When prototyping AI experiences (AIX), interface designers seek useful and usable ways to support end-user tasks through AI capabilities. However, AI poses challenges to design due to its dynamic behavior in response to training data, end-user data, and feedback. Designers must consider AI's uncertainties and offer adaptations such as explainability, error recovery, and automation vs. human task control. Unfortunately, current prototyping tools assume a black-box view of AI, forcing designers to work with separate tools to explore machine learning models, understand model performance, and align interface choices with model behavior. This introduces friction to rapid and iterative prototyping. We propose Model-Informed Prototyping (MIP), a workflow for AIX design that combines model exploration with UI prototyping tasks. Our system, ProtoAI, allows designers to directly incorporate model outputs into interface designs, evaluate design choices across different inputs, and iteratively revise designs by analyzing model breakdowns. We demonstrate how ProtoAI can readily operationalize human-AI design guidelines. Our user study finds that designers can effectively engage in MIP to create and evaluate AI-powered interfaces during AIX design.


The Anterior transpetrosal approach is a skull base surgical procedure that can provide a wide operative view of the petroclival and the prepontine region. This approach requires one to accurately understand the anatomy of the anterior part of the temporal bone and the histological structure of the dura mater. In addition, it is necessary to learn operative techniques for venous preservation, accurate hemostasis at each step, and prevention of cerebrospinal fluid leakage. In this article, the anatomy and surgical techniques that are required for a beginner to master the anterior transpetrosal approach are explained step by step.


Lifetime of levels in /sup 225/Ra, /sup 225/Ac, and /sup 227/Ac have been measured by delayed coincidence techniques and these have been used to determine the E1 gamma-ray transition probabilities. The reduced E1 transition probabilities. The reduced E1 transition probabilities in /sup 225/Ra and /sup 225/Ac are about two orders of magnitude larger than the values in mid-actinide nuclei. On the other hand, the E1 rate in /sup 227/Ac is similar to those measured in heavier actinides. Previous studies suggest the presence of octupole deformation in all the three nuclei. The present investigation indicates that fast E1 transitions occur for nuclei with octupole deformation. However, the studies also show that there is no one-to-one correspondence between E1 rate and octupole deformation. 13 refs., 4 figs.


Simulations and experiments are reported for nonequilibrium steady-state assembly of small colloidal crystal clusters in rotating magnetic fields vs frequency and amplitude. High-dimensional trajectories of particle coordinates from image analysis of experiments and from Stokesian Dynamic computer simulations are fit to low-dimensional reaction coordinate based Fokker-Planck and Langevin equations. The coefficients of these equations are effective energy and diffusivity landscapes that capture configuration-dependent energy and friction for nonequilibrium steady-state dynamics. Two reaction coordinates that capture condensation and anisotropy of dipolar chains folding into crystals are sufficient to capture high-dimensional experimental and simulated dynamics in terms of first passage time distributions. Our findings illustrate how field-mediated nonequilibrium steady-state colloidal assembly dynamics can be modeled to interpret and design pathways toward target microstructures and morphologies.


Efficient cooperation between organizations across all the phases of a project lifecycle is a critical factor to increase the chances of project success and drive sustainable business. However, and according to research, despite the large benefits that efficient organizational cooperation provides to organizations, they are still often reluctant to engage in cooperative partnerships. The reviewed literature argues that the major reason for such a trend is due to the lack of efficient and actionable supportive models to manage organizational cooperative risks. In this work we propose a model to efficiently support the management of organizational cooperative risks in project environments. The model, MCPx (management of cooperative projects), was developed based on four critical scientific pillars, (1) project risk management, (2) cooperative networks, (3) social network analysis, and (4) business intelligence architecture, and will analyze in a quantitative way how project cooperative behaviors evolve across a bounded time period, and to which extent they can turn into a cooperative project risk (essentially potential threats). For this matter, the MCPx model will quantitatively analyze five key project cooperative behavioral dimensions, (1) communication, (2) information sharing, (3) trust, (4) problem solving and (5) decision making, which show how dynamic interactions between project stakeholders evolve across time. The implementation and functioning principles of the MCPx model are illustrated with a case study.


Empirical research has shown that social interactions affect the use of public benefits, thus providing evidence in favor of the idea of "welfare cultures." In this paper we take the next crucial step by separately identifying the role of social stigma and information sharing in welfare participation, using Census data. We argue that the stigma vs. information distinction has possibly important consequences. Separate identification exploits the asymmetry between association and mere spatial proximity: we asume that while information is transmitted within groups, stigma works across groups as well. We also allow for heterogeneity of social effects across different race-ethnic groups and find non-trivial differences. We find that while the information channel is more important than stigma, White Americans appear to perceive stigma more from otherWhite Americans than by other races, and Black and Hispanic Americans appear to respond principally to stigma from external groups. JEL Classification Codes: I30, Z13.


This paper analyses the circumstances under which conflict in the East China Sea could occur and the implications for Australia. Executive summary Tensions between China and Japan have ratcheted up in recent years to the point where their territorial dispute over islands in the East China Sea is seen as among the region's most dangerous flashpoints. The prospect of Sino-Japanese conflict over these islands is one that cannot be taken lightly by Australia. Economically, three of our four leading trading partners are located in Northeast Asia, while sea lanes vital to Australian trade run through the waters of the East China Sea. Strategically and politically, two US allies are based in this region and America retains a strong forward military presence there. This paper starts from the premise that insufficient attention has been given to the potential ramifications for Australia of conflict in the East China Sea, particularly in terms of whether Australia's alliance obligations with the United States could embroil Canberra in a conflict. The paper is motivated in part by Defence Minister Johnston's June 2014 remarks stating that the ANZUS alliance would not commit Australia to a conflict where the US had sent forces to support Japan. While reminiscent of remarks made a decade earlier by then-Foreign Minister Alexander Downer in relation to the prospect of Australian involvement via ANZUS in a Taiwan contingency, Johnston's assessment has not attracted anywhere near the same level of attention and analysis as those made by Downer in August 2004. The purpose of this paper is to begin to fill this gap in Australia's public and policy debate by analysing the circumstances under which conflict in the East China Sea could occur and the implications thereof for Australia. The paper answers three questions: 1. What does Australia's alliance relationship with the US commit Canberra to in the event of conflict in the East China Sea? 2. What are the risks that Australia faces as a result of ANZUS and other associated international commitments? 3. What can be done to better understand and manage these risks?


The broth of sea cucumber was decolorized with mineral sorbents, as perlite and bentonite, and with chitosans of crab carapace and shrimp shell. The chitosans were the most effective in sorption and subsequent removal of the protein-pigment complex, providing the decolorization degree of 35–55 %. Besides, the content of glycosides in the broth was twice decreased. The amino sugars content changed in dependence on the chitosan origin: the chitosan of crab carapace did not influence on this parameter, but the chitosan of shrimp shell caused its halving. For the optimal combination of chemical compounds in the broth, the chitosan with high molecular weight (1300 kDa) extracted from crab carapace should be used for decolorizing. Preliminary fermentation of the broth with Protamex increased concentration of biologically active peptides with low molecular weight in the solution. The fermented and decolorized broth of sea cucumber has good organoleptic properties and high content of biologically active components, as glycosides, amino sugars and low molecular weight peptides, so could be used as the basis for nonalcoholic tonic drinks.


Background: Nowadays, one criterion to assess the impact of various treatments in cancer patients is the quality of life (QOL), which represents the patients' physical and psychosocial manner. It is already proved that BCc1 nanomedicine enjoys therapeutic behavior in cancer treatment of in vitro, animal, and human studies. Objectives: In the present study, we aimed at investigating the QOL in gastric cancer patients according to the European Organization for Research and Treatment of Cancer (EORTC QLQ-C30) questionnaire after treating them with BCc1 nanomedicine synthesized based on nanochelating technology. Methods: A randomized, double-blind, and multicenter study was conducted to investigate the QLQ-STO30 of 60 metastatic (8 weeks after treatment) and 60 non-metastatic (20 weeks after treatment) gastric cancer patients in two separate groups named BCc1 nanomedicine and placebo. Results: In the metastatic patients, the mean difference of overall QLQ-STO30 showed a 2.8-score improvement in BCc1 nanomedicine (P 0.05) and a 3-score decline in placebo (P > 0.05). Conclusions: The results of the study showed that BCc1 nanomedicine improves a number of indices in metastatic and non-metastatic gastric cancer patients, such as functional domains, symptom scales, and global QOL included in EORTC QLQ-STO30 questionnaire.


Two mesoscale net sampling surveys were conducted in the south-west Atlantic between 34° and 55 °S. The first survey was in the austral spring of 1990 and used both an RMT8 net which was trawled obliquely down to 200 or 300 m and caught mainly macrozooplankton and a Bongo net which was deployed at the surface and sampled mesozooplankton. The second survey was in the austral spring of 1991 and used a Bongo net which was deployed obliquely down to 50 m and sampled mesozooplankton. This thesis considers the species composition and abundance of these samples and represents one of the first insights into the mesoscale biogeography of zooplankton communities in the south-west Atlantic. 155 species from 9 taxonomic groups were considered including euphausiids, hyperiid amphipods, chaetognaths, salps, siphonophores, and nektonic/planktonic fish. Multivariate analyses were used to highlight species assemblage distribution patterns and determine strongly correlated environmental variables. In the 1990 RMT8 samples, species assemblages showed a distribution pattern related to the location of water masses, which was reflected in a combination of water mass and latitude being the most strongly correlated environmental variables. In the 1990 Bongo samples, a combination of seasurface temperature and latitude were most strongly correlated environmental variables and different species assemblages showed a pattern of being located in exclusive temperature ranges. The two sample sets did exhibit some common distribution patterns especially in the warm, sub-tropical waters to the north and the Falkland Shelf to the south. However, there were fundamental differences in the mid-latitudes regions, possibly reflecting the reduced ability of larvae to counteract expatriating forces when compared with adults. Further comparisons made between the 1990 and 1991 Bongo sample sets highlighted some of the causal factors behind distribution patterns. For instance, the precise definition of the boundary between sub-tropical and sub-Antarctic assemblages by the 17.3°C isotherm despite the multitude of expatriating phenomena suggested that many organisms were at the edge of their physiological limits in this region. In polar waters, distribution patterns were consistent but temperatures variable suggesting that advection rather than temperature tolerance was more influential. Further data from Montu (1977) and the Discovery Investigations was examined to add a seasonal dimension to the above patterns as well as providing an insight into the importance of population ecology on community distribution. Studies were concentrated on euphausiid species from which it was apparent that size structure and species dominance changed considerably with season. Estimates of the productivity of these species showed that weight-specific rates were comparable with more sub-tropical regions despite biomass levels being proportionally low. The use of satellite thermal images for predicting faunal distribution patterns was assessed with respect to future biogeographic analysis of this region. Images were a good predictor at the sub-tropical boundary but a poor predictor in other regions highlighting the fact that in situ net sampling methods still appear to be the most effective and reliable investigative tools for biogeographic analysis.


