation were also accompanied by significantly decrease of H2O2. This was achieved by down- regulating the transcripts of Nox1 and Nox2 genes, the isoform of NADPH oxidase. Additionally, a decreased enzymatic activity of both superoxide dismutase (SOD) and catalase (CAT) were also detected in S. sclerotiorum after cAMP treatment. We concluded that H2O2 not only regulates the formation of sclerotia, but also cross-talks with cAMP in regulating the inhibition of sclerotial initiation and maturation.


The sirtuin/Sir2 (Silent information regulator 2) family of NAD+-dependent deacetylases and mono-ADP-ribosyltransferases plays a part in several cellular processes including gene silencing, cell cycle regulation and life span extension in yeast and animals. However, information about their occurrence and role in the plant genomes is scarce. Recently, two putative sirtuin genes encoding a SIRT4-like and a SIRT7-like protein respectively were identified in the grapevine genome. Starting from the putative coding sequences present in the database, we have been able to obtain two long fragments of the true coding sequences for each sirtuin gene. In order to better understand the physiological role of both sirtuins, in vitro assays were carried out. We could demonstrate only very weak NAD+-dependent deacetylase activity in vitro, either in the absence or the presence of resveratrol, a naturally occurring phytoalexin which is synthesized in stressed grapevine cells and which is able to activate sirtuins in several organisms. Moreover we did not observe mono-ADP-ribosyltransferase activity in either of the proteins. Finally, we investigated the expression of both sirtuin genes under conditions of stress, such as in the presence methyl jasmonate and UV-C irradiation. Our preliminary assays showed that neither methyl jasmonate nor UV-C rays influence the expression of these grapevine sirtuin genes.


Regulatory authorities have a crucial role in communicating about the vaccines they license. In terms of content and timing, their communication to the public is usually driven by data on quality, safety and efficacy. However, concerns over safety and vaccine hesitancy have emerged in some communities in various countries, and this demands a new approach to communication, starting with listening to the public debate. Reviewing communication research findings, coming in particular from the cognitive, decision‐making and media sciences, constitutes one mechanism of listening and has led the European Union (EU) regulatory network to developing guidance about which common concerns and information needs of the public to address through proactive and prepared communication. The guidance has been welcomed by EU and international fora. The current article summarizes the recommendations and shares the underlying research findings, as well as a proof of concept that communication research can be valuable for regulators. It is critical that regulators integrate the communication process with product risk assessment in the framework of pharmacovigilance, to ensure that public concerns are addressed in the assessments and that information about evidence and uncertainty relating to safety is provided to the public and vaccination policy makers in a specific, clear and accurate manner. Additionally, information from regulatory authorities should support healthcare professionals in their communication with patients. Meeting the information interests of the public is the principal prerequisite for informed decisions as well as safe and effective use of vaccines and medicines overall. This is also fundamental for trust in the authorities' commitment to patient and population health.


OF DISSERTATION THERAPEUTIC POTENTIAL OF TARGETING REACTIVE OXYGEN SPECIES (ROS) STRESS IN MYELODYSPLASTIC SYNDROME (MDS) Myelodysplastic syndromes (MDS) are a diverse group of clonal hematologic disorders characterized by ineffective blood cell production (hematopoiesis), dysplastic (abnormal) cell morphology in one or more hematopoietic lineages, and progression to acute myeloid leukemia (AML). The response rate to current FDA approved therapies is low and not durable. Just about 50% of MDS patients respond to these drug therapies and a majority of responders relapse within 2-3 years. Hence there is a compelling need to investigate new therapy options. We investigated the anticancer potential and possible underlying molecular mechanisms of action of a plant-derived compound, Withaferin A (WFA) in MDS. We utilized the MDS-L cell line model to test the efficacy of WFA both in vitro and in vivo. WFA exhibited potent but selective cytotoxicity to MDS-L cells as seen by a dose-dependent decrease in cell viability of these cells when treated with WFA whereas WFA had no apparent significant effect on the viability of normal primary human bone marrow cells. In addition, WFA significantly reduced engraftment of MDS-L cells in a xenotransplantation model. Through the use of microarray gene expression analysis, we identified that reactive oxygen species (ROS)-activated JNK/AP-1 signaling is a major pathway mediating apoptosis of MDS-L cells by WFA. Increase in ROS plays a central role in the cytotoxicity of WFA in MDS-L cells. Consistent with the finding that increase in ROS plays a central role in mediating WFA cytotoxicity in MDS-L cells, WFA did not increase ROS levels in normal bone marrow cells. Taken together, these results suggest that pharmacologic manipulation of redox biology could be exploited to selectively target malignant cells while sparing normal cells in MDS.


