Abstract The Farrell-Jones and the Baum-Connes Conjecture say that one can compute the algebraic K- and L-theory of the group ring and the topological K-theory of the reduced group C*-algebra of a group G in terms of these functors for the virtually cyclic subgroups or the finite subgroups of G. By induction theory we want to reduce these families of subgroups to a smaller family, for instance to the family of subgroups which are either finite hyperelementary or extensions of finite hyperelementary groups with ℤ as kernel or to the family of finite cyclic subgroups. Roughly speaking, we extend the induction theorems of Dress for finite groups to infinite groups.


Crit Care Med 2016 • Volume 44 • Number 12 (Suppl.) hospital LOS, changes in code status, disposition, and mortality were collected. Results: There were 204 MICU admissions at baseline (1.5 months); 194 during intervention period (1.5 months). Compared to baseline, there was an increase in percentage of admissions with goals of care discussions (42% vs 55%). There were decreases in time from ICU admission to goals of care discussion (5.55 vs 2.22 days), ICU length of stay (5.69 vs 3.74 days), and hospital length of stay (10.6 vs 7.8 days). There was no change in the proportion of patients who were full code (67% vs 72%), in-hospital mortality (22% vs 21%), or patient/family perceptions of shared decision-making ("Did you feel included in the decision-making process," 4.65 vs 4.71 on 5-point Likert scale). Conclusions: A program to have routine early, facilitated goals of care education and discussion was associated with more frequent and earlier goals of care discussion, less healthcare utilization, and maintenance of patient/family shared decision-making.


This elementary introduction to string field theory highlights the features and the limitations of this approach to quantum gravity as it is currently understood. String field theory is a formulation of string theory as a field theory in space-time with an infinite number of massive fields. Although existing constructions of string field theory require expanding around a fixed choice of space-time background, the theory is in principle background-independent, in the sense that different backgrounds can be realized as different field configurations in the theory. String field theory is the only string formalism developed so far which, in principle, has the potential to systematically address questions involving multiple asymptotically distinct string backgrounds. Thus, although it is not yet well defined as a quantum theory, string field theory may eventually be helpful for understanding questions related to cosmology in string theory.


In this workshop/discussion we will demonstrate how we have used a range of tools to measure the student experience on a second level 60 point undergraduate interdisciplinary module that is taught remotely. This module currently has 350 students who are located all over the UK, with a minority based in Europe and the rest of the world. As with other modules offered by the Open University (OU) in the UK, our students come from a diverse background and learn from printed and VLE materials with help from their tutors, who deliver correspondence tuition and tutorials (a mixture of face to face and online tutorials). The module chair, responsible for the quality of teaching materials, does not have direct contact with the students. In our session, we will outline how, in our capacities as the module chair and TEL designer, we have compiled a comprehensive picture of our student experience, gathered from different stakeholder perspectives and using qualitative and quantitative methods to inform the changes to the module. This workshop will demonstrate learning analytics alone is not sufficient in understanding learner experience. Different methods (including learning analytics) can help to contextualise learner experience better and hence contribute to student success more effectively.


A simple procedure is described to aid in the selection of antigens from gram-negative organisms that are most likely to exhibit serotype-specific epitopes when used as immunogens in the mouse. Several such proteins of Yersinia enterocolitica serotype O:8 were identified by immunoblotting through their binding to polyclonal antibodies that remained in immune serum after the serum had been adsorbed with common antigens prepared from a variety of closely related serotypes and Gram-negative organisms. The selected proteins were purified electrophoretically and used to immunize mice to obtain immune spleen cells for cell fusions. Serotype-specific monoclonal antibodies (MAbs) were successfully developed to a 36-kDa outer membrane protein resembling the porin OmpF. Additional MAbs also were produced that cross-reacted with other serotypes. Only cross-reactive epitopes were detected on a 34-kDa protein. The MAbs were used to show that the relative expression of the 36-kDa protein varied severalfold according to the medium used to grow the cells. These MAbs are promising agents for serological identification of Y. enterocolitica serotype O:8. The procedure should be useful in many situations where extensive cross-reactivities impede generation of highly specific MAbs.


Introduction Isolated traumatic fractures of both Patellae, occurring at the same time, in an otherwise healthy person, are very rare. The Patella, as a subcutaneous and a cancellous bone, is vulnerable to injury. However, simultaneous injury to both Patellae without the involvement of any other bony injuries occurs infrequently, and only a few cases have been reported in the literature. Case Presentation We report a rare case of isolated, traumatic bilateral Patella fracture with unusual fracture patterns and briefly review the literature. Conclusions In simultaneous bilateral Patella fractures, good functional outcome can be expected following a stable surgical fixation and a structured rehabilitation regime. However, personality of the fracture determines salvage versus sacrifice of the Patella.


BACKGROUND/AIMS
Smoking is a major risk factor for several cardiovascular and pulmonary diseases, and it has also been associated with the loss of skeletal muscle mass and strength leading to sarcopenia. The aim of this is study is to analyze the effects of cigarette smoking on the diaphragm muscle histopathology of postmortem samples from patients without respiratory diseases.

METHODS
Diaphragm samples were stained with hematoxylin and eosin for histopathological analysis. Picrosirius stain was used to highlight the collagen fibers.

RESULTS
Cigarette smokers had an increase of histopathological alterations as abnormal cytoplasm, abnormal fiber size and shape, and central nucleus. Additionally, smokers had an increase of collagen fibers on diaphragm muscle.

CONCLUSION
Smoking may influence in a negatively fashion the diaphragm musculature.


The landscape of emerging applications has been continually widening, encompassing various data-intensive applications like artificial intelligence, machine learning, secure encryption, Internet-of-Things, etc. A sustainable approach toward creating dedicated hardware platforms that can cater to multiple applications often requires the underlying hardware to context-switch or support more than one context simultaneously. This paper presents a context-switching and dual-context memory based on the standard 8T SRAM bit-cell. Specifically, we exploit the availability of multi-VT transistors by selectively choosing the read-port transistors of the 8T SRAM cell to be either high-VT or low-VT. The 8T SRAM cell is thus augmented to store ROM data (represented as the VT of the transistors constituting the read-port) while simultaneously storing RAM data. Further, we propose specific sensing methodologies such that the memory array can support RAM-only or ROM-only mode (context-switching (CS) mode) or RAM and ROM mode simultaneously (dual-context (DC) mode). Extensive Monte-Carlo simulations have verified the robustness of our proposed ROM-augmented CS/DC memory on the Globalfoundries 22nm-FDX technology node.


In modern economic world income plays a very vital role in every one's daily life. Investment has been one of the major concerns for the Non-institutional investors as their today's small savings would be meeting with the expenses of tomorrow. The risk and returns proportion from each of these investment options varies from one to another. Investor's behavior plays an important role in investment decision making, which is influenced by many a factors during the process of investment decision making. Today, investors have many avenues of investment with different features to cater their present and future needs. The focus of this paper (non-institutional investors), unlike institutional investor, suffers from various sort of perception while deploying their funds due to their low investible funds, risk taking capacity, low investment education and their exposure to evaluate the available information. This situation of the non-institutional investors motivates to study as these investors are the finest source of small savings in investment set-up of the country. This paper presents a conceptual framework for research on investment determinants among noninstitutional investors to be carried out further by the researchers.


This paper proposes a new variable step-size algorithm using an evolutionary-type searching approach. The step-sizes of the adaptive filter are evolved regularly in a controlled manner to reduce the squared estimation error at each iteration. The algorithm improves the rate of convergence and achieves a low steady-state misadjustment. The performance analysis of the adaptive filter and simulation results are presented in the paper. The results show that the new algorithm outperforms the least mean square (LMS) algorithm with constant step-size considerably.<<ETX>>


We present in this paper several iterative methods based on EM and Stochastic EM methodology, that allow to estimate parametric or semiparametric mixture models for randomly right censored lifetime data, provided they are identifiable. We consider different levels of completion for the (incomplete) observed data, and provide genuine or EM-like algorithms for several situations. In particular, we show that in censored semiparametric situations, a stochastic step is the only practical solution allowing computation of nonparametric estimates of the unknown survival function. The effectiveness of the new proposed algorithms is demonstrated in simulation studies.


Mammalian STE20-like kinase 2 (MST2), a member of the STE20-like kinase family, has been shown in previous studies to undergo proteolytic activation by caspase-3 during cell apoptosis. A few studies have also implicated protein phosphorylation reactions in MST2 regulation. In this study, we examined the mechanism of MST2 regulation with an emphasis on the relationship between caspase-3 cleavage and protein phosphorylation. Both the full-length MST2 and the caspase-3-truncated form of MST2 overexpressed in 293T cells exist in a phosphorylated state. On the other hand, the endogenous full-length MST2 from rat thymus or from proliferating cells is mainly unphosphorylated whereas the caspase-3-truncated endogenous MST2 from apoptotic cells is highly phosphorylated. Cell transfection studies using mutant MST2 constructs indicate that MST2 depends on the autophosphorylation of a unique threonine residue, Thr180, for kinase activity. The autophosphorylation reaction shows strong dependence on MST2 concentration suggesting that it is an intermolecular reaction. While both the full-length MST2 and the caspase-3-truncated form of MST2 undergo autophosphorylation, the two forms of the phosphorylated MST2 display marked difference in susceptibility to protein phosphatases. The full-length phospho-MST2 is rapidly dephosphorylated by protein phosphatase 1 or protein phosphatase 2A whereas the truncated MST2 is remarkably resistant to the dephosphorylation. Based on the present results, a novel molecular mechanism for MST2 regulation in apoptotic cells is postulated. In normal cells, because of the low concentration and the ready reversal of the autophosphorylation by protein phosphatases, MST2 is present mainly in the unphosphorylated and inactive state. During cell apoptosis, MST2 is cleaved by caspase-3 and undergoes irreversible autophosphorylation, thus resulting in the accumulation of active MST2.


