Locative media projects are beginning to be recognized in various arts and humanities disciplines as a portal through which interpretive information can be connected to location. Projects can be accessed from two different perspectives: in front of a computer screen or on the ground with the aid of a GPS enabled smart phone. In either format, content in the form of narrative, video, images, historic documents, etc., can be connected with a specific GPS point location on a map or on a real site. However, while locative media holds the potential to create a visitor experience without negatively impacting the local community and their cultural landscapes, its utility, impacts and weaknesses have not yet been fully explored. This paper reviews a series of six projects in the United States, Canada and the Czech Republic, to analyse the strengths, weaknesses, and hurdles to implementation of this emerging technology. While it holds promise for the interpretation of both tangible and intangible heritage, there are significant ethical and privacy issues to its implementation. The central case, of a project implemented in the Gullah community of St. Helena Island, South Carolina, illustrates the potential for the technology to become a conduit for the sharing of intangible heritage with younger generations. It also provides an illustration of the impacts of heritage tourism, and both the strengths and weaknesses of this approach for the interpretation of tangible and intangible heritage. In conclusion the paper evaluates the types of heritage that can be effectively conveyed through this medium, as well as heritage that is not well suited to this approach (e.g. private home landscape) that causes issues of visual access for the public, and perceived intrusion for the community.


Study Design:Retrospective diagnostic trial. Objective:To determine the diagnostic performance of 3-dimensional turbo spin-echo (3D-TSE) isotropic magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) in the assessment of cervical spine pathology. Summary of Background Data:MRI is the imaging modality of choice for many cervical spine pathologies. However, axial imaging may be suboptimal if the image plane is oriented differently than the plane of interest, due to lordosis, kyphosis, or deformity. 3D-TSE isotropic MRI is a promising novel technology that bypasses this limitation by enabling dynamic image reformation in any desired orientation. Methods:Forty-eight patients who underwent 3D-TSE and conventional 2-dimensional fast spin-echo (2D-FSE) T2-weighted cervical spine MRI at our institution were randomly selected. 3D-TSE and 2D-FSE sequences from each subject were independently evaluated by 2 orthopedic spine surgeons and 4 musculoskeletal radiologists. Images were assessed using specific pilot-tested criteria for stenosis, herniation, and degenerative changes. Intermethod, interrater, and intrarater agreements for 3D-TSE and 2D-FSE, and Fleiss &kgr; coefficients were determined. Results:The overall intermethod agreement was 80.7%. The interrater agreement was 75.9% for 3D-TSE and 75.7% for 2D-FSE (P=0.47). The intrarater agreement was 82.2% for 3D-TSE and 81.5% for 2D-FSE (P=0.71). Fleiss &kgr; coefficients were 0.42 for 3D-TSE and 0.43 for 2D-FSE (P=0.62), indicating moderate interrater reliability. The intermethod agreement and the 2D-FSE intrarater agreement were statistically similar (P=0.49). Conclusions:There is a high degree of agreement between 3D-TSE and 2D-FSE MRI in assessing the cervical spine. The intermethod variability was statistically similar to the intrinsic intrarater variability of 2D-FSE MRI. This study demonstrates that 3D-TSE yields at least equivalent diagnostic information as conventional 2D-FSE in the cervical spine. In addition, reviewers noted subjective advantages of 3D-TSE image reprocessing, especially when evaluating greater pathology or deformity, with a simplified image acquisition process.


Abstract. Estimations of tree annual biomass increments are used by a variety of studies related to forest productivity or carbon fluxes. Biomass increment estimations can be easily obtained from diameter surveys or historical diameter reconstructions based on tree rings' records. However, the biomass models rely on the assumption that wood density is constant. Converting volume increment into biomass also requires assumptions about the wood density. Wood density has been largely reported to vary both in time and between trees. In Norway spruce, wood density is known to increase with decreasing ring width. This could lead to underestimating the biomass or carbon deposition in bad years. The variations between trees of wood density have never been discussed but could also contribute to deviations. A modelling approach could attenuate these effects but will also generate errors. Here a model of wood density variations in Norway spruce, and an allometric model of volume growth were developed. We accounted for variations in wood density both between years and between trees, based on specific measurements. We compared the effects of neglecting each variation source on the estimations of annual biomass increment. We also assessed the errors of the biomass increment predictions at tree level, and of the annual productivity at plot level. Our results showed a partial compensation of the decrease in ring width in bad years by the increase in wood density. The underestimation of the biomass increment in those years reached 15 %. The errors related to the use of an allometric model of volume growth were modest, around ±15 %. The errors related to variations in wood density were much larger, the biggest component being the inter-tree variability. The errors in plot-level annual biomass productivity reached up to 40 %, with a full account of all the error sources.


Abstract The paper presents a theory of the moral structure of international human rights. It proceeds by drawing on recent scholarship on the philosophy of national constitutional rights, which has shown that there is now an emerging global consensus on certain structural features of constitutional rights; in previous work I have summarized this under the label 'the global model of constitutional rights'. Starting from the theory of rights underlying the global model, the paper asks what modifications, if any, are required to turn that theory into a suitable theory of international human rights. In particular, it examines the widely held view that international human rights are more minimalist than national constitutional rights. Discussing recent work by Ronald Dworkin (on political/constitutional versus human rights) and Joseph Raz (on legitimate authority versus national sovereignty), the paper concludes that it is not possible to make rights more minimalist than they already are under the global model. It follows that the moral structures of national constitutional rights and international human rights are identical. The final section of the paper examines some implications of this result, addressing the issues of the workability of the proposed conception of international human rights in practice, its point and purpose, and discussing the obligations of states to participate in international mechanisms for the protection of human rights.


ABSTRACT:
 The advantage of the clonal plants over the nonclonal species in colonization of all biomes and biogeographical regions primarily is due to occurrence of two modes of reproduction. The creating of vegetative propagules with high vitality and survivability, enables the spread in the newly colonized site, while seed production increases the chances for successful recruitment of seedlings, ensuring the genetic diversity of the population. The differences in allocation into vegetative reproduction and generative propagation in relation to rising height of adjacent plants was investigated in populations of Serratula tinctoria L., occurring in Molinietum caeruleae meadows localized in Southern Poland. Each locality was represented by randomly established three permanent study plots: dominated by small meadow species (LOW), prevailed by large-tussock grasses (INTER) and overgrown by shrubs and trees (HIGH). In the years 2009–2011 the number of leaf rosettes and length of the longest leaf in rosette (as a measure of allocation in vegetative propagation), as well as height of generative stems, number of capitula per stem and number of seeds per capitulum (as indicators of investment in generative reproduction) were observed. The allocation in vegetative reproduction decreased along the gradient of vegetation height. The gradually decline of number of rosettes might be caused by lack of free space suitable for establishment of new ramets, whereas the small leaf size could be due to drastically augmentation of shading. The allocation in generative reproduction increased along the gradient of vegetation height. The placement of structures necessary for generative propagation in higher layers of herbaceous canopy, as well as considerable number of capitula and seed production might increase the chances for successful recruitment of seedlings. On the basis of obtained results combining with published data it should be assumed, that the substantial allocation in vegetative reproduction and the slight investment in generative propagation seems to be sufficient for persistence of Serratula tinctoria populations in patches dominated by small meadow species, while the considerable allocation in generative reproduction could be crucial for maintenance of population viability under competitive conditions.


The reactions of the iodomethylate (I) of N,N-dimethylthiobenzamide with nucleophilic reagents have been examined. The iodomethylate I reacted with sodium ethylmercaptide and potassium cyanide to give N,N-dimethylbenzamide methylethylmercaptol and α-dimethylamino-α-methylthiobenzyl cyanide respectively. When primary amines and the monosodium salts of active methylene compounds were treated with the iodomethy late I, benzamidine hydroiodides and α-dimethylaminobenzylidene derivatives of the active methylene compounds were, respectively, obtained, and methyl mercaptan was eliminated. Further, it has been found that diamines, such as o-phenylenediamine, easily condensed with the iodomethylate I to yield such heterocyclic compoundsas 2-phenylbenzimidazole, while methyl mercaptanand dimethylamine were eliminated.


The principle that rational agents should maximize expected utility or choiceworthiness is intuitively plausible in many ordinary cases of decision-making under uncertainty. But it is less plausible in cases of extreme, low-probability risk (like Pascal's Mugging), and intolerably paradoxical in cases like the St. Petersburg and Pasadena games. In this paper I show that, under certain conditions, stochastic dominance reasoning can capture most of the plausible implications of expectational reasoning while avoiding most of its pitfalls. Specifically, given sufficient background uncertainty about the choiceworthiness of one's options, many expectation-maximizing gambles that do not stochastically dominate their alternatives "in a vacuum" become stochastically dominant in virtue of that background uncertainty. But, even under these conditions, stochastic dominance will generally not require agents to accept extreme gambles like Pascal's Mugging or the St. Petersburg game. The sort of background uncertainty on which these results depend looks unavoidable for any agent who measures the choiceworthiness of her options in part by the total amount of value in the resulting world. At least for such agents, then, stochastic dominance offers a plausible general principle of choice under uncertainty that can explain more of the apparent rational constraints on such choices than has previously been recognized.


