The impact of social and environmental circumstances on success in an intensive behavioral intervention to lose weight and reduce risk of type 2 diabetes is unknown. We examined the association of social and environmental circumstances such as provisions of social relations and support, home and work environment, and adverse life events on weight loss and diabetes incidence in the Diabetes Prevention Program (DPP) randomized controlled trial. We included data on 650 female and 319 male adults from the DPP lifestyle intervention group with information on social circumstances and body weight at baseline and follow-up after 6 months (24 weeks of lifestyle intervention), 1, and 2 years. We applied Cox proportional hazards model to obtain hazard ratios (HRs), with social circumstances as the exposures and body weight gain (>7%) or development of diabetes as outcome, adjusting for baseline age, sex, marital status, and number of individuals in the home of the participant. Life style intervention participants who experienced events or changes at work during the DPP trial had a 44% higher risk of developing diabetes [HRR=1.44, 95% CI:1.02;2.04] as compared to lifestyle intervention participants who did not have such experiences at work. Adjustment of body weight gain after the intervention period explained a small component of this risk: 1.38 [95% CI:0.94;2.03]. Negative changes in the home environment [HRR=1.09, 95% CI:0.76;1.56], low provision of social relations [HRR=1.15, 95% CI:0.81;1.65] or adverse life events [HRR=1.14, 95% CI:0.81;1.62] did not increase the HR of developing diabetes. Social circumstances were not associated with >7% body weight increase between the end of the intervention period and 1 or year 2. Thus, our results suggest that work changes and stresses may worsen the possibility of lowering diabetes risk through intensive lifestyle interventions. Disclosure J. NIelsen: None. M.K. Ali: None. Funding National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases; General Clinical Research Center; Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development; National Institute on Aging; Office of Research on Women9s Health; Office of Research on Minority Health; Centers for Disease Control and Prevention


Stevia rebaudiana Bertoni has sweet substances (stevioside) in its leaves that are free of calories and their consumption is beneficial for diabetic patients and is also helpful in high blood pressure also. Because of low capability in seed germination, tissue culture is an appropriate method for propagation of this plant. In the current study, optimization of stevia in vitro cultivation via direct organogenesis with different explants, light intensities and plant hormones has been examined. These treatments included BAP (at 0.5, 1, 1.5 and 2mg/l) in combination with n2,4-D, IBA and NAA (each with concentrations of 0.1, 0.2 and 0.5mg/l) and different light intensities (Dark, 2000, 4000 and 6000 lux). MS was utilized as a basal medium. Results indicated the highest rate of organogenesis (85%) occurred on the axillary buds explants with a medium containing 1.5mg/l BAP + 0.1mg/l NAA under 6000 lux light intensity. Also, the highest range of primary organ per explant (42) with 0.3cm length was achieved at this condition. The most efficient medium for rhizogenesis i.e. 100% root production along with the highest root number (11 with approximately 7.13cm length) was obtained in presence of activated charcoal and 1mg/l of IBA. At the end of rhizogenesis experiments, the plantlet length and node multiplicity were 12.8cm and 7 respectively. Greenhouse cultivation of these plantlets was successful.


In this paper, we investigate the accuracy and efficiency of discontinuous Galerkin spectral method simulations of under‐resolved transitional and turbulent flows at moderate Reynolds numbers, where the accurate prediction of closely coupled laminar regions, transition and developed turbulence presents a great challenge to large eddy simulation modelling. We take full advantage of the low numerical errors and associated superior scale resolving capabilities of high‐order spectral methods by using high‐order ansatz functions up to 12th order. We employ polynomial de‐aliasing techniques to prevent instabilities arising from inexact quadrature of nonlinearities. Without the need for any additional filtering, explicit or implicit modelling, or artificial dissipation, our high‐order schemes capture the turbulent flow at the considered Reynolds number range very well. Three classical large eddy simulation benchmark problems are considered: a circular cylinder flow at ReD=3900, a confined periodic hill flow at Reh=2800 and the transitional flow over a SD7003 airfoil at Rec=60,000. For all computations, the total number of degrees of freedom used for the discontinuous Galerkin spectral method simulations is chosen to be equal or considerably less than the reported data in literature. In all three cases, we achieve an equal or better match to direct numerical simulation results, compared with other schemes of lower order with explicitly or implicitly added subgrid scale models. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.


A morphological study using freeze-etching and scanning electron microscopy was carried out on lymphocytes from human peripheral blood. Freeze-etching electron microscopy of lymphocytes fractured at the level of the membrane shows the presence of two groups of cells according to their surface morphology: lymphocytes with a smooth surface and lymphocytes with a villous surface. Cells with surface features identical to the two types described by freeze-etching were also observed by scanning electron microscopy. Some lymphocytes with smooth surface showing uropods were also observed.


A 46-year-old man having multiple myeloma developed cutaneous nodules and large cervical and mediastinal extramedullary plasmacytomas while being treated with phenylalanine mustard. The tumors progressed to a size producing tracheal and superior vena caval obstruction and spinal cord compression. They responded to phenylalanine mustard and radiation therapy. The myeloma cells were best identified by examination of Wright-stained smears obtained by needle aspiration of the tumor nodules.


3D mesoporous hybrid NiCo2O4@graphene nanoarchitectures were successfully synthesized by a combination of freeze drying and hydrothermal reaction. Field-emission scanning electron microscopy (FESEM) and TEM analyses revealed that the NiCo2O4@graphene nanostructures consist of a hierarchical mesoporous sheet-on-sheet nanoarchitecture with a high specific surface area of 194 m2 g−1. Ultrathin NiCo2O4 nanosheets, with a thickness of a few nanometers and mesopores ranging from 2 to 5 nm, were wrapped in graphene nanosheets and hybrid nanoarchitectures were formed. When applied as electrode materials in supercapacitors, the hybrid NiCo2O4@graphene nanosheets exhibited a high capacitance of 778 F g−1 at a current density of 1 A g−1, and an excellent cycling performance extending to 10 000 cycles at a high current density of 10 A g−1.


A novel inverter output filter based on DC magnetic flux controllable inductor can change its inductance according to different working states of AC variable frequency speed regulating control system, appropriately by adjusting the power applied on the inductor DC control coils. A better filtering effect and better electrical driving effect thus can be achieved. The unique structure inductor has advantages of simple configuration, less harmonic, relative less response time .It also can run continuously and has larger regulating range, etc. Applying harmonic suppression winding of control side can reduce the harmonic, and the inductor is easier to control. The characteristics of structure and control, the effect of harmonic suppression are mentioned. The effect of AC variable frequency speed regulating control system which applying the adjustable inverter output filter is also discussed. And the experimental results are given.


BACKGROUND/AIMS
The aim of this study was to assess the applicability and accuracy of the modified serum pancreolauryl test (sPLT) in patients with chronic pancreatitis (cP).

METHODOLOGY
We compared the results of a modified serum pancreolauryl test to morphological changes as detected by endoscopic retrograde pancreatography (ERP) in 60 patients with a history suggesting chronic pancreatitis were compared. Serum fluorescein was measured 30, 60, 120, 150, 180 and 240 minutes after the ingestion of fluoresceindilaureat, a standardized breakfast, and i.v. administration of secretin (1 U/kg) and metoclopramide (10 mg). Furthermore, the results of sPLT and ERP were compared to the findings on abdominal ultrasonography.

RESULTS
Forty of 60 patients suffered from cP according to ERP criteria. With a fluorescein cut-off point of 4.5 micrograms/ml, sPLT reached a sensitivity of 68% and a specificity of 50%. According to the ROC curve, the optimal cut-off point was at a fluorescein level of 4.1 micrograms/ml; however, predictive accuracy was only slightly improved at this point. In the subgroup of patients with advanced pancreatic duct changes (n = 23), however, sPLT reached a sensitivity of 87% with 16 patients showing a peak fluorescein concentration below 2.5 micrograms/ml.

CONCLUSION
Like other indirect pancreatic function tests, modified sPLT provides good recognition of patients with advanced cP but poor identification of patients with mild or moderate cP, leading to an unsatisfying overall performance of the test.


The aim of diagnostic procedures following abdominal injuries is rapid assessment of the necessity for surgical intervention and specification of the organ lesion, thus reducing the number of negative laparotomies. The extent of the diagnostic approach must be reduced in unstable patients. Sonography is the standard procedure in stable as well as in unstable patients, both in the initial period and the subsequent follow-up. CT-scan is complementary to sonography in detecting organ lesions. Sonographically guided puncture has replaced diagnostic peritoneal lavage. Laparoscopy following blunt abdominal injuries is not useful; however, it may be helpful following penetrating abdominal trauma.


This article looks at the implementation of so-called "assisted voluntary return" policies in Austria and Britain, where state agencies have recently replaced nongovernmental organizations as providers of return counseling. To better understand how such a shift affects the in/voluntariness of return, I identify three dimensions along which the "quality" of voluntariness can be assessed and relate them to concrete aspects of return counseling practice: absence of coercion; availability of acceptable alternatives; and access to adequate and trusted information. Based on original qualitative data, I show that even within an overall restrictive and oppressive regime, return counselors can make room for voluntariness by upholding ethical and procedural standards—if they retain substantial independence from the government.


Algebraic tools in statistics have recently been receiving special attention and a number of interactions between algebraic geometry and computational statistics have been rapidly developing. This paper presents another such connection, namely, one between probabilistic models invariant under a finite group of (non-singular) linear transformations and polynomials invariant under the same group. Two specific aspects of the connection are discussed: generalization of the (uniqueness part of the multivariate) problem of moments and log-linear, or toric, modeling by expansion of invariant terms. A distribution of minuscule subimages extracted from a large database of natural images is analyzed to illustrate the above concepts.


