The sampling theorem is recognized as an interpolation formula. Starting from the Lagrange Polynomial, this theorem is developed under conditions which are of broader applicability than those usually stated. Such a view point indicates the essential unity of temporal and frequency domain application. It will also be shown that the theorem is applicable as an exact interpolation formula throughout the complex plane. The basic theorem is extended to include sampling of the first derivative of the function. The concept of band-limited functions is introduced through use of Fourier-Stieltjes representations. This is then shown to be subsumed under the general class of functions which is considered in connection with the interpolation theorems developed. This approach, as presented, readily leads to the establishment of many sampling theorems. It is hoped that this paper will aid the formulation of particularly applicable sampling theorems for specific problems.


This study aims to analyze the profit model of We media in mainland of China. Specifically, there are three main research questions. First, what are the main profit models used by We media in China? Second, what are the types that those profit models belong to? Third, how can we evaluate those profit models? Based on the in-depth interview about nine people (three college faculties, three journalists and three employees of We media), this study draws such conclusions. 1. There are totally six profit models used by We media in mainland of China, Specifically, advertising, paid reading, membership, profit-sharing model, e-commerce, and derivative service. 2. These six profit models can be divided into four types. Advertising belongs to "direct and high profit", e-commerce belongs to "indirect and high profit", derivative service belongs to "indirect and low profit", the remaining three profit models, paid reading, membership and profit-sharing model belong to "direct and low profit". 3. We can evaluate the profit model of We media through two main aspects. On the one hand, we need to recognize We media's profit models in China are very rich. In other words, We media can make money by many different ways, which is a good condition for We media's improvement. While on the other hand, there is a feature of We media's profit models, which is direct and low profit method accounts for the high level of proportion. It means We media's actual profitability is not very strong, so most of We media can only gain low profit in practice.


Lifetime prediction of the fielded c-Si solar modules due to location-specific weather conditions has been an important topic of photovoltaic research and the economic viability of solar energy. Data analytic techniques such as the performance ratio method, Statistical clear sky model, and Suns-Vmp methods quantify the degradation from measured data of a solar farm, however, the nonlinear time-dependence and correlated degradations make it difficult to use the empirical degradation rates for ultimate lifetime projection. In this article, we propose a complementary physics-based model to predict the solder bond failure caused by mechanical stress associated with the variations of the temperature. Integrating the worldwide weather information from NASA/NSRDB databases, the model predicts the location-specific output-power degradation and the lifetime of a module due to solder bond failure. The model parameters are calibrated against qualification tests involving thermal cycling of specific batches of modules from a specific technology/manufacturer. The results may be summarized as: 1) Modules installed at higher latitudes show a longer lifetime due to reduced damage accumulation. 2) The reduction of temperature fluctuation close to large bodies of water, such as seashores, increases solder bond lifetime significantly. 3) Relatively speaking, modules installed close to the Tropic of Cancer/Capricorn (23.5° North/South) suffer from a higher solder bond damage and have a shorter lifetime, suggesting a conservative design. This model should serve as a building block of a comprehensive reliability framework that can predict the lifetime of a module that experiences simultaneous and correlated degradation mechanisms involving yellowing, corrosion, and potential-induced degradation.


The sorptivity, S, is a measure of the ability of a porous material to absorb and transmit water by capillary action. Transfer sorptivity, A, is a measure of the ability of an absorbent substrate to withdraw water from a wet mortar mix. Desorptivity, R, on the other hand, is the parameter that quantifies water retaining ability of freshly-mixed natural hydraulic lime and cement mortars. The measurement of transfer sorptivity is essentially identical to that of sorptivity except that the brick is placed in contact with a wet mortar mix rather than with water. This paper concerns the combination of wet mortar and brick substrate and the interaction between them. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the influence of hydraulicity, mix water content and sand grain size on the transfer sorptivity of a range of freshly mixed hydraulic lime and PC mortars and to investigate the relationship between transfer sorptivity and desorptivity for the case a substrate material of constant sorptivity. The measurement of transfer sorptivity is not straightforward. Before such measurements could be carried out, it was necessary to confirm that the substrate material to be used was highly homogeneous. To this end, two types of bricks are first investigated to establish their suitability as substrate materials for these measurements. A methodology for the measurement of transfer sorptivity is developed. The results have been shown that the transfer sorptivity increases systematically with increasing hydraulicity; that the transfer sorptivity increases systematically as the water content of a mix is increased; and that the transfer sorptivity of a given mortar increases as the sand grain size is increased. These parameters have important practical consequences, not only in the initial adhesion of the mortar to the substrate but also in the strength of the set material. The ability to monitor the water retaining properties can also allow efficiency in masonry construction.


terestingly and logically from definition of the field through formula and objectives to a generous section of facsimile copies of advertisements which on the actual record have produced desired results. Reference to these, with careful analyses, runs through the book. In the main, the viewpoint is that of the advertisers; hence it is all the more valuable to the man who sells space, whether he be at the bottom of the ladder or a department head of an advertising medium. ThED M. POWNALL State University of Iowa


Background : Wellness champion teams can be a critical "grass roots" strategy in building a culture of worksite wellness; however, little is known about key elements of programs to prepare individuals for this role and their level of impact. Aim : To describe the components of a worksite wellness champion program at a large public land grant university in the Midwest and the characteristics of individuals who participate in this role. Methods : The Wellness Innovator program components, including processes of recruitment and retention, as well as demographic data of the Innovators are described. Results : 464 Innovators currently serve in the role. Support from supervisors/managers is key for sustained Innovator engagement. Conclusions : The Wellness Innovator program is an important strategy in encouraging faculty and staff to participate in wellness activities and services. More research is needed to determine the impact of wellness champion teams on health and wellness outcomes.


Summary Statement Patients with adolescent idiopathic scoliosis show clear signs of abnormal motor coordination between the long superficial paraspinal muscles and the deep rotators. These findings suggest an abnormal behavior of the deep rotator muscles at the concave side. Introduction An imbalance between the myoelectric activity of the muscles of the convexity and the concavity has been described in patients with adolescent idiopathic scoliosis (AIS). These findings are based on EMG patterns recorded with surface electrodes that do not distinguish between deep and superficial muscles. This work was aimed at analyzing the coupled behavior of the superficial and deep paraspinal muscles in subjects with AIS at both sides of the curve. Material A total of 16 females (mean age, 16.2±4.3 years) with AIS between 20 and 35° Cobb (mean, 32.8±11.9°) underwent electromyography of the paraspinal muscles by direct intramuscular disposable concentric electrodes (Dantec DCN TM ) of 25mm and 37mm in length, and 0.46 mm. in diameter. A total of 4 electrodes were inserted at the apex on both sides of the curve (2 in deep rotator muscle and 2 in the long paraspinal superficial muscles). Myoelectrical activity was recorded simultaneously in the four muscle groups in different positions: standing, flexion, extension, right and left lateralizations, and rotations toward the side of the concavity and convexity. A 4-channel Keypoint® electromyography device (Medtronic, Denmark) was used. The recorded signals were analyzed in a laptop with Windows ® 7 Intel Core i3 64bit with Matlab ® R2012a. The following parameters were analyzed: Signal power, Mean and Median frecuency, and the Dimitrov spectral index, a marker of muscle fatigue. In addition, the signal power in each task was normalised by the signal power in standing position. The records were compared with those obtained in 4 healthy subjects, matched in age, without spinal deformity. Results The signal amplitude in different subjects and tests ranged from tens of microvolts up to two milivolts. Most of the energy of the EMG signal was concentrated below 500 Hz in power spectrum density chart. In standing position, the activity of the deep muscle was greater than that of the long superficial paraspinal muscles, with higher activation in the convex side (63% of cases). Increased activity of the deep muscles as compared to the surperficial layers was also evident during flexion of the spine, with a higher activity of the deep muscles of the concavity. The 4 muscle groups showed low activity during spine extension movements, though the deep rotator activity was always greater than the superficial paraspinal muscles. In rotation exercises, the most active muscles were found the contralateral with a clear inhibition of the deep muscles of the concavity in the rotation to that side. This did not apply for rotation through the convex side. It was also noticeable that in the case of deep muscles, both sides of the spine require high activation when performing left flexion. Conclusions Patients with AIS show clear signs of abnormal motor coordination between the superficial paraspinal muscles and the deep rotators. These findings do not clearly define whether this mismatch is primary or secondary to the presence of the deformity although they suggest an abnormal behavior of deep rotator muscles that could have etiopathogenic relevance.