We introduce and demonstrate a new metrology method applicable for 3-dimensional (3D) measurements, based on common-path phase-shift interferometry. The method includes a unique optical setup in which wavefront modifications are applied over spatial regions of the wavefront reflected from an inspected object, and proprietary algorithm is used to fully reconstruct the reflected wavefront and thus the sample topography and reflectivity. This 3D measurement method was implemented into a measurement system, consisting of a measurement head integrated with a white-light microscope, using the latter as its imaging system. The system has sub nano-meter Z-axis accuracy, independent of the optical magnification. Other advantages of the technique are rapid real-time data acquisition, immunity to noise and vibration, small size, no moving parts, ability to work in various lateral magnifications, and versatile (reflectance or transmittance) optical imaging. The systemis small footprint, insensitivity to vibrations and operation simplicity, make it suitable to measure MEMS components in production environments and in conjunction with other probing systems.


Large-scale annotated corpora have yielded impressive performance improvements in computer vision and multimedia content analysis. However, such datasets depend on an enormous amount of human labeling effort. When the labels correspond to well-known concepts, it is straightforward to train the annotators by giving a few examples with known answers. It is also straightforward to judge the quality of their labels. Neither is true when there are thousands of complex domain-specific labels. Training on all labels is infeasible and the quality of an annotator's judgements may be vastly different for some subsets of labels than for others. This paper proposes a set of data-driven algorithms to 1) train image annotators on how to disambiguate among automatically generated candidate labels, 2) evaluate the quality of annotators' label suggestions, and 3) weigh predictions. The algorithms adapt to the skills of each annotator both in the questions asked and the weights given to their answers. The underlying judgements are Bayesian, based on adaptive priors. We measure the benefits of these algorithms on a live user experiment related to image-based plant identification involving around 1000 people. The proposed methods are shown to enable huge gains in annotation accuracy. A standard user can correctly label around <inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">$2\%$ </tex-math></inline-formula> of our data. This goes up to <inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">$80\%$</tex-math> </inline-formula> with machine learning assisted training and assignment and up to almost <inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$90\%$</tex-math></inline-formula> when doing a weighted combination of several annotators' labels.


Hosting over 10 million of software projects, GitHub is one of the most important data sources to study behavior of developers and software projects. However, with the increase of the size of open source datasets, the potential threats to mining these datasets have also grown. As the dataset grows, it becomes gradually unrealistic for human to confirm quality of all samples. Some studies have investigated this problem and provided solutions to avoid threats in sample selection, but some of these solutions (e.g., finding development projects) require human intervention. When the amount of data to be processed increases, these semi-automatic solutions become less useful since the effort in need for human intervention is far beyond affordable. To solve this problem, we investigated the GHTorrent dataset and proposed a method to detect public development projects. The results show that our method can effectively improve the sample selection process in two ways: (1) We provide a simple model to automatically select samples (with 0.827 precision and 0.947 recall); (2) We also offer a complex model to help researchers carefully screen samples (with 63.2% less effort than manually confirming all samples, and can achieve 0.926 precision and 0.959 recall).


It is known that convolution back-projection(CBP) operator used for reconsruction of images from its 1D projections has a non-local filter that requires global projection data. The exposure time of the object to harmful radiation is thereby increased. Recently it has been proved that the filtering operation done on a chosen wavelet function instead of the projections leads to a localised filter and minimises the number of projections needed to reconstruct the region of interest(ROI) in the image. This concept was extended using two dimensional and one dimensional multiresolution analysis filter banks, in which the filters are combined with the non-local CBP filter to get short length filters. In this paper it is proved that the presence of unwanted information in all previous algorithms is due to aliasing and a new algorithm is proposed for reconstruction without any aliasing. The proposed scheme is implemented using Shepp-Logon phantom head and the performance is compared. compared.


Thirty-three patients between the ages of nine and twenty with idiopathic scoliosis were subjected to a series of simple cardiac and pulmonary-function studies. None of these patients had received any surgical therapy. Seventeen of the thirty-three (52 per cent) had significant reduction of pulmonary volume, best reflected by the vital capacity which showed good statistical correlation with both degree of lateral curvature and estimated rotation. The greater the curve, the greater was the deficit in the vital capacity. Only one of these patients had significant subjective complaints, indicating the occult nature of these deficits in patients of this age. No cardiac abnormalities were uncovered in this group of patients. Further work in this area is clearly indicated. It is essential to determine the natural course of this respiratory impairment over a period of years and to determine the effect of conservative and surgical correction of this deformity.


: To quantitatively evaluate the effect of meteorological conditions on air pollution, data from 14 meteorological sounding stations and surface observation stations in Xinjiang were used to analyze the spatial and temporal distribution characteristics of atmospheric self-purification capacity index (ASI) and air stagnation index (ASI TS ) from 2010 to 2020. Results showed a negative correlation between ASI and ASI TS . ASI was the largest in summer and the smallest in winter. It was generally greater in southern Xinjiang than in northern Xinjiang, whereas ASI TS showed the opposite trend. This implied that the atmospheric diffusion conditions were better in southern Xinjiang than in northern Xinjiang, and a static and stable atmospheric circulation more easily formed in northern Xinjiang than in southern Xinjiang. The daily pollution data of air environment monitoring stations from 2015 to 2020 were used to determine the correlation between the air quality of Xinjiang in different seasons and the air quality of five heavily polluted stations and the two indexes. The two indexes highly correlated with the air pollution data of Urumqi station, and the static stability index was better, which can well indicate the degree of air pollution. However, no good correlation was found between the two indexes and the air pollution data of four stations in the southern Xinjiang basin. In the heavy pollution case in the spring of 2018, the PM 10 concentration span was very large, so the two indexes showed a high dispersion on the scatter diagram, which is not applicable. In particular, in Hotan and Aksu, the two indexes showed a certain correlation with the pollutant concentration, and ASI TS performed better. In Kashgar, ASI showed no correlation with air quality, and ASI TS showed a weak correlation; the two indexes showed no correlation with the air quality of Korla, implying poor applicability. Further study on the distribution of indexes under different pollution levels in the capital city of Urumqi showed that the early warning indicators can be preliminarily condensed as follows: When pollutant emission is serious, and if ASI is distributed at 0 - 20 t · (d · km 2 ) − 1 , it is susceptible to heavy weather pollution, and the range of ASI TS is of little significance.


Fourteen low molecular mass UV absorbing ampholytes containing 1 or 2 weakly acidic and 1 or 2 weakly basic functional groups that best satisfy Rilbe's requirement for being good carrier ampholytes (ΔpKa = pKamonoanion ‒ pKamonocation < 2) were selected from a large group of commercially readily available ampholytes in a computational study using two software packages (ChemSketch and SPARC). Their electrophoretic mobilities were measured in 10 mM ionic strength BGEs covering the 2 < pH < 12 range. Using our Debye‐Hückel and Onsager‐Fuoss laws‐based new software, AnglerFish (freeware, https://echmet.natur.cuni.cz/software/download), the effective mobilities were recalculated to zero ionic strength from which the thermodynamic pKa values and limiting ionic mobilities of the ampholytes were directly calculated by Henderson‐Hasselbalch equation‐type nonlinear regression. The tabulated thermodynamic pKa values and limiting ionic mobilities of these ampholytes (pI markers) facilitate both the overall and the narrow‐segment characterization of the pH gradients obtained in IEF in order to mitigate the errors of analyte ampholyte pI assignments caused by the usual (but rarely proven) assumption of pH gradient linearity. These thermodynamic pKa and limiting mobility values also enable the reality‐based numeric simulation of the IEF process using, for example, Simul (freeware, https://echmet.natur.cuni.cz/software/download).


A milestone in the effort to rationalize national policy on the oceans will be reached on 21 May 2004, when the comment period ends for 50 state governors who are reviewing the preliminary report by the United States Commission on Ocean Policy ( ).

The report, released on 20 April, is the first comprehensive review of marine issues in more than 30 years, motivated by the recognition that our approaches to ocean policy are not working today. The report was mandated by Congress, with commission members appointed by the president. Some of the problems identified by the academic, governmental, and commercial constituents of the commission are neither new nor necessarily exclusive to the United States: overfishing, shoreline erosion, pollution, and harmful algal blooms. Others, such as dead zones and the introduction of invasive species, are growing in prominence. These problems, further compounded by a growing coastal population, call for new strategies and more and better information.

The main function of the report is to provide the missing strategies and policy framework for our national ocean agenda. From a scientific and research perspective, the report comes none too soon. The oceans cover 70% of Earth's surface, govern climate and weather variability, and provide most of the oxygen on the planet. Unfortunately, ocean research funding in the United States has not kept pace with demands for ocean knowledge. Europe now leads in important areas of climate research, Japan is building a research ship capable of drilling into and sampling the upper mantle, and South Korea is an emerging presence in the field of autonomous underwater vehicles.

![Figure][1]

CREDIT: WHOI

The Commission on Ocean Policy not only recognizes the importance of enhancing the U.S. contribution to the international research and monitoring efforts directed at this global resource, but indicates that our lack of understanding of how the oceans specifically affect the United States (and vice versa) may underlie our largest policy void today. The preliminary report emphasizes research as the foundation of informed policy, as a prerequisite for improved prediction, and as the nursery for technical innovation that may yield commercial dividends. The recommendations therefore include a doubling of federal ocean and coastal research spending over the next 5 years to $1.3 billion per year, plus annual funding of $650 million to $750 million for an Integrated Ocean Observing System, a modernization fund for ships and infrastructure, and developing 5-year science plans for long-term advances in basic and applied ocean science and technology.

The proposed investment in ocean technologies is particularly essential, because it could put the U.S. research community within reach of meeting current challenges such as environmental prediction. Our ability to predict environmental change on the scale of hours to decades would not only help save lives but also billions of dollars in property and crop damages. Prediction about the ocean has been limited, in part, by a simple lack of data. We have seen that with the development of ocean observatories worldwide, this is beginning to change.

