Detection of antineutrinos from U and Th series decay within the Earth (geoneutrinos) constrains the absolute abundance of these elements. Marine detectors will measure the ratio over the mantle beneath the site and provide spatial averaging. The measured mantle Th/U may well be significantly below its bulk earth value of ~4; Pb isotope measurements on mantle-derived rocks yield low Th/U values, effectively averaged over geological time. The physics of the modern biological process is complicated, but the net effect is that much of the U in the mantle comes from subducted marine sediments and subducted upper oceanic crust. That is, U subducts preferentially relative to Th. Oxygen ultimately from photosynthesis oxidizes U(IV) to U(VI), which is soluble during weathering and sediment transport. Dissolved U(VI) reacts with FeO in the oceanic crust and organic carbon within sediments to become immobile U(IV). These deep marine rocks are preferentially subducted relative to Th(IV)-bearing continental margin rocks. Ferric iron from anoxygenic photosynthesis and oxygen in local oases likely mobilized some U during the Archean Era when there was very little O2 in the air. Conversely, these elements behave similarly in the absence of life, where the elements occur as U(IV) and Th(IV), which do not significantly fractionate during igneous processes. Neither do they fractionate during weathering, as they are essentially insoluble in water in surface environments. Th(IV) and U(IV) remain in solid clay-sized material. Overall, geoneutrino data constrain the masses of mantle chemical and isotopic domains recognized by studies of mantle-derived rocks and show the extent of recycling into the mantle over geological time.


Although a plethora of literature exists on hate or extremist group activity, the role of racist women remains an unexplored area. The current study sought to explore one method of communication for racist women, the Internet. The researchers conducted a content analysis on 227 discussion threads provided on one of the oldest extremist websites on the Internet, Stormfront. The purpose of this study was to investigate the content of the discussion threads described as 'For Stormfront Ladies Only.' Of primary interest to the researchers was whether the content discussed by women in this 'White Nationalist' cyber community supported the assertion by some scholars that the role of women in racist activities is undergoing a transformation and the implications of this study in that regard are discussed.


Abstract The Lower Williams Lake tailings, which resulted from U-milling operations during the late 1950s and early 1960s, cover an area of 2 ha in a small bog under partial water cover. The tailings are underlain by a sand unit containing decaying organic material above the natural base consisting of sand, till, and gravel. The tailings are composed predominantly of quartz, muscovite, K-feldspar, plagioclase, and clinochlore. Residual pyrite grains, displaying angular to subangular particles measuring less than 1 to 250 μm, occur in concentrations ranging from trace to approximately 6 wt%. Framboidal pyrite has formed within the tailings basin in association with organic-rich material. The appearance of framboidal pyrite in the tailings indicates a reversal of the oxidation process and reprecipitation of Fe sulfides. In addition, the tailings include calcite, calcian siderite, Feoxyhydroxides, and Fe-Si-oxyhydroxides as secondary precipitates and replacement products. Groundwaters in the tailings and the underlying units are saturated with respect to gypsum and siderite. These and the other saturation indices calculated for calcite, goethite, and barite are consistent with the secondary mineralogy of the tailings. Conditions promoting the formation of pyrite can be described as neutral to weakly alkaline and reducing assisted by microbial activity. This study provides the first account of secondary carbonates and framboidal pyrite in the Elliot Lake tailings. The existing environmental conditions at the site are favorable for the desired site rehabilitation.


During fetal life, CD4+CD3− lymphoid tissue inducer (LTi) cells are required for lymph node and Peyer's patch development in mice. In adult animals, CD4+CD3− cells are found in low numbers in lymphoid organs. Whether adult CD4+CD3− cells are LTi cells and are generated and maintained through cytokine signals has not been directly addressed. In this study we show that adult CD4+CD3− cells adoptively transferred into neonatal CXCR5−/− mice induced the formation of intestinal lymphoid tissues, demonstrating for the first time their bona fide LTi function. Increasing IL-7 availability in wild-type mice either by IL-7 transgene expression or treatment with IL-7/anti-IL-7 complexes increased adult LTi cell numbers through de novo generation from bone marrow cells and increased the survival and proliferation of LTi cells. Our observations demonstrate that adult CD4+lineage− cells are LTi cells and that the availability of IL-7 determines the size of the adult LTi cell pool.


Purpose: This article aims to describe and discuss what local weather landscapes mean to children and how weather implies exploring bodily sensations and capabilities. It does so by following the work of a community artist, working as a kindergarten teacher, over 1 year. Design/Approach/Methods: Through a narrative inquiry approach, which also includes studies of archival data and field notes, we analyze how local and personally experienced weather events imply what we call "cultures of exploration" in institutional practices. The epistemologies cross the specter of cultural–historical, pragmatic, and deep ecological philosophy. Findings: Through this study, we exemplify how experiencing weather is intertwined into pedagogical practices like habituating the body to cope with cold and wet weather, learning about danger in a wild natural landscape, and valuing species as a powerful practice. The descriptions exemplify "cultures of exploration" as a pedagogical approach. Originality/Value: In this time of an increasing climate crisis on our planet, the value of our findings is to foreground new insights, awareness, and knowledge relevant to children; to early-childhood education; and to life and societies at large. We can thus develop methods to better care for, protect, and educate children. This article has the potential to show how weather events are intertwined with everyday institutional practices—as well as how children, through exploration, learn to cope with seasonal weather landscapes and local cultural adaptations.


Purpose: This analysis investigated the effect of faith-based coping used by cardiac patients undergoing surgery on physical and mental fatigue, symptoms which have significant prognostic implications for mortality. Particularly, we explored whether this faith effect is independent or explained by positive mediators. Methods: Two weeks preoperatively, 481 patients (male, 58%; mean age=62 years) were recruited for three sequential interviews. Among them, 426 completed the second interview, and 335 completed the post-operative follow-up. Cross-clamp and bypass time were obtained from patients' charts. Plasma interlukin-6 (IL-6) was used as a correlate of age-associated diseases and frailty. Results: Hierarchical multiple regression analyses showed that pre-operative positive religious coping styles and optimism contributed to reduced physical fatigue, controlling for post-operatively confirmed prayer coping and such covariates as severe injury. Depression and lower-back problems contributed to mental fatigue. No potential mediators explained these effects. Conclusion: Faith-based coping and optimism are independent predictors of physical fatigue.


This article explores the importance of psychoanalysis to John Guillory's literary sociology. The failure of scholars to recognize the canon wars as a symptom of the increasing institutional marginality of literary studies derives from their commitment to what Guillory calls an "ego-ideal" of the profession. In particular, the psychic investments of literary critics account, on the one hand, for their inflated claims to political relevance and, on the other, for the ability of professors of literature to strike an anti-institutional pose from within the privileged space of the university. The essay turns to recent developments in the field to consider how Guillory's analysis might respond to our present moment. If his sociological method neatly describes the failures of self-understanding among scholars with respect to the canon wars and the politics of literary criticism, it nonetheless fails to capture the importance of recent work in a more affirmative key, where ideology critique is joined to the study of lived experience.


This study investigated 51 patients with Type 1 Gaucher's disease clinically and radiographically for the presence of osteonecrosis. Twenty-five female and 26 male patients with a mean age of 37 years were evaluated retrospectively for osteonecrosis of the proximal and distal femur, proximal tibia, and proximal humerus. All patients were examined before enzyme replacement therapy. Gender, age at diagnosis, prior splenectomy, hematocrit, platelet count, acid phosphatase level, radiographs of the long bones, and magnetic resonance quantitative chemical shift imaging of the spine were analyzed to see if any of these values or findings were associated with the presence of osteonecrosis. Splenectomy was an independent risk factor for the presence of osteonecrosis in three of the four major sites and was a multivariate risk factor for osteonecrosis of the proximal femur and tibia. Male gender was the other significant multivariate risk factor for osteonecrosis of the humerus and distal femur when all sites were taken into account.


In this paper, the effects of character strengths on the physiological reactivity to social anxiety induced by the Trier Social Stress Task were reported. On the basis of their scores in the Chinese Virtues Questionnaire, 30 college students were assigned to either high- (n = 15) or low-character-strength (n = 15) groups. Their psychological stress and physiological data across three laboratory stages (namely, baseline, stress exposure, and post-stress) were collected. Results indicated that individuals with high character strengths exhibited rapid cardiovascular recovery from baseline to post-stress even if high- and low-character-strength groups showed similar patterns of cardiovascular arousal in response to the stress at baseline and stress exposure. These results prove that character strengths are stress-defense factors that allow for psychological and physiological adaptation to stress.


a responsibility that I cannot ignore. After ten years of intimate association with the various vested-interest &dquo;professionals,&dquo; I am dismayed at the accelerated rate of what a colleague of mine refers to as &dquo;galloping professionalism,&dquo; which is just another name for monism and reminiscent of the confused cowboy who jumped on his horse and rode off in all directions. If reporting responsible scholarly research means that Professor Hard-


Metabolic acidosis and changes in serum osmolarity are consequences of 0.9% normal saline (NS) solution administration. We sought to determine if these physiologic changes influence patient outcome. Patients undergoing aortic reconstructive surgery were enrolled and were randomly assigned to receive lactated Ringer's (LR) solution (n = 33) or NS (n = 33) in a double-blinded fashion. Anesthetic and fluid management were standardized. Multiple measures of outcome were monitored. The NS patients developed a hyperchloremic acidosis and received more bicarbonate therapy (30 ± 62 mL in the NS group versus 4 ± 16 mL in the LR group; mean ± sd), which was given if the base deficit was greater than −5 mEq/L. The NS patients also received a larger volume of platelet transfusion (478 ± 302 mL in the NS group versus 223 ± 24 mL in the LR group; mean ± sd). When all blood products were summed, the NS group received significantly more blood products (P = 0.02). There were no differences in duration of mechanical ventilation, intensive care unit stay, hospital stay, and incidence of complications. When NS was used as the primary intraoperative solution, significantly more acidosis was seen on completion of surgery. This acidosis resulted in no apparent change in outcome but required larger amounts of bicarbonate to achieve predetermined measurements of base deficit and was associated with the use of larger amounts of blood products. These changes should be considered when choosing fluids for surgical procedures involving extensive blood loss and requiring extensive fluid administration.


