Biochemical investigations of red blood and oxygen transportation by erythrocyte hemoglobin were performed in volunteered for chamber experiments (0.14 MPa) with normal and hypoxic oxyargon medium (O2-Ar). Erythrocyte metabolism, lipid and phospholipids spectra, and effectiveness of oxygen release and retention by hemoglobin were studied in the baseline data collection period, on day 6 in hyperbaric and normoxic O2-Ar medium (13.7% O2), on day 3 in hyperbaric and hypoxic O2-Ar (9.9% O2) and on day 1 and 10 during the post-experiment rehab. Elevated pressure, hypoxia and ensuing decompression revealed an ATP reduction that could be a result of shifts on the membrane level and increased G6PD activity associated with cell reparation processes. Changes in membrane lipid and phospholipids composition point to an altered phase state of plasmatic membrane, i.e., increased viscosity which is indicative of possible impairment of membrane permeability As a rule, hyperbaria impacted oxygen transportation in blood of the subjects; effect of hypoxia combined with hyperbaria was not uniform ranging from none to decreasing or increasing oxygen transportation that can be extenuated by selectivity and individual sensitivity to the factors in the experiment Loss of O2 transportation efficiency by hemoglobin is most likely connected with the increase of plasmatic membrane viscosity that could affect hemoporphyrin conformation of membrane-bound hemoglobin and obstruct oxygen transport though membrane.


The influence of type of diet and time after feeding on concentration of isoacids in rumen fluid of 6 fistulated sheep were investigated. The concentration of isoacids in rumen fluid was higher in diets rich in concentrate and protein (5.6) than in roughage diets (3.4) or in straw-starch-urea diets poor in native protein (highest concentration: 2.1 mmol/l rumen fluid). Feeding of roughage diet or straw-starch-urea-diet effected a significant decrease of concentration of isoacids in the rumen fluid after morning feeding, but concentrate-roughage diet, increased the isoacids-concentration. Reasons for decreased concentration of isoacids may be a shortage of corresponding amino acids and a high activity of cellulolytic microbes. Infusion of isoacids (3 g per day) in the rumen of sheep fed with a straw-starch-sugar-urea diet did not significantly influence the in sacco dry matter degradability of untreated wheat straw, but increased the dry matter loss of ammonia treated wheat straw from 16.0; 26.6; 39.4; 54.0 and 58.8% to 17.3; 29.7; 43.1; 56.3 and 63.0% after 6; 12; 24; 48 and 72 h rumen incubation time respectively. Further experiments seem to be necessary. The effect of isoacids may be expected to occur with poor quality feeds, rich in fibre low in protein and hence low in branched-chain amino acids.


OF THESIS Synthesis and Characterization of P-type Copper Indium Diselenide (CIS) Nanowires embedded in Porous Alumina templates This work focuses on a simple template assisted approach for fabricating I-III-VI semiconductor nanowire arrays. Vertically aligned nanowires of p-CIS of controllable diameter and thickness are electrodeposited, from an acidic electrolyte solution, inside porous aluminum templates using a three electrode set up with saturated calomel electrode as the reference. AAO template over ITO-glass was used as starting template for the device fabrication. The deposited CIS is annealed at different temperatures in a reducing environment (95% Ar+ 5% H2) for 30 minutes. X-ray diffraction of the nanowires showed nanocrystalline cubic phase structures with a strong orientation in the direction. The effective bandgap of the deposited CIS nanowires determined using the Near Infrared (NIR) Spectrometer was found to be 1.07eV. The type of CIS electrodeposited inside the porous alumina template is determined to be p-type from the Schottky diode obtained with ITO-CIS-Au structure. Schottky diodes were characterized and analyzed at room temperature.


A fundamental assumption in this paper is that user satisfaction depends on product design. The approach consists of 5 steps: (1) define user satisfaction, (2) decompose product design elements, (3) conduct experiments, (4) develop relationship models, and (5) analyse critical design features. In order to demonstrate the practicability of this approach, relationship models were developed based on experimental data using a total of 60 subjects (30 American and 30 Korean subjects). In addition, critical design features and their common properties were identified for audio/visual consumer products. Similarities and differences between American and Korean consumers were discussed. The resulting relationship models can be used to predict user satisfaction and provide significant remedies for design change.


QUESTIONS: In case of Heberden's nodes the osteoarthritis starts with a so called tidemark flaking as a reaction to a subchondral ossification. The question was, if a differentiation in relation to a control group by an objective score is possible. METHODS: 218 finger joints from 56 cadavers were investigated morphologically (score). RESULTS: The osteoarthritis starts with a subchondral ossification. At this time the surface of the cartilage is not destroyed yet. Reactive tidemark flaking is the beginning of the general degradation. In relation to a control group a significant differentiation by a histological score is possible. CONCLUSIONS: In case of Heberden's nodes the osteoarthritis starts with the subchondral ossification. Because Heberden's nodes are the specific manifestation of the Generalized Osteoarthritis on the distal finger joints, further studies have to assess, if the same pathogenetic mechanism can be seen in osteoarthritis of the large joints.


Background: Control and prevention of infectious diseases has been a primary health mandate. The reporting system is a vital step in preventing and controlling of these diseases. Most important, healthcare workers who have a responsibility to report must be aware of this responsibility. The present study aimed to improve the compliance of primary healthcare workers against reportable tropical and non-tropical dermatological diseases. Objective of the study: The objective was to assess the knowledge, skills, and practice of primary healthcare workers in Saudi Arabia regarding the surveillance system of reportable tropical and non-tropical dermatological diseases using an assessment tool featuring closed-ended questions. As a secondary objective, this study assessed the satisfaction of primary healthcare workers with the surveillance system. Subjects and methods: Through a cross-sectional design, the study used an electronic self-administered questionnaire targeting the primary healthcare workers who met the inclusion criteria through a non-probability sampling technique. Results: By the end of the study period, data had been collected from 377 primary healthcare workers. Slightly more than half of them worked for the ministry of health facilities. In the last year, the vast majority (88%) of participants did not report any infectious diseases. Poor or low knowledge was reported by almost half of the participants concerning which dermatological diseases should be notified immediately on clinical suspicion or routinely on a weekly basis. Clinically and in response to the skills assessment, 57% of the participants had lower skills scores in detecting and identifying the skin ulcer of leishmania. Half of the participants were less satisfied with the feedback after their notification and considered the notification forms complicated and time-consuming, especially with the usual high workload in primary healthcare centers. Furthermore, the observed significant differences (p < 0.001) in knowledge and skill scores were demonstrated with female healthcare workers, older participants, employees from the Ministry of National Guard Health Affairs, and workers with more than ten years of experience. Conclusion:The present study has shown the limitations of public health surveillance due to underreporting and lack of timeliness. The dissatisfaction of study participants with feedback after the notification step is another finding that demonstrates the need for collaboration among public health authorities and healthcare workers. Fortunately, health departments can implement measures to improve practitioners' awareness through continuous medical education and providing frequent feedback to overcome these hurdles.


PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to demonstrate the rationale, technical framework, content creation workflow and evaluation for a multilingual massive open online course (MOOC) to facilitate information literacy (IL) considering cultural aspects.Design/methodology/approachA good practice analysis built the basis for the technical and content framework. The evaluation approach consisted of three phases: first, the students were asked to fill out a short self-assessment questionnaire and a shortened adapted version of a standardized IL test. Second, they completed the full version of the IL MOOC. Third, they were asked to fill out the full version of a standardized IL test and a user experience questionnaire.FindingsThe results show that first the designed workflow was suitable in practice and led to the implementation of a full-grown MOOC. Second, the implementation itself provides implications for future projects developing multilingual educational resources. Third, the evaluation results show that participants achieved significantly higher results in a standardized IL test after attending the MOOC as mandatory coursework. Variations between the different student groups in the participating countries were observed. Fourth, self-motivation to complete the MOOC showed to be a challenge for students asked to attend the MOOC as nonmandatory out-of-classroom task. It seems that multilingual facilitation alone is not sufficient to increase active MOOC participation.Originality/valueThis paper presents an innovative approach of developing multilingual IL teaching resources and is one of the first works to evaluate the impact of an IL MOOC on learners' experience and learning outcomes in an international evaluation study.


Rule-based machine translation is a machine translation paradigm where linguistic knowledge is encoded by an expert in the form of rules that translate text from source to target language. While this approach grants extensive control over the output of the system, the cost of formalising the needed linguistic knowledge is much higher than training a corpus-based system, where a machine learning approach is used to automatically learn to translate from examples. In this paper, we describe different approaches to leverage the information contained in rule-based machine translation systems to improve a corpus-based one, namely, a neural machine translation model, with a focus on a low-resource scenario. Three different kinds of information were used: morphological information, named entities and terminology. In addition to evaluating the general performance of the system, we systematically analysed the performance of the proposed approaches when dealing with the targeted phenomena. Our results suggest that the proposed models have limited ability to learn from external information, and most approaches do not significantly alter the results of the automatic evaluation, but our preliminary qualitative evaluation shows that in certain cases the hypothesis generated by our system exhibit favourable behaviour such as keeping the use of passive voice.


The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic is caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), warranting urgent study of the molecular mechanisms of SARS-CoV-2 infection and host immune response. Type I interferon (IFN-I) is a key component of host innate immune system responsible for eliminating the virus at the early stage of infection. In contrast, SARS-CoV-2 has evolved multiple strategies to evade innate immune response to facilitate viral replication, transmission, and pathogenesis. This review summarizes the recent progresses on SARS-CoV-2 proteins that antagonize host IFN-I production and/or signaling. These progresses have provided knowledge for new vaccine and antiviral development to prevent and control COVID-19.