Barrett9s Esophagus is a pre-malignant condition with a low rate of progression to esophageal adenocarcinoma. Endoscopic surveillance is recommended for early detection of cancer, which allows the study neoplastic progression in vivo over space and time. Since genetic clonal diversity predicts neoplastic progression (Maley Nat. Gen. 38, 468-473 (2006)), we developed an agent-based model to explore the effect of different parameters, such as mutation rate, selective effect of mutations and clonal expansion probability, on the spatio-temporal dynamics of genetic diversity. A typical Barrett9s segment contains ∼90,000 crypts and we assume that clonal expansion occurs by crypt bifurcation, since the rate of crypt bifurcation is high in other diseases marked by chronic inflammation (Cheng The Anat. Record 216, 44-48 (1986)). The Barrett9s segment is a cylinder that we model as a two-dimensional 300 by 300 hexagonal grid, wrapped around along one dimension. Crypts (agents) divide, die or mutate according to basal division, death and mutation rates as well as the mutation states of loci conferring reproductive and survival advantages. If a crypt needs to divide, and all of its six neighbors are alive, a daughter crypt displaces one of the neighbors at random with probability r, the "mechanism of clonal expansion probability". We use a Gillespie algorithm for rapid simulation of the evolutionary dynamics of the constant-size crypt population, consistent with the stability of the Barrett9s segment length. We ran 1080 simulations, varying selective mutation rate from 1e-5 to 1e-8, neutral mutation rate from 1e-4 to 1e-7, selective effect of mutations conferring reproductive or survival advantage from 0.001 to 2, and mechanism of clonal expansion probability r from 0 to 1. Our results show that when r is high, clones expand rapidly, selective sweeps occur often and a single dominant clone bearing all reproductive advantage mutations is likely to emerge. When r is low, clones expand slowly, clonal interference occurs often and multiple independent competing clones emerge. This model predicts that genetic diversity increases over time, since a clone only expanded when it acquired mutations conferring quicker crypt division rate, which is coupled to higher stem cell division and mutation rates, thereby generating higher diversity within the expanding clone compared to its surroundings. Our results suggest that designing experiments to measure the rate and mechanism of crypt bifurcation will help distinguish between two neoplastic progression modes: clonal evolution with successive selective sweeps versus multiple independent interfering clones. We also show that sampling few cells from many biopsies estimates the underlying genetic diversity better than sampling many cells from few biopsies. Citation Format: {Authors}. {Abstract title} [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the 101st Annual Meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research; 2010 Apr 17-21; Washington, DC. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2010;70(8 Suppl):Abstract nr 101.


The pulmonary capillaries of neonatal lungs are potentially vulnerable to stress failure because of the complex changes in the pulmonary circulation that occur at birth. We perfusion fixed the lungs from nine anesthetized newborn rabbits at capillary transmural pressures (P(tm)) of 5 +/- 5, 10 +/- 5, and 15 +/- 5 cmH(2)O. Normal microscopic appearances were seen at P(tm) values of 5 +/- 5 and 10 +/- 5 cmH(2)O, but massive airway edema was observed in lungs perfused at a P(tm) of 15 +/- 5 cmH(2)O. Consistent with this, no disruptions of the alveolar epithelium were observed at P(tm) values of 5 +/- 5 cmH(2)O, but mean values of 0.11 and 1.22 breaks/mm epithelium were found at P(tm) of 10 +/- 5 and 15 +/- 5 cmH(2)O, respectively (P < 0.05 for 5 +/- 5 vs. 15 +/- 5 cmH(2)O). These pressures are in striking contrast to those in the adult rabbit in which, by a similar procedure, a P(tm) of 52.5 cmH(2)O, is required before stress failure is consistently seen. We conclude that stress failure of pulmonary capillaries in newborn rabbit lungs can occur at P(tm) values of less than one-third of those that are required in adult lungs.


Considering a complex set of interplay with its host, Salmonella needs numerous genes for its full virulence. These genes responsible for invasion, survival, and extra intestinal spread are located on pathogenicity islands known as Salmonella pathogenicity islands (SPIs) that are thought to be acquired by horizontal gene transfer. A total of 17 SPIs (1–17) are recognized so far. The type III secretion system (T3SS) encoded by SPI-1 is considered as the most important virulence factor for Salmonella that delivers effector proteins necessary for invasion and production of enteritis. Among various SPIs, the role in virulence is well proven for SPI1 and SPI2 and further insight into the complex regulatory network of SPIs can contribute to drug investigation and prevention of infection.


Broad gain spectrum light sources such as widely tunable semiconductor lasers are attractive for a wide range of applications including precision measurement, biomedical treatment, and environment monitoring. Furthermore, broadband lasers emitting in the 1.55 µm region are of great interest for fiber-optic communication applications such as dense wavelength division multiplexing system. Self-assembled quantum dots (QDs) grown in the Stranski-Krastanow mode are ideal candidates for broad gain spectrum medium, which usually have a large inhomogeneous broadening resulting from the random distribution of the QDs on their growth surface, e.g., the photoluminescence linewidth from the self-assembled InAs/InP QDs is typically greater than 200 nm [1]. This large inhomogeneous broadening is beneficial to broaden the gain spectrum of QD devices. In this talk, I will present our works on the development of broad gain spectrum InAs/InP QD materials and laser devices including ultra-broadband tunable InAs/InP QD external cavity lasers [2, 3], ultrashort pulse InAs/InP QD single-section mode-locked lasers with high output power [4, 5], and flat-topped ultrabroad stimulated emission InAs/InP QD lasers [6].


Abstract : Recently, the Directorate of Intelligence (DI) has seen a spate of new thinking on its mission and on how it conducts that mission. As well-meaning and insightful as all this new thinking is, however, most is coming from senior DI managers, not from the analysts and other junior and mid-level officers who carry out the DI's mission on a daily basis. In addition, some frontline DI officers -- myself included -- would take exception to the idea that the concepts put forth in Tradecraft 2000 truly represent new thinking. Much of it is merely a return to the basics of DI tradecraft that many of us in the Directorate seem to have forgotten. Before leaving the DI on a rotational assignment, I endeavored to set down some of the axioms by which I have tried to live in my career. To experienced analysts, many of the principles will sound like truisms. But the new DI analyst, and more than a few old hands, would be well served by remembering these 15 principles in their everyday conduct. The principles are as follows: (1) Believe in your own professional judgments; (2) Be aggressive, and do not fear being wrong; (3) It is better to be mistaken than to be wrong; (4) Avoid mirror imaging at all costs; (5) Intelligence is of no value if it is not disseminated; (6) Coordination is necessary, but do not settle for the least common denominator; (7) When everyone agrees on an issue, something probably is wrong; (8) The consumer does not care how much you know, just tell him what is important; (9) Form is never more important than substance; (10) Aggressively pursue collection of information you need; (11) Do not take the editing process too seriously; (12) Know your Community counter parts and talk to them frequently; (13) Never let your career take precedence over your job; (14) Being an intelligence analyst is not a popularity contest; and (15) Do not take your job or yourself too seriously.


Bone involvement of sickle cell disease (SCD) patients varies from acute clinical manifestations of painful vaso-occlusive crises or osteomyelitis to more chronic affection of bone mineral density (BMD) and debilitating osteonecrosis and osteoporosis. Secreted klotho protein is involved in calcium (Ca) reabsorption in the kidney. This study aimed to measure serum klotho levels in children with SCD to determine the possibility of using it as a marker of low BMD in children with SCD in correlation with a dual-energy radiograph absorptiometry scan. This study included 60 sickle disease patients and 30 age-matched and sex-matched control participants without SCD. A highly statistically significant difference was found between patients with normal BMD and those with low BMD, with serum Ca and klotho levels being lower in the latter group. Klotho serum level correlated positively with both serum Ca and BMD. Serum klotho level showed 94.9% sensitivity and 95.2% specificity in the detection of low BMD. Both serum Ca and klotho serum levels may be useful markers for detection of low BMD related to SCD with high sensitivity and specificity; however, klotho may be a better indicator as it is less affected by the nutritional and endocrinal status of patients or by intake of Ca supplements.


To determine whether insulin induces acute changes in endogenous glucose production (EGP) via changes in gluconeogenesis (GNG), glycogenolysis (GL), or both, we measured GNG (with (2)H(2)O) and GL (EGP-GNG) in nine patients with type 1 diabetes during acute insulin excess produced by subcutaneous injection of insulin and during insulin deficiency which developed between 5 and 8 h after insulin injection. During insulin excess, free insulin concentration rose fivefold (from 36 to 180 pmol/l). Plasma glucose was maintained between 6.2 and 6.7 mmol/l for approximately 4 h with IV glucose. EGP (with 6,6-(2)H glucose) decreased from 17.1 to 9.8 micro mol. kg(-1). min(-1) after 1 h. This decrease was almost completely accounted for by a decrease in GL (from 10.7 to 4.6 micro mol. kg(-1). min(-1)). During insulin deficiency, plasma glucose rose from 6.2 to 10.5 mmol/l and EGP from 9.5 to 14.3 micro mol/kg min. The increase in EGP again was accounted for by an increase in GL. We conclude that in type 1 diabetes acute regulation of EGP by insulin is mainly via changes in GL while GNG changes little during the early hours of acute insulin excess or deficiency.