Introduction: Usually the symptoms presented in odontogenic sinusitis do not differ from chronic sinusitis of other origin. However, odontogenic sinusitis is considered as an independent disease which requires specific diagnostic approach and treatment.  Aim: The aim of the study is to define the main symptoms of odontogenic rhinosinusitis with periapical lesions and its impact on the quality of life.  Material and methods: The SNOT-22 and OHIP-14 questionnaires were distributed among 26 symptomatic patients suffering from odontogenic sinusitis with periapical lesions in the teeth that remain in close contact with the maxillary sinus floor. Data was collected by means of an interview and standard examination performed by an otolaryngologist and a maxillofacial surgeon. The symptoms were also objectified using nasal endoscopy and radiological studies. The acquired data was statistically analyzed.  Results: The total OHIP-14 score was 14.7 ± 11.3, whereas the total SNOT-22 score was 44.6 ± 18.8. Women scored significantly higher in the total SNOT-22 score as well as domains concerning nasal symptoms, quality of sleep, and emotional symptoms. The answers given in similar items were comparable between both questionnaires.  Conclusions: Properly diagnosed odontogenic sinusitis (OS) with periapical lesions (PAL) will improve the quality of health-care and spare the patients inadequate procedures. Standard examination should include a unified and validated question-naire concerning both sinonasal and oral symptoms. Painful aching in the mouth and discomfort during eating might help to identify the OS with PAL during a medical interview and help both ENT (ear-nose-throat) specialists and dentists to establish proper patient-oriented diagnosis and treatment.


Graffiti are increasingly observed on urban and peri-urban buildings and their removal requires a huge financial outlay by local governments and agencies. Graffiti are not usually removed immediately, but rather over the passage of time, viz. months or even years. In this study, which forms part of a wider research project on graffiti removal, different methods (gravimetric analysis, examination of digital images, colour and infrared measurements) were used to evaluate the performance of accelerated ageing tests (involving exposure to humidity, freeze-thawing cycles and NaCl and Na2SO4 salts) for graffiti painted on stone. Silver (metallic) and black (non-metallic) graffiti spray paints were applied to two types of igneous rock (granite and rhyolitic ignimbrite) and one sedimentary rock (fossiliferous limestone, i.e., biocalcarenite). The metallic and non-metallic graffiti spray paints acted differently on the stone surfaces, both chemically and physically. Older graffiti were found to be more vulnerable to weathering agents. The ageing test with NaCl and particularly Na2SO4, both applied to granite, proved the most severe on the paints, yielding more detrimental and faster artificial ageing of the type of material under study.


This article discusses women's roles as victims, perpetrators, and peacemakers in armed conflicts in contemporary Sri Lanka. It covers such phenomena as rape as a weapon of war, women IDPs, "war widows," female-headed households, women suicide bombers, mothers for peace, and feminist peace activism. The article points out that aggression and victimization need to be understood as occurring across ethnicity and gender as well as within ethnic and gender groups. Contributing toward a political economy perspective, the article considers the complex intersection of gender, ethnicity, caste, and social class within the confluence of local, regional, and international forces. The article concludes by emphasizing the need to broaden the social class and local bases of feminist peace activism and to formulate an integrated gender-, ethnicity- and class-sensitive policy agenda for postconflict development in Sri Lanka.


The inherent security and computational demands of classical consensus protocols are often presumed impervious to various forms of attack. However, quantum computing advancements present considerable threats to the assumed attack resistance of classical security strategies currently deployed within blockchain systems. Adopting consensus algorithms fortified with post-quantum security measures can significantly enhance traditional blockchains' privacy and security dimensions. Notable advantages of such post-quantum solutions in blockchain consensus include accelerated transaction verification, clarified mining authorship, and resilience against quantum attacks. Yet, a comprehensive analysis of the implications of post-quantum solutions for blockchain consensus is notably absent in the existing scholarly discourse. This paper aims to bridge this gap by systematically reviewing Post-Quantum Blockchain Consensus (PQBC). The four primary contributions of this study are (i) a systematic approach to presenting a comprehensive overview of PQBC, (ii) the systematic selection and analysis of 29 key studies from an initial pool of 1192 papers, (iii) a critical review of methods, enhancements to security, scalability, trust, and privacy, as well as the evaluation employed for PQBC, and (iv) a discussion of primary gaps and prospective directions for future PQBC research.


Aim To determine the quality of external cause of death data. Methodology Data on all injury deaths were captured from multiple sources police station diaries, autopsy reports, coroners inquests, hospital records in addition to death certificates from the Registrars Office in Jamaica. Records were sorted and merged on close matches of name, date of birth, sex and address. For each death, data were updated into one complete record and underlying cause re-coded when necessary. Results 38% of all injury deaths were not registered 13% of the remainder were misclassified as SSIs. Capture rate of homicides increased from 42% to 85%. Homicides had been mis-classified as Accidents caused by firearms and Legal interventions. Homicide rose in rank from 7th leading cause of death to 5th. Proportional injury mortality due to homicides increased from 18.3% to 31.5%. Capture rate of fatal road traffic injuries (RTIs) increased from 28% to 83% RTIs rose in rank from 21st leading cause of death to 19th Proportional injury mortalities for RTIs increased from 7.1% to 11.5% Capture rate of fatal self-inflicted injuries increased from 19% to 97%. Self-inflicted deaths were usually misclassified as Accidental threats to breathing and Accidental poisoning. Conclusion That estimates based on published injury mortalities would be grossly underestimated, but every effort should be taken to ensure the completeness of data, especially the training of certifying physicians in the correct medical certification of cause of death.


To develop volumetric micro-CT fluoroscopy for small animal imaging, we have proposed a cone-beam system with multiple x-ray sources. In this paper, we extend Parker's single-source half-scan weighting scheme to the case of an odd number of x-ray sources that are equiangularly distributed, and apply it for half-scan Feldkamp-type reconstruction in this unique geometry. In the numerical simulation with the Shepp-Logan phantom, representative images indicate that the proposed half-scan Feldkamp-type algorithm produces temporal resolution significantly superior to that with a single x-ray source cone-beam system.


Based on the results of several years of experimental work carried out on a typical building in Venice, the Palazzo Zorzi, a method, including both materials and equipment, has been developed for the reduction of dampness in the walls of such buildings. The effectiveness of this method has been proved by measurements of changes in moisture distribution over a four-year period. Using it, penetration of sea-water into the walls was prevented, and the capillary transport of moisture up the walls reduced, resulting in the drying out of the walls.


We analyze the broad-band X-ray spectrum (0.3–50 keV) of the luminous Seyfert 1/quasar PG 1211+143—the archetypal source for high-velocity X-ray outflows—using near-simultaneous XMM-Newton and NuSTAR observations. We compare pure relativistic reflection models with a model including the strong imprint of photoionized emission and absorption from a high-velocity wind, finding a spectral fit that extrapolates well over the higher photon energies covered by NuSTAR. Inclusion of the high signal-to-noise ratio XMM-Newton spectrum provides much tighter constraints on the model parameters, with a much harder photon index/lower reflection fraction compared to that from the NuSTAR data alone. We show that pure relativistic reflection models are not able to account for the spectral complexity of PG 1211+143 and that wind absorption models are strongly required to match the data in both the soft X-ray and Fe K spectral regions. In confirming the significance of previously reported ionized absorption features, the new analysis provides a further demonstration of the power of combining the high throughput and resolution of long-look XMM-Newton observations with the unprecedented spectral coverage of NuSTAR.


There has been extensive research about the association between school physical environment and children's educational performance. However, the relationship between the sustainability of school physical environments and children's environmental awareness via education has been rarely addressed in the literature. This paper evaluates the possible differences between the environmental attitudes and behaviours of children in schools designed for sustainability and conventional schools in Victoria, Australia. The New Environmental Paradigm (NEP) and General Ecological Behaviours (GEB) scales were employed to measure the environmental awareness of 275 grade 4-6 children in seven primary schools. Quantitative analysis was conducted to look for significant differences between the environmental attitudes and behaviours of two groups: children attending conventional schools and children attending schools assessed as being designed or refurbished with sustainability in mind. The results of the analysis indicated that there was a statistically significant difference between the two groups. Factor analysis revealed the NEP and GEB to be multidimensional scales. Considering the relationship between school design and the identified behaviour and attitude factors showed the presence of sustainability features had the greatest impact on the factor Children's Attitudes via ESD (Environmentally Sustainable Design) at School. This result invites professionals in the built environment design disciplines to re-think the pedagogic importance of environmentally sustainable design in schools.


PURPOSE
To analyse the effects of aloe vera on the treatment of oral ulcers.

MATERIALS AND METHODS
Relevant studies were identified from PubMed, Embase, ClinicalTrials.gov, SinoMed, Web of Science and Cochrane Library. Randomised controlled trials (RCTs) involving aloe vera (AV) in the treatment of oral ulcers were included. The data were extracted and pooled for meta-analysis to compare the clinical outcomes of patients with oral ulcers in terms of treatment effect, the size of ulcers, Visual Analogue Scale (VAS) for pain, and therapy duration. The standardised mean differences (SMD) with 95% confidence intervals (CI) were determined for the main outcomes, heterogeneity was analysed using the I2 test, and the studies' risk of bias was evaluating using the Cochrane risk of bias assessment tool.

RESULTS
The study included 9 trials with a total of 847 participants. Seven trials were included in the meta-analysis. The results indicated no statistically significant differences in pain scores as assessed by the VAS (I2 = 95%, p = 0.89; SMD: -0.12, 95% CI: -1.84, 1.60) and size of ulcers (I2 = 88%, p = 0.60; SMD: -0.29, 95% CI: -1.39, 0.81). Clinical efficacy of the aloe vera group was better compared to control group (I2 = 89%, p = 0.007; RR: 2.25, 95% CI: 1.25, 4.06). Therapy duration was statistically significantly lower following AV gel application in two of the studies (I2 = 0%, p < 0.001; SMD: -1.32, 95% CI: -1.84, -0.79). Considering the results in a systematic manner, AV accelerated tissue epithelialisation and the wound-healing process.

CONCLUSION
Compared with other interventions, aloe vera has a better therapeutic effect and shorter healing time. It is comparable with other interventions in relieving pain and reducing ulcer size, but it has higher safety and almost no side effects.