Abstract Objective: To perform a systematic review of the health economic evidence on the care of children and adolescents with complex clinical conditions, comparing groups included and not included (control group) in palliative care at the end of life. Data source: The seven databases searched were PubMed, Embase, Web of Science, Cochrane Library, Virtual Health Library–Latin American and Caribbean Health Sciences Literature (VHL-LILACS), EBSCOhost, and Paediatric Economic Database Evaluation, following recommendations of the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) Statement, from January 1979 to November 2020. The review included studies of patients under 18 years of age with complex clinical conditions that compared a palliative care group with a control group. The economic outcomes analyzed were length and place of stay at the end of life (home, hospice, ward, intensive care unit, emergency room), diagnostic and therapeutic procedures performed, and health-related costs. The exclusion criteria were: studies without a matched control group, conference/congress abstracts, letters to the editor, editorials, comments, qualitative studies, narrative reviews, studies with ten or fewer participants in each group, articles published in languages other than English, Portuguese, or Spanish. Data synthesis: Out of the 518 articles identified, 4 met the inclusion criteria. We found evidence of direct economic benefits, such as reduced health costs, indirect savings, and protection of patients from undergoing invasive procedures, surgeries, and costly therapies, which cause greater suffering at the end of life. Therefore, participating in a palliative care program saved financial and technological resources, besides increasing the frequency of deaths at home and improving the quality of life. Conclusions: Public and private policies to promote palliative care represent better efficiency when allocating available health care resources.


Customer satisfaction is an ever-growing concern of management throughout the world. To find the way to increase customer satisfaction, we must understand customer requirements. Kano distinguishes between five types of customer requirements which influence customer satisfaction in different way when met. The objectives of this paper are to divide the quality of education service through the Kano Model. The concept was applied to A Airlines. In so doing, several satisfying and dissatisfying quality factors in education service were identified. Further, several academic and practical implication for education service were proposed.


Predictive graph mining approaches in chemical databases are extremely popular and effective. Most of these approaches first extract frequent sub-graphs and then use them as features to build predictive models. In the work presented here, the approach taken is similar. However, instead of frequent sub-graphs, frequent trees, based on SMILES strings are derived. For this, the SMILES strings of chemical compounds are decomposed into fragment trees, which in turn are mined for interesting sub-trees. These tree based patterns are then used as features by a classifier to build predictive models. The approach is experimentally evaluated on a real world chemical data set.


Scat is frequently used to study animal diets because it is easy to find and collect, but one concern is that gross fecal analysis (GFA) techniques exaggerate the importance of small-bodied prey to mammalian mesopredator diets. To capitalize on the benefits of scat, we suggest the analysis of scat carbon and nitrogen isotope values (δ13C and δ15N). This technique offers researchers a non-invasive method to gather short-term dietary information. We conducted three interrelated studies to validate the use of isotopic values from coyote scat: 1) we determined tissue-to-tissue apparent C and N isotope enrichment factors (ε13* and ε15*) for coyotes from road kill animals (n = 4); 2) we derived diet-to-scat isotope discrimination factors for coyotes; and 3) we used field collected coyote scats (n = 12) to compare estimates of coyote dietary proportions from stable isotope mixing models with estimates from two GFA techniques. Scat consistently had the lowest δ13C and δ15N values among the tissues sampled. We derived a diet-to-scat Δ13C value of -1.5‰ ± 1.6‰ and Δ15N value of 2.3‰ ± 1.3‰ for coyotes. Coyote scat δ13C and δ15N values adjusted for discrimination consistently plot within the isotopic mixing space created by known dietary items. In comparison with GFA results, we found that mixing model estimates of coyote dietary proportions de-emphasize the importance of small-bodied prey. Coyote scat δ13C and δ15N values therefore offer a relatively quick and non-invasive way to gain accurate dietary information.


In 2008, approximately 4,500 people in Germany died in traffic accidents and around 71,000 people were badly injured. Altogether, yearly productivity loss caused by these injuries is estimated to be around 5 billion Euros. International and national studies revealed the trauma centre level of the primary hospital as the major predictor for trauma-related mortality. In 2006, the German Society for Trauma Surgery (DGU) called its members to form regionally based networks of hospitals engaged in trauma care. In April 2008, 45 hospitals in the north-west region of Germany, two hospitals from the Netherlands, and the local emergency services founded the "TraumaNetwork NorthWest (TNNW)." The major goals of these networks are: 1) To shorten the time between accident and admission to the appropriate hospital, 2) to create effective ways of communication, and 3) to implement common preand in-hospital standards for trauma care. In order to improve acute trauma care, we looked for new ways of communicating from hospital to hospital, as well as from emergency services to hospitals. Local emergency services will be able to locate the site of an accident on a digital map and find the next (in terms of transport time under emergency conditions) appropriate hospital with free capacity. The emergency physician at the accident site also has an overview of the nearest trauma centres on a hand-held device and can contact them if required. Hospitals can exchange diagnostic data (e.g., CT scans) securely via a fast Internet connection and view the scans either on their own radiology workstation or on an integrated web viewer. Since the necessary software is not commercially available, a team of computer and medical specialists was commissioned for developing the software for commercial use. After the software is in place, a preand post-analysis will be performed to study the consequences of the new communication on transport time and injury-related mortality within the region. The project is recognized as a pilot project by the DGU and – if successful – is meant to be adapted across Germany. Introduction In 2008, approximately 4,500 people in Germany died in traffic accidents and around 71,000 people were badly injured. Altogether, yearly productivity loss caused by injuries is estimated to be around 5 billion Euros. International and national studies revealed the level of the primary trauma care hospital as the major predictor for trauma-related mortality. Improving Communication in Acute Trauma Christian Juhra, Frank Uckert, Thomas Weber, Sebastian Hentsch, Rene Hartensuer, Thomas Vordemvenne and Michael J. Raschke