BACKGROUND
Pediatric anesthesia nowadays requires specific knowledge and expertise. The Anaesthesia PRactice In Children Observational Trial (APRICOT) was a European multicentre study designed for the identification of perioperative severe critical events and management. We aimed at analysing the Italian database in an attempt to determine the practice of anesthesia and the incidence of severe critical events in Italy.

METHODS
Secondary analyses of the database consisted in extracting the raw data from the 25 Italian centres that participated to APRICOT. Descriptive statistics and comparison with the reference data were made for all the variables collected.

RESULTS
Two thousands and eighty seven children were analysed. The Italian cohort represents 6.7% of the overall study population. Most of the children were ASA 1-2 (90.6%) and underwent a surgical procedure (62.8%). In more than 84% of the cases, anesthesia management was performed by an expert with main or frequent activity in pediatric anesthesia with on an average 15 years of experience. The overall incidence of severe critical events was 3% (95% CI 2.2-3.8). The most frequently reported severe critical incidents were of respiratory (2%; CI 1.4-2.6) and cardiovascular origin (0.7%; CI 0.3-1), while drug error, anaphylaxis and bronchial aspiration were very rare. There were no report of perioperative cardiac arrest or patients with neurological damage.

CONCLUSIONS
This secondary analysis demonstrates that the incidence of severe critical incidence was lower in Italy in comparison to that reported for Europe. This low rate of critical events may be related to the high expertise and experience of the anesthesiologists in charge of the children in the Italian centres that participated to APRICOT.


Gossip protocols aim at arriving, by means of point-to-point or group communications, at a situation in which all the agents know each other's secrets. We consider distributed gossip protocols which are expressed by means of epistemic logic. We provide an operational semantics of such protocols and set up an appropriate framework to argue about their correctness. Then we analyze specific protocols for complete graphs and for directed rings.


This paper considers the multiarmed bandit problem with multiple simultaneous arm pulls and the additional restriction that we do not allow recourse to arms that were pulled at some point in the past but then discarded. This additional restriction is highly desirable from an operational perspective, and we refer to this problem as the "irrevocable multiarmed bandit" problem. We observe that natural modifications to well-known heuristics for multiarmed bandit problems that satisfy this irrevocability constraint have unsatisfactory performance and, thus motivated, introduce a new heuristic: the "packing" heuristic. We establish through numerical experiments that the packing heuristic offers excellent performance, even relative to heuristics that are not constrained to be irrevocable. We also provide a theoretical analysis that studies the "price" of irrevocability, i.e., the performance loss incurred in imposing the constraint we propose on the multiarmed bandit model. We show that this performance loss is uniformly bounded for a general class of multiarmed bandit problems and indicate its dependence on various problem parameters. Finally, we obtain a computationally fast algorithm to implement the packing heuristic; the algorithm renders the packing heuristic computationally cheaper than methods that rely on the computation of Gittins indices.


Autoradiography is used to determine the anatomical distribution of biological molecules in human tissue and experimental animal models. This method is based on the analysis of the specific binding of radiolabeled compounds to locate neurotransmitter receptors or transporters in fresh frozen tissue slices. The anatomical resolution obtained by quantification of the radioligands has allowed the density of receptor proteins to be mapped over the last 40 years. The data yielded by autoradiography identify the receptors at their specific microscopic localization in the tissues and also in their native microenvironment, the intact cell membrane. Furthermore, in functional autoradiography, the effects of small molecules on the activity of G protein-coupled receptors are evaluated. More recently, autoradiography has been combined with membrane microarrays to improve the high-throughput screening of compounds. These technical advances have made autoradiography an essential analytical method for the progress of drug discovery. We include the future prospects and some preliminary results for imaging mass spectrometry (IMS) as a useful new method in pharmacodynamic and pharmacokinetic studies, complementing autoradiographic studies. IMS results could also be presented as density maps of molecules, proteins, and metabolites in tissue sections that can be identified, localized, and quantified, with the advantage of avoiding any labeling of marker molecules. The limitations and future developments of these techniques are discussed here.


With the booming number of web services, it is a challenge for inexperienced developers to select suitable services and make service compositions. Therefore, recommending services based on user queries becomes a necessity. For modeling the queries and services' descriptions, many recent studies are based on LDA (Latent Dirichlet Allocation). However, some previous empirical works indicate that LDA model doesn't gain high accuracy in generating latent presentation which is subject to the restrictive assumption of the Dirichlet-Multinomial distribution. In this paper, we propose a Time-aware Collaborative Poisson Factorization (TCPF) to tackle the problem. TCPF takes Poisson Factorization as the foundation to model mashup queries and service descriptions separately, and incorporate them with the historical usage data together using collective matrix factorization. Experiments on the real-world ProgrammableWeb dataset show that our model outperforms the state-of-the-art methods (e.g., Time-aware collaborative domain regression) by 7.7% in terms of mean average precision, and costs much less time on the sparse, massive and long-tailed data set.


Trialkyphosphine oxides (TRPO) was successfully used for the impregnation of D3520 resin to prepare an extractant-impregnated resin (EIR). Solid extraction of Au(I) from alkaline cyanide solution was studied using this extractant-impregnated resin (EIR), with addition of cetyltrimethylammonium bromide (CTMAB), directly into the aurous aqueous phase in advance. The mechanism of solid extraction was further investigated by means of FTIR, XPS and SEM. The column separation studies have shown that cationic surfactant CTMAB played a key role in the solid phase extraction, and the resin containing TRPO were effective for the extraction of gold when the molar ratio of CTMAB: Au( I ) reached 1:1. FTIR spectroscopy of gold loaded EIR showed that the frequency of C[triple bond]N stretching vibration was at 2144 cm(-1), and the frequency of P=O stretching vibration shifted to lower frequency from 1153 to 1150 cm(-1). The XPS spectrum of N(1s), Au(4f7/2) and Au(4f5/2) sugges- ted that the coordination environment of gold did not change before and after extraction, and gold was still as the form of Au (CN)2(-) anion exiting in the loaded resin; O(1s) spectrum showed that the chemically combined water significantly increased after solid extraction from 30.74% to 42.34%; Comparing to the P(2p) spectrum before and after extraction, the binding energy increased from 132. 15 to 132. 45 eV, indicating there maybe existing hydrogen-bond interaction between P=O and water molecule, such as P=O...H-O-H. The above results obtained established that in the solid extraction process, the hydrophobic ion association [CTMA+ x Au(CN)] diffused from the bulk solution into the pores of the EIR, and then be solvated by TRPO adsorbed in the pores through hydrogen bonding bridged by the water molecules.


Taking exception to the psychoanalytic and theological interpretations, I stress the play's resistance to interpretation and suggest that the play might well be about the art of living in a meaningless world. Borrowing the term 'semiotic chora' from Julia Kristeva, I read as a representation and dramatization of the space where subjectivity has not yet been constructed and thus many possibilities are still open. I also suggest that the play offers a therapeutic journey to the abject elements of human life.


Internal damping is investigated for body-centred cubic transition metals (W, Mo, Nb, Ta), using a torsional pendulum, for temperatures between 80° K and 300° K. Cold-worked specimens are found to have a relaxation peak between 200° K and 250° K, which can in general be resolved into several components. By comparison with high frequency measurements, these component peaks are thought to consist of two sets, one due to the relaxation of dislocations (Bordoni peaks) and the other due to the relaxation of the point defects loosely bound to dislocation lines.


CYSTOID MACULAR EDEMA AFTER PHACOEMULSIFICATION IN DIABETICS Samanta et al report 65 diabetic patients with a variety of levels of retinopathy who underwent phacoemulsification. Although 47% of those without preexisting retinopathy and 55% of those with pre-existing retinopathy (p<0.05) developed postoperative cystoid macular edema, there was a tendency for those with no pre-existing retinopathy to develop angiographic rather than clinical edema.


In this Paper we discuss an algorithm for a real-time transmission of moving color image on the TCP/IP network using wavelet transform and neural network. The Image frames received from the camera are two-level wavelet-transformed in the server, and are transmitted to the client on the network. Then, the client performs the inverse wavelet-transform using only the received pieces of each image frame within the prescribed time limit to display the moving images. When the TCP/IP network is busy, only a fraction of each image frame will be delivered. When the line is free, the whole frame of each image will be transferred to the client. The receiver warns the sender of the condition of traffic congestion in the network by sending a special short frame for this specific purpose. The sender can respond to this information of warning by simply reducing the data rate which is adjusted with a neural network or fuzzy logic. In this way we can send a stream of moving images adaptively adjusting to the network traffic condition.


Abstract
 Global warming is one of biggest problems faced in the 21st century. One of the impacts of global warming is that it can affect the transpiration rate of plants that °Ccur. This study purpose to see how much increase in air temperature that occurred in the region of South Sumatra Province and to know the effect of increase in ari temperature in the region of South Sumatra Province on transpiration rate of Lansium domesticum Corr. This study used a complete randomized design with 9 treatments (22.9 °C, 23.6 °C, 24.6 °C, 26.3 °C, 27 °C, 27.8 °C, 31.7 °C, 32.5 °C, and 32.9 °C) and 3 replications. Air temperature data as secondary data obtained from the Meteorology, Climatology and Geophysics Agency (MCGA) Palembang Climatology Station in South Sumatra Province. The measurement of transpiration rate is done by modified potometer method with additional glass box. The data obtained are presented in the form of tables and graphs. Transpiration rate (mm3/g plant/hour) at temperture 22.9 °C = 4.37, 23.6 °C = 7.03, 24.6 °C = 8.03, 26.3 °C = 10.11, 27 °C = 13.13, 27.8 °C = 17.87, 31.7 °C = 23.21, 32.5 °C= 25.45 and 32.9 °C= 27.24. At the minimum air temperature in the region of South Sumatra Province there is increase in air temperature of 1.5 °C, average daily air temperature increase 1.3 °C and maximum air temperature increase 1.2 °C.