Rodent-borne hantaviruses (family Bunyaviridae, genus Hantavirus) cause hantavirus pulmonary syndrome in the Americas and hemorrhagic fever with renal syndrome in Europe and Asia. The viruses are transmitted to humans mainly by inhalation of virus-contaminated aerosols of rodent excreta and secreta. Classic clinical hemorrhagic fever with renal syndrome occurs in five phases: fever, hypotension, oliguria, polyuria, and convalescence. Hantavirus pulmonary syndrome is a severe acute disease that is associated with respiratory failure, pulmonary edema and cardiogenic shock. The diagnosis of hantavirus infections in humans is based on clinical and epidemiological information as well as laboratory tests. We review diagnosis for hantavirus infections based on serology, PCR, immunochemistry and virus culture.


Native Americans are highly underrepresented in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) careers; however, little research exists concerning how to promote Native Americans' participation in STEM. In this study, we address this gap by examining variables hypothesized to promote participation using the career self-management (CSM) model among Native American college students with STEM career goals. Results of stepwise regressions demonstrated that academic achievement along with the problem-solving aspects of career self-management (CSM) self-efficacy and instrumental assistance from parents, peers, and others in students' schools and communities predicts clearer, more specific, and more personally congruent goals; and that these goals along with self-efficacy and instrumental assistance predict career exploration. Contrary to hypotheses, neither STEM outcome expectations nor gender was related to goals or exploration. These findings suggest that CSM can be used to guide research regarding the STEM career development of Native American college students.


PurposeThe purpose of this study was to perform thermo-mechanical deformation and stress analysis in a functionally graded (FG) hollow cylinder considering steady-state temperature distribution under the effect of rotation, gravity and constant heat generation.Design/methodology/approachNavier's equation was used to solve the problem, and the obtained results were validated with benchmarks found to be in excellent agreement. The variation of temperature and other material properties such as Young's modulus, density, thermal expansion coefficient and thermal conductivity varied radially as per power-law variation.FindingsThe effect of rotation was found to be vital compared to gravity and heat generation when compared individually and in combination. The results of displacement and stresses were presented for varying grading indices.Practical implicationsFG cylinders have huge industrial applications as it opens the possibility of developing structures with a high strength/weight ratio. The present study will benefit industries in identifying the effective grading index that can be used by industries for fabricating FG structures.Originality/valueThe effect of rotation, body force and heat generation on a cylindrical body has not been studied before. Furthermore, the combined effect of rotation, body force and heat generation has been studied to understand the behaviour of cylinders operating under similar conditions.


In a 55-year-old man, a tumor about 3 cm in diameter was detected in the upper abdomen by abdominal ultrasound screening during follow-up of chronic hepatitis C discovered in 1990. There were no symptoms and no abnormalities on physical examination. Tests for tumor markers were negative. By barium meal and gastroscopy, submucosal tumor was found on the lesser curvature of the stomach, with bridging fold in the absence of central ulceration. Biopsy revealed no tumor tissue. Under the diagnosis of submucosal tumor of the stomach, either a leiomyoma or leiomyosarcoma, partial resection of stomach was performed. Direct invasion of the surrounding organs, lymph node metastasis or distant metastasis was not observed grossly in the operation. Histologic examination of the resected specimen revealed proliferation of spindle cells and oval cells in an interlacing pattern. Immunohistochemistry for CD34, vimentin and c-kit protein was strongly positive, while smooth muscle actin, S-100 protein, desmin and p53 protein were negative. The proliferating cell nuclear antigen index was about 50%, while the MIB-1 index was < or = 1%. From these findings, this tumor was diagnosed as a gastrointestinal stromal tumor of the uncommitted type.


Background The introduction of the frozen elephant trunk (FET) technique for total arch replacement (TAR) has revolutionized the field of aortivascular surgery by allowing hybrid repair of complex aortic pathologies in a single step through combining an open surgical approach with an endovascular one. FET has been associated with favorable aortic remodeling, however, its is also associated with development of distal stent graft induced new entry (dSINE) tears postoperatively. The rate of aortic remodeling and the incidence of dSINE have been linked together, in addition, there seems to be a relationship between these two variables and FET insetion length as well as graft size. Aims The scope of this review is to highlight the rate of aortic remodeling as well the incidence of dSINE associated with different FET devices available commercially. This review also aimed to investigate the relationship between aortic remodeling, dSINE, FET insertion length and FET graft size. Methods We conducted a comprehensive literature search using multiple electronic databases including PubMed, Ovid, Scopus and Embase in order to collate all research evidence on the above mentioned variables. Results Thoraflex™ Hybrid Plexus seems to yield optimum aortic remodeling by promoting maximum false thrombosis as well true lumen expansion. Thoraflex Hybrid™ is also associated with the lowest incidence of dSINE post-FET relative to the other FET devices on the market. Aortic remodeling and dSINE do influence each other and are both linked with FET graft length and size. Conclusion The FET technique for TAR shows excellent aortic remodeling but is associated with a considerable risk of dSINE development. However, Thoraflex™ Hybrid has demonstrated itself to be the superior FET device on the aortic arch prostheses market. Since aortic remodeling, dSINE, FET insertion length and stent graft size are all interconnect, the choice of FET device length and size must be made with great care for optimum results.


This paper describes a two-dimensional model of fluid flow and heat transfer with phase change for the planar flow casting process. Boundary-layer theory is used to model fluid flow and heat transfer in the solidification puddle, and a semi-implicit finite difference scheme is used to solve the corresponding governing equations. In order to take into account non-equilibrium solidification with melt undercooling, a kinetics relationship between the interface velocity and the interface undercooling is incorporated in the model. The location of the interface and its temperature are calculated using an interface tracking technique based on control volume integrals with element subdivision. Besides the interface velocity and temperature, the model also predicts the shape of the downstream meniscus formed between the crucible and the moving wheel. Some results for the planar flow casting of an aluminium melt with undercooling are also presented, including predictions of the streamlines and isotherms in the puddle. The effect of the interface kinetics and melt undercooling on the solidification characteristics is quantified through comparison with an equilibrium solidification model.


The crystalline inclusions of the host compound trans-11,12-bis[bis(p-chlorophenyl)hydroxymethyl]-9,10-ethanoanthracene, with guests such as pentan-2-ol[1·pentan-2-ol(1:1), 1a], 1,4-dioxane [1·1,4-dioxane (2:5), 1b] and o-xylene [1·o-xylene (1:2), 1c] were shown by X-ray analysis to have host matrices mainly determined by directional 'electrophile–nucleophile pairing' interactions, involving a chloro substituent and the adjacent aryl π electrons of a neighbouring molecule. The observed shorter Cl⋯centroid distances in 1a–c are between 3.33 and 3.75 A. On the other hand, the versatility of host–guest interactions due to the different proton donor–acceptor abilities and polarities of the guests yielded various packing relations with different symmetries and conformations of the host hydroxy functions. Although compounds 1a and 1b contain H-bonded 1·pentanol and 1·dioxane aggregates, respectively, the realized packing arrangements seem to be a compromise between close packing on the one hand and hydrogen bonding on the other. Compound 1c is a lattice-type inclusion in which the o-xylene guests are trapped in tunnels formed by the bulky host molecules.