Crystal structures of metal-product complexes of fructose 1, 6-bisphosphatase (FBPase) reveal competition between AMP and divalent cations. In the presence of AMP, the Zn(2+)-product and Mg(2+)-product complexes have a divalent cation present only at one of three metal binding sites (site 1). The enzyme is in the T-state conformation with a disordered loop of residues 52-72 (loop 52-72). In the absence of AMP, the enzyme crystallizes in the R-state conformation, with loop 52-72 associated with the active site. In structures without AMP, three metal-binding sites are occupied by Zn(2+) and two of three metal sites (sites 1 and 2) by Mg(2+). Evidently, the association of AMP with FBPase disorders loop 52-72, the consequence of which is the release of cations from two of three metal binding sites. In the Mg(2+) complexes (but not the Zn(2+) complexes), the 1-OH group of fructose 6-phosphate (F6P) coordinates to the metal at site 1 and is oriented for a nucleophilic attack on the bound phosphate molecule. A mechanism is presented for the forward reaction, in which Asp74 and Glu98 together generate a hydroxide anion coordinated to the Mg(2+) at site 2, which then displaces F6P. Development of negative charge on the 1-oxygen of F6P is stabilized by its coordination to the Mg(2+) at site 1.


: Changing conditions in the Arctic have had severe consequences for many marine mammals. In this study, we examined blubber cortisol using radioimmunoassay in 4 Canadian beluga whale Dephinapterus leucas populations. The endangered Cumberland Sound population had higher cortisol levels (mean ± SE: 0.65 ± 0.11 ng g −1 ) than populations not at risk: Eastern Beaufort Sea (0.31 ± 0.03 ng g −1 ; p < 0.001), Eastern High Arctic-Baffin Bay (0.32 ± 0.09 ng g −1 ; p = 0.004), and Western Hudson Bay (0.44 ± 0.04 ng g −1 ; p = 0.004). To evaluate if measured cortisol differences were due to differences in diet, we compared stable isotope ratios of carbon and nitrogen ( δ 13 C and δ 15 N) and dietary fatty acids among populations. Beluga whales from Eastern Beau-fort Sea had lower δ 13 C (p ≤ 0.017) and higher δ 15 N (p < 0.001) values than other measured populations, while Western Hudson Bay beluga dietary fatty acid profiles differed from other measured populations (p < 0.001). Population and sex were significant predictors of blubber cortisol (p ≤ 0.017). Females exhibited higher cortisol than males. Despite diet differences among populations, neither stable isotopes nor fatty acids were significant predictors of cortisol, suggesting differences in cortisol levels were unrelated to diet. Other factors, such as increased risk of predation, hunting pressure, vessel traffic, or differences in baseline blubber cortisol concentrations may be contributing to elevated cortisol levels in Cumberland Sound beluga whales. Measuring blubber cortisol in combination with chemical indicators of diet provides a useful method for monitoring population health and can be used to inform management and conservation.


Antipsychotic medications are widely used in the United States (US). Understanding the extent of use and comparative safety of antipsychotics is especially important for certain groups of people such as pregnant women or hospitalized patients, for whom the evidence on safety and effectiveness is limited. Previous studies lacked power to detect difference in safety endpoints or suffered from potential confounding bias. In this dissertation, we used large administrative claims databases to provide evidence for antipsychotic use among vulnerable population subgroups.

In Chapter 1, we describe the pattern of antipsychotic utilization among publicly insured pregnant women in the US using a nationwide Medicaid claims database. We found that atypical antipsychotics are increasingly used in this population between 2001 and 2010, with a notable increase in the diagnosis of and antipsychotic use for bipolar spectrum disorders. More than 50% of women discontinue treatment after becoming pregnant and polytherapy with other psychoactive drugs was common. These findings require further attention with respect to safety of antipsychotic in this population.

In Chapter 2, we examine the association between the use of atypical antipsychotic and the risk of gestational diabetes (GDM) among pregnant women in Medicaid. Comparing women who continue treatment to those who discontinue among prevalent users of antipsychotic without pre-existing diabetes at the beginning of pregnancy, we observed a potentially increased risk of GDM among continuers of quetiapine and olanzapine but not for the continuers of aripiprazole, ziprasidone, or risperidone. Olanzapine showed the strongest evidence of increased risk of GDM across multiple analyses, but the variability in results was not large enough to comment on comparative safety of different antipsychotics.

In Chapter 3, we examine the comparative safety of antipsychotics in hospitalized patients with acute myocardial infarction, where antipsychotics are often used to manage delirium-related agitation. We found that the hazard ratio of 7-day mortality was greater for patients who received haloperidol compared to those who received atypical antipsychotics after adjusting for a large number of confounders. While residual confounding is a possible alternative explanation, our result is consistent with what has been reported from outpatient studies and in nursing home population.


Frequency multipliers (doubler and tripler) are demonstrated at room temperature, using a simple circuit that combines a load resistor with an InP-based resonant-tunneling high electron mobility transistor (RTHEMT). The RTHEMT incorporates an InGaAs/AlAs/InAs pseudomorphic resonant tunneling diode into the source of a nonalloyed ohmic contact InAlAs/InGaAs high electron mobility transistor. A nearly flat valley current is obtained in the RTHEMT's current-voltage characteristics, which results in pronounced negative transconductance throughout a wide range of drain-to-source bias voltages. As a result, frequency multipliers using RTHEMT's feature large output voltage swing and reduced power consumption.


Rabbits immunized with group B type III, group C, and Streptococcus pneumoniae type XIV streptococcal vaccines developed autoantibodies reactive with autologous and isologous erythrocytes and human O-positive erythrocytes at reduced temperatures. The cold agglutinin antibodies were present in both the immunoglobulin M (IgM) and IgG fractions of group C streptococcal antiserum and in the IgM fraction of group B type III and S. pneumoniae type XIV antisera. BALB/c, CF1, and local strains of mice immunized with group B type III and S. pneumoniae type XIV streptococcal vaccines also produced a cold agglutinin antibody reactive with rabbit and human erythrocytes. The cold agglutinin antibodies were reactive with saccharide compounds representative of the determinants present on the individual bacterial carbohydrate structures, individual vaccine preparations, and isolated polysaccharides. The group C antibodies in rabbits were reactive with sugar ligands in the following order: N-acetylgalactosamine greater than melibiose greater than lactose greater than galactose greater than glucose. Group B type III and S. pneumoniae type XIV cold agglutinin antibodies in rabbit antisera, however, displayed reactivities different from group C antibodies and from each other. Group B type III antibodies reacted with galactose greater than lactose greater than N-acetylgalactosamine greater than glucose greater than rhamnose; S. pneumoniae type XIV antibodies reacted with lactose greater than melibiose greater than galactose greater than glucose greater than N-acetylgalactosamine. The same relative ligand specificity was observed for the cold agglutinin antibodies in S. pneumoniae type XIV mouse antisera. The cold agglutinin antibodies in group B type III and S. pneumoniae type XIV antiserum reacted with erythrocytes at higher temperatures (up to 31 degrees C) than did group C antibodies (up to 14 degrees C). In addition, S. pneumoniae type XIV antibodies did not discriminate between I- or i-bearing human erythrocytes to a significant extent. The results obtained provide substantial evidence that autoreactive cold agglutinin antibodies produced by immunization with these vaccines represent subpopulations of bacterial carbohydrate-specific antibodies that cross-react with mammalian carbohydrate structures.


Submitted for the SHOCK07 Meeting of The American Physical Society Molecular dynamics simulations of anomalous elastic response of covalent crystals to shock compression KEITH MCLAUGHLIN, IVAN OLEYNIK, University of South Florida, SERGEY ZYBIN, California Institute of Technology, MARK ELERT, U.S. Naval Academy, CARTER WHITE, Naval Research Laboratory — We have performed large-scale molecular-dynamics simulations of shock-wave propagation in single-crystal covalent solids such as diamond and silicon. An anomalous elastic response of these materials has been observed in the intermediate range of shock-wave intensities between the elastic-plastic split shock-wave regime and the shock-induced chemistry regime. The anomalous elastic response is characterized by the absence of plastic deformations in highly uniaxially compressed material. The unusual materials response in shock-compressed diamond is attributed to unique and complex constitutive relationships: both shear and longitudinal stresses are non-monotonic functions of compression. This example clearly demonstrates the necessity of generalization of the notion of the Hugoniot elastic limit (HEL) to include critical shear stresses in a criterion of materials yielding upon shock compression. Ivan Oleynik University of South Florida Date submitted: 23 Feb 2007 Electronic form version 1.4


Patients with profound left ventricular (LV) dysfunction supported by a left ventricular assist device (LVAD) may have recovery of LV function, but current methods for assessing this are difficult or not readily available. A new method to estimate LV performance was tested in 6 patients on LVAD (age, 47 +/- 12 years). Simultaneous measures of LV cross-sectional area (substitute for volume) using transesophageal echocardiographic automated border detection and femoral arterial pressure (substitute for LV ejection pressure) were recorded during brief periods on and off LVAD. During the LVAD off period, femoral arterial pressure and LV area signals were combined on-line to generate arterial pressure-LV area loops. The slope of the linear regression line connecting the end systolic points generated during LV filling after LVAD off was used as an estimate of end systolic elastance denoted by Ees. The average Ees was 3.8 +/- 3.1 mmHg/cm2. These values are significantly lower than those of 13 control patients (22.3 +/- 15.4 mmHg/cm2). This method of estimating Ees may be clinically useful in assessing LV recovery in patients on LVAD after extended support.


The management of acoustic neuromas is directed towards early diagnosis and surgical removal. The routine use of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) has permitted the diagnosis of very small acoustic neuromas. However, it is becoming evident that not all acoustic neuromas will grow if left alone. In our series we followed 44 patients with acoustic neuromas for an average of 30.5 months and assessed their growth by serial MRI scanning. We followed 20 intracanalicular and 24 cerebello-pontine angle lesions. In both groups the phenomenon of arrested growth was demonstrated in the majority. When growth did occur, it did so at a variable rate, but was always evident within the first year. We recommend an initial observation period of 1 year in all small neuromas. If growth occurs at this stage removal is indicated. When growth does not occur serial MRI review at increasing intervals indicated.