Knowledge Graph (KG) alignment is to discover the mappings (i.e., equivalent entities, relations, and others) between two KGs. The existing methods can be divided into the embedding-based models, and the conventional reasoning and lexical matching based systems. The former compute the similarity of entities via their cross-KG embeddings, but they usually rely on an ideal supervised learning setting for good performance and lack appropriate reasoning to avoid logically wrong mappings; while the latter address the reasoning issue but are poor at utilizing the KG graph structures and the entity contexts. In this study, we aim at combining the above two solutions and thus propose an iterative framework named PRASE which is based on probabilistic reasoning and semantic embedding. It learns the KG embeddings via entity mappings from a probabilistic reasoning system named PARIS, and feeds the resultant entity mappings and embeddings back into PARIS for augmentation. The PRASE framework is compatible with different embedding-based models, and our experiments on multiple datasets have demonstrated its state-of-the-art performance.


Background: Leprosy is an infectious disease which faces diagnostic challenges. Slit-skin smear (SSS) is an age simple diagnostic technique, yet not commonly applied by health care providers. The study aimed to determine the effectiveness of SSS in terms of validity, diagnostic accuracy, and percentage agreement against punch biopsy in diagnosing leprosy among leprosy patients who were diagnosed with leprosy on clinical grounds only (i.e., number of skin lesions and/or peripheral nerve thickening). Methods: An evaluation study of diagnostic tests with a cross-sectional design was conducted at a tertiary care center of Bankura. In general, 70 new untreated leprosy patients, diagnosed solely by clinical grounds (i.e., count of skin lesions and/or thickening of the nerve) and attending the dermatology outpatient department (From February 2019 to January 2020) were enrolled in this study. After excluding pure neuritic, relapse, and seriously ill patients by consecutive sampling, they were subjected to both SSS and punch biopsy using a standard process. SPSS for Windows (Version 16.0., Chicago, SPSS Inc.) was used to analyze data. Z test, chi-square test, and kappa test were conducted to test the statistical significance between the effectiveness of SSS and punch biopsy. Results: The sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value, negative predictive value, positive likelihood ratio, negative likelihood ratio, diagnostic odds ratio (DOR), and diagnostic accuracy of SSS were 81.81%, 95.83%, 90%, 92%, 20%, 0.19%, 102.87%, and 91.42%, respectively. Based on the results, SSS could detect acid-fast bacilli (AFB) in clinically diagnosed leprosy cases slightly less than punch biopsy, but it was statistically insignificant (Z=0.3689, P=0.71138, df=1). Finally, Cohen's Kappa coefficient was 0.796, representing substantial agreement between SSS and punch biopsy (95% CI: 0.641-0.951). Conclusions: Overall, SSS is more or less equally effective as compared to punch biopsy in confirming leprosy cases. Interest and training on SSS among resident doctors should be emphasized accordingly.


In this paper, a novel approach in which parallel Kalman filters (KF) are coupled to parallel recursive least squares (RLS) estimators is proposed for adaptive blind equalization of multi-input multi-output (MIMO) channels. Using the inverse of a FIR polynomial matrix, a regression model is developed to formulate parallel RLS algorithms to estimate the unknown channel parameters. Conditions for existence of the inverse of a FIR polynomial matrix are investigated. A state-space representation is formulated to develop parallel Kalman filters (KF) to estimate the state from which the input signals can be recovered and separated. Then, the KF are coupled to the RLS algorithms to jointly recover the input signals and separate them, as well as to estimate the channel parameters blindly from the channel output measurements. The proposed approach is corroborated with a simulation example on adaptive blind equalization of MIMO channels. Simulation results show that the proposed approach is effective in recovering and separating the source signals, and estimating the channel parameters blindly from the channel output measurements.


Severely burned patients require rapid administration of large volumes of isotonic fluids. Obtaining adequate intravenous (IV) access in children with greater than 70% total body surface area burns may be difficult, time-consuming, and sometimes impossible. This report describes the use of intraosseous infusion technique as a life-saving means of establishing IV access in two severely burned children.


We consider marriage problems where myopic and farsighted players interact. To study such problems, we use the pairwise myopic-farsighted stable set. Blocking occurs by coalitions of size one or two. We require that all blocking players should strictly improve. We pay particular attention to the question whether core elements survive in this environment. This is the case when all players are myopic as well as when all players are farsighted. It also holds for matching problems satisfying the top-coalition property. For general matching problems where all women are farsighted, there is only one core element that can belong to the pairwise myopic-farsighted stable set, the woman-optimal stable matching, so all other stable outcomes are excluded for sure. If the woman-optimal stable matching is dominated from the woman point of view by an individually rational matching, then the pairwise myopic farsighted stable set cannot contain a core element. We show that blocking by coalitions of arbitrary size leads to identical results.


Mexican Protestantism was born in the encounter between Mexican Catholics and Anglo American Protestants, after the United States ventured into the Southwest and wrested territory from Mexico in the early nineteenth century. Sea la Luz tells the story of Mexican converts and the churches they developed through the records of Protestant missionaries. Juan Francisco Martinez traces Protestant mission work among the Spanish speaking of the Southwest throughout the nineteenth century. By 1900, about 150 Spanish-speaking Protestant churches with more than five thousand adult members existed in the region. They were rejected by their own people because they were Protestants, but Anglo American Protestants did not readily accept them either because they were Mexican. In spite of the pressures from both their own community and the larger society, they forged a new religious identity in the midst of conquest.


The absolute value of the cross section for the abstraction reaction between fast H atoms and H2O has been determined experimentally at a mean collision energy of 2.46 eV. The OH population distribution at the same mean energy has also been determined. The new measurements are compared with state-of-the-art quantum mechanical and quasiclassical scattering calculations on the most recently developed potential energy surface.


The anti-inflammatory efficiency of low-dose radiotherapy (LD-RT) for degenerative joint disorders was demonstrated over decades but had no explanation on a cellular or molecular level. As inflammatory diseases are the results of complex and pathologically unbalanced cellular and molecular interactions more recent in-vivo and in-vitro data will be discussed for possible explanation of the mechanism underlying ant-inflammatory LD-RT.2


Introduction:Effective reduction in prenatal mortality and comorbid complications, and associated expenses necessitates the determination of the causative agents and early identification of the risk of preterm delivery in pregnant women.Methodology: A cross-sectional study was conducted on the cases of 5651 mothers. Data was collected based on the information recorded in the patient files within the time period of 2016-2020 in the community health centers of Gonabad. Logistic regression model was employed to determine the factors associated with preterm delivery. The external validity of the model of the factors predicting preterm delivery was independently analyzed for the data collected from 100 postpartum women.Findings: Of the total deliveries studied, preterm delivery occurred in 11.5% of them (i.e., 649 deliveries). The multiple logistic regression model included 7 variables for predicting preterm birth. The developed model was checked for internal and external validity using accuracy, specificity, sensitivity, positive predictive value, negative predictive value and the area under the ROC curve. In the educational data, accuracy, specificity, sensitivity positive predictive value, negative predictive value, and the area under the ROC curve was 65.4%, 65.8%, 66.0%, 19.3%, 92.9%, 0.681, respectively. Conclusion: This model has used 7 most important independent predictors of preterm delivery and the performance of the model is relatively good. Using the variables of this study, health care workers can identify mothers at risk of preterm delivery, and take the necessary measures to protect the mothers at risk. The results of this research can initiate further studies in this field.


Chronic infection and inflammation are the primary causes of declining lung function in Cystic Fibrosis (CF) patients. ORKAMBI® (Lumacaftor-Ivacaftor) is an approved combination therapy for Cystic Fibrosis (CF) patients bearing the most common mutation, F508del, in the cystic fibrosis conductance regulator (CFTR) protein. It has been previously shown that ORKAMBI®-mediated rescue of CFTR is reduced by a pre-existing Pseudomonas aeruginosa infection. Here, we show that the infection of F508del-CFTR human bronchial epithelial (HBE) cells with lab strain and four different clinical strains of P. aeruginosa, isolated from the lung sputum of CF patients, decreases CFTR function in a strain-specific manner by 48 to 88%. The treatment of infected cells with antibiotic tobramycin or cationic antimicrobial peptide 6K-F17 was found to decrease clinical strain bacterial growth on HBE cells and restore ORKAMBI®-mediated rescue of F508del-CFTR function. Further, 6K-F17 was found to downregulate the expression of pro-inflammatory cytokines, interleukin (IL)-8, IL-6, and tumor necrosis factor-α in infected HBE cells. The results provide strong evidence for a combination therapy approach involving CFTR modulators and anti-infectives (i.e., tobramycin and/or 6K-F17) to improve their overall efficacy in CF patients.


Background Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) is considered a very debilitating disorder with severe loss of quality of life and income. Aims This study estimates the quality of life and economic consequences of OCD in China. Methods The research team interviewed 639 patients with OCD in 13 hospitals in 12 cities in China. The direct method was used to get the direct cost of OCD. Indirect costs associated with OCD were estimated using the human capital approach. Linear regression analysis was conducted for quality of life and generalised linear model analysis was conducted for total cost. Sensitivity analysis was used to analyse the uncertainty of total cost. Results The mean quality of life score for OCD was 52.78 (20.46). The annual total cost of OCD per capita was 24 503.78 (95% CI: 22 621.53 to 26 386.03) renminbi (RMB) (US$3465.88 (95% CI: US$3199.65 to US$3732.11)). The annual cost of OCD in China was estimated to be 37.74 billion (95% CI: 34.95 billion to 40.53 billion) RMB (equal to US$5.34 billion (95% CI: US$4.94 billion to US$5.73 billion)). Sensitivity analysis showed that the total annual cost of OCD in China was between 23.15 billion RMB (US$3.27 billion) and 370.00 billion RMB (US$52.33 billion). Worse social function status, more psychiatric symptoms and higher Yale Brown Obsessive-Compulsive Scale (Y-BOCS) score were associated with worse quality of life. The numbers of clinic visits and hospitalisations, socioeconomic status, education, Y-BOCS scores and age were found to be significantly associated with total cost. Conclusions OCD is associated with low quality of life and high costs in China. The findings call for concerted efforts to improve services for patients with OCD. Improvements may include early detection and diagnosis, the provision of evidence-based treatments and relapse prevention strategies.