Intramuscular hemangioma (IMH) of the upper extremity is extremely rare and mostly found in children. The authors presented a 39-year-old female with an unusual case of fixed flexion deformity of the middle finger and ring finger with deep forearm pain for three years. The patient was diagnosed with IMH of the flexor digitorum superficialis muscle. Excision of the IMH was performed and intra-operatively passive extension of PIP joints was achieved. After 12 months follow-up, the patient was satisfied with the outcomes with no recurrence of flexion contracture. IMH of the upper extremity is an uncommon disease, especially in adults. It should be considered in patient who presented with deep forearm pain and finger flexion deformity. Early investigation should be performed and surgical removal remains the treatment of choice. Furthermore, tendon transfer should be reserved in case of functional deficits.

Keywords: Intramuscular hemangioma, Flexion contracture, Forearm, Soft tissue tumor


Web site evolution is characterized by a limited support to the understanding activities offered to the developers. In fact, design diagrams are often missing or outdated. A potentially interesting option is to reverse engineer high level views of Web sites from the content of the Web pages. Clustering is a valuable technique that can be used in this respect. Web pages can be clustered together based on the similarity of summary information about their content, represented as a list of automatically extracted keywords. This work presents an empirical study that was conducted to determine the meaningfulness for Web developers of clusters automatically produced from the analysis of the Web page content. Natural language processing (NLP) plays a central role in content analysis and keyword extraction. Thus, a second objective of the study was to assess the contribution of some shallow NLP techniques to the clustering task.


Choice of diet is a combination of socioeconomic, psychological, and biological factors. This article reports on a preliminary study using an animal model and approximating the dietary conditions found on some Native American reservations. The results suggest that alcohol consumption in these disadvantaged populations may be a result of tryptophan deficiency. Tryptophan-deficient rats consumed more alcohol under ad-libitum conditions, perhaps to compensate for the lack of this essential amino acid. Tryptophan is the biological precursor of serotonin, a central neurotransmitter that has been implicated in mood elevations and declines. Alcohol has been found to mimic the effects of tryptophan or serotonin. We suggest that alcohol consumption may act to compensate for the dietary deficiency of this amino acid. The model attributing alcohol consumption to tryptophan deficiency thus connects socioeconomic, psychological, and biological factors.


ABSTRACT Introduction Psoriatic Arthritis (PsA) is a multifaceted disease in which various musculoskeletal and skin manifestations are involved. Beyond these features, PsA is associated with comorbidities that might increase the burden of the disease. Areas covered In the last years a growing interest has come out for the concept of multimorbidity in rheumatology. Multimorbidity was defined as the 'co-existence of two or more chronic diseases in the same individual.' In the multimorbidity concept, the patient is of central concern and all coexisting diseases are of equal importance. Comorbidity was defined as the 'occurrence of any distinct additional entity during the clinical course of patient who has the index disease under study.' In PsA, comorbidity and multimorbidity have often been confusingly used interchangeably, showing that there is an unmet need on this topic. Expert opinion This perspective article dealt with these different visions of the co-existence of other diseases in PsA, providing a distinction between them, not only for the impact on the treatment decision but also in how this concept might be incorporated into clinical trials design, choosing the right outcome measures for the patient-centric concept of multimorbidity. For this perspective, the authors searched PubMed and the Cochrane library for articles published.


The diagnosis of amebic colitis can be difficult and confusing. The gross endoscopic appearance as well as the results of endoscopic biopsy can be extremely helpful in differentiating amebiasis from other forms of colitis. Clinical symptoms, laboratory studies, x-ray findings, cultures, and even serological studies may not be sufficient for making an accurate diagnosis. To illustrate the potential difficulties we are reporting three patients in whom the diagnosis of amebiasis was considered but in whom endoscopy was important for arriving at the correct diagnosis.


Drawing on the thoughts of various philosophers, political thinkers, economists, and lawyers, Terry Anderson and Laura Huggins present a blueprint for the nonexpert-expert on how societies can encourage or discourage freedom and prosperity through their property rights institutions. This Hoover Classic edition ofProperty Rightsdetails step-by-step what property rights are, what they do, how they evolve, how they can be protected, and how they promote freedom and prosperity."


Specific distortions of the five-dimensional cubic hyperlattice are proposed to describe the approximant phases of the decagonal phase in Al-Cu-Co-Si and Al-Cu-Co alloys. Density wave patterns are used to show the corresponding simulation of known high-resolution electron microscopy images.


Safely managed waste reuse may be a sustainable way to protect human health and livelihoods in agrarian-based countries without adequate sewerage. The safe recovery and reuse of fecal sludge-derived fertilizer (FSF) has become an important policy discussion in low-income economies as a way to manage urban sanitation to benefit peri-urban agriculture. But what drives the user acceptance of composted fecal sludge? We develop a preference-ranking model to understand the attributes of FSF that contribute to its acceptance in Karnataka, India. We use this traditionally economic modeling method to uncover cultural practices and power disparities underlying the waste economy. We model farmowners and farmworkers separately, as the choice to use FSF as an employer versus as an employee is fundamentally different. We find that farmers who are willing to use FSF prefer to conceal its origins from their workers and from their own caste group. This is particularly the case for caste-adhering, vegetarian farmowners. We find that workers are open to using FSF if its attributes resemble cow manure, which they are comfortable handling. The waste economy in rural India remains shaped by caste hierarchies and practices, but these remain unacknowledged in policies promoting sustainable 'business' models for safe reuse. Current efforts under consideration toward formalizing the reuse sector should explicitly acknowledge caste practices in the waste economy, or they may perpetuate the size and scope of the caste-based informal sector.


Petro-conflict in the Niger Delta area of Nigeria has caused significant disruption of
oil business and loss of lives over five decades. The crises escalated from the
struggle between the indigenous and the Nigerian government to control oil
exploration. In order to understand the causes and responses of the indigenous Niger
Delta people to the Petro-conflict, qualitative research methods based on the
narrative method of inquiry were used to collect data from the three actors namely;
the indigenous people, the oil and gas companies (OGCs) and Nigerian government
representatives. The purpose of this qualitative study was to explore the causes of
petro-conflict and responses in the Niger Delta Region of Nigeria. The study is
guided by the following research objectives;
1. To investigate the main causes of Petro-conflict in the Niger Delta region.
2. To explore provocative confrontations leading to the use of firearms by the
militia group to protect the interest of the indigenous Niger Delta.
3. To examine the effect of oil exploring activities by the oil companies in the
Niger Delta region.
4. To identify the strategies used by Nigerian government to restore peace in the
Niger Delta region.
5. To investigate the perception of the indigenous Niger Delta people towards
establishing a lasting peace in the region.
The criteria for data collection were that the informants must have had a minimum of
25 years experience of the Petro-conflict in the area. This strategy was used to ensure
that the informants supply sufficient data to describe various crises over a reasonable
period. This is necessary to gain more insight on the qualitative data obtained
through an in-depth interview conducted at the convenience of 12 informants
comprising of 4 each from the three actors. Content analysis was used to extract
relevant data corresponding to the experiences of the informants. Crisis Decision
Theory postulated by Sweeny's and Coping Theory by Lazarus and Folkman's were used to explain the causes and responses of the indigenous Niger Delta people to the
Petro-conflict. Nigeria government decision and concern was mainly for the interest
of protecting the oil resources and neglected the welfare of the indigenous people.
This further stir-up among the indigenous because, oil activities has damaged their
agricultural lands and rivers, which is their primary sources of livelihood. Research
findings shows that the Petro-conflict was intensified by the unfair decision by
government. The militant group comprising of indigenous youth often aggressively
confronts military forces, further disrupts, and destroys oil and gas pipeline and oil
activities. For oil activities to continue, Nigerian government mobilizes the military
forces to guard oil exploration activities in the region. The expectation of the
indigenous such as providing job opportunities and alternative sources of livelihood
has not been satisfied and the Petro-conflict has affected the entire region. The Petroconflict
remains a threat in the Niger Delta area as long as the interest of the
government is devoted to the resources rather than the people. Although organizing
an interview for data collection was very difficult in the Niger Delta area, the
research method was appropriate to explore the causes of the Petro-conflict and the
responses of the indigenous people.


Simple geometric models of wheat grains have been analysed to determine the effects of changes In shape and size on volume per unit surface area and hence potential milling yield. These analyses suggest that substantial changes In grain volume would have a greater effect on milling yield than would changes in grain shape. The shape and size of kernels of current Australian cultivars differ markedly from the optimum required to maximize volume per unit surface area (1 e. a spherical gram) Available data on genetic variability for grain size indicates that it should be possible to increase the gram size of Australian wheats by 50-100% and improve potential milling yields by 2-3%. However, while considerable genetic variation for grain shape also exists, the evidence available suggests that selection for optimal shape is likely to result in a correlated reduction in seed size thereby offsetting any gains achieved by changing seed shape.


The study of Paul—more than the study of Jesus—has been and continues to be the arena of discourse where Christians (and recently some Jews) work out their religious identity. Put another way, reading, interpreting and reinterpreting Paul fosters the construction, reconstruction, and sometimes deconstruction of the boundary that marks the distinction between Christianity and Judaism.Since there exists much scholarship on how the history of the interpretation of Paul has been motivated by Christian–Jewish polemic, I will not illustrate that history here. Instead, I wish to highlight two things that distinguish the contemporary debate from previous ones: 1) There is input from the Jewish side—both in terms of content and persons,—which has led to what many think of as a "Jewish" understanding of Paul; and 2) that this Jewish perspective on Paul is not only perceived by some scholars as problematic, wrong, or misguided but as a threat to Christianity itself, thus proving that Christian–Jewish polemic is alive and well in Pauline studies, in spite of recent widespread acknowledgment of Paul's Jewishness!Demonstrating that these two qualities characterize current debate about Paul is not difficult to do. However, by discussing these two aspects of Pauline scholarship, I intend to complicate the notion of religious identity at work in the interpretation of Paul, in an effort to reveal that an essentialist understanding of religious identity underlies the debate about Paul's Jewishness. This kind of essentialism fails to account for the elasticity within religious traditions and the permeability between religious traditions, and thus it greatly exacerbates the problem of Christian–Jewish polemic in the study of Paul. Unless we grasp the flexibility that inheres in religious identity, which includes giving up the notion of essentialism, the study of Paul will continue to be marred by these polemics.