We report a patient with gyrate atrophy, a rare metabolic disease, who had bilateral late spontaneous posterior dislocation of in-the-bag posterior chamber intraocular lens (PCIOL). He underwent pars plana vitrectomy, PCIOL retrieval and anterior chamber intraocular lens implantation in both eyes. This report may imply that patients with gyrate atrophy are at risk for spontaneous dislocation of intraocular lenses.


Worldwide Chemical items is pressure driven concrete when joined with water, solidifies into a strong mass. Compound investigation of concrete crude materials gave information into the substance properties of concrete. In this paper we are examining about the different substance sythesis and properties of Portland concrete. In this paper we are additionally examining about the market size of Portland concrete and use of concrete and their proportion.


The influence of different diets on cholesterol content of liver and muscle of European eel (Anguilla anguilla) was studied for the first time. In control eel, cholesterol constituted near 7.5% of total lipids in liver and about 1% in muscle. Feeding herring meal-55% diet produced a drastic increase in hepatic cholesterol after a 30 d period. In muscle, cholesterol content also increased after any dietary treatment. Free cholesterol represented about 34% of total cholesterol in liver and about 50% in muscle. In both tissues, these percentages increased after any experimental condition assayed. The n-3/n-6 ratio in the fatty acid composition was manifestly low in herring meal-55% diet, mainly due to the minimal amount of total n-3 fatty acids. This fact may account for the increase in liver cholesterol, bearing in mind the hypocholesterolemic effect of the polyunsaturated n-3 fatty acids.


Traditional composite materials used for construction purposes currently face many questions regarding their sustainability – mainly because they do not come from renewable sources and due to the problems related to their end-of-life management. These challenges motivate companies and researchers to look at the natural fiber composite materials with increased interest. Usually natural fiber materials in construction are used together with mineral binders, but in this research new organic binder – sapropel (organic rich lake sediments) is used as a binder for natural fiber composite materials with various fillers. In previous research these composite materials have proven their applicability in construction industry due to their sufficient mechanical strength and low thermal conductivity. Thus, in this research evaluation of the biodegradability of composite materials were done, comparing them to natural fiber materials with mineral binders. As a methods respiration intensity of microorganisms in soil and enzyme activity of microorganisms were used. For studied materials biodegradability potential have been examined, depending on the filler properties and presence of mineral matter content in the obtained composite materials.


Federal involvement in employment training, from the establishment of the Royal Military College in 1884 to the legislation of the National Training Program in 1982, has been to ensure a qualified Canadian labour force. The evolving Canadian economy and the changing world of work have required a federal role varying from passive financing to direct training involvement. An examination of current and future demographic and employment trends, altered demand patterns, changing technology, new challenges of employment and unemployment, and a narrowing global community; in Federal reports and papers indicates that a com- prehensive, cooperative human resource strategy is essential to Canadian econo- mic health and international competitiveness.


Subject-driven image generation aims at generating images containing customized subjects, which has recently drawn enormous attention from the research community. However, the previous works cannot precisely control the background and position of the target subject. In this work, we aspire to fill the void and propose two novel subject-driven sub-tasks, i.e., Subject Replacement and Subject Addition. The new tasks are challenging in multiple aspects: replacing a subject with a customized one can change its shape, texture, and color, while adding a target subject to a designated position in a provided scene necessitates a context-aware posture. To conquer these two novel tasks, we first manually curate a new dataset DreamEditBench containing 22 different types of subjects, and 440 source images with different difficulty levels. We plan to host DreamEditBench as a platform and hire trained evaluators for standard human evaluation. We also devise an innovative method DreamEditor to resolve these tasks by performing iterative generation, which enables a smooth adaptation to the customized subject. In this project, we conduct automatic and human evaluations to understand the performance of DreamEditor and baselines on DreamEditBench. For Subject Replacement, we found that the existing models are sensitive to the shape and color of the original subject. The model failure rate will dramatically increase when the source and target subjects are highly different. For Subject Addition, we found that the existing models cannot easily blend the customized subjects into the background smoothly, leading to noticeable artifacts in the generated image. We hope DreamEditBench can become a standard platform to enable future investigations toward building more controllable subject-driven image editing. Our project homepage is https://dreameditbenchteam.github.io/.


Meigs' syndrome is classically characterized as the triad of ascites, pleural effusion, and ovarian fibroma. The incidence is not easily determined but has been described in medical literature. We report a case of a patient who presented for shortness of breath and was found to have pleural effusion, ascites, and an ovarian mass. Investigative measures were consistent with Meigs' syndrome; however, definitive diagnosis was not able to be determined as our patient opted for symptomatic treatment rather than pursue surgical options. We discuss the pathophysiology of pleural effusion, ascites, and management of Meigs' and pseudo-Meigs' syndrome. Ultimately, we discuss palliative options for patients who are not ideal candidates for surgery.


We address the problem of transmission of information over the AWGN channel using lattices. In particular, we will deal with previously introduced LDA lattices which are obtained by Construction A from LDPC codes over the finite field Fp. We will show how to build a particular ensemble of LDA lattices related to bipartite graphs with good expansion properties. We investigate the quality of this family under lattice decoding and show that a random member in it can be reliably decoded for any value of the channel noise variance up to Poltyrev limit. Values of p and the parameters for which optimal performance is guaranteed under lattice decoding are in accordance with the optimal parameters found experimentally under iterative decoding.


Central nervous system (CNS) inflammation is a potential therapeutic target for neurodegenerative diseases. In recent years, a number of studies have focused on the links between neurodegenerative diseases and CNS glial cells, especially microglia. Microglia are the main resident immune cells in the CNS and represent approximately 10-15% of all CNS cells. Microglia play an important role in maintaining brain homeostasis at rest by surveying the environment, and engulfing apoptotic cells and debris in the healthy brain. However, under certain pathological conditions, microglia can generate neurotoxic factors, such as pro-inflammatory cytokines and molecules like nitric oxide (NO), which lead to CNS inflammatory diseases. In this review, we discuss the evidence that regulation of microglial ion channels may modulate CNS inflammation and subsequent tissue damage in neurological disorders. In particular, we discuss the role of transient receptor potential (TRP) channels in microglia in both acute and chronic inflammatory conditions, and describe the physiological and pathophysiological roles of TRP channels in CNS inflammatory pathways. Additionally, we describe the benefits of stimulation/inhibition of TRP channels in animal models of microglia-related CNS inflammatory diseases.


The eco-friendly aqueous electrosynthesis of AgIn5Se8 (AISe) nanocrystals (NCs), and their respective core/shell structure AgIn5Se8/ZnS NCs (AISe/ZnS), was carried out by using L-glutathione (GSH) as a stabilizer. Se0 direct reduction was carried out in a graphite powder macroelectrode of an electrochemical cavity cell, controlled by current (i = 30 mA) and electric charge (Q = 11.6 C). The generated Se2− ions react with In3+ and Ag+ ions in the intermediate compartment of the cell to give AISe NCs. A paired electrolysis (Zn0 anode/S0 in a graphite powder cathode) was carried out to prepare ZnS-GSH NCs, using the same electrochemical apparatus (i = 30 mA and Q = 9.6 C). The effects of the Ag+/In3+ ratio (0.5, 0.28 and 0.18) and ZnS shell on the optical properties of AISe NCs were investigated. The ternary AISe NCs were characterized by XRD and HRTEM, which revealed that AgIn5Se8 had a cubic phase structure (Ag+/In3+ = 0.18) and the ZnS shell had a zinc blende structure. The shell growth promoted a heterojunction formation with different crystalline phases, leading to a quantum yield decrease (QY: AISe = 18.6%; AISe/ZnS = 16.0%). The NCs were irradiated with a near-infrared laser at different power densities (λexc = 785 nm). AISe and AISe/ZnS samples showed photothermal response, reaching 381 K and 402 K, respectively.


In this study the experimental and computational results for a fast ship model is presented. The Reynolds Averaged Navier Stokes (RANS) equations and the nonlinear free surface boundary conditions are discretized by means of an overset grid finite volume scheme. The experiments are performed at Istanbul Technical University Towing Tank basin. In the numerical turbulent flow calculations, the relationship between the Boussinesq's hypothesis of turbulence viscosity and the velocities are obtained through the standard k-e turbulence model. Simulations of turbulent free surface flows around the model are performed by using Star CCM+ solver and Volume of Fluid (VOF) model to capture the free surface between air and water. The total resistance of the ship model is compared with the experimental results. Bow and aft wave form developments are also investigated qualitatively. For Froude (Fn) numbers less than 0.25, the computations are found to be well satisfactory, giving efficient and accurate tool to predict curves of resistance. For relatively higher speeds (Fn>0.25) a low Reynolds number turbulence model may be more suitable to predict the resistance.


This paper presents some Perron-type results for the nonuniform ordinary dichotomy of evolution families on the real line with nonuniform exponential growth. It it also mentioned the notion of the admissibility of the pair (L 1 (X);L 1 (X)) to an evolution family. This notion is used to obtain a result for the nonuniform ordinary dichotomy for an evolution family on the real line.


Renal clear cell carcinoma (RCC) has different manifestations, including uncommon metastasis and paraneoplastic syndromes. Here we report a rare case of RCC presenting as metastasis to the mandible. A 57-year-old patient with mandibular swelling was referred to the dentist. After necessary evaluations, an incisional biopsy of mandible showed metastatic RCC. The patient was referred to the urologist. The patient underwent right radical nephrectomy. Pathological examination showed clear renal cell carcinoma. Every abnormal bone lesion in the oral cavity should be evaluated carefully and the possibility of a malignant lesion should always be considered.