Energy is the key source of input to drive and improve the life cycle. The finiteness of fossil fuel has increased the demand for other sources. Biodiesels are promising alternative fuel and they are renewable. It has gained attention due to the smallness of fuels and environmental concern. The usage of liquid fuels prepared from used edible oil by transesterification process is one of the alternate methods for the use of fossil fuels. The recent focus relies on using used edible oil for producing biodiesel.


This paper presents a Depthwise Disout Convolutional Neural Network (DD-CNN) for the detection and classification of urban acoustic scenes. Specifically, we use log-mel as feature representations of acoustic signals for the inputs of our network. In the proposed DD-CNN, depthwise separable convolution is used to reduce the network complexity. Besides, SpecAugment and Disout are used for further performance boosting. Experimental results demonstrate that our DD-CNN can learn discriminative acoustic characteristics from audio fragments and effectively reduce the network complexity. Our DD-CNN was used for the low-complexity acoustic scene classification task of the DCASE2020 Challenge, which achieves 92.04% accuracy on the validation set.


Reusing of the past information and lessons learned helps practitioners in better management of various aspects of construction projects, such as cost estimation, planning, contracting, and design. Measuring the similarity of construction projects improves the efficiency of the existing information systems in retrieval of relevant cases. It was hypothesized that the Work Breakdown Structure (WBS) of projects contains the necessary information to measure the semantic similarity of construction projects; therefore, WBS can be used as a potential representative of the projects. In this research project, a novel method is proposed to assess the semantic similarity of projects by application of natural language processing techniques. In this method, a new project is compared with the documented as-built projects based on their WBS similarity. This method is implemented using two metrics: (1) node similarity that compares the semantics of all nodes in two WBSs; (2) structural similarity which compares the topology of the work breakdown structures. The proposed system calculates a similarity score between 0 and 1 for each metric and the combination of these two scores provides the final similarity score between a pair of WBSs, thus it could rank the similarity of the documented cases to the new project based on their final scores. Experimental results indicated that the structural similarity produced about 15 percent higher degree of retrieval precision than the node similarity.


In the present investigation, a new design flow meter with pressure detection has been optimized and investigated numerically. In the classical design of the KROHNE flow meter a paddle is used as a sensor, containing piezoelectric elements. When flow passes around a bluff body periodic flow separation develops which is responsible for the oscillation of the paddle. Thus the piezoelectric elements transform the mechanical movement of the paddle in electrical signal which can be evaluated in signal processing. Such a sensor construction is restricted to medium temperatures until 240°C. In order to achieve an accurate measurement at higher temperatures, for example at 500°C, a new design flow meter has been developed. Instead of using a paddle which is positioned to detect periodic flow fluctuations, the periodic change of pressure is detected through two openings which are positioned at the side wall close to the bluff body and leading to a pressure chamber. The periodically changing pressure acts on a membrane and thus with a suitable sensor design it is possible to detect the underlying frequency.


Film cooling is extensively used to provide protection against the severe thermal environment in gas turbine engines. Most of the computational studies on film cooling flow have been done using steady Reynolds-averaged Navier-Stokes calculation procedures. However, the flowfield associated with a jet in a crossflow is highly unsteady and complex with different types of vortical structures. In this paper, a computational investigation about the unsteady phenomena of a jet in a crossflow is performed using detached eddy simulation. Detailed computation of a single row of 35 deg round holes on a flat plate has been obtained for a 1.0 blowing ratio and a 2.0 density ratio. First, time-step size, grid resolution, and computational domain tests for an unsteady simulation have been conducted. Comparison between the results of unsteady Reynolds-averaged Navier-Stokes calculation, detached eddy simulation, and large eddy simulation is also performed. Comparison of the time-averaged detached eddy simulation prediction with the measured film-cooling effectiveness shows that the detached eddy simulation prediction is reasonable. From present detached eddy simulations, the influential coherent vortical structures of a film cooling flow can be seen. The unsteady physics of jet in a crossflow interactions and a jet liftoff in film cooling flows have been explained.


Ameenah khan, Imran Masoud Qasmi ,Tariq mehmood mirza, Khadija tul Kubra Department of Radiology, CMH,Lahore ABSTRACT BACKGROUND : Polycystic ovarian syndrome is a common endocrine disorder of females of reproductive age group. Recent studies have shown that changes in Doppler indices of ovarian arteries  in patients of PCOS are much more marked than changes in morphology of ovary and uterus. OBJECTIVE : To determine frequency  of  deranged ovarian artery Doppler indices in patients of PCOS  in the form of percentage STUDY DESIGN: Descriptive cross sectional study. SETTING ; DEPARTMENT OF RADIOLOGY ,CMH LAHORE DURATION OF STUDY : Nov 2018 to April 2019 METHODS: Total 205 women aged between 18-40 years presenting with PCOS were included. Transvaginal  Doppler ultrasound was performed to determine Pulsatility and Resistive indices of ovarian artery which were labelled deranged if above or below the normal range. PI ( range: 2.01to 4.30 ) and  RI (range: 0.80 to 0.95 ). Data was stratified for age, BMI and duration of PCOS. RESULTS: The Pulsatility index ranged from 2.01 to 4.27. Resistive index ranged from 0.80 to 0.94. Ovarian artery Doppler indices were deranged in 175 (85.4%) women with PCOS. The mean age of the patients was 27.2±5.9 years while the mean duration of PCOS was 18.4±7.1 months. The BMI of patients ranged from 20.8 Kg/m 2 to 34.0 Kg/m 2 with a mean of 26.9±3.9 Kg/m 2 . 33.6% of obese women had deranged ovarian artery Doppler indices. CONCLUSION: In this study, we observed that ovarian artery Doppler indices were deranged in a significant proportion of women with PCOS which suggests potential role of Doppler indices in the diagnostic workup of women with suspicion of PCOS. KEY WORDS : Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome, Ultrasound Doppler, Pulsatility Index, Resistive Index


Variability of ten polymorphic loci (ABO, RhD, PGD, ACP, PGM1, GLO, ESD, ADA, GC, TF) was studied in 326 Buryat and 310 Russian newborns from Ulan-Ude city. Marked differences between two groups were observed in the distributions of allelic frequencies of ABO, RhD, PGD, ACP, PGM1, GLO, ESD, GC loci. Genetic similarities between Buryat and other mongoloids were estimated. Close similarity was observed between Buryat, Mongols, Yakut and Kyzyl.


A sandwich-structured composite consisted of a pure poly(vinylidene fluoride-co-hexafluoropropylene) (P(VDF-HFP)) central layer and two BaTiO3–P(VDF-HFP) neighboring layers was developed for high energy storage density. The sandwiched structure effectively enhanced dielectric properties and energy storage capacity of the composites. Breakdown strength and energy storage density of the composite with 35 vol% P(VDF-HFP) central layer reached 315 kV mm−1 and 5.22 J cm−3, which were enhanced by 68% and 125% compared to 187 kV mm−1 and 2.32 J cm−3 of the single layer composite, respectively. The dielectric constant of the composites with sandwich-structure was approximately 3 times higher than the pure P(VDF-HFP) and the dielectric loss was as low as 0.026 at 1 kHz. These results demonstrated that the sandwich-structured ceramics/polymer composite was an effective way to produce high energy density composites.


Indonesia has a long history of aquaculture, dating from the 15th century. Subsequently, the country has become a significant contributor to global aquaculture production, destined for both international and domestic markets. In 2009 the Government of Indonesia announced its vision to see Indonesia become the highest (volume) producer of aquaculture products in the world by 2015, with production targets equivalent to an overall increase in production of 353% between 2009 and 2014. This paper comprises a PEEST (policy, economic, environmental, social, technical) review undertaken as a background study for a SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats) analysis, the outcomes of the SWOT analysis and a discussion of possible approaches to support sustainable aquaculture development in Indonesia. To meet the vision of a dramatic expansion of aquaculture production, one or more of the following strategies is required: intensification and production segmentation, areal expansion, and/or production diversification. Most likely the continued development of aquaculture in Indonesia will be a combination of these three strategies, with the relative influence of each depending on production sector and market demands. A key issue identified in the PEEST review and SWOT analysis is the dominance (in terms of number) of Indonesian aquaculture by smallholder aquaculture farmers. We argue that a range of influences, including aquaculture production expansion and changing international market requirements, have the potential to negatively impact smallholder aquaculture farmers in Indonesia, and that further policy development should specifically address these issues.


An emerging trend of next generation communication systems is to provide network edges with additional capabilities such as storage resources in the form of caches to reduce file delivery latency. To investigate the impact of this technique on latency, we study the delivery time of a cache-aided broadcast-relay wireless network consisting of one central base station, M cache-equipped transceivers and K receivers under finite precision channel state information (CSI). We use the normalized delivery time (NDT) to capture the worst-case per-bit latency in a file delivery. Lower and upper bounds on the NDT are derived to understand the influence of K, M, cache capacity and channel quality on the NDT. In particular, regimes of NDT-optimality are identified and discussed.


The objective of this research was to examine the population structure of full-blood (100%) Wagyu cattle registered in the United States with the American Wagyu Association, with the aim of estimating and comparing the levels of inbreeding from both pedigree and genotypic data. A total of 4132 full-blood Wagyu cattle pedigrees were assessed and used to compute the inbreeding coefficients (FIT and FST ) and the effective population size (Ne ) from pedigree data for the period 1994 to 2011. In addition to pedigree analysis, 47 full-blood Wagyu cattle representing eight prominent sire lines in the American Wagyu cattle population were genotyped using the Illumina BovineSNP50 BeadChip. Genotypic data were then used to estimate genomic inbreeding coefficients (FROH ) by calculating runs of homozygosity. The mean inbreeding coefficient based on the pedigree data was estimated at 4.80%. The effective population size averaged 17 between the years 1994 and 2011 with an increase of 42.9 in 2000 and a drop of 1.8 in 2011. Examination of the runs of homozygosity revealed that the 47 Wagyu cattle from the eight prominent sire lines had a mean genomic inbreeding coefficient (FROH ) estimated at 9.08% compared to a mean inbreeding coefficient based on pedigree data of 4.8%. These data suggest that the mean genotype inbreeding coefficient of full-blood Wagyu cattle exceeds the inbreeding coefficient identified by pedigree. Inbreeding has increased slowly at a rate of 0.03% per year over the past 17 years. Wagyu breeders should continue to utilize many sires from divergent lines and consider outcrossing to other breeds to enhance genetic diversity and minimize the adverse effects of inbreeding in Wagyu.