For the longitudinal survey of human schistosomiasis japonica in the villages of Sto. Tomas and San Vicente in the province of Bohol, Philippines, the circumoval precipitin (COP) test was used for case detection. Plasma collected by finger prick from the community people and lyophilized eggs of Schistosoma japonicum were used for the assay. Degree of precipitation at type 2 or 3 of Yokogawa et al. [1] was considered as positive. Selective mass chemotherapy with praziquantel was given to the patients including cases with only positive COP reactions. San Vicente and Sto. Tomas villages were examined in 1984 and 1982, respectively and followed up in 1986. Positive COP reactions were converted to negative in 82.1% or 55 out of 67 cases treated in 1984 and 1985 at San Vicente. Similarly, negative conversion was observed in 75.4% or 43 out of 57 cases treated in 1981 and 1982 at Sto. Tomas. The cases with persistent positive COP reaction after treatment were considered as incomplete cure or reinfection. The concentrated distribution of positive cases around the habitat of Oncomelania snails was observed at San Vicente where the prevalence of COP positives declined from 22.2% to 14.0% in 2 years. These results suggest that in the area with selective mass chemotherapy on schistosomiasis japonica, COP reactions of treated cases are converted to negative at high proportions in 2 years, and the positives detected by subsequent survey after 2 years are considered mostly as new infections or reinfections.


Current research in author profiling to discover a legal author's fingerprint does not only follow examinations based on statistical parameters only but include more and more dynamic methods that can learn and that react adaptable to the specific behavior of an author. But the question on how to appropriately represent a text is still one of the fundamental tasks, and the problem of which attribute should be used to fingerprint the author's style is still not exactly defined. In this work, we focus on linguistic selection of attributes to fingerprint the style of the authors Parkin, Bassewitz and Leander. We use texts of the genre Fairy Tale as it has a clear style and texts of a shorter size with a straightforward story-line and a simple language.


Introduction Dendritic cells (DC) play a key role in discriminating between commensal microorganisms and potentially harmful pathogens. Expression of surface markers and cytokine production by DC at the time of antigen presentation control T-cell differentiation, cytokine profile & homing properties imprinted on stimulated T-cells. This process defines the type of immune response that occurs and its anatomical location. In CD, dysregulation of the immune response to gut microbiota and aberrant immune cell trafficking play a central role in disease pathogenesis. Infliximab (IFX) is an effective treatment for CD, but its mechanism of action is unclear. In this study, we investigated the effect of IFX pre-treated blood-enriched DC, isolated from patients with active CD and healthy controls (HC), on human T-cell proliferation, phenotype&cytokine production Methods Low density cells (LDC), enriched for DC, were obtained following Ficoll and Nycoprep gradient separation of fresh blood from patients with active ileocolonic CD (CDAI > 220) and HC. LDC were cultured (0.5x106cells/ml) with IFX (1.10μg&100μg/ml&basal) for 24hr. T-cells were enriched from allogeneic HC blood and labelled with CFSE. LDC were added to T-cells in complete medium (400,000cells/ml) at basal,1.2&3% concentrations and incubated for 5days. Following incubation, T-cell proliferation, expression of β7&CLA surface homing markers and cytokine content of T-cells (TNFα, TGFβ, IFNγ, IL-10.15.17) was quantified by flow cytometry on stimulated T-cells. Unparied t-test and one-way ANOVA statistical analyses were applied Results In basal conditions, LDC from HC & CD patients did not differ in their stimulatory capacity for allogeneic T-cells or in the cytokine profile acquired by T-cells. However, T-cells stimulated by LDC from CD patients decreased β7 intensity ratio. Following culture with IFX, LDC decreased their stimulatory capacity in a dose-dependent, stepwise fashion in both HC and CD. Culture with IFX did not have any effect on the acquired homing profile of stimulated T-cells, although these T-cells had a trend (not statistically significant) towards lower TNFα and higher IL-17 production Conclusion The marked reduction in the ability of LDC to stimulate T-cells following culture with IFX represents one plausible explanation for the efficacy of anti TNF-alpha therapies in the treatment of CD. This effect was dose-dependent (within our range of test concentrations) suggesting that higher doses of IFX further reduce T-cell stimulation and may provide one explanation of the clinical benefits of dose escalation in refractory CD Disclosure of Interest None Declared.


The working process of marine diesel engine is simulated by combining mean value engine model and volumetric model. It reflects some average parameters such as effective pressure, effective power and engine speed, as well as reflects real-time explosion pressure, maximum temperature in cylinder and indicator diagram. In order to accelerate the simulation, Crank Angle and cylinder pressure is imported into MATLAB workspace, and a diesel model based on BP neural networks is built. The cylinder pressure can be shown in marine simulator by using trained BP neural network.


How should we define 'health' and 'disease'? There are three main positions in the literature. Naturalists desire value-free definitions based on scientific theories. Normativists believe that our uses of 'health' and 'disease' reflect value judgments. Hybrid theorists offer definitions containing both normativist and naturalist elements. This paper discusses the problems with these views and offers an alternative approach to the debate over 'health' and 'disease'. Instead of trying to find the correct definitions of 'health' and 'disease' we should explicitly talk about the considerations that are central in medical discussions, namely state descriptions (descriptions of physiological or psychological states) and normative claims (claims about what states we value or disvalue). This distinction avoids the problems facing the major approaches to defining 'health' and 'disease', and it more clearly captures what matters in medical


This paper will discuss the problem of environmental pollution and waste management. Everything that surrounds us is directly or indirectly connected to the environment. Not only the man, but also other living beings as well as the nature (volcanic eruptions, earthquakes) have effects on environmental pollution. Environmental pollution is present from the very beginning of life, but today it is a serious problem that threatens the survival of mankind. During the preparation of scientific research, we noticed a problem: "What is the influence of the waste management on the environment?" Today, every person living on planet Earth is worried about environmental pollution because the consequences faced every day, through the air we breathe, the food and water we consume, through pollution and radiation we are exposed to. Also, the consequences of environmental problems are manifested through the lack of natural resources, extinction of plant and animal species, as well as the problems in the global ecosystems and biochemical processes. Based on the research problem we can hypothesize: Yes, waste management has a great impact on the environment.


Differences in cranial morphology among the Dicynodontia have been correlated with changes in masticatory function, and hence, dietary preference. Although the derived masticatory apparatus of dicynodonts allowed propaliny, it has previously been hypothesized that Lystrosaurus primarily utilized powerful orthal jaw movements to process fibrous vegetation. Cranial specializations of Lystrosaurus, such as shortened and deepened cranium and a mobile premaxilla‐nasal suture, are thought to have increased the efficiency of its masticatory system compared with generalized Permian dicynodonts. Here we aim to test this assertion using biomechanical modeling techniques. We use finite element analysis (FEA) and a study of cranial functional morphology to compare the biomechanical performance of the crania of Lystrosaurus and Oudenodon, a generalized dicynodont, during orthal bite simulations. Muscle forces were estimated for each dicynodont using the dry skull method and applied to each cranium to produce a reaction force at a bite point. Patterns and average magnitude of Von Mises stress in each dicynodont cranium and in segmented regions of interest were assessed. During orthal bite simulations, higher stress occurs throughout the Oudenodon cranium, indicating that the cranium of Lystrosaurus is more resistant to normal, static feeding loads. Despite this difference in stress magnitude, patterns of stress are similar within both taxa. The FE‐stress results, along with mechanical advantage of adductor musculature, a broad symphyseal contact, and other cranial features suggest that Lystrosaurus may have used a snapping bite to cope with tough fibrous vegetation. Anat Rec, 292:862–874, 2009. © 2009 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.


Background: Redo coronary artery bypass grafting (redo CABG) is associated with increased mortality and morbidity. The aim of this study was to systematically evaluate the evidence comparing the outcomes of off-pump with on-pump redo CABG. Methods: Studies were systematically searched and identified using PubMed, EMBASE, the Cochrane Library, and the International Clinical Trials Registry Platform (ICTRP) by two researchers independently. The primary outcome was 30-day mortality, and the secondary outcomes were in-hospital mortality, post-operative complications, completeness of revascularization, blood transfusion rate, duration of mechanical ventilation, intensive care unit and hospital stays. Results: The 21 studies including 4,889 patients were enrolled in our meta-analysis. Compared with on-pump, the off-pump technique was associated with significantly reduced 30-day mortality (odds ratio [OR] = 0.43, 95% confidence interval [CI] = 0.26-0.72, p = 0.001). Moreover, a notably decreased in-hospital mortality (OR = 0.55, 95% CI = 0.39-0.76, p = 0.0004) and incidence of post-operative new-onset atrial fibrillation, myocardial infarction, acute kidney injury, low cardiac output state, blood transfusion rate (OR = 0.46, 95% CI = 0.35-0.60, p < 0.00001; OR = 0.54, 95% CI = 0.38-0.78, p = 0.0007; OR = 0.51, 95% CI = 0.37-0.70, p < 0.0001; OR = 0.31, 95% CI = 0.20-0.47, p < 0.00001; OR = 0.29, 95% CI = 0.14-0.61, p = 0.001) and significantly shortened duration of mechanical ventilation, intensive care unit and hospital stays (mean difference [MD] = −8.21 h, 95% CI = −11.74 to −4.68, p < 0.00001; MD = −0.77 d, 95% CI = −0.81 to −0.73, p < 0.00001; MD = −2.24 d, 95% CI = −3.17 to −1.32, p < 0.00001) could be observed when comparing the outcomes of off-pump with on-pump redo CABG. There was nonsignificant difference between off-pump and on-pump redo CABG in completeness of revascularization. Conclusion: In patients undergoing redo CABG surgery, the off-pump technique was associated with decreased mortality, less post-operative complications when compared to on-pump.