The relationship of self-regulated learning to the achievement test scores of 62 Grade 6 students was studied. Generally, the metacognitive and affective variables correlated significantly with teachers' grades and standardized test scores in mathematics, reading, and science. Planning and self-assessment significantly predicted the six measures of achievement. Step-wise multiple regression analyses using the metacognitive and affective variables largely indicate that students' and teachers' perceptions of scholastic ability and planning appear to be the most salient factors in predicting academic performance. The locus of control dimension had no utility in predicting classroom grades and performance on standardized measures of achievement. The implications of the findings for teaching and learning are discussed.


Abstract. We investigate the influence of different chemical and physical processes on the water vapour distribution in the lower stratosphere (LS), in particular in the Asian and North-American monsoon anticyclones (AMA and NAMA, respectively). Specifically, we analyze effects of large-scale temperatures, methane oxidation, ice microphysics, and small-scale atmospheric mixing processes in model experiments with the chemistry transport model CLaMS. All these processes hydrate the LS, in particular over the Asian Monsoon. While ice microphysics has the largest global moistening impact, it is small-scale mixing which dominates the specific signature in the AMA. In particular, the small-scale mixing parameterization strongly contributes to the seasonal and intra-seasonal variability of water vapour in that region and including it in the model simulations results in a significantly improved agreement with observations. Although none of our experiments reproduces the spatial pattern of the NAMA seen in MLS observations, they all exhibit a realistic annual cycle and intra-seasonal variability, which are mainly controlled by temperatures. We further analyse the sensitivity of these results to the domain-filling trajectory set-up used in the five model experiments, here-called Lagrangian Trajectory Filling (LTF). Compared with MLS observations and with a multiyear reference simulation using the standard version of CLaMS, we find that LTF schemes result in a drier global LS and drier water vapour signal over the monsoon regions. Besides, the intra-seasonal variability of water vapour in the AMA is less correlated with MLS during June--August. We relate these results to the fact that the LTF schemes produce a low density of air parcels in the moistest areas of the AMA.


Lack of adjustment or school failure is of concern to educators, child welfare workers, educational, and school psychologists as well as parents, but there are few studies on this aspect of education, especially among late adolescents. Furthermore, there is a lack of research on teachers as socialization agents as an independent variable in adolescents' school adjustment. The present study was conducted to explore how upper secondary school students' perceptions of teacher socialization practices were related to motivation for continued education, school alienation, intention to quit school, truancy, and class absence. The sample consisted of Norwegian adolescents aged 15- to 18-years-old (n = 564) in vocational and general educational courses from one upper secondary school. Perceptions of teacher socialization practices accounted for unique variances in school adjustment. Of the teacher socialization variables, academic support best explained variances in school adjustment. The findings suggest that the associations between teachers as socializing agents and motivation for continued education were relatively strong, but the other associations were relatively modest. The limitations and implications of this study are discussed.


Villages hold a prominent and expansive position in terms of sovereignty and their role in regulating and managing village affairs, as outlined in Law Number 6 of 2014 concerning Villages, Government Regulation Number 43 of 2014, and Government Regulation Number 76 of 2015, which pertain to the implementation of regulations stated in Law Number 6 of 2014 concerning Villages. Within the authority of the Village Head and members of the Village Representative Institution, one crucial aspect related to village governance is the existence of Village Regulations. These regulations play a vital role as they serve as the legal foundation for the implementation of various village programs and activities. As statutory regulations, Village Regulations are bound by formal and material principles that must be adhered to. Village regulations, as legal products, must align with the procedural techniques for creating legislation outlined in Law Number 12 of 2011 concerning the Establishment of Laws and Regulations. The process of formulating laws and regulations requires specific knowledge and skills that should be well understood by both the village government and the village community.
Keywords: village, regulation, government


Cicloprolol is a new cardioselective beta-blocking agent with partial agonist activity (intrinsic sympathomimetic activity, ISA). Its haemodynamic profile was compared with that of atenolol (cardioselective; no ISA) in a comparative dose-response study of 24 ischaemic patients with diminished cardiac reserve. Following a stable control period, equivalent intravenous (i.v.) beta-blocking boluses of atenolol (1, 1, 2, and 4 mg) or cicloprolol (0.025, 0.025, 0.05, and 0.1 mg/kg) were randomly administered and haemodynamics and left ventricular ejection fraction were determined at rest and during bicycle exercise. At rest, atenolol reduced heart rate (HR) and cardiac index; diastolic blood pressure (DBP), systemic vascular resistance index (SVRI), and pulmonary artery occluded pressure (PAOP) increased without change in mean arterial pressure (MAP). Cicloprolol increased left ventricular ejection fraction, reduced its end-diastolic volume, and tended to reduce filling pressure without change in other variables. During exercise, atenolol reduced ejection fraction and increased SVRI; in contrast, cicloprolol did not significantly alter these parameters. Attenuation of exercise tachycardia and cardiac index increase was similar after each agent. Thus, the cardiac performance assessed from left ventricular stroke index or ejection fraction/filling pressure relationships was less depressed after cicloprolol as compared with atenolol. The relevance of such haemodynamic differences to exercise ability or quality of life during sustained therapy warrants examination.


Every day, large amounts of sensitive data are distributed across mobile phones, wearable devices, and other sensors. Traditionally, these enormous datasets have been processed on a single system, with complex models being trained to make valuable predictions. Distributed machine learning techniques such as Federated and Split Learning have recently been developed to protect user data and privacy better while ensuring high performance. Both of these distributed learning architectures have advantages and disadvantages. In this article, we examine these tradeoffs and suggest a new hybrid Federated Split Learning architecture that combines the efficiency and privacy benefits of both. Our evaluation demonstrates how our hybrid Federated Split Learning approach can lower the amount of processing power required by each client running a distributed learning system, and reduce training and inference time while keeping a similar accuracy. We also discuss the resiliency of our approach to deep learning privacy inference attacks and compare our solution to other recently proposed benchmarks.


Background Diagnosis of coronary ischaemia by perfusion cardiovascular magnetic resonance (CMR) has high sensitivity and specificity when using X-ray coronary angiography as the reference standard. Potential reasons for false negative perfusion CMR studies include suboptimal image quality, technical reasons, or the potential discrepancy between angiographic stenosis and detectable myocardial hypoperfusion. The rates at which these factors occur have not been specifically studied to date. The CE-MARC study prospectively enrolled 752 patients with suspected coronary artery disease, scheduled to undergo CMR, SPECT and X-ray coronary angiography. We assessed potential reasons for the false negative CMR perfusion studies within CE-MARC. Table 1 Patient characteristics for false negative perfusion CMR in CE-MARC. False negative patients CE-MARC whole population N 35 752 Age (years) 61±7 60±10 Male 29 (83%) 471 (63%) Body-mass index (kg/m2) 28.3±4.0 29.2±4.4 Resting BP (mm Hg) 125/71±20/10 138/79±21/11 LAD disease 19 (54%) 183 (25%) Circumflex disease 16 (46%) 133 (18%) RCA disease 8 (23%) 110 (15%) Left main disease 2 (6%) 23 (3%) Data as n (%) or mean±SD. Methods All patients with significant coronary stenosis (≥70% stenosis of a first order coronary artery ≥2 mm diameter, or left main stem stenosis ≥50% as measured by quantitative coronary angiography (QCA)), who had a normal or probably normal CMR perfusion analysis from the original, blinded read were selected from the CE-MARC population. Patient and imaging characteristics were analysed. Myocardial perfusion reserve (MPR) was calculated offline (PMI v0.4) from CMR stress and rest perfusion images using the Fermi model, with arterial input defined in LV blood pool, and the whole mid-LV short axis myocardial slice used as tissue response. Results 36 patients with a false-negative CMR result were identified (table 1). 1 patient had 'unusable' image quality grading, and was excluded from further analysis. 4 (11%) patients had images graded as 'poor quality.' 10 patients (29%) had inadequate hemodynamic response to adenosine (SBP decrease <10 mm Hg or heart rate increase <10 beats/min). 1 patient (3%) had angiographic 3-vessel disease, supporting balanced ischaemia. A further 6 patients (17%) had an adequate hemodynamic response but MPR <1.5, suggesting possible inadequate vasodilatation (in the absence of triple vessel disease). Of the remaining 14 patients, mean QCA diameter of culprit stenoses was 74%±12%, close to the angiographic cut-off of ≥70% for significant disease (figure 1). Figure 1 Factors associated with a false negative CMR perfusion scan. One factor is shown per patient (n=35). Conclusions Of the many potential factors contributing to false negative CMR perfusion studies, over one third of false negative studies may have been related to lack of efficacy of pharmacological stress at the standard adenosine dose of 140 µg/kg/min. A substantial proportion of patients had coronary stenosis severity close to the angiographic cut-off of 70%, which may represent discordance between anatomical and functional assessment. Non-diagnostic image quality and three-vessel disease made a relatively small contribution to false-negative CMR studies.


Horseradish peroxidase was used to demonstrate the nature of the retinotectal fibre pathways from normal eyes and from compound double nasal (NN), double temporal (TT) and double ventral (VV) eyes in Xenopus. From normal eyes, nasal fibres were widespread in the optic tract and mostly entered the tectum through the medial and lateral brachia. Ventral retinal fibres approached the tectum via the medial brachium and dorsal retinal fibres passed through the lateral brachium, while temporal retinal fibres formed a narrow band in the centre of the tract and entered the tectum directly at its rostral border. Fibres from NN eyes formed a wide tract and strong medial and lateral brachia. Fibres from VV eyes all entered the tectum via the medial brachium and fibres from TT eyes formed a narrow tract and entered the tectum directly from its rostral extremity. Thus fibres from each type of compound eye followed pathways to the tectum that were appropriate to the embryonic origin of the retina forming the compound eye.