Born of advances in electronics, sensors, satellite communications, and battery endurance, observatories are platforms equipped with instruments that continually measure diverse properties of the sea in fair weather and foul. They float with currents, lie on the seabed, or hover in midwater or at the surface. Some are self-propelled robots that swim at sea for months and telemeter their data ashore. A network of such observatories will mean richer, more continuous data that will provide new understanding of conditions that affect fisheries and help track shifts in weather and long-term climate change. It will illuminate the migratory patterns of marine mammals, the reasons for drought or floods, and the fate and long-term effects of pollutants. It will immediately detect the occurrence of tsunamis, undersea earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, and extreme weather at sea, improving prediction of their devastating effects at sea and ashore. For example, the economic value of accurate prediction of El Nino/Southern Oscillation phenomena to U.S. agriculture alone is estimated at half a billion dollars per year in improved cropping decisions.

If the commission's recommendations are upheld and these initiatives are undertaken, our country will be on a new course of not only understanding our oceans but in conserving, managing, and using them wisely.

 [1]: pending:yes


Background: The aim of this article is to describe the development, principles and practices of the Homeless Health Outreach Team in Queensland, Australia. The following article, in the next issue, builds upon this with a case study. Contents: Relevant documentation and literature was reviewed. The Homeless Health Outreach Team has developed a model of practice based on local and international experience. Conclusions: Specialized mental health services for the homeless have been able to successfully engage and manage clients by working in collaboration with local mental health services, housing, and non-government organisations.


Generators of structure editing-based programming environments require some form of unparse specification language with which an implementor can describe mappings between objects in the programming environment and concrete, visual representations of them. They must also provide an unparser to execute those mappings in a running programming environment. We descr ibe one such unparse specification language, called VIZ , and its unparser, called UAL . V IZ combines in a uniform descriptive framework a variety of capabilities to descr ibe flexible views of a programming database using a library of high-level formatting routines that can be customized and extended by the implementor. T h e U A L unparser allows the highly conditional unparse mappings of V IZ to be executed efficiently. Its implementation is based on the automatic generation of explicit display views, together with a scheme for efficient incremental updating of them in response to arbitrary changes to objects in the programming environment. Th is research is supported in part by the Software Engineering Division of C E N T A C S / C O R A D C O M , Fort Monmouth, N J . University Libraries Cf\r r University Table of


Abstract Oral Lichen Planus (OLP) is an oral inflammatory condition, mediated by host immune system reaction, presenting basal membrane damages with inflammatory lesions in the mouth and/or skin. In this study, the role of functional polymorphisms in the MBL2 gene, encoding for Mannose-Binding Protein C (MBP-C), a member of the innate immune response and an acute-phase protein able to activate the complement cascade, was investigated to assess a possible association with OLP susceptibility in Italian patients. Two variations at the promoter region (called H/L and X/Y) and three at the first exon (at codon 52, 54, and 57) of the MBL2 gene were analyzed in 69 OLP patients and 244 healthy controls from northeastern Italy. Considering the polymorphisms singularly, the MBL2 X allele and C/T genotype of the D allele (correlated with low MBP-C expression) were associated with susceptibility to develop OLP. Moreover, when taking into account MBL2 combined genotypes, more OLP patients were deficient MBP-C producers than not deficient, who were more represented among healthy controls. MBL2 combined genotypes, responsible for deficient MBP-C production, are associated with an increased risk of developing OLP.


This study presents a robust and semi-blind watermarking by embedding information into low frequency AC coefficients of Discrete Cosine Transform (DCT). Since the imperceptibility is the most significant issue in watermarking, the DC value is maintained unchanged. The proposed methods utilize the DC values of the neighboring blocks to predict the AC coefficients of the center block. The low frequency AC coefficients are modified to carry watermark information. The Least Mean Squares (LMS) is employed to yield the intermediate filters, cooperating with the neighboring DC coefficients to precisely predict the original AC coefficients. Two watermarking methods, namely Watermark Embedding in the Predicted AC Coefficient (WEPAC) and Watermark Embedding in the Original AC coefficient (WEOAC), are presented in this study. Moreover, many attacks are addressed to show the robustness of the proposed methods.


Investigated the environmental assessment from the point of system simulation, the environment assessment system belongs to the discrete event dynamic system. According to the comparison between the environment assessment system and the military command automation system, there are many common grounds in essence. Therefore, in order to solve the problems exist in environmental assessment field nowadays, the relative theories of the military command automation system (C4ISR) were transplanted to environmental assessment field. Finally, based on the information technology and the simulation technology one solution was constructed named Environmental Assessment Automation System-C4ISRE (Command, Control, Communications, Computer, Intelligence, Surveillance, Reconnaissance, Environmental Assessment). The relative theories of C4ISRE including Discrete Event Dynamic Systems (DEDS), the technology of using Petri Net (PN) to analyze and model the DEDS, Distributed Virtual Reality (DVR), Computer Generated Forces (CGF), Synthetic Natural Environment (SNE), Dynamic Environment Simulation (DSE), Environmental Assessment(EA). The integration of upper contents constructs the theory frame of Informatization Environmental Assessment (IEA¿and also makes a stable theoretical base for IEA's further research.


Spintronic-based computing-in-memory (CiM) architecture has emerged as one of the efficient solutions to eliminate the latency/bandwidth bottleneck of conventional von-Neumann architecture. Voltage-controlled spin–orbit torque (SOT) memory offers ultralow power and high-speed operation among the various spintronic memories. In this article, advanced encryption standard (AES) system within CiM architecture using voltage-controlled SOT device has been presented. The entire encryption process is performed within the high-density spintronic-based memory array to achieve low power and high processing speed. The reconfigurable logic operations and random key generation for AES are achieved by using a single voltage-controlled SOT device within the memory array. The results show that the proposed architecture is 96%, 52.1%, and 14% more efficient in terms of energy consumption, throughput, and area, respectively, when compared with one of the most efficient SOT-based AES systems.


As champions of the irrational and the uncanny, the Surrealists frequently incorporated classical monsters into their art as part of their search for a new modern myth. However, these creatures became subject to gender codification, with the sphinx and chimera in particular becoming attached to the imagery surrounding the sexually provocative, castrating femme-fatale. The woman Surrealist Leonor Fini (1907-1996) diverged from the Surrealist norm to create complex and ambiguous monsters, rather than simply expressions of the lethally enticing femme-fatale. Fini uses a range of monsters in her art, from the classical sphinx to creatures of popular culture, such as the witch and the werewolf. These monsters are almost always female, or at the very least androgynous, yet the actions and attitudes they are found in invites a new reading of the destructive female monster and/or the 'monstrous' female. Equally, the children and adolescent girls that appear in her work are often depicted in a negative light: they are ugly, unkind and selfish. Through a detailed iconographical analysis, this paper will explore Fini's use of both traditional and non-traditional monsters as a method of subverting preconceived gender and social codes, ultimately reconsidering the notion of what exactly is monstrous.


Mexican American Studies (MAS) courses have been criticized for many years. Legislation in Arizona and Texas have attempted to ban the content. This article pushes back on this attempt of oppression and offers MAS teachers a framework to apply when teaching the content. Using a timeline to depict the years of attempts for Mexican American Studies to be approved, we offer practitioners and researchers an Ethnic Studies framework particularly with MAS courses. Using cultural art, poetry, and literature, MAS teachers can benefit from using the Cinco Dedos framework especially at the secondary (6-12) grade levels. This framework prepares MAS teachers to utilize various Chicanx histories to tell the stories of Mexican American heroes not talked about in traditional American history courses. This article also provides tools to use in secondary MAS classrooms that highlight Mexican American culture for students provided by a MAS teacher. One of the founders of the framework uses this in his MAS course at a high school located in San Antonio, TX.


Introduction: Hirsutism is a condition that affects 10% of women worldwide. In many cultures, hirsutism is regarded as loss of femininity and can be psychologically traumatizing to the suffering females. The aim of the present study was to evaluate how topical capislow would affect or enhance the efficacy of laser hair removal. Methods: A randomized, monoblinded, placebo controlled split face study of combined topical capislow and long pulsed Nd-YAG laser on one side of the face versus long pulsed Nd-YAG laser alone on the opposite side of the face. Laser sessions were done at 4 weeks interval for maximum seven sessions. Topical capislow and placebo were applied once daily from the day of the first laser session to the day of the last laser session. Patients were evaluated both subjectively and objectively in each laser session and for six months after the last laser session. Results: Both treatment modalities were well tolerated and accepted with significantly better results in combined capislow and laser group versus laser alone. Conclusion: Topical capislow can represent a safe and effective synergistic method for laser with faster results but this is a temporary effect retained only to the time of its application.


An estimated 71 million individuals in the United States are currently diagnosed with cardiovascular disease (CVD). If untreated, CVD conditions such as systemic hypertension, coronary artery disease, and heart failure will have potentially serious and often fatal outcomes. Numerous clinical trials have established a variety of evidence-based medications that are efficacious in the treatment of CVD. These drugs will be ineffective, however, if patients have trouble adhering to their prescribed regimens. In patients with hypertension or heart failure, or in those who have suffered a myocardial infarction, poor adherence to therapies has been linked to a variety of problems, including poor blood pressure control, rehospitalization, and increased healthcare resource utilization. Both the asymptomatic nature of some forms of CVD and the high pill burden associated with certain therapies have been linked to poor adherence. Reducing pill burden through the use of once-daily formulations has proven valuable in improving adherence to evidence-based therapies. This review will discuss the impact of adherence to prescribed therapies for CVD, outline common barriers to adherence, and demonstrate the value of once-daily dosing regimens for improved patient adherence.