The problem of shooting targets in the air is rather complex task, in which every missile system for air defence is responsible for fire control. In this paper we present a novel approach and mode for fire control in air-defence systems based on homing missiles. A device for calculation of the launching zone (AOZ) is used for intelligent estimation whether the target has entered the launching zone. The proposed novel approach makes essential use a fuzzy reasoning, a fuzzy-rule knowledge base for target's velocity, to calculate the launching zone immediately upon the first detection of a target. Namely, it uses pre-defined launching zones for different flying regimes and different velocities of potential targets, and the data are stored into a look-up table along with the associated pass angles and flying times to the launching zone border. Computational model for simulation and simulation experiments were carried out using a new model constructed in Matlab-Simulink platform. Copyright © 2007 IFAC


This article aims to explain the presence of mosque in Ambarukmo Plaza which is categorized one of the leading shopping center in Yogyakarta. The presence of mosque in the shopping center is a unique and interesting phenomenon because the mosque becomes one of the essential elements of the marketing strategy that the management of the mosque is directly under the management of Ambarukmo Plaza. So that the mosque becomes an integral part of the market system which takes place in the shopping center. In view of the business, providing public facilities are part of the service to the consumer. The mosque which is used as a public facility, in addition to having the function as a means of worship, is also functioned as a means of social activities and other activities. In terms of methodology, this article was written by using a qualitative approach that produces descriptive data about the presence of mosque in Ambarukmo Plaza, Yogyakarta. Based on the analysis of field data findings by using Bourdieu's concepts such practice, habitus, and arena, as well as market and capital, it can be drawn the conclusion that the presence of mosque in the shopping center opens a new space related to the religious capital, and it encourages the owners of religious capital to compete and to win this relatively new arena. Instead, the owner of the economic capital that intentionally creates this new arena is also competing to increase their capital accumulation through the same arena. Thus, the implication, if any shopping center or mall uses the religious capital to win the market, then it will indirectly strengthen the thesis from some social scientists predicted that this is the age of religious resurgence in the public sphere.

Keywords: mosque, mall, bourdieu, religious capital and religious resurgence.


ABSTRACT Recently, the AlB2-type compounds (such as AlB2 and MgB2) which exhibit Dirac Nodal Line (DNLs) semimetal on their electronic band structure and Phononic Weyl Nodal Straight Lines (PTWNLs) on their phonon spectrum, have received wide attentions on their novel properties. Up to date, no comparative studies have been investigated on their electronic structures, phonon spectrum, and electron phonon coupling (EPC) under the conditions of carrier doping and strain engineering. Here, we systemically investigate their above properties under carrier doping and strain engineering by first-principles calculations. The results show that the superconducting transition temperature T c can be enhanced by electron doping and tensile strain. For AlB2, the tensile strain of 6% can enhance T c to 10.25 K and with the doping concentrate of 0.1 e- per cell can enhance T c reach to 9.89 K. Moreover, the physical quantities related to superconductivity of AlB2 are more affected by carrier doping than MgB2. Our results provide a theoretical reference to explore the correlation between electronic and phonon topological properties in AlB2-type materials.


Subcutaneous injections of ovine PRL (oPRL; 4 mg/kg) were used to study the negative feedback of PRL on its own secretion in the adult male rat. A single injection of oPRL significantly suppressed the endogenous secretion of rat PRL within 3-4 h, an effect that persisted until the oPRL was substantially cleared from the circulation some 4-6 h later. In rats injected every 8 h, rat PRL levels were suppressed for 48 h, while LH titers increased significantly at some time points, and FSH levels varied in the same direction as LH. LHRH concentrations in 10 brain structures containing cell bodies, axons, and terminal boutons were not affected by 48 h of oPRL treatment. Dopamine turnover in both medial and lateral aspects of the median eminence increased as early as 2 h after the first oPRL injection and remained elevated after 10 and 26 h of oPRL exposure. The results are consistent with the hypothesis that the tuberoinfundibular dopamine neurons mediate the negative feedback action of PRL on its own secretion. Further, under these experimental conditions, neurons projecting to both medial and lateral aspects of the median eminence are equally sensitive to elevated PRL levels.


The Gross-Pitaevskii equation, or more generally the nonlinear Schrodinger equation, models the Bose-Einstein condensates in a macroscopic gaseous superfluid wave-matter state in ultra-cold temperature. We provide analytical study of the NLS with L2 initial data in order to understand propagation of the defocusing and focusing waves for the BEC mechanism in the presence of electromagnetic fields. Numerical simulations are performed for the two-dimensional GPE with anisotropic quadratic potentials.


Qualified assistance for stoma patients in
Lithuania is insufficient. Failure to provide preoperative
information to patients results in not only physical, but also
psychological trauma, which negatively affects the patients'
postoperative quality of life. Physicians and nurses have
insufficient information about stoma care. In Lithuania, there have
been no studies that would evaluate the organization of assistance
for stoma patients. The aim of the performed study was to identify
the drawbacks in the assistance for stoma patients in hospitals,
and to propose measures for the elimination of these drawbacks.
Methods and results. During the study, several investigations were
performed, including questionnaire-based inquiry of patients for
the evaluation of their post-operative quality of life following
stoma formation, and the inquiry of patients for the comparison of
the importance of preoperative and postoperative training on stoma
care. The inquiry was performed using standardized quality of life
questionnaires EORTC QLQ-C30 (version 3), EORTC QLQ-CR38, and
additional questionnaires aimed at the evaluation of the
convenience of the stoma site and the influence of preoperative and
postoperative training on the quality of life during the distant
postoperative period. For the second inquiry, three groups of
subjects were formed. The first group included patients in whom
optimal site of the stoma was selected before the operation, who
were provided with full information on... [to full
text]


The authors report the ultrastructural characteristics of myopericytoma, a recently described variant of perivascular (pericytic) tumors, mainly with regard to their myopericytic cells and vessels. Myopericytes range between pericytes and vascular smooth muscle cells (SMCs) in a morphologic continuum. The principal findings of the intermediate phenotypes are (1) elongated or annular morphology with processes of varying length and thickness (usually long and thin); (2) a continuous, irregularly thickened and zonally duplicated basement membrane; (3) heterocellular "peg and socket" junctions with neighboring endothelial cells, and scarce specialized junctions between myopericytes; (4) numerous micropinocytotic vesicles, whether continuous or forming focal rows; (5) abundant thin microfilaments, grouped in bundles with dense bodies and adhesion plaques; (6) poorly developed synthetic system (RER and Golgi); (7) pseudointracellular bodies formed by invagination of basement and plasma membranes, with numerous endocytic vesicles; and (8) zones of cytoplasmic rarefaction near micropinocytotic vesicles and intracellular organelles. The ultrastructure of myopericytes therefore makes it possible to distinguish them from pericytes, SMCs, and fibroblast/myofibroblasts, which is useful for myopericytoma diagnosis. The main pattern of the vessels, with perivascular concentric and multilayered growth of myopericytes (a thick wall in contrast to a small lumen) and lack of elastic material, also supports an intermediate form between pericytic and muscular microvasculature. The presence of myopericytes more similar to SMCs and of hemangiopericytoma-like vessels concurs with transitional forms with angioleyomyoma and true hemangiopericytoma, histogenetically representing a morphologic continuum for the perivascular tumors.


One of the most important issues in spontaneous speech recognition is how to cope with the degradation of recognition accuracy due to speaking rate fluctuation within an utterance. This paper proposes an acoustic model for adjusting mixture weights and transition probabilities of the HMM for each frame according to the local speaking rate. The proposed model is implemented along with variants and conventional models using the Bayesian network framework. The proposed model has a hidden variable representing variation of the "mode" of the speaking rate and its value controls the parameters of the underlying HMM. Model training and maximum probability assignment of the variables are conducted using the EM/GEM and inference algorithms for Bayesian networks. Utterances from meetings and lectures are used for evaluation where Bayesian network-based acoustic models are used to rescore the utterance hypotheses obtained from a first-pass N-best list. In the experiments, the proposed model shows consistently higher performance than conventional models.


BACKGROUND
Platelet-rich fibrin (PRF) membranes are known to enhance wound healing after periodontal surgeries and dental implant procedures.

OBJECTIVES
The aim of the present study was to examine the effect of PRF on soft tissue healing and the crestal bone level (CBL) around non-submerged dental implants.

MATERIAL AND METHODS
A total of 40 patients, aged 20-60 years, with partially edentulous posterior mandibular sites were divided into 2 groups of 20 patients each: group I received non-submerged implants with a PRF membrane; and group II was treated with non-submerged implants alone. The examined parameters included the modified plaque index (mPI), the gingival index (GI), the width of keratinized tissue (WKT), the thickness of keratinized tissue (TKT), and CBL, assessed using digital intraoral periapical radiography (IOPA). All parameters were measured at baseline (immediately post-op), and at 3-month and 6-month follow-ups.

RESULTS
In comparison with baseline, statistically significant increases in WKT and TKT were observed in both groups at 3 and 6 months post-op (p < 0.05). Also, significant gains were noted in group I vs. group II (p < 0.05). The CBL increased significantly in both groups at 3 and 6 months post-op (p < 0.05), with no remarkable differences from 3 to 6 months. A decreased CBL was observed in group I vs. group II at the 3- and 6-month intervals (p < 0.05).

CONCLUSIONS
The PRF membrane enhances peri-implant tissue wound healing, with gains in soft tissue width and thickness around non-submerged implants.