The retreat of Arctic sea ice in recent decades is a pre‐eminent signal of climate change. What role has the atmospheric circulation played in driving the sea ice decline? To address this question, we document the evolution of Arctic sea ice concentration trends during the period January 1979–April 2007 in light of changing atmospheric circulation conditions, in particular an upward trend in the wintertime Northern Annular Mode during the first half of the record and a downward trend during the second half. The results indicate that concurrent atmospheric circulation trends contribute to forcing winter and summer sea ice concentration trends in many parts of the marginal ice zone during both periods. However, there is also an emerging signal of overall Arctic sea ice decline since 1979 in both winter and summer that is not directly attributable to a trend in the overlying atmospheric circulation.


It is 'fruitful and stimulating' write Profs. FEINMAN & PRICE (p. 3) , 'for scholars. . . to take stock periodically'. To that end, they discuss "The tempo of theoretical change', the scientific status of archaeology and the increasingly vexed issue of how the discipline relates to anthropology. They have gathered a most distinguished roster of fellow [JS (and one Mexican) scholars to appraise the state or the art in: 'settlement pattern research', 'Paleoanthropology' and 'Fully modern humans', 'Holocene hunter-gatherers', 'The transition to food production', 'dynamics of social inequality'. 'craft production', 'Warfare and evolution', state formation in the Old World and Ilie New, 'Classical archaeology and anthropological archaeology in North America' arid research on empires. Especially from a North American perspective, it is a practical, effective, creative, thorough, and very useful review, although notahle for ignoring ethics. The photographs are of uneven qnality. Mulling i t all over at the end, the editors remark on 'urgency in our quest' (p. 493) as 'dcvelopment' churns ever more effectively over the ground that we study. They could not have closed more aptly. GARY M. FEINMAN & T. DOUGLAS PRICE (ed.]. Archaeology at the millennium: a sourcebook. xix+508 pages, 91 figures, 9 tables. 2001. New York (NY): Kluwer AcademidPlenum; 0-306-46452-7 hardback $85.


Src homology 2-containing inositol 5'-phosphatase (SHIP) inhibits immune receptor signaling through hydrolysis of the phosphatidylinositol-3 kinase (PI3K) product PI-3,4,5-P3, forming PI-3,4-P2. SHIP represses FcεRI- and cytokine-mediated mast cell activation in vitro, but little is known regarding the function of SHIP in mast cells in vivo, or the susceptibility of Ship-/- mice to mast cell-associated diseases. In this study, we found that Ship-/- mice have systemic mast cell hyperplasia, increased serum levels of IL-6, TNF, and IL-5, and heightened anaphylactic response. Further, by reconstituting mast cell-deficient mice with Ship+/+ or Ship-/- mast cells, we found that the above defects were due to loss of SHIP in mast cells. Additionally, we found that loss of SHIP in mast cells alone resulted in increased allergic asthma pathology. In summary, our data show that SHIP represses allergic inflammation and mast cell hyperplasia in vivo, and that SHIP exerts these effects specifically in mast cells.


Whereas recent studies suggest that cholesterol plays important role in the regulation of membrane proteins, its effect on the interaction of the cell membrane with the underlying cytoskeleton is not well understood. Here, we investigated this by measuring the forces needed to extract nanotubes (tethers) from the plasma membrane, using atomic force microscopy. The magnitude of these forces provided a direct measure of cell stiffness, cell membrane effective surface viscosity and association with the underlying cytoskeleton. Furthermore, we measured the lateral diffusion constant of a lipid analog DiIC12, using fluorescence recovery after photobleaching, which offers additional information on the organization of the membrane. We found that cholesterol depletion significantly increased the adhesion energy between the membrane and the cytoskeleton and decreased the membrane diffusion constant. An increase in cellular cholesterol to a level higher than that in control cells led to a decrease in the adhesion energy and the membrane surface viscosity. Disassembly of the actin network abrogated all the observed effects, suggesting that cholesterol affects the mechanical properties of a cell through the underlying cytoskeleton. The results of these quantitative studies may help to better understand the biomechanical processes accompanying the development of atherosclerosis.


Suppose the mean responses from m-1 treatment groups in an experiment are to be compared to the mean of a control group. A uniform allocation of observations over the treatment groups is then often used. However, other allocation schemes can give a better precision in the inference. This is particularly emphasised when the variances of the responses are different in different treatment groups. Here we consider optimal allocation according to the A- and D_{A}-criteria for the cases of equal as well as different variances of the responses in the treatment groups. We also consider the case when costs for observations are different in different treatment groups. As expected, optimal allocation depends on the variances of the responses in the treatment groups. If the variances are unknown, a minimax strategy can be used. This means that allocation is made subject to the worst case as the variances are varied within specified intervals. In general, minimax designs are difficult to find. However, for the case of treatment groups, as is considered here, we show that the minimax strategy is very simple to apply. The efficiency of allocations according to the minimax strategy is compared to the uniform as well as the locally optimal D_{A}- and A-optimal allocations.


One of the most costly factors in providing a global computing infrastructure such as the WLCG is the human effort in deployment, integration, and operation of the distributed services supporting collaborative computing, data sharing and delivery, and analysis of extreme scale datasets. Furthermore, the time required to roll out global software updates, introduce new service components, or prototype novel systems requiring coordinated deployments across multiple facilities is often increased by communication latencies, staff availability, and in many cases expertise required for operations of bespoke services. While the WLCG (and distributed systems implemented throughout HEP) is a global service platform, it lacks the capability and flexibility of a modern platform-as-a-service including continuous integration/continuous delivery (CI/CD) methods, development-operations capabilities (DevOps, where developers assume a more direct role in the actual production infrastructure), and automation. Most importantly, tooling which reduces required training, bespoke service expertise, and the operational effort throughout the infrastructure, most notably at the resource endpoints (sites), is entirely absent in the current model. In this paper, we explore ideas and questions around potential NoOps models in this context: what is realistic given organizational policies and constraints? How should operational responsibility be organized across teams and facilities? What are the technical gaps? What are the social and cybersecurity challenges? Conversely what advantages does a NoOps model deliver for innovation and for accelerating the pace of delivery of new services needed for the HL-LHC era? We will describe initial work along these lines in the context of providing a data delivery network supporting IRIS-HEP DOMA R&D.


The prevalence of Fragile-X syndrome in those with learning disability has been reported. There is little agreement regarding the prevalence rate which varies between 0% and 16%. We report a study investigating the prevalence of Fragile-X syndrome in two institutions for those with learning disability, using DNA testing. We found a rate of 0.7%, which is one of the lowest recorded rates. We also found that physical signs could be used as a reliable discriminator to determine those likely to have the disorder. We conclude that indiscriminate mass screening of those with learning disability for the Fragile-X syndrome is probably not useful because, in adults, physical signs and a family history of learning disability can predict those likely to have the disorder.


The use of video and audio on the web is now an integrated and established arena in tertiary education. Research emphasis for such web based video-audio teaching and learning experience has shifted towards enabling and enhancing user's interaction, friendly navigation, collaborative learning and reflection. This paper examines EVA (Educational Video with collaborative Annotation), a web based interactive asynchronous video teaching and learning platform that supports collaborative temporal video bookmarking and HTML annotations in real time, synchronized video & annotation delivery, and auto-indexation of the content of the video bookmarks & associated annotations for easy searching and navigation. Several teaching and learning pilot projects using the EVA platform are currently being conducted in sport coaching, child development psychology, teacher professional learning, and social works. Initial feedbacks from these pilot studies have been positive.


Background: African American women are more likely to have advanced breast cancer at the time of diagnosis and experience worse outcomes than Caucasian women. National surveys have shown that African American women obtain less breast cancer screening than Caucasian women. However, the degree to which psychosocial and economic barriers contribute to racial differences in breast cancer screening remains unclear. Objectives: The purpose of this study was to examine regional predictors of breast cancer screening among African American women residing in Nashville, Chattanooga, and Memphis. In addition to regional predictors of breast cancer screening, obstacles to screening were also examined. The aim of this study was to incorporate this information into programs aimed at improving breast cancer screening rates at the three Tennessee cities. Methods: As part of the Meharry Community Networks Program (CNP) needs assessment, a community survey was administered to assess demographic characteristics, breast cancer screening practices, health care access and utilization, and lifestyle behaviors of low-income African American women. Participants were recruited from predominantly African American communities in Nashville, Chattanooga, and Memphis. Only women 40 years and older were included in this study. The final sample size was 286. Results: The screening rates for mammograms within the past two years among African American women, 40 years and older in Nashville, Chattanooga, and Memphis were 65%, 67% and 62% respectively. There were no regional differences in the screening rates. The predictors of mammograms in the three regions included having made at least one medical visit in the past year, annual household income, employment status, and health insurance status. Although geographically, there were similar predictors of breast cancer screening, there were differences in barriers to screening among the three cities. For example, Memphis participants were more likely to report transportation issues and child/elderly care as obstacles to screening compared to participants in Nashville and Chattanooga (p Discussion: Understanding regional similarities and differences in breast cancer screening behaviors among African American women is important for addressing psychosocial and economic barriers that may contribute to low screening rates. Citation Information: Cancer Epidemiol Biomarkers Prev 2010;19(10 Suppl):B113.


A new approach based on the finite-difference technique has been developed to study the steady incompressible Navier-Stokes equations in the laminar region, where the domain is partially bounded by a free surface. The nonstaggered fractional step method is used to solve the flow equations written in terms of primitive variables. The physical domain is transformed to a rectangle by means of a numerical mapping technique. The location of the phase boundary is accomplished by means of two methods depending on the surface tension effect: the normal-stress boundary condition or the kinematic boundary condition. We have tested the accuracy and efficiency of the numerical method by solving four different test problems: lid-driven flow in an inclined cavity, film in the absence of gravity, the "stick-slip" problem, and the Newtonian jet swell problem.