Background: Infectious diseases are diseases caused by pathogenic bacteria such as Streptococcus pyogenes bacteria. This bacterium is a gram-positive, cocci-shaped chain that infect the respiratory tract. As a result of irrational use of antibiotics is causing bacterial resistance. Utilization of plants used in traditional medicine as an alternative by some people. Binahong (Anredera cordifolia (Ten.) Steenis) is a plant that can be used as a traditional medicine can be found easily in Indonesia. Binahong is one of the medicinal plants are thought to have antibacterial effects.
Objective: To investigate the effect of leaf extracts binahong (Anredera cordifolia (Ten) Steenis) against Streptococcus pyogenes bacterial growth in vitro.
Research Methods: The study was conducted in July 2014 in the Laboratory of Bacteriology of Ministry of Health polytechnic Yogyakarta. Types experimental research is real by using desain one-short case study. Binahong leaves were tested came from Yogyakarta Sleman. Analysis of the data obtained and performed descriptive statistics and presented in tables or graphs. The statistical test used is one way analysis of variance (One Way Anova).
Result: The mean diameter of inhibition zone binahong leaf extract on the growth of the bacterium Streptococcus pyogenes at the smallest concentration that is 20% of 12.3 mm and largest concentration of 100% at 23.6 mm.
Conclusion: there is influence binahong leaf extract against Streptococcus pyogenes growth in vitro.


The effects of the natural gonadotropin releasing hormone (LH-RH) and of a long-acting analogue, desgly10-D-leu6-LH-RH ethylamide, on the serum FSH, LH, testosterone and oestradiol-17 beta levels were studied in healthy men. The basal value for FSH was 3.58 +/- 0.47 mU/ml (SE), for LH 6.33 +/- 1.19 mU/ml. Following an intravenous dose of LH-RH the values increased by 3.40 +/- 0.88 and 25.99 +/- 5.67 mU/ml, respectively. After intravenous administration of the long-acting analogue, the peak FSH exceeded the basal value by 12.89 +/- 6.95 mU/ml, while LH increased by 41.27 +/- 4.72 mU/ml. The effect of the analogue on FSH and LH lasted 693 min and 862 min, respectively. Neither preparation changed the serum testosterone or oestradiol-17 beta levels essentially. The results suggest that the long-acting variant of LH-RH is more suitable than the natural hormone for examination of the FSH and LH reserves in men.


Visual servoing has been proven to obtain better performance than encoders at comparable cost. However, the often computationally intensive vision algorithms and the ever growing demands for higher frame rate make its realization very challenging. This paper demonstrated the feasibility of achieving high frame-rate visual servoing applications on the wide Single-Instruction-Multiple-Data (SIMD) processors. An industrial application, Organic-Light-Emitting-Diode (OLED) substrate localization, is chosen as a typical example. Firstly, we proposed an improved vision pipeline for repetitive structure localization, which is more robust, and also more friendly to embedded processors and FPGA/ASIC realization. Then, a highly-efficient SIMD processor for vision servoing is also proposed. The number of processing elements (PEs) in this proposed SIMD processor is dynamically reconfigurable, which (i) enables efficient processing for different vector lengths; (ii) can easily adjust to the various performance requirements; and (iii) saves energy consumption. For input frames of 120 x 45 resolution, the proposed vision pipeline can process a frame within 275 mus, sufficient to meet the throughput requirement of 1000 fps with a latency of less than 1 ms for the whole vision servoing system. Compared to the reference realization on MicroBlaze, the proposed SIMD processor achieves a 18x performance improvement.


Background Evidence of the association between dietary pattern and outcomes of breast cancer was limited in Asian women, including Chinese. Patients and Methods A prospective cohort study was initiated among Chinese breast cancer patients to investigate lifestyle habits and outcomes of breast cancer. At each follow-up, validated food frequency questionnaires (FFQ) were used to assess patients' dietary intake. This study included 1226 patients with invasive early-stage breast cancer with detailed data at 18-month follow-up after cancer diagnosis. Factor analysis was used to derive dietary patterns, whereby two dietary patterns were identified. Cox proportional hazards models were used to investigate associations between dietary patterns and time to outcome, including breast cancer recurrence, overall mortality and breast cancer-specific mortality. Results With a median follow-up time of 54.1 months, 165 patients had breast cancer recurrence and 98 deaths occurred. Two dietary patterns were identified: "Western dietary pattern" characterized by high intake of refined grains and cakes, red and processed meat and oil; "healthy dietary pattern" characterized by high consumption of vegetables and fruits. Participants in the highest tertile of "Western dietary pattern" did not have a higher risk of breast cancer recurrence (Ptrend = 0.89), overall mortality (Ptrend = 0.48) and breast cancer-specific mortality (Ptrend = 0.75). Similarly, a null association existed between "healthy dietary pattern" and outcomes of breast cancer. Conclusion Neither dietary pattern was associated with risk of breast cancer recurrence, all-causes death or death from breast cancer. Prospective follow-up is still needed to further confirm the association between specific dietary pattern and outcomes of breast cancer.


Veterinary medicine was introduced into Madagascar with the arrival of French settlers in the early 1900s. At first, veterinary practitioners were all French, and they trained Madagascan veterinary auxiliaries. The first Madagascan veterinarians were trained in French veterinary schools. The idea of organising the profession dates back to the 1970s, but only in 1991 was the Animal Health Law, covering the veterinary profession, adopted by the National Assembly; it was promulgated by President Ratsiraka on July 25 of that same year. Thus, the National Order of Veterinary Doctors of Madagascar (ONDVM: Ordre national des docteurs vétérinaires malagasy) was instituted by a decree in February 1992. All veterinarians and paraprofessionals were employed in the public sector at the time and this new structure proved vital for the private exercise of the veterinary profession. With the adoption of a new national livestock policy, vaccination against major cattle and swine diseases became a profitable activity. One of the objectives of the sectoral livestock programme was that a total of 90 new posts for veterinarians should be created and located throughout the different regions and rural townships of the country. The Centre de promotion vétérinaire (Centre for Veterinary Promotion), which was created in 1992, was the organisation charged with carrying out this task. In 1998, once the private veterinarians were installed, a survey was undertaken with the aim of making an exhaustive assessment of all private veterinarians, collecting data from the public veterinary stations in zones covered by private veterinarians, and establishing a programme of disengagement and withdrawal of the decentralised services, particularly the public veterinary stations. More recently, the Administration and the ONDVM have been facing various organisational problems, notably with regard to the different levels of animal health staff working in the field. Thus, the Order is currently waging a mobilisation and awareness campaign for the adoption of a new animal health law. All new measures would be aimed at strengthening the management of artificial insemination centres and border protection and improving the work of all those involved in animal health: official and private veterinarians and members of the Order of Veterinary Doctors and the Order of Veterinary Paraprofessionals.


Precultured guinea pig alveolar macrophages (AM) and freshly harvested alveolar cells (FHAC) activated by interaction with Mycoplasma pneumoniae were cytotoxic for xenogeneic 75selenomethionine-labeled tumor target cells. Phagocytosis of whole opsonized or nonopsonized M. pneumoniae cells was more effective in eliciting cytotoxicity than uptake of sonicated microorganisms. The addition of living mycoplasma cells to the assay system enhanced the cytotoxic effect considerably. Target cells were significantly more susceptible to the cytotoxic action of phagocytes if they were coated with mycoplasma antigen or cocultured together with M. pneumoniae. The activation of the phagocytes could be inhibited by 2-deoxy-D-glucose but not by antimicrobial substances suppressing mycoplasma protein synthesis. It was accompanied by 51Cr release without detectable signs of cell damage. The supernatants of activated cells were cytotoxic for approximately 24 h. Inhibition, release, and cytotoxic activity indicate the necessity of an intact metabolism of the effector cells and suggest a secretion of cytotoxic substances.


The authors report a case of myositis ossificans localised in the abductor digiti minimi of the hand. This type of fast growing tumor can be confused with malignant tumors. The diagnosis between these different tumors is discussed. Surgical removal seems the best treatment.


In this paper, we introduce new divergences called Jensen–Sharma–Mittal and Jeffreys–Sharma–Mittal in relation to convex functions. Some theorems, which give the lower and upper bounds for two new introduced divergences, are provided. The obtained results imply some new inequalities corresponding to known divergences. Some examples, which show that these are the generalizations of Rényi, Tsallis, and Kullback–Leibler types of divergences, are provided in order to show a few applications of new divergences.


Background Malawian children are at high risk of burn injuries due to the nature of their environments and paucity of burn prevention programmes. Moreover, data which reports the burden of burn injuries has often been limited to the interpretation of hospital-based records which only provides the pattern of burns which attend medical facilities, but does not reflect the household context or perceptions of such injuries necessary to create culturally appropriate prevention initiatives. Objective To explore the factors associated with paediatric burn injuries in rural and peri-urban Malawi Methods A qualitative approach explored cultural and contextual factors associated with paediatric burn injuries across four sites in Malawi. Data was collected through household observations, interviews and focus groups. Interviews were also conducted with a sample of health professionals and key informants. Findings Parents are limited in their ability to provide adequate protection from burn injuries due to a lack of: knowledge about injury prevention, safety equipment, control to make alterations to their housing and ability to adequately supervise children. Health professionals reported they were unable to consistently provide information to parents and caregivers about burns prevention due to a lack of time and resources. Conclusion The factors associated with paediatric burn injuries in Malawi are multifaceted and intertwined by the complex nature of the household environment and those who live within it. Importantly, this study provides a starting point from which to understand these factors and gives a voice to those affected. Policy implications There is an urgent need to raise an awareness of the burns problem to policy makers, health professionals, parents as well as government and non-government organisations to initiate the development of comprehensive prevention initiatives. Future strategies need to consider the integration of multilevel support to address the challenges faced by families living in rural and peri-urban Malawi.


Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to consider the value of an industry ecosystem in providing context for both identifying and evaluating organisation opportunities and related entrepreneurial behaviour for future strategic growth by reference to a case study in the health-care industry. Using a validated entrepreneurship mindset audit instrument, an assessment is made of the leadership, decision-making, behaviour and awareness dimensions of professional practice health-care staff to create the internal culture that fosters an entrepreneurial orientated organisation that can deliver effective innovation for satisfied users of health-care services.

Design/methodology/approach
This case study examines the distinctive dimensions of entrepreneurial mindset – leadership, decision-making, behaviour and awareness – within a practice-based health-care (nursing) ecosystem and how these dimensions impact organisation performance throughout the health-care industry.

Findings
This study validates research findings that entrepreneurial leadership encourages entrepreneurial behaviour and an entrepreneurial culture supports the development of innovations. Opportunities for such cultural behaviour are best understood by measuring the staff's and leaders' "entrepreneurial mindset".

Research limitations/implications
Generalising results from this case study requires caution. The positive outcome from the professional practice examples, and their strong association with impactful entrepreneurial mindset values on service delivery, requires further evaluation.

Practical implications
Using an entrepreneurial mindset audit to assess organisation's cultural behaviour enables management to identify factors fostering or inhibiting entrepreneurial activity and to devise interventions to improve strategic direction.

Originality/value
Entrepreneurial mindset is not a new concept, but adding the critical significance of spiritual awareness to creative entrepreneur behaviour, together with a visioning map, adds both value and understanding to enhance organisation performance.


We give an elementary proof of the fact that, for continuous-time systems, it is impossible to use (even discontinuous) pure state feedback to achieve robust global asymptotic stabilization of a disconnected set of points or robust global regulation to a target while avoiding an obstacle. Indeed, we show that arbitrarily small, piecewise constant measurement noise can keep the trajectories away from the target. We give a constructive, Lyapunov-based hybrid state feedback that achieves robust regulation in the above mentioned settings


IGF-I, IGF-II, and the IGF-I receptor are widely distributed throughout the neonatal rat lung on days 4, 7, 10, and 14 of life, with a similar abundance at each of these time points. Injection of 20 μg/g of a truncated soluble IGF-I receptor on days 2 and 5 of life, to decoy ligand away from the endogenous IGF-I receptor, reduced lung weight and lung-to-body weight ratio, reduced lung tissue fraction, and impaired alveolar formation, as assessed by secondary crest formation and mean linear intercepts on day 7 of life. Lung procollagen I content and elastin fiber density were also reduced. Injection of 100 μg/day of neutralizing anti-IGF-I, to prevent IGF-I from binding to the IGF-I receptor, on days 3, 4, and 5 of life reduced tissue fraction and elastin fiber density and impaired alveolar formation on day 6 of life. Both interventions reduced total lung cell and secondary crest cell DNA synthesis and small vessel counts per unit area, but these effects were lost after normalization to the reduced tissue fraction. These findings are consistent with a role for IGF-I binding to the IGF-I receptor in postnatal lung growth and on alveologenesis through a nonspecific positive effect on DNA synthesis. Injection of 100 μg/day of neutralizing anti-IGF-II, to prevent IGF-II from binding to the IGF-I receptor, on days 3, 4, and 5 of life had no effect on total lung cell DNA synthesis per unit area on day 6 of life, and a role for IGF-II in postnatal alveologenesis was not further pursued.


Behcet's disease (BD) is a multisystemic inflammatory disease and is characterized by recurrent attacks on eyes, brain, skin, and gut. There is evidence that skewed T-cell responses contributed to its pathophysiology in patients with BD. Recently, we found that Th17 cells, a new helper T (Th) cell subset, were increased in patients with BD, and both Th type 1 (Th1) and Th17 cell differentiation signaling pathways were overactivated. Several researches revealed that genetic polymorphisms in Th1/Th17 cell differentiation signaling pathways were associated with the onset of BD. Here, we summarize current findings on the Th cell subsets, their contribution to the pathogenesis of BD and the genetic backgrounds, especially in view of IL-12 family cytokine production and pattern recognition receptors of macrophages/monocytes.


Educational computer-based competition environments need to be designed with a set of features that enhance the learning process. Although recently some frameworks for the design of educational computer-based systems (e.g., educational games) have been proposed, they do not focus on the details of the competition. Therefore, the design of educational computer-based competition environments is still an open issue. We propose the 4NESS framework for the design of such competition environments. This framework classifies the competition features into four dimensions: easiness, fairness, awareness, and adaptiveness. We designed the ISCARE educational computer-based competition environment implementing these four dimensions to evaluate and validate some included features for competition, and conducted experiments during three consecutive years. Students considered the computer-based competition environment with the proposed features, including a modification of the Swiss system, to be very easy to use, fair for pairing students, moderately fair for calculating scores, with good awareness of their state during the competition and that of their peers, and with contents of appropriate level, especially for the group working with adaptive contents. Adaptation of contents made students increase their learning gains in 0.5 sigmas during the competition. Pairings were seen as with students of similar levels. And final scores were moderately fair: while the order tends to be similar as compared to the results in the post-test, students grades with high performance tend to be lower in the competition environment.


This study begins with measuring Chinese and Japanese listed companies' business performance by the company's market power efficiency and profitability efficiency basing on stochastic frontier analysis in household appliance industry from 2001 to 2004. This estimation shows that Chinese average technical efficiency score is about half of Japanese score on both market power efficiency and profitability efficiency. Then this paper jointly analyzes advertising and R&D activity's effect on the two efficiencies. These estimations indicate that R&D activity cannot promote firm's market power efficiency, but can promote profitability efficiency in long-term; and advertising and promotion would play a significantly positive role to firm's market power and profitability efficiency in short-term.


The state splitting algorithm of Adler, Coppersmith, and Hassner for graphs with edges of fixed length is extended to graphs with edges of variable lengths. This has the potential to improve modulation code construction techniques. Although the ideas of state splitting come from dynamical systems, completely graph-theoretic terms are used.


The cabbage aphid is one of the main curses of Brassicas in general, and the search for healthier foods has been stimulating the development of techniques inside of the maintainable handling, as the microbial control. The objective of this work was determine concentrations of the microbial B. bassiana for the handling of the cabbage aphid. Nymphs of B. brassicae were inoculated in submerged cabbage leaves in fungic suspensions , of the commercial product Boveril®, in the concentrations of 0.05, 0.08, 0.12, 0.31, 0.50, 1.0, 1.5, 2.0 grams per liter of distilled water plus adhesive espalhante Hai-Teem®, and maintained 26.0 ± 1.0°C and UR of 75.0 ± 5%. There was an increment of the mortality in function of the increase of the concentration, because, to smallest concentration (0.05g/L) it presented reduced effect of control 14% of confirmed mortality. However, the concentrations of 1.0-2.0g/L of water provided a superior mortality of 85%. The value found for CL50 was of 0.233g/L. In that way the microbial control of the cabbage aphid can be economical and biologically viable for the handling of this pest in brassicas cultivations.


Bryophytes, the first non-vascular embryophytes, are an interesting component of phytodiversity. North-East India can be considered as a hub of bryo-floristic species due to its suitable climatic condition butecological research on bryo-flora is in infancy. Therefore, to assess the diversity and distribution ofbryophytes, we conducted a literature review. From our study, about 23000 species of bryophytes arerecorded in world and nearly 2489 taxa are noted from India among which 340 species are endemic. InNorth-Eastern India, about 1786 of bryophytes are abundantly distributed and most of the endemic specieshave been recorded from Sikkim. Diversity of bryophytes acts as one of the important ecological indicators.A new vision of research has been provided by this review paper on the diversity of bryophytes andconservation of endemic species for future aspects.


Various studies have been carried out related to the labyrinth seals and reported in the open literature using the different seal arrangements at the stator-rotor seal cavity region. In the present study, numerical analysis has been carried out for the static and rotational effects of labyrinth seals at various flow and geometrical, parametric conditions for the optimized leak flow using straight and steeped seal configurations. And, an experimental data has been generated for the straight through seals, and the numerical data of the same case is validated with the experimental data. The k-omega SST turbulence model is considered with 5% turbulence intensity for the CFD analysis. At a particular seal clearance, as the number of teeth increases the leakage flow is found to be decreased. The leak flow is found to be lower with the stepped labyrinth seals in comparison to the straight through seals. The leak flow amount is found to be lower at a rotational condition in comparison to the stationary condition. From the overall results, it is observed that the stepped seal with a lower clearance at a compressor bleed air temperature and rotational conditions have shown better performance with the lower leak air mass flow.


We present an analysis of the X-ray emission of the super-nova remnant MSH14-63, which was partially covered by three observations with XMM-Newton. The detection of Fe K emission at 6.4 keV, and the lack of spatial correlation between hard X-ray and radio emission is evidence against a dominant X-ray synchrotron component. We argue that the hard X-ray continuum is best explained by non-thermal bremsstrahlung from a supra-thermal tail to an otherwise cool electron gas. The existence of low electron temperatures is supported by low temperatures found in other parts of the remnant, which are as low as 0.2 keV in some regions.


A semi-physical virtual reality system applying to AUV (Autonomous Underwater Vehicle) control study is presented in this paper. This system is composed of three nodes: (1) control node for receiving sensors information and sending control command, (2) virtual model node for virtual devices and sensors and (3) vision node for virtual ocean environment information and displaying the posture of AUV. The control node can be both linked to the real hardware or actuators dealing with a real mission, and linked to the virtual node for purpose test. The experiment results showed that, (1)The the horizitional plane controller parameter perfprmed well in the real lake test, while the vertical plane controller parameter should be little changed. (2) the stable and dynamic performance almost are the same between the virtual and real experiments.


