Background Current evidence suggests a direct relationship between the magnitude of troponin elevation and mortality, albeit over a limited range of troponin levels, and clinicians generally work under the impression that higher troponins signify higher mortality in all age groups. The objective of our study was to use big data to determine the relationship between the full spectrum of troponin level and mortality in patients in whom troponin testing has been performed for clinical purposes. Methods As part of the National Institute for Health Research Health Informatics Collaborative project, all troponin values measured during the study period (2010 to 2017) were assembled from five cardiovascular centres. Troponin concentrations were standardised as a multiple of each laboratory's 99th-percentile of the upper limit of normal (ULN). All patients were followed up until death or censoring on 1st April 2017. To model the relation between peak troponin level and all-cause mortality we used restricted cubic spline Cox regression analysis. Splines were adjusted for patient age, gender, haemoglobin, creatinine, white cell count and C-reactive protein. Results 257,948 patients underwent troponin assessment. During a median follow-up of 1,198 (IQR, 514–1,866) days, there were 55,850 (21.7%) deaths. Using multivariable-adjusted restricted cubic spline Cox regression analysis, an inverted-U shaped relationship was observed between peak troponin level and mortality in all patients (figure 1A). Among patients who were admitted to hospital, the recorded diagnostic code was acute coronary syndrome (ACS) in 14,468 patients and non-ACS in 120,049 patients. The revascularisation rate within 3 months was 61.0% (n=8,820) in ACS versus 4.0% (n=4,793) in non-ACS patients. There was a very different rate of revascularisation across the spectrum of troponin. The rate was only 1.4% for troponins below 1 xULN, and 6.1% between 1 and 10 xULN. Beyond 10 xULN, rate of revascularisation rose rapidly to over 85% for greater than 10,000 xULN (figure 1B). Stratifying patients by revascularisation, the restricted cubic spline Cox regression curve showed a progressive increase in mortality within both the revascularised and non-revascularised strata, even to very high peak troponin levels (figure 1C). Overall, revascularisation was associated with lower hazard ratios across all troponin levels. A similar pattern was seen when patients were stratified by the presence or absence of ACS diagnosis.Abstract 69 Figure 1 A) Adjusted association between troponin level and the hazard ratio for all-cause mortality using restricted cubic splines; B) Proportion of patients undergoing coronary revascularisartion according to troponin level; C) Association between troponin level and the hazard ratio for all-cause mortality using restricted cubic splines stratified by revascularisation status.The shaded region shows the 95% confidence interval Conclusion An elevated troponin, even slightly above the ULN should be taken seriously. The inverted-U shaped mortality relationship with troponin occurred because patients with the highest troponin formed a different clinical subgroup who underwent different clinical management with a high revascularisation rate. These data on troponin level and mortality may help to inform clinical practice decisions and guide future risk stratification algorithms for patients with elevated troponin. Conflict of Interest No conflicts of interest


A simple numerical solution for electromagnetic scattering from a 2-D homogeneous chiral cylinder of arbitrary cross section placed above a dielectric half-space (DHS) is presented. A modified surface equivalence principle is used to obtain coupled electric field integral equations. For feasible application of method of moments, a perturbation method is used where a strip of finite width approximates the surface of the infinite half-space. The perturbed currents on the interface are expressed as a difference of the currents with the cylinder present and the exact solution (cylinder removed). The excitation vector now contains the reflected field from the DHS in addition to the incident field. Transverse magnetic (TM) and transverse electric (TE) excitations are treated. Computed results include perturbed currents on the dielectric interface and the scattered fields. Excellent agreement is observed for special cases available in the literature.


We develop a dataset describing variables associated with six Falklands War battles: combatant numbers; deaths; temporal aspects; and offensive support. Linear relationships between battle duration and deaths necessitate using force and loss ratios to remove temporal variation. Mass action models of battle attrition fit this dataset poorly (at best coefficient of determination \(R^{2}=0.10\)). The low level rules in simulations used by military force designers frequently share assumptions with, or are, mass action models. Errors in force balance or constitution are dangerous so exposing problems with and exploring improvements on existing combat models is important. While six data points are too few for a thorough analysis, our results are consistent with: a linear relationship between time in danger and number killed; different times in danger for the two sides, dependent on detection and lethality ranges; and data substructure, even when temporal aspects are removed through ratio models. This data substructure indicates at least one extra variable needs to be considered. We contend that this variable is related to suppression, and this contention is not falsified by the high use of offensive support in the most successful attacks. Mathematical modellers should consider cancelling out temporal variation in combat datasets through ratio models and/or exploring the effects of mutable detection and lethality ranges. Suppression is an attempt to manage exposure to death, to introduce non-stationarity and irregularity into the dataset to benefit the suppressor, to change the bounds of the system using a soft controller; we should investigate how to model it. Force designers should ask simulation modellers whether the mathematical models underlying their simulations represent suppression accurately (or at all) and rethink reductions of simultaneously delivered offensive support available on demand based on models ignoring suppression.

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This article aims to explore the vertical integration decision of a beef processor from an integrated approach operations strategy and transaction costs economic theory. In this research, vertical integration as a structural decision of operations strategy determined by the occurrence of transaction costs. The paper presents one case study carried out in one beef Processor Company which illustrates the main theoretical assumptions. The results suggest that transaction costs economics helps to identify key points of major strategic decisions on vertical integration due to its behavioural perspective, reducing the effect of uncertainty and asset specificity of this decision. At the end of the paper, future research is suggested.


Despite the remarkable diversity among the bacterial species which can be transformed by purified deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA), there appears to be considerable uniformity in the mechanism of the transformation process. The steps of the transformation process have been known for some time and have been considered in several reviews (13, 15, 19), but for clarity the common features are briefly summarized below. (i) A reversible association of the DNA with recipient cells occurs. (ii) Irreversible binding and nonspecific incorporation of high molecular weight DNA, achieved by means of an energy-consuming process, result in a state of deoxyribonuclease insensitivity. The recipient cells have a unique and transient physiological capability, referred to as competence, which enables them to carry out this process. This capacity is itself controlled by at least one genetic locus. (iii) A period of latency follows during which nonhomologous DNA (and much homologous DNA) is degraded to acid soluble components. (iv) Single-stranded portions of donor molecules which have survived degradation are integrated to replace approximately homologous sections of recipient DNA. This process resembles repair synthesis of DNA and not extensive DNA synthesis, since the newly integrated region is probably not much greater than several thousand nucleotides in extent (2). Under normal physiological conditions, the competent cells cannotincorporate single-stranded DNA directly; however, by manipulating the recipient culture during certain stages of growth, or stressing the physical boundaries of the cell, various species can be induced to take up DNA under conditions where it would otherwise be excluded (4, 5, 7, 12). Finally, (v) segregation and expression of the newly incorporated genetic information occurs, leading to the production of genetically stable progeny bacterial cells that are phenotypically distinguishable from the original recipient population. Special note should be made of the fact that, under the normal physiological conditions which are required for competence development, none of the transformable species has been shown to be capable of conjugation. This leads to the speculation that transformation may represent the normal means of genetic exchange in these species. Spizizen and co-workers made a very significant contribution to the study of microbial genetics when they identified and characterized the transformation system in Bacillus subtilis (1, 24, 25). This system has numerous advantages over other transformation systems. Important among these are the ability of B. subtilis to grow and develop competence in a simply defined glucose-salts growth medium, its nonpathogenicity, and its well-characterized built-in system of cellular differentiation-the process of endospore formation. However, the relative inefficiency of the B. subtilis system is one serious disadvantage for many genetic studies. In the system which Spizizen characterized, only 1 to 4% of the recipient population is actually in a state of competence when this characteristic is being maximally expressed. This must be compared with levels of competence which exceed 90% in other species. The following considerations led us to undertake a study of the physiology of competence development in B. subtilis. (i) The expression of competence is a peculiar prerequisite for DNA uptake in all transformable systems known, yet there appears to be little or no uniformity in the characteristics of the formation of this stage among the widely diverse transformable species. A better understanding of the physiology of the cells involved might bring to light some unifying characteristics. (ii) In recent years, considerable attention has been focused on the functioning of B. subtilis genetic material as it relates to the