To the Editor. —We read with great interest the article by Kritchevsky et al1describing two patients who did not develop any memory defect after infarction in the dorsomedial (DM) nucleus of the thalamus. To localize the lesion, and to estimate the volume of the nucleus involved, they used magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) with a stereotaxic method, a modification of that described by Archer et al2and Graff-Radford et al.3One patient had a right-sided lesion involving about 15% of the DM nucleus, and the other had bilateral lesions that affected about 15% of the left side of the DM nucleus and less than 5% of the right side of the DM nucleus. In the stereotaxic method they used, errors on the order of millimeters can inevitably arise. First, although they used the center of the lesion as a reference point, it is difficult to determine the


The full length cry2Ab gene was cloned by PCR-RFLP method from Bt strain B-Pr-88, which was isolated in China with high toxicity to the Lepidopteran insect pests. Nucleic acid sequence analysis showed that this gene was 1902 base pairs encoding 633 amino acids. This cry gene was named cry2Ab4 as a novel gene by Bacillus thuringiensis Delta Endotoxin Nomenclature Committee. The full open reading frame sequence of the cry2Ab4 gene was amplified with a pair of PCR primers L2ab5/L2ab3 designed according to its DNA sequence,and inserted into the BamH I /EcoR I sites of E. coli expression vector pET21b to obtain the recombinant plasmid pET-2Ab4. The result of SDS-PAGE proved that Cry2Ab4 could be expressed as a 60 kD protein in E. coli BL21 (DE3)strain induced by IPTG. Bioassay of the expressed product of the cry2Ab4 gene showed that Cry2Ab4 was highly toxic to the larvae of Helicoverpa armigera and Leguminivora glycinivorella, moderately active to the larvae of Plutella xylostella and Chilo suppressalis, but not insecticidal to the larvae of Spodotera exigua and Ostrinia furnacalis. Our result indicated that cry2Ab4 gene could be used as a novel gene for generation of transgenic plants and engineered microorganism.


Comparative analysis of chlorina and cpSRP mutants provides the novel genetic evidence for the flexible organization of light-harvesting complexes and their dynamic and reversible allocation to the two photosystems. State transitions in photosynthesis provide for the dynamic allocation of a mobile fraction of light-harvesting complex II (LHCII) to photosystem II (PSII) in state I and to photosystem I (PSI) in state II. In the state I-to-state II transition, LHCII is phosphorylated by STN7 and associates with PSI to favor absorption cross-section of PSI. Here, we used Arabidopsis (Arabidopsis thaliana) mutants with defects in chlorophyll (Chl) b biosynthesis or in the chloroplast signal recognition particle (cpSRP) machinery to study the flexible formation of PS-LHC supercomplexes. Intriguingly, we found that impaired Chl b biosynthesis in chlorina1-2 (ch1-2) led to preferentially stabilized LHCI rather than LHCII, while the contents of both LHCI and LHCII were equally depressed in the cpSRP43-deficient mutant (chaos). In view of recent findings on the modified state transitions in LHCI-deficient mutants (Benson et al., 2015), the ch1-2 and chaos mutants were used to assess the influence of varying LHCI/LHCII antenna size on state transitions. Under state II conditions, LHCII-PSI supercomplexes were not formed in both ch1-2 and chaos plants. LHCII phosphorylation was drastically reduced in ch1-2, and the inactivation of STN7 correlates with the lack of state transitions. In contrast, phosphorylated LHCII in chaos was observed to be exclusively associated with PSII complexes, indicating a lack of mobile LHCII in chaos. Thus, the comparative analysis of ch1-2 and chaos mutants provides new evidence for the flexible organization of LHCs and enhances our understanding of the reversible allocation of LHCII to the two photosystems.