A community's water supply is one of its most important infrastructures, as sufficient quality and quantity of water are as much prerequisites for human life as economic development. The rapid urbanization predicted for developing countries will cause serious water shortages in densely populated areas. The Lao People's Democratic Republic (PDR) is taking precautions by planning and developing their water supply infrastructure to ensure reliable supply of water. We used the five capitals model of sustainable livelihoods to capture how a household makes a living and analyzed the effects of five forms of capital (natural, physical, human, financial, and social) on water consumption behaviors from the perspective of the residents' livelihood. We conducted a survey to gain an understanding of the thought processes behind water consumption behavior in two villages in suburban Vientiane. The results indicated that natural and physical capital delayed connections to the water supply. Financial capital stimulated the purchase of high-quality water in preference to a connection to the water supply. This lack of connection is not necessarily sustainable in the near future, considering ongoing urbanization. Furthermore, this possibility presents a difficult problem, as residents do not usually acknowledge it. To accomplish sustainable development goals, this gap should be overcome.


In the companion to the present paper, the one‐dimensional k‐ε lake model SIMSTRAT is coupled to a single‐column atmospheric model, nicknamed FIZC, and an application of the coupled model to the deep Lake Geneva, Switzerland, is described. In this paper, the response of Lake Geneva to global warming caused by an increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration (i.e., 2 × CO2) is investigated. Coupling the models allowed for feedbacks between the lake surface and the atmosphere and produced changes in atmospheric moisture and cloud cover that further modified the downward radiation fluxes. The time evolution of atmospheric variables as well as those of the lake's thermal profile could be reproduced realistically by devising a set of adjustable parameters. In a "control" 1 × CO2 climate experiment, the coupled FIZC‐SIMSTRAT model demonstrated genuine skills in reproducing epilimnetic and hypolimnetic temperatures, with annual mean errors and standard deviations of 0.25°C ± 0.25°C and 0.3°C ± 0.15°C, respectively. Doubling the CO2 concentration induced an atmospheric warming that impacted the lake's thermal structure, increasing the stability of the water column and extending the stratified period by 3 weeks. Epilimnetic temperatures were seen to increase by 2.6°C to 4.2°C, while hypolimnion temperatures increased by 2.2°C. Climate change modified components of the surface energy budget through changes mainly in air temperature, moisture, and cloud cover. During summer, reduced cloud cover resulted in an increase in the annual net solar radiation budget. A larger water vapor deficit at the air‐water interface induced a cooling effect in the lake.


Summary

In this study, Protected Geographical Indication (PGI) Mortadella Bologna cooking process was investigated for heat and mass transfer. Apparent mass and heat transfer coefficient functions as well as apparent thermal diffusivity and mass diffusion coefficients were experimentally estimated. These thermo-physical properties were used to develop a mathematical model for the simulation of simultaneous heat and mass transfer during Mortadella Bologna PGI cooking. The developed method was successfully validated for both heat and mass transfer by means of experimental cooking tests: maximum errors of about 3.5% and 4% were found for final product temperature and cooking time experimentally obtained respectively. Simulated weight loss values were also found not to differ significantly from those experimentally obtained. In addition, the developed model was successfully validated during a Mortadella cooking process carried out in an industrial plant proposing itself as a predictive tool to forecast and optimise cooking time and weight loss of this type of meat product. The proposed approach may be also used to design air cooking processes of other food products.


Anaemia is a common finding in South American camelids presented to the veterinary clinic. This report describes the case of a llama presented with general weakness and pale conjunctives, displaying severe anaemia with a Packed Cell Volume (PCV) of 6 per cent and suffering from haemonchosis. The animal was presented in lateral recumbency before being treated with whole blood transfusion. After administering a total volume of 850-ml blood, the clinical condition improved remarkably. Regeneration of the haematological parameters required several weeks, PCV increased from 6 per cent on day 0 to 23 per cent on day 28.


The incidence and the clinical implications of hypocalcemia were evaluated in acutely ill patients admitted to the Medical Intensive Care Unit of the Detroit Receiving Hospital. Total and ionized calcium levels were prospectively evaluated upon admission for all patients over a three-month interval. A high proportion of patients (62 of 88, 70 percent) were found to have decreased levels of both total and ionized calcium. Known causes of hypocalcemia could be identified in only 28 patients (45 percent). These included hypomagnesemia (17, 28 percent), renal insufficiency (five, 8 percent), alkalosis (four, 6 percent), and acute pancreatitis (two, 3 percent). In the remaining 34 patients (55 percent), no readily identifiable cause could be found. These 34 patients had a lower mean albumin level than did the 23 normocalcemic patients (p less than 0.01), but there were no differences in age, pH, serum creatinine, magnesium, or phosphate between the two groups. Serum albumin correlated directly with ionized calcium levels (n = 82, r = 0.33, p less than 0.01), as well as with total calcium levels (n = 76, r = 0.70, p less than 0.01). There was a strong association between sepsis and hypocalcemia. Patients who survived the hospitalization had higher mean ionized calcium, total calcium, and albumin values than did nonsurvivors, but there were no differences in age, serum creatinine, magnesium, and phosphate between the two groups. The mortality of the hypocalcemic patients (44 percent) was significantly greater (p less than 0.05) than the mortality of the normocalcemic patients (17 percent). These findings suggest that hypocalcemia is a very common abnormality in acutely ill patients and is associated with a poor prognosis.


This paper presents a monocular vision based 3D bicycle tracking framework for intelligent vehicles based on a detection method exploiting a deformable part model and a tracking method using an Interacting Multiple Model (IMM) algorithm. Bicycle tracking is important because bicycles share the road with vehicles and can move at comparable speeds in urban environments. From a computer vision standpoint, bicycle detection is challenging as bicycle's appearance can change dramatically between viewpoints and a person riding on the bicycle is a non-rigid object. To this end, we present a tracking-by-detection method to detect and track bicycles that takes into account these difficult issues. First, a mixture model of multiple viewpoints is defined and trained via a Latent Support Vector Machine (LSVM) to detect bicycles under a variety of circumstances. Each model uses a part-based representation. This robust bicycle detector provides a series of measurements (i.e., bounding boxes) in the context of the Kalman filter. Second, to exploit the unique characteristics of bicycle tracking, two motion models based on bicycle's kinematics are fused using an IMM algorithm. For each motion model, an extended Kalman filter (EKF) is used to estimate the position and velocity of a bicycle in the vehicle coordinates. Finally, a single bicycle tracking method using an IMM algorithm is extended to that of multiple bicycle tracking by incorporating a Rao-Blackwellized Particle Filter which runs a particle filter for a data association and an IMM filter for each bicycle tracking. We demonstrate the effectiveness of this approach through a series of experiments run on a new bicycle dataset captured from a vehicle-mounted camera.


Although analysts have long held that bias disqualifies a mediator, more recent analysis, pioneered by Saadia Touval, shows that bias can be quite helpful to mediation under the assumption that the mediator delivers the agreement of the party toward which it is biased. Of course, the mediator is still expected to be trustworthy in dealing with the parties and reliable in communications. Prenegotiation and diagnosis, probably the least analyzed early stages of negotiation, are shown to be crucial to a successful negotiation and the necessary preconditions to an efficient and effective process. Leverage, the term for "power" in negotiation, is a scarce resource and takes the form of effective persuasion rather than material inducements and punishments; it depends above all on the need of the conflicting parties for an agreement, which in turn depends on the attractiveness of their alternatives or security points (BATNAs).