A method for obtaining purified ungerminated macroconidia is described, and a technique for obtaining 85 to 90% germination of macroconidia under normal nutritional conditions is presented.


In this work, we explore the relationship between topic models and co-maintenance history by introducing a visualization that compares conceptual cohesion within change lists. We explain how this view of the project history can give insight about the semantic architecture of the code, and we identify a number of patterns that characterize particular kinds of maintenance tasks. We examine the relationship between co-maintenance history and concept location, and visualize the distribution of changes across concepts to show how these techniques can be used to predict co-maintenance of source code methods.


After an introduction on IMS Bordeaux Laboratory (Integration : from Material to Systems) and on the group ONDES (Waves), the talk will focus on Surface Acoustic Wave or SAW-based devices for highly sensitive and real-time chemical or biochemical sensing applications.
This overview presents a versatile effort made at IMS Bordeaux labs through a large spectrum of applications investigated, among them mainly environmental and health related ones. The devices are fabricated with the collaboration of the national technological network (RTB) at LAAS-CNRS (Toulouse, France), then they are functionalized with various innovative materials developed with national or international partners specialized in chemistry and/or biolotechnologies. These materials are based on organic, inorganic, hybrid materials, either natural or engineered, typically with micro- to nano-structuration and surface modification for increased sensitivity and specificity. Their integration into thin-films as well as microfluidics and other embedded features lead to microsensing platforms customized for the targeted compounds and applications.
We will also discuss an increasing interest for carbonated materials such as nanotubes or graphene which could lead to unexpected sensitivities, as well as recent developments with microtransducers based on other resonant phenomena: flexible imprinted radio-frequency devices and polymer optical microring resonators. Together with new topics on the development of wireless solutions for micro-energy, this leads us to perspectives in wireless sensing networks.


This work investigates the problem of efficiency optimization in capacitor-run single-phase induction motors. The double-revolving-field concept is employed in the theoretical analysis and a relation between the main and auxiliary stator currents is derived that accomplishes optimal efficiency under constant torque operation. A triac-based drive with an optimal efficiency voltage controller is proposed. The controller is easily implemented since an experimental procedure is used for adjusting its parameters. Moreover, the proposed control scheme satisfies all of the prerequisites of simplicity, reliability, and cost-effectiveness that are imposed by the utilization of a single-phase motor. Several experimental results are presented to validate the effectiveness of the proposed efficiency optimization control method.


Cancer is a diseased state, but it is not incurable. Indications and methods of therapy have been standardized almost internationally. Early diagnosis leads to better rates of cure. Cancer presents as an individually characterized multiplicity of symptoms of the disease. Individualization is the real art of medicine. Truthful information, adjusted to the individual patient in each case, should be given at the right time. There should be no rush to make early statements of prognosis, especially statements of hopeless despair. No physician has the right to prolong the supravital and subhuman stage of dying. Absolute dominance of the physical time factor over the specifically human qualities and the patient's own individuality is not justified. The legal situation with regard to the gray area of passive euthanasia should be more clearly defined.


The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of ulnar lengthening and wrist position on force transmission through the radioulnar carpal joint in a forced dorsiflexed wrist position. Eight cadaveric arms were subjected to a 30 kg compressive load directed down the forearm towards the wrist. A pressure sensor recorded forces across the wrist joint with the triangular fibrocartilage complex intact and excised. The biomechanics of the distal radioulnar joint were altered by changes in ulnar length and wrist position. Pressures at the ulnolunate articulation increased as the ulna was lengthened and were significantly lower when the triangular fibrocartilage complex was excised. An inverse relationship between triangular fibrocartilage complex thickness and ulnar variance was shown. Greater increases in ulnolunate pressure were observed in more positive ulnar variant wrists.


Abstract : Personnel at Defense Finance and Accounting Service (DFAS) and other DoD accounting offices supporting the Other Defense Organizations general fund, and preparers and users of the DoD Agency-Wide financial statements would benefit from the results of this audit. DFAS Indianapolis (DFAS-IN) provides accounting and financial reporting support for 42 Other Defense Organizations general funds. DFAS-IN receives trial balance information from field accounting sites, which is used to prepare financial statements and budget reports. These 42 Other Defense Organizations general funds were a reporting component of the FY 2007 DoD Agency-Wide Financial Statements and had $140.5 billion in budget authority for FY 2007. Results of the audit show that DFAS-IN's internal controls were not adequate. We identified a material internal control weakness in accounting adjustments made to Other Defense Organizations general fund accounting records. The accounting adjustments were not sufficiently supported and approved. Specifically, the controls did not ensure that accounting adjustments were properly supported, that journal entries recorded in the accounting system agreed with the control log, and that cost estimates used on journal vouchers were supported and properly classified and disclosed on the financial statements. These internal control weaknesses increased the risk that DoD materially misstated balances reported in the DoD Agency-Wide financial statements. In addition, the lack of footnote disclosures discussed in this report could mislead the users of the financial statements. The Under Secretary of Defense (Comptroller)/Chief Financial Officer should update the DoD Regulation 7000.14-R, "DoD Financial Management Regulation," to include requirements for financial statement footnote disclosures of the amounts of unresolved abnormal balances.


Injecting-drug use is the second most frequently reported risk behavior for infection with human immunodeficiency virus (HIV). As of December 31, 1995, of 513,486 cases of acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS) reported to CDC, 184,359 (36%) were directly or indirectly associated with injecting-drug use. Injecting-drug-user (IDU)-associated AIDS cases include persons who are IDUs (n = 161,891), their heterosexual sex partners (n = 18,710), and children (n = 3,758) whose mothers were IDUs or sex partners of IDUs. This report characterizes persons with and trends in IDU-associated AIDS reported to CDC through 1995 from the 50 states, the District of Columbia, and the U.S. territories.


Conditions for CP violation in the scalar potential sector of general N-Higgs-doublet models are analyzed from a group theoretical perspective. For the simplest two-Higgs-doublet model potential, a minimum set of conditions for explicit and spontaneous CP violation is presented. The conditions can be given a clear geometrical interpretation in terms of quantities in the adjoint representation of the basis transformation group for the two doublets. Such conditions depend on CP-odd pseudoscalar invariants. When the potential is CP invariant, the explicit procedure to reach the real CP-basis and the explicit CP transformation can also be obtained. The procedure to find the real basis and the conditions for CP violation are then extended to general N-Higgs-doublet model potentials. The analysis becomes more involved and only a formal procedure to reach the real basis is found. Necessary conditions for CP invariance can still be formulated in terms of group invariants: the CP-odd generalized pseudoscalars. The problem can be completely solved for three Higgs-doublets.


The statistically processed results are sometimes not intuitive for the structural health monitoring systems of cable-stayed bridges which process voluminous data from a lot of sensors. For this reason, the signals-image recognition algorithm using images more intuitive than numerical values is presented in this study. The signals-image here means not a photograph taken by any camera but the artificial image which consists of measured signals and their process results. It is applied to extract the features from signals and identify the cable vibrations. Consequently, identifying and classifying signals-images have been successfully performed.


A novel structure denoted a "hollow nanosphere aggregate" is synthesized by introducing nanoscale Kirkendall diffusion to the spray pyrolysis process. The hollow Fe2O3 nanosphere aggregates with spherical shape and micron size are synthesized as the first target material. A solid iron oxide-carbon composite powder that is prepared by a one-pot spray pyrolysis process is transformed into the hollow Fe2O3 nanosphere aggregates by sequential post-pyrolysis treatments under reducing and oxidizing atmospheres. The nanoscale Kirkendall diffusion plays a key role in the formation of the hollow Fe2O3 nanosphere aggregates with spherical shape and micron size. The unique structure of the hollow Fe2O3 nanosphere aggregates results in their superior electrochemical properties as an anode material for lithium ion batteries by improving the structural stability during cycling. The hollow metal oxide nanosphere aggregates with various compositions for wide applications including energy storage can be prepared by the simple fabrication method introduced in this study.


Cadmium accumulation by Pseudomonas fluorescens H2 attached to glass surfaces and by cells free in suspension in maleate buffer was compared and showed several major differences. The time to saturation of cells with Cd(2+) was different for attached and free cells, although both showed biphasic uptake of Cd(2+). The accumulation of Cd(2+) by free cells was inhibited by the presence of zinc but remained several orders of magnitude higher than accumulation by attached cells. The presence of Zn(2+), however, did not inhibit Cd(2+) uptake by cells attached to the solid substratum. Cadmium uptake still increased with Cd(2+) concentration for both free and attached cells in the presence of Zn(2+). The accumulation of Cd(2+) by both free and attached cells increased with pH up to pH 11. The presence of a metabolic inhibitor, carbomyl cyanide m-chlorophenyl-hydrazone, reduced the uptake of Cd(2+) by free cells by 40% but reduced uptake by attached cells by only 25%. Approximately 65% of Cd(2+) accumulated by cells free in suspension was associated with the cell wall, 33% was present in the cytoplasm and only 2% was bound to exopolymer. The results suggest that the characteristics of heavy metal accumulation by bacterial cells are substantially affected by attachment to solid surfaces.