Background: Cluster of differentiation (CD47) is a trans-membrane glycosylated protein which is upregulated in several cancers. Increased expression of CD47 on tumor cells is associated with immune evasion and cancer progression. CD47 through its interaction with signal regulatory protein alpha (SIRPα), a cell-surface molecule on macrophages inhibits phagocytosis of tumor cells. Disrupting CD47-SIRPα interactions by monoclonal antibodies targeting CD47 and recombinant SIRPα proteins have been used as therapeutic strategies for treating cancer. Our objective was to discover and develop peptide/peptidomimetic based CD47 antagonists for disrupting CD47-SIRPα interactions. Methods: Through rational design based on crystal structure of CD47/SIRPα interacting interface, we designed peptides having potential to disrupt CD47-SIRPα interactions. FACS based cellular binding assay was developed to assess the binding affinity of CD47 antagonists. SIRPα protein labelled with fluorescent dye was incubated with Jurkat T cells expressing high levels of CD47 in the presence/absence of peptides. Binding affinity was measured by decrease in fluorescence. Functional activity of the peptides was evaluated in a FACS-based phagocytosis assays, in which tumor cells were incubated with human/mouse macrophages in the presence/absence of CD47 antagonists. Results: We identified CD47 antagonists demonstrating disruption of CD47-SIRPα interaction in a cellular binding assay. These peptides significantly inhibited phagocytosis of different tumor cells by macrophages. The lead CD47 antagonist displaying good ADME properties including moderate oral bioavailability was evaluated in a B16F10 syngeneic mouse tumor model. The lead CD47 antagonist inhibited primary tumor growth as well tumor metastasis to lungs. Biomarker characterization and efficacy studies in additional tumor models are ongoing. Citation Format: Pottayil G. Sasikumar, Chennakrishnareddy Gundala, Nagaraj M. Gowda, Sudarshan S. Naremaddepalli, Archana Bhumireddy, Rashmi Nair, Wesley Roy Balasubramanian, Anirudha Lakshminarasimhan, Samiulla S. Dodheri, Kiran Aithal, Raghuveer K. Ramachandra, Girish Daginakatte, Murali Ramachandra. Targeting CD47- SIRPα interaction by novel peptide-based antagonists [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the American Association for Cancer Research Annual Meeting 2017; 2017 Apr 1-5; Washington, DC. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2017;77(13 Suppl):Abstract nr 1650. doi:10.1158/1538-7445.AM2017-1650


Despite its importance, there are still many problems encountered in the learning of the topic of reflection in school. One of the solutions for these problems is the implementation of learning approaches that fit the modern curricula and the development of good quality instructional materials. Therefore, the aim of this study was to describe the quality of investigative instructional material with computer assisted instruction for the topic of reflection in Grade VII. The result of the analysis suggested that the investigative instructional material for the topic of reflection in Grade 7 is of good quality because it fulfills the following criteria: (1) the teacher was capable to manage the lesson well, (2) the students were actively involved during the lesson, (3) the students gave positive response to the instructional material, (4) the achievement test is valid, reliable, and sensitive; and (5) the validator claimed that the developed instructional material is valid.


Leonardo da Vinci's arguments for the supremacy of painting over the arts of poetry, music, and sculpture address issues that have been relevant to debates over the nature of representation since the time Plato discussed imitation until today, maintains Claire Farago in this wide-ranging critical analysis of the first important modern contribution to the comparison of the arts. This study systematically examines 46 passages compiled in the mid-sixteenth century from eighteen of Leonardo's notebooks and their relationship to the artist's holograph writings on painting, providing a critical transcription newly made from the Codex Vaticanus Urbinas 1270 and a new English translation with extensive notes that take into account Leonardo's scientific terminology, the highly contrived form of his rhetorical argumentation, and the role played by his original editors.


SUMMARY Cocoa (Theobroma cacao L.) is produced in systems of varying complexity ranging from monoculture with temporary shade to highly diverse agroforests. Producers have to weigh high cocoa yields in the short to medium term in monocultures against higher total system yields in the short term and sustainable production systems in the long term in conjunction with ecosystem services in agroforestry systems (AFs). More long-term data on the comparative agronomic, economic and ecological performance of differently managed cocoa production systems is required to make sound recommendations to farmers. This paper describes the only long-term field trial worldwide comparing different cocoa production systems under conventional and organic management. The factors (i) crop diversity (monoculture vs. agroforestry), (ii) management practice (conventional vs. organic) and (iii) cultivar are being tested in a full-factorial, randomized complete block design with four replications. First, results showed significantly faster development of trunk circumferences in monocultures (+21%) compared to AFs. Cocoa yields were 47% lower in the organic compared to the conventional monoculture. In the AFs, however, the organic–conventional yield gap was less pronounced (−16%) and statistically insignificant. The cumulative yields of all products harvested were significantly higher in the AFs (+161%) compared to the monocultures. The productivity of cocoa by-crops in AFs may contribute to local food security and risk distribution in smallholder contexts.


Objectives: Aim of this study was to determine the levels of trust in dental health care service in Riyadh City, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia & the elements affecting trust.

Methods: The patients were interviewed while they were completing the questionnaires, to evaluate the clarity of the contents and to answer any relevant questions. The confidentiality of the patient was respected and anonymity is guaranteed.

Results: Trust increased with increasing age of the survived person, female's total trust score was less compared to males and as the education level increased the level of trust score decreased. As the family income and social status increased the total trust increased. Trust score was higher in non-insured subjects compared to insured subjects and the people who are not suffering from long-term dental problems had higher trust level compared to ones with long-term dental problems.

Conclusion: Extending and promoting the dental care in primary health institutions and appropriate referrals to advanced dental care centers will improve the trust of patients, improve utilization of resources & result in better dental care. The results of this study suggest that there is a need for further research to better understand and improve the trust of patients in dentists. Wider population-based study throughout the country may help to understand the effect of gender, age and education on patient's trust in the Saudi dental care system & can also assess the reliability of the results of this study.


The constrained Cramér-Rao bound (CCRB) is a benchmark for constrained parameter estimation. However, the CCRB unbiasedness conditions are too strict and thus, the CCRB may not be a lower bound for estimators under constraints. The recently developed Lehmann-unbiased-CCRB (LU-CCRB) was shown to be a lower bound for the commonly used constrained maximum likelihood (CML) estimator performance in cases where the CCRB is not. In constrained parameter estimation, the estimator is usually required to satisfy the constraints. However, the LU-CCRB is a lower bound for Lehmann-unbiased estimators that do not necessarily satisfy the constraints. In this letter, we consider the norm constraint and derive a novel bound, called norm-constrained CCRB (NC-CCRB), which is a lower bound on the mean-squared-error matrix trace of Lehmann-unbiased estimators that satisfy the norm constraint. The NC-CCRB is shown to be tighter than the LU-CCRB. In the simulations, we consider a linear estimation problem under norm constraint in which the proposed NC-CCRB better predicts the performance of the CML estimator than the CCRB trace and the LU-CCRB.


RuO2/carbon powder electrodes have been designed to be enclosed in a supercapacitor cell and compressed under a constant pressure (4.84 kgf cm−2), which could overcome binder failure under repeated volumetric changes. In this binder-free powder electrode system, the resistance and ESR are substantially decreased (0.39 Ω at 1 kHz) and the capacitive retention is also greatly improved (7% decrement after 4000 cycles) with a maximum specific capacitance of 835 F (g of total electrode weight)−1, corresponding to 1391.7 F (g of RuO2 weight)−1, which is likely close to the intrinsic energy-storage capability of RuO2 materials. Comparing the specific capacitances at different discharge rates of 5 mV s−1 and 100 mV s−1, a decrement of only 24% occurs in specific capacitance, which is considered to be excellent in RuO2 systems. Furthermore, in the Ragone plot analysis, the developed binder-free system shows an excellent energy and power density of 24.9 W h kg−1 and 16.1 kW kg−1, respectively, at 50 mV s−1, which are ca. 63.2% and 44.7% higher, respectively, than those of a typical binder-containing system (11.1 W h kg−1 and 7.2 kW kg−1).


NUA35 (Reg. No. GP-278, PI 657698) and NUA56 (Reg. No. GP-279, PI 657699), are high seed mineral, red-mottled common beans (Phaseolus vulgaris L.) developed by the International Center for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT) in Cali, Colombia, and tested with various national agricultural research systems and nongovernmental organizations from Latin America and eastern and southern Africa as part of the Harvest Plus and Agrosalud programs for biofortification. Both germplasm lines were selected from the backcross population ['CAL96' x (CAL96 x G14519)] where CAL96 is a commercial cultivar in Colombia and Uganda, and G14519 is a high seed mineral germplasm accession from the CIAT genebank. The seed iron and zinc content of NUA35 and NUA56, along with CAL96 as a check, was determined over 15 sites with varying climate, altitude and soil types in Bolivia, Colombia, Costa Rica, and Guatemala using atomic absorption spectrophotometry. On average, iron content was 18 and 23 mg kg -1 higher for NUA35 and NUA56, respectively than for CAL96; while zinc content was 8 and 7 mg kg -1 higher, respectively. To our knowledge, these are the first germplasm lines to be bred specifically for nutritional quality in common beans.