The Kangerlussuaq Alkaline Complex, East Greenland, is one of the largest alkaline complexes in the world. It is known to host a number of occurrences of base and precious metal mineralization, including the Flammefjeld porphyry Mo deposits and a suite of epithermal style base and precious metal veins in an area around the Sondre Syenitgletscher. Here we describe and date a previously unknown occurrence of molybdenite-pyrite-scheelite–bearing quartz veins associated with alkali basalt dikes that intrude the main syenites of the complex. The veins appear to be cogenetic with the dikes, which crosscut and brecciate granodiorites of the Cirque 1320 complex. Sulfur isotope signatures of molybdenite and pyrite in the veins give a tight range with mean δ 34 S of 2.2 ± 0.7‰, consistent with a magmatic S source related to the intrusion of the dikes. Molybdenite from the veins gave an Re-Os age of 52.74 ± 0.26 Ma, some 13 m.y. older than molybdenite at the Flammefjeld porphyry deposit, thus distinguishing this metallogenic episode as a distinct event, temporally unrelated to the known Mo mineralization at Flammefjeld. Significantly, in terms of the timing of regional metallogenesis and magmatism, our date suggests that the age of the Kangerlussuaq Alkaline Complex itself may be slightly older than the 50 Ma currently accepted, based on 40 Ar- 39 Ar dating from biotites in the main syenites. Given the common discrepancy in ore systems of 40 Ar- 39 Ar, which produce slightly younger dates than those by Re-Os and U-Pb, we suggest the actual age of the Kangerlussuaq Alkaline Complex may be closer to 53 to 52 Ma.


Visual search has been classified as easy feature search, with rapid target detection and little set size dependence, versus slower difficult search with focused attention, with set size–dependent speed. Reverse hierarchy theory attributes these classes to rapid high cortical-level vision at a glance versus low-level vision with scrutiny, attributing easy search to high-level representations. Accordingly, faces "pop out" of heterogeneous object photographs. Individuals with autism have difficulties recognizing faces, and we now asked if this disability disturbs their search for faces. We compare search times and set size slopes for children with autism spectrum disorders (ASDs) and those with neurotypical development (NT) when searching for faces. Human face targets were found rapidly, with shallow set size slopes. The between-group difference between slopes (18.8 vs. 11.3 ms/item) is significant, suggesting that faces may not "pop out" as easily, but in our view does not warrant classifying ASD face search as categorically different from that of NT children. We also tested search for different target categories, dog and lion faces, and nonface basic categories, cars and houses. The ASD group was generally a bit slower than the NT group, and their slopes were somewhat steeper. Nevertheless, the overall dependencies on target category were similar: human face search fastest, nonface categories slowest, and dog and lion faces in between. We conclude that autism may spare vision at a glance, including face detection, despite its reported effects on face recognition, which may require vision with scrutiny. This dichotomy is consistent with the two perceptual modes suggested by reverse hierarchy theory.


Background: Now a day people are more concerned about the nutrition and their health status. Form the last two decades a lot of progress has been seen to isolate substance of high nutrition and medicinal values from the daily consumable items. It is proved that these dietary supplements derived from plants and animals have benefits to the body or may supply the body with essential fatty acids, proteins or other nutrients which are helpful in improving body function. The especial food entities with such benefits are termed as nutraceuticals.
Objective: This study aims to evaluate the use of nutraceuticals among the inhabitant of Penang, Malaysia. Furthermore, this study also aims to understand the population need for the nutraceutical use and difference in nutraceutical use among the inhabitants.
Method: A cross sectional study conducted among the inhabitants of Penang using a structured twenty three item questionnaire. A non-probability sampling method was used to approach the potential participants. Chi Square test was used to test the difference between proportions. However, in the case where 2x2 tables have expected cell count less than five among 25% of the cells then Fischer exact test was preferred over Chi Square.
Results: A total of seven hundred respondents were approached for their participation in this study. Of whom four hundred showed their willingness to participate in the study with a response rate of 57.1%. Majority 218 (54.5%) of the respondents were female. Findings demonstrated that 267(66.8%) of the respondents were familiar with the use of nutraceuticals and 282 (70.5%) have used or using nutraceuticals. Most of the respondents 294 (73.6%) believe that nutraceuticals are safe to use. While evaluating respondents perceptions toward the use of nutraceutical, the use of nutraceuticals to cure the medical complications was found statistically significant (x2= 21.196, df=3, p= 0.000). In addition to this other disclosed the nutraceutical use to improve the body function [i.e overall organs performance], to improve the mental performance and to reduce weight.
Conclusion: Malaysian population was found familiar with the nutraceuticals and nearly all participants of this study have reported their use. The use of nutraceuticals was higher among Chinese women in comparison to other ethnic groups' i.e Malay and Indians. In general it was found that majority believe that nutraceuticals are safe to use, for general well being. Women were more likely to use nutraceuticals for sliming purpose, while men reported to improve the body function.


Sex differences in running behaviors between male and female mice occur naturally in the wild. Recent experiments using head restrained mice on a running wheel have exploited locomotion to provide insight in the neural underpinnings of a number of behaviors ranging from spatial navigation to decision making. However, it is largely unknown how males and females behave differently in this experimental paradigm. We found that in head-fixed mice that were initially exposed to a running wheel, all female mice ran forward naturally within the first two days, while almost all male mice scurried backward for up to 4 days. With daily exposure, male mice progressively learned to naturally run forward, with this transition occurring over the course of a 7-day period. Taken together, we have identified a sexually divergent behavior in head-fixed running that should be considered in experiments that use this experimental design. Furthermore, this sex-specific difference could serve as a new way to interrogate the neural underpinnings of a number of behaviors such as anxiety or fear.


Considering the legislative aftermath of Japanese imperial expansion in Korea as an illustrative case, this study examines the residual sovereignty over Korea after the end of WW II to the conclusion of the Treaty of Peace with Japan. Under its own interpretations of the Potsdam Declaration, Japan managed to retain the territorial sovereignty over Korea. Until the signing the treaty in September, 1951, Japan had sidestepped renunciation of all right, title, and claim to Korea. For the United States, the trusteeship system to Korea was the second best formula in case inability to force Japan to renounce the territorial sovereignty over Korea. The system, that the US would permit Japan to retain residual sovereignty( territorial sovereignty), aimed at making it possible for Korea to be separated from Japan, without Japan's renunciation of sovereignty over Korea. Based on these findings, this study points out the necessity to reinterpret the issues occurred between Japan and Republic of Korea in the process of concluding the Treaty.


The fundamental mechanism of a dispersed two-phase flow was investigated. Experiments were carried out to understand how the particles behaves under the influence of the particle size, shape, metamorphoses (bubble) and buoyancy of a single particle which is ascending from the standstill water. Two CCD cameras were employed for image processing of the behavior of the particles and the surrounding flow, which was interpreted with the technique of correlation PIV (Particle Image Velocimetry) and PTV (Particle Tracking Veloci- metry), respectively The experimental results showed that the large density difference bet- ween a particle and water caused high relative velocity and induced zigzag motion of the particle. Furthermore, the turbulence intensity of a bubble was about twice the case of the spherical solid particle of similar diameter.


ing fees, and/or honoraria (less than $10,000) from Novartis. Dr. Beukelman has received consultancy fees, speaking fees, and/or honoraria (less than $10,000 each) from McKesson Health Solutions, Genentech, and UCB, and (more than $10,000) from Novartis. Dr. Nigrovic has received consultancy fees, speaking fees, and/or honoraria (less than $10,000 each) from Alkermes, Genentech, and Momenta, and (more than $10,000) from Novartis. Dr. Schneider has received consultancy fees, speaking fees, and/or honoraria (less than $10,000 each) from Novartis and Hoffmann La-Roche.