The China ADS (C-ADS) project proposes to build a 1000 MW Accelerator Driven sub-critical System around 2032. The accelerator will work in CW mode with 10 mA in beam current and 1.5 GeV in final beam energy. The linac is composed of two major sections: the injector section and the main linac section. There are two different schemes for the injector section. The Injector- I scheme is based on a 325 MHz RFQ and superconducting spoke cavities of the same RF frequency and the Injector- II scheme is based on a 162.5 MHz RFQ and superconducting HWR cavities of the same frequency. The main linac design will be different for different injector choices. The two different designs for the main linac have been studied according to the beam characteristics from the different injector schemes.


Background: The Baltic Sea region has been an area of intense political, economic and cultural contacts since the early Middle Ages. However, it severely suffered both during the Second World War and in its aftermath through to 1989. Since the mid-1990s, initiatives, programs and organisations promoting cooperation in this region have been put in place, and, in line with the expansion of the European Union, there have been far more opportunities (both organisational and financial) for cross-border cooperation, including in a transboundary context. Material and methods: The main sources of data for quantitative analysis have been official reports of Interreg Programme projects in the Baltic Sea region, as given effect to in the period between 2007 and 2013. In turn, qualitative analysis has drawn on descriptions of selected projects, mainly in reports and on relevant websites. Results: This article acquaints the reader with issues underpinning cross-border cooperation in the transboundary context of the Baltic Sea region, focusing on key aspects relating to the establishment of transboundary tourist space. Several examples of EU co-financed cross-border cooperation in tourism are also presented in greater detail. Conclusions: The process of establishing transboundary tourist space across the Baltic Sea is seen to depend greatly on co-financing by the European Union. Such EU-backed projects serving the development of cross-border tourism in the transboundary context of the Baltic Sea region can be assigned to four groups entailing: (1) the integration of transport, (2) tourism management, (3) the generation of tourist products, and (4) the development of a regional identity. However, it is typical of these projects for cooperation in the development of tourist attractions and products to be led by entities from the more developed part of the region, which therefore receive more funding than partners' beneficiaries from the Baltic's less-developed part. Preliminary analysis thus suggests that EU projects may not necessarily help to even out differences, i.e. reduce disparities, between the "Old" and "New" EU, even if they may be significant in helping to combine potential.


This newsletter provides an overview of recent case law concerning confiscation of illegal assets in the Netherlands. Four recent rulings of the Dutch 'Hoge Raad' are discussed. They concern confiscation after a conviction for money laundering, confiscation under a defendant who is both a witness and a suspect (a crown witness), and freezing of assets under a mala fide third party


For the design guide of a vessel operating in cold region, numerical analysis was carried out to evaluate the weather-tight door whichinstalled the heating cables by using ANSYS 13.0 Transient Thermal. The numerical analysis was performed by considering Advection-Diffusion equation. This study based on the experimental results of 'A study on Anti-Icing Technique for Weather-Tight Door of Ice-Strengthened Vessels'(Jeong, et al., 2011a) in KIOST. For validation of the numerical analysis results, the cold chamber experimental data measured by the heat sensors in certain location of the weather-tight door was used. The external environmental temperature which varies from 5℃ to -55℃ was considered in numerical analysis. Also three different heating cables which have the heat capacity of 33 W/m, 45 W/m and 66 W/m were adapted for the design parameters to be the most efficient and guidelines for anti-icing design of the weather tight door.


"Uniformly" modified phosphodiester or phosphorothioate oligonucleotides incorporating 2'-deoxy-2'-fluoroadenosine, -guanosine, -uridine, and -cytidine, reported herein for the first time, when hybridized with RNA afforded consistent additive enhancement of duplex stability without compromising base-pair specificity. CD spectra of the 2'-deoxy-2'-fluoro-modified oligonucleotides hybridized with RNA indicated that the duplex adopts a fully A-form conformation. The 2'-deoxy-2'-fluoro-modified oligonucleotides in phosphodiester form were not resistant to nucleases; however, the modified phosphorothioate oligonucleotides were highly nuclease resistant and retained exceptional binding affinity to the RNA targets. The stabilizing effects of the 2'-deoxy-2'-fluoro modifications on RNA-DNA duplexes were shown to be superior to those of the 2'-O-methylribo substitutions. RNA hybrid duplexes with uniformly 2'-deoxy-2'-fluoro-modified oligonucleotides did not support HeLa RNase H activity; however, incorporation of the modifications into "chimeric" oligonucleotides has been shown to activate mammalian RNase H. "Uniformly" modified 2'-deoxy-2'-fluoro phosphorothioate oligonucleotides afforded antisense molecules with (1) high binding affinity and selectivity for the RNA target and (2) stability toward nucleases.


Treatment need index (TNI) is a tool used to determine treatment need for caries in a population, J Mann introduced this index in 1993. This study aims to determine the treatment need for caries in children aged 6-12 years at the Pediatric Clinic Universitas Sumatera Utara 2019-2020 based on gender and age. This research is an analytic study with a cross-sectional design. The research sample is secondary data from the patient examination sheet at the Pediatric Clinic University of Sumatera Utara in 2019-2020 and 396 samples meet the inclusion criteria. Caries treatment need based on the TNI are: no treatment required, preventive, sealent, initial, moderate, advanced, radical and extraction. These analytical tests used in this research are the Mann-Whitney and Kruskal-Wallis tests with a significance value of p<0.05. The results show the most need for caries treatment is initial treatment (score 3.89), followed by radical treatment (score 2.26), extraction (score 1.45), moderate (score 0.90), fissure sealant (score 0.67) and advanced (score 0.36). There was no difference in caries treatment need by gender and no difference in caries treatment need based on the child's age. In conclusion, the need for one surface filling is the most common case, and three surface fillings or crown is the least needed treatment.


An investigation into the most suitable alkali metal ions for templating the assembly of [2]catenanes from di-, tri-, and tetra(ethylene glycol)-containing guest diamines and isophthalaldehyde has indicated that Na(+), K(+), and Rb(+) ions are optimal for preparing [2]catenanes containing at least one di(ethylene glycol) unit, two tri(ethylene glycol) units, and at least one tetra(ethylene glycol) unit [in the absence of a di(ethylene glycol) unit], respectively.


We present a system that constructs "implicit shape models" for classes of rigid 3D objects and utilizes these models to estimating the pose of class instances in single 2D images. We use the framework of implicit shape models to construct a voting procedure that allows for 3D transformations and projection and accounts for self occlusion. The model is comprised of a collection of learned features, their 3D locations, their appearances in different views, and the set of views in which they are visible. We further learn the parameters of a model from training images by applying a method that relies on factorization. We demonstrate the utility of the constructed models by applying them in pose estimation experiments to recover the viewpoint of class instances.


The teaching of academic skills to individuals with autism has received little attention from research literature, probably because the classical deficits in communication, reciprocal social interaction and behaviors are seen as priorities in scientific investigations. Nevertheless, the development of technologies for teaching academic skills to this population is necessary, mainly in the context of Brazilian school inclusion. People with autism are being included with greater frequency in regular classes and, consequently, need adequate strategies to learn academic contents for their entrance, permanence and progress in the schools. Many studies describe characteristics and difficulties that people with autism have, which can influence the way they learn. These variables need to be considered when planning appropriate teaching strategies for this population. Among these variables are the ways in which these individuals respond to environmental stimuli, the way they think and their typical behaviors. This study describes strategies for teaching addition and subtraction to an adolescent with autism. These teaching procedures were elaborated based on the general characteristics of autism, principles derived from Applied Behavior Analysis, and the repertoire of the participant. The results show gradual learning of the taught skills.


OBJECTIVES
Alteration in the composition of extracellular matrix has been suggested as the major factor for the development of tendinopathy and calcified tendinopathy, which has poorer clinical manifestation. This study investigated the changes of major proteoglycans and collagens in a calcified tendinopathy model and correlated the expression with the acquisition of chondrocyte phenotype, ectopic ossification and loss of matrix organization in the same model.

METHODS
Thirty-six rats were used. Collagenase or saline was injected into the patellar tendons of each rat. At Weeks 2, 4 and 12, samples were used for immunohistochemistry of major proteoglycans and collagens and mRNA quantification.

RESULTS
An increase in collagen type III and I expression was observed after injury at Week 2. Although their levels diminished with time, the ratio of collagen type III to collagen type I remained higher than that in healthy tendon at Week 12. The expression of biglycan, fibromodulin and aggrecan increased with time, whereas the expression of decorin was sustained from Week 2 to Week 12. The expression of major proteoglycans and collagens was observed in the tendon cells and matrix at Week 2 and became localized at the chondrocyte-like cells around the calcific deposits at Week 12.

CONCLUSION
Sustained expression of proteoglycans and a high collagen type III/collagen type I ratio might account for poor matrix organization in calcified tendinopathy. The localization of major proteoglycans around chondro-osseous region might indicate interference of collagen assembly, which favours ectopic chondrogenesis, ossification and predisposition to tendon rupture.


The article describes the El Portal Latino Alzheimer's Project--a dementia-specific outreach and services program targeting Latino caregivers in the Los Angeles County area. The project is an example of an interorganizational community-based collaborative developed to provide an array of coordinated, ethnic-sensitive services to Latino dementia-affected adults and their family caregivers, using culturally specific outreach and services delivery strategies. Results of an evaluation of service utilization indicate a reduction in barriers to care and an increase in services utilization. Los Angeles County provides a natural urban laboratory to study the special needs and circumstances of older Latinos dealing with chronic and debilitating illnesses. Implications for social work practice are discussed.