With the increasing medical complexity of patients undergoing posterior lumbar surgery, more patients are pharmacologically immunosuppressed to manage chronic conditions. The effects of immunosuppression have become of greater interest across multiple surgical specialties. The goal of the current study was to investigate whether long-term corticosteroid use is independently associated with perioperative adverse outcomes among patients undergoing posterior lumbar surgery. Patients who underwent elective posterior lumbar spine surgery (decompression and/or fusion) were identified in the 2005-2016 National Surgical Quality Improvement Program (NSQIP) database. Patient factors, surgical factors, and 30-day perioperative outcomes for patients taking long-term corticosteroids were compared with those for patients who were not taking these drugs. Propensity matching and multivariate analysis were used to evaluate comparable patients while controlling for potentially confounding variables. In total, 140,519 patients undergoing posterior lumbar spine surgery were identified. Of these, 5243 (3.73%) were taking corticosteroids. After propensity matching and controlling for age, sex, body mass index, functional status, American Society of Anesthesiologists class, and surgical procedure, those taking corticosteroids were at greater risk for any adverse event (odds ratio, 1.45), a serious adverse event (odds ratio, 1.57), a minor adverse event (odds ratio, 1.47), infection (odds ratio, 1.48), reoperation (odds ratio, 1.48), and readmission (odds ratio, 1.47) (P≤.001 for each). The findings confirmed that long-term corticosteroid use is associated with significant increases in perioperative adverse outcomes for patients undergoing elective posterior lumbar surgery, even with matching and controlling for potentially confounding variables. These findings can guide patient counseling and preemptive interventions before surgery for this patient population. [Orthopedics. 2021;44(3):172-179.].


This paper presents a theory to quantify the informational value of human acts. We argue that living is functioning against entropy. Acting is presented as a set of decisions and choices to create order that we use as the foundation to develop the concept of complexity of human acts. Frequency theory of probability is then applied to characterize human acts in terms of their degree of freedom and to set up a scale of the information and predictability carried out in human decisions. A taxonomy is also included in the scale categorizing acts as destructive, mechanical, ludic or vital according to their complexity. A formulation to estimate the informational value of human individual and collective acts follows. The final part of the paper presents and discuss the consequences of our theory. We argue that technological artifacts embed information and that modernization can be understood as a one-way process to embed acts of ever increasing levels of complexity in devices. However, the total amount of information is conserved and modernity only enables us to redistribute our informational potential. Agnumetry is introduced as a method to quantify modernity. Finally we outline the relation between the informational value of production and the informational value of consumption (operative information), and between them and market value, price and money.


The complex permittivity of bulk ceramic ferroelectric of nominal composition PbZr0.4Ti0.6O3 was measured in the range 0.2-2 THz using transmission time-domain spectroscopy. The results indicate strong absorption and dispersion in this frequency range often seen in highly disordered and polar materials. The results are compared to equivalent thin film data in the literature, and significant differences in the real and imaginary permittivity suggest that substrate clamping and degree of polarisation of the ferroelectric thin film materials affect dielectric properties even at these high frequencies.


The East Sea (also known as the Japan Sea; hereafter, EJS) has its own deep overturning circulation, that operates over a centurial timescale compared with a millennial timescale in the ocean. This allows the EJS to be used as a natural laboratory for investigating potential future changes in the oceanic system. Dissolved inorganic carbon (DIC), total alkalinity (TA), and pH were measured in 2019 in a wide area of the EJS to investigate the characteristics and changes of the carbonate system since the last extensive survey in 1999. In the layer below ∼1,000 m, DIC and apparent oxygen utilization (AOU) was uniform implying rapid horizontal mixing within a few years. Since 1999, DIC concentration increased by ∼11 μmol kg–1 in the layer deeper than 500 m. This increase accompanied a commensurate increase in AOU with the canonical ratio of 1.3, indicating that the accumulation of DIC was supplied from organic matter decomposition. This observation is consistent with a previous study suggesting that the slowed deep water ventilation was the cause of the increase in AOU and fast acidification. In the EJS, increase in DIC from the surface water to deep waters is much higher than that in TA, which is caused by high primary productivity and export production together with low rates of CaCO3 export. Thus, the DIC/TA ratio of deep waters, an indicator of vulnerability to acidification, is high. A recently reported change in deep water ventilation, namely, re-initiation of deep water formation reaching deeper depths to the Deep Water and the Bottom Water, implies that unexpected changes in the carbonate system may be detected in the future, which needs to be further monitored.


Unlike to perfect competitive markets, in electricity oligopoly markets due to strategic producers and transmission constraints Gencos may increase their own profit through strategic biddings. This paper investigates the problem of developing optimal bidding strategies of generators in two cases when they all bid strategically and when some of them alter their biddings in order to exercise market power. The problem is modeled as a bi-level optimization that at the first level each generator maximizes its payoff through strategic bidding and at the second level a system dispatch is accomplished through an OPF problem. The AC power flow model is used for proposed OPF that considers ancillary services as well. Using proposed model optimal bidding strategies of generators in order to achieve to the most profit while considering system constraints are presented and impact of of generators' different bidding strategies on system Nash equilibrium point is studied. Finally IEEE-30 bus test system is used for case study to demonstrate simulation results.


ABSTRACT Aminoacyl-tRNA synthetases (aaRSs) are a conserved family of enzymes with an essential role in protein synthesis: ligating amino acids to cognate tRNA molecules for translation. In addition to their role in tRNA charging, aaRSs have acquired non-canonical functions, including post-transcriptional regulation of mRNA expression. Yet, the extent and mechanisms of these post-transcriptional functions are largely unknown. Herein, we performed a comprehensive transcriptome analysis to define the mRNAs that are associated with almost all aaRSs present in S. cerevisiae cytosol. Nineteen (out of twenty) isogenic strains of GFP-tagged cytosolic aaRSs were subjected to immunoprecipitation with anti-GFP beads along with an untagged control. mRNAs associated with each aaRS were then identified by RNA-seq. The extent of mRNA association varied significantly between aaRSs, from MetRS in which none appeared to be statistically significant, to PheRS that binds hundreds of different mRNAs. Interestingly, many target mRNAs are bound by multiple aaRSs, suggesting co-regulation by this family of enzymes. Gene Ontology analyses for aaRSs with a considerable number of target mRNAs discovered an enrichment for pathways of amino acid metabolism and of ribosome biosynthesis. Furthermore, sequence and structure motif analysis revealed for some aaRSs an enrichment for motifs that resemble the anticodon stem loop of cognate tRNAs. These data suggest that aaRSs coordinate mRNA expression in response to amino acid availability and may utilize RNA elements that mimic their canonical tRNA binding partners.


Lower extremity rehabilitation has seen recent increased interest. New tools are available to improve gait retraining in both adults and children. However, it remains difficult to determine optimal ways to plan interventions due to difficulties in continuously monitoring outcomes in patients undergoing rehabilitation. In this paper, we introduce an extension of the Force Field Adaptation Paradigm, used to quantitatively assess upper extremity motor adaptation, to the lower extremity. The algorithm is implemented on the Lokomat lower extremity gait orthosis and utilized to assess short-term motor adaptation. Establishing an understanding of how healthy adults' motor systems adapt to external perturbations will be important to understanding how the adaptive mechanisms involved in gait are altered by disease.


The localization lengths of ultrathin disordered Au and Ag nanowires are estimated by calculating the wire conductances as functions of wire lengths. We study Ag and Au monoatomic linear chains, and thicker Ag wires with very small cross-sections. For the monoatomic chains we consider two types of disorder: bounded random fluctuations of the interatomic distances, and the presence of random substitutional impurities. The effect of impurity atoms on the nanowire conductance is much stronger. Our results show that electrical transport in ultrathin disordered wires may occur in the strong localization regime, and with relatively small amounts of disorder the localization lengths can be very small. The localization length dependence on wire thickness is investigated for Ag nanowires with different impurity concentrations.


MUIZNIEKS, BRITTA DACE. Population Viability Analysis of Puerto Rican Parrots: an assessment of its current status and prognosis for recovery. (Under the direction of Dr. Jaime A. Collazo.) Despite 34 years of recovery efforts, the Puerto Rican Parrot continues to face a high risk of extinction. In 2002 the population count was estimated at 20-24 individuals, similar to post-hurricane Hugo counts (23) and close to the all time low count of 17-19 individuals in 1973. In light of this situation, coupled with discussions about establishing a second population in the karst region in north-central Puerto Rico, I reviewed cumulative demographic data collected over the past 13 years and conducted a population viability analysis to update the status and recovery outlook of the species. I used program Vortex to assess the status of the species and conducted a sensitivity analysis to assess the relative importance of selected parameters in the demography of the species. Basic Scenario model projections over 100 years were of a declining population (stoc. r = -0.066). Within 10 years the mean population (across extant populations) dropped from 40 to 24 individuals, and within 20 years, to 15 individuals. The persistence of the population was 0 and the mean time to extinction was 37.4 years. Sensitivity analyses indicated that almost none of the parameter values used in the model scenarios yielded a positive, mean stochastic growth. Low juvenile mortality (32% for age 0-1) produced the only positive average stochastic growth rate (r>0.02). Relative to the Basic Scenario model, the population grew only when productivity levels exceeded 2.5. Productivity levels recorded from 1990-95 (1.88 young fledged/active nest) and 1996-2002 (1.23young fledged/active nest) resulted in a steady population decline with very low persistence (0-3%). At the average productivity since 1990 (1.56 young fledged /active nest), supplementation temporarily boosted the mean population size. Once supplementations stopped, mean population size declined. The population continued to grow only when supplementation was coupled with sustained high productivity (e.g., 2.75 young fledged /active nest). To augment the knowledge base of resident avifauna in north-central Puerto Rico, I collected information on the general biology of the Puerto Rican Woodpecker. The biology of the species was poorly documented, and its nesting habits might provide insights into what Puerto Rican Parrots may face when released in the region. Woodpecker detections were consistently higher in lower montane/shaded coffee plantation sites when compared to sites in karst topography. Management, past and present, in shaded coffee plantations may help explain the high number of detections in shaded coffee sites as compared to secondary forests. Management results in higher numbers of dead trees as trees are girdled routinely to "create openings" in the shade. The onset of reproduction during my study was in January, with the majority of incubation occurring in February and March. The average observed clutch size was 5 eggs (n=6, SE=0.26), with only one cavity containing 4 eggs. Nest success varied greatly from year to year. In 1998, only 1 out of 7 active nests successfully fledged young, whereas in 1999, 7 out of 9 did so. Possible explanations for high chick mortality, particularly in 1998, were infestation of chicks with ectoparasites or dehydration and/or hyperthermia. There is no evidence, from this study or from literature, to believe that the status of the Puerto Rican Woodpecker is in danger. The value of this study lies primarily on augmenting the knowledge about the natural history of another endemic species.