Summary. The evolving nature of medical knowledge and technology requires that the practitioners of tomorrow be able to develop practice management and computer skills in order to enhance quality patient care, ongoing education, and research. The paper describes how the discipline of medical informatics can be integrated into an undergraduate medical curriculum, not as a course or series of courses, but as a repeated theme throughout the 3‐year systembased curriculum. Recommendations specific to integrating medical informatics into an undergraduate curriculum are outlined with respect to: (1) content; (2) content organization; (3) management; and (4) evaluation. Six areas of information and computer management applications are discussed. These are computer‐assisted learning, retrieving and organizing information from computerised databases, the application of medical informatics tools to the critical appraisal of literature and associated statistical software packages, hospital ‐ and office‐based information systems, and electronic communications. Medical education has a history of resistance to change. Reference to guidelines and experiences of others who have negotiated information management and medical informatics changes into medical school environments can therefore be helpful. It is in this context that this paper is presented.


We have presented a simple but effective method to design flexible actuators. This process relies on understanding the behavior of a simple unit cell element built out of SMA sheet. The unit cell effectively uses the properties of flat SMA sheets: it operates in the bent region where more force is generated; it minimizes the nonbent SMA; and it heats up only the bent regions. However, the force generated by this unit cell does not scale up well, and an array of them is needed to increase the force generated. Building an actuator out of an array of unit cells increases its complexity but provides advantages, including the control of expansion length, trajectory, and generated force. Given the current technologies, including 3-D printing and laser cutting, a variety of support structures can be built to create an actuator with a given behavior. We have shown three types of configurations: linear, rotational, and surface. The linear actuator has been tested for endurance and can easily perform over 10,000 repetitions under load without breaking. These actuators have been tested in actual systems, such as the battery-operated HexRoller robot that uses six actuators connected in a chain. The robot demonstrates that this SMA actuator is power efficient compared with other SMA designs that cannot operate with batteries. We have also showed that a rotational version of this type of actuator is comparable with an electromagnetic motor.


This paper aims at analyzing school parties from interaction spaces and principals' narratives in six schools in the state of Jalisco. A party is a ritual where participants share symbols related to imaginary –hence the importance of conducting an analysis for understanding institutions as a symbolic framework. A core argument is that established actors are configured from symbolic practices in the institutional space (schools). The repetition of these practices awash with symbolism leads to daily rituals or micro rituals that are ratified in institutions. Methodologically, interviews and non-participant observation in school interaction spaces were used. Based on the findings, it may be stated that the nuclear family, rooted in the Christian image in which authority is a central point, becomes a fundamental factor in shaping institutional life as well as the imaginary linked to school parties.


The efficiency of common law hypothesis provides a set of first principles for lawyer-economists who examine the evolution of legal rules over time. Recent work, however, observes a trend toward redistribution, especially in tort. This chapter attempts to reconcile the conflicting accounts by introducing externalities in individual activity to the original litigation model. As externalities increase, organizing costs among potential parties increase. If the sum of organizing costs and remaining transacting costs is not prohibitive, then all of those allocatively affected reach an agreement. I call this a pan-efficient equilibrium. However, if the sum of costs is prohibitive, litigation may ensue. Parties litigate pan-inefficient rules when their expectations of victory differ. For this reason, plaintiffs may forgo immediate litigation in favor of waiting for organizing costs to recede and for the probability of victory to increase. Once party expectations of victory differ, they litigate, and courts discern the merits of pan-inefficient precedents. Over time, the tendency for pan-inefficient rules to arise more frequently in litigation will lead to their disproportionate overruling relative to pan-efficient precedents. This framework explains the apparent instability between redistribution and efficiency and provides an updated interpretation of the efficiency of common law. Keywords: efficiency of common law hypothesis, economic loss rule, tort misalignments


In this paper we present a method of automatic disease recognition by using statistical spatio-temporal disease models in cardiac echo videos. Starting from echo videos of known viewpoints as training data, we form a statistical model of shape and motion information within a cardiac cycle for each disease. Specifically, an active shape model (ASM) is used to model shape and texture information in an echo frame. The motion information derived by tracking ASMs through a heart cycle is then represented compactly using eigen-motion features to constitute a joint spatio-temporal statistical model per disease class and observation viewpoint. Each of these models is then fit to a new cardiac echo video of an unknown disease, and the best fitting model is used to label the disease class. Results are presented that show the method can discriminate patients with hypokinesia from normal patients.


Abstract The study was conducted to investigate the effects of fish or palm oil diets with different roughage levels on dairy performance, milk physicochemical composition and apparent transfer efficiency of fatty acids (FA) in goat milk. The experiment was conducted with 40 Aleppo goats with a mean parity of 2.53 ± 0.8 (multiparous), mean initial body weight of 47.23 kg and 25 ± 5 days in milk which were allocated to four (2 × 2) experimental diets with two oil sources (fish or palm oil) at 25.6 g/kg of dietary dry matter and forage levels (400 or 600 g/kg). The experimental data were analysed by repeated measures analysis, using the MIXED procedure. The concentrations of saturated FA decreased with high forage level and fish oil diets; however, the fish oil diets caused an increase in C14 saturated FA. Fish oil diets with high roughage levels more efficiently increased conjugated linoleic acid, n-6 (18 : 2), and n-3 (20 : 5). The apparent transfer efficiency of 18 : 1, 18 : 2, 18 : 3 and 20 : 5 decreased and the transfer efficiency of 22 : 6 increased with the use of fish oil in the diet. The roughage level did not affect the apparent transfer efficiency of 18 : 1 and 18 : 2, but the low roughage level increased the apparent transfer efficiency of 20 : 5. High roughage diets improved milk quality parameters through increasing eicosapentaenoic acid, polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFA), PUFA/saturated FA and atherogenicity index, thus it was concluded that dietary roughage level could be considered as an important designator of milk quality when a supplement of fish oil and palm oil was supplied to goats.


4H-SiC ultraviolet p-i-n photodiodes with four different epitaxial structures were fabricated. The experimental results prove that both a thin P+-type Ohmic contact layer and a thick intrinsic layer were indispensible for a high-performance ultraviolet p-i-n photodiode. A 4H-SiC p-i-n photodiode with responsivity as high as 0.139 A/W at 278 nm incident wavelength was achieved. Meanwhile, within a certain wavelength range, the peak response wavelength of an ultraviolet p-i-n photodiode would be modulated by properly varying the thicknesses of P+-type layer and the intrinsic layer. Moreover, the theoretical calculation was carried out to further authorise the experimental results.


Sputtering (ion surface bombardment) of various calcium-containing powder samples with an energetic (17 keV), high-current (16)O(-) beam has produced the diatomic dications of CaSi(2+), CaP(2+), CaF(2+), CaH(2+), CaCl(2+), CaBr(2+) and CaI(2+). These molecular gas-phase species have been identified in positive ion mass spectra at half-integer m/z values; their ion flight times through a magnetic-sector mass spectrometer were roughly 10(-5) s. Most of them appear to be novel molecular ions; the stability of the latter four (CaH(2+), CaCl(2+), CaBr(2+) and CaI(2+)) had been demonstrated in previous theoretical studies, whereas only CaF(2+) and CaBr(2+) had been observed before. Here we combine the results of our experimental search with a detailed theoretical study of the remaining three systems CaSi(2+), CaP(2+) and CaF(2+). All electronic states correlating with the first dissociation channel are characterized using high level ab initio electronic structure calculations. In their ground states, we find CaSi(2+) to be a long-lived metastable molecule, whereas CaF(2+) and CaP(2+) are thermodynamically stable, with respective equilibrium internuclear distances of 6.253, 4.740, and 5.731 a(0). CaSi(2+) has a well depth of 7116 (0.88) cm(-1) (eV) and a dissociation asymptote 7956 (0.99) cm(-1) (eV) below the ground state minimum. The dissociation energy of CaF(2+) is estimated to be 3404 (0.42) cm(-1) (eV), whereas for CaP(2+) we found 2547 (0.32) cm(-1) (eV), and a barrier height of 8118 (1.01) cm(-1) (eV). Their adiabatic double ionisation energies are 22.87, 16.91, and 17.32 eV, respectively, for the F, Si, and P containing dications.


By using Input-Output(I-O)and multipliers analysis, this paper intends to measure the impact of tourist's expenditure in Malaysian economy. The importance of impact is described by multipliers, the total refers to the multipliers of output, income, and employment. By knowing the multipliers, the total economics impact generated by the tourist's expenditure can be computed. The result indicate manufacturing and finance, insurance real estate and
business service sectors are the main contributors to the Malaysian economy output, particularly in boosting the tourism sector's output. In conclusion, since this industry showing its capability in contributing towards generating the Malaysian economy growth, the policy makers should provide the appropriate policy recommendations for future economics development strategy in tourism industry by identifying the key sectors that interrelated with tourism.