The article looks at the impact of the introduction of Union citizenship on the scope of application of the Treaty. In particular it considers how the citizenship provisions have affected the personal and the material scope of the Treaty. By virtue of Article 17 EC the personal scope of the Treaty is expanded so that any Union citizen, and not only the migrant citizen, now falls within the personal scope of the Treaty. The significance of this finding then depends on the definition of the material scope of the Treaty, i.e. on the identification of the rights that Union citizens can claim qua citizens. In this respect, it is clear that Union citizens have a right to move; and a right to reside in any of the Member States (subject to limitations and conditions). Union citizens have also a right to equal treatment deriving from Article 12 EC. In this respect, the article argues that such a right to equal treatment is not merely an ancillary right which is conditional upon migration; rather, Article 12 EC is a self-standing right pertaining to all those who fall within the personal scope of the Treaty. As a result, Article 12 EC is capable of being invoked by static union citizens to challenge reverse discrimination.


Nowadays, strategies to cope with environmental issues play a crucial role in the development of planning methodologies for electric distribution networks (EDNs). The primary goal of these methodologies is to find the equilibrium point, for which the EDN provides a high-quality service with the most environmentally-committed operation. Based on this fact, an alternative strategic approach for short-term EDN planning is presented. This decision-making scheme is based on classical investment actions to enhance the EDN performance in which the investment and operating costs, as well as the carbon tax surpluses, are minimised simultaneously. Unlike the traditional short-term planning methods and to explore a more accurate approach, the electricity demand is represented by the voltage-dependent exponential load model. By using this representation, substantial benefits related to energy saving can be achieved. To validate the proposed planning scheme, several test cases considering constant power demand and voltage-dependent representation are widely studied on a 135-node distribution network. Additionally, the scalability of the proposed planning scheme is studied by using two medium distribution networks of 42- and 417-node. Numerical results confirm the robustness and applicability of the presented approach as an appropriate way of promoting to an efficient and low carbon tax surplus network.


Manuscript History: Lead toxicity is a worldwide health problem due to continuous exposure of the population to lead in the environment especially workers in industries. It affects many body organs especially the liver and kidneys. The present investigation aimed to study the protective role of Zingiber officinlae against lead acetate toxicity on various haematological parameters in male albino wistar rats. Adult 42 healthy rats were randomly divided into seven groups viz. normal control (group I), lower dose of ginger extract @200mg/kg b wt (group II), higher dose of ginger extract @300mg/kg b wt (group III), lead acetate control @200mg/kg b wt (group IV), lower dose of ginger + Lead acetate (group V), higher dose of ginger + Lead acetate (group VI) and lead + silymarin @100mg/kg b wt (group VII) orally for 8 weeks. The mean RBC and Hb values were reduced significantly (P<0.05) in lead treated rats but the mean WBC values were increased. Whereas significant improvement was noticed in ginger treated rats increase RBC and Hb values and WBC levels were recovered to normal as dose dependent manner. The alteration in haematological parameters in the present study indicates decreased lifespan and fragility of RBC and damage to liver and kidney in lead poisoned male wistar albino rats.


The development of energy-efficient technologies at all stages of a building's life cycle is essential to achieving sustainable development goals. The object of the study is climate-adaptive façade structures with air gaps in the form of a Trombe wall and a double-skin façade. Cases using phase-change materials (PCM) and photovoltaic modules (PV) in climate-adaptive structures are analyzed separately. The research method is aimed to review and analyze the energy-saving potential from integrating the Trombe wall or double-skin façade in buildings. The work systematizes full-scale, physical, and mathematical experiments. Articles from Scopus and Web of Science systems from 2001 to 2022 inclusive were subject to consideration. The article presents a statistical analysis given by the scientific community on the current topic's dynamics. The study's significance is characterized by a lack of knowledge on the behavior of the mentioned façade systems in various climate zones and for different buildings types. The results have shown that comprehensive studies on the investigated systems are significant and can serve for further designs and energy efficiency improvements. For the first time, a scientometric analysis of articles on the topic "Climate-adaptive façades" was compiled.


Abstract Sulfentrazone is a herbicide that has been observed to injure crops in an unpredictable manner. Therefore, experiments were conducted to determine whether root absorption of sulfentrazone was dependent on the pH of the rooting medium. Studies were initiated to examine sulfentrazone uptake of whole plants from soil and hydroponic solution, as well of excised roots in solution. These experiments demonstrated that transpiration decreased as soil pH decreased and herbicide rate increased; it was our intention to use this measure as a description of herbicide injury. Likewise, plants grown for 24 h in 14C-sulfentrazone hydroponic solution accumulated a greater herbicide concentration in roots as solution pH decreased below 6.5. This trend of increased absorption with reduced solution pH was again demonstrated when excised cotton roots were placed for durations of 10 to 120 min in hydroponic solution containing 14C-sulfentrazone. However, when excised roots were placed in solution containing the weak acid herbicide glyphosate, no trend of increased absorption was observed with changes in solution pH. Therefore, it was concluded that the accompanying change in solubility, as sulfentrazone was converted from the ionic to the neutral form, was responsible for the increased absorption by plant roots. Localized differences in soil pH could be responsible for greater sulfentrazone uptake and explain the unpredictable patterns of injury that have been observed. Nomenclature: Glyphosate; sulfentrazone; cotton, Gossypium hirsutum L. 'Fibermaxx 989 RR/BG'; tobacco, Nicotiana tobacum 'TN 90', 'KY 14'.


Most research on urban agriculture in sub-Saharan Africa has concentrated on farming by individual urban households, while farming by urban institutions has been largely overlooked. Probably the most prevalent and important type of institutional urban agriculture is school farming, the focus of this paper. The authors examine school farming and school feeding in Nakuru town in Kenya on the basis of a survey among primary and secondary schools carried out in June 2006. A largely structured questionnaire was used to obtain data on school characteristics, school farming activities, and school feeding practices. Moreover, anthropometric data were gathered for all class 1 primary school pupils. The study shows that school farming is very common in Nakuru town. Almost all primary and secondary schools are engaged in flower gardening and tree growing, over half of the schools practise crop cultivation and a number of schools keep some livestock. The majority of crop-cultivating schools also have a school feeding programme. Two 'success stories' demonstrate that schools in Nakuru can reach a high degree of self-sufficiency for their feeding programmes. Factors contributing to this success are the availability of land and water, and external support for school farming. [ASC Leiden abstract]


The neoplastic cells of classical Hodgkin's disease (cHD), ie, Hodgkin and Reed-Sternberg cells (HRS cells), contain clonally rearranged Ig genes, but are dissimilar to normal B cells in that they mostly do not display B-cell antigens such as CD20 or CD19. The transcription factor B-cell-specific activator protein (BSAP) influences numerous B-cell functions such as B-cell antigen expression, Ig expression, and class switch. We analyzed the expression of BSAP in cHD and control tissues by isotopic in situ hybridization and immunohistochemistry to determine whether BSAP is expressed in HRS cells and, if so, whether it may be involved in the genesis of the abnormal phenotype of these cells. Both in normal lymphoid tissue and non-Hodgkin lymphomas, BSAP transcripts and protein were almost exclusively found in B cells and B-cell lymphomas (40 cases), but were absent from the tumor cells of T-cell neoplasms (41 cases), including 19 cases of anaplastic large cell lymphoma of T- and null-cell type. Among cHD, variable numbers of HRS cells exhibited BSAP transcripts (22 of 25 cases) and protein (28 of 31 cases). Our findings show that BSAP is sufficiently specific to serve as B-cell marker. BSAP expression in HRS cells provides further strong evidence for a frequent B-cell origin of cHD and helps distinguish this disease from anaplastic large cell lymphoma of T- and null-cell type. Because BSAP is much more frequently expressed in HRS cells than the conventional B-cell antigens, the abnormal immunophenotype of HRS cells with frequent absence of B-cell antigens does not appear to be due to absent BSAP expression.


Using dye laser as pumping light source, we have first realized on NYAB crystal the laser self-frequency doubling run from 1.06μm to 0.53μm. The threshold energy is less than 4mJ; conversion efficiency is 6.2%, and the self-frequency-doubling green light output energy is 2.5mJ.