Already for more than a decade, consumer electronic devices have been available for entertainment, educational, or telecommunication tasks based on multimedia streaming applications, i.e., applications that process streams of audio and video samples in digital form. Multimedia capabilities are expected to become more and more commonplace in portable devices. This leads to challenges with respect to cost efficiency and quality. This thesis contributes models and analysis techniques for improving the cost efficiency, and therefore also the quality, of multimedia devices. Portable consumer electronic devices should feature flexible functionality on the one hand and low power consumption on the other hand. Those two requirements are conflicting. Therefore, we focus on a class of hardware that represents a good trade-off between those two requirements, namely on domain-specific multiprocessor systems-on-chip (MP-SoC). Our research work contributes to dynamic (i.e., run-time) optimization of MP-SoC system metrics. The central question in this area is how to ensure that real-time constraints are satisfied and the metric of interest such as perceived multimedia quality or power consumption is optimized. In these cases, we speak of quality-of-service (QoS) and power management, respectively. In this thesis, we pursue real-time constraint satisfaction that is guaranteed by the system by construction and proven mainly based on analytical reasoning. That approach is often taken in real-time systems to ensure reliable performance. Therefore the performance analysis has to be conservative, i.e. it has to use pessimistic assumptions on the unknown conditions that can negatively influence the system performance. We adopt this hypothesis as the foundation of this work. Therefore, the subject of this thesis is the analysis of guaranteed performance for multimedia applications running on multiprocessors. It is very important to note that our conservative approach is essentially different from considering only the worst-case state of the system. Unlike the worst-case approach, our approach is dynamic, i.e. it makes use of run-time characteristics of the input data and the environment of the application. The main purpose of our performance analysis method is to guide the run-time optimization. Typically, a resource or quality manager predicts the execution time, i.e., the time it takes the system to process a certain number of input data samples. When the execution times get smaller, due to dependency of the execution time on the input data, the manager can switch the control parameter for the metric of interest such that the metric improves but the system gets slower. For power optimization, that means switching to a low-power mode. If execution times grow, the manager can set parameters so that the system gets faster. For QoS management, for example, the application can be switched to a different quality mode with some degradation in perceived quality. The real-time constraints are then never violated and the metrics of interest are kept as good as possible. Unfortunately, maintaining system metrics such as power and quality at the optimal level contradicts with our main requirement, i.e., providing performance guarantees, because for this one has to give up some quality or power consumption. Therefore, the performance analysis approach developed in this thesis is not only conservative, but also accurate, so that the optimization of the metric of interest does not suffer too much from conservativity. This is not trivial to realize when two factors are combined: parallel execution on multiple processors and dynamic variation of the data-dependent execution delays. We achieve the goal of conservative and accurate performance estimation for an important class of multiprocessor platforms and multimedia applications. Our performance analysis technique is realizable in practice in QoS or power management setups. We consider a generic MP-SoC platform that runs a dynamic set of applications, each application possibly using multiple processors. We assume that the applications are independent, although it is possible to relax this requirement in the future. To support real-time constraints, we require that the platform can provide guaranteed computation, communication and memory budgets for applications. Following important trends in system-on-chip communication, we support both global buses and networks-on-chip. We represent every application as a homogeneous synchronous dataflow (HSDF) graph, where the application tasks are modeled as graph nodes, called actors. We allow dynamic datadependent actor execution delays, which makes HSDF graphs very useful to express modern streaming applications. Our reason to consider HSDF graphs is that they provide a good basic foundation for analytical performance estimation. In this setup, this thesis provides three major contributions: 1. Given an application mapped to an MP-SoC platform, given the performance guarantees for the individual computation units (the processors) and the communication unit (the network-on-chip), and given constant actor execution delays, we derive the throughput and the execution time of the system as a whole. 2. Given a mapped application and platform performance guarantees as in the previous item, we extend our approach for constant actor execution delays to dynamic datadependent actor delays. 3. We propose a global implementation trajectory that starts from the application specification and goes through design-time and run-time phases. It uses an extension of the HSDF model of computation to reflect the design decisions made along the trajectory. We present our model and trajectory not only to put the first two contributions into the right context, but also to present our vision on different parts of the trajectory, to make a complete and consistent story. Our first contribution uses the idea of so-called IPC (inter-processor communication) graphs known from the literature, whereby a single model of computation (i.e., HSDF graphs) are used to model not only the computation units, but also the communication unit (the global bus or the network-on-chip) and the FIFO (first-in-first-out) buffers that form a 'glue' between the computation and communication units. We were the first to propose HSDF graph structures for modeling bounded FIFO buffers and guaranteed throughput network connections for the network-on-chip communication in MP-SoCs. As a result, our HSDF models enable the formalization of the on-chip FIFO buffer capacity minimization problem under a throughput constraint as a graph-theoretic problem. Using HSDF graphs to formalize that problem helps to find the performance bottlenecks in a given solution to this problem and to improve this solution. To demonstrate this, we use the JPEG decoder application case study. Also, we show that, assuming constant – worst-case for the given JPEG image – actor delays, we can predict execution times of JPEG decoding on two processors with an accuracy of 21%. Our second contribution is based on an extension of the scenario approach. This approach is based on the observation that the dynamic behavior of an application is typically composed of a limited number of sub-behaviors, i.e., scenarios, that have similar resource requirements, i.e., similar actor execution delays in the context of this thesis. The previous work on scenarios treats only single-processor applications or multiprocessor applications that do not exploit all the flexibility of the HSDF model of computation. We develop new scenario-based techniques in the context of HSDF graphs, to derive the timing overlap between different scenarios, which is very important to achieve good accuracy for general HSDF graphs executing on multiprocessors. We exploit this idea in an application case study – the MPEG-4 arbitrarily-shaped video decoder, and demonstrate execution time prediction with an average accuracy of 11%. To the best of our knowledge, for the given setup, no other existing performance technique can provide a comparable accuracy and at the same time performance guarantees.