Die uitkomsgerigte onderwysstelsel (UGO) word deur kontroversie gekenmerk en die 2008 matriekuitslae in wiskunde wat aan ongewoon baie studente toelating tot universiteit verleen het, het nie daartoe bygedra om kritici te stil nie. Die eerste studente wat hulle volle skoolopleiding in die UGO-stelsel beleef het, het universiteite in 2009 bereik en hulle gereedheid vir universiteitswiskunde en prestasie op universiteitsvlak is belangrik as sukseskriterium van die UGO-stelsel.
In 'n vorige studie is studenteprestasie in wiskunde-toelatingstoetse vir 2005-2007 ondersoek en bevind dat studente wat gedeeltelike blootstelling aan UGO gehad het, slegter vaar in die kategorie van modellering- en verhoudingsprobleme as wat hulle voorgangers gedoen het. Na aanleiding hiervan word hierdie studie onderneem om te ondersoek hoe die 2009-inname van studente in 'n modelleringskursus op universiteitsvlak vaar. Daar word verslag gedoen oor studenteprestasie in die kursus, probleme wat ondervind is, die effek van regstellende intervensie op prestasie en of die UGO-stelsel se studente voldoende vir modellering op universiteitsvlak voorberei is.
Mathematical modelling: From school to university
The outcomes based education (OBE) system is characterised by controversy and the 2008 matric results that rendered admission to an unusually large number of students did nothing to silence critics. The first students who completed their full cycle of school education in the OBE system entered universities in 2009 and their preparedness for university mathematics as well as their performance at university level are important as indicaters for estimating the success or otherwise of the OBE system.
In a previous study student performance in mathematics admission tests for 2005-2007 was investigated and it was found that students who had had partial exposure to OBE performed worse than had been the case with their predecessors in the categories of modelling and ratio problems. As a result, this study was conducted to investigate how the 2009 intake of students performed in a modelling course at university level. A report is presented which deals with student performance in the course, problems experienced, the effect of remedial intervention on performance and whether students of the OBE system are adequately prepared for mathematical modelling at university level.
This study focuses on performance in a first year course in mathematical modelling at the University of Pretoria. The course is problem based and is technology intensive, requiring use of the software package Matlab. For investigative purposes the papers of semester tests 1 and 2 of 2005 were used unchanged for tests in 2009. Students of 2009 did not have access to the 2005 papers and the same lecturer taught students of both groups. The lecturer also noted personal experiences in respect of students and was able to draw reasonable comparisons between the 2009 students and previous groups because of her years of involvement with the course. The entrance requirement of 60% for matric mathematics in 2005 was increased to 70% in 2009.
Results indicate that the pass percentage decreased in both semester tests from 2005 to 2009. The percentage of students with less than 40% also increased in both semester tests from 2005 to 2009. A surprising observation was that the percentage of students who excelled increased remarkably from 2005 to 2009 in both semester tests. Extra assistance was requested by students after the first semester test in 2009 and resulted in a week of intervention during which revision and extra problems were attended to.
The results of the two semester tests of 2009 did not live up to expectations of the matric results of the group . Despite the exceptional matric results, performance in the modelling course was decidely poorer. Results indicate that most students were not adequately prepared for the course - as could be predicted from the previous study.
The 2009 group was characterised by two aspects - excellent matric results on the one hand and full school education within the OBE system on the other. It is difficult to distinguish between the influence of the two aspects. It would be convenient to blame the substantial size of the "under 40" groups in both semester tests of 2009 on the better than average matric marks. Yet the increased admission requirements should have compensated for the high matric marks. If the matric results are considered to be reliable then the possibility cannot be excluded that the OBE system had had an influence on the underpreparedness of underperforming students in the course. By contrast, in the instance of top achievers if these students had been influenced by the OBE system it had a positive rather than a negative effect on their performance.
It would appear that OBE may have had a polarising effect between good and poor students. Good students performed exceptionally well and poor students did worse than expected. It would, however, be unfair to summarily reject the OBE system. Personal impressions of the lecturer include that the OBE-generation asks for assistance when they need it, they are willing to try and use their resources to their own advantage.


An anomalous output conductance that resembled short-channel effects was observed in long-channel N-polar GaN-channel/AlGaN-back-barrier/GaN-buffer high electron mobility transistors. The phenomenon could not be reasonably explained by drain-induced barrier lowering, leakage currents, or impact ionization events. We propose that the output conductance was caused by the ionization of a donorlike hole trap state at the negatively polarized AlGaN-back-barrier/GaN-buffer interface that shifted the threshold voltage at the drain side of the gate, where a high-field depletion region developed beyond current saturation. No evidence of increased output conductance or related device performance degradation was apparent under small-signal high-frequency conditions. The output conductance was suppressed by introducing photogenerated holes that compensated the traps. The effect of several typical back-barrier designs on the dc output conductance was examined.


A method is presented for the calculation of the detection probabilities for a scanning radar employing feedback integration. An equation is developed for the optimum feedbacd value̲ the equation holds for small and large sample sizes and for fluctuating and nonfluctuating targets. Then, a value for the antenna beam-shape factor is given which enables one to calculate detection probabilities.


Coalescence process of copper nano-clusters is investigated by molecular dynamics simulation using inter-atomic interaction based on effective-medium theory. Stable atomic configuration at 0K is determined for several spherical clusters and icosahedral structure composed of 13, 55, or 147 atoms is obtained. Excess energy of clusters averaged over approximated surface area is larger than that of a flat surface. Compressive stress and high atomic energy exist near center in small clusters. By interaction simulation between two equivalent clusters, in which they approach each other with some offset distance or some initial rotation motion and coalesce, it is found that rotation motion of the whole body is generated as a consequence and that rotational kinetic energy obtained after coalescence is affected by size of the original cluster and initial offset distance. Transition from translational kinetic energy to rotational kinetic energycompletes in less than 1 picosecond. In clusters system composed of 1366 atoms, it is shown, by the analysis of coordination number or atomic configurations and trajectories, that compressive deformation in coalescence process becomes smaller with increasing initial offset distance. In the system with small number of atoms, lattice vibration is large and it is supposed that rearrangement of atomic structure is relatively easy.


As Lebanon faces compound challenges, a looming food security crisis is rapidly approaching, much of which could be attributed to the lack of long-term planning for sustainability in its agricultural sector. The disconnect between decision-makers within the agricultural sector, and other interconnected sectors is exacerbated by the lack of integrative national platforms and methodologies for quantifying the trade-offs associated with possible interventions. This study aims to: (1) identify and quantify the critical interconnections between water, energy, nutrition, and food systems in Lebanon; (2) develop a framework to quantify the trade-offs associated with adopting interventions within current water, energy, and agriculture portfolios and practices; (3) evaluate producers' perceptions toward their willingness to implement proposed changes in crop production, renewable energy, and water reuse. Findings show that investing in locally producing Lebanon's needs of broad beans, lentils, chickpeas, and peas, results in cost savings, increased nutritional value in the locally produced basket, and reduced reliance on foreign markets. In turn, this comes at additional water, energy, land and carbon footprints which needs to be accounted for. Given the uncertainty of future currency conversion rates, it becomes more critical to identify a strategic food basket that could be produced locally to reduce reliance on imports. Conclusions from this study can play a role in informing policymaking and planning in Lebanon, which could be adapted and replicated in other countries in the MENA Region.


Trisomy 14 (T14) mosaicism is a rare chromosomal condition characterised by various clinical features, including developmental delay, growth impairment, and dysmorphism. Here, we report on a 12-year-old female referred for cytogenetic analysis due to short stature. Standard GTG-banding analysis on the patient's peripheral blood revealed mosaic Τ14 in the form of an i(14)(q10) in 3% of cells. Furthermore, a small supernumerary marker chromosome (sSMC) had been detected in the first trimester of pregnancy in chorionic villus sampling. A skin biopsy in the patient revealed the presence of a metacentric sSMC in 100% of cells. Cytogenetic and FISH studies showed that it was a de novo metacentric bisatellited sSMC derived from chromosomes 14 or 22. Oligonucleotide array-CGH using skin cells revealed no copy number variations. Studies for uniparental disomy 14 by microsatellite analysis confirmed biparental inheritance. To the best of our knowledge, this is the second report of a patient with 2 abnormal cell lines involving chromosome 14 in different tissues, one with mosaic T14 in the form of i(14)(q10) and one with an sSMC derived from chromosome 14, present in blood and skin, respectively. A rare mechanism of trisomy rescue events is proposed to explain the presence of the different cell lines in the tissues examined. This case highlights the importance of providing the cytogenetics laboratory with adequate clinical data to test for low mosaicism and analyse different tissues if necessary, thus contributing to the suitable clinical management of the patient.


This paper presents the design and development of Virtual Inertia control in a DFIG based wind energy system for transient active power support to grid. Inertia required for the active power support is calculated from fundamental equations and are used as design values for the generator/turbine. The rotor is connected to a dc bus through a bi-directional ac-dc converter and on the ac side the frequency and voltage is varied as directed by a Virtual inertia controller. With the shaft speed and grid frequency as inputs the controller gives out the rotor injection frequency and voltage. The active power sharing across rotor and stator is facilitated by controlling the phase angle of the inverter pole voltage with respect to the rotor voltage. The entire system is executed in MATLAB/Simulink Model and its performance is evaluated under various wind speed conditions. At different wind speeds the inertial response and the statorrotor power sharing are presented for varying inverter phase angles. The power balance is verified in each case to validate the effectiveness of the proposed virtual inertial controller.


This paper discusses the fundamental combinatorial question of whether or not, for a given string α, there exists a morphism σ such that σ is unambiguous with respect to α, i. e. there exists no other morphism τ satisfying τ(α) = σ(α). While Freydenberger et al. (International Journal of Foundations of Computer Science 17, 2006) characterise those strings for which there exists an unambiguous non-erasing morphism σ, little is known about the unambiguity of erasing morphisms, i.e. morphisms which map symbols onto the empty string. The present paper demonstrates that, in contrast to the main result by Freydenberger et al., the existence of an unambiguous erasing morphisms for a given string can essentially depend on the size of the target alphabet of the morphism. In addition to this, those strings for which there exists an erasing morphism over an infinite target alphabet are characterised, complexity issues are discussed and some sufficient conditions for the (non-)existence of unambiguous erasing morphisms are given.