A coding scheme that can provide different levels of error protection for different sets of bits in a transmitted symbol using trellis-coded modulation is presented. The scheme uses simple trellis code with 4-16 stages that are coupled with quadrature amplitude modulated (QAM) and asymmetrical QAM constellations. It has been found that the scheme can provide various levels of error protection for different sets of bits against channel impairments without much added complexity compared to the conventional trellis-coded modulation. The scheme also provides a design flexibility so that it is easily modified to accommodate different needs for error protection in various data transmission systems. A detailed design procedure and the performances of several unequal error protection codes are presented.<<ETX>>


In 2005, the Pharmacy Department of the University Hospital of Ancona began collaboration with the engineers of the Loccioni group in order to realize a fully automated system for the preparation of cytostatic drugs, which could be safe for both healthcare workers and patients. At present, the cytotoxic laboratory of Ancona is equipped with two robots and one Class II biological-safety cabinet. The introduction of the robots in the cytotoxic laboratory has increased both efficiency and safety of the working process. The drug-preparation process begins when the pharmacist confirms the medical prescription (exact posology, modalities of reconstitution), and starts the preparation cycle. The sterility of the preparations is monthly tested in collaboration to the local microbiology laboratory. All preparations' results were germ-free even after storage at room temperature for two weeks. The dose accuracy is verified by visual and gravimetric independent systems. Drug concentration errors exceeding the limit of 10% fixed by the Italian Pharmacopeia were found only in 1.1% of the preparations. The average dose error was 0.8% (standard deviation 1.7%).


My thesis on asylum dispersal is written within an emotionally charged atmosphere concerning immigration, asylum, multiculturalism and Islamic extremism. In this climate of unreasoned attitudes towards asylum seeking generally, my main aim was to qualitatively investigate, via one case study area - Romantown - the persistent policy and political problem of where to place asylum seekers.

 The suitability of Romantown, as a dispersal area, has ultimately concurred with polls that suggested dispersal to ethnically diverse areas created less public anxiety and reduced the possibility of violence and unrest (Flynn, 2003). As a dispersal site, Romantown also reflects the recommendations on suitability made by the Audit Commission regarding ethnic composition, the existence of refugee networks and existing places of worship for new asylum populations (Robinson et al, 2003, Audit Commission, 2000c). So the research questions I have focussed on are: 1. Do ethnically diverse communities like Romantown make better dispersal sites for asylum seekers? 2. What are the particular social and cultural dynamics that exist within this community in relation to asylum seeker dispersal? 3. How and in what ways have the range of agencies (statutory, voluntary, faith/refugee based) in Romantown engaged in the governance of multiculture and asylum seeker integration?

 The fieldwork findings from the case study however revealed a more complex picture. Firstly there were elements of hospitality and tension between community residents and asylum seekers, and secondly whilst community agency management was very extensive with a number of committed individuals, overall it was chaotic and generally badly funded. Key findings from Chapters Five and Six presented unexpected cultural divisions between Sikh and Pakistani residents and Kurdish asylum seekers although ultimately dialogue was managed through competent agency and faith community intervention.

 With certain caveats, as discussed, Romantown did emerge as a strong, competent community, willing and able to manage the dispersal of new settlements of asylum seekers despite incidences of resident disapproval and limited resources. The case study revealed the existence of robust and active informal agency structures alongside the more visible formal ones. However, this resulted in the workings of community governance being harder to recognise as asylum groups retreated away from the public arena to form their own forum.

 The ethnographic approach used here was able to illuminate the micro-social of community dynamics crucial to this line of enquiry which is complemented by the unique position of resident/researcher.


Swyer- James- MacLeod Syndrome (SJMS) is a constrictive bronchiolitis with airflow obstruction, decreased number and diameter of ipsilateral peripheral pulmonary vessels and air trapping with characteristic radiological feature of unilateral hyperlucency on chest radiography. Computerized tomography (CT) provides useful additional information. The diagnosis is usually made in childhood, but sometimes it in adult. Here, we report a case in a 36 year old adult female who presented with complaints of breathlessness on exertion, cough and recurrent rhinitis with past history of TB and child hood chest infection. Imaging findings are characteristic of Swyer- James- Macleod syndrome.


Travel time is considered more useful to users than other travel-related information such as speed. It is mainly estimated by point or interval detection systems. In this study, the authors investigate the deficiency of these systems in estimating travel times when they are used in isolation, and proposed a fusion algorithm that simultaneously utilises data from both point and interval detection systems. The fusion algorithm is based on the traffic flow and k -nearest neighbourhood ( k -NN) models. Specifically, the authors precisely define the so-called the time lag issue in interval detection systems. To overcome this problem, they analysed the travel time variation because of variation in traffic states using fused data from point and interval detection systems. The authors show that the travel time obtained from interval detection systems is renewed by considering the travel time variation and their results show that the proposed algorithm satisfactorily predicts the travel time with the mean absolute percentage errors (MAPE).


Eucalyptus camaldulensis and E. citriodora are two Eucalyptus species that are very rich in essential oil and are often used in ethnomedicine for the treatment of different ailments. However, the leaves of E. camaldulensis and E. citriodora are very similar in structure and can be very difficult to distinguish when dry or in fragments. Hence, comparative phytochemical screening, elemental, pharmacognostic and GCMS analyses were carried out on the leaves and leaves extracts of two Eucalyptus species harvested from a garden in order to establish some distinguishing physicochemical and pharmacognostic characteristics. The leaf essential oils of the two species were extracted by hydro-distillation and analyzed on GC-MS. The results of phytochemical screening revealed presence of saponins, carbohydrates and sterols in both species. Elemental analysis indicated that the levels of the elements in the two samples differ. Chromium (Cr) was below detectable limit in the two samples while Pb, Mn, Zn, Fe, Cu and Mg were detected and quantified. Only Eucalyptus citriodora showed the presence of flavonoids.  Tannins, alkaloids and anthraquinones were not detected in the two Eucalyptus species. The dry-leaf moisture contents were 9.5% and 9.7% for camaldulensis and citriodora, respectively. The GC-MS analyses of the hydro-distilled essential oils from both plants showed 57 and 39 components for camaldulensis and citriodora, respectively. 35 and 18 components were identified respectively from the two species. However, only seven (7) components were common to the two species, which include 4-terpineol (16.30% and 19.32%), Spathulenol (15.01% and 4.65%), Thymol (4.50% and 1.66%), α-terpineol (1.59% and 3.98%), caryophyllene (0.10% and 3.93%), viridiflorol (0.20% and 2.06%) and phytol (0.30% and 2.21%), respectively. Citronellol and its acetate and isopulegol and its acetate were absent in E. camaldulensis and were appreciably present in E. citriodora. α-Eudesmol was appreciably present in E. camaldulensis but absent in E. citriodora. Citronellol, isopulegol and α-eudesmol may be the distinctive marker compounds between the two species. The microscopic characters of the leaves revealed useful diagnostic parameters for the species. The information obtained from this study, is important not just for establishing morphological or phytoconstituents differences necessary for identification and authentication purposes, but also for monograph development, standardization and pharmaceutical reference as possible source of lead/ hit compounds in drug development or as raw material in drug excipients.  Keywords: Eucalyptus camaldulensis; Eucalyptus citriodora; Essential oil; GC-MS; Pharmacognostic


A new genus and species, Parafoxiphalus longicarpus, and a new species, Metharpinia protuberantis belonging to the family Phoxocephalidae, are described from the Argentine Sea. Both taxa were collected from sandy substrata in the intertidal and subtidal regions. Parafoxiphalus longicarpus is related to Foxiphalus Barnard, 1979 and they share many characters, most of them in plesiomorphic condition. Metharpinia protuberantis is an intermediate species between Metharpinia Schellenberg, 1931 and Microphoxus Barnard, 1960, and its assignation to the first genus is discussed.


Diversity and abundance of zooplankton of Jebba Upper Basin, Nigeria, were studied between March and May 2015. Three stations were selected and sampled monthly and investigated for zooplankton community structure using basic measurement of diversity for qualitative and quantitative samples to characterize the zooplankton fauna. The zooplanktons were present throughout the sampling period in the month of May with average abundance of 108 individuals/10 ml. The high abundance of individuals was also recorded in March but higher in the month of May. A total number of 658 individuals of zooplanktons were enumerated from the samples. The most evenly distributed is cladocera which represented 40.58% of the total population of zooplankton, though most abundant zooplankton is copepoda (41.19%) while Rotifer is the most diverse in terms of species representation. The zooplankton abundance followed the order copepoda>cladocera>rotifer. The zooplankton community of Jebba Upper Basin dominating and characterized by the species indicate good ecological condition of the river.


Background Primary ovarian insufficiency (POI) is a female disease characterized by ovarian function loss under 40 years old. Transplantation of exosomes is an encouraging regenerative medicine method that has the potential for restoring ovarian functions post-POI with high efficiency. Therefore, we investigate the therapeutic efficacy and potential mechanisms of human umbilical cord mesenchymal stem cell- (UCMSC-) derived exosomes on ovarian dysfunction post-POI. Methods The model of POI was established by intraperitoneal injection with 5 mg/kg cisplatin. The mouse ovarian function was detected by measuring the levels of anti-Mullerian hormone, follicle-stimulating hormone, and estradiol and detecting the morphological changes. For in vitro experiments, the characterization and identification of UCMSCs and UCMSC-derived exosomes were done by observation of morphologies and flow cytometry. To exclude the interference effect of nonspecific precipitation substances, UCMSCs were treated with RNase A or RNase A in combination with Triton X-100. Granulosa cell (GC) identification was performed using immunofluorescence. GC proliferation and viability were assessed using 5-ethynyl-2′-deoxyuridine (EdU) assays and Cell Counting Kit-8 (CCK-8), and GC apoptosis was calculated by flow cytometry. Gene expression and protein levels were evaluated using reverse transcription quantitative polymerase chain reaction (RT-qPCR) and western blotting. The binding relationship between miR-29a and HMG-box transcription factor (HBP1) was verified by luciferase reporter assays. Results In vitro, the human UCMSC-derived exosomes carrying miR-29a upregulation promoted the proliferation of GCs and suppressed their apoptosis. In vivo, miR-29a upregulation reserved the mature follicles and restored the ovarian functions. miR-29a targeted HBP1 and negatively regulated its expression. HBP1 upregulation rescued the miR-29a upregulation-induced inhibition in GC apoptosis and inactivated the Wnt/β-catenin pathway. Conclusion The exosomal miR-29a derived from human UCMSCs improves the ovarian function by targeting HBP1 and activating the Wnt/β-catenin pathway.