This research paper is entitled Hedges Used in "Your Letter" The Jakarta Post.The objectives of the study are to describe the types of the hedges that are mostly used in "Your Letter" of The Jakarta Post and to find out the reason why the writer used the hedges in "Your Letter" of The Jakarta Post. As a descriptive
research, the study was conducted by collecting any relevant data and information about the topic or problem of the study. The data collection used the following steps:
searching the on-line newspapers which are required for the research, choosing newspapers that are required, and documenting the data collection. Observing words and phrase written in "Your Letter". The researcher analyzed sentences that have hedging particles, words, and phrases used in "Your Letter" of The Jakarta Post dated April, 9th-14th June. This study focuses on the hedges used in "Your Letter" of The Jakarta Post. In this research, there are 18 texts from 6 data which have 176 hedges. The first domination is modal auxiliary verb; there are 95 hedges or 53,98 %. The second domination is approximators of degree, quantity, frequency and time with 55 hedges or 31,25%. The third domination is modal auxiliary lexical and if clause; there are 13 hedges or 7,39%. The researcher does not find any hedges in adjectival, adverbial and nominal modal phrases; introductory phrases and compound hedges. Moreover, the researcher not only find the type of the hedges but also the function of the hedges. In the research, the reason for minimizing the "thread-to-face" becomes the first domination in the data; there are 95 hedges or 53,98%. The hedges show tentativeness. The second domination is being way of being more precise in reporting result with 55 hedges or 31,25%, the third domination is conforming to an established writing style with 26 hedges or 14,77%. The researcher does not find any function of being positive or negative politeness strategies.


A rare case of dural arteriovenous fistula (DAVF) in the superior sagittal sinus (SSS), the transverse sinus and the sigmoid sinus is reported. A 64-year-old man, who had had an episode of temporary visual disturbance after moderate fever for a week about 20 years before, was aware of loss of visual acuity and reduced field of view in the right eye. When he was introduced to our outpatient service, increased intracranial pressure (ICP) was detected by lumbar puncture. Cerebral angiograms showed bilateral DAVFs both in the posterior fossa and the SSS concomitant with thrombosis in the transverse sinus, sigmoid sinus and SSS. Afterwards, endovascular transarterial embolization through bilateral occipital, posterior auricular and left middle meningeal, superior temporal arteries was carried out. In addition, transvenous thrombolytic therapy using a catheter inserted into SSS resulted in the improvement of his visual problems. Although he was discharged at once, he was readmitted to our department with Foster Kennedy syndrome and increased ICP. Cerebral angiograms showed recurrence of both DAVF and sinus thrombosis. Transarterial embolization was performed again resulting in a significant reduction of DAVF, and his visual acuity was recovered to a moderate degree. The origin of DAVF is still controversial. Although two theories, "congenital" and "acquired", are put forward, it has been thought that both factors play important roles. In our case, the patient had stenosis in the jugular canal portions of the sigmoid sinus. In addition, sinus thrombosis seemed to have occurred. It is thought that increased intrasinus pressure may have lead to communication with surrounding arteries through existing dural vessels. We applied transvenous thrombolytic therapy in this case. Our result suggests that we should consider this therapy for some cases of DAVF.


The research study compares the effect of different concentrations of
Artemisia vulgaris (Damong Maria) on Mesocricetus auratus (golden hamster)
with induced gastric ulcer. Forty eight mature male golden hamsters were
acclimatized for seven days and were grouped by six treatments; each treatment
had eight golden hamsters. The negative control involved administration in 3 days
of 0.05ml of 20% acetic acid for inducing lesion in the cardiac, the fundus and the
pylorus gastric regions. One golden hamster was sacrificed histopathologically to
determine the number and depth of ulcerations. The Omeprazole (Omepron)
known as an anti-ulcer drug served as the positive control. It was given in 12
weeks as Damong Maria to compare its potential anti-ulcer property based on
their different concentrations which are 30%, 50%, 70%, and 90%. The golden
hamster in each treatment was sacrificed to confirm the possible healing of
ulceration on each gastric region. Generally, the increasing concentration
(P<0.05) of Damong Maria extract is indirectly proportional to the gastric lesions
on the ulcer sites.


We experimentally show that biological molecular motor F_{1}-ATPase (F_{1}) implements an optimal rectification mechanism. The rectification mechanism hardly suppresses the synthesis of adenosine triphosphate by F_{1}, which is F_{1}'s physiological role, while inhibiting the unfavorable hydrolysis of adenosine triphosphate. This optimal rectification contrasts highly with that of a simple ratchet model, where the inhibition of the backward current is inevitably accompanied by the suppression of the forward current. Our detailed analysis of single-molecule trajectories demonstrates a novel but simple rectification mechanism of F_{1} with parallel landscapes and asymmetric transition rates.


Abstract The study aimed to assess the effects of vitamin E (VE) supplementation and fat source on fatty acid (FA) composition, VE concentrations, and antioxidant capacity in plasma and tissues of pigs fed to a heavy slaughter weight (150 kg). A total of 64 pigs (32 barrows, 32 gilts; 28.41 ± 0.83 kg) were blocked by sex and weight, and randomly assigned to one of eight dietary treatments (n = 8 per treatment) in a 4 × 2 factorial arrangement. Fat sources included corn starch (CS), 5% tallow (TW), 5% distiller's corn oil (DCO), and 5% coconut oil (CN); VE supplementation levels were 11 and 200 ppm. Five-phase diets were formulated to meet requirement estimates of NRC (2012) and fed to pigs for each period of 25 kg from 25 to 150 kg. Increasing VE supplementation level increased C16:1 (P < 0.05) content but decreased C20:0 (P < 0.05) content in backfat and belly fat, while in liver, it increased C17:0 (P < 0.05) but decreased C18:0 (P < 0.05). Compared to the pigs fed the CS diet, the pigs fed the CN diet had greater (P < 0.05) content of total saturated FA, the pigs fed the DCO diet had greater (P < 0.05) content of total polyunsaturated FA content and iodine value, and the pigs fed the TW diet had greater (P < 0.05) content of total monounsaturated FA in backfat, belly fat, and liver. Plasma VE concentrations increased linearly (P < 0.05) with increasing length of feeding but faster (P < 0.05) in the pigs fed the CN and TW diets compared with the CS and DCO diets within the 200 ppm VE level; the pigs fed the DCO diet had the highest plasma VE concentrations (P < 0.05) from Phase 2 to Phase 5 within the 11 ppm VE level. The VE concentrations in liver and loin muscle (P < 0.05) increased with increasing dietary VE level from 11 to 200 ppm, but it was not affected by dietary fat source. There was no effect of VE supplementation and fat source on antioxidant capacity in plasma and liver except that pigs fed the DCO diet had greater liver SOD activity (P < 0.05) than the pigs fed the CN diet. In conclusion, dietary VE supplementation did not affect FA profile in backfat, belly fat, and liver consistently, while dietary FA composition with different fat sources affected much of the FA profile in backfat, belly fat, and liver. The higher level of VE supplementation increased liver and muscle VE concentrations and dietary fat sources affected plasma VE concentrations differently (P < 0.05), wherein the TW and CN diets increased the VE absorption greater than the DCO diet.


This research was carried out with the aim of improving the mathematics learning outcomes of third grade students at SDN Pende 03 by using analog clock teaching aids on time unit measurement material. This type of research is classroom action research (CAR). The subjects were class III students, totaling 23 students. This CAR design includes planning, implementation, observation (evaluation), and reflection. Data collection techniques using observation, tests, and documentation. Data analysis used quantitative descriptive statistics. The results showed an increase in the percentage of student learning outcomes, this can be seen from each cycle. It was found that student learning outcomes increased compared to the pre-cycle average score of 51.96 to 63.48 in the first cycle, then to 72.17 in the second cycle. Thus, it can be concluded that the use of analog clock teaching aids in time unit measurement material can improve student learning outcomes.


Mass spectrometry is a technique for the analysis and very sensitive identification of molecules. It allows one to determine the mass of the studied product, whether pure or in a mixture, and provides some information on its molecular structure. In the particular case of peptides, this method can, under certain conditions, also provide information on the amino acid sequence. There are two complementary methods in mass spectrometry for the study of the biological molecules: i) ionisation by laser desorption assisted by matrix (MALDI) coupled to a mass analyser of the time of flight type (TOF), which is very effective for the direct study of a mixture of products and ii) ionisation by electronebulisation (ESI) coupled to mass analysers of the quadripolar type and time of flight (Qq-TOF), which allows the interfacing between high phase liquid chromatography and mass spectrometry. These two complementary techniques were already used to draw up toxin charts of snake and spider venoms. The purpose is to be able to characterise species based on an actual peptide print of poisonous gland secretions.


Minimizing transportation costs is essential in the forest products industry, as the relatively low value and high weight of the products causes transportation to account for exceptionally high portion of the overall cost. The forest products such as logs, chips, and residues (woody biomass) are one of the major business sources in Michigan especially in Upper Peninsula of Michigan. Currently, truck transportation is used for the great majority of the trips, but it is believed that a more cost-efficient transportation chain might be achieved through use of multimodal approach by trucks and rail and in some cases water transportation.This paper presents the three alternative transportation supply chain models for woody biomass transportation; 1) single mode, 2) multimodal and 3) intermediate storage. The paper uses data from three recent studies to describe the forest products transportation in the upper mid-west, including the typical distances for movements and the breakdown of cost elements for each alternative. It will discuss the potential benefits of increased use of rail as part of the transportation chain and address the perceived drawbacks and challenges caused by the shift. It will also present cost-gradient maps developed to highlight the capability of rail to expand the economical radius for obtaining feedstock and demonstrate how increasing fuel prices change the balance toward multimodal transportation. Finally, the paper will highlight the potential for gained efficiency in log truck operations through increased use of rail.Copyright © 2012 by ASME


ABSTRACT The lead poisoning of Flint, Michigan's water is popularly framed as a case of "environmental racism" given that Flint's population is mostly black and lower income. In this essay I argue that we see the environmental racism that underlies Flint's water poisoning not as incidental to our political-economic order, nor even as stemming from racist intent, but as inseparable from liberalism, an organizing logic we take for granted in our modern age. I expand on the idea of "racial liberalism" here. While upholding the promise of individual freedoms and equality for all, racial liberalism—particularly as it was translated into urban renewal and property making in mid-20th-century urban America—drove dispossession. In Flint racialized property dispossession has been one major factor underlying the city's financial duress, abandonment, and poisoned infrastructure. Yet, through austerity discourse, Flint is disciplined as if it were a financially reckless individual while the structural and historical causes of its duress are masked. Tracing the history of property making and taking in Flint and the effects of austerity urbanism on its water infrastructure, my central argument is that our understanding of Flint's predicament—the disproportionate poisoning of young African-Americans—can be deepened if we read it as a case of racial liberalism's illiberal legacies.