Introduction: Western flower thrips, Frankliniella occidentalis (Pergande) is a serious pest of fruit crops in flowering stage worldwide. Many researches have been studied different methods of western flower thrips control. Two control methods including pesticide application and the use of colored sticky traps are commonly used by farmers due to the ease of use and low running costs. Chemical control is known as the main tool in controlling of this pest. In recent decades, mixing several kinds of pesticides by farmers has been become common strategy which seems to be due to their synergistic effects and decreasing of pest resistance one. The current study was done to detect the best color sticky trap in monitoring and to determine the most effective pesticide in controlling western flower thrips.
Materials and Methods: In the current study, the pest attraction rate by 3 sticky color traps (Blue, Yellow, White) and efficacy of five pesticides were investigated against western flower thrips in two separately randomized complete block design in the apple orchard around Shiraz city. The treatments included: deltametrin + imidacloprid, acetamiprid, antifeedant, azadirachtin and oxydemeton methyl. Mortality percent of insects in different treatments was calculated using the Henderson-Tilton formula. Before conducting the experiment, trees was not treated by any pesticides for one year. Each trap was hung in the middle of the trees´ canopy at about 1.5 meter height from the ground. Sticky cards (10 x 25 cm) were visited weekly to record the number of the captured western flower thrips. Each trap was replaced with new one weekly. Number of western flower thrips was analyzed through one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) using the SPSS version 9. The significant differences among means were compared using the Duncan's multiple range test at 95% confidence interval whenever treatment effects were significant.
Results and Discussion: Analysis of variance showed that there were significant differences among treatments after 14 days post-treatment (F5, 10 = 6.51, P = 0.006). Mean comparisons showed that treatments deltametrin + imidacloprid, acetamiprid and antifeedant had significant difference with control. Pesticide efficacies based on Henderson-Tilton formula at 14 days post-treatment showed that acetamiprid provided the best control (83.3%) of F. occidentalis, followed by deltametrin + imidacloprid (77.7%) and antifeedant (70.1%). Effectiveness of acetamiprid, which is a systemic pesticide and belongs to neonicotinoids, against a wide range of insect pests has been reported by many researchers. The treatment oxydemeton methyl caused low mortality (less than 30%) in F. occidentalis. The reason of that may be related to resistance of this insect to oxydemeton methyl. This pesticide is older than other tested compounds and has been used by farmers against fruit pests from long time ago. Further studies are needed to confirm these findings like bioassay of this pesticide. In addition, some researchers have shown that inappropriate application of chemical compounds resulted in high level and widespread resistance of thrips to chemicals. Results of color traps showed that blue traps attracted significantly more thrips than other colors in the all sampling dates. On average, the blue, yellow and white traps captured 34.31 ± 13.85, 12.56 ± 4.78 and 4.87 ± 1.83 thrips respectively. In general, there are many studies have been conducted to determine the effect of color traps on thrips. Some studies have reported that thrips are attracted to blue, while the others have reported that yellow is more attractive for them. There are evidences that F. schultzei is also caught by red color. With regard to color preference of western flower thrips, there are many disagreements among researchers. Different researchers have stated different reasons for these contradictions that the most important are the availability of food sources, thrips density, environmental conditions and the duration time of the experiment carrying out.
Conclusion: The results of the present study indicated that a remarkable ability of blue traps in catching of the western flower thrip. In addition, results showed that acetamiprid, deltametrin + imidacloprid and antifeedant could considerably reduce the population density of F. occidentalis. Although the pesticides acetamiprid, deltametrin and imidacloprid have been recommended in IPM programs, in organic farming, it is approved that application of pesticides are much more limited. It seems that antifeedant is environment-friendly and can be recommended in organic farming. However, more research is needed to explore the impact of this compound on other agricultural systems. In conclusion, blue sticky color and deltametrin + imidacloprid, acetamiprid and antifeedant could be useful in IPM planes against western flower thrips.


Thioredoxin-interacting protein (TXNIP) plays important roles in the pathogenesis of type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM). This study was aimed to investigate the association between T2DM and polymorphisms of TXNIP genes in a Chinese Han population. To our knowledge, there were no studies on this aspect in China. In our research, genotyping was performed by direct sequencing in 161 T2DM patients and 146 healthy controls. The relationships between the genotypes of single nucleotide polymorphism and serum-specific clinical variables were analyzed. TXNIP protein expression was detected by western blotting. We found that the frequencies of G allele, the CG, and CG/GG genotypes of TXNIP rs7212 were all significantly higher in T2DM patients than the controls. G allele, CG, and CG/GG genotypes of rs7212 were associated with a higher risk of T2DM. Furthermore, the CG and CG/GG genotypes of rs7212 in T2DM patients with a longer duration of disease were more frequent compared with the CC genotype diabetes. For rs7212, T2DM patients with higher glucose (GLU) level or/and HbA1c level more frequently carried G allele. In addition, the protein level of TXNIP in the peripheral leukocytes with T2DM was significantly higher than in the controls. Our study indicates that the TXNIP polymorphisms are associated with the susceptibility to T2DM in a Chinese Han population from central China.


Background: Trichomonas vaginalis (TV) is a sexually transmitted pathogen. The study was conducted to determine its prevalence among 300 adult patients in 4 public health facilities in the Nsukka District of Enugu State, Nigeria. Method: The researchers collected high vagina swabs and urine samples were collected from 150 men and 150 women, respectively. The specimens were scrutinized for color, odor of discharge and urine, and motile trichomoniasis. Results: The prevalence of the TV was 45.0% (135/300) with women showing the highest prevalence (63.7%). Among the patients attending the University of Nigeria, Nsukka Medical Center, the prevalence was the highest at 31.9%. TV infection was more common among older adults aged 38 to 47 years (39.3%), married adults (76.3%), and those with secondary education (68.9%). Urogenital analysis reported that males with pains during urination were 51.0% and males with penile tingling were 12.2%. The highest vaginal Hydrogen ion concentration level of 6.8 was observed in women aged 38 to 47 years. Additionally, the results reported that Vaginal candidiasis, Bacterial vaginosis, and Herpes simplex virus type 2 antibodies were not independently associated with TV infection. In the unadjusted analysis, the odds of TV infection were higher in men (8.1), while Chlamydia trachomatis infection was higher in women (8.8). Among the adults diagnosed with herpes simplex virus type 2 antibodies, the odds of TV infection were 3.9 for both men and women. Men with penile human papillomavirus infection had lower odds of TV infection (1.9), while women with vaginal human papillomavirus infection had higher odds of TV infection (2.2). Conclusion: The prevalence of TV infection is high among sexually active adults in the Nigerian community. It is therefore crucial to implement the increased public health actions such as regular and early diagnosis to reduce its prevalence.


This article describes the advantages and possibilities of using LA-ICP-MS for isotope ratio measurements, briefly comparing quadrupole, sector-field and multi-collector systems. It also discusses problems and limitations of the respective set-ups. A special focus lies on biological samples from stable isotope tracer experiments and on spatially resolved isotope ratio measurements including imaging of isotope ratios. The article explores if there are valid reasons why until now almost no one used LA-ICP-MS to image isotope ratios. It wants to encourage the ICP-MS community to realise the potential of using LA-ICP-MS for isotope ratio measurements in biological samples and to hopefully spur further developments and applications.


Proceedings: AACR 104th Annual Meeting 2013; Apr 6-10, 2013; Washington, DC

Hypoxia-inducible transcription factors (HIF) are key regulators of cellular adaptation to hypoxia in solid tumors, and HIF-1α controls the expression of genes involved in anaerobic metabolism, angiogenesis, cell growth and survival. Hydrocarbon cross-linked alpha helical peptides (Stapled Peptides) are a breakthrough approach to create new class of drugs that modulate intracellular protein-protein interactions. Here, we have mimicked the structure and function of the CITED2 protein, an endogenous negative regulator of the interaction between HIF-1α and p300 proteins, by designing a Stapled Peptide derived from CITED2 to generate the first example of a potent and selective Stapled Peptide inhibitor of HIF-1α-dependent transcription. ATSP-9172 bound to the CH1 domain of p300 and disrupted the HIF-1α C-TAD/CH1 interaction in biochemical assays and inhibited HIF-dependent reporter gene activity in ME-180 cells. Examination of endogenous transcript levels in ME-180 cells revealed that ATSP-9172 down-regulated the transcription of HIF-1α target genes, such as adolase C, angiopoietin-like 4, and carbonic anhydrase 9 in a dose-dependent manner, but did not affect the expression of non-HIF target genes, verifying a specific and on-target mechanism of action. ATSP-9172 exhibited a dramatic improvement in solubility and plasma stability profile relative to the linear peptide, and demonstrated favorable pharmacokinetic properties in mice by providing high systemic exposure, low plasma clearance and long elimination half-life. Finally, intravenous administration of ATSP-9172 on an every other day schedule significantly inhibited tumor growth in a PC-3 human prostate tumor xenograft model (p < 0.05); this inhibition was found to be dose-dependent. Our results demonstrate that a Stapled Peptide mimicking the HIF inhibitory function of the native CITED2 protein provides a novel and specific strategy to suppress HIF-1α-dependent gene expression for cancer therapy.

Citation Format: Kaiming Sun, Steven J. DeMarco, Vincent Guerlavais, Aditi Mukherjee, Sean Irwin, Eric Shi, Hongliang Cai, Krzysztof Darlak, Solimar Santiago, Jessica Pero, Karen A. Olson, Huw M. Nash, Yong Chang. ATSP-9172, a novel Stapled Peptide inhibitor of HIF-dependent transcriptional activity with in vivo antitumor efficacy in a preclinical model of prostate cancer. [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the 104th Annual Meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research; 2013 Apr 6-10; Washington, DC. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2013;73(8 Suppl):Abstract nr LB-304. doi:10.1158/1538-7445.AM2013-LB-304


We demonstrate an ultra-compact short-wave infrared (SWIR) multispectral detector chip by monolithically integrating the narrowband Fabry – Perot microcavities array with the InGaAs detector focal plane array. A 16-channel SWIR multispectral detector has been fabricated for demonstration. Sixteen different narrowband response spectra are acquired on a 64 × 64 pixels detector chip by four times combinatorial etching processes. The peak of the response spectra varies from 1450 to 1666 nm with full width at half-maximum of 24 nm on average. The size of the SWIR multispectral detection system is remarkably reduced to a 2 mm 2 detector chip.