In this paper we propose feasibility demonstration of twin-field quantum key ditribution system based on multi-mode weak coherent phase-coded states. Their utilization provides indisputable advantages described in the paper. We also provide the detailed description of nontrivial interference scheme for those states and derive detection and quantum bit error rates. Since we propose the feasibility scheme we present in this paper only asymptotic secure key estimation and show that in principle it can beat well-known fundamental limit of repeaterless quantum communications , i.e., the secret key capacity of the lossy communication channel. Also we present here the experimental setup and provide the experimental values of detection rates dependence on the modulation signals phase difference.


Analysis was made of the physical, neuropsychic and somatic development of children whose patients suffered from chronic alcoholism as compared to the control group children. Retardation in the physical development (primarily in body weight with alcoholic mother, in the height with alcoholism of father or of both parents) and in the neuropsychic development, the higher general somatic and infection morbidity, the increased level of the stigmas of dysembryogenesis and developmental abnormalities were detectable significantly more frequently.


We show how nuisance parameter marginalized posteriors can be inferred directly from simulations in a likelihood-free setting, without having to jointly infer the higher dimensional interesting and nuisance parameter posterior first and marginalize a posteriori. The result is that for an inference task with a given number of interesting parameters, the number of simulations required to perform likelihood-free inference can be kept (roughly) the same irrespective of the number of additional nuisances to be marginalized over. To achieve this, we introduce two extensions to the standard likelihood-free inference set-up. First, we show how nuisance parameters can be recast as latent variables and hence automatically marginalized over in the likelihood-free framework. Secondly, we derive an asymptotically optimal compression from N data to n summaries – one per interesting parameter - such that the Fisher information is (asymptotically) preserved, but the summaries are insensitive to the nuisance parameters. This means that the nuisance marginalized inference task involves learning n interesting parameters from n 'nuisance hardened' data summaries, regardless of the presence or number of additional nuisance parameters to be marginalized over. We validate our approach on two examples from cosmology: supernovae and weak-lensing data analyses with nuisance parametrized systematics. For the supernova problem, high-fidelity posterior inference of Ωm and w0 (marginalized over systematics) can be obtained from just a few hundred data simulations. For the weak-lensing problem, six cosmological parameters can be inferred from just $\mathcal {O}(10^3)$ simulations, irrespective of whether 10 additional nuisance parameters are included in the problem or not.


The Higgs pair production in gluon fusion is a sensitive probe of beyond-Standard Model (BSM) phenomena and its detection is a major goal for the LHC and higher energy hadron collider experiments. In this work we reanalyze the possible modifications of the Higgs pair production cross section within low energy supersymmetry models. We show that the supersymmetric contributions to the Higgs pair production cross section are strongly correlated with the ones of the single Higgs production in the gluon fusion channel. Motivated by the analysis of ATLAS and CMS Higgs production data, we show that the scalar superpartners' contributions may lead to significant modification of the di-Higgs production rate and invariant mass distribution with respect to the SM predictions. We also analyze the combined effects on the di-Higgs production rate of a modification of the Higgs trilinear and top-quark Yukawa couplings in the presence of light stops. In particular, we show that due to the destructive interference of the triangle and box amplitude contributions to the di-Higgs production cross section, even a small modification of the top-quark Yukawa coupling can lead to a significant increase of the di-Higgs production rate.


The author outlines two major development efforts designed to maintain the price performance advantage of the Intel i960 family of 32-b embedded processors. These are trace-driven simulation and profile-driven compilers. The trace-driven simulation environment is used to evaluate micro-architectural trade-offs in microprocessor design. This simulation methodology allows the simulation of real applications under a wide variety of process and system configurations. Two-pass profile driven compiler technology allows a compiler to optimize a program based on the execution of that program.<<ETX>>


The higher order crack tip fields for physical weak-discontinuous problem of cylindrical shells are investigated. The crack located at the interface between homogeneous materials and exponential functionally graded materials. The governing equations are derived for homogeneous materials and FGMs regions considering transverse shear deformation effect. The higher order crack tip fields of two regions are obtained by the eigen-expansion method, respectively. Finally, the whole crack tip high order fields are assembled and given.


Effects of defatted mango (Mangifera indica) and wild mango (Irvingia gabonensis, Irvingia wombolu) kernels in substituted diets of commercial feed, on weight and plasma lipid profile were analysed using Wistar rats after 21-day feeding. Lipid profiling was conducted using enzymatic/colorimetric techniques. The substitution with each kernel type in the commercial feed was 0, 25, 50, 75 and 100%. Diet substitution of up to 75% inversely correlated with weight gained (P<0.05). Up to 50% diet substitution was over 93% acceptable for consumption by the animals. Lipid profile analysis indicated that total cholesterol (TC) and low density lipoprotein (LDL) decreased with increasing diet substitution. The reverse was observed with HDL. TG increased up to 50% defatted M. indica kernel (DMIK) substitution and 25% defatted I. gabonensis kernel (DIGK)/defatted I. wombolu kernel (DIWK) but decreased thereafter. LDL/Cholesterol degradation could have increased TG level and possibly inhibited at higher diet substitutions due to increased residual polyphenolic substances present in the kernel samples. These variables also significantly improved the lipid profile status of the experimental animals (P<0.05).

 Key words: Lipid profile, Mangifera indica, Irvingia gabonensis, Irvingia wombolu, cholesterol.


THE ACTIVE PARTICIPATION OF teachers in designing classroom learning experiences contributes to teacher abilities to facilitate learning. This paper reports on a case study of one Dutch teacher designing a technology-rich learning environment for emergent literacy. Data was collected to explore the design and implementation of the learning environment. The main findings from the design study are that scaffolding teacher design takes mammoth effort; appears to contribute to teacher learning; yields usable products and ownership, both of which seem to contribute to classroom implementation, but also yields products whose subject matter quality is questionable. The pre-post test data from the implementation study indicates that all children working with the intervention exhibited significant learning gains. Based on the findings, it is hypothesised that the high degree of teacher ownership which stems from designing classroom materials positively influences integration of on-computer activities with off-computer classroom activities, and that a high level of integration yields positive influence on pupil learning about the functions of written language. This rich but small-scale study points to the need for more refined understanding of the gap between what teachers have already mastered and what they can achieve when provided with support, when engaging in technology-rich classroom innovation. We therefore call for innovation design to not only meet learner needs, but also to fit explicitly within a teacher's 'technological zone of proximal development'.


The surface stiffness of the microenvironment is a mechanical signal regulating biofilm growth without the risks associated with the use of bioactive agents. However, the mechanisms determining the expansion or prevention of biofilm growth on soft and stiff substrates are largely unknown. To answer this question, we used PDMS (polydimethylsiloxane, 9–574 kPa) and HA (hyaluronic acid gels, 44 Pa–2 kPa) differing in their hydration. We showed that the softest HA inhibited Escherichia coli biofilm growth, while the stiffest PDMS activated it. The bacterial mechanical environment significantly regulated the MscS mechanosensitive channel in higher abundance on the least colonized HA-44Pa, while Type-1 pili (FimA) showed regulation in higher abundance on the most colonized PDMS-9kPa. Type-1 pili regulated the free motion (the capacity of bacteria to move far from their initial position) necessary for biofilm growth independent of the substrate surface stiffness. In contrast, the total length travelled by the bacteria (diffusion coefficient) varied positively with the surface stiffness but not with the biofilm growth. The softest, hydrated HA, the least colonized surface, revealed the least diffusive and the least free-moving bacteria. Finally, this shows that customizing the surface elasticity and hydration, together, is an efficient means of affecting the bacteria's mobility and attachment to the surface and thus designing biomedical surfaces to prevent biofilm growth.


This contribution illustrates the Research through Design process of Mr.V the Spaceman, a tactful object meant to support families of children with cancer maintain a healthy domestic life during stressful times. By recounting insights from the field and unfolding changes to the original artifact over a period of two years, the paper illuminates how an understanding of tactfulness has emerged and developed into a key design quality for this work. This complex and entangled process of making is surfaced and illustrated by a rich and scrupulous annotation of the artisanal craft and technological explorations that led from the original Mr.V prototype to what is now Mr.V the Spaceman.


Concrete is one of the construction materials consisting of a mixture of coarse aggregate and fine aggregate as a filling material, as well as cement and water as a binder. With the addition of fiber as a partial replacement of cement to obtain a cheaper cost, for simple buildings. With partial replacement of cement with fiber in normal concrete, which aims to determine the effect of partial replacement of cement with fiber against the compressive strength of concrete. By comparing the length variation of fibers which are respectively 4 cm, 6 cm, 8 cm and fibers taken 2% of the weight of cement. Where the calculation analysis (mix desing) using SNI 7656-2012 (procedure for making normal concrete mix plan). Mix design is done in order to determine the proportion of the mixture is done with strong concrete quality planned. The test object is a cylinder with a diameter with a diameter of 15 cm and height of 30 cm. From the results obtained the replacemen of some of the cement with fibers. Where the test results of normal concrete slump of 10 cm, fiber concrete measuring 4 cm by 10 cm, fiber conrete measuring 6 cm byy 9.8 cm and fiber concrete measuring 8 cm by 9.7 cm. And the maximum compressive strength test results obtained decreased, the test value of cylindrical concrete without the addition of fiber of 27.08 MPa, where the compressive strength of concrete by using 2% fibers with a length of 4 cm of 26.70 MPa, concrete fiber 6 cm of 25.94 MPa, and for fiber 8 cm of 24.72 MPa. So that the compressive strength of concrete that occurs decreases from normal concrete without the addition of fibers.


A quantitative study of arteriolar structure has been undertaken in 23 individuals with chronic hypertension and 18 normotensive controls. In the hypertensive individuals, some arterioles were found to have an increased, and others a subnormal, mass of medial smooth muscle. Both abnormalities often bear a definite relation to arteriolar sclerotic lesions, those arterioles proximal to sclerotic segments having an increased medial coat and those distal, an atrophic coat. Mean values for mass of arteriolar muscle were often normal in organs of the hypertensive patients. These anatomic features can be correlated with a variety of physiological and clinical observations in the disorder.