Background Lower extremity peripheral artery disease (PAD) is a growing epidemic with limited effecOve treatment options. Herein, we provide a single nuclei atlas of PAD limb muscle to facilitate a better understanding of the composition of cells and transcriptional differences that comprise the diseased limb muscle. Methods We obtained gastrocnemius muscle specimens from 20 PAD patients and 12 non-PAD controls. Nuclei were isolated and single nuclei RNA sequencing (snRNAseq) was performed. The composition of nuclei was characterized by iteraOve clustering via principal component analysis, differenOal expression analysis, and the use of known marker genes. BioinformaOcs analysis was performed to determine differences in gene expression between PAD and non-PAD nuclei, as well as subsequent analysis of intercellular signaling networks. Additional histological analyses of muscle specimens accompany the snRNAseq atlas. Results snRNAseq analysis indicated a fiber type shim with PAD paOents having fewer Type I (slow/oxidaOve) and more Type II (fast/glycolyOc) myonuclei compared to non-PAD, which was confirmed using immunostaining of muscle specimens. Myonuclei from PAD displayed global upregulation of genes involved in stress response, autophagy, hypoxia, and atrophy. Subclustering of myonuclei also idenOfied populations that were unique to PAD muscle characterized by metabolic dysregulation. PAD muscles also displayed unique transcriptional profiles and increased diversity of transcriptomes in muscle stem cells, regeneraOng myonuclei, and fibro-adipogenic progenitor (FAPs) cells. Analysis of intercellular communication networks revealed FAPs as a major signaling hub in PAD muscle, as well as deficiencies in angiogenic and bone morphogeneOc protein signaling which may contribute to poor limb function in PAD. Conclusions This reference snRNAseq atlas provides a comprehensive analysis of the cell composition, transcriptional signature, and intercellular communication pathways that are altered in the PAD condition.


Purpose: The backdrop of the article is the emergence of an international and politically motivated ambition that aims at standardising the purpose and outcomes of teaching practices via various forms of outcome controls. This ambition of standardisation is discussed in a Swedish context in relation to social studies teaching, which, at its core, has highly diverse and sometimes conflicting aims and purposes. The purpose of the article is to analyse tensions that arise in practice as ten experienced Swedish social studies teachers implement outcome-focused reforms in their teaching, and to critically discuss implications for social studies teaching. Method: Interviews, observations and a conceptual framework built on Paul Ricœur's discussion on the concept of practical reason has been used to analyse tensions that arose when the teachers implemented standardised tests and grading. Findings: Teaching practices shifted from social studies extrinsic dimensions (emphasising an open and individual understanding from social issues) toward social studies intrinsic dimensions (emphasising knowledge about a predetermined content) as a result of policy changes, teachers meaning-making of the reforms, and in relation to external constraints. In conclusion, it is argued that this shift risks circumscribing tools that can be used to deal with inherently complex subject dimensions.


Abstract In this work a mobile robot cooperation strategy based on computational vision is presented. Such strategy is applied to a mobile robot team formed by simple and cheap robots and a leader robot with more computational power. The leader has an omnidirectional visual system and uses color segmentation to obtain the pose of the followers. This visual information is used by a nonlinear stable controller that manages team formation. Simulations and tests were run and current results are encouraging.


The purpose of research is evaluation of the implementation of the national sports achievement development program for shooting sports in PB PERBAKIN using the CIPP evaluation model (Contexs, Input, Process, Product). The sampling technique was purposive sampling, so the sample in this study is 39 people. Collecting data using observation, interviews, questionnaires, and documentation. The data analysis technique used in this research is quantitative and qualitative descriptive analysis. The results showed that the overall results of the evaluation of the coaching program for improving national sports achievement in the airsoft sport in PB. PERBAKIN has been running well with a score of 67,92. In terms of context, it has gone well with a nikai of 69,40. In terms of input it has been going well with a value of 70,21. In terms of the process has been going well with a value of 67,35. In terms of the product, in general, the achievements achieved are quite good, but the achievement is not maximized so that a score of 56,75 is obtained even though it is not in line with expectations but in this evaluation there are good things, namely the support and enthusiasm of parents for athletes is very good.


Proceedings: AACR 102nd Annual Meeting 2011‐‐ Apr 2‐6, 2011; Orlando, FL

Valproic acid (VPA) is a first-generation anti-epileptic drug that has been shown to inhibit proliferation and induce apoptosis in various hematological malignancies, including multiple myeloma and chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL). We show here that the mechanism of VPA-induced apoptosis in CLL is associated with activation of the TNF-related apoptosis-inducing ligand (TRAIL) apoptotic pathway in vitro and in vivo. Treatment of leukemic cell lines or primary CLL cells with VPA increased the level of TRAIL receptor 1 (TRAIL-R1), but not TRAIL-R2, and upregulated the TRAIL pathway in vitro, resulting in increased casepase-8 cleavage. Treatment with VPA also induced formation of reactive oxygen species (ROS), and the combined cytotoxicity of VPA and fludarabine was dampened upon co-treatment with a ROS scavenger, N-acetylcysteine. Having shown the effects of VPA in vitro, a phase II clinical trial was initiated at CancerCare Manitoba to determine the activity of VPA in CLL, either when used alone or in combination with fludarabine. Five patients who had received at least one prior therapy with fludarabine have to date been examined. Three out of 5 patients were fludarabine-resistant, as defined as no response to fludarabine or relapse 50% fall in lymphocyte/lymph node size after receiving 5 cycles of the combination. Peripheral blood samples were obtained prior to each treatment cycle, and mononuclear cells were isolated for analysis by immunoblotting and immunocytochemistry. Levels of both histone 3-acetyl and histone 4-acetyl initially increased and then fluctuated during the course of treatment. TRAIL-R1 levels increased during the course of therapy, while no significant changes in TRAIL-R2 levels were observed. Expression of mRNA levels of genes involved in apoptosis was examined in one patient before and 28 days following VPA. There was a global up-regulation of both pro- and anti-apoptotic genes (as categorized by their gene ontology) which likely explains the effect of VPA on fludarabine sensitivity in CLL. In summary, VPA induces hyper-acetylation of histones in CLL and activates the TRAIL apoptotic pathway. While VPA is ineffective as a single agent in CLL, it can sensitize CLL cells to fludarabine and could be used as an adjuvant in fludarabine-based treatment regimens.

Citation Format: {Authors}. {Abstract title} [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the 102nd Annual Meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research; 2011 Apr 2-6; Orlando, FL. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2011;71(8 Suppl):Abstract nr 2015. doi:10.1158/1538-7445.AM2011-2015


A new model of physically realizable electromagnetic source is proposed. The source is partially coherent and non-uniformly totally polarized. The coherence and polarization characteristics of this new source are analyzed. The spatial coherence area of the source can be easily modified at will. The state of polarization is linear across the transverse plane of the source with an azimuth that varies from point to point in a different way depending on the selected values of the parameters that define the source.


In this work, a previously published model for the water up take of stormwater in sponge-like porous bodies by the group is further developed. This is done by investigating the highest-performing model and considering the water uptake from the surroundings of a pond and rain-infiltrated soil. This implies that water uptake from impermeable to partially permeable surfaces is examined. Hence, the following cases are considered: (1) impervious bottom surface and no precipitation, (2) impervious bottom surface with precipitation, (3) permeable soil with no precipitation, and (4) permeable soil with precipitation. A mathematical model covering all these cases is presented, where the governing equations are the mass conservation and Darcy's law together with an assumption of a sharp wetting front being a first-order approximation of the complete Richard's equation. Results for the water uptake height, pond depth, and wetting front are computed numerically and plotted against time. Analytical solutions are also presented in certain cases, and critical values are obtained. The parametric study includes variations in the ratio of the model- to the surrounding ground surface area, initial pond depth, precipitation, and soil characteristics. To exemplify, the time it takes to absorb the water from the pond after a precipitation period is presented. The results are related to the Swedish rainfall data of 1 h duration with a return period of 10 years. When evaluating efficiency, the focus is on the absorption time. Results vary considerably, demonstrating a general trend that with soil infiltration, the water absorption rate is higher. For most cases, the considered water amount is absorbed completely, although depending on the parameters and conditions. These results serve to optimize the model for each of the cases. The main focus of the research lies in the theoretical aspect.


Curcumin (Cum) has been reported to have potential chemo-preventive and chemotherapeutic activity through influencing various processes, inducing cell cycle arrest, differentiation and apoptosis in a series of cancers. However, the poor solubility of Cum limits its further applications in the treatment of cancer. We have previously reported Cum-loaded nanoparticles (Cum-NPs) prepared with amphilic methoxy poly(ethylene glycol)-polycaprolactone (mPEG-PCL) block copolymers. The current study demonstrated superior antitumor efficacy of Cum-NPs over free Cum in the treatment of lung cancer. In vivo evaluation further demonstrated superior anticancer effects of Cum-NPs by delaying tumor growth compared to free Cum in an established A549 transplanted mice model. Moreover, Cum-NPs showed little toxicity to normal tissues including bone marrow, liver and kidney at a therapeutic dose. These results suggest that Cum-NPs are effective to inhibit the growth of human lung cancer with little toxicity to normal tissues, and could provide a clinically useful therapeutic regimen. They thus merit more research to evaluate the feasibility of clinical application.


Previous studies in speculative prefetching focus on building and evaluating access models for the purpose of access prediction. This paper on the other hand investigates the performance of speculative prefetching. When prefetching is performed speculatively, there is bound to be an increase in the network load. Furthermore, the prefetched items must compete for space with existing cache occupants. These two factors-increased load and eviction of potentially useful cache entries-are considered in the analysis. We obtain the following conclusion: to maximise the improvement in access time, prefetch exclusively all items with access probabilities exceeding a certain threshold.


Quantitative structure‐activity relationships (QSARs) for predicting skin and respiratory sensitization are reviewed. Overall, progress has been hampered by the sparseness of good quality experimental data, a fact that makes it difficult, at this time, to recommend one or two QSARs for predicting skin and respiratory sensitization. Creation of appropriate data sets for uninvestigated classes of chemicals by experimentation should facilitate the development of more robust QSARs for predicting skin and respiratory sensitization. Such QSARs will be valuable in the evaluation of identifiable toxic hazards where dose responses are relevant, as is the case for skin and respiratory sensitization.