This book is what you need to bring you up to speed on virtualization. If you are in IT or an IT manager and whant to know what the buzz is all about, start with this book. It covers all aspects of virtualization. There has never been a Virtualization Guide like this. 100 Success Secrets is not about the ins and outs of Virtualization. Instead, it answers the top 100 questions that we are asked and those we come across in forums, our consultancy and education programs. It tells you exactly how to deal with those questions, with tips that have never before been offered in print. This book is also not about Virtualization's best practice and standards details. Instead, it introduces everything you want to know to be successful with Virtualization.


A capillary electrophoresis immunoassay (CEIA) was developed for the determination of trace metolcarb (MTMC) in food. The method was based on the competitive reactions between fluorescently labeled MTMC tracer and free MTMC with a limited amount of anti‐MTMC antibody and the separation and determination by CE with LIF detector. A fluorescent reagent, FITC was labeled on MTMC to construct an immunofluorescent probe. CEIA experimental parameters such as the pH value and concentration of the running buffer and separation voltage as well as incubation time were systematically investigated. Under the optimized conditions, fluorescently labeled antigen and antibody bound could be well separated within 3 min using Na2B4O7/NaH2PO4 buffer (20:10 mmol/L, pH 9.0) for background electrolyte, 20 kV for the separation voltage, and 20°C for the column temperature. The linear range of the method was 0.25–50.0 μg/L with LOD 0.07 μg/L. The RSD for relative migration time and relative fluorescence intensity ratio were 2.90% (intraday) and 4.73% (intraday), respectively. The proposed method has been applied to determine the residue of MTMC in food samples with the satisfactory recovery.


Intra-intestinal pressure was recorded with open-tip catheters in experimental low small-bowel obstruction in the cat. At zero time the pressure was 2-4 mmHg. After 72 hours sustained intraluminal pressure ranged mainly between 5 and 10 mmHg. Long periods of inactivity alternated with short bouts of spontaneous bowel activity. During activity the pressure rose to about 20 mmHg. In motility responses elicited by cholecystokinin, momentary pressure waves amounting to 40-50 mmHg were recorded. The result of simple mechanical obstruction is predominantly a bowel distension, whereas the magnitude of sustained intraluminal pressure is rather modest. Possible effects of distension on intestinal microcirculation are discussed.


Tip-of-the-tongue states (TOTs) in proficient Hebrew–English bilinguals were compared to those of age-matched monolinguals. Monolinguals retrieved words in English, and bilinguals retrieved words from both languages. Results showed an increased TOT rate in bilinguals. However, bilinguals demonstrated comparable rates of spontaneous resolution, and similar ability to access partial information about target words. Interestingly, bilinguals named the same number of targets as monolinguals when naming an item in either language was counted as a correct response. Besides bilingualism, other factors that predicted TOT rate included word frequency (only for bilinguals), and age (younger participants had more TOTs). Unexpectedly, TOTs for Hebrew targets were not characterized by increased access to grammatical gender and number of syllables relative to control states, thus contrasting notably with TOTs for Italian and English targets respectively. We discuss these results in terms of their relevance for constraining models of bilingual lexical access and models of TOT.


One of the most important properties of hydrophobically functionalized polyelectrolytes (HF-PEs) and their assemblies is their ability to encapsulate hydrophobic/amphiphilic agents and provide release on demand of the entrapped payload. The aim of the present work was to synthesize and study self-organization behavior in aqueous solution of hydrophobically functionalized poly(acrylic acid) (PAA) comprising the ester-type pH labile moiety with various degrees of hydrophobization and side-chain lengths in the absence and presence of appropriate mono- and polyvalent electrolytes (i.e., NaCl or CaCl2). The synthesis and purification of hydrophobically functionalized PAA were performed under mild conditions in order to avoid chemical degradation of the polymers. The modified polyelectrolytes self-assembly in aqueous systems was monitored using diffusion-ordered nuclear magnetic resonance (DOSY NMR). The performed studies, supported by the all-atoms molecular dynamics simulations, revealed a strong dependence of polyelectrolyte self-assembled state on concentration—specific concentration regions with the coexistence of both smaller and larger aggregates were observed (values of hydrodynamic diameter DH around one nanometer and between two to six nanometers, respectively). Our investigations enabled us to gain crucial information about the self-assembly of the hydrophobically functionalized poly(acrylic acid) and opened the possibility of understanding and predicting its performance under various conditions.


This research discuss about the impact of export Indonesia's cassava to Malaysia (2009-2014). The aim of this research is it know what export cassava's impact to the economic and political sectors in Indonesia. Cassava was choosen as a research subject because as one of the best commodities in national commodities. Not only in a good climate, good temperature, good human and natural resources. But also easy in the planting, growing, and having ability to be food stufle and industrial raw is the reason this research appointment. Based on author would like to see what is the impact of economic and political term. From cassava's export after that cooperation process for Indonesia which is able to be a reference for other.This also explain how the Indonesia government's efforts in building these commodities and makes this commodity is able to full fill domestic demand and take it off as an export commodity based a second cooperation between Indonesia and Malaysia regarding of foodcrops cooperation. In the other case, demands to the Indonesia government in has role foe that success of this cassava's commodity export to Malaysia is needed all efforts both in pro-farmers, regulation, policy, strategy, innovation, and good accomodation like of export equipment, and capital. The government should be able to accommodate every farmer's need, which is the success of a country for farmers is the creation of an agribusiness based on national and international agricultural. Keywords: impact, export, cassava, national commodity, Indonesia, Malaysia.


In an attempt to investigate blood unit ordering policies, researchers have created a discrete-event model of the UK National Blood Service (NBS) supply chain in the Southampton area of the UK. The model has been created using Simul8, a commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) discrete-event simulation package (CSP). However, as more hospitals were added to the model, it was discovered that the length of time needed to perform a single simulation severely increased. It has been claimed that distributed simulation, a technique that uses the resources of many computers to execute a simulation model, can reduce simulation runtime. Further, an emerging standardized approach exists that supports distributed simulation with CSPs. These CSP Interoperability (CSPI) standards are compatible with the IEEE 1516 standard, the High Level Architecture (HLA), the de facto interoperability standard for distributed simulation. To investigate if distributed simulation can reduce the execution time of NBS supply chain simulation, this paper presents experiences of creating a distributed version of the CSP Simul8 according to the CSPI/HLA standards. It shows that the distributed version of the simulation does indeed run faster when the model reaches a certain size. Further, we argue that understanding the relationship of model features is key to performance. This is illustrated by experimentation with two different protocols implementations (using Time Advance Request (TAR) and Next Event Request (NER)). Our contribution is therefore the demonstration that distributed simulation is a useful technique in the timely execution of supply chains of this type and that careful analysis of model features can further increase performance.


Influence maximization (IM), which selects a set of k seed users (a.k.a., a seed set) to maximize the influence spread over a social network, is a fundamental problem in a wide range of applications. However, most existing IM algorithms are static and location-unaware. They fail to provide high-quality seed sets efficiently when the social network evolves rapidly and IM queries are location-aware. In this article, we first define two IM queries, namely Stream Influence Maximization (SIM) and Location-aware SIM (LSIM), to track influential users over social streams. Technically, SIM adopts the sliding window model and maintains a seed set with the maximum influence value collectively over the most recent social actions. LSIM further considers social actions are associated with geo-tags and identifies a seed set that maximizes the influence value in a query region over a location-aware social stream. Then, we propose the Sparse Influential Checkpoints (SIC) framework for efficient SIM query processing. SIC maintains a sequence of influential checkpoints over the sliding window and each checkpoint maintains a partial solution for SIM in an append-only substream of social actions. Theoretically, SIC keeps a logarithmic number of checkpoints w.r.t. the size of the sliding window and always returns an approximate solution from one of the checkpoint for the SIM query at any time. Furthermore, we propose the Location-based SIC (LSIC) framework and its improved version LSIC+, both of which process LSIM queries by integrating the SIC framework with a Quadtree spatial index. LSIC can provide approximate solutions for both ad hoc and continuous LSIM queries in real time, while LSIC+ further improves the solution quality of LSIC. Experimental results on real-world datasets demonstrate the effectiveness and efficiency of the proposed frameworks against the state-of-the-art IM algorithms.


In conventional direct torque controlled (DTC) induction motor drive, there is usually undesired torque and flux ripple. The given torque is the speed output regulator; therefore, it necessary continues tuning for adjusting parameters Kp, Ki. In conventional proportional- integral (PI) speed controller, the performance of motor may differ over time that may cause unexpected torque disturbances, causing sluggishness of a control system. Tuning PID parameters are essential to DTC system to improve the performance of the system at a low speeds. In this paper particle swarm optimization (PSO) proposed to correct the parameters (Kp, Ki) of a speed controller in order to minimize torque ripple, flux ripple, and stator current distortion. Firstly, introduce brief description for conventional DTC design and PSO. Secondly, close loop speed controller in DTC for induction motor using PSO technique to provide high performance of accuracy. Finally, simulation results demonstrate that a reduction of torque and flux ripples is achieved in a whole speed range.

 Key words: Particle swarm optimization, PID controller, direct torque control.


In this paper, we employ a hybrid feedback control strategy to globally asymptotically stabilize a setpoint on a smooth compact manifold without boundary satisfying the following: there exists a finite maximal atlas such that the desired setpoint belongs to each chart of the atlas. The proposed hybrid controller includes a proportional-derivative (PD) action during flows and, at jumps, uses hysteresis to switch between local coordinate charts to stabilize the desired setpoint robustly with respect to exogenous disturbances. We show that the proposed controller can be used for attitude stabilization of a rigid body and we illustrate the behavior of the closed-loop system via simulation results.