Objective: There are limited studies investigating the metabolic syndrome (MetS) in patients using antidepressants. This study examines and compares the prevalence of MetS and related factors in psychiatric patients taking various antidepressants at an outpatient clinic. Methods: The study comprised a total of 70 patients using fluoxetine, paroxetine, sertraline, citalopram, escitalopram, clomipramine and venlafaxine aged 18-60 years with depressive and anxiety disorder. MetS rates of patients (according to National Cholesterol Education Program-Adult Treatment Panel III-NCEP III) who met the study criteria were obtained. Results: In our study metabolic syndrome frequency was 32.8% in total patient groups according to NCEP-III criteria. The higher metabolic syndrome frequency was found in drug groups such as clomipramine, paroxetine and venlafaxine groups. The safest drug for metabolic syndrome was fluoxetine as seen in its relevant group. Conclusion: Conventional antidepressants may cause metabolic syndrome which is important for mortality, morbidity and quality of life of psychiatric patients.


The use of earth materials as daily covers not only consumes valuable landfill space, but also brings a series of operating issues such as fine migration and hetergenity of waste mass. In this study, a mixture of paper sludge and waste tire chips was proposed for daily cover applications in MSW landfills. The engineering properties of the individual tire chips, the sludge, as well as their mixture, were evaluated in this study in terms of the index properties, hydraulic conductivity, and shear resistance of the materials. When compared to traditional soil covers, the proposed cover material was found to be lighter in weight, more impermeable and higher in shear resistance. It was also found that with the addition of tire chips to the paper sludge, the shear strength of the mixture improved considerably. The results suggest that the proposed material has mechanical characteristics that are desirable to be a landfill daily cover.


Treatment of alkyl halides, including tertiary alkyl bromides, with cyclopentadienylmagnesium bromide in the presence of a catalytic amount of copper(II) triflate yielded the corresponding cyclopentadienylated products in high yields. The following hydrogenation of the products provided alkyl-substituted cyclopentanes.


Using a model of O-ring production function, the paper demonstrates how certain communities can get caught in a low-literacy trap in which each individual finds it not worthwhile investing in higher skills because others are not high-skilled. The model sheds light on educational policy. It is shown that policy for promoting human capital has to take the form of a mechanism for solving the coordination failure in people's choice of educational strategy.


Literature on ethanol production from Lignocellulo-Starch Biomass (LCSB) containing starch besides cellulose and hemicellulose, is scanty. Fed-Batch Separate Hydrolysis And Fermentation (F-SHF) was earlier found more beneficial than Fed-Batch Simultaneous Saccharification and Fermentation (F-SSF).The study aimed at modification of the saccharification and fermentation strategies by including a prehydrolysis step prior to the SSF and compared the ethanol yields with co-culture fermentation using hexose-fermenting Saccharomyces cerevisiae and pentose-fermenting Scheffersomyces stipitis.Fed-batch hybrid-SSF and Fed-Batch Separate Hydrolysis and Co-culture Fermentation (F-SHCF) in improving ethanol yield from Steam (ST) or Dilute Sulfuric Acid (DSA) pretreated LCSBs (peels of root and vegetable crops) were studied.There was a progressive build-up of ethanol during F-HSSF up to 72h and further production up to 120h was negligible, with no difference among pretreatments. Despite very high ethanol production in the initial 24h of fermentation by S.cerevisiae under F-SHCF, the further increase was negligible. A rapid hike in ethanol production was observed when S. stipitis was also supplemented because of xylose conversion to ethanol.While ST gave higher ethanol (296-323 ml/kg) than DSA under F-HSSF, the latter was advantageous under F-SHCF for certain residues. Prehydrolysis (24h; 50°C) enhanced initial sugar levels favouring fast fermentation and subsequent saccharification and fermentation occurred concurrently at 37°C for 120h, thus leading to energy saving and hence F-HSSF was advantageous. Owing to the low hemicellulose content in LCSBs, the relative advantage of co-culture fermentation over monoculture fermentation was not significant.


This report summarizes the results of an extensive and comprehensive study to evaluate the possibility of contaminating hot mix asphalt due to the use of alternate fuel types and through poor combustion of the fuel. Eleven different fuels were used, and the plant burner was adjusted to optimum, insufficient oxygen and excess oxygen conditions. Samples of aggregates and of hot mix produced under these combinations of fuel and combustion conditions were collected and tested using a variety of chemical ad physical tests. Gravimetric analysis of the heated aggregates did reveal the presence of minute traces of residue at less than 35 ppb by weight of aggregate. This residue was then analyzed using gas chromatography and Fourier Transform Infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy, and was shown to be composed of partially decomposed tars and fuel residues. The dynamic shear rheometer, bending beam rheometer and direct tension tests were used to assess whether the residue caused any changes in binder properties; none were detected. Samples of the hot mix produced in the plant were evaluated using gyratory compaction parameters, Superpave shear tests, dynamic modulus, loaded wheel and moisture sensitivity tests. Again, no significant changes in mix properties were observed. Based on these findings, it was recommended that the South Dakota Department of Transportation expand the list of allowable fuels to include recycled fuel oils and fuels up to No. 6, allowing the use of economical alternates. No. 6 fuel should be evaluated in pilot field projects for possible inclusion in future specifications. Other specification changes and inspection techniques to ensure combustion adequacy and mix performance were recommended.


Dynamic reconfiguration allows the system configuration to be changed while the system is in execution. It is definitely a desirable property for any large distributed system where dynamic modification and extension to the system and its applications are required. We have developed a software platform based on a graph-oriented model, which provides support for programming reconfigurable distributed applications. In this paper, we describe a dynamic reconfiguration manager for the graph-oriented distributed programming environment. The services and requirements of dynamic reconfiguration are identified, the architecture design of a dynamic reconfiguration manager is presented, and a central server-based prototypical implementation of the manager on a local area network of workstations is described.


The purpose of this paper is to extend a synthesis of knowledge about wilderness visitors and their visits developed in 1985. At that time, visitor research was in decline, and there was very little ability to understand trends. Over the last 15 years, wilderness visitor research has been initiated at many places in the U.S. where no previous studies had been completed. There have also been several studies specifically aimed at providing comparisons over time. Although review of these studies has concluded that very little has changed about how we describe visitors, their visits or their preferences for management, limited data suggest that the way visitors relate to wilderness has changed and will continue to


Trace metal (TM) mobility and toxicity varies with changing soil conditions. Geochemical models can account for the influence of soil characteristics on TM behaviour. We tested the effectiveness of the Stockholm humic model (SHM), and the NICAeDonnan model (NDM) to estimate partitioning coefficients (log Kd) in 26 forest floor horizons of podzolic soils enriched in trace metals from deposition by metal smelters. We wanted to know if a consistent approach could be applied to model metal partitioning in forest floors without optimizing each individual soil. When optimized, the SHM reproduced the partitioning of Cd, Cu and Zn but not Pb. It was necessary to revise the affinity constants for the NDM to simultaneously simulate the partitioning of the four metals. Revised affinity constants for the NDM model based on a fixed definition of soil organic carbon, i.e., a fixed ratio of fulvic and humic acids per unit carbon, reproduced metal partitioning more effectively in an independent data set of 16 soils than the use of generic affinity constants available for these models. From the perspective of the applicability of these models to risk assessment, this result suggests geochemical models using affinity constants that have been verified and/or modified against multiple soils from a region can provide good estimates of metal partitioning on a regional scale. 2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.


The possible effects of both the beta-casein (beta-CN) phosphorylation level and the kappa-CN glycosylation level on micelle formation were studied using the doubly-phosphorylated form (beta-CN-2P) and the quadruply-phosphorylated form (beta-CN-4P) of human beta-CN, along with bovine kappa-CN to compare with previous studies using the more highly glycosylated human kappa-CN. Addition of bovine kappa-CN to human beta-CN-2P, beta-CN-4P, or a 1/1 (wt/wt) mixture of the two was at kappa/beta molar ratios from 0.0 to approximately 0.6 and micelles were reconstituted by addition of Ca+2 either directly at 37 degrees C for determination of the fraction suspended or at an initial temperature of 4 degrees that was gradually increased to 37 degrees C with the change in particle size monitored by turbidity measurements. Analysis of the data indicates that the 4P form requires more kappa-CN for stabilization than the 2P form but that the mixture of the two is more like the 4P form in that lateral kappa-kappa interactions may enhance beta-kappa interactions and micelle formation. Above a kappa/beta molar ratio of about 0.2, the caseins were fully suspended into reconstituted micelles. However, micelle size decreased at a higher ratio, indicating that the kappa-CN probably occupies a surface position and may regulate micelle size by its relative abundance. A comparison with published results suggests that the higher glycosylation level of human kappa-CN may protect a larger surface area and result in smaller micelles. Changes in reconstituted micelle size with pH indicate that positively charged groups in the kappa-CN may interact with the negatively charged phosphate esters in the beta-CN moieties in addition to kappa-beta hydrophobic interactions.


Bacterial mastitis in small ruminants is a complex disease, with massive economic loss in dairy sheep/goat industry due to poor productivity. The current mastitis prevention strategy relies on culling of infected ewes or does and or the use of antimicrobial agents to eliminate the bacterial infection. This has a potential risk for developing antibiotic resistant bacteria, posing human health risk from consumption of raw sheep or goat dairy products. Existing experimental and licensed vaccines on the market are ineffective against reducing the risk of mastitis in herds or flocks. Raising the needs for development of improved vaccines against mastitis for use in sheep and goats. This review examines, current understanding of the pathological processes and immunological responses against bacterial mastitis, using S. aureus as an example. By highlighting the protective defense mechanism induced in the udder against S. aureus mastitis. Based on evidence from published studies on pathological process and protective immune response mechanism, the need for improved vaccines for prevention of mastitis in small ruminant is high-lighted and the development of a vaccine capable of enhancing immune response mechanism, that reduce the establishment of intramammary infection through induction of local IgA, IgG2 and Th17 immune responses is proposed.


This Perspective describes the unique Jonathan Amy Facility for Chemical Instrumentation in the Department of Chemistry at Purdue University, tracing its history and mode of operation. It also describes aspects of the career of its namesake and some of his insights which have been central to analytical instrumentation development, improvement, and utilization, both at Purdue and nationally.