A knowledge-based inference system for weightless neural networks (WNNs) is described in this paper. With the use such a system, rules can be inserted and extracted into/from WNNs. The process of rule insertion and rule extraction in WNNs is often more natural than in other neural network models. The system proposed allows the understanding on how the neural networks reach the solution to a problem. A straightforward application of the system is the design of expert systems and data mining techniques.


BACKGROUND
Investigated were effects of overexpression of interleukin-10 (IL-10) on the outcome and progression of crescentic glomerulonephritis in Wistar-Kyoto (WKY) rats.

METHODS
Rats were singly or simultaneously injected with antiglomerular basement membrane (a-GBM) antibody and adenoviral vector encoding rat IL-10 (Ad-rIL-10) or LacZ (Ad-LacZ) (3 x 1010 pfu/rat) intravenously, and were sacrificed at day 7. Their kidneys and other organs were isolated and examined by histology and immunohistochemistry. The In vivo expression of IL-10 mRNA in the liver of Ad-rIL-10-injected rats was confirmed by both reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) and ribonuclease protection assay analysis and its translated protein was measured in the serum by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA).

RESULTS
The exogenous IL-10 mRNA was strongly expressed in the liver in a dose-dependent manner and was intense at days 4 and 7 but was less intense at day 14. Ad-rIL-10 treatment significantly reduced the incidence of glomerular crescent formation from 67%+/- 1.9% in a-GBM antibody-treated group or 69.8%+/- 1.9% in a-GBM antibody + Ad-LacZ-treated group to 21.6%+/- 1.8% (P < 0.001), the glomerular infiltration of macrophages from 35.7 +/- 6.3 cell s/gcs (a-GBM antibody) or 37.6 +/- 8.6 cells/gcs (both a-GBM antibody + Ad-LacZ) to 17.9 +/- 5.5 cells/gcs (P < 0.001), that of major histocompatibility complex (MHC) class II-positive cells from 14.4 +/- 5.3 cells/gcs (a-GBM antibody) or 15 +/- 4.6 cells/gcs (a-GBM antibody + Ad-LacZ) to 5.7 +/- 2.3 cells/gcs (P < 0.0001) at day 7, the glomerular and immune tissue expression of IL-1beta mRNA, as well as the proteinuria from 159.0 +/- 22.7 mg/24 hours (a-GBM antibody) or 166 +/- 28 mg/24 hours (a-GBM antibody + Ad-LacZ) to 42.2 +/- 35.2 mg/24 hours (P < 0.01) at day 7. The serum creatinine and blood urea nitrogen levels were also reduced from 2.8 +/- 0.1 mg/dL (a-GBM antibody) or 2.8 +/- 0.1 mg/dL (a-GBM antibody + Ad-LacZ) to 1.0 +/- 0.1 mg/dL (P < 0.001) and from 63.2 +/- 8.9 mg/dL (a-GBM antibody) or 61.3 +/- 5.2 mg/dL (a-GBM antibody + Ad-LacZ) to 27.0 +/- 4.5 mg/dL (P < 0.001), respectively. However, the glomerular accumulation of CD8+ T cells was unaffected: 5.4 +/- 1.1 cells/gcs (a-GBM antibody + Ad-rIL-10), 5.9 +/- 1.5 cells/gcs (a-GBM antibody), and 5.8 +/- 1.1 cells/gcs (a-GBM antibody + Ad-LacZ) (P= NS).

CONCLUSION
IL-10 gene transfer significantly attenuated the glomerular lesions and injury in the anti-GBM crescentic glomerulonephritis of WKY rats.


p50, the major core protein of messenger ribonucleoprotein particles (mRNPs) in the cytoplasm of somatic mammalian cells, has been characterized previously as a member of the Y-box binding transcription factor family of proteins (YB-protein) by both high structural homology and ability to bind specifically the Y-box sequence in double-stranded DNA. YB proteins are present in a whole range of cell types and some have been identified as germ-specific cytoplasmic proteins masking stored mRNA from translation. Western blot analysis of the distribution of p50 in subcellular fractions of COS-1 cells shows that p50 is a cytoplasmic protein quantitatively associated with mRNA, both in polyribosomes and in free mRNPs. The level of p50 in COS-1 cells determined by Western immunoblotting is 0.10% of total protein, which is nearly equimolar to that of ribosomes and is approximately 5-10-fold higher than the mRNA level. Transient transfection of COS-1 cells with a p50-expressing vector results in a dramatic inhibition of protein synthesis. A control transfection with a vector expressing a frameshift mutant of p50 does not cause translation inhibition. Therefore the increase in p50 protein level is responsible for the inhibitory effect in these cells.


Abstract The electrohydrodynamic (EHD) flow induced by the corona discharge was experimentally investigated in an electrostatic precipitator (ESP). The ESP was a narrow horizontal Plexiglas box (1300 mm×60 mm×60 mm). The electrode set consisted of a single wire discharge electrode and two collecting aluminum plate electrodes. Particle Image Velocimetry (PIV) method was used to visualize the EHD flow characteristics inside the ESP seeded with fine oil droplets. The influence of applied voltage (from 8 kV to 10 kV) and primary gas flow (0.15 m/s, 0.2 m/s, 0.4 m/s) on the EHD flow transition was elucidated through experimental analysis. The formation and transition of typical EHD flows from onset to the fully developed were described and explained. Experimental results showed that the EHD flow patterns change depends on the gas velocity and applied voltage. EHD flow starts with flow streamlines near collecting plates bending towards the wire electrode, forming two void regions. An oscillating jet forming the downstream appeared and moved towards the wire electrode as voltage increased. For higher velocities (≥0.2 m/s), the EHD transition became near wire phenomenon with a jet-like flow structure near the wire, forming a void region behind the wire and expanding as voltage increased. Fully developed EHD secondary flow in the form of counter-rotating vortices appeared upstream with high applied voltage.


Interprofessional education (IPE) occurs when members of more than one health or social care profession learn interactively together to improve interprofessional collaboration and health care delivery. Interprofessional experiences provide students with the skills and knowledge needed to work in a collaborative manner; however, there is no review on the outcome measures used to assess the effectiveness of IPE learning. The current systematic review examined the outcome measures used to assess interprofessional learning during student clinical experiences. An electronic search of databases retrieved trials of health professional students who completed an IPE intervention during a student clinical experience. Methodological quality of twenty-five studies meeting the inclusion criteria published between 1997 and 2018 was scored independently by two raters using the Physiotherapy Evidence Database and the Confidence in the Evidence from Reviews of Qualitative Research tool. The Interdisciplinary Education Perception Scale was used most frequently to assess interprofessional learning during a student clinical experience. This review provides a summary of outcome measures for educators to consider for evaluation of interprofessional activities during student clinical placements and serves to inform future conversations regarding the use and development of outcome measures to provide evidence for student achievement of IPE objectives and competencies.


[Abridged] We use high-resolution $HST$ imaging and $e$-MERLIN 1.5-GHz observations of galaxy cores from the LeMMINGs survey to investigate the relation between optical structural properties and nuclear radio emission for a large sample of galaxies. We perform accurate, multi-component decompositions of new surface brightness profiles extracted from $HST$ images for 163 LeMMINGs galaxies and fit up to six galaxy components (e.g., bulges, discs, AGN, bars, rings, spiral arms, and nuclear star clusters) simultaneously with S\'ersic and/or core-S\'ersic models. By adding such decomposition data for 10 LeMMINGs galaxies from our past work, the final sample of 173 nearby galaxies (102 Ss, 42 S0s, 23 Es plus 6 Irr) with bulge stellar mass (typically) M_*, bulge ~ 10^6-10^12.5 M_sun, encompasses all optical spectral classes (LINER, Seyfert, ALG and H II). We show that the bulge mass can be significantly overestimated in many galaxies when components such as bars, rings and spirals are not included in the fits. We additionally implement a Monte Carlo method to determine errors on bulge, disc and other fitted structural parameters. Moving (in the opposite direction) across the Hubble sequence, i.e., from the irregular to elliptical galaxies, we confirm that bulges become larger, more prominent and round. Such bulge dominance is associated with a brighter radio core luminosity. We also find that the radio detection fraction increases with bulge mass. At M_*,bulge>10^11 M_sun, the radio detection fraction is 77%, declining to 24% for M_bulge<10^10 M_sun. Furthermore, we observe core-S\'ersic bulges tend to be systematically round and to possess high radio core luminosities and boxy-distorted or pure elliptical isophotes.