Women play a great role in agriculture activities as they are producer of the major part of food crop in developing countries and empowering them enable household nutrition. This study aims to assess the effect of women's empowerment in agriculture on the nutritional status of children, particularly in rural Burkina Faso. Based on data from the 2014 Multisectoral Continuous Survey (EMC), the study uses variables such as sales income control, access to land, autonomy in production decisions, access to credit and the level of education of women as empowerment measures. For the robustness check, the study adopts a dual measurement approach that first uses the variables of empowerment to identify their isolated effects and builds a composite index of empowerment in a second time. The estimation technique addresses different possibilities for the identification of parameters and the results indicate that women's empowerment has a beneficial effect on children's nutrition.


Medication errors are an important cause of patient morbidity and mortality and excessive costs, including in anesthesia. Conventional methods of injectable drug administration in anesthesia make little use of technology to support manual checking and are idiosyncratic and relatively error prone. Similarly, conventional anesthesia records are handwritten, time-consuming to make, and often unreliable. There are automated record systems, but they do not provide support for checking drugs. Therefore, by using a multifaceted approach based on established principles of systems design and human factors psychology, we have developed a system that includes trays that promote a well-organized anesthetic workspace, color- and bar-coded labeling of syringes, and automatic visual and auditory verification of the syringe labels by computer just before each drug administration. In addition, documentation of drugs administered and a traditional anesthetic case record are generated automatically. The system has been successfully deployed for 25 mo and has been used by 35 anesthesiologists in 1148 diverse cases, including cardiopulmonary bypass procedures, heart and lung transplants, and orthopedic and otorhinolaryngologic operations. It is in daily use in a tertiary teaching center and in a private hospital.


Underlying acquired immunity to the fungus Candida albicans is usually present in adult immunocompetent individuals and is presumed to prevent mucosal colonization progressing to symptomatic infection. Exploration of immunological events leading to Candida resistance or susceptibility has indicated the central role of the innate and adaptive immune systems, the relative contribution of which may vary depending on the site of the primary infection. Nevertheless, acquired resistance to infection results from the development of Th1 responses. Cytokines produced by Th1 cells activate phagocytic cells to a candidacidal state. In contrast, cytokines produced by Th2 cells inhibit Th1 development and deactivate phagocytic effector cells. Because reciprocal influences have been recognized between innate and adaptive Th immunity, it appears that an integrated immune response determines the life‐long commensalism of the fungus at the mucosal level, as well as the transition from mucosal saprophyte to pathogen.


In industrial processes, inferential sensors have been extensively applied for prediction of quality variables that are difficult to measure online directly by hard sensors. Deep learning is a recently developed technique for feature representation of complex data, which has great potentials in soft sensor modeling. However, it often needs a large number of representative data to train and obtain a good deep network. Moreover, layer-wise pretraining often causes information loss and generalization degradation of high hidden layers. This greatly limits the implementation and application of deep learning networks in industrial processes. In this article, a layer-wise data augmentation (LWDA) strategy is proposed for the pretraining of deep learning networks and soft sensor modeling. In particular, the LWDA-based stacked autoencoder (LWDA-SAE) is developed in detail. Finally, the proposed LWDA-SAE model is applied to predict the 10% and 50% boiling points of the aviation kerosene in an industrial hydrocracking process. The results show that the LWDA-SAE-based soft sensor is superior to multilayer perceptron, traditional SAE, and the SAE with data augmentation only for its input layer (IDA-SAE). Moreover, LWDA-SAE can converge at a faster speed with a lower learning error than the other methods.


Motivation: The origin of sex chromosomes and the emergence of the mechanism of inactivation of the X chromosomes in the course of mammalian evolution remain some of the most intriguing phenomena. X inactivation is controlled by a special locus of the X chromosome: the inactivation center, in which the central functional role is assigned to the Xist gene. Despite progress, X inactivation is still in the spotlight and still promises surprises. The question of the origin of X inactivation is opened-ended: what molecular mechanisms made it happen? We are particularly interested in the question of the origin of the Xist gene. How and when did this gene emerge? On the basis of what sequences did they? And since this gene is in the class of large non-coding regulatory RNA genes, this question is more general. The aim of this work was to reconstruct the ancestral Xist gene of placental mammals, to reveal features of its structure and identify its evolutionary pathways. Results: We have performed a comparative analysis of the structure and organization of this gene in a variety of evolutionarily close and distant mammalian species; revealed the mosaic evolution of the structure elements of the gene; identified common conserved and species-specific gene sequences; revealed an interspecific lability of the exon-intron structure; determined the structure of the gene for chimpanzee, dog and rat; reconstructed the gene, which was ancestral to Xist in placental mammals and about 100 Myr ago consisted of 10 exons and had most probably emerged de novo with the advent of the sex chromosomes.


BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE
A mutation (C77G) in exon 4 of the CD45 gene is the most common cause of CD45 abnormal splicing in European populations, which has been associated with an increased susceptibility to human immunodeficiency virus infection. We aimed to analyze the C77G frequency in the Spanish population.

PATIENTS AND METHOD
517 healthy donors. CD45RA and RO expression was determined in circulating T lymphocytes by flow cytometry. CD45 exon 4 sequencing was carried out in individuals with an abnormal coexpression of CD45 isoforms.

RESULTS
6/517 individuals presented CD45RA persistence on memory T cells; all of them were heterozygous for C77G mutation. The resulting allelic frequency was 0,58% (95% confidence interval, 0.23-1.32).

CONCLUSIONS
C77G is present in the Spanish population. Further studies to elucidate its clinical significance are needed.


The Early Ordovician Kindblade Formation (Arbuckle Group), exposed in the Arbuckle Mountains of south-central Oklahoma, is a shallow marine epicontinental carbonate sequence that contains numerous storm deposits. Similar deposits also occur in other Arbukle Group units, although not as abundantly as in the Kindblade Formation. The storm deposits (tempestites) are of two types, proximal and distal; the latter dominates in terms of both number and aggregate thickness. Distal tempestites consist of a fining upward sequence, 5 to 50 cm (2 to 20 in.) thick, that overlies an eroded hardground or firmground. The sequence consists of a lag lithoclastic grainstone that grades up into a laminated peloidal grainstone and then into mudstone. Firmgrounds are characterized by hummocky, sharp, and erosional contacts (relief 2 to 7 cm, 0.75 to 2.75 in.) with grainstone-filled erosive pockets. Hardgrounds are characterized by sharp hummocky-to-convolute surfaces (relief < 4 cm, 1.5 in.), which are mineralized and bored. Primary sedimentary features such as laminations, burrows, and allochems are truncated at the surfaces, and borings are filled with unsorted lithoclasts. The lithoclasts at the base of the sequence are bored, generally well rounded, discoid in shape, and consist of mudstone, peloidal packstone, and oolitic grainstone. Infiltration fabrics within the lithoclastic grainstone include cement-filled shelter voids beneath large clasts and internal sediment perched on the upper surfaces of lithoclasts. The overlying peloidal grainstones contain ripple cross-la inations, plane-laminations, and hummocky cross-stratification as well as rare escape burrows. The overlying mudstone is sparsely fossiliferous and bioturbated with burrows either selectively dolomitized or infilled with lithoclastic grainstone. Although there are many examples of the ideal sequence described above, complex composite or amalgamated beds are also common. Proximal tempestites consist of coarse lithoclastic flat pebble conglomerate beds approximately 1 m (3.25 ft) thick that are interbedded with ooid grainstone and overlie mudstone. The contact between the units is sharp and erosional. The lithoclasts are of variable composition and may be up to 20 cm (7.75 in.) in diameter. The two types of tempestites occur in crude cycles, which consist of distal deposits overlain by proximal tempestites and ooid grainstones. The cycles are interpreted as shallowing-upward progradational sequences. The abundance of the storm deposits in the section, approximately one every 20 cm (7.75 in.), indicates that hundreds of storm-induced events are recorded in the Kindblade Formation. The tempestites represent rare catastrophic events, while the hardgrounds-firmgrounds are discontinuity surfaces that represent gaps in the sequence. End_of_Article - Last_Page 471------------


OBJECTIVE
To establish the values of the pulsed Doppler myocardial performance index (MPI, Tei index) for the left and the right ventricle in normal fetuses at 18 to 40 weeks gestation.

MATERIAL AND METHODS
Echocardiography exams were performed in 140 normal fetuses at 18 to 40 weeks gestation at the tertiary centre for fetal cardiology MPI was calculated in pulsed Doppler using formula: (a-b)/b. The time a was measured from a closure click to the subsequent opening click of the mitral/tricuspid valve and time b from opening to the closure clicks of the aortic/pulmonary valve.

RESULTS
The mean MPI for the LV was 0.47 +/- 0.07 and for RV 0.48 +/- 0.1. There was no difference between the Tei index LV and the Tei index RV (p = 0.41). We observed a linear correlation between the Tei index LV and the Tei index RV (p = 0.008; r = 0.22). Fetal heart rate and gestational age had no effect on the MPI for both ventricles.

CONCLUSIONS
The assessed normal values of Tei index for the left and the right ventricles in fetuses may be used in comparison of myocardial performance in various clinical settings.