TLS, the Transport Layer Security protocol, has quickly become the most popular protocol on the Internet, already used to load over 70% of web pages in Mozilla Firefox. Due to its ubiquity, TLS is also a popular protocol for censorship circumvention tools, including Tor and Signal, among others. However, the wide range of features supported in TLS makes it possible to distinguish implementations from one another by what set of cipher suites, elliptic curves, signature algorithms, and other extensions they support. Already, censors have used deep packet inspection (DPI) to identify and block popular circumvention tools based on the fingerprint of their TLS implementation. In response, many circumvention tools have attempted to mimic popular TLS implementations such as browsers, but this technique has several challenges. First, it is burdensome to keep up with the rapidly-changing browser TLS implementations, and know what fingerprints would be good candidates to mimic. Second, TLS implementations can be difficult to mimic correctly, as they offer many features that may not be supported by the relatively lightweight libraries used in typical circumvention tools. Finally, dependency changes and updates to the underlying libraries can silently impact what an application's TLS fingerprint looks like, making it difficult for tool maintainers to keep up. In this paper, we collect and analyze real-world TLS traffic from over 11.8 billion TLS connections over 9 months to identify a wide range of TLS client implementations actually used on the Internet. We use our data to analyze TLS implementations of several popular censorship circumvention tools, including Lantern, Psiphon, Signal, Outline, TapDance, and Tor (Snowflake and meek pluggable transports). We find that the many of these tools use TLS configurations that are easily distinguishable from the real-world traffic they attempt to mimic, even when these tools have put effort into parroting popular TLS implementations. To address this problem, we have developed a library, uTLS, that enables tool maintainers to automatically mimic other popular TLS implementations. Using our real-world traffic dataset, we observe many popular TLS implementations we are able to correctly mimic with uTLS, and we describe ways our tool can more flexibly adapt to the dynamic TLS ecosystem with minimal manual effort.


Improving the electrocatalytic performance of oxygen evolution reaction (OER) is essential for oxygen-involved electrochemical devices, including water splitting and rechargeable metal–air batteries. In this work, we report that the OER performance of commercial catalysts of IrO2, Co3O4, and Pt-C can be improved by replacing the traditional Nafion® ionomer with newly synthesized copolymers consisting of protonated imidazolium moieties such as ion conductors and binders in electrodes. Specifically, such an improvement in OER performance for all the tested catalysts is more significant in basic and neutral environments than that under acidic conditions. We anticipate that the results will provide new ideas for the conceptual design of electrodes for oxygen-involved electrochemical devices.


Intraradicular installation of vesicular-arbuscular mycorrhizas on the roots acts to amplify growth and to increase potential yield. Extraradicular network of hyphae developed by mycorrhizas acts as an extension of the root in order to access the nutrients located in unexplored areas. The percentage of roots occupied by mycorrhizal hyphae fluctuates heavily under the influence of fertilization. The highest values of the colonization parameters were recorded with a high level of phosphorus fertilization applied as phasial input. High doses of mineral fertilizers with phosphorus applied with seeding favors the development intraradicular hyphal networks in wheat roots.  Â


Oculomotor disturbance resulting from orbital floor fractures have different etiologic factors, sometimes damage of one of the ocular motor nerves, caused by direct injury to the orbit; this damage occurs also to one or more of the extrinsic ocular muscles, especially the obliques; frequently, the diplopia is caused by prolapsed orbital tissues with or without muscle entrapment or by a muscle fibrosis; when the diplopia appears after orbital floor reconstruction there is often a palsy of the inferior rectus muscle in front of silicone implant or bone graft on the orbital floor. In oculomotor disturbance after orbital floor fracture, the first stage will be to recognize the mechanism of the diplopia by a clinical examination, motility in the nine positions, Hess Charts, binocular vision and field, forced duction, radiography and sometimes coronal computed tomography which also allow visualization of soft tissues densities, including all extraocular muscles. If there is an indication of orbital surgery, it will be done always in first; oculomotor surgery will be done if necessary at the second stage, if there is a permanent diplopia without evolution during six months. The purpose of the treatment is to obtain orthophoria in primary position and in down gaze. A series of cases of fracture of the orbital floor with resulting diplopia are described. The method, the time, and the indications of orbital or oculomotor surgery are discussed according the variety of cases.


Abstract The dire implications of navigating the overwhelming whiteness of the education system for Black women is foregrounded by the author's autoethnography about her educational journey and experiences. Within it, the author illustrates the key role of her Black identity - despite being immersed in whiteness– to provide a strong sense of self, pride and resilience, which ultimately leads to her survival in the unequal spaces of the education system. By way of her own educational experiences, the author shares how she becomes motivated to embark upon a PhD as a way to centre and affirm Black identities and in order to make palatable spaces within the hostility of whiteness. Drawing on her PhD research, which is framed by Black feminist epistemology, Critical Race Theory and Bourdieu's theory of practice, her findings, based on the semi-structured interviewing of 25 other Black British women graduates, illustrates that the participants share similar educational experiences and responses. The paper concludes by asserting that the attainment of Black girls and young women often does not reflect their strong commitment to education- which evidences one consequence of journeying into the 'heart of whiteness'. Therefore, the author argues for the necessity of more research and support for this diverse group.


Physically active rats have facilitated heat shock protein 72 (Hsp72) responses after stressor exposure in both brain and peripheral tissues compared with sedentary rats. This study verifies that physically active animals do not have elevated Hsp72 levels compared with sedentary animals in the hypothalamus, pituitary, or dorsal vagal complex. We then examined whether 1) physically active rats respond more efficiently than sedentary rats to a bacterial challenge; 2) peripheral immune challenge elicits brain induction of Hsp72; 3) this induction is facilitated by prior freewheel running; and 4) Hsp72 upregulation produced by peripheral immune challenge results in a commensurate decrease in the proinflammatory cytokine IL-1beta. Adult male Fischer 344 rats were housed with either a mobile or locked running wheel. Six weeks later, rats were injected intraperitoneally with saline or Escherichia coli and killed 30 min, 2.5 h, 6 h, and 24 h later. Serum endotoxin and IL-1beta, and peritoneal fluid endotoxin and E. coli colony-forming units (CFUs) were measured. Hsp72 and IL-1beta were measured in hypothalamus, pituitary, and dorsal vagal complex. The results were that physically active rats had a faster reduction in endotoxin and E. coli CFUs and lower levels of circulating endotoxin and cytokines compared with sedentary rats. E. coli challenge elicited significantly greater time-dependent increases of both Hsp72 and IL-1beta in hypothalamus, pituitary, and dorsal vagal complex of physically active animals but not sedentary animals. Contrary to our hypothesis, increases in Hsp72 were positively correlated with IL-1beta. This study extends our findings that physical activity facilitates stress-induced Hsp72 to include immunological stressors such as bacterial challenge and suggests that brain Hsp72 and IL-1beta responses to peripheral immune challenge may contribute to exercise-mediated resistance to long-term sickness.


INTRODUCTION
The recent investigations point out the significant role of oxidative stress in the development of thyroid gland disease. The present study was designed to investigate the variation of oxidative stae in women with non-autoimmunological subclinical hyperthyroidism.

MATERIAL AND METHODS
The study was conducted on 20 females with non-autoimmunological subclinical hyperthyroidism and 15 healthy women. Manganase-containing superoxide dismutase (Mn-SOD) and extracellular superoxide dismutase (EC-SOD) plasma activity, and malondialdehyde (MDA) plasma concentration were measured.

RESULTS
EC-SOD plasma activity was significantly higher in women with subclinical hyperthyroidism when compared with the control group (13.3 +/- 2.1 vs. 10.9 +/- 1.4 NU/ml; p < 0.05), unlike Mn-SOD (4.2 +/- 0.5 vs. 4.0 +/- 1.0 NU/ml). MDA plasma concentration increased significantly in women with subclinical hyperthyroidism (3.5 +/- 1.2 vs. 2.0 +/- 0.6 micromol/l; p < 0.05).

CONCLUSIONS
The increased EC-SOD plasma activity may reflect disturbances of oxidative state in subclinical hyperthyroidism. Parallel increase of MDA plasma concentration may indicate enhancement of lipid peroxidationin in patients with subclinical hyperthyroidism.


This paper presents a measurement scheme of the stiffness of rotating spindle in radial directions. The measurement purpose is to characterize the spindle stiffness that is needed for the monitoring of the cutting forces in a sensor-integrated spindle. The spindle has been developed for an intelligent machining center, having four eddy current sensors that detect the radial displacements of the spindle in X and Y directions. The sensor signals are interpreted as the forces applied on the tool-holder-spindle system by using the force-displacement relationship (spindle stiffness) obtained from the calibration tests. In order to measure the stiffness of the rotating spindle, a loading unit is fabricated. Several loading tests are carried out and the force-displacement relationship is investigated under different running conditions. It is found that the forcedisplacement relationship with the rotating spindle has nonlinear characteristic.


The method of correction of single errors in the residue class (RC) is considered in this article. The results of analysis of arithmetic code correcting possibilities showed high efficiency of the use of position-independent code structures in RC. Examples of correction of the data single errors which presented by the code of RC are made in the article.