– To determine age and growth of yellow bullheads (Ameiurus natalis), we collected fish from canals and marshes in southern Florida from April 2000 to January 2001, and from Oct 2003 to February 2005. Fish ranged from 97 to 312 mm in total length and from 13.4 to 538.1 g in wet mass. We aged 144 yellow bullheads using cross-sections of pectoral spines and a subsample of 55 fish were aged using sanded and polished cross-sections of lapillar otoliths. Pectoral-spine age estimates had relatively high precision between two experienced readers (average percent error [APE] = 6.1%, CV = 8.6%), with 65% of ages having perfect agreement and 92% agreeing within ±1 year. Lapillar-otolith age estimates provided inadequate precision with high APE (16.8%) and CV (23.7%), and low percent agreement (25% perfect agreement and 61% within ±1 year). Annuli in lapilli were not clearly demarcated and were not evident in all cross-sections of the otoliths; moreover, longitudinal sections of lapilli were unreadable. Precision estimates in comparing ages between pectoral spines and otoliths also indicated aging difficulties, with an APE of 20.6% and a CV of 29.1%. Determining ages by using crosssections of lapilli was therefore not reliable for yellow bullheads in southern Florida, and so we did not use otolith age estimates as input into the growth model. The pectoral-spine aging method was validated using oxytetracycline (OTC)-injected yellow bullheads, which were found to deposit one complete annulus (one translucent and one opaque zone) over a 12-month period. Yellow bullheads from south Florida ranged in age from 1-12 years based on aging using pectoral spines; and therefore had a maximum age that was double that previously reported for any other yellow bullhead population. Yellow bullheads grew relatively rapidly in their first 3 years, but after age 5 their growth slowed and approached an asymptote of ~214 mm total length. Yellow bullheads in south Florida grew relatively slowly and were smaller compared to yellow bullheads from other populations throughout the United States.


Abstract This chapter introduces very briefly the framework and tools for lexical and grammatical processing that have been used in the evolutionary language game experiments reported in this book. This framework is called Fluid Construction Grammar (FCG) because it rests on a constructional approach to language and emphasizes flexible grammar application. Construction grammar organizes the knowledge needed for parsing or producing utterances in terms of bi-directional mappings between meaning and form. In line with other contemporary linguistic formalisms, FCG uses feature structures and unification and includes several innovations which make the formalism more adapted to implement flexible and robust language processing systems on real robots. This chapter is an introduction to the formalism and how it is used in processing.


Pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) is an effective tool for preventing HIV infection among men who have sex with men (MSM), but its cost-effectiveness has varied across settings. Using an agent-based model, we projected the cost-effectiveness of a statewide PrEP program for MSM in Rhode Island over the next decade. In the absence of PrEP, the model predicted an average of 830 new HIV infections over ten years. Scaling up the existing PrEP program to cover 15% of MSM with ten or more partners each year could reduce the number of new HIV infections by 33.1% at a cost of $184,234 per quality-adjusted life-year (QALY) gained. Expanded PrEP use among MSM at high risk for HIV infection has the potential to prevent a large number of new HIV infections but the high drug-related costs may limit the cost-effectiveness of this intervention.


The hypothesis that extrinsic innervation of the small bowel provides pathways for initiation and coordinated propagation of the interdigestive migrating contractions (IMC) was reinvestigated in dogs. Motor activity was measured by chronically implanted force transducers. After a control study, 40-cm segments of the jejunum were extrinsically denervated. All IMC migrated distally through the extrinsically denervated segments. Thiry loops were then constructed from the extrinsically denervated segments, and continuity of the intestine was restored by end-to-end anastomosis. IMC proximal to the anastomosis did not migrate through the extrinsically denervated loop but migrated to sites across the anastomosis. In the extrinsically denervated loop, bands of strong contractions, quite similar to the IMC, occurred at the orad end of the loop independent of the IMC and propagated distally to the caudad end of the loop. The duration, frequency, and migrating velocity of these bands of contraction were different from those of IMC. These results suggest that extrinsic innervation is not essential for the initiation and orad sequential propagation of periodic motor activity like IMC, even when intrinsic innervation is discontinued.


One in four toddlers in Indonesia is stunted, so the government is trying to reduce stunting by implementing integrated nutrition interventions. This case report aims to follow up on the results of the Stunting Case Audit (AKS) conducted by the Department of Health and across sectors by identifying risk factors for stunting, optimizing the role of Primary Health Care in clinically treating patients, and evaluating the implementation of integrated nutrition interventions that have been implemented. The patient is a toddler aged 25 months, weight 9.0 kg and height 78 cm, so the nutritional status according to the indicators of weight for age and height of age results in underweight and severe stunting. There are internal risks in patients, namely poor nutrition, poor personal hygiene, and chronic skin infections. In contrast, the external risks are the lack of parental income, a crowded home environment, and the mother's lack of knowledge about nutrition and health behavior. Forms of specific nutrition interventions include: handling skin infections and education on the practice of providing nutrition, while sensitive nutrition interventions include education on improving personal hygiene, providing PKH assistance, and building livable houses. The intervention and evaluation activities were carried out within 3 months. They resulted in improvements in providing nutrition, skin complaints, personal hygiene, and the implementation of PHBS in homes that were livable even though weight gain had not run optimally.


"Essays, poems, songs, folkloric anecdotes and photographs celebrating the myth of Mao. ... The editor supplies an insightful, and cohesing introduction". -- Reference & Research Book News "(A) highly entertaining and informative collection of translations of official, admiring, tacky, but sometimes also highly critical writings, and illustrations of objects, all featuring Mao. ... A must-have book for everybody interested in contemporary China, Mao, and his legacy now and in the future". -- China Information


Although sitting is a large part of everyday life is the influence of the sitting positions and chair design on pressure and load distribution as well as comfort for transfemoral amputees quite unexplored. The aim of this study was therefore to examine this further.Two transfemorally amputated females (49 and 57 years old) participated in the study. Three positions were examined for each subject; sitting without foot support and sitting with the knee joints flexed 90◦ and 105◦. The pressure inside the socket was measured by two pressure sensors, placed distally and proximally on the posterior wall inside the socket. The lengthwise pressure distribution and the sidewise load distribution between the socket and the underlying material was measured by a pressure mat. In addition to this, the subjects answered a questionnaire regarding the subjective comfort for each position. The result showed that the pressure underneath the socket were higher distally than proximally without foot support. The pressure transferred proximally as the knee became more flexed. The most even load distribution sidewise was found when the subjects sat with their knees flexed 105 degrees. Sitting with the knees flexed 90◦ was ranked as the most comfortable position. No conclusion could be made regarding the pressure inside of the socket. Additionally, according to this study the level of comfort does not have any clear relation with the sidewise load distribution or the longitudinal pressure distribution.


OBJECTIVE
To investigate the effects of Newcastle disease virus (NDV) infection on the expression of survivin and cell cycle in human tongue squamous carcinoma TSCCa cells.

METHODS
The proliferation of TSCCa cells infected with NDV in vitro was evaluated by means of MTT assay, and survivin expression in the infected cells was detected using RT-PCR and Western blotting. Flow cytometry was performed to assess the changes in the cell apoptosis, cell cycle and cell proliferation index (PI) of the cells.

RESULTS
NDV infection resulted in decreased survivin expression and increased apoptosis of TSCCa cells, with reduced cell percentage in G2/M and S phases and lowered PI of the cells, showing significant differences from those of the negative control cells (P<0.05).

CONCLUSION
NDV infection can inhibit survivin expression, affect the cell cycle of TSCCa cells and induce their apoptosis.


This article examines rural mobilization and propaganda by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in Henan via the case of an uprising during the Northern Expedition, as well as official and popular representation of that event before and after 1949. It confirms recent scholarship regarding the role of local interpersonal networks in early rural mobilization, which in this context required infiltration of local, religio-magical popular militias called Red Spear societies. It then examines popular and party-constructed representations of the revolt, illustrating both the function of early CCP propaganda within rural popular culture and its implications for official historiography, which practiced specific forms of erasure in representing popular collective memory. It uses party documents, memoirs, and local histories to show that the historical significance of the Queshan uprising resides less in the failed revolt itself than in the ways its legacy was appropriated by cadres and historians during the twentieth century.


Cytoplasmic autoantibodies to vasopressin-cells (AVPcAb) have been detected not only in patients with overt central diabetes insipidus (CDI), but also in patients with endocrine autoimmune diseases without CDI. This suggests that complete CDI can be preceded by a preclinical stage. Among 878 patients with endocrine autoimmune diseases without CDI, 9 patients found to be AVPcAb positive and 139 AVPcAb-negative controls were enrolled in this open prospective study. They were evaluated for AVPcAb and posterior pituitary function at least yearly for about 4 yr (range, 37-48 months); during this span, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) of posterior pituitary and stalk was performed only in the AVPcAb-positive patients. Five of the 9 AVPcAb-positive patients had normal posterior pituitary function at study entry. They were AVPcAb positive throughout the follow-up period. At later stages of the study, 3 of them developed partial CDI, and 1 developed complete CDI. The remaining 4 patients showed impaired response to the water deprivation test at study entry and were diagnosed as having partial CDI. Two of them agreed to receive desmopressin replacement for 1 yr. After this treatment, the patients became negative for AVPcAb and displayed normal posterior pituitary function until the end of the follow-up. Conversely, the 2 untreated patients with partial CDI remained AVPcAb positive. One of them developed overt CDI. None of the controls became AVPcAb positive or developed CDI. The normal hyperintense MRI signal of the posterior pituitary, present at study entry, persisted subsequently in all 9 AVPcAb-positive patients, including those developing overt CDI, only disappearing in the late phase of complete CDI. In asymptomatic subjects, the monitoring of AVPcAb, but not MRI, seems to be useful to predict a progression toward partial/overt CDI. Early desmopressin therapy in patients with partial CDI could interrupt or delay the autoimmune damage and the progression toward clinically overt CDI.