Abstract Guided by the behavioral model of health service use, this study examined the effect of South Asians' perceptions of healthcare, religious belief, and socioeconomic status on their perceived benefits and risks of COVID‐19 vaccines (N = 245). Cross‐sectional survey was used. Logistic regressions results showed that higher levels of perceived involvement in South Asian community health and trust in the healthcare system were associated with higher odds of reporting perceived vaccine benefits. Permanent residents, students (vs. unemployed), and Pakistani (vs. Indians) also perceived the vaccine as beneficial. On the other hand, believing that the body was sacred and being Buddhist (vs. Hindu) were associated with higher odds of perceiving severe vaccination risk. Those who believed that God would cure COVID‐19 and those with higher education tended to perceive the vaccine as having a limited effect. Implications on designing culturally appropriate COVID‐19 vaccines messages in interethnic settings are discussed.


In this paper, we propose a discrete mathematical model that describes the evolution of the "covid-19" virus in a human population and the efforts made to control it. Our objective is to develop a simple, logical and an optimal strategy to reduce the negative impact of this infectious disease on countries. This objective is achieved through maximizing the number of people applying the preventive measures recommended by WHO against the pandemic in order to reduce the infection as much as possible. The tools of optimal control theory were used in this study, in particular Pontryagin's maximum principle.


The authors compare the performance of three heuristic algorithms for the minimization of sum-of-products expressions realized by the H.G. Kerkhoff and J.T. Butler's (1986) multiple-valued programmable logic arrays. Heuristic methods are important because exact minimization is extremely time-consuming. The authors compare the heuristics to the exact solution, showing that heuristic methods are reasonably close to minimal. They use as a basis of comparison the average number of product terms over a set of randomly generated functions. All three heuristics produce nearly the same average number of product terms. Although the averages are close, there is surprisingly little overlap among the set of functions for which the best realization is achieved. Thus, there is a benefit to applying different heuristics and then choosing the best realization.<<ETX>>


We report the use of chemically modified carbon nanotubes as a substrate for cultured neurons. The morphological features of neurons that directly reflect their potential capability in synaptic transmission are characterized. The chemical properties of carbon nanotubes are systematically varied by attaching different functional groups that confer known characteristics to the substrate. By manipulating the charge carried by functionalized carbon nanotubes we are able to control the outgrowth and branching pattern of neuronal processes.


A HUMAN BEING AS A DYNAMIC SPIRITUAL AND BODILY INDIVIDUAL
IN THE TEACHING OF ST. MAXIMUS THE CONFESSOR
(Summary)
In St. Maximus the Confessor's teaching human nature consists of the soul
and the body, in which logos of power that unifies them together is inscribed.
Human nature manifests itself in the individual human being. The human being
as the body and the soul naturally longs for God. This longing is fulfilled by the
movement, which is connected to dynamism of the entire human structure. The
dynamism is inscribed in the mind, reason, spirit, will, sense, passionate powers
and body. The dynamic aspiration for God does not imply getting rid of any of the
human elements, even passionate and bodily, but on the contrary, it demands appreciation
and proper use of all the natural powers of the human being. Maximus
the Confessor treats the human being as a whole. The human is not only mind,
reason and spirit, but also will, sense, passionate powers and body. The dynamism
of mental and spiritual sphere should be extended in the senses, passionate powers
and body, so that the body also becomes the source of virtues, and is deified
together with the soul through unity with the Absolute. This unity as the goal of human longing will never be static, but dynamic, because the fulfillment of
this longing is the state with eternal movement. So human being will constantly
strive for even more perfect unity with God. Through this unity the human being
becomes more human. The originality of the Author consists in the fact that using
the anthropological views of the earlier tradition and interpreting them mystically
and symbolically, he intertwined the entire dynamism of human being with the
structure of the Platonic world. The human being through the longing for God
and through the proper use of natural powers mystically unites with God not only
himself/herself, but also the entire universe, because the structure of the human
being is analogous to the structure of the universe.


ABSTRACT This qualitative study explored the effects of human–animal relationships on care-farms, with specific attention to the context of trauma histories. We questioned how the interpretative act and belief in identifying shared narratives of prior suffering could change how people relate to their own narratives of trauma and grief and to animals. Drawing on a study of grieving individuals' experiences on a care-farm providing support and psychoeducation to individuals who have experienced traumatic grief, we present the results of an in-depth qualitative survey. As part of the study, participants were asked to reflect on whether it was important that the service-provider's model included helping rescue animals: 91% answered affirmatively. Participants were invited to expand discursively why, or why not, this had been meaningful to them. Our results show that participants assigned benefits from personally identifying a "shared narrative" of trauma with the animals, that witnessing a level of rehabilitation and resilience in animals with trauma histories was meaningful for participants for their own integration of grief, and that being able to contribute "care" for animals provided a mechanism for compassionate practice. Our findings suggest that animals with loss and trauma biographies may provide unique and unexpected psychological benefits to humans facing grief and trauma. We are not suggesting that animals who have a traumatic past have an inherent capacity for providing salutary benefit or that such animals should be engaged to provide therapeutic opportunities. Rather, we emphasize the importance of narrative and how such narratives change how participants relate to, and interact with, animals. Our research serves as an important reminder that "therapy animals" are living beings with their own life histories and experiences. Careful thought needs to be given when working with animals in a therapeutic context in order to protect both vulnerable humans and animals.


Over the last decade, agroecology has rapidly moved from the margins and taken centre stage in global discussions on environment and development. Institutions like the United Nation's Food and Agriculture Organization increasingly argue that agroecology can significantly help alleviate hunger and poverty as well as contribute to meeting other sustainable development goals. In this context, the history and practices of agroecology are outlined, and some of the ecological, social, economic, and political challenges for transformation to agroecology and food sovereignty have been identified.


Aim This study aimed to assess the molecular subtypes of breast cancer for patients attending a dedicated breast care center and examine the association with clinicopathological features, treatment and survival outcomes. Methods Demographic, clinicopathological and treatment details were collected from women with primary breast cancer. Immunohistochemical subtypes were also collected. The association between breast cancer subtypes and clinicopathological features was assessed using the chi-square or Fisher's exact test. Survival outcomes were compared among subtypes with the log-rank test. Results Immunohistochemical subtypes were not associated with tumor size, lymphovascular invasion or lymph node involvement but differed by histological grade (p=0.014) and nuclear grade of tumors (p=0.001). The 5-year overall survival estimates for luminal A, luminal B, HER-2-positive and triple-negative tumors were 100%, 96.2%, 71.4% and 92.3% respectively. Compared to luminal A tumors (93.4%), luminal B (80.8%), HER-2-positive (71.4%) and triple-negative (76.9%) tumors exhibited a reduced disease-free survival (DFS). Patients with ER-positive tumors had a higher DFS than their ER-negative counterparts (p=0.036). Patients with tumors expressing a low Ki-67 level had a more favorable prognosis (p=0.02). Conclusions The most prevalent luminal A subtype is associated with relatively better prognosis, whereas HER-2-positive and triple-negative tumors are prone to early relapse with diminished survival.