The hemodynamic changes which occur when clamping and unclamping the aorta during reconstructive surgery might be a threat to the elderly patient with concomitant cardiac disease. In addition, the cross-clamping induces a temporary ischemia of the legs, with severe metabolic derangement after the release of the aortic clamp. We have studied the effect of a intraoperative adrenergic block (phenoxybenzamine plus metoprolol) on the central circulation and the skeletal metabolism in 14 patients undergoing aortic reconstruction to treat occlusive arteriosclerotic disease. Cardiac output, heart rate, arterial and pulmonary artery pressures, and cardiac filling pressures, as well as femoral venous blood flow were studied. Biopsy specimens of the lateral vastus muscle and blood samples from the radial artery and iliac vein were taken before aortic clamping, and before, 30 minutes, four and 16 hours after the aorta was unclamped, as well as five days postoperatively. In addition, intramuscular temperature and pH were measured. Glycogen, glucose, lactate, pyruvate, ATP, ADP, AMP, phosphocreatine (PCr) and creatine (Cr) contents of the muscle and lactate and pyruvate concentrations in iliac venous and radial arterial blood were determined using enzymatic fluorometric techniques. Mean arterial blood pressure (MAP) averaged 80 mmHg before clamping, chiefly because of the low systemic vascular resistance (SVR), and left ventricular stroke work (LVSW) was normal. At clamping MAP, SVR, LVSW, remained unchanged. MAP and LVSW were unaffected even though SVR decreased slightly after the aorta was unclamped and resulted in an increased cardiac output, mainly due to a higher stroke volume. No major change in the pulmonary circulation was observed. During clamping the muscle lactate/pyruvate ratio increased, intramuscular pH and femoral venous blood flow decreased indicating insufficient tissue perfusion. Energy charge (EC), the adenylate (ATP + ADP + AMP) and creatine (PCr + Cr) pools were, however, unchanged. In spite of a restored blood flow to the legs, a severe metabolic derangement of the muscle was observed after declamping, with lowered EC, ATP + ADP + AMP and PCr + Cr indicating cellular damage. No improvement in the condition of the cells was observed 16 hours after operation. In conclusion, we found that by using neurolept anesthesia and an intraoperative adrenergic block in combination with a differentiated fluid therapy the central circulation stabilized and was largely unaffected by the clamping and unclamping procedures. In spite of the improved central hemodynamics no favorable effect on the skeletal muscle metabolism was observed.


Experimental solubility data have been obtained for sixteen organic solutes in molten polystyrene by a gas chromatographic procedure for temperatures from 408° to 503°K and pressures to 4 atm. The effects of diffusion and adsorption of the solute on the substrate were considered. The Henry's law constants resulting from this study and those obtained by other investigators were related to the reduced temperature. The effect of pressure on the Henry's law constants is also discussed, and a relationship is presented for the heat of solution.


Assisting persons during physical therapy or augmenting their performance often requires precise delivery of an intervention. Robotic devices are perfectly placed to do so, but their intervention highly depends on the physical human-robot connection. The inherent compliance in the connection leads to delays and losses in bi-directional power transmission and can lead to human-robot joint axes misalignment. This is often neglected in the literature by assuming a rigid connection and has a negative impact on the intervention's effectiveness and robustness. This paper presents the preliminary results of a study that aims to close that gap. The study investigates what model forms and parameters best capture human-robot connection dynamics across different persons, connection designs (cuffs), and cuff strapping pressures. The results show that the linear spring-damper model is the best compromise, but its parameters must be adjusted for each individual and different conditions separately.


The localization of viral nucleic acids in the cell is essential for understanding the infectious cycle. One of the strategies developed for this purpose is the use of nucleotide analogs such as bromodeoxyuridine (BrdU, analog to thymine) or bromouridine (BrU, analog of uridine), which are incorporated into the nucleic acids during replication or transcription. In adenovirus infections, BrdU has been used to localize newly synthesized viral genomes in the nucleus, where it is key to distinguish between host and viral DNA. Here, we describe our experience with methodological variations of BrdU labeling to localize adenovirus genomes in fluorescence and electron microscopy. We illustrate the need to define conditions in which most of the newly synthesized DNA corresponds to the virus and not the host, and the amount of BrdU provided is enough to incorporate to the new DNA molecules without hampering the cell metabolism. We hope that our discussion of problems encountered and solutions implemented will help other researches interested in viral genome localization in infected cells.


Lowering the impurity content in the thermal barrier coating has the effect of improving the high temperature stability and service life. SiO2, Al2O3, TiO2 and Fe2O3 are several common low melting point oxide impurities in the YSZ (Yttria- Stabilized Zirconia) top coatings, and they all have some influence on the performance of the coatings. But there is no quantitative research on the relationship between impurity content and the properties of the coatings. In this paper, YSZ spraying materials with SiO2, Al2O3 and Fe2O3 with the content changing from less than 0.01wt% to 1wt% were designed. The bond coatings were all NiCoCrAlY and were prepared by HVOF (High-Velocity Oxygen-Fuel). The top coatings were prepared by APS (Atmospheric Plasma Spraying). The microstructure, phase structure and thermal shock resistance of the above coatings were investigated. The results showed that the increase of oxide impurity content was more prone to thermal shock failure. It shows that the oxide impurity has a significant influence on the properties of YSZ coating.


Recent highly sensitive absorption measurements of lithium niobate (LiNbO3) show that within the spectral range between 500 and 2900 nm the transparency is limited by impurities such as iron or hydrogen. In order to reduce the residual absorption, 5-mol.-%-MgO-doped and undoped congruent as well as undoped stoichiometric LiNbO3 crystals are annealed in dry oxygen atmosphere. The extinction coefficient of the treated crystals is measured using whispering-gallery-resonator-based absorption spectroscopy. The conducted measurements show that the treatment of stoichiometric crystals leads to scattering centers. For the congruent material residual metallic ions like iron and copper dominate the absorption in the spectral region from 400–2000 nm, and oxidization only shifts the center of the absorption in our case from that of iron to that of copper, thus inhibiting reaching the theoretical loss limit. Nevertheless, starting from 2000 nm, where absorption caused by hydrogen dominates, annealing leads to a significant drop in absorption, narrowing here the gap to the theoretical loss limit.


Deadwood is an important legacy structure in managed forests, providing continuity in shelter and resource availability for many organisms and acting as a vehicle by which nutrients can be passed from one stand to the next following a harvest. Despite existing at the interface between below- and above-ground systems, however, much remains unknown about the role woody debris plays in linking these zones. Moreover, it remains untested whether the accelerative effects of wood-feeding insects on wood decomposition influence tree growth or nutritional status in forests. In this study, we added different quantities of pine logs to the bases of saplings in two-year-old loblolly pine (Pinus taeda L.) plantations in Mississippi, USA. We included a treatment in which subterranean termites (Blattodea: Rhinotermitidae: Reticulitermes) were excluded from logs to determine how these insects affect the release of nutrients from wood and, in turn, tree growth. After 51 months of decomposition, we quantified below-ground effects by measuring microbial biomass, plant-available forms of N, and ectomycorrhizal diversity associated with fine tree roots. Meanwhile, above-ground measurements focused on the elemental concentrations in decomposing wood either protected or unprotected from termites and tree metrics related to growth and nutrient status. We found additions of wood to significantly increase nitrate and potential net nitrification relative to reference treatments but detected no significant effects on tree growth, needle nitrogen concentrations, or ectomycorrhizal diversity. Soil nitrate and potential net nitrification were higher under protected vs. unprotected logs, and plant-available forms of N were mostly more abundant short distances away from both protected and unprotected logs than directly under them. The wood of logs protected from termites had significantly lower concentrations of most elements compared to that of unprotected logs, largely due to the large amounts of soil imported into unprotected logs by termites. Termite exclusion had no measurable effect on tree growth, nutritional status, or ectomycorrhizal diversity, however. Our findings indicate that deadwood and termites both contribute to the spatial heterogeneity of soil properties but may have limited short-term local effects on tree growth. Longer-term studies and studies on less fertile sites are needed.


In the era of clinical information explosion, a good strategy for clinical text summarization is helpful to improve the clinical workflow. The ideal summarization strategy can preserve important information in the informative but less organized, ill-structured clinical narrative texts. Instead of using pure statistical learning approaches, which are difficult to interpret and explain, we utilized knowledge of computational linguistics with human experts-curated biomedical knowledge base to achieve the interpretable and meaningful clinical text summarization. Our research objective is to use the biomedical ontology with semantic information, and take the advantage from the language hierarchical structure, the constituency tree, in order to identify the correct clinical concepts and the corresponding negation information, which is critical for summarizing clinical concepts from narrative text. We achieved the clinically acceptable performance for both negation detection and concept identification, and the clinical concepts with common negated patterns can be identified and negated by the proposed method.


In this article, a Space-Time Finite Element Method (STFEM) is proposed for the resolution of mechanical problems involving three dimensions in space and one in time. Special attention will be paid to the non-separation of the space and time variables because this kind of interpolation is well suited to mesh adaptation. For that purpose, we have developed a technique of 4D mesh generation adapted to space-time remeshing. A difficulty arose in the representation of 4D finite elements and meshes. This original technique does not require coarse-to-fine and fine-to-coarse mesh-to-mesh transfer operators and does not increase the size of the linear systems to be solved, compared to traditional finite element methods. Space-time meshes are composed of simplex finite elements. Computations are carried out in the context of the continuous Galerkin method. We have tested the method on a linearized elastodynamics problem. Our technique of mesh adaptation was validated on elementary examples and applied to a problem of mobile loading. The convergence and stability of the method are studied and compared with existing methods. This work is a first implementation of 4D space-time remeshing. A stability criterion for the method is established, as well as a convergence rate of about two. Using simplex elements, it is possible to develop a technique of mesh adaptation able to follow a mobile loading zone.


Abstract. In 2018, the ancient tomb was discovered in Tagawa, Fukuoka. The sizes of the tomb were measured by UAV. The length is 443 m, the diameter is 152 m, and the height is 33 m: the second biggest mound in Japan. Chinese history book, Sanguozhi (Chen, 280) reads Yamatai country occupied 27 countries in Japan in the 3rd century by the queen Himiko. The location of Yamatai was 840 km south from Soul with 70000 families, and the size of Himiko's tomb was 150 m diameters. The locations of Yamatai country and Himiko's tomb are still unknown. From Sanguozhi, the optimum location was estimated with the direction, the distance and family numbers. Family numbers were estimated from the river watershed areas. Kyushu islands have 28 big rivers, corresponding to 28 countries described in Sanguozhi. Each river corresponded to each country, and their family number was estimated by 2.5% of the watershed area with family number / 10 a. Finally, the Chikugo river watershed was a candidate of Yamatai country. Moreover, two kinds of tombs became candidates of Himiko's tomb.