Abstract This paper examines whether on-the-job embeddedness moderates the impact of work and family conflict on leaving intention. Drawing on conservation of resources theory, the paper investigates the buffering effect of the three on-the-job embeddedness components (fit, links and sacrifice). Contrary to predictions, in this sample of white-collar manufacturing employees on-the-job fit embeddedness had no effect on the relationship between work and family conflict and leaving intention. As predicted, on-the-job link embeddedness weakened the effect and on-the-job sacrifice embeddedness strengthened the effect of work and life conflict on leaving intention. The results suggest that organisations can reduce turnover intention during times of work and life conflict by developing employee on-the-job link embeddedness.


A stereoselective multicomponent reaction involving Meldrum's acid, a conjugated dienal, and an alcohol is reported. Valuable cyclopenta[ b]furan-2-ones are obtained as products of this straightforward transformation, which is accompanied by the formation of four stereocenters, two new cycles, and four new bonds (two C-C and two C-heteroatom). A reaction mechanism was elaborated involving an initial Knoevenagel condensation followed by cycloisomerization and eventual fragmentation.


Background: There is a dearth of data on ballistic related injury from developing countries. The pattern of gunshot injuries from Uyo, Akwa-Ibom State is yet to be evaluated. The aim of this study was to evaluate the pattern of gunshot injuries presenting to the tertiary hospital in Uyo, Akwa-Ibom State over a 22 month period from 2013 to 2014, using data from the trauma registry at the University of Uyo Teaching Hospital.
Methods: A retrospective study. Data on gunshot injuries in 2013 and 2014 was abstracted from the trauma registry.Results: Twenty-seven patients sustained gunshot injury over the period of the study. The male to female ratio was 5.8:1. Mean age was 34 years. Median time to presentation was 5.1 hours (IQR) (2.9 - 10.4). Seventy percent of injuries occurred at home or on the road. Twenty six percent of injuries occurred in the trunk.  The low to medium socioeconomic group had 88.9% of the patients.
Conclusion: The pattern of gunshot injuries in Uyo, Akwa-Ibom State are similar to that found in other non-combatant zones of Nigeria. However, it was noted that the numbers per year were relatively fewer than those from the South-West of Nigeria; most patients were from the low to medium socioeconomic group.


Tuberculous (TB) meningitis or tubercular meningitis is a Mycobacterium tuberculosis infection of the meninges—the system of membranes which envelop the central nervous system. Molecular tests like the automated rapid molecular assay Xpert® MTB/RIF greatly expedites the detection of M. tuberculosis complex and rifampicin resistance. We report a 22-year old man with cerebral lupus and concurrent rifampicin resistance tuberculous meningitis which was detected by Xpert® MTB/RIF test in the cerebrospinal fluid. The rifampicin resistance in this patient was due to poor compliance. The patient took one tablet of akurit-4 throughout the intensive phase of treatment. This report highlights the usefulness of molecular testing which allowed a faster diagnosis than a bacteriologic confirmation of drug resistant tuberculosis. This is important as early diagnosis and treatment leads to better outcome in TBM.