In vivo microdialysis was used to measure the effects of long-term treatment of rats with desipramine upon the regulation by α2-adrenoceptors of serotonin (5-HT) release from the serotonergic neurons in the hippocampus. Extracellular levels of 5-HT were estimated by assaying its concentrations in the perfusate using HPLC-ECD. When the α2-adrenoceptor agonist brimonidine was added to the perfusion solution, the K+-evoked 5-HT release was significantly inhibited in a concentration-dependent manner. Treatment with pertussis toxin did not alter the K+-evoked release of 5-HT but abolished the inhibitory effect of brimonidine. Long-term desipramine treatment significantly reduced the inhibitory effect of brimonidine upon the K+-evoked 5-HT release, and both the 5-HT content of the hippocampus and the basal 5-HT concentration in the dialysate were significantly increased. The present study suggests that long-term administration of desipramine causes a functional subsensitivity of the presynaptic α2-adrenoceptors that regulate serotonergic neuronal function in the rat hippocampus. It also supports the concept that changes in the sensitivity of α2-adrenoceptors that regulate neurotransmitter release play an important role in the mechanism of antidepressant drug action.


A novel visual model-driven approach to security protocol design, verification, and implementation is presented in this paper. User-friendly graphical models are combined with rigorous formal methods to enable protocol verification and sound automatic code generation. Domain-specific abstractions keep the graphical models simple, yet powerful enough to represent complex, realistic protocols such as SSH. The main contribution is to bring together aspects that were only partially available or not available at all in previous proposals.


The meridional interior flow obtained from the RAPID array is determined by horizontal density fluctuations at the eastern and western boundary of 26°N. The physical causes of these density variations are responsible for fluctuations in the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) and through it, the meridional heat transport of the Atlantic. In this modelling study, a high resolution ocean model is used to investigate the source and origin of the AMOC variability associated with the density fluctuations at the eastern boundary. The AMOC in the model is in good agreement with the RAPID observations and appears to adequately represent the smaller scale features of variability around the Canary Islands. In this paper, we identify a robust relationship between the density structure south of the Canary Islands, the local wind stress curl (WSC) around these islands and the AMOC using an empirical orthogonal functions analysis, wavelet transform and wavelet coherence. We find that the deep density fluctuations at the eastern boundary of 26°N arise from the pumping effect of the spatial pattern of WSC south of the islands. These deep density fluctuations drive the AMOC both on seasonal and interannual timescales, through their influence on the basinwide tilt of the thermocline. At seasonal timescales, the density fluctuations south of the islands are driven by the WSC and directly influence the AMOC. At interannual timescales, a significant coherence is found between the density fluctuation and the southward UMO transport although the origin of these density fluctuations is not explained by the the direct pumping caused by the WSC.


Infants often take an asymmetrical posture and muscle tone, that is, one sided flattening of the skull, postural scoliosis, limitation of abduction of the flexed hip, pelvic obliquity and so on.In this study, we described the significance of the these oblique posture in infancy and the techniques of their handlings.In order to prevent the occurrance of deformity of the skull, new-born babies should be put into the side position for the first four months. After that they should be kept in the prone position.When an oblique posture was noticed in infants, we advised their mothers to do some handlings which were based on the righting and balance reactions: for example, oblique suspension.


Visual grounding on 3D point clouds is an emerging vision and language task that benefits various applications in understanding the 3D visual world. By formulating this task as a grounding-by-detection problem, lots of recent works focus on how to exploit more powerful detectors and comprehensive language features, but (1) how to model complex relations for generating context-aware object proposals and (2) how to leverage proposal relations to distinguish the true target object from similar proposals are not fully studied yet. Inspired by the well-known transformer architecture, we propose a relation-aware visual grounding method on 3D point clouds, named as 3DVG-Transformer, to fully utilize the contextual clues for relation-enhanced proposal generation and cross-modal proposal disambiguation, which are enabled by a newly designed coordinate-guided contextual aggregation (CCA) module in the object proposal generation stage, and a multiplex attention (MA) module in the cross-modal feature fusion stage. We validate that our 3DVG-Transformer outperforms the state-of-the-art methods by a large margin, on two point cloud-based visual grounding datasets, ScanRefer and Nr3D/Sr3D from ReferIt3D, especially for complex scenarios containing multiple objects of the same category.


Previous studies have shown that a special proteolipid extract from the electric organ of Electrophorus showed high affinity binding for acetylcholine and other cholinergic agents. This proteolipid has now been incorporated into ultrathin lipidic membranes, and the membrane resistance was studied. The resistance decreased from 7.27 ± 0.82 x 105 ohm cm2 in the control membrane to 1.83 x 105 ohm cm2 with addition of 72 µg/ml proteolipid. The decrease in resistance followed a potential function of order four with the proteolipid concentration in the membrane-forming solution. The presence of this proteolipid determined some type of cationic selectivity which was not observed in the control. At a critical point of proteolipid concentration the conductance spontaneously fluctuated between two levels. The membrane current jumped from one state to another by way of single discrete steps, reminiscent of those obtained with the excitatory inducing material or the macrocyclic antibiotics. In membranes containing another proteolipid having no cholinergic binding properties, the increase in conductance was smaller, and had a linear function with the concentration. In this case the "flip flop" fluctuation and the cationic selectivity were not observed. The membranes containing the cholinergic proteolipid reacted to the addition of acetylcholine by a rapid and transient increase in conductance that was considerably reduced or abolished by a previous application of d-tubocurarine. These membranes also interacted with other cholinergic agents, such as gallamine triethiodide, hexamethonium, and α-bungarotoxin. These results suggest that this special proteolipid, when added to the artificial membranes, induces a "chemical excitability" toward cholinergic ligands.


The annual meeting of the German Society for Neurogastroenterology and Motility was held at Castle Hohenkammer from 28th to 30th of March 2008 with C. Pehl (Vilsbiburg) as chairman. The members of the Society study the function of the enteric nervous system, gastrointestinal motility, and functional disturbances of the GI tract. Basic researchers as well as clinical scientists are members of the Society and discussed together their results at this meeting. Results from thirty-six working groups from different European countries, USA, and Egypt were presented at the annual meeting. In addition, Prof. Mark Fox (Switzerland/United Kingdom) gave a review lecture entitled "New technologies to evaluate esophageal function".


The present study was conducted to investigate the presence of developmental stage (s) of Babesia species in Amblyomma variegatum. A total of 137 Amblyomma variegatum ticks (85 males and 52 females) were examined by haemolymph smears. Out of the examined male ticks, there were 41 nymphs and 44 adults. The female ticks were 23 nymphs and 29 engorged adults. Sixteen adult males and nine nymphs were positive for vermicules of Babesia species but only eight females showed structures similar to Babesia vermicules. The present study recommends conducting molecular and experimental studies to confirm the type of Babesia parasite in Amblyomma variegatum tick


Three-stage 18-level hybrid inverter design with novel control method is presented. The inverter consists of main high-, medium-, and low-voltage stages connected in series from the output side. The high-voltage stage is a three-phase, six-switch conventional subinverter. The medium- and low-voltage stages are made of three-level subinverters constructed by H-bridge units. The proposed control strategy assumes a reference input voltage vector and aims to approximate it to the nearest inverter vector. The control concept is based on holding the high-voltage state as long as it is feasible to do so. The reference voltage vector has been represented in a 60°-spaced two axis coordinate system to reduce the computational effort. The concept of the staged-control has been presented, the transformed inverter vectors and their relation to the switching variables have been defined, and the implementation process has been described. The test results verify the effectiveness of the proposed strategy in terms of computational efficiency as well as the capability of the inverter to produce very low distorted voltage with low switching losses.


PURPOSE
This study was undertaken to explore how rural low-income families with children process health information following a nurse-delivered intervention designed to reduce environmental risks in their homes.

DESIGN AND METHOD
Grounded theory methodology with a constructivist approach was used to conduct the study. Semistructured interviews of 10 primary child caregivers in rural low-income families who had participated in an environmental risk reduction intervention were completed from 2009 to 2011. Data were categorized using comparative analysis, theoretical sampling, and coding techniques.

FINDINGS
The three phases-(a) visiting my perception, (b) weighing the evidence, and (c) making a new meaning-explained the core process of the grounded theory of Re-Forming the Risk Message.

CONCLUSIONS
Rural low-income families at risk for environmental hazards in their homes determined what health information and needed subsequent actions regarding their risks were important by changing the meanings of nurse-delivered messages.

CLINICAL RELEVANCE
Nursing interventions designed to improve health behaviors and reduce risks are often based on stage theories that explain how change occurs through steps leading to positive actions through delivery of risk messages. However, the risk message delivered in an intervention designed to engage action is not always the risk message people decide to use. To understand whether people are ready to engage in positive behaviors through interventions, or if needed changes to the information must be made, nurses need to discover and explore reasons for the re-formed risk messages.


The authors studied 57 patients with pericarditis in the Ward of Internal Medicine of the University of São Paulo from January 1993 through May 1995. A comparison was made with the results of a similar study performed in the same hospital in 1989. Increasing frequency of pericarditis was verified. Tuberculosis, formerly the most frequent etiologic agent, decreased while neoplastic diseases became more common.


Telomeres at the ends of eukaryotic chromosomes play a critical role in tumorgenesis. Using microfluidic PCR and next-generation bisulfite sequencing technology, we investigated the promoter methylation of 29 telomere related genes in paired tumor and normal tissues from 184 breast cancer patients. The expression of significantly differentially methylated genes was quantified using qPCR method. We observed that the average methylation level of the 29 telomere related genes was significant higher in tumor than that in normal tissues (P = 4.30E-21). A total of 4 genes (RAD50, RTEL, TERC and TRF1) showed significant hyper-methylation in breast tumor tissues. RAD51D showed significant methylation difference among the four breast cancer subtypes. The methylation of TERC showed significant association with ER status of breast cancer. The expression profiles of the 4 hyper-methylated genes showed significantly reduced expression in tumor tissues. The integration analysis of methylation and expression of these 4 genes showed a good performance in breast cancer prediction (AUC = 0.947). Our results revealed the methylation pattern of telomere related genes in breast cancer and suggested a novel 4-gene panel might be a valuable biomarker for breast cancer diagnosis.


A thiourea-based tripodal colorimetric anion sensor was synthesized. Its binding abilities with AcO- and halide anions in DMSO were studied by UV-Vis spectra. The sensor showed different color responses to these anions. The association constants and different stoichiometries were deduced by nonlinear least-square curve fitting or linear fitting.