The paper deals with the application of Information Technology (IT) in order to develop the virtual enterprise within the area of Manufacturing Engineering. The research project called Toronto Virtual Enterprise (TOVE) and the generic reference architecture and methodology (GERAM) are presented. Based on the results of these projects a multi-agent oriented networking system for CAD/CAPP/CAM has been defined.


The aim of this investigation was to analyse the perception of waterborne diseases and socioeconomic and environmental aspects of Quilombolas in vulnerable communities in Northeast Brazil, as the research was conducted in three vulnerable communities located in this area. The study was sectional regarding quantitative approach and was carried out from September 2018–August 2019 through interviews with 164 individuals and the analysis of drinking water quality. The highest prevalence was intestinal parasitic diseases (57%), primarily Schistosoma mansoni (20%). The interviews revealed that 27% of individuals used drinking water from the general distribution network and 26% from a well/spring outside the residence. Of these, 39% did not undergo any treatment before ingestion. Of the 10 water samples collected for microbiological analysis, there was growth of heterotrophic bacteria (53%), faecal coliforms (50%) and thermotolerant bacteria (7%). Study participants were subject to environmental characteristics that made them vulnerable to health issues. The promotion of health actions and the implementation of measures related to the treatment and storage of drinking water are tools that can combat the occurrence of diseases.


1. The alterations in voluntary wrist extension and flexion movement trajectories induced by application of vibration to the tendon of flexor carpi radialis throughout the course of the movement, together with the associated EMG patterns, have been studied in normal human subjects. Both extension and flexion movements were routinely of a target amplitude of 30 deg and made against a torque load of 0.32 N m. Flexor tendon vibration consistently produced undershooting of voluntary extension movements. In contrast, voluntary flexion movements were relatively unaffected. 2. The degree of vibration‐induced undershooting of 1 s voluntary extension movements was graded according to the amplitude (0.75, 1.0 and 1.5 mm) of flexor tendon vibration. 3. As flexor vibration was initiated progressively later (at greater angular thresholds) during the course of 1 s voluntary extension movements, and the period of vibration was proportionately reduced, so the degree of vibration‐induced undershooting showed a corresponding decline. 4. Varying the torque loads (0.32, 0.65 and 0.97 N m) against which 1 s extension movements were made, and thereby the strength of voluntary extensor contraction, produced no systematic changes in the degree of flexor vibration‐induced undershooting. 5. Analysis of EMG patterns recorded from wrist flexor and extensor muscles indicated that vibration‐induced undershooting of extension movements resulted largely from a reduction in activity in the prime‐mover rather than increased antagonist activity. The earliest reductions in extensor EMG commenced some 40 ms after the onset of vibration, i.e. well before voluntary reaction time; these initial responses were considered to be 'automatic' in nature. 6. These results support the view that the central nervous system utilizes proprioceptive information in the continuous regulation of moderately slow voluntary wrist movements. Proprioceptive sensory input from the passively lengthening antagonist muscle, presumably arising mainly from muscle spindle I a afferents, appears to be particularly important and to act mainly in the reciprocal control of the prime‐mover.


This descriptive qualitative study is aimed at identifying and describing the types of free collocations found in the articles of Readers Digest. By taking a sample of ten articles from different months for each year since 2003 up to 2012, it was found all the four productive free collocations were in the data. Type 4 (Determiner + Adjective + Noun) was the dominant type (53.92 %). This was possible because the adjective in the pattern included the present participle and past participle of verb as adjectives. The other types have the following percentages (in order of the highest level to the lowest level): Type 1 (33.40 %), Type 2 (10.06 %), and Type 3 (2.62 %). The largest number of free collocations was found in the book of Feeding My Fashion (13.48 %). The data analysis also indicated that all the articles contain free collocations. As free collocations are abundant in text, it is suggested that this grammatical construction be introduced as part of strategy to master English.


What is Geely's growth strategy and internationalisation level? The main aim of this paper is the analysis of the Chinese automotive internationalisation strategy as a case study of Geely Automobile. China become the largest auto market in the world after the USA since 2009; China"s automobile industry has been in rapid development since early 1990s. Geely one of China's top ten auto manufacturers and also among the country's top 500 firms. The pattern of Chinese automobile industry is supported by the multinational corporations. But Geely (Chery and BYD) is quite special, it has no technology and no cooperative foreign company. Geely has its "own brand" which has been the three big state automobile companies' wish for many years. The progress of Geely's internationalization has began, but is at a initial, but progressing based international standards. However Geely's rising rate of domestic sale and exportation is quite astonishing, since 1997, when Geely was newly founded, Geely sold 483,000 automobiles, placing it 8th on the list of Chinese automobile manufacturers in 2012. Thus Geely became one of the leading Chinese automobile manufacturers. Geely is the first independent and largest private automobile manufacturer in China. In 2009, Geely acquired Volvo Cars for $1.8 billion from Ford Motor Company. Geely brought 100% stake in Volvo, as well as the related assets (including intellectual property), using this technology to make its own upgraded brand. Geely"s growth strategy is characterised as active internationalisation, establishing its own brand and differentiation, diversification of exports market and market entry modes from exports and FDI, and M&A strategies. In this paper, Section II analyses the growth strategy of the of Geely Automobile. Section III examines the Geely"s M&A strategy of Volvo, Manganese Bronze, and DSI. Section V provides some concluding remarks.


Building on classical invariant theory, it is observed that the polarised traces generate the centraliser $Z_L(sl(N))$ of the diagonal embedding of $U(sl(N))$ in $U(sl(N))^{\otimes L}$. The paper then focuses on $sl(3)$ and the case $L=2$. A Calabi--Yau algebra $\mathcal{A}$ with three generators is introduced and explicitly shown to possess a PBW basis and a certain central element. It is seen that $Z_2(sl(3))$ is isomorphic to a quotient of the algebra $\mathcal{A}$ by a single explicit relation fixing the value of the central element. Upon concentrating on three highest weight representations occurring in the Clebsch--Gordan series of $U(sl(3))$, a specialisation of $\mathcal{A}$ arises, involving the pairs of numbers characterising the three highest weights. In this realisation in $U(sl(3))\otimes U(sl(3))$, the coefficients in the defining relations and the value of the central element have degrees that correspond to the fundamental degrees of the Weyl group of type $E_6$. With the correct association between the six parameters of the representations and some roots of $E_6$, the symmetry under the full Weyl group of type $E_6$ is made manifest. The coefficients of the relations and the value of the central element in the realisation in $U(sl(3))\otimes U(sl(3))$ are expressed in terms of the fundamental invariant polynomials associated to $E_6$. It is also shown that the relations of the algebra $\mathcal{A}$ can be realised with Heun type operators in the Racah or Hahn algebra.


A recent article in Eos (May 13, 1997, p. 199), "Conference on the Magnetization of the Oceanic Crust Steers Future Research," made reference to certain geomagnetic data held by the U.S. Navy. The authors expressed concern for the safekeeping of the data mentioned above. Their concern was apparently predicated on the belief that these data are being stored only on aging magnetic tapes. This is not the case. The geomagnetic data, held by the Naval Oceanographic Office, are stored in multiple copies on several different stable media, including on-line storage in our relatively new Integrated Database Management System.


Significant natural gas resources are known to exist in the United States in tight, low-permeability sandstones that cover a prospective area of 1,000,000 mi/sup 2/ (2,590,000 km/sup 2/). Characterization and reliable estimation of their production potential based on well logs are important although difficult task. Proper evaluation of low permeability sands based on conventional log-interpretation techniques is frequently inadequate. Furthermore, while empirical rules of thumb assist in the evaluation of localized conditions, they only provide guidelines. Recent developments in quantitative log-analysis techniques incorporate natural-gamma-ray spectral data and application of the Waxman-Smits model for detailed reservoir description. Quantitative correlations of cation exchange capacity (CEC), water salinity, porosity, and conductivity of water- and hydrocarbon-bearing shaly sand reservoirs are based on resistivity, density, neutron and natural-gamma-ray spectral data. These correlations provide important information about clay volume, reservoir porosities (total, effective) and fluid-saturation distribution (total, effective), type of clay minerals (smectite, illite, chlorite/kaolinite), their distribution in the reservoir (dispersed, laminated, structural), and log-derived indicators of potential formation damage. Field experiences are reviewed for logging and evaluating tight formations in south Texas; the Jurassic Cotton Valley trend in east Texas, Louisiana, and Arkansas; and the Tertiary Fort Union and Cretaceous Mesaverde Formations of the Piceancemore » basin in Colorado.« less


The paper focuses on describing and applying a refined method of investment payback calculation related to industrial robot applications. Industrial robots play an important role in modern manufacturing companies, therefore it is important to precisely determine the investment payback of robot applications. In the first part of the paper, we introduce payback calculation theory in general and the current approaches to payback calculation of robot applications in practice. Subsequently, we point out that current approaches seem insufficient due to tracking only a limited number of costs and savings. Subsequently, we attempt to identify all identifiable costs and savings related to robotic applications, then we present a refined method to determine the payback of robot applications more precisely. The method is then applied in a case study performed in an industrial enterprise. Finally, we evaluate how significantly this refined method differs from the calculation used in practice and these findings are summarised.


The research paper in hand presents a thorough exploration of the fishing vessel accidents and near misses in the UK fishing industry as well as the underlying human element factors and sub-factors contributing to them. In this respect, the regulatory regime in the fishing industry both at national and international level is initially examined while also complemented by the investigation of past research efforts to address these issues. Furthermore, the analysis of the fishing vessels accidents and near misses as recorded in the UK MAIB (Marine Accident Investigation Branch) database for a period of 19 years is performed in order to derive the causal factors leading to the fishing vessel accidents. It is initially shown that the fatalities and injuries taking place due to fishing vessels' accidents have alarmingly remained unchanged over the last 15-20 years. Another key finding is that the number of accidents and near misses per day and night shifts is quite similar while most accidents take place in coastal waters. Furthermore, human factors are related to the vast majority of fishing vessels accidents with the principal ones referring to "non-compliance", "equipment misuse or poorly designed", "training" and "competence". Finally, remedial measures are also suggested in order to address the main accident causes identified.