Background: Voriconazole is a triazole antifungal agent and a commonly used first-line treatment for invasive aspergillosis (IA). The study was performed to explore the factors affecting voriconazole trough concentration and maintenance dose to optimize voriconazole dosage in pediatric patients. Method: The demographic information, concentration data, CYP2C19 genotypes, and clinical outcomes of eligible pediatric patients from January 1th, 2016 to December 31th, 2018 were collected retrospective . Result: The study finally included 145 voriconazole trough concentrations from 94 pediatric patients. Steady trough concentration ranged from 0.04 to 16.11 μg/mL. Morerover, the distinction between the maximum and the minimum corrected concentration of per kilogram maintenance dosage is as high as 907 folds and children ≤2 years old showed the minimum variation compared to other individuals (P<0.001). A high inter- and intra-individual variability of voriconazole in pediatric patients were observed. Only 54.5% of the pediatric patients achieved the target range (1.0 to 5.5 μg/mL) at unadjusted initial dosage, while 35.9% of children were subtherapeutic, only 9.6% of children were supratherapeutic at unadjusted initial dosing. The younger children (≤12 years) seem to have a lower trough concentration (P=0.0096) and lower percentage of target achievements (P=0.004). And 98.97% of the maintenance dosage was below 9.0 mg/kg. For pediatric patients of different ages, it was found that most of them was underdosed. While, to achieve targeted therapeutic level for different age groups of ≤2, 2-6, 6-12, and 12-18 years, the median voriconazole maintenance doses were 5.7, 6.7, 5.0, and 3.3 mg-1kg/12h, respectively had been required in order to achieve therapeutic level (P<0.001). Conclusion: Pediatric patients especially those ≤12 years old might need a higher dosage regime to achieve therapeutic trough concentration. Importantly, early and repeat monitoring of voriconazole is essential to ensure the effectiveness and safety of voriconazole in children.


An integrated Y-junction switch is used to demonstrate all-optical switching due to two mechanisms in GaAs-AlGaAs multiple quantum well structures at room temperature. Carrier-induced nonlinearities are compared to nonlinearities due to the optical Stark effect for ultrafast operation. In the first case, device geometry is exploited by a two-pulse switching process, whereby one control pulse turns the device on and a second control pulse turns the device off. Time gating of signal pulses within an 8 ps window was realized in our experiments. In the second case, the nonlinearity is ultrafast, and hence switching and recovery take place during the control pulse evolution. Consecutive switching events spaced 1.7 ps apart have been achieved. In our measurements, two-photon absorption played a significant role in the switching characteristics of the device. In order to access the carrier-induced nonlinearity, the pulse energy that is needed for switching (9 pJ in this case) results in a very high peak intensity that leads to two-photon absorption. This is observed as a strongly induced absorption exactly at the precise zero time delay between the control and signal pulses. In the second case, two-photon absorption competes directly with the optical Stark effect since both are instantaneous intensity dependent effects. Furthermore, the optical Stark effect appears to saturate at a low intensity level (0.9 pJ or 200 MW/cm/sup 2/); consequently only incomplete switching with a 2:1 contrast ratio was observed, whereas a 9:1 switching contrast was achieved with the carrier-induced nonlinearity.


The two dimensional surface of an integer quantum hall multilayer is mapped onto a Heisenberg spin-chain with ferromagnetic coupling. Using this mapping it is shown non-perturbatively that the surface states constitute a very anisotropic metal in the infinite size limit. For multilayers of finite size, two diffusive mesoscopic regimes are identified and the conductance fluctuations are calculated perturbatively for both. The Heisenberg spin-chain representation is used to study the directed wave problem and the exact result is obtained that the mean-square deflection of a directed wave grows as the square root of the propagation of the distance.


The purpose of this study is to evaluate and compare perceptions between public librarians and public library users and determine their preferences for quality Korean Consumer Health Information (CHI) websites, providing useful data for future CHI resource development and librarian CHI reference services. In this study, a group of librarians and users assessed health information resource sites that are searched by a relatively high number of users, based on the assessment criteria developed in preceding studies. First, there were significant differences between librarian and user groups in assessing health information resource sites, with the user group assessment being more rigorous. Second, the group that participated in criteria development gave higher points than the nonparticipant group in their site assessment. Third, this study analyzed the influence of librarians' experience in providing, and users' experience in searching for, health information. Although the differences were not significant, the more experienced groups gave higher points to both sites and criteria assessment than the ones with no experience. Through this study, a total of fifteen health information websites were assessed, and the results can be referred to by both librarians and users in public libraries and applied to other studies on resource assessment in the future. This study is the first study to deal with the assessment of CHI resources available to public librarians and users, as opposed to past studies, which have focused on general Internet users' assessment of CHI resources. This study is also the first Korean study that has assessed CHI resources available in public libraries.


Ectopic liver is a rare entity discussed infrequently in the surgical literature. Liver ectopia develops due to rests of liver parenchyma retained at various intraperitoneal or intrathoracic locations during migration of the liver proper during embryologic development. It is usually found during exploration for other diagnoses, commonly diseases of the biliary tree. We report a case in which a 3.7-cm mass associated with the fundus of the gallbladder was visualized preoperatively by computed tomography and identified histologically as ectopic liver after diagnostic laparoscopy and cholecystectomy with en bloc resection of the associated mass.


Municipality activities require interoperability both between municipality offices, and government and private sector. Due to the lack of interoperability, traditional municipalities, and governments face serious problems. These are mainly poor quality and high cost of services, and low economical revenues. E-municipality has been proposed for solving these problems. An interoperability infrastructure is at the heart of e-municipality and e-government applications. Web services have emerged as the next generation of Web-based technology for interoperability. Web services are modular, self-describing, self-contained applications that are accessible over the Internet. Based on open standards, Web services enable to construct Web-based applications using any platform, object model, and programming language. Although Web services were initially suggested for e-business, they have collected a great interest from various communities. Recently, they became a current issue for developing distributed applications and sharing geospatial data between GIS communities. GIS data and application providers can develop geospatial web services, and share their information over the Internet using Web services. The motivation of this work was to determine the potentials of the Web services technologies for an interoperability infrastructure for emunicipality, and suggest Web services for municipalities to lower costs, improve service quality, and increase revenues in municipality. This is an urgent need especially for municipalities in Turkey. We have first examined major municipality activities for the municipality of Trabzon in Turkey. And identified possible geospatial Web services. We have also implemented some of these services using Cape Clear TM Web Services development and deployment software. We have found out that Web services have a great potential for e-municipality.


The Rf1 gene in sunflower can effectively restore the pollen fertility of PET1 cytoplasm in male-sterile lines and has been widely used in commercial hybrid production. Identifying molecular markers tightly linked to this gene will be useful in marker-assisted selection to develop maintainer and restorer lines. Rf1 has been mapped to Linkage Group (LG) 13 of the public sunflower simple sequence repeat (SSR) map by aligning maps constructed from different populations and only one SSR marker was reported to be loosely linked to Rf1. This paper reports the result of applying target region amplification polymorphism (TRAP) and SSR markers to map and develop a sequencetagged site (STS) marker tightly linked to Rf1 using two populations derived from a cross between two U.S. public sunflower lines, RHA439 and cmsHA441. An SSR marker, ORS511, was 3.7 cM from the Rf1 gene and a TRAP marker, K11F05Sa12-160, was linked to Rf1 at a distance of 0.4 cM. This TRAP marker was converted to an STS marker for using in sunflower breeding.


When one looks at many preventive health practice norms, one might conclude that North Carolina has a unique "health care personality." The norms in North Carolina do not quite fit with regional norms in the southeastern United States, nor do they align with those of the Mid-Atlantic states. North Carolina's attitudes, trends, and practices related to the protection, promotion, and support of breastfeeding are no exception. North Carolina has a special set of issues that affect trends and practices in breastfeeding and vary across the state. Breastfeeding is sometimes referred to as the "homeless intervention." It has no commercial home. It is neither entirely a women's issue nor entirely a children's issue. Breastfeeding is not a one-time thing, like an immunization or a pill; rather, it demands a 24/7 commitment on the part of new parents who have many things to learn. However, it is a mistake to think of breastfeeding as simply a lifestyle choice. In the United States, we once considered avoidance of smoking, use of a seat belt or a bike helmet, and regular exercise to be lifestyle choices with no real public health impact. However, we have been persuaded by data on health and survival, as well as by the social and health care costs of nonadherence to public health recommendations, to value these preventive health behaviors and to support them with social marketing campaigns, insurance incentives, and even laws to increase acceptance and to promote behavior change. These considerations also apply to breastfeeding. Breastfeeding is a vital preventive health practice and an issue for all who care about health, whether from a clinical, business, or personal viewpoint. The support, or lack thereof, for breastfeeding has measurable implications in terms of lifelong health and wellness for North Carolinians.


An experiment was conducted to determine the accuracy of three different gestation feed drops. Each drop was tested at three different angles (90, 75, 60°) from the feed line. Feed was collected and weighed at feeder settings of 2, 4, 6, 8, and 10 lb for the EconoDrop and Accu-Drop feed dispensers. Samples were taken at 2, 4, 6, and 8 lb for the UltraDrop feed dispenser due to a smaller storage capacity for feed with this feed drop. There were five replications (five drops of each type) at each feed setting. There was a drop type by angle interaction (P<0.01) for the feed dispenser settings versus the actual pounds of feed dropped. At angles of 90 or 60 degrees, the Accu-Drop and the Ultra-Drop feed dispensers more (P<0.10) accurately dropped the correct amount of feed at the respective feeder settings. The amount of feed dropped at each dispenser setting was influenced more by angle to the feed line with the Econo-Drop than with the Accu-Drop or UltraDrop feed dispensers. This study demonstrated that the Accu-Drop and the Ultra-Drop feed dispensers are more accurate than the Econo-Drop feed dispenser. Therefore, producers should consider the additional feed cost over the lifetime of the feed drops and not rely solely on initial price.; Swine Day, 2006, Kansas State University, Manhattan, KS, 2006


We present the case report of a 10 years old patient to whom, based on the clinical examination, lab and imaging studies we established the diagnosis. Sturge- Weber syndrome, oculo-dermal melanocytosis-right side. This case is interesting because of the unusual and rare association of these two diseases.