The self-assembly behavior of azobenzene-based triblock copolymers poly(ethylene oxide)-block-polystyrene-block-poly[6-(4-methoxy-4′-oxy-azobenzene) hexyl methacrylate] (PEO-b-PS-b-PMMAZO) and their mixtures with PS or PMMAZO homopolymers was studied by means of transmission electron microscopy, scanning electron microscopy, laser light scattering and UV–vis spectrophotometry. It was found that pure block copolymers self-assembled into spherical micelles with core–shell structures. The addition of PS or PMMAZO homopolymers can not only increase the aggregate size but also have a significant influence on the photo-isomerization behavior and photo-deformation behavior of the aggregate. The photo-isomerization study revealed that a complete trans–cis or cis–trans isomerization of azobenzene chromophores can be acquired when irradiated with UV or visible light for polymers both in organic solutions and in micelles. The photo-isomerization rate of azobenzene chromophores increases when PS homopolymers were incorporated into micelles, while with the addition of PMMAZO homopolymers, it decreases. The photo-induced elongation of the aggregates by irradiation of a linearly polarized laser was observed for all the samples, and the deformation degree increases with the weight fraction of azobenzene groups in the parent copolymers, as well as the PMMAZO content for the mixture micelles.


High altitude environmental stressors have numerous and varied physiological effects on human health. Yet few analyses have investigated the influence of high altitude in resident populations over a large extent. In this study a preliminary analysis of the association between altitude and mortality in India was conducted. The assessment of mortality rates at different altitudes integrated geospatial concepts through a Geographic Information System (GIS) and Digital Elevation Model (DEM). Furthermore, surveyed health data was obtained from the Million Death Study (MDS) and the Special Fertility and Mortality Survey (SFMS) datasets. The statistical analysis reveals that all-cause mortality rate has no significant association with altitudes. However, it shows a positive correlation between altitude and prematurity and low birth weight mortality rate in neonates. Additionally, higher drinking rates for males were found at greater altitude. The preliminary results confirmed the relationship between particular mortality rate and altitude in India, but further investigations need to assess the total effect of altitude on mortality.


This research proposed a method to produce activated carbon from rice husk by carbonation process, physical activation and chemical activation using NaOH. The performance of activated carbon was tested by batch experiments in which the adsorption system contained 1 g of rice husk activated carbon in 100 mL of artificial wastewater with initial concentration of Cu(II) ion being 148.26 mg/L, initial pH 6, at 27 o C and 1 atm to determine the efficiency of reducing Cu(II) ion over the contact time and presence of stirring on chemical activation. The results showed that the efficiency of reducing Cu(II) ion by rice husk activated carbon increased exponentially with increasing contact time with a maximum value of 74.33% at 90 minutes of contact time. The results also showed that stirring on chemical activation increased the efficiency of Cu(II) ion reduction by 14.94%. Adsorption kinetics studies showed that Cu(II) ion reduction followed the pseudo-second order adsorption equation with the adsorption capacity of 10.18 mg/g and adsorption rate constant of 0.0013 g/mg.min for rice husk activated carbon without stirring in the chemical activation. Stirring in the chemical activation.increased the capacity and rate of adsorption constant to 12.07 mg/g and 0.0052 g/mg.min, respectively.


The nucleocapsid (N) protein of severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) coronavirus plays important roles in both viral replication and modulation of host cell processes. New ligands that target the N protein may thus provide tools to track the protein inside cells, detect interaction hot spots on the protein surface, and discover sites that could be used to develop new anti-SARS therapies. Using mRNA display selection and directed evolution, we designed novel antibody-like protein affinity reagents that target SARS N protein with high affinity and selectivity. Our libraries were based on an 88-residue variant of the 10th fibronectin type III domain from human fibronectin (10Fn3). This selection resulted in eight independent 10Fn3 intrabodies, two that require the N-terminal domain for binding and six that recognize the C terminus, one with Kd = 1.7 nm. 10Fn3 intrabodies are well expressed in mammalian cells and are relocalized by N in SARS-infected cells. Seven of the selected intrabodies tested do not perturb cellular function when expressed singly in vivo and inhibit virus replication from 11- to 5900-fold when expressed in cells prior to infection. Targeting two sites on SARS-N simultaneously using two distinct 10Fn3s results in synergistic inhibition of virus replication.


Introduction: Older people face challenges in the overburdened health-care services in Nigeria, especially when hospitalised. Few available studies on mortality were retrospective, oftentimes with incomplete data which may affect the establishment of the outcome. Objectives: This study determined the 30-day all-cause mortality rate (MR) and associated factors amongst older patients in the medical wards of University College Hospital, Ibadan. Materials and Methods: A prospective cohort study of 417 patients (>60 years) from the 1st day of admission to death or discharge at the end of 30th day of admission. Data were collected with a semi-structured questionnaire. Information obtained included respondents' sociodemographic characteristics, anthropometric measurements, frailty and functional status. Others were morbidity profile, quality of life, cognition, nutrition, anxiety and depression. Data were analysed using SPSS version 24 at a level of significance P < 0.05. Results: The mean age was 71.6 ± 8.1 years and 216 (51.8%) were females. Eighty-seven (20.9%) deaths were recorded. The unadjusted 30-day all-cause MR was 13.7 deaths (95% confidence interval [CI]: 11.0–16.9/1000 patient-days). This was significantly higher amongst males than females with a MR ratio (MRR) of 1.93 ([95% CI: 1.23–3.05]; P = 0.01). Factors significantly associated with mortality were being financially self-supporting (MRR = 2.82; 95% CI: 1.01–6.41), having a cognitive impairment (MRR = 1.92; 95% CI: 1.12–3.20), frailty (MRR = 1.65; 95% CI: 1.01–2.84), ischemic heart disease (MRR = 1.93; 95% CI: 1.18–3.07) and acute exacerbation of bronchial asthma (MRR = 3.92; 95% CI: 1.04–9.42). Conclusion: The 30-day MR was high amongst older patients, especially the males. Modifiable factors contributing to hospital mortality should be addressed at admission.


Purpose
Kupferstein (2018) surveyed 460 respondents and found that 46 percent of respondents met the diagnostic threshold for posttraumatic stress disorder after exposure to applied-behavior-analysis-based intervention. The purpose of this paper is to provide an evaluation a critical analysis of Kupferstein (2018) including the experimental methods and discussion of the results.

Design/methodology/approach
The authors evaluated the Kupferstein's methodological rigor with respect to the use of hypothesis testing, use of indirect measures, selection of respondents, ambiguity in definitions, measurement system, and framing of the experimental question when conducting the correlational analysis in addition to Kupferstein's analysis and discussion of the results.

Findings
Based upon the analysis, Kupferstein's results should be viewed with extreme caution due to several methodological and conceptual flaws including, but not limited to, leading questions used within a non-validated survey, failure to confirm diagnosis, and incomplete description of interventions.

Originality/value
It is the authors' hope that this analysis provides caregivers, clinicians, and service providers with a scientific lens which will useful in viewing the limitations and methodological flaws of Kupferstein.


Spectral karyotyping (SKY) represents an effective tool to detect individual chromosomes and analyze major karyotype abnormalities within an entire genome. We have tested the feasibility of combining SKY and FISH/protein detection in order to combine SKY's unique abilities with specific loci detection. Our experimental results demonstrate that various combined protocols involving SKY, FISH and immunostaining work well when proper procedures are used. This combined approach allows the tracking of key genes or targeted chromosome regions while monitoring changes throughout the whole genome. It is particularly useful when simultaneously monitoring the behavior of both protein complexes and DNA loci within the genome. The details of this methodology are described and systematically tested in this communication.


This work focuses on the properties of Cu-Ag alloys deposited by cold spraying. Helium was used as the carrier gas, accelerating particles to 823 m/sec, which is in the middle of the deposition window for Cu alloys. To avoid oxygen contamination, the gun was placed in a helium-filled chamber and a closed-loop circulating system was used to minimize helium loss. Deposition parameters were varied during spraying and their effect on hardness, tensile properties, residual stress, and porosity was assessed in as-sprayed and heat-treated samples. Ultimate tensile strengths of 450 MPa and yield strengths of about 420 MPa were obtained for the as-sprayed samples and it was shown that strength and ductility can be tailored by heat treating, reaching elongation values higher than 45%. An increase in deposition rate from 55 to 142 g/min was also achieved without a significant decrease in mechanical properties.


Databases of medical records contain a wealth of information critical to many areas of research including drug safety, health outcomes, clinical epidemiology and translational medicine. Through commercially available databases, researchers can gain a better understanding of the impact of exposure to drugs and medical devices, identify populations at risk for adverse effects, estimate the prevalence and natural history of medical conditions, and assess drug utilization across different demographic groups. However, the daunting size and complexity of these databases as well as lack of convenient tools to mine them have made this information largely inaccessible to all but a few experts with advanced data management and statistical programming skills. Using a combination of a relational data management strategy and a graphical user front-end, we have developed an approach that allows any medical researcher to perform a number of common searches and analyses in a consistent, intuitive and interactive manner, without the assistance of an expert programmer. Moreover, the optimization work done on the database and application sides have dramatically reduced the time needed to analyze the data and, thus, increased the number of studies that can be performed. A crucial part of any such study is the selection of code lists for diseases, procedures, medications, etc., and we have supported this effort by allowing definitions to be queried using common ontologies and shared conveniently across the organization.


Penetrating thoracic injury from BB shot remains an innocuous event in most patients, but factors including location, proximity, gun type, and patient weight may identify groups at risk. The following cases demonstrate morbidity and mortality in two patients, and this experience may suggest the need for reassessment of this injury.