Background Comparison of mean pain intensity difference (PID), total pain relief at 2 hours (TOTPAR2), onset of pain relief, decrease in number of pain episodes, global improvement and adverse effects in participants receiving either fixed dose combination of Drotaverine hydrochloride and Paracetamol or Paracetamol alone. Methods A randomised double-blind controlled trial for adults between 18–59 years of age conducted at an Indian tertiary care hospital. Participants of either gender with acute infectious diarrhoea (defined as at least 3 – unformed, watery or soft), stools accompanied by symptoms within 24 hours preceding randomization with duration of illness. Results 252 (126 in each group) participants were enrolled, and all of them received at least one dose of medication. 242 participants completed the study. Mean pain intensity difference (mPID) at 60 min after administration of study medication (mPID60 min) as assessed by VAS, Pain Intensity at all-time points/Total pain relief (TOTPAR), the summed, time-weighted pain relief at 2 hours using both VAS and VRS showed statistically significant improvement in Drotaverine hydrochloride (80 mg) and Paracetamol (500 mg) group. The onset of pain relief was also significantly better in Drotaverine hydrochloride (80 mg) and Paracetamol (500 mg) group when assessed by using VRS. Conclusions Overall, based on the results of this study, it can be concluded that fixed dose combination of Drotaverine hydrochloride (80 mg) and Paracetamol (500 mg) is an effective and safe antispasmodic agent in abdominal pain patients with acute infectious gastroenteritis with a good safety profile. It seems to be a useful addition to the presently available formulations for abdominal pain accompanying acute gastroenteritis.


At a time when the role of the mental health social worker seems to be under further review, it is important to recognise the particular skills and training that are unique to social work.


A resin composition for a foam according to the present invention comprises at least a resin emulsion and cellulose nanofibers.


Field-programmable interconnection chips (FPIC's) provide the capability of realizing user programmable interconnection for any desired permutation. Such an interconnection is very much desired for supporting rapid prototyping of hardware systems and for providing programmable communication networks for parallel and distributed computing. An FPIC should realize any possible permutation of input to output pins via a set of programmable switches. In this paper, we show that any such architecture requires a minimum of /spl Omega/(n log n) switches, where /spl Omega/ is the number of I/O pins. The result stems from an analysis of the underlying permutation network. In addition, for networks of bounded degree d, we prove an /spl Omega/(log/sub d-1/ n) bound on the routing delay (maximum length of routing paths for specific I/O permutations) and an /spl Omega/(n log/sub d-1/ n) bound on the average utilization of programmable switches used by the FPIC to implement a specific permutation. For the same type of networks, we prove an /spl Omega/(n log/sub d-1/ n) bound on the number of nodes of the network. Furthermore, we design efficient architectures for FPIC's offering a wide variety of routing delays, high average programmable resource utilization, and O(n/sup 2/)-area two-layer layouts. The proposed structures are called hybrid Benes-Crossbar (HBC) architectures and clearly exhibit a tradeoff between performance (routing delay utilization) and area of the layout.


The present study was aimed at defining the roles of intracellular triglyceride pools in apolipoprotein B secretion from HepG2 cells. Oleic acid (0.2 mmol/L) in the medium stimulated both triglyceride synthesis and apolipoprotein B secretion. Stimulation of apolipoprotein B secretion was lost about 30-40 min after oleic acid was removed from the medium, despite the finding that most newly synthesized triglyceride was still present in the cells. This suggested that only a small fraction of newly synthesized triglyceride was transferred to a pool available for assembly of nascent apoB into lipoproteins. Using cell fractionation, we analyzed two triglyceride pools in HepG2 cells: a microsomal pool and a cytoplasmic pool. Oleic acid-induced increases in the microsomal pool were small and short-lived due to secretion; this pool, therefore, is a "secretion-coupled" pool. The large majority of newly synthesized triglyceride was in a cytosolic pool that was not associated with secretion of apoB. Dibutyryl cAMP treatment was associated with a 3-fold increase in the mobilization of the triglyceride droplets. Apolipoprotein B secretion, however, was not increased, suggesting that the amount of triglyceride that entered the "secretion-coupled" pool after hydrolysis and re-esterification of cytoplasmic triglyceride was inadequate to stimulate apolipoprotein B secretion. In summary, the majority of newly synthesized triglyceride, whether derived from exogenous or endogenous fatty acids, is rapidly shifted to a cytoplasmic pool that does not play a regulatory role in apolipoprotein B secretion. The presence of a very small "secretion-coupled" pool of triglyceride in HepG2 cells likely explains the high rates of degradation of nascent apolipoprotein B, and the low rates of secretion of lipid-poor lipoproteins.


In this contribution we exhibit a new consistent group-manifold reduction of pure Einstein gravity in the vielbein formulation when the compactification group manifold is S3. The novel feature in the reduction is to consider the two 3-dimensional Lie algebras that S3 admits. We discuss the characteristics of the lower-dimensional theory and we emphasize the results generated by the new group-manifold reduction. As an application we show that the lower-dimensional theory admits a domain wall solution which upon uplifting to the higherdimension results to be the self-dual (in both curvature and spin connection) Kaluza-Klein monopole.


: Recently, image categorization has been an active research topic due to the urgent need to retrieve and browse digital images via semantic keywords.  As an important and challenging problem in machine learning and computer vision, multilabel classification is typically implemented in a max-margin multilabel learning framework, where the inter-label separability is characterized by the sample-specific classification margins between labels. However, the conventional multilabel classification approaches are usually incapable of effectively exploring the intrinsic inter-label correlations as well as jointly modeling the interactions between inter-label correlations and multilabel classification. To address this issue, we proposed an efficient visual aided image search application on mobile phone combined with local spot and scene search. Mobile visual search became an active filed areas in pass few year. It involves methods from several research areas. Due to the complexity of visual information compared with text or voice signals we develop a joint multilabel classification by using text, image and voice input.


A 73-year-old male ex-smoker of 10 cigarettes/day (up until 10 years ago) with a history of hypertension treated with Diovan 80 (Valsartan) was referred by his dentist. For the past 6 months the patient has presented an ulcer located in the right retromolar trigone region. In the last 2 months the patient has used chlorhexidine rinses, and is not wearing his dentures; the lesions fail to heal, however. Intraoral examination showed an ulcer in the right retromolar trigone area (Fig. 1-2), with a fibroelastic consistency. No regional lymph nodes were palpable. A panoramic X-ray study (Fig. 3), biopsy (Fig. 4-6) and CT exploration were requested.


. We observed the nearby early-type spiral galaxy NGC 4594 (M104, Sombrero galaxy) with the Very Large Array at 4.86 GHz, with the Effelsberg 100-m telescope at 8.35 GHz as well as with the Heinrich Hertz Telescope at 345 GHz in radio continuum. The 4.86 and 8.35 GHz data contain polarization information and hence information about the magnetic fields: we detected a large-scale magnetic field which is to our knowledge the first detection of a large-scale magnetic field in an Sa galaxy in the radio range. The magnetic field orientation in M 104 is predominantly parallel to the disk but has also vertical components at larger z-distances from the disk. This field configuration is typical for normal edge-on spiral galaxies. The 345 GHz data pertain to the cold dust content of the galaxy. Despite the optical appearance of the object with the huge dust lane, its dust content is smaller than that of more late-type spirals.


Introduction and aims The National Institute for Health Care and Excellence recommend that alcohol screening and brief intervention (ASBI) should be routinely implemented in secondary care. This study used theoretical frameworks to understand how health professionals can be supported to adapt their behaviour and clinical practice. Design and methods Staff training and support was conducted using theoretical frameworks. A 12-week study, delivering ASBI was carried out as part of routine practice in an endoscopy day-unit. Anonymised patient data were collected using the Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Tool (AUDIT) and whether patients received a brief intervention. Staff completed the Shortened Alcohol and Alcohol Problems Perceptions Questionnaire at three time points and took part in a focus group both pre and post study. Results For staff, levels or role adequacy, role legitimacy, motivation to discuss alcohol, security in their role, job satisfaction and commitment to working with patients who drink increased during the time of the study. 1598 individual patients were seen in the department in the timeframe. Of these, 1180 patients were approached (74%); 18% (n=207) of patients were AUDIT positive. Discussion This study has shown that it is possible to reach a high number of patients in a busy hospital out-patient department and deliver ASBI by working with staff using theoretical frameworks for training. Embedding evidence-based public health interventions into routine clinical environments is complex. The social system in which professionals operate requires consideration alongside individual professionals' real and perceived barriers and facilitators to change.