One of the fastest growing next generation consumer products is a robot technology industry and it is rapidly forming a huge market. A depth extraction is one of the key techniques to adopt a home assistant robot for avoiding obstacles and looking for a transfer route. However, a home assistant robot mounted stereo vision systems produce unpredictable changes in video sequences when the robot is walking and needs hard computation to produce an accurate estimation. In this paper, we propose hardware based realtime stereo depth extraction method for an intelligent home assistant robot. For fast adaption of the external environment, we present depth map extraction algorithm by using preprocessing, parallel prediction searching employing median filter. Experimental results show that the proposed method reduces the processing time and the energy consumption compared to the conventional methods. This implementation is suitable for adaptive real-time depth extraction that is compatible with current robot applications.


Wave propagation in a single-layered hexagonal boron nitride ( h-BN) metamaterial is investigated by molecular dynamics (MD) simulation and the finite element method (FEM). The molecular model for a single-layered h-BN metamaterial is established. The transmission performance of elastic waves in metamaterials is simulated by the MD method. The MD simulation results show that the metamaterial has an elastic wave bandgap in the frequency range of THz. The edge states in the bandgap region are found by the MD method and FEM, and the wave propagation is confined to the boundary only. The results obtained by the FEM roughly agree with those of MD simulations. The difference in the bonding structures between the atoms at the boundary and interior of the metamaterial results in the differences between the FEM and MD results. The size effect on the bandgap structure is studied by comparing the transmission curves of the metamaterial with different unit cell sizes. The size effect becomes more substantial with decreasing feature size of the metamaterial. This work can be helpful for the vibration suppression of nanoelectromechanical systems.


Restrictive emotionality and restrictive affectionate behavior between men, 2 components of male gender role conflict (O'Neil, Helms, Gable, David, & Wrightsman, 1986) were studied to understand their mediating role in the association between 2 Latino masculinity ideologies (i.e., machismo and caballerismo) and attitudes toward seeking professional psychological help. Four separate path analyses (Mplus, V 7.11, Muthen & Muthen, 1998–2013) were used to test for the hypothesized indirect effects. Results did not indicate support for any of the 4 hypothesized indirect effects with a community-based sample of 202 adult Latino men. However, significant associations between machismo, age, and help-seeking attitudes were found. Implications of these findings as well as recommendations for future research are discussed.


Self-assembled lithium iron phosphate (LiFePO4) with tunable microstructure is an effective way to improve the electrochemical performance of cathode materials for lithium ion batteries. Herein, self-assembled LiFePO4/C twin microspheres are synthesized by a hydrothermal method using a mixed solution of phosphoric acid and phytic acid as the phosphorus source. The twin microspheres are hierarchical structures composed of primary nano-sized capsule-like particles (about 100 nm in diameter and 200 nm in length). The uniform thin carbon layer on the surface of the particles improves the charge transport capacity. The channel between the particles facilitates the electrolyte infiltration, and the high electrolyte accessibility enables the electrode material to obtain excellent ion transport. The optimal LiFePO4/C-60 exhibits excellent rate performance with discharge capacity of 156.3 mA h g−1 and 118.5 mA h g−1 respectively at 0.2C and 10C, and low temperature performances with discharge capacity of 90.67 mA h g−1 and 66.7 mA h g−1 at −15 °C and −25 °C, respectively. This research may provide a new pathway to improve the performance of LiFePO4 by tuning the micro-structures by adjusting the relative content of phosphoric acid and phytic acid.


Humans usually acquire Fasciola infection by eating contaminated aquatic vegetation, such as watercress. After ingestion, Fasciola metacercariae excyst in the duodenum. In contrast to other liver flukes (Clonorchis and Opisthorchis) that migrate through the ampulla of Vater and ascend the biliary tree, Fasciola metacercariae penetrate the duodenal wall, migrate through the peritoneal cavity, and enter the liver. After a period of migrating randomly through the liver parenchyma, they eventually reach the larger biliary ducts and mature into adults. We present a case that illustrates this migration route of Fasciola.


The metabolism of (6-7-3H) estradiol-17 beta was studied in vitro in different cellular fractions of Guinea Pig placenta. The substrate was transformed into free as well as conjugated (hydrosoluble) estrone. It was thus possible to conclude, on one hand the existence of a very active microsomial 17 beta-hydroxy steroid-dehydrogenase and on the other the presence of a cytosolic system of estrogen conjugation. No estradiol-17 alpha or estriol were determined.


This paper addresses the low-frequency problems for open capacitive problems in the electric field integral equation using Calderón multiplicative preconditioner (CMP-EFIE). At low frequencies, the CMP-EFIE fails to extract accurate highorder current for a capacitor problem. By representing the electric current at different frequency orders as a power series, we successfully apply the perturbation method on the CMP-EFIE for capacitive structures with open surfaces. Numerical results show that the highly accurate current for a capacitor can be obtained with fast convergence at extremely low frequencies.


It is, therefore, most important that a patient is not labeled with the diagnosis of 'benign congenital hypotonia' but that a specific diagnosis be established by information provided by a CPK test and muscle biopsy interpreted by a physician with wide experience in diagnosing neuromuscular disorders. Other laboratory studies and DNA testing may also be needed. A specific diagnosis is important so that precautions against malignant hyperthermia may be taken in all the family members and genetic counseling offered.


Bugs are a well known Achilles' heel of software development. In the last few years, machine learning techniques to combat software bugs have become popular. However, results of these techniques are not good enough for practical adoption. In addition, most techniques do not provide reasons for why a code change is a bug.
Furthermore, suggestions to fix the bug would be greatly beneficial. An added bonus would be engaging humans to improve the bug and fix prediction process.
In this dissertation, a step-by-step procedure which effectively predicts buggy code changes (Bug Prognosticator), produces bug fix suggestions (Fix Suggester), and utilizes human feedback is presented. Each of these steps can be used independently, but combining them allows more effective management of bugs. These techniques are tested on many open source and a large commercial project. Human feedback was used to understand and improve the performance of the techniques. Feedback was primarily gathered from industry participants in order to assess practical suitability.
The Bug Prognosticator explores feature selection techniques and classifiers to improve results of code change bug prediction. The optimized Bug Prognosticator is able to achieve an average 97% precision and 70% recall when evaluated on eleven projects, ten open source and one commercial.
The Fix Suggester uses the Bug Prognosticator and statistical analysis of keyword term frequencies to suggest unordered fix keywords to a code change predicted to be buggy. The suggestions are validated against actual bug fixes to confirm their utility. The Fix Suggester is able to achieve 46.9% precision and 38.9% recall on its predicted fix tokens. This is a reasonable start to the difficult problem of predicting the contents of a bug fix.
To improve the efficiency of the Bug Prognosticator and the Fix Suggester, active learning is employed on willing human participants. Developers aid the Bug Prognosticator and the Fix Suggester on code changes that machines find hard to evaluate. The developer's feedback is used to enhance the performance of the Bug Prognosticator and the Fix Suggester. In addition, a user study is performed to gauge the utility of the Fix Suggester.
The dissertation concludes with a discussion of future work and challenges faced by the techniques. Given the success of statistical defect prediction techniques, more industrial exposure would benefit researchers and software practitioners.


Dekker, Rowley, and Ford's sympathetic treatment of a relationship between a witch and her demonic familiar in The Witch of Edmonton works to question and criticize prevailing cultural attitudes that problematically associated liberal female speech with a transgressing female body. This challenge arises from their demonstration that such attitudes are precisely what force Mother Sawyer into a pact with the devil -- a pact that turns out to suddenly enact her persecutors' previously groundless conflation of her speech with her body, in a way that exposes the real horror and absurdity of this association, and the tragic effects it has on Sawyer herself. The fates of other women in the play echo Sawyer's to further expose the unjust paradoxes in attitudes surrounding women's speech.