Genetic screening can identify individuals with increased susceptibility to certain workplace toxicants. One conceivable benefit is a reduction in occupational disease costs. We examine this rationale by considering the associations among genetic traits, exposure, disease risk, and disease incidence. Given appropriate information, we describe methods for computing the expectation and variance of the future number of disease cases and of the differential screening cost per worker hired (a cost-benefit measure). We present two hypothetical scenarios: (1) benzene-induced cancer with few expected cases, and (2) chronic beryllium disease with many expected cases. We show that variability in disease incidence and cost outcomes must be considered because in specific instances, screening can be cost-beneficial on average but yield an unfavorable outcome with high probability. This circumstance pertains to scenarios involving small differences between the expected number of cases in screened versus unscreened cohorts.


INTRODUCTION At the turn of XX-XXI centuries, via synergetics and situational approach, the situation of re-discovery of the universe, place and role of human-anthropos in it, becomes unprecedented. Today the world had already evidentially came across as not just globally evolving, but coevolving, universal, branch-like self-organizing and self-developing system. Distinguishing "absolute" and "ideal", it can be said that for the first time the world came across as the world without Absolute, as the left-alone-universe. Arrival of neoclassic philosophy, including such main novelty, shows (see works of late J. Derrida (Derrida, 1997), E.N. Knyazeva (Knyazeva, 2015), V.A. Lectorskii (Lektorskiy, 2015), V.S. Stepin (Stepin, 2012) and many others), that coevolution is a stage of a new, qualitatively different type of thinking and behavior of mankind in the universe, not of any kind, but only of allowable attitude of a man to himself, this is a new stage of ecological imperative and a man, new mechanisms and ways of integration process of a man and nature, new quality of their convergent interactions. Under such quality are understood new interactions: not only with its nearest part - "geographical environment", "cosmos", but already with eternal-endless Existence. In which is actively present an eternal form of existence as a life that happened in form of anthropos--"observer" on level of a man. MATERIALS AND METHODS Until last third of twentieth century the idea of anthropic principle was one of the major, but in cosmology. The largest "turns to man" had happened several times. Detection of properties of "anthropic principle" and "observer of neoclassical type" will be more fruitful is to compare them with previous ones: "anthropocentrism". Their comparativistics shows that the first one, "anthropocentrism" proceeded from classical world understanding, eventually from the closed ultimate secluded picture of the world, from linearly established Order, Correctness, created and sanctioned by some External Absolute. Assuming this, a man is explained in brought from outside, supernatural manner that is a support of not itself but some Absolute or man assimilating himself to absolute. Unwillingly a man started to be envisioned as the "center" on the universe, and as an observer, positioned seemingly over the world, absolute transcendental and outside external observer. As observer, he strives to absolute truth, not blurred by subjectiveness and subjectness, in his opinion. This particularly happens in "prosperity periods" of classical type of the world view, when a man was outshines by reducibly understood mind, "absolute mind of the Universe", turned into "absolutely reasonable Order". Such "pandeterminism, similar to infective disease" (Frankl, 2006) had infected a significant part of mankind. "Anthropological approach" is determined by seemingly diverse, neoclassical picture of the world. But the picture of the world itself stays the same, relativist-absolutist, relativism became the Absolute, the form of Absolute had changed: now as absolute happened to be accepted not Order, but Chaos; and "rational fascism" and "madness in classic era" were replaced, we can say, by irrational fascism (Deleuze et al., 1972). It seemed that a man came to envision himself being "already in the world", in quality of seemingly internal observer, but immanent, i.e. thrown in bu Absolute from without, but now by irrational, schizoid Absolute. As observer a man turned into confused observer--"narrativist", "nomadologist" living in ontological instability (Saykina and Krasnov, 2015). The life started to be thought as unity of fluxes of becoming with biased basis. The world appeared as plan on which heterogenetic multiplicities, "multiplicities-without-unity" are roaming, homeless in existence, with involvement "into Universal game" (Badiou, 2004). Views of anthropos as observer on his "emergence", status, place and role in life of the universe, in cognition of the universe had changed a little. …


After introducing the definition of a holomorphic function over the complex plane, I will explain the Cauchy-Riemann equations. Using these tools, I will supply a proof of the fundamental theorem of algebra using methods from complex analysis. A discussion of singularities and the complex logarithm will follow. Finally, I will suggest methods of integrating challenging functions using Morera's theorem.


The proportional odds model is one member of the family of cumulative logistic regression models, designed for studying the effect of covariates on an ordinal responses variable. Relationships with other members of this family are described, emphasizing the effect of response aggregation. The connection with latent variable models, dispersion models, continuation-ratio models, and log-linear models is also discussed.

Keywords:

canonical regression model;
extreme-value distribution;
latent variable;
logistic regression model;
proportional-hazards model


This review discusses low-lying (n = 3) Rydberg electronic states of molecules and radicals, in particular those that result in mixed configurations and participate in non-adiabatic interactions. Rydberg-valence interactions are ubiquitous in molecules and radicals and have important effects on potential energy surface shapes, spectroscopy, and dissociation dynamics. The review emphasises selected properties that are affected by these interactions and illustrates them with several examples, mostly involving free radicals, in which collaboration between experimental and theoretical investigations has been crucial for understanding. Specifically, the cases of substituted methyl, vinyl, and hydroxyalkyl radicals are described, as well as Rydberg states of diazomethane and the ethyl radical. The issue of triple conical intersections is also briefly discussed.


We have reported that up-regulation of PKM2 in renal glomeruli isolated from patients with more than 50 years of type 1 diabetes (Joslin Medalist Study) correlated with preservation of renal function even in the presence of chronic hyperglycemia. Further, pharmacological activation of PKM2 in T1D mice and podocyte-specific deletion of PKM2 in cultured cells and in vivo strongly showed that PKM2 activation protects renal glomeruli from hyperglycemia/diabetes induced damage (Nat. Med 2017). To confirm these findings in type 1 and type 2 diabetes, we performed the following: 1. We showed the protein expressions of glycolytic (PKM1, PKM2, ENO1) and mitochondrial (MTCO2) enzymes to be significantly elevated in glomeruli of post mortem kidneys in people with T2D without DN compared to those with DN, or nondiabetic controls. 2. Plasma PKM2 levels (SomaLogic aptamer assay) in the Medalists (n=180) correlated with albumin-to-creatinine ratio (ACR;p=0.03) and eGFR (p=0.0002) at baseline. In a replication cohort (n=219) of patients with T1D in the longitudinal Joslin Kidney Study (JKS) baseline plasma PKM2 also correlated with ACR (p=0.0001). High baseline plasma PKM2 in JKS was independently associated with a slower decline in eGFR (p=0.004) and a slower progression to end-stage renal disease (p=0.0002). 3. TEPP-46, a PKM2 activator, prevented diabetes induced increases in mRNA expression of pro-fibrotic (Col3a1, Fn1, TGFb1) and inflammatory (Ccl2) genes, and enhanced key mitochondrial protein (Ppargc1a) in uninephrectomized T2D db/db mice. No differences in ACR were observed between TEPP-46 treated and untreated diabetic mice. These findings support the hypothesis that PKM2 activation may protect or even reverse the initiation and progression of diabetic glomerular dysfunction and pathology in both T1D and T2D, suggesting that activating PKM2 could be a clinically effective therapeutic target to stop the progression of DN. Disclosure D. Gordin: None. T. Shinjo: None. R. St-Louis: None. W. Qi: None. L.J. Tinsley: None. D.M. Pober: None. M.J. Brissett: None. M. Niewczas: None. J. Dreyfuss: None. H. Pan: None. T. Sadowski: Employee; Self; Sanofi. A. Kannt: Employee; Self; Sanofi. Stock/Shareholder; Self; Sanofi. H. Shah: None. H.A. Keenan: Research Support; Self; Sanofi. Employee; Self; Sanofi Genzyme. A. Krolewski: None. G.L. King: Research Support; Self; Sanofi-Aventis.


This study tested the effects of the sedative-hypnotic drug triazolam (Halcion) on the ability to inhibit behavior in humans. Thirty adults practiced a stop-signal task that measured their ability to inhibit and activate behavioral responses on a choice reaction time task. Equal numbers of participants (i.e., n = 10) then received either 0.25 mg, 0.125 mg, or 0 mg (placebo) of triazolam under double-blind conditions and performed the task intermittently over a 3-hr period. In accord with the hypothesis, triazolam reduced response inhibitions and increased the time required to inhibit a response. The drug also slowed the activation of responses. The findings contribute to the understanding of the basic behavioral mechanisms by which sedative-hypnotic drugs can produce states of behavioral disinhibition in some individuals.


This paper discusses the evaluation problem using observational data when the timing of treatment is an outcome of a stochastic process. We show that, without additional assumptions, it is not possible to estimate the average treatment effect and treatment on the treated. It is, however, possible to estimate the effect of treatment on the treated up to a certain time point. We propose an estimator to estimate this effect and show that it is possible to test for an average treatment effect.


Many distributed systems work on a common shared state; in such systems, distributed agreement is necessary for consistency. With an increasing number of servers, these systems become more susceptible to single-server failures, increasing the relevance of fault-tolerance. Atomic broadcast enables fault-tolerant distributed agreement, yet it is costly to solve. Most practical algorithms entail linear work per broadcast message. AllConcur – a leaderless approach – reduces the work, by connecting the servers via a sparse resilient overlay network; yet, this resiliency entails redundancy, limiting the reduction of work. In this paper, we propose AllConcur+, an atomic broadcast algorithm that lifts this limitation: During intervals with no failures, it achieves minimal work by using a redundancy-free overlay network. When failures do occur, it automatically recovers by switching to a resilient overlay network. In our performance evaluation of non-failure scenarios, AllConcur+ achieves comparable throughput to AllGather – a non-fault-tolerant distributed agreement algorithm – and outperforms AllConcur, LCR and Libpaxos both in terms of throughput and latency. Furthermore, our evaluation of failure scenarios shows that AllConcur+'s expected performance is robust with regard to occasional failures. Thus, for realistic use cases, leveraging redundancy-free distributed agreement during intervals with no failures improves performance significantly.