Author(s): Rothman, Jason | Advisor(s): McFrederick, Quinn | Abstract: Bees are important insect pollinators in both agricultural and natural settings who may encounter toxicants while foraging on plants growing in contaminated soils. How these chemicals affect the bee microbiome, which confers many health benefits to the host, is an important but understudied aspect of pollinator health. Through a combination of 16S rRNA gene sequencing, LC-MS metabolomics, ICP-OES spectroscopy, quantitative PCR, culturing, microbiome manipulation, and whole organism exposure studies, I attempt to establish the effects that toxicants have on social bees and their associated microbes. The microbiome of animals has been shown to reduce metalloid toxicity, so I exposed microbiome-inoculated or uninoculated bumble bees to 0.75 mg/L selenate and found that inoculated bees survive longer when compared to uninoculated bees. I also showed that selenate exposure altered the composition of the bumble bee microbiome and that the growth of two major gut symbionts – Snodgrassella alvi and Lactobacillus bombicola – was unaffected by this exposure. Due to the pervasiveness of environmental pollution in bee habitats, I exposed bumble bees to cadmium, copper, selenate, imidacloprid, and hydrogen peroxide and found that each of these compounds can be lethal to bees. I also showed that most of these chemicals can affect the diversity of the bee microbiome and that there is interstrain variation in toxicant tolerance genes in the major bee symbionts Snodgrassella alvi and Gilliamella apicola. As exposure to cadmium or selenate has been shown to affect animal-associated microbes, I assayed the effects of these chemicals on honey bees and observed shifts in the bee microbiome at multiple timepoints. I also found that exposure to selenate and cadmium changes the overall bee metabolome and may cause oxidative damage to proteins and lipids. Lastly, I found that bee-associated bacteria can bioaccumulate cadmium but generally not selenate. In this dissertation I demonstrated that bee-associated bacteria are generally robust to toxicant exposure, but that chemicals can alter the composition of both bumble bee and honey bee microbiomes. I also show that toxicants affect bee metabolism, and that the bee microbiome plays an important role in maintaining host health when challenged with toxicants.


Insurances for students If you start your studies, you have to think about insurance. But which insurance is really necessary? Health insurance a statutory obligation anyway and private liability insurance are indispensable for all students. For studying abroad an additional foreign health insurance is necessary. Before concluding any further insurance contracts, however, you should ask yourself whether you really need to have a personal risk insured. Note: High quality advice is provided by German consumer organisations. Insurance broker, on the other hand, are mainly interested in selling their own products. SeitenmenÃ1⁄4: 0


The effect of cold-immobilized stress on the gamma-aminobutylic acid (GABA)/benzodiazepine (BZP) receptor complex in the rat striatum was examined. The stressful manipulation induced a significant decrease in the amount of [3H]muscimol binding sites in the striatal particulate fraction. On the other hand, [3H]flunitrazepam (FLN) binding and the enhancing effect of FLN or secobarbital on the [3H]muscimol binding to the striatal particulate fraction were not influenced by the stress treatment. These results suggest that cold-immobilized stress may selectively change GABAA receptor binding without altering BZP receptor binding as well as the functional coupling between GABAA and BZP receptors.


for Technology and Quality Evaluating product quality level is necessary before the manufactured items are delivered to the customer. When the amount of the items to be manufactured is limited and the product is of high price and should be evaluated by destructive testing, the number of samples to be tested should be as small as possible. This paper presents a small-sample inspection method using hyper-geometric distribution and Bayesian approach for finite small-sized population. A method of determining the minimum sample size is presented for given population size, allowable number of defectives, warranteed defective level, and confidence level which is the degree of confidence on the product quality level recognized by both the producer and the customer.


Formation of authigenic trioctahedral Mg-rich smectite is common in evaporative lake sediments, but was not described previously in modern marine evaporative environments. This study documents formation of authigenic K-rich, Mg-smectite during very early diagenesis in the dominantly sili-ciclastic Salina Ometepec (Baja California), a large supratidal evaporative sabkha complex near the mouth of the Colorado River. Here, sediment pore waters are exceptionally Mg2+-rich relative to other marine evaporative environments due to suppressed sulfate reduction which limits production of carbonate alkalinity and, hence, carbonate (particularly dolomite) precipitation. Sediment cores were obtained along a five km transect seaward across the hypersaline mud flat to evaluate how these atypical geochemical conditions would affect the clay mineral compositions.Scanning transmission electron microscopy (STEM) observations show that the smectite from the marine Inlet, near the sediment source, consists of grains of irregular shape that give selected area diffraction (SAED) patterns reflecting dominant turbostratic stacking. Analytical electron microscopy (AEM) analyses indicate that K+ is the dominant interlayer cation; the mean composition is approximately K0.7(Al3.3Fe(III)0.3Mg0.5)(Al0.5Si7.5)O20(OH)4. Such smectite is implied to be detrital in part because it is similar to smectite known to be deposited by the Colorado River.Smectite from the hypersaline mud flat occurs as aggregates of small subhedral pseudohexagonal plate or lath-shaped crystals ≤250 nm in diameter, with thicknesses varying between three and ten layers. The SAED patterns reflect substantial turbostratic stacking, but with a greater frequency of interlayer coherency as compared with detrital smectite. Crystals from greater sediment depths are larger and more nearly euhedral. This smectite is dominantly trioctahedral, with mean composition approximately K0.7(Al0.7Fe(III)0.5Mg4.45)(Al1.2Si6.8)O20(OH)4 (saponitic). This smectite is inferred to be dominantly authigenic in origin.The X-ray diffraction (XRD) and STEM/AEM data collectively imply that detrital aluminous diocta-hedral smectite reacts to form authigenic Mg-rich trioctahedral smectite, driven in part by the high Mg2+/ Ca2+ ratio of pore waters. Such early-formed Mg-rich smectite may be the precursor for the trioctahedral mixed-layer smectite, corrensite, and chlorite assemblages found in ancient marine evaporative sequences. These results also add to the accumulating evidence that interlayer K+ in marine smectite is fixed during the earliest stages of marine diagenesis near the sediment water interface.


A molecular pathological study was conducted on sugarcane smut disease in Egypt. The study concerned the isolation, identification and diversity of the causal organism sugarcane smut from different sugarcane production areas in Egypt. Molecular methods, Internal transcribed region (ITS), b-East mating type gene and RAPD-PCR were used to investigate the genetic polymorphism between the twenty Ustilago scitaminea isolates. The obtained results revealed that, the combined data clustering analysis of the RAPD-PCR assigned the tested 20 isolates into two main groups, one of them included only one isolate (HAQ-1) and the other included 19 isolates. RAPD grouped most of the isolates according to its sampling places, indicating high diversity of U. scitaminea in Egypt. Alignment of the internal transcribed spacer rDNA (ITS) of 20 isolates of U. scitaminea depicting 100 % similarities between all the tested isolates except isolate (ADA-1), which has one base difference in the ITS2 region and scored 99.87% similarity with the other tested isolates. The obtained two sequences of U. scitaminea internal transcribed spacer sequence of isolates ADA-1 and HAQ-2 was submitted in NCBI Gene bank under the accession number JQ912111 and JQ912112 respectively. The Egyptian U. scitaminea isolate ADA-1 showed a close distance to Reunion isolate while the second Egyptian isolate HAQ-2 was much closer to China isolate. Blast and multiple sequence alignment of the b-East mating type gene sequences of the 20 Egyptian isolates were found identical to Sporisorium scitamineum b-East mating-type gene published in Gene-Bank from China.
Induced mutation in sugarcane resistant (GT-54-9) and susceptible (NCo310) varieties through the use of gamma radiation was used to study the mutation effects on improving sugarcane and to study molecular markers associated with smut resistance. Doses of Gamma radiation (0.5, 1, 2, 3 kr) were used to induce mutagenesis in sugarcane. The radiation treatments caused a high significant variation in all Agronomical characteristics among the GT54-9 and NCo310 mutants. A significant increase in mean values was observed for most of the quality characters as compared to the untreated GT54-9 and NCo310 control. The normal and transformed percentage of smutted stools of GT54-9 (257 mutants) and NCo310 (32 mutants) artificially inoculated (dipping and injection inoculation) with smut spores for 3 seasons were field evaluated. GT54-9 mutants were grouped into 5 groups according to the transformed percentage of infection i.e., group 1 (0 -1%, 38 mutants), group 2 (>1-5%, 29 mutants), group 3 (>5-20%, 71 mutants), group 4 (>20-40%, 65 mutants), group 5 (>40%, 55 mutants). The untreated mother cultivar was placed in group 3 (5-20% infection). The results revealed the importance of direct mutagenic treatment and selection for improvement of commercial sugarcane varieties in Egypt.
PR proteins changes were monitored in healthy and artificially infected plants. The obtained results showed the role of these enzymes in infected and non-infected clones of the susceptible and resistant mutants. A dramatic increase in the activity of the tested enzymes phenylalanine ammonia lyase, peroxidase, esterase and chitinase was noticed in the resistant infected plants compared to the susceptible infected plants and to the moderately resistant control. Generally, the levels of the tested enzymes in the healthy susceptible plants were lower than those recorded in the resistant or the moderately resistant control.
Of the 89 RAPD primers screened, only four revealed polymorphism (difference), i.e., OPA11 and OPL-14, OPN-6 and OPAM-14 between the two DNA bulks of resistant and susceptible mutants generated from sugarcane variety GT54-9. Of the four Polymorphic RAPD primers only one primers (OPL14) was able to distinguish between the resistant and susceptible sugarcane mutants. The primers OPL14 amplified a 600bp (Approx.) band in resistant mutants. Sequencing of the extracted resistance marker bands showed high homology 98.09% between the resulted sequences. Mega blast-n searches in NCBI showed 98% maximum identity with Saccharum hybrid accession number JN800059. The used SSR (27 primer) and ISSR (20 primer) couldn't distinguish between the resistant and the susceptible clones. Of the twelve AFLP primer combination, one primer combination (ACC/CTG) showed differences between resistant and susceptible sugarcane mutants. While the other tested primer combination couldn't distinguish between them.