Epsilon is an extensible platform of integrated and taskspecific languages for model management. With solutions to the 2011 TTC Hello World case, this paper demonstrates some of the key features of the Epsilon Object Language (an extension and reworking of OCL), which is at the core of Epsilon. In addition, the paper introduces several of the task-specific languages provided by Epsilon including the Epsilon Generation Language (for model-to-text transformation), the Epsilon Validation Language (for model validation) and Epsilon Flock (for model migration).


ABSTRACT Physically active lessons present a key paradigm shift in educational practice. However, little is known about the barriers to implementing physically active lessons. To address this, 31 practising primary teachers (23 = female) from 9 primary schools across West Yorkshire, England, were engaged in focus group interviews. Drawing on the socio-ecological model, findings revealed that barriers influencing the implementation of physically active lessons are multifaceted. Teacher's confidence and competence, concerns over classroom space, preparation time and resources, coupled with the wider school culture that is influenced by governors and parents, reinforce a didactic approach and act as barriers to physically active lessons.


All medical interventions need informed consent of the patient, which is obtained after providing all the relevant information to him in a comprehensible form resulting in meaningful decision making. Psychiatric patients, on some occasions, lack the capacity to take decisions on their mental health care and treatment. Utmost care should be taken in dealing with such patients, to proceed for their treatment after obtaining consent from their relatives/friends as per the legal provisions. The recently introduced Mental Health Care Bill – 2013 contains elaborate provisions regarding informed consent, which is to be obtained from persons with mental illness, and/or his nominated representative. Full informed consent is mandatory from all participants before proceeding to carry out any research project. Persons with mental illness who lack capacity to give consent should be included in a research study, only if there is likelihood of benefit for them or if it is intended to promote the health of the population represented by the potential subject.


This paper introduces the design philosophy and underlying principles of WYKIWYG, a language to implement high performance network services. A WYKIWYG compiler, unlike compilers for traditional languages, is empowered with the knowledge of underlying OS mechanisms such as task management, memory management, the device I/O interface etc. generates code which is specically optimized for these echanisms, and can even go as far as modifying or extending them in a controlled manner. Preliminary experiments with manually compiled code show that such code can improve the throughput of network services by up to an order of magnitude.


ABSTRACT – This work aimed to evaluate the postharvest of peaches cv. Aurora-1 stored under refrigeration. The fruit were harvested in two stages ("mature green" and ripe). The lots were stored at three temperatures (2°C, 6°C, and 12°C), for 35 days and evaluated every seven days for skin color, loss of fresh mass (PMF), firmness (FIR), appearance, titratable acidity (TA), soluble solids (SS), soluble sugar (AS) and reducers (AR), soluble (SP) and total (PT) pectin, and the percentage of pectin solubilization (SOL). The lower storage temperature gave the greatest shelf life and the fruit at mature green stage had better appearance. The PMF showed a gradient of weight loss due to the increase of temperature and the mature green fruit had smaller weight loss at the end of storage for all temperatures, compared to mature. The skin color of the fruit "mature green", stored at 2°C, had little change, from green-yellow to light yellow, while on temperatures at 6°C and 12°C this gradient was more intense. The same effect was found in ripe peaches. The FIR was affected by temperature, and the lowest temperature changed slowly. The AT for ripe peaches was higher for the mature green. There was no influence of treatments on the contents of SS, AS and AR. Peaches 'Aurora-1' showed no chilling injury symptoms and the ones harvested at mature green stage, when stored at 2°C had 35 days of shelf life.Index terms: Prunus persica, harvest stage, cold storage.


The ability to visualize data often leads to new insights. Data that is more than three dimensional must be visualized as a series of projections or transformed into some other representation which usually causes a loss of detail. Parallel coordinates allow one to visualize data in two dimensions without a loss of information. In this paper, we discuss the use of parallel coordinates to visualize fuzzy data. Fuzzy data may consist of fuzzy rules, which can be viewed as cutting a swath through an n-dimensional space. Fuzzy clusters may also be considered as fuzzy data in a similar way. Examples are given from three domains. The examples show that parallel coordinates can be used to find extraneous fuzzy rules, separate fuzzy clusters as well as validate previous findings about data sets.


Mobile network operators, with decreasing revenue but high network performance requirements, are standing at a crossroads. Investing in 3GPP defined highly functional mobile networks and the consequent maintenance to sustain the market-driven network service quality standard results in high total cost of ownership unseen in fixed operators. Revenue reduction will make it significantly difficult to fund such TCO in the future. In this light, sharing networks is a viable solution to reduce network expenditure, as can also be seen from present trends. However, current networking sharing solutions, although reducing TCO, come with limitations in network management flexibility, and standalone decision making in network expansion and service introduction. Virtualization-based isolation techniques have the potential of enabling network sharing along with management flexibility and independence among the sharing entities. However, virtualization brings added complexity to the overall network management structure. In this article, we propose a next mobile network architecture, where the physical network infrastructure is shared by multiple entities, but the management and control of the physical infrastructure, virtual network creation and maintenance, and the usage of the virtual networks are decoupled from each other to reduce management complexity in each segment. In addition, we address the technical as well as business perspectives of the proposed architecture, discuss open issues, and provide research directions to realize such a flexible value-added commercial network for the future.


Editor's note: This is the first in a three-part series of AAP News articles looking at oral health assessment and intervention in very young patients as outlined in the AAP Policy Statement, Oral Health Risk Assessment Timing and Establishment of the Dental Home (Pediatrics.2003 ;111:1113-1116[


A superconducting quarter wave resonator (QWR) of frequency=162.5 MHz and β=0.085 has been designed at Peking University.This paper focus on the multipacting (MP) study for the QWR with CST Particle Studio. The simulation results for the initial designed model reveal that there is no sign of MP with its normal operating accelerating gradients in the range of 6-8 MV/m. The accelerating gradient range that may incur MP is from about 1.4 MV/m to 3.2 MV/m, and the places where MP may be encountered are mainly located at the top part of the QWR. So the effect of different top geometries on MP has also been studied in depth. Our results show that inward convex round roof is better than other round roofs, and plane roofs have an obvious advantage over round roofs on the suppression of MP in general. While considering the optimization of its electromagnetic (EM) design, our initial designed model is also acceptable.


In resistance arteries, endothelium-derived nitric oxide inhibits vasoconstrictors;this and endothelium-dependent relaxations to acetylcholine are blunted in hypertension. The sensitivity of hypertensive resistance arteries with endothelium to intraluminal endothelin-1 is normal but is reduced without endothelium. Thus hypertension impairs endothelial regulation of the resistance circulation.


Aerodynamic heating levels on a typical inlet configuration of a scramjet engine are estimated using both standard design correlations and numerical flow simulations. The stagnation point heat flux is estimated using the Fay and Riddell formula. Aerodynamic heating over the inclined ramps is estimated using Van Driest method. Numerical flow simulations are carried out using a Reynolds averaged Navier–Stokes (RANS) solver coupled with energy equations and the Shear Stress Transport (SST) k–ω turbulence model. The aerodynamic heat flux estimates are validated with in-house measurements in a shock tunnel and for a scramjet flight experiment in the Mach number range 1.59 to 7.92. The emergence of a good agreement between them confirms the appropriateness of design correlations for heat flux estimation in scramjet inlets. The choice of simplification and appropriateness of design correlations to complex geometries demand critical assessment. Numerical flow simulations capture flow features and enable the identification of potential augmented heating zones, which will be critical for long-duration scramjet missions.


We discuss the transition from a fully decoherent to a (quasi)condensate regime in a harmonically trapped weakly interacting one-dimensional (1D) Bose gas. By using analytic approaches and verifying them against exact numerical solutions, we find a characteristic crossover temperature and crossover atom number that depend on the interaction strength and the trap frequency. We then identify the conditions for observing either an interaction-induced crossover scenario or else a finite-size Bose-Einstein condensation phenomenon characteristic of an ideal trapped 1D gas.


We present finite energy SU(2) Yang–Mills–Higgs particles of one-half topological charge. The magnetic fields of these solutions at spatial infinity correspond to the magnetic field of a positive one-half magnetic monopole at the origin and a semi-infinite Dirac string on one-half of the z-axis carrying a magnetic flux of going into the origin. Hence the net magnetic charge is zero. The gauge potentials are singular along one-half of the z-axis, elsewhere they are regular.