Pheochromocytoma and paraganglioma are catecholamine secreting tumors. Malignancy is uncommon - approximately 10% for pheochromocytoma and 20% for paraganglyoma. Surgery, when possible, is the first line treatment. Prognosis is poor because of a frequent local recurrence and/or metastases and the lack of specific chemotherapeutic agents. We report the case of a 60 years old man who was hospitalized at the age of 48 for episodes of paroxystic hypertension with spells. The high levels of vanillylmandelic acid (VMA), more than 50 mg/24h at 3 determinations, confirmed the excess of catecholamine, but the CT scan failed to reveal the tumor. The iodine-131- meta-iodobenzylguanidine (I-MIBG) scintigraphy showed the presence of a 1.5 cm nodule in the left abdominal paraaortic region. The patient refused surgery and had a satisfactory evolution with antihypertensive therapy. 11 years later he was admitted in the Vascular Surgery Department for acute ischemia of inferior limbs; a voluminous para-aortic tumor was diagnosed and resected. The pathology confirmed paraganglioma and described some atypical cells without being able to discriminate between benign or malignant pattern. Anamnesis could not identify any other case in the family. After another year he was admitted in the Endocrine Department for the reappearance of the adrenergic syndrome, with VMA at 30.8 mg/24h. The thoracic and abdominal CT-scan showed abdominal and thoracic metastatic tumors. The patient was referred to a specialized center were octeotride scintigraphy confirmed local recurrence and metastatic tumors in the lungs. He was treated with Sunitinib with a good initial response and he died after 16 years from the initial diagnostic of paraganglioma.


Background and Objective The association between plasma betaine levels and cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) has been revealed except for pulmonary hypertension (PH). In this study, we aimed to explore the role of betaine in patients with PH. Methods Inpatients with PH at Fuwai Hospital were enrolled after excluding relative comorbidities. Each patient received at least one follow-up through a clinical visit, and the fasting blood was obtained both at the first and second hospitalization for betaine detection. The primary endpoint was defined as composite outcome events and the mean duration was 14.3 (6.9, 21.3) months. The associations of betaine and changes of betaine (Δbetaine) with disease severity and prognosis were explored. Results Finally, a total of 216 patients with PH were included and the medians for betaine plasma levels in the total patients group, low betaine, and high betaine groups were 49.8 (39.0, 68.3) μM, 39.0 (33.5, 44.7) μM, and 68.1 (57.8, 88.7) μM, respectively. High betaine was associated with poor World Health Organization Functional Class (WHO-FC), increased N-terminal pro-brain natriuretic peptide (NT-proBNP), low tricuspid annular plane systolic excursion (TAPSE), and cardiac output index even after adjusting for confounders. Patients with high betaine were over twice the risk to receive the poor prognosis than those with a low level [hazard ratio (HR) = 2.080, (95% CI: 1.033–4.188)]. Moreover, the decrease of betaine level after further treatment was positively correlated to ΔNT-proBNP indicating Δbetaine might be an effector of disease severity, and dynamic increase of betaine was also associated with poor prognosis in PH. Conclusion Betaine was associated with disease severity and might be an effector in PH. Patients with increased levels or with dynamic rise of betaine heralded a poor prognosis.


An experiment was conducted to study the effect of egg size on embryo development, heat production, and energy partitioning between egg and hatchling. Small (56.1 +/- 0.12 g SEM) and large (70.0 +/- 0.11 g SEM) hatching eggs were incubated in climate respiration chambers, and eggshell temperature was maintained constant at 37.8 degrees C in both egg weight classes by adjusting machine temperature. Dry matter, ash, protein, and fat contents were determined in albumen, yolk, yolk-free body (YFB), and residual yolk (RY), and carbohydrate contents and caloric values were calculated. To achieve a constant eggshell temperature, machine temperature needed to be set lower from d 15 onward, coinciding with increased heat production in large eggs compared with small eggs. Selective nutrient uptake resulted in higher fat content and lower protein content in RY in chicks that hatched from small eggs compared with large eggs. The respiration quotient in small and large eggs was the same, and embryos in small and large eggs were equally efficient in the transfer of energy from egg to YFB. The surplus availability of nutrients in large eggs was therefore held responsible for the absolute and relative higher weight of RY in chicks that hatched from large eggs compared with small eggs.


The relationships between productivity and plant species diversity were assessed using data from the Sustainable Grazing Systems (SGS) 10 national experiment sites. Each site applied up to 7 different management treatments. Sites varied in the amount of data available for analysis. Plant species diversity was assessed in terms of both the total and native species present at each site. More than 200 plant taxa were recorded over the period of the experiment, about one-third of which were native. In the majority of cases, the native species present within a treatment remained there throughout the experiments, even when fertilised and oversown with introduced species. The number of native species increased by 1 or 2 over the 3–4 years of each experiment where grasslands were less intensively used (average herbage mass >2 t DM/ha), but decreased in more heavily grazed treatments. Native grasses made much greater contributions to herbage mass than other native species. Of the more than 70 native plant species found, the most numerous were broadleaf species, which tended to be more variable under management treatments. As total species richness increased, there was a tendency for pasture productivity to be less, for the mean standing herbage mass to be less and for seasonal growth to be less stable. This depended upon experiments and tended to apply at the sites with higher annual pasture growth rates. All treatments had >10 plant species within the small (about 1.5 ha) paddocks used and larger paddocks often had many more. It was apparent from the high plant species richness at each site (about 25–100 species) that many more niches exist in these paddocks than the number of species usually sown in a pasture. Opportunities to redesign pasture mixtures to exploit more of the resources available obviously exist. Understanding of the relationships among management practices, productivity and plant species diversity is limited, but will become important as we seek more sustainable grazing systems. The studies analysed here suggested that where the herbage mass was maintained between 2 and 4 t DM/ha then species were maintained and productivity was optimised.