Multi-layer graphene, serving as a conductive solid lubricant, is coated on the metal surface of electrical terminals. This graphene layer reduces the wear and the friction between two sliding metal surfaces while maintaining the same level of electrical conduction when a pair of terminals engage. The friction between the metal surfaces was tested under dry sliding in a cyclical insertion process with and without the graphene coating. Comprehensive characterizations were performed on the terminals to examine the insertion effects on graphene using scanning electron microscopy, four-probe resistance characterization, lateral force microscopy, and Raman spectroscopy. With the thin graphene layers grown by plasma enhanced chemical vapor deposition on gold (Au) and silver (Ag) terminals, the insertional forces can be reduced by 74 % and 34 % after the first cycle and 79 % and 32 % after the 10th cycle of terminal engagement compared with pristine Au and Ag terminals. The resistance of engaged terminals remains almost unchanged with the graphene coating. Graphene stays on the terminals to prevent wear-out during the cyclic insertional process and survives the industrial standardized reliability test through high humidity and thermal cycling with almost no change.


225Ac (t(1/2) = 10 days) is an alternative alpha-emitter that has been proposed for radioimmunotherapy (RIT) due to its many favorable properties, such as half-life and mode of decay. The factor limiting use of (225)Ac in RIT is the lack of an acceptably stable chelate for in vivo applications. Herein is described the first reported bifunctional chelate for (225)Ac that has been evaluated for stability for in vivo applications. The detailed synthesis of a bifunctional chelating agent 2-(4-isothiocyanatobenzyl)-1,4,7,10,13, 16-hexaazacyclohexadecane- 1,4,7,10,13,16-hexaacetic acid (HEHA-NCS) is reported. This ligand was conjugated to three monoclonal antibodies, CC49, T101, and BL-3 with chelate-to-protein ratios between 1.4 and 2. The three conjugates were radiolabeled with (225)Ac, and serum stability study of the [(225)Ac]BL-3-HEHA conjugate was performed.


Research at the Chair of Human-Computer Interaction (HCI group) at FernUniversitat in Hagen is focused on the investigation and development of interactive and intelligent systems. Cooperating with researchers around the world, the group is active in basic as well as applied research. The underlying motivation on the part of basic research is the big question of the nature of consciousness. Here the group is interested in the investigation of intelligent biological systems by means of theory building as well as simulations on computers and robotical systems. More concrete, the HCI group aims at gaining deeper insight into particular aspects of human or animal cognition, such as vision or spatial cognition. The main goal on the part of applied research is the development of intelligent computer systems that interact with humans in an intuitive and multimodal way.


Highly divergent accounts exist of the nature of emotional feelings. Following Lambie and Marcel (2002), that divergence is traced back to actual differences in experience that result from variations in the involvement and direction of attention during emotions. The dimensions of variation include first versus second order experience, world- versus self-focus, appraisal or action-readiness focus, and attention mode (synthetic-analytic, immersed-detached). It is argued that the most characteristic form during actual emotional events consists of the more or less immersed and synthetic perception of an emotionally meaningful world or of oneself as emotionally meaningful. Meaning consists of perceived qualities that represent appraisal and action readiness. Although information from one's body is central for all emotion experience, it is not central in all emotion experience. Feeling of the body in a particular state represents detached analytic self-focused awareness only.Emotion experience not only represents a perspective on emotional reactions but also contributes to the constitution of those reactions, notably with respect to attention shifts, action initiation and action guidance, and emotion regulation. It is a major factor in constituting a representation of "self" and in establishing social coherence.


Cyclic steam stimulation is one of the important ways to develop heavy oil. In the past research, saturated steam and superheated steam were mainly used as injected fluids. With the advancement of technology, supercritical water cyclic steam stimulation began to receive more and more attention.
 Thermodynamic oil recovery is the main way of heavy oil development, and supercritical water as a displacement medium for thermodynamic oil recovery has high pressure, high thermal enthalpy value and low density which makes it easy to spread in formation. At the same time, supercritical water also has some special properties, its polarity will reverse under high temperature and high pressure, which is beneficial to the mutual solubility of supercritical water and crude oil, increasing the efficiency of oil displacement.
 In this paper, a cyclic steam stimulation model is presented for estimating recovery factors and production rates of different injection fluids, and the corresponding parameters are derived by a pilot field test. Firstly, a steam stimulation model using different injection fluids is proposed based on the properties of supercritical water, saturated and superheated steam. Secondly, according to the established model, the effect of the state of injected water on production rate and recovery factor of cyclic steam stimulation was studied. Thirdly, using supercritical water as the displacement medium, the effect of injection rate on production rate and recovery rate of cyclic steam stimulation was studied. Finally, the optimal production rate is obtained by analyzing the results.
 Results show that: (a) Supercritical water can better heat the formation during steam stimulation than saturated and superheated steam. (b) Supercritical water has better injection capacity than saturated and superheated steam. (c) Cumulative oil production when injecting supercritical water is greater than the injection of saturated steam and superheated steam. (d) Cumulative oil production of supercritical water injection increases as injection rate rises. (e) The higher the injection rate is, the higher the production rate at the same production time.


Tissue Engineering (TE) represents a promising solution to fabricate engineered constructs able to restore tissue damage after implantation. In the classic TE approach, biomaterials are used alongside growth factors to create a scaffolding structure that supports cells during the construct maturation. A current challenge in TE is the creation of engineered constructs able to mimic the complex microenvironment found in the natural tissue, so as to promote and guide cell migration, proliferation, and differentiation. In this context, the introduction inside the scaffold of molecularly imprinted polymers (MIPs)—synthetic receptors able to reversibly bind to biomolecules—holds great promise to enhance the scaffold-cell interaction. In this review, we analyze the main strategies that have been used for MIP design and fabrication with a particular focus on biomedical research. Furthermore, to highlight the potential of MIPs for scaffold-based TE, we present recent examples on how MIPs have been used in TE to introduce biophysical cues as well as for drug delivery and sequestering.


This memo contains an algorithmic description of the rules used by an RSVP implementation for processing messages. It is intended to clarify the version 1 RSVP protocol specification.


In this paper, we propose context-aware profiles and a filtering process for personalising informational content that is delivered to mobile users by Web-based information systems (WIS). The context-aware profiles allow mobile users to express their personal preferences for particular situations they encounter when using a WIS. We argue that the preferences and the needs of a mobile user may vary according to the context in which he uses the system. By defining these profiles, we propose a filtering process that takes into account both the user's current context and the user's preferences for this context. This process selects, in a first step, the context-aware profiles that match the user's current context, and then it filters the available informational content based on the selected profiles.


Internet-based interactive multimedia technologies enable online firms to employ a variety of formats to present and promote their products: They can use pictures, videos, and sounds to depict products, as well as give consumers the opportunity to try out products virtually. Despite the several previous endeavors that studied the effects of different product presentation formats, the functional mechanisms underlying these presentation methods have not been investigated in a comprehensive way. This paper investigates a model showing how these functional mechanisms (namely, vividness and interactivity) influence consumers' intentions to return to a website and their intentions to purchase products. A study conducted to test this model has largely confirmed our expectations: (1) both vividness and interactivity of product presentations are the primary design features that influence the efficacy of the presentations; (2) consumers' perceptions of the diagnosticity of websites, their perceptions of the compatibility between online shopping and physical shopping, and their shopping enjoyment derived from a particular online shopping experience jointly influence consumers' attitudes toward shopping at a website; and (3) both consumers' attitudes toward products and their attitudes toward shopping at a website contribute to their intentions to purchase the products displayed on the website.


In the early fourth century CE, after the escalation of a series of succession disputes among the imperial Sima clan, the Jin dynasty collapsed and its capital city of Luoyang 洛陽 was destroyed. However, the end of the dynasty did not cause the Sima clan to fall from power entirely. Instead, the Jin dynasty was reestablished in the new capital of Jiankang 建康, the city known today as Nanjing. The earlier incarnation of the Jin would come to be known as the Western Jin dynasty, while the restored Jin dynasty is referred to as the Eastern Jin. The impact of this cataclysm on the inhabitants of Luoyang and the surrounding regions is difficult to quantify, and even harder to understand in more personal terms. We know that many of those who did not perish fled to the southeast, crossing the Yangzi River to resettle in the new capital. Later texts refer to this period as "The disorder of the Yongjia Reign" (Yongjia zhi luan 永嘉之亂). This epithet uses the imperial reign name given to the period between 307 and 313, even though the disasters did not neatly begin and end with those years. Although the Yongjia troubles are addressed throughout surviving historiographic material, there is no work of history dedicated to documenting the ensuing exodus from Luoyang to Jiankang.


Resource management is the general topic of the present paper, particularly, we deal with capacity sharing for interference limited wireless networks by power control. Proportional reduction of the signal-to-interference ratio (SIR) requirements is suggested as the control mechanism to accommodate users in the case of overload. For this purpose, we carefully describe the geometrical structure and the asymptotic behavior of the set of feasible power vectors as a proportionality factor tends to its boundaries. In the case that there is no feasible power adjustment, the minimum proportional SIR reduction is determined under general power constraints. We conclude with developing a locally quadratic convergent algorithm for numerical computation of the optimum power assignment. The investigations provide both insight into the theoretical structure of optimum power allocation as well as a practical method for call admission control.