The software development process is an incremental and iterative activity. Source code is constantly changed to reflect changing requirements, to respond to testing results, and to address problem reports. This paper presents a methodology and a toolkit (VITA) for applying source code analysis techniques to configuration management repository data with the aim of identifying the impact on file changes due to change requests and problem reports. The repository data are clustered, analyzed, and visualized in a semi-automated manner according to user-selectable criteria. The approach is illustrated with a real-world model problem concerning software process improvement of an embedded software system.


Context: Research into the effectiveness of occipital trigger point release has not clarified whether self-administered soft tissue techniques using other devices produce the same gains in mobility and function as when the clinician delivers the manual trigger point release.
Purpose: The purpose of the study is to see whether the same restoration to the superficial backline function that is achieved with a clinician-administered suboccipital release can also be obtained through a patient-administered method.
Methods and Results: The study employed a randomized descriptive laboratory study in which 60 participants reported for a single data collection session, and were either put into a clinician or self-administered treatment group. There was a statistically significant main effect for the intervention, F(1,58) = 18.24, p < .001, eta = .239, indicating that both the clinician administered and the self-administered groups improved from pretest (Pre M = 4.74, SD = 7.96) to posttest (M = 6.79, SD = 7.58). But there was not a statistically significant interaction of time and group, F(1,58) = 18.24, p = .360, eta = .014, indicating that neither group outperformed the other.
Interpretation: The significant clinical implication within the study was that there was no significant difference between gains in mobility between clinician administered and self-administered suboccipital release. The significant finding in this study is toe touch distance increased for all participants following a suboccipital release.
Clinical Bottom Line: If a clinician properly instructs a patient on how to perform a suboccipital release, the intervention is just as successful as when the clinician performs the suboccipital release.
Keywords/Key Phrases: Clinical-Related Outcomes; Manual Techniques; Myofascial Release


BACKGROUND
Inpatient treatment is a complex intervention for the most serious mental health disorders in child and adolescent psychiatry. This is the first large-scale study into its effectiveness and costs. Previous studies have been criticised for methodological weaknesses.

METHODS
A prospective cohort study, including economic evaluation, conducted in 8 UK units (total n = 150) with one year follow-up after discharge. Patients acted as their own controls. Outcome measurement was the clinician-rated Childhood Global Assessment Scale (CGAS); researcher-rated health needs assessment; parent- and teacher-rated symptomatology.

RESULTS
We found a significant (p < .001) and clinically meaningful 12-point improvement in CGAS following mean 16.6 week admission (effect size .92); this improvement was sustained at 1 year follow-up. Comparatively, during the mean 16.4 week pre-admission period there was a 3.7-point improvement (effect size .27). Health needs assessment showed similar gain (p < .001, effect size 1.25), as did teacher- and parent-rated symptoms. Improvement was found across all diagnoses. Longer stays, positive therapeutic alliance and better premorbid family functioning independently predicted better outcome. Mean cost of admission was pound 24,100; pre-admission and post-discharge support costs were similar.

CONCLUSIONS
Inpatient treatment is associated with substantive sustained health gain across a range of diagnoses. Lack of intensive outpatient-treatment alternatives limits any unqualified inference about causal effects, but the rigour of measurement here gives the strongest indication to date of the positive impact of admission for complex mental health problems in young people.


Thermoelectric modules (TEMs) are widely used to provide precision temperature control in photonic applications. A problem with TEMs, however, is that when they are subjected to a large range of ambient temperatures the power of consumption of TEMs can be excessive. This study proposes the replacement of the TEM based approach with a variable conductance heat pipe (VCHP). VCHPs offer reduced power consumption compared to TEMs whilst still offering precision temperature control of the device. Using existing theory this paper investigates the use of wicked and non-wicked reservoirs and the effect of reservoir volume on the sensitivity of the evaporator temperature to changes in both ambient temperature and heat load for both heated and unheated reservoirs. The paper also investigates the effectiveness of the use of a steel collar between the reservoir and the condenser in reducing the heat loss to ambient. The paper concludes that passive control of evaporator temperature can be achieved for the case of a variable heat load, but not for the case of a variable ambient temperature, that evaporator temperature is more sensitive to reservoir temperature for a wicked than a non-wicked reservoir, and that with the use of a steel collar between the reservoir and the condenser a VCHP provides a significant power consumption reduction when compared to a TEM.Copyright © 2006 by ASME


To assess the effect of chronic insulin-deficient diabetes on myocardial fuel substrate metabolism in vivo, we measured the myocardial balance of glucose, free fatty acids (FFAs), and amino acids in nine postabsorptive conscious dogs 4–6 wk after treatment with streptozocin. The acute effect of insulin on the myocardial balance of these same substrates was measured in six dogs by use of the euglycemic insulin clamp technique. To further examine the effect of insulin on heart amino acid balance, we studied three additional dogs given a constant infusion of amino acids during the insulin clamp to blunt the insulin-induced hypoaminoacidemia. In these dogs, the fasting plasma glucose concentration was markedly elevated (258 ± 3 mg/dl). In the basal period, there was no significant glucose uptake by the heart [arterial vs. coronary sinus concentration difference (Δ) = 1.0 ± 2.0 mg/dl]; furthermore, physiologic hyperinsulinemia did not stimulate glucose uptake (Δ = 2.0 ± 2.5 mg/dl). Postabsorptively, arterial FFAs were elevated (1550 ± 320 μμ) in diabetic animals, and there was a significant net extraction of FFAs by the heart (net uptake 26 ± 9 μmol/min; extraction ratio 30 ± 8%). During the insulin clamp, arterial FFAs declined (645 ± 240 μM), as did heart FFA uptake (11 ± 6 μmol/min), and the net extraction ratio for FFAs was unchanged (30 ± 7%). Similarly, the arterial branched-chain amino acid (BCAA) concentration was elevated in the postabsorptive state, and there was a significant myocardial uptake of these amino acids and of alanine. With infusion of insulin alone or a combination of insulin and amino acids, there was a highly significant linear correlation between the arterial BCAA concentration and myocardial BCAA uptake (r = .80, P < .02). Glutamine is the dominant amino acid released by the diabetic myocardium, both in the basal period and during insulin infusion (0.4 ± 0.4 and 1.1 ± 0.4 μmol/min, respectively). We conclude that when compared with myocardium of normal dogs, the myocardium of diabetic dogs is severely resistant to the action of insulin to promote glucose uptake.


Target Value Design (TVD), a lean approach, has been implemented successfully in the past decade in various countries and its process mandates the collaboration of project participants. However, issues of adapting collaborative practices and the time it takes firsttime users to understand TVD practices have been a challenge in TVD projects. Recently, there has been an increase in the creation, reinvention and use of simulations and serious games to teach TVD and other lean principles to project stakeholders encountering them for the first time. The 50 minute version of the simulation game developed in Texas A & M University was used to illustrate TVD practice and collaboration in this study. The study used 24 industry stakeholders from a reputable real estate developer during the implementation of TVD on a live project in Nigeria. The results reported that the simulation is effective in illustrating the practices of TVD including collaboration and designing to set targets. Finally, this study recommends the inclusion of the TVD simulation game in training and workshops for project team before the commencement of construction projects because it demonstrated to be a simple and practical method of understanding collaboration and TVD practices.


The present study investigates how coordination between stress responsivity of the parasympathetic nervous system (PNS) and sympathetic nervous system (SNS) moderates the prospective effects of marital conflict on internalizing and externalizing symptoms across adolescence. Although an important avenue for psychophysiological research concerns how PNS and SNS responses jointly influence adjustment in the context of stress, these processes have rarely been studied in adolescence or longitudinally. Participants were 252 youth (53% female, 66% European American, 34% African American) who participated in laboratory assessments when they were 16, 17, and 18 years old. PNS activity (measured via respiratory sinus arrhythmia [RSA]) and SNS activity (measured via skin conductance level [SCL]) were assessed during a resting baseline and in response to a laboratory-based challenge (star tracing). Parents and adolescents both reported on marital conflict and adolescents reported on their internalizing and externalizing symptoms. At higher levels of marital conflict, coactivation of PNS and SNS activity, characterized by increased RSA and increased SCL from baseline to challenge, predicted elevated internalizing symptoms and an increase in externalizing behavior across adolescence. Coinhibition, or decreased activity across both systems, also predicted an increase in internalizing symptoms over time. At lower levels of marital conflict, internalizing and externalizing symptoms were relatively low. Findings extend primarily cross-sectional work with younger children by demonstrating that coordination between the two branches of the autonomic nervous system (ANS) moderates the longitudinal effects of marital conflict on psychological and behavioral maladjustment among adolescents.


DESCRIPTION: This volume is a revised version of a doctoral dissertation undertaken at The University of Sydney. It examines the florescene of urban society during the mid to late Third Millennium BCE in the northern Levant, focusing on the largely unexplored region of the upper Orontes Valley, specifically the site of Tell Nebi Mend, ancient Qadesh (on the Orontes). This work seeks to explore the role and significance of 'small' regional sites during the Early Bronze Age IV, by presenting a detailed stratigraphic and ceramic analysis of the Tell Nebi Mend sequence from the mid Third Millennium (Early Bronze Age III) through the early Second Millennium BCE (Middle Bronze Age I). One of the principal aims of this work is to construct a detailed ceramic typology for Tell Nebi Mend and the upper Orontes during the late Third Millennium BCE. This stratigraphically anchored assemblage was designed as a foil for the more intensively investigated 'mega-site' sequences of the region, such as Ebla and Hama. It was also designed to explore and examine the development and evolution of regional ceramic horizons and the growth of inter-site interaction that occurred during the later Early Bronze Age. Although this work will not be the last word on studies of the EB IV, the ceramic and stratigraphic information presented sheds new and important light on many of the key research issues that surround the Early Bronze Age IV, such as the nature of the Early Bronze Age III-IV transition and the regional response to the 'collapse' of the Early Bronze Age urban system ca. 2000 BCE. ISBN: 9789042930117 (hb)