Apseudo-spectral approximation is presented to solve the problemof pull-in instability in a cantilevermicro-switch. Aswell known, pull-in instability arises when the acting force reaches a critical threshold beyond which equilibrium is no longer possible. In particular, Coulomb electrostatic force is considered, although the method can be easily generalized to account for fringe as well as Casimir effects. A numerical comparison is presented between a pseudo-spectral and a Finite Element (FE) approximation of the problem, both methods employing the same number of degrees of freedom. It is shown that the pseudo-spectral method appears more effective in accurately approximating the behavior of the cantilever near its tip. This fact is crucial to capturing the threshold voltage on the verge of pull-in. Conversely, the FE approximation presents rapid successions of attracting/repulsing regions along the cantilever, which are not restricted to the near pull-in regime.


Some applications of computer graphics to archeology are described. One project involved making a solid model of part of the Roman temple excavated at Bath, England, and its surroundings, comprising the Temple of Sulis Minerva, its precinct with surrounding colonnade, the Facade of the Four Seasons, and the barrel-roofed bathhouse that formerly enclosed what is now called the King's Bath. This model was constructed using a newly developed ray caster called DORA (divided object-space ray-casting algorithm). A second model was done of the Roman Fortress Baths in Caerleon, Wales. A quantity of archaeological graphics, both reconstructions and displays of data such as resistivity results, were also produced.<<ETX>>


The present study was designed to investigate the role of spinal neuronal nicotinic acetylcholine receptors in the analgesic effects of isoflurane. After having established the mice model of analgesia by intraperitoneally injecting (i.p.) appropriate doses of isoflurane, nicotine, a neuronal nicotinic acetylcholine receptor agonist was intrathecally injected. The effects of isoflurane and nicotine on paw licking times and formalin-induced c-fos expression in the spinal cord dorsal horn were examined. Our correlative studies have shown that isoflurane can decrease the paw licking times and simultaneously suppress c-fos expression after injection of formalin in the mice. Nicotine can partially antagonize the effects induced by isoflurane above. Spinal neuronal nicotinic acetylcholine receptors may be important targets for the analgesic effects of isoflurane in formalin pain.


The spin-polarized transport through two-level quantum dots weakly coupled to ferromagnetic leads is considered theoretically in the Coulomb blockade regime. It is assumed that the dot is doubly occupied, so that the current flows due to cotunneling through singlet and triplet states of the dot. It is shown that transport characteristics strongly depend on the ground state of the quantum dot. If the ground state is a singlet, differential conductance (G) displays a broad minimum at low bias voltage, while tunnel magnetoresistance (TMR) is given by the Julliere value. If the ground state of the system is a triplet, there is a maximum in differential conductance at zero bias when the leads form the antiparallel configuration. The maximum is accompanied by a minimum in TMR. The different behavior of G and TMR may thus help to determine the ground state of the dot and the energy difference between the singlet and triplet states.


The relative contributions of free waves and bound waves to the formation of an extreme wave event remains a topic of interest in offshore engineering. A variety of methods have been proposed for identifying and removing the bound wave components. The method of "phase separation" or "phase manipulation" repeats simulations/experiments of a wave field with an offset in the initial phase of the wave components and relies upon summation of the resulting wave fields to isolate the bound harmonics, following from a Stokes expansion in steepness; the method has proven effective in isolating bound harmonics but requires that all cases be repeated. Alternatively, the bound harmonics can be removed using a three-dimensional fast Fourier transform (3D-FFT) of the wave field. However, the Fourier transform requires periodicity in the signal and assumes homogeneity in space and stationarity in time, producing spurious modes otherwise. We compare the phase separation and 3D-FFT approaches for a steep, focusing wave group in deep water using the numerical simulation tool, OceanWave3D, and discuss the effectiveness of both methods.


Stress prevalence in the larger society also affects library practitioners. This makes stress studies amongst these information professionals both topical and challenging. The subsisting dearth of stress-based reports in the library professional literature available to the researchers provided further motivation for this investigation. The research setting is Imo State of Nigeria while the subjects of study consist of librarians and library officers drawn from different in the state libraries. Data were collected through a customized questionnaire designed to elicit information on signs, types, causes, consequences and remedies to stress among the respondents. Results show that the major signs of stress are tiredness, headache, forgetfulness and insomnia resulting from unfavorable situations and events at home and work place, in addition t, negative personal lifestyle. The major consequences of stress revealed in this study included: decline in productivity, quarrelsomeness, martial crises and in health complications. Adequate remuneration of library staff, positive lifestyle and other remedies proffered in this report, which were influenced by the findings, would assist in ameliorating the adverse consequences of stress amongst library personnel in the study location and elsewhere.