OBJECTIVE
To evaluate the outcome and durability of high-energy transurethral microwave thermotherapy (HE-TUMT) in comparison with transurethral resection of the prostate (TURP).

PATIENTS AND METHODS
Fifty-two patients with BPH and lower urinary tract symptoms were randomized and treated either by TURP (21 patients; mean prostate volume 45 mL, SD 15) or HE-TUMT (31 patients, mean prostate volume 43 mL, SD 12). Long-term results were obtained at a mean (SD) follow-up of 2.4 (0.5) years.

RESULTS
During the follow-up, the mean symptomatic improvement stabilized at 56% after TUMT and 74% after TURP. The mean maximum urinary flow rate increased by 62% after TUMT and 105% after TURP. Before treatment, 78% of patients in the TURP group were obstructed according to urodynamic investigation and after treatment, 14% remained obstructed. In the TUMT group, 67% of patients were obstructed before treatment and 33% remained so afterward. Six patients (19%) underwent TURP after TUMT (four after 1 year) and two patients were also treated with medication. One patient underwent a bladder neck incision after TURP to treat bladder neck sclerosis. Three patients were not satisfied with the outcome after the additional TURP.

CONCLUSION
Both treatment modalities show good symptomatic and objective results at > 2 years of follow-up. Most re-treatments were performed > or = 1 year after treatment and were based on subjective findings.


In recent years, along with enhancement of boards of directors' status and their crucial role on organizational strategic decisions, it has been paid significant attention to the improvement of board performance level. On the other hand, the increase of environmental complexities of the organization and its environment has highlighted the significance of information role on managerial decisions. Therefore, it seems that the use of information plays a vital role on performance improvement of the modern board in today's knowledge-base economy. The purpose of the study is to investigate the factors affecting information technology used by the board and their impacts on board's performance. To examine the hypothesis, a number of board members were chosen in both manufacturing and services companies in Mashhad. The applied research methodology was a combination of various data, both quantitative and qualitative. Quantitative data were analyzed by using regression analysis and goodness of fit index. The research results indicate that the factors include; environmental dynamism, culture and firm strategy have effect on using information Technology and that performance level can improve with information use of board of directors. In addition, chief information officer plays a moderator role on influence of using information technology on firm performance level.


The spatial relations between parts in an assembly can be critical for the functional and aesthetic quality of a product. In the case of the automobile, these relations can be between doors, fenders, hood, panels, and so on. Variation in these relations, caused by part and assembly variation, influences the output variation, which is what the customer sees and judges. This paper presents a computer-aided tolerancing tool that supports and improves split-line design with respect to geometrical variation. A split-line is the relation between two mating parts over a distance. The design and placement of a split-line in an automobile body are influenced by several aspects such as design language, geometrical dimensioning, crash safety, and so on. In this paper only the geometrical dimensioning aspects have been considered. The research has been carried out using simulations and analyses in a computer-aided tolerancing software. The tool presented describes a way to calculate and visualize the geometrically most robust area and split-line between two parts. The findings from the research show that it is difficult to calculate and visualize the result in flush and gap directions in the same way. The tool gives insight into how the configuration of the locating schemes influences the geometrical robustness of the design.


Coherent causal memory (CCM) is causal memory in which prefixes of an execution can be mapped to global memory states in a consistent way. While CCM requires conflicting pairs of writes to be globally ordered, it allows writes to remain unordered with respect to both reads and nonconflicting writes. Nevertheless, it supports assertional, state-based program reasoning using generalized Owicki-Gries proof outlines (where assertions can be attached to any causal program edge). Indeed, we show that from a reasoning standpoint, CCM differs from sequentially consistent (SC) memory only in that ghost code added by the user is not allowed to introduce new write-write races.
While CCM provides most of the formal reasoning leverage of SC memory, it is much more efficiently implemented. As an illustration, we describe a simple programming discipline that provides CCM on top of x86-TSO. The discipline is considerably more relaxed than the one needed to ensure SC; for example, it introduces no burden whatsoever for programs in which at most one thread writes to any variable.


Ethopabate (ETP) is a coccidiostat that is frequently used to prevent and treat coccidiosis in chickens. Illegal use and abuse of ETP can lead to drug residues in edible animal tissues, which present a potential health risk to consumers. To rapidly monitor ETP residues, a monoclonal antibody-based indirect competitive enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ic-ELISA) has been developed that has simple sample preparation and clean-up. After immunogen preparation, inoculation and cell fusion, a monoclonal antibody (4G7) was obtained with the lgG2 isotype. The 4G7 antibody had the ability to specifically recognize ETP with an IC50 value of 0.66 μg L−1, it was found to have weak and insignificant cross-reactivity for some structure-related analogs. With the optimized ic-ELISA protocol, the detection limits of ETP were calculated as 0.21 μg kg−1 and 0.34 μg kg−1 in chicken muscle and liver samples, respectively. The recoveries ranged from 85.4% to 98.4% with a coefficient of variation of less than 15%. Furthermore, good correlations between the results of ic-ELISA and high-performance liquid chromatography demonstrated the reliability of the developed ic-ELISA. This proposed method is a rapid, sensitive and useful tool that offers a cost-effective alternative to current published procedures without any concession in the ability to detect ETP residues in edible animal tissues.


This study examines whether the lure of injury compensation prompts whiplash claimants to overstate their symptoms. Claim settlement is the intervention of interest, as it represents the point at which there is no further incentive to exaggerate symptoms, and neck pain at 24 months is the outcome of interest. Longitudinal data on neck pain scores and timing of claim settlement were regressed, controlling for the effect of time on recovery, to compare outcomes in claimants who had and had not settled their compensation claims. The results show clearly that removing the financial incentive to over-report symptoms has no effect on self-reported neck pain in a fault-based compensation scheme, and this finding concurs with other studies on this topic. Policy decisions to limit compensation in the belief that claimants systematically misrepresent their health status are not supported empirically Claimants do not appear to be "cured by a verdict".


Porous structures offer an attractive approach to reduce the amount of natural resources used while maintaining relatively high mechanical efficiency. However, for some applications the drop in mechanical properties resulting from the introduction of porosity is too high, which has limited the broader utilization of porous materials in industry. Here, it is shown that steel monoliths can be designed to display high mechanical efficiency and reversible self‐reinforcing properties when made with porous architectures with up to three hierarchical levels. Ultralight steel structures that can float on water and autonomously adapt their stiffness are manufactured by the thermal reduction and sintering of 3D printed foam templates. Using distinct mechanical testing techniques, image analysis, and finite element simulations, the mechanisms leading to the high mechanical efficiency and self‐stiffening ability of the hierarchical porous monoliths are studied. The design and fabrication of mechanically stable porous monoliths using iron as a widely available natural resource is expected to contribute to the future development of functional materials with a more sustainable footprint.


Indonesia as the biggest archipelago country and situated in equator is very vulnerable to the adverse effect of climate change. There are two main categories of efforts to handle the issues in climate change; that are how to mitigate it and how to adapt to the change. One of the main culprits of climate change is the emission of carbon gas due to fossil fuel energy utilization contributing 302 million tonnes CO2equivalent.President of the Republic of Indonesia in 2009 in the G-20 Meeting, Pittsburgh, USA, and in 2010 in COP 15 UNFCCC, Copenhagen, Denmark issued the national voluntary target to reduce greenhouse gas emission by year 2020 as much as 26% from business-as-usual by national domestic efforts. This emission reduction will further be improved as much as 41% from business-as-usual by international supports. The Government of Indonesia issued a national action plan to reduce greenhouse gases emission which is enforced by Presidential Regulation No. 61/2011. To achieve this target in energy sector,REFF-Burn (Reducing Emission from Fossil Fuel Burning) concept has been proposed by Sumiarso. Based on REFF-Burn Technology Portfolio, reducing emission from fossil-fuel burning is categorized in three different stages, which are pre-combustion, during combustion and post-combustion. In pre-combustion stage, utilization of clean energy is one of the wise choices. The perspective of the clean energy resources and utilization in Indonesia is discussed in this paper.


Two barrels of double microelectrodes have been filled with different salts so that the electrophoretic injection of Na+ and K+ ions could be investigated in alternating sequence on the same motoneuron in the cat spinal cord. The effects of these injections on the mechanism generating the IPSP were evaluated by determining the equilibrium potential for the IPSP (the EIPSP), i. e. the membrane potential at which the IPSP is zero. Such determinations have been made every 5 to 10 s after ion injections and have provided the most direct evidence of the ionic mechanism generating the IPSP. Comparison of the Na+ and K+ ion injections shows that the former injection always displaced the EIPSP much farther in the depolarizing direction and that recovery was much slower, with a half-time of 70 to 120 s, in contrast to about 20 s after the K+ injection. In the discussion and evaluation of these results it was postulated that almost all of the displacement of the EIPSP in the depolarizing direction was due to the increased intracellular Cl- concentration, the (Cl-)i. Under normal conditions a high (Cl-)i declines by diffusional exchange across the cell membrane with a half-time of about 20 s, but this decline is much slower when the internal potassium is depleted. An explanation of this difference will be given in the following paper.


The article is dedicated to otrthographical content of the first soviet standard «Tolkovyi slovar' russkogo yazyka» after edition of D.N. Ushakov. The specific aspects of spelling are analyzed in the context of orthographic situation in postreformed period and D.N. Ushakov's views. It is set the approaches to normalization of such controversial groups of writing as compound adjectives with the meaning of colour shade, stressed vowels о/е after hushings in nouns' suffixes, н/нн in suffixes of adjectives and participles. The basic groups of orthographic variants in the dictionary are defended, their normative status is determined. It is defended the influence of the dictionary on the normalization postreform spelling.