: Miscanthus is a perennial herb with C 4 photosynthesis. Due to high biomass, cellulose content, low ash, high calorific value, remarkable adaptability to different environments and low production cost, Miscanthus has been considered as one of the most potential energy plants and become the research focus at home and abroad. This article reviews the research progress and comprehensive utilization of Miscanthus , and prospects the foreground.


The structure of the variable liquid column oscillator(VLCO) is analogous to that of the tuned liquide column damper used to suppress oscillatory motion in large structures like tall buildings and cargo ships. VLCO is the technology to absorb high potential energy made by process of accelerated motions to occur the effect of an air spring by installation of inner air chamber. So, the application of VLCO can obtain to improve efficiency of energy than wave energy converters made in Pelamis Company. In this research, the experiments were carried out for the motion characteristics of simple floating body by varying the amount of internal fluid. The experimental results were compared with the calculated results.


An automated noise-robust premature ventricular contraction (PVC) detection method is proposed based on the sparse signal decomposition, temporal features, and decision rules. In this Letter, the authors exploit sparse expansion of electrocardiogram (ECG) signals on mixed dictionaries for simultaneously enhancing the QRS complex and reducing the influence of tall P and T waves, baseline wanders, and muscle artefacts. They further investigate a set of ten generalised temporal features combined with decision-rule-based detection algorithm for discriminating PVC beats from non-PVC beats. The accuracy and robustness of the proposed method is evaluated using 47 ECG recordings from the MIT/BIH arrhythmia database. Evaluation results show that the proposed method achieves an average sensitivity of 89.69%, and specificity 99.63%. Results further show that the proposed decision-rule-based algorithm with ten generalised features can accurately detect different patterns of PVC beats (uniform and multiform, couplets, triplets, and ventricular tachycardia) in presence of other normal and abnormal heartbeats.


Although the concept of spirituality is highly individualized and defined by patients in a variety of ways, religious beliefs and values exert a deep influence on how patients perceive illness, make decisions, cope with the burden of the disease, and adhere to treatment. When a person confront disturbance in faith and merit system which have signify life, provides hope and power, boredom appears. The person who has mental health disturbance has problems such as hopeless, powerless, uneasiness with life, disturbance in self-respect and finding life is meaningless. One of the duties of nurses is to support patients to cope with patience experiments and find meaning for life with holistic approach when knowledge and power of patients are fallen short. Spiritual concept, which is one of fundamental concept of holistic care, is as important as person's physical, emotional, social aspect. Research on spiritual wellbeing has suggested that it can directly impact physical and emotional outcomes, and is of great importance to patients. However, by nurses blinding importance of spiritual maintenance, lack of presentation ability for this maintenance, messing religion and spirituality, undesirability of spiritual care or considering an unscientific approach causes ignoring of spiritual care. In this article, there are informations about importance of spiritual care for psychiatry nursing, spiritual needs of individuals, knowledge levels of psychiatry nurses about spiritual needs and psychosocial abilities to give spiritual maintenance.


A patient handling device (20) includes a controller (44), with a plurality of sensors (54), control panels (68, 70, 72), and lamps (86, 88, 92) electrically connected to 10 the controller (44).-The patient handling device (20) records the normal/desired state of the various components when power is applied. When one of the components goes outside the normal/desired state, the controller (44) issues an alarm. This alarm includes illuminating a plurality of amber alert lamps (86, 88) which can normally be viewed by a user at any position around the outside of the patient handling device (20). The patient 15 handling device (20) also includes a position control (106). This control (106) restricts movement of an upper/fowler portion (32) of the patient handling device (20) in a certain range of angular positions, while permitting movement of the upper portion (32) outside the certain range. A normal lamp (92) is illuminated in the absence of an alarm.


This report is the final component of work commissioned by London Probation Trust (LPT) to help further understand the capacity of community organisations to engage with those convicted of terrorism offences. This report speaks to LPT's commitment to work undertaken as part of the Prevent Strategy, and its aim of reducing re-offending through reintegrating ex-offenders into the community. This report is supplemented by a database of London based groups engaged with Prevent work, which have the potential to assist LPT in its work


Introduction: Hypertension is a degenerative disease. Those aged ≥55 years are at risk for suffering from hypertension, previously blood pressure prehypertension before being diagnosed with hypertension occurred between the third and fifth decades. The World Health Organization reports as many as 839 million cases of hypertension, by 2025 this figure is expected to increase to 1.15 billion or around 29% of the world's total population, where female sufferers are more than 30% compared to male hypertension sufferers, namely 29%. One of the non-pharmacological treatments to treat hypertension is consuming cucumber. Methods: International and national literature searched through electronic media with keyword hints. Eight articles were selected, each of which represents an effectiveness of giving cucumber to reduce blood pressure and provides various information. Results: There was an effect of giving cucumber on reducing blood pressure in respondents. Discussion: One alternative that can be used to lower blood pressure is by consuming cucumber. The diuretic effect on cucumber causes the salt content in the blood to decrease. Reduced levels of salt that absorbs or retains water will reduce blood volume so that it can lighten the work of the heart in pumping blood, and eventually blood pressure will decrease. Conclusion: The conclusion based on the analysis that has been done is that cucumber is effective for lowering blood pressure.


OBJECTIVE
Because an increasing proportion of US children spends time in day care center environments, a national estimate of injury risks in day care centers is needed.

METHODS
We interviewed directors of 1797 day care centers from every state and the District of Columbia from October to December 1990 and analyzed medically attended injuries and center characteristics reported by the directors.

RESULTS
The centers were attended by 138,404 children. In the 2 months before the center directors were interviewed, 556 children sustained injuries requiring medical attention while attending the centers. The injury rate was 1.5 injuries per 100,000 child hours in day care. The most common injuries were cuts or lacerations (31%), bumps or bruises (15%), fractures (10%), and dental injuries (8%). Most injuries (51%) occurred on the playground. Many injuries (18%), and more than half of fractures and concussions (53%) were due to falls from climbing equipment.

CONCLUSIONS
Day care center injury rates estimated by this study were relatively low. Many injuries that occur in this setting are probably minor. However, lowering the height of playground equipment and providing more resilient playground surfaces could further reduce injury risks in day care centers.


In cooperation with Philips, the company Frontier Design has developed a system that synthesizes a DSP architecture, starting from an algorithmic description of the behaviour of the processor. This synthesis system is called Mistral2. Code generation is part of the process of generating assembly code for processors. This includes resource assignment, register binding and scheduling. A software infrastructure called FACTS for doing research in this area has been set up at the Eindhoven University of Technology (TUE). FA CTS is a code generation tool in which constraint analysis techniques developed at the TUE and the Nat.Lab. play a central role. To makesure that the techniques applied in FACTS are able to cope with relevant industrial applications, it is necessary to obtain industrially relevant code generation benchmarks for FACTS. Therefore it would be very useful if the Mistral2 frontend could be used to generate these benchmarks. We have designed a software interface from Mistral2 to FACTS. This interface is capable of reading binary in formation created by Mistral2 v 1.4 rev2 and transferring the necessary information toa textual input format for FACTS. The interface has been tested using a broad range of Mistral2 examples. On the one hand, the functionality of the interface has been visually verified using small examples. The small examples -can be divided in four categories: basic blocks, hierarchical examples, loops and conditional constructs. On the other hand, the robustness of the interface has been verified using larger examples. The interface is capable of dealing correctly with basic blocks, hierarchical examples, loops and larger examples. The generated output for examples that contain conditional constrocts does not contain the right functionality as present in the Mistral2 input description. Future work includes the impravement of the way the interface deals with conditional constructs. Furthermore, it is very interesting to translate the results of FA CTS back to Mistral2. In order to do this, the results of FACTS must be translated to Mistral2 pragmas that can control the Mistral2 scheduler.


Over the past century, the white-nosed coati (WNC; Nasua narica) has expanded its northernmost range from the United States-Mexico border into northern Arizona. WNC are medium-sized, opportunistic omnivores that often occur in large groups ("bands") and forage on insects, fruits, and small vertebrates. We compiled data from iNaturalist, published literature, Arizona Game and Fish records, museum collections, personal communications, and our own camera trap photography to chronicle this range expansion. Historical records documented WNC populations in mountainous areas along the US-Mexican border but rarely north of Tucson, AZ. The popularity of using wildlife cameras in both research and recreation, paired with the advancement of citizen science projects like iNaturalist have generated a vast amount of new data on species distributions. With this new body of information we report the range of WNC now occurs over 400 km farther north, extending north of Flagstaff, Arizona. Recent records include occurrence in ponderosa pine forest that sustain sometimes heavy winter snow – an environment vastly different from the species' normal range. The northward expansion of this meso-carnivore invites many questions about drivers of range expansion, including climate change, mesopredator release, or simple opportunism. More research into the behavior and ecology of WNC in the northern extent of their range is needed to guide understanding and potential future management of this species, its impacts, and prediction of other such range expansions.