The dynamics of Davydov solitons within the so-called mod D1> state which allows quantum effects in the lattice are studied at physiological temperatures using Davydov's averaged Hamiltonian method. For this purpose the Euler-Lagrange method is used to obtain approximate equations of motion from a thermally averaged Hamiltonian. Within mod D1> dynamics at T=0K and for parameter values appropriate for proteins, no solitons are found. It is demonstrated that temperature effects at 300 K shift the stability window for travelling solitons into regions of the parameter space which might be realistic for proteins.


Series Foreword. Preface. Part 1. The Meaning and Relevance of Commitment. H.J. Klein, J.C. Molloy, J.T. Cooper, Conceptual Foundations: Construct Definitions and Theoretical Representations of Workplace Commitment. J.P. Meyer, Commitment in a Changing World of Work. M. Riketta, R.Van Dick, Commitment's Place in the Literature. Part 2. Multiple Foci of Commitment. C. Vandenberghe, Organizational Commitments. T.E. Becker, Interpersonal Commitments. M.J. Neubert, C. Wu, Action Commitments. Part 3. Building and Maintaining Commitments. M.E. Bergman, J.K. Benzer, J.B. Henning, The Role of Individual Differences as Contributors to the Development of Commitment. S.J. Wayne, J.A-M. Coyle-Shapiro, R. Eisenberger, R.C. Liden, D.M. Rousseau, L.M. Shore, Social Influences. P.M. Wright, R. Kehoe, Organizational Level Antecedents and Consequences of Commitment. S.A. Wasti, C. OEnder, Commitment across Cultures: Progress, Pitfalls and Propositions. Part 4. Methodological Issue and Challenges. S. Jaros, Measurement of Commitment. R.J. Vandenberg, L.J. Stanley, Statistical and Methodological Challenges for Commitment Researchers: Issues of Invariance, Change Across Time, and Profile Differences. Part 5. Integration and Future Directions. T.E. Becker, H.J. Klein, J.P. Meyer, Accumulated Wisdom and New Directions for Workplace Commitments.


Childhood neuroblastoma, an embryonal neoplasm of sympathetic nervous system progenitors, occurs in a familial form with an autosomal dominant mode of inheritance. Genetic susceptibility to this disorder is thought to arise via a germline mutation affecting a tumor suppressor gene, in accord with the two‐hit model established for familial and sporadic retinoblastoma. Surprisingly, the familial neuroblastoma predisposition locus does not map to chromosome band 1p36, a genomic region likely to contain one or more neuroblastoma suppressor genes. We reasoned that inherited point mutations affecting one allele would be unmasked in many cases by somatically acquired deletions of the second allele that included the target gene in the tumor cells from these patients. Thus, to identify chromosomal regions that might contain suppressor genes important in hereditary neuroblastoma, we analyzed six familial tumors by comparative genomic hybridization. Recurrent losses of genetic material were detected on chromosome arms 3p (consensus region, 3p24‐pter), 10p (consensus, 10p12‐p13), 10q (consensus, 10q25‐qter), 16q (consensus, 16q12‐q22), and 20q (consensus, 20q13.3‐qter), in addition to the regions commonly deleted in sporadic neuroblastomas (1p36 and 11q). These chromosomal sites may harbor novel tumor suppressor genes that could aid in our understanding of the predisposition to and pathogenesis of familial neuroblastoma and potentially sporadic tumors as well. Genes Chromosom. Cancer 19:176–184, 1997. © 1997 Wiley‐Liss Inc.


Abstract As the cancer burden increases, so too does the cost, to health systems, economies, and individuals. There is increasing interest in productivity and out-of-pocket costs for individuals and their carers, but these remain poorly understood. The costs of cancer in women, often carers themselves, are less understood. This summary analysis explored data on the cancer burden in Australia (and health costs in comparable countries), including expenditure reports and literature on macroeconomic outcomes and out-of-pocket costs, to highlight the cost impacts of a cancer diagnosis in women, at a societal and an individual level. Data on productivity costs were skewed toward men, as men are over-represented in paid work compared with women. Data on societal and individual costs of cancer in women were scant, yet the predominance of women in unpaid work suggests the cost is significant. Evidence for the benefits of cancer prevention and early detection suggests that improved targeting of interventions to women would reduce costs at a societal and an individual level. More research is needed on the specific impacts of cancer on women and those they care for, to better target public health and support services to need.