The therapeutic agents that have been described will successfully convert close to 100% of all episodes of PST in children. Digoxin is the most frequently used agent for treatment of acute PST and is highly effective and safe. Recently, cardioversion and beta-adrenergic blockade are being employed more frequently, both with specific indications. Newer electrical means and new agents such as Verapamil are effective but the former are not yet widely used and the latter not yet authorized for use in the United States. Prophylaxis of recurrent episodes is usually successful with digoxin, with the addition or substitution of propranolol in certain conditions.


Since the creation of the euro, capital flows among member countries have been large and volatile. Motivated by this fact, I provide a theory connecting the exchange rate regime to financial integration. The key feature of the model is that monetary policy affects the value of collateral that creditors seize in case of default. Under flexible exchange rates, national governments can expropriate foreign investors by depreciating the exchange rate. Anticipating this, investors impose tight limits on international borrowing. In a monetary union this source of exchange rate risk is absent, because national governments do not control monetary policy. Forming a monetary union thus increases financial integration by boosting borrowing capacity toward foreign investors. This process, however, does not necessarily lead to higher welfare. The reason is that a high degree of financial integration can generate multiple equilibria, with bad equilibria characterized by inefficient capital flights. Capital controls or fiscal transfers can eliminate bad equilibria, but their implementation requires international cooperation.


Objective To compare the morphology of the pulmonary vessels in tetralogy of Fallot or pulmonary atresia–ventricular septal defect (PA–VSD) with (del22q) and without 22q11 deletion (non-del22q). Patients 94 consecutive infants (54 with tetralogy of Fallot, 40 with PA–VSD) were studied using ultrasound and catheterisation. Molecular investigations Identification of the 22q deletion was performed either by fluorescent in situ hybridisation or polymerisation chain reaction genotyping. Results 25 patients were del22q (16/40 (40%) PA–VSD v 9/54 (17%) tetralogy of Fallot; p < 0.02). Major aortopulmonary collateral arteries was more common in patients with PA–VSD-del22q (p < 0.03). Such collaterals were identified in 13 patients: 10 del22q and three non-del22q (p < 0.001). The size of the right and left pulmonary arteries expressed as a standard deviation (SD) difference of the normal range was −4.2 (quartiles −5.3 and −2.9) for PA–VSD del22q, and −2.6 (−3.1 and −1.8) for PA–VSD non-del22q (p = 0.02). The mean (SD) difference between the measured and theoretical Nakata index was −373 (94) for PA–VSD del22q v−245 (93) in PA–VSD non-del22q (p = 0.0002). In tetralogy of Fallot patients with and without del22q, the size of the pulmonary arteries was similar (p = 0.6). Conclusions A "specific" phenotype could be defined in patients with deletion: PA–VSD, major aortopulmonary collateral arteries with complex loop morphology, and small central pulmonary arteries. Differences in the morphology of the pulmonary vessels may indicate a different timing of the faulty developmental pathway in patients with and without 22q11 deletion.


OBJECTIVE
To report short and medium term outcomes, and complications, in dogs treated for rupture of the lateral glenohumeral ligament (LGHL) with a novel, arthroscopically assisted technique.

STUDY DESIGN
Retrospective case series.

ANIMALS
Dogs (n = 10) with LGHL injury.

METHODS
Dogs were included after arthroscopic confirmation of rupture of the LGHL and treatment using an arthroscopically assisted suture anchor technique with informed owner consent. Outcomes were assessed by the authors and owners and complications arising from treatment recorded.

RESULTS
After 6 months, 7 dogs were assessed as having full function, 2 as having acceptable function, and 1 had poor function. There was 1 minor intra-operative and 1 minor post-operative complication. There were no major complications encountered 6 months after treatment.

CONCLUSIONS
Dogs with LGHL injury can be treated using this novel technique with low complication rates and good outcomes after 6 months.


Abstract 2173 Background: The risk of hemorrhage in acute myeloid leukemia (AML) is influenced by a multitude of factors. In this study we investigated whether hemorrhage in AML patients is associated with endothelial disruption, potentially caused by thrombocytopenia, platelet dysfunction and leukocytosis. In general, dysfunction of the inner lining of the vessel wall, the endothelium, contributes significantly to capillary leakage and bleeding and to the pathophysiology of systemic critical illness like sepsis and trauma. Trauma patients with excessive degradation of the endothelial glycocalyx, have increased coagulopathy, bleeding and mortality. In AML patients, bleeding may also in part be attributed to direct activation and dysfunction of the endothelium, since leukemic blast cells and thrombocytopenia both activate or disrupts the endothelium. Design and Methods: All study patients were participants in a previous prospective study of functional platelet defects and hemorrhage. Patients were diagnosed with AML according to the WHO-classification, and enrolled in the study at the time of diagnosis before onset of treatment. In the present study, 49 patients with available serum or plasma samples from the original cohort were included. We measured soluble markers of glycocalyx degradation and endothelial cell activation and damage (syndecan-1, Inter Cellular Adhesion Molecule-1 (sICAM-1), sE-selectin, thrombomodulin (sTM)), natural anticoagulation (protein C), platelet activation (sCD40L) and cell turn-over (histone complexed DNA (hcDNA)) along with previously collected data on bleeding status and platelet activation markers (CD62P, CD63, PAC-1) before and after thrombin receptor agonist peptide (TRAP) stimulation. Hemorrhage was evaluated according to the Common Toxicity Criteria on a 0–4 scale and performed by the same physician in 47 patients. Results: Median age was 67 years (IQR: 51–74) and 41% (n=20) were female. Twenty three patients (47%) had no bleeding (grade 0), whereas 22 (45%) and 4 (8%) patients experienced bleeding according to group 1 and 2 classification respectively. No patients suffered from grade 3 or 4 bleeding. Patients with bleeding (group 1 and 2) had, as expected, lower platelet count (median: 22 (IQR: 17–45) vs. 92 (38–153) mia/L) but also had higher circulating levels of syndecan-1 (46 (30–102) vs. 27 (21–57) ng/mL) and sICAM-1 (384 (293–553) vs. 264 (193–376) ng/mL) indicating increased endothelial glycocalyx degradation and endothelial cell activation. Also, bleeding patients had lower TRAP-stimulated CD62P and CD63 platelet expression, indicating impaired platelet function. Leukocyte count (blast count) correlated positively with syndecan-1, sE-selectin and sTM, suggesting that the degree of glycocalyx degradation and endothelial cell activation and damage was related to the number of circulating blasts. Patients with endothelial glycocalyx degradation, evidenced by syndecan-1 level ≥ median, had more bleeding (16 vs. 9 patients) and reduced TRAP-stimulated CD62P expression despite comparable platelet counts. These patients were older (70 (63–78) vs. 58 (47–71) years), displayed signs of profound endothelial cell activation and damage, evidenced by higher levels of ICAM-1 (361 (300–502) vs. 255 (198–389) ng/mL) and sTM (4.1 (3.5–5.4) vs. 1.8 (1.5–2.5) ng/mL), and had higher leukocyte count (25 (3–89) vs. 5 (2–18) mia/L) (all p Conclusions: High syndecan-1 levels in AML patients are associated with bleeding, impaired platelet function, higher age, endothelial cell activation and damage, and leukocytosis. These findings identify new aspects of the vascular pathophysiology of bleeding in AML, and we suggest that platelet dysfunction and leukocytosis may contribute to the endothelial disruption. In the future, interventions designed to stabilize the endothelium and prevent endothelial degradation may reduce the risk of fatal hemorrhage in AML patients. Disclosures: No relevant conflicts of interest to declare.


The impacts of entropy generation and Hall current on MHD Casson fluid over a stretching surface with velocity slip factor have been numerically analyzed. Numerical work for the governing equations is established by using a shooting method with a fourth-order Runge–Kutta integration scheme. The outcomes show that the entropy generation is enhanced with a magnetic parameter, Reynolds number and group parameter. Further, the reverse behavior is observed with the Hall parameter, Eckert number, Casson parameter and slip factor. Also, it is viewed that Bejan number reduces with a group parameter.


In 1978, the British Conservative Party hired Saatchi & Saatchi to handle their upcoming General Election publicity. The LABOUR ISN'T WORKING. poster is the most famous poster from that campaign and, indeed, one of the most well known in British history. This paper will examine the poster's visual rhetoric in order to establish how and why this poster became so famous. The paper concert that it is not just what is present, but what is absent is equally as important. This paper will identify and account for the visual rhetoric of this poster by using a social semiotic analysis, similar to that advocated by Robert Hodge and Gunther Kress in Social Semiotics. This paper has evolved has evolved from the author's Ph.D. thesis, which is a social semiotic analysis of the Conservative Party's 1979 General Election poster and print advertising. To date, there has been no other critical analysis of the visual rhetoric of this poster.


OBJECT
Stereotactic radiosurgery is an increasingly used, and the least invasive, surgical option for patients with trigeminal neuralgia (TN). In this study, the authors performed a retrospective evaluation of the safety and efficacy of this method for idiopathic TN.

METHODS
The authors reviewed data from 76 patients with idiopathic TN who underwent Gamma Knife surgery (GKS). The mean age of the patients was 64 years (range 27-83 years). All patients had typical features of TN. Thirty patients (39.5%) had previously undergone surgery. The intervention consisted of GKS on the retrogasserian cisternal portion of the fifth cranial nerve. The mean maximum GKS dose used was 85.1 Gy (range 75-90 Gy).

RESULTS
Patients were followed-up from 6 to 42 months (mean 20.3 months) after GKS. Complete pain relief was achieved in 83.1% of the patients within 1 year, 70.9% within 2 years, and 62.5% within 3 years. Patients who underwent previous surgery demonstrated a lower rate of pain relief (p < 0.05). Twenty patients (26.3%) reported pain recurrence between 6 and 42 months after treatment. New or worsened persistent trigeminal dysfunction developed after GKS in 16 patients (21%); 8 of these patients described some facial numbness/not bothersome, and 8 reported some facial numbness/somewhat bothersome. None of the patients developed troublesome dysesthesia or anesthesia dolorosa.

CONCLUSIONS
Gamma Knife surgery for idiopathic TN proved to be safe and effective and was associated with a particularly low rate of complications.