Although the main symptom of facial nerve neurinoma is facial paralysis, it has been reported that about 30% of patients with facial nerve tumor do not demonstrate symptoms of facial paralysis at the initial diagnosis. Although facial nerve neurinoma is a benign tumor that can be completely treated by surgical extraction, irreversible facial paralysis is almost unavoidable. Therefore, one method is to wait until facial paralysis has clearly developed before performing surgery. However, enlargement of the tumor may cause destruction of adjacent organs and serious complications. Therefore, we must carefully consider the surgical timing as well as how we explain the risk of complications to the patient.In this case, there was an interval of six years from the initial diagnosis of neurinoma until the patient consented to surgery. The tumor had extended from the horizontal portion of the facial nerve to the parotid gland, and destroyed not only the facial canal but also the structures of the middle ear and the posterior wall of the external auditory meatus, causing conductive hearing loss. Severe facial paralysis and moderate conductive hearing loss was present at the time of surgery. Postoperative functional loss was minimized by performing tympanoplasty type III and facial nerve reconstruction by interposition to the hypoglossal nerve.


In Reply In the demonstration we evaluated, the CDS systems did not access the entire patient record in a readily computable format. Rather, ordering clinicians entered data describing the reason each test was ordered into the CDS system. The systems varied regarding the inclusion of data pertinent to demographics, past medical history, prior imaging or other studies, symptom characterization, and social status. The ability of the CDS systems to link to and rate orders was highly dependent on the completeness and quality of the data entered. Although the demonstration used several data entry methods, all of the systems studied used top-down methods of capturing structured data, and all showed a substantial proportion of orders could not be rated. We agree that accessing the data in electronic health records (which requires semantic interoperability) could improve the usability and performance of CDS systems.


The synchronous conditions of two kinds of the small-world (SW) network are studied. The small world topology can affect on dynamical behaviors of the beam transport network (BTN) largely, if the BTN is constructed with the SW topology, the global linear coupling and special linear feedback can realize the synchronization control of beam halo-chaos as well as periodic state in the BTN with the SW topology, respectively. This important result can provide an effective way for the experimental study and the engineering design of the BTN in the high-current accelerator driven radioactive clean nuclear power systems, and may have potential use in prospective applications for halo-chaos secure communication.


A stochastic signal optimization method based on a genetic algorithm (GA-SOM) that interfaces with the microscopic simulation program CORSIM is assessed. A network in Chicago consisting of nine signalized intersections is used as an evaluation test bed. Taking CORSIM as the best representation of reality, the performance of the GA-SOM plan sets a ceiling on how good any (fixed) signal plan can be. An important aspect of this approach is its accommodations of variability. Also discussed is the robustness of an optimal plan under changes in demand. This benchmark is used to assess the best signal plan generated by TRANSYT-7F (T7F), Version 8.1, from among 12 reasonable strategies. The performance of the best T7F plan falls short of the benchmark on several counts, reflecting the need to account for variability in the highly stochastic system of traffic operations, which is not possible under the deterministic conditions intrinsic to T7F. As a sidelight, the performance of the GA-SOM plan within T7F is also computed and it is found to perform nearly as well as the optimum T7F plan.


The article questions an assumption in palliative care literature, namely that all patients have a spiritual dimension and that all staff can offer spiritual care. The article identifies spirituality as a particular kind of discourse. In late-modern Anglophone societies, this discourse arises from the experience of a particular generation and a particular segment of the population, namely those moving beyond formal religion; this segment is probably better represented among caring professionals than among dying patients. A four-fold typology of patients' approaches to religion/spirituality is developed, indicating the potential of differentiating between actual patients, rather than presuming a universal 'search for meaning'. This alternative approach may enhance opportunities for team working and reduce the likelihood of any one member of staff feeling spiritual care to be an unwelcome burden.


Several different types of commercially available greases, aged in a roll stability tester, have been tested in a ball-on-disc machine where the film thickness was measured using the interferometry method. The grease film thickness at very low speed is thicker than the base oil film thickness due to the contribution of the thickener in this regime, which practically vanishes at higher speeds. The (mechanical) aging process reduces the thickener material, decreasing the grease film thickness at very low speeds (entrainment speed less than 0.01 m/s) with aging time, whereas no significant difference was found at higher speeds where the grease film thickness still approached the calculated base oil film thickness.


While source code expresses and implements design considerations for software system, test cases capture and represent the domain knowledge of software developer, her assumptions on the implicit and explicit interaction protocols in the system, and the expected behavior of different modules of the system in normal and exceptional conditions. Moreover, test cases capture information about the environment and the data the system operates on. As such, together with the system source code, test cases integrate important system and domain knowledge. Besides being an important project artifact, test cases embody up to the half the overall software development cost and effort. Software projects produce many test cases of different kind and granularity to thoroughly check the system functionality, aiming to prevent, detect, and remove different types of faults. Simple test cases exercise small parts of the system aiming to detect faults in single modules. More complex integration and system test cases exercise larger parts of the system aiming to detect problems in module interactions and verify the functionality of the system as a whole. Not surprisingly, the test case complexity comes at a cost – developing complex test cases is a laborious and expensive task that is hard to automate. Our intuition is that important information that is naturally present in test cases can be reused to reduce the effort in generation of new test cases. This thesis develops this intuition and investigates the phenomenon of information reuse among test cases. We first empirically investigated many test cases from real software projects and demonstrated that test cases of different granularity indeed share code fragments and build upon each other. Then we proposed an approach for automatically generating complex test cases by extracting and exploiting information in existing simple ones. In particular, our approach automatically generates integration test cases from unit ones. We implemented our approach in a prototype to evaluate its ability to generate new and useful test cases for real software systems. Our studies show that test cases generated with our approach reveal new interaction faults even in well tested applications. We evaluated the effectiveness of our approach by comparing it with the state of the art test generation techniques. The evaluation results show that our approach is effective, it finds relevant faults differently from other approaches that tend to find different and usually less relevant faults.


Background—Helicobacter pylori infection raises basal and meal stimulated serum gastrin concentrations and lowers iron stores, which may in turn reduce fasting plasma glucose concentrations in the population. Aim—To determine whether H pylori infection leads to lower fasting plasma glucose concentrations in the population. Methods—One hundred and seventy three women and 165 men, randomly selected from the electoral rolls of an Australian city, participated in a cardiovascular risk factor survey. Plasma glucose concentrations and H pylori IgG antibody titres were measured. Non-fasting subjects and pregnant women were excluded, as were known diabetics, whose plasma glucose concentrations would be affected by diet and/or medications. Fasting plasma glucose concentrations were logarithmically transformed and the relation with H pylori infection, adjusting for age and other confounding factors, was determined for men and women separately by analyses of variance. Results—Helicobacter pylori infection was significantly associated with fasting plasma glucose concentration among women. Infected women had a lower mean fasting plasma glucose concentration (5.2 mmol/litre; range, 3.9–8.2) than did non-infected women (5.4 mmol/litre; range, 3.9–11.1). Conclusions—Helicobacter pylori infection may lead to lower fasting plasma glucose concentrations among women and should be considered when interpreting concentrations bordering on diabetes.


Exotic rocks found as pebbles in the Torridon Group span the range of Lewisian events (3000 to 1000 my. B.P.) but were formed at higher crustal levels than the present Lewisian. Their variations southward along the present outcrop seem to reflect changes in the basement as it is traced through Greenland towards Labrador. The new evidence is consistent with the views of previous workers. Tourmaline is used as a 'supracrustal index' and confirmed as a valuable dating mineral.


Information regarding the utility of adjunct diagnostic tests