Abstract Methyl α-D-fructofuranoside was transformed regioselectively into the corresponding 6-S-thioacetate in one step by use of the thio-Mitsunobu reaction. Reaction of the trimesylate derived from this thioacetate with sodium hydrogen carbonate led to the thietanosugar methyl 4,6-anhydro-1,3-di-O-mesyl-4-thio-α-D-tagatofuranoside. Methyl β-D-fructofuranoside gave the corresponding 6-S-thioacetate and, with excess thioacetic acid, the 1-S,6-S-bis-thioacetate. Whereas this mono-thioacetate did not yield a thietano derivative, the bis-thioacetate gave the bis-thietane methyl 1,3:4,6-dianhydro-1,4-dithio-β-D-sorbofuranoside with sodium hydrogen carbonate.


Skin papillomas are noncancerous and outwardgrowing lumps that doesn't spread and are not aggressive.Papillomas are also known as verruca or warts when they reach to the skin. The surface in which papilloma occurs in is called epithelia. The most common cause for papillomas is Human papillomavirus (HPV). There are more than 100 different HPV types. In Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) warts are considered to occur because of liver weakness, caused by wind heat invasion. The treated patient is a woman who was admitted to the clinic for removal of multiple skin warts located on the neck. Only one treatment was made with fire-needle acupuncture. Acupuncture was done directly on the warts with a few punctures on one wart. Treatment was with duration of 5-10 minutes. After the treatment, the skin needed one week to heal and the warts to fall off. After one week all warts were gone. Acupuncture whether done with hot or cold needles, can significantly improve people's health, boost theimmunity, remove viral infections, enhance the blood and Qi flow, and especially when done properly by a good trained doctor the positive results are inevitable.


Abstract Exposure to lead causes a number of diseases, including mild mental retardation resulting from loss of IQ points, as well as increased blood pressure, gastrointestinal effects. Several other disease outcomes have been associated with exposure to lead, but evidence is considered insufficient at this time for a quantitative assessment of their impact on health to be made here. Lead, due to its multiplicity of uses (e.g. leaded petrol, lead in paints, ceramics, food cans, make-up, traditional remedies, batteries), is present in air, dust, soil and water to varying degrees. Each of these media can act as a route of human exposure, through ingestion or inhalation and, to a small degree for organic lead compounds, dermal absorption. Human exposure can be assessed directly, through body burden measurements (lead in blood, teeth or bone) or indirectly, by measuring levels of lead in the environment (air, dust, food or water).


Myoclonic astatic epilepsy is currently treated with valproic acid as the first line treatment of choice. However, this is based on expert opinion due to the paucity of good evidence1. Described here is the case of a 7-year-old boy with myoclonic astatic epilepsy, whose seizures could not be controlled on valproic acid monotherapy, and who rapidly improved with ethosuximide as add-on therapy.


A cracked tooth is a common presentation in general dental practice. It may be difficult to diagnose, owing to the variations in the clinical presentation. The symptoms that result from a cracked tooth have given rise to the term Cracked Tooth Syndrome (CTS). This article reviews and discusses the clinical signs, symptoms and the management of CTS. An early diagnosis is important to relieve pain, restore function and improve the prognosis for the tooth. The prognosis can be unpredictable and this needs to be understood by patients before embarking on definitive treatment.


This article highlights the results of comprehensive studies at Sartan cave and open-air sites (MIS 2) in the northwestern Altai. Their stratigraphic profiles include loam layers, often with geest. Absolute dates are discussed, as well as the relative stratigraphic position of lithological layers within profiles of stratified Pleistocene sites, using available paleoenvironmental data. The Sartan sites of the region are base-camps with a complete sequence of raw material reduction. Such a combination of base-camp and workshop features indicates the proximity of raw material sources. The main hunting targets were animals inhabiting mosaic landscapes. Sites correlated with various stages of the Sartan glaciation have yielded stone and bone assemblages of the final stage of the regional Upper Paleolithic. Petrographic characteristics of lithic assemblages and sources of raw material are evaluated. Typological and technological properties of industries are listed. The Late Upper Paleolithic of southern Siberia reveals a combination of Upper and Middle Paleolithic features, evidencing cultural conservatism. These industries are rather similar to those of central, southeastern, and northeastern Altai and to contemporaneous industries of southern Siberia.


Between 2005 and 2010 the worldwide stored information increased tenfold. Traditional data processing systems cannot keep up with this data explosion anymore, as they are not designed to scale well enough according to this changed environment. Companies like Google or Yahoo, who have to deal with vast amounts of data on a daily basis, have targeted this problem by developing highly flexible, scalable and fault tolerant systems known as Big Data frameworks (e.g. Hadoop) that utilise large clusters of commodity computers. Big Data Streams combine the concepts of Big Data frameworks with the ability of data stream management systems to process data continuously without the need of storing information at any time. S4 is an existing Big Data Stream system, but it still does not meet all requirements for successful Big Data Streaming. S4Latin improves S4 by introducing a language based data processing framework that combines querylike features and procedural data flow elements to allow users to create new streaming applications by writing a few lines of consecutive statements instead of extensive configuration and code-based features of traditional S4 applications. We demonstrate the capabilities of S4Latin and how easy new complex streaming applications can be built using it.


The objective of this article is to describe the International Organization of Securities Commissions - IOSCO, its internal procedures, normative product and implementation process, and to test the role played by the US Securities and Exchange Commission - SEC since the Organization's birth. The pervasiveness of the US Securities Laws will be tested both on the most important document IOSCO has ever adopted, the Objectives and Principles of Securities Regulation, representing the regulatory philosophy of the Organization; and, as a more detailed case study, on the documents concerning the regulation of Credit Rating Agencies, a very hot topics for international finance. Moreover, it will be analyzed the position of the US in the crossborder enforcement cooperation process established under the auspices of IOSCO in the last twenty years and how this has recently changed. The results seem to suggest that IOSCO's has been deeply affected by the US Securities Laws even if, more recently, the emerging of new important markets is progressively turning the Organization into a multipolar forum where the US is no longer the only "regulatory" superpower.


The xoconostle (Opuntia matudae Scheinvar) is a sour fruit, of which the peel is consumed. It is perishable, but it has a beneficial effect on human health, as recognized popularly in Mexico. The objective of this study was to create a snack of dried xoconostle using neotame, an artificial non-caloric sweetener, to improve flavor. We present (a) a partial chemical characterization of the fruit (total phenolic content (TP) and antioxidant activity (AA)), (b) dehydration techniques (heating by convection and freeze-drying), and (c) sensorial characterization of the final product. The experimental unit was 40 g of fresh xoconostle peel with three replications. The sweetener did not affect dehydration time of convective heat. The sweetened lyophilized xoconostle had lower TP and AA than unsweetened xoconostle. The sensorial analysis showed that lyophilized xoconostle sweetened with neotame (aqueous solution 32 mg L -1 ) has acceptable flavor and appearance.


During the course of studies on protein kinases in psoriatic epidermis, a novel histone-activated protein kinase activity was identified. This activity (referred to as PK-II because it was the second peak of protein kinase activity eluted from a DEAE column) was partially purified from the supernatant of an epidermal homogenate by DEAE-cellulose column chromatography. Although histone was not a substrate for phosphorylation, in the presence of histone, endogenous proteins of Mr 105 and 95 kDa were phosphorylated. Activity was not affected by Ca2+/phospholipid, cAMP, cGMP, cAMP-dependent kinase inhibitor, spermine, spermidine, calmodulin, EGF, or phorbol ester. Phosphorylation was specific for serine and threonine residues. A major peak of PK-II activity eluted from sepharose 6B with an apparent Mr of 100 kDa, suggesting that histone may stimulate autophosphorylation. The properties of PK-II resemble those recently described for a class of polypeptide-dependent protein kinases isolated from placenta, Ehrlich ascites tumor cells, and bakers' yeast. PK-II was significantly higher in psoriatic involved epidermis (32.6 +/- 11.6 pmol/min/mg protein) compared to psoriatic uninvolved epidermis (5.7 +/- 0.6 pmol/min/mg; p = 0.03) and normal epidermis (9.5 +/- 2.2 pmol/min/mg; p = 0.05). The function of histone stimulated protein kinase in epidermal function and its role in the pathophysiology of psoriasis remain to be explored.


This demo paper serves to describe a research platform for autonomous surveillance by mobile robots. System components from various technical disciplines (including robot navigation, computer vision, discrete event systems, and human-computer interaction) have been combined together into a cohesive, modular system architecture. We employ our architecture to experiment with state-of-the-art methods in planning and decision making under uncertainty, which we demonstrate enable robots to effectively patrol and respond to surveillance events in a large indoor environment.


Realism and Individualism. Charles S. Peirce and the Threat of Modern Nominalism discusses the main problems, tenets, assumptions, and arguments involved in Charles S. Peirce's early and late realist stances and subjects to critical scrutiny the still dominant view that Pragmatic Realism merely extends or refines new arguments in support of Scholastic Realism without questioning its basic assumptions. The book presents a critical overview of Peirce's views on modern nominalism and offers a novel approach to the social-anthropological underpinnings of his realism, especially Pragmatic Realism vis a vis the individualist tendencies in modern thought. The book is of interest to scholars and students of philosophy, especially students of American pragmatism, anthropology, linguistic pragmatics, as well as to anyone interested in Charles S. Peirce, Duns Scotus, Ockham, and generally to semioticians, social scientists, and sociologists.


Alternative tourism is a type of tourism that provides cultural interaction and income to the local people in the area where it is realized and is now included in the rural development policies of many countries and supported in development strategies. Bingol city has rich vegetation, natural beauty, various nature tourism (plateau-flora-winter-river-hunting-cave, wildlife observation and trekking) activities in terms of rural tourism, so Bingol has a separate place about potential turism activities. Therefore, the heritage, natural beauties and rural tourism potential of Bingol should be promoted in a more remarkable and awareness-raising manner and tourism activities in the province should be supported more and potential should be realized. In this study, the literature review, field studies and observations, the concept of rural tourism and the importance of rural tourism are tried to be explained and the existing rural tourism potential of Bingol province is evaluated with observations and visual materials. The living standards of the local people will be further improved by increasing the tourism and natural values, agricultural and cultural activities, thus contributing to the development of the Bingol city. Keywords: Bingol, tourism, alternarive tourism, rural tourism. DOI: 10.7176/JSTR/5-12-32