This study focused on individual health education for people with hypertension who were being seen in public health centers. The program was on adjusted intervention program that considered the characteristics of each individual and reflected to individual`s will to change. Each individual had a different lifestyle with different characteristics and habits so the study considered these individual`s characteristics. A comparison was done of knowledge related to hypertension, self-efficacy, and self-care in these individuals. In order to determine the effectiveness of education given by the nurses the variables were measured before and after the individual health education program. The participants in this study were 85 people with hypertension who were seen at a public health center in G city. They were assigned to an experimental group (43) and a control group (42). A tool developed by Park Young-Im (1994) was used to measure knowledge related to hypertension and self-efficacy. A tool developed by Lee Young-Whee (1994) was used for self-care. Data collection was done for 10 weeks from March 24 to May 31, 2003 using interviews with questionnaires. The following is a summary of the results of the study. Hypothesis 1. "the experimental group which had the individual health education will have higher knowledge score on hypertension than the control group that did not have the individual health education" was supported (t=4.17, p=0.00). Hypothesis 2. "the experimental group which had the individual health education will have higher self-efficacy scores than the control group that did not have the individual health education" was supported (t=4.06, P=0.00). Hypothesis 3. "the experimental group which had the individual health education will have better self-care ability than the control group that did not have the individual health education" was supported (t=4.94, P=0.00). Based on the results of this study, the public health centers should develop an educational program that uses a variety of visual aids and assess the effects of the education on patients with different chronic diseases. After the development of an inclusive education program which will standardize health education effectively and provide a variety of teaching methods, study is needed to measure changes in lifestyle after education and to determine how much knowledge related to hypertension, self-efficacy, and self-care increase


The main purpose of this paper is to investigate the effect of sisal fibre loading on mechanical properties of jute fibre reinforced epoxy composite. The hybrid sisal /jute fibres reinforced epoxy composites are prepared by hand lay-up technique at different loading of fibres. Scanning electron microscopy is used to study the interfacial studies of prepared composites. A positive effect of hybridization is observed in this study. The results show that mechanical properties (tensile test, flexural test and impact test) of hybrid composite increase with increase in fibre loading up to 30 wt.%.


Background: Cancer cell migration is fundamentally required for breast tumour invasion and metastasis. The insulin-like growth factor 1 tyrosine kinase receptor (IGF-1R) and the chemokine G-protein coupled receptor, CXCR4 have been shown to play an important role in breast cancer metastasis. Our previous study has shown that IGF-1R can transactivate CXCR4 via a physical association in the human MDA-MB-231 metastatic breast cancer cell line and that this plays a key role in IGF-I-induced migration of these cells. In the present study we used pharmacological inhibition and RNAi to identify PI3Kγ as an important migration signalling molecule downstream of receptor transactivation in MDA-MB-231 cells. To identify PI3Kγ-regulated proteins upon transactivation of CXCR4 by IGF-I, we undertook a comparative proteomics approach using 2-DFluorescence Difference Gel Electrophoresis (DIGE) and identified the proteins by mass spectrometry. Results: These experiments identified eukaryotic elongation factor 2 (eEF2) as a novel downstream target of PI3Kγ after activation of the IGF-1R-CXCR4 heterodimer by IGF-I. Further analysis demonstrated that eEF2 is phosphorylated in MDA-MB-231 cells in response to IGF-I and that this is dependent on PI3Kγ activity. Conclusions: Our data imply a novel role for PI3Kγ in facilitating cell migration by regulating phosphorylation of eEF2.


Abstract : This compendium gathers summaries of the conditions, variables, and results of 86 studies on portage. The data are presented in a tabular format to facilitate research. Indexes of authors, study categories, and variables are provided to assist the researcher in locating rapidly the summaries most needed. (Author)


Young infants learn words by detecting patterns in the speech signal and by associating these patterns to stimuli presented by non-speech modalities (e.g vision). In this paper, we model this behaviour by designing and testing a computational model of word discovery. The model is able to build word-like representations on the basis of multimodal input data. The discovery of words (and word-like entities) takes place within a communicative loop between two protagonists, a 'carer' and the 'learner'. Experiments carried out on three different European languages (Finnish, Swedish, and Dutch) show that a robust word representation can be learned in using about 50 acoustic tokens (examples) of that word. The model is inspired by the memory structure that is assumed functional for human speech processing.


Ten elderly patients each had a ventricular rate responsive pulse generator (Activitrax) placed in them to help correct severe conduction abnormalities; none had suspected ischemic heart disease. The pulse generator was programmed to a maximal pacing rate of 125 ppm, a medium activity threshold, and a rate response of 6. Six weeks after implantation of the pulse generator, the patients were evaluated before exercising and again when the pacing rate reached 125 ppm. The evaluation protocol included an M-mode echocardiogram from which the following measurements were taken: the left ventricular end-diastolic volume (EDV), the end-systolic volume (ESV), the ejection fraction (EF), and the peak systolic pressure/end-systolic volume (PSP/ESV). The numerical values were recorded, calculated, and compared statically with the following results: the EDV increased from 91 +/- 10 to 125 +/- 20 cc (p less than .05); the ESV decreased from 64 +/- 10 to 24 +/- 6 cc (p less than .005); the EF increased from 41 +/- 5 to 61 +/- 10% (p less than .05); and the PSP/ESV ratio increased from 1.70 +/- 1 to 4.10 +/- 2 mm Hg/cc (p = 10). Also, during the maximal pacing rate, the septum of all patients showed paradoxical septal motion. All patients in our study have been asymptomatic and have shown an increase in their exercise capacity. We conclude that during exercise the left ventricular function ins influenced more by heart rate than by AV synchrony, as indicated by an elevated EDV in most patients.


. Louis de Broglie's discovery of the wave nature of matter 80 years ago and the subsequent development of quantum mechanics by Erwin Schr¨odinger, Werner Heisenberg and Paul Dirac solved many riddles of those days and determined physics of the whole 20th century. Yet, after this long time, matter wave interferometry is as up to date as it was in 1927 when Louis de Broglie's hypothesis was verified, e.g., by Davisson and Germer. Atom interferometry, ion interferometry and Bose-Einstein condensates are today's fascinating applications based on de Broglie's discovery. The focus of the present contribution are Hanbury Brown-Twiss anti-correlations (i.e. interferences between two fermions (electrons)) and the quantitative observation of decoherence by electron biprism interferometry.


Tunable metamorphic InGaAs partially depleted absorber photodiodes with resonant cavity enhanced structure are fabricated on GaAs substrate. Dark-current densities of 7.2 × 10−7 A/cm2 at 0 V and 3.6 × 10−4 A/cm2 at −5 V, a high quantum efficiency of 74.4% at 1546 nm, and a 3-dB bandwidth up to 12 GHz are achieved. The full width at half maximum of the detector is about 16 nm. Furthermore, through thermal tuning, the peak wavelength red shifts from 1527 nm to 1544 nm, and a tuning range of 17 nm is realized without fabricating extra tuning electrodes.


Abstract Holocene tephrostratigraphy in Alaska provides independent chronology and stratigraphic correlation in a region where reworked old (Holocene) organic carbon can significantly distort radiocarbon chronologies. Here, we present new glass chemistry and chronology for Holocene tephras preserved in three Alaskan lakes: one in the eastern interior and two in the southern Brooks Range. Tephra beds in the eastern interior lake-sediment core are correlated with the White River Ash and the Hayes tephra set H (~4200–3700 cal yr BP), and an additional discrete tephra bed is likely from the Aleutian arc/Alaska Peninsula. Cryptotephras (nonvisible tephras) found in the Brooks Range include the informally named "Ruppert tephra" (~2700–2300 cal yr BP) and the Aniakchak caldera-forming event II (CFE II) tephra (~3600 cal yr BP). A third underlying Brooks Range cryptotephra is chemically indistinguishable from the Aniakchak CFE II tephra (4070–3760 cal yr BP) and is likely to be from an earlier eruption of the Aniakchak volcano.


Urban security has emerged as one of the key priorities in political and public life in Greece over recent years, and especially since the country fell into financial crisis in 2009. This article offers an unprecedented overview of the challenges, actors and expertise in the management of urban security in Greece, drawing attention to the political tensions that envelop them. The first section focuses on the phenomena considered to constitute core challenges for urban security in the country: from common crime, immigration and urban poverty and degradation, to social unrest, policing, farright militias and vigilantism. The various state and non-state actors engaged in the management of urban security are then outlined, and the relationship between expertise and official policy-making is critically assessed. Objective and subjective forms of insecurity are shown to be highly contentious, responses to such insecurities are found to produce insecurities in their own right, and constraints upon non-technical expertise are identified as limiting the scope of pertinent state policy.


In this paper we provide a comparative analysis of inequality in household consumption per capita in four South-Eastern European countries, Albania, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Bulgaria, and Serbia. The analysis is based on a largely consistent dataset derived from the World Bank's Living Standards Measurement Study (LSMS) providing data for at least two years for each of these countries and a comparable set of variables. We apply inequality decomposition methods based on regression analysis and variants of the Shapley value approach. We also present results from related methods like a decomposition of the explained variance using different approaches for comparisons. The results suggest that three groups of variables are particularly important for explaining patterns of inequality; these are socio-demographic variables, employment status and education. Regional aspects and nationality or ethnicity plays a less important role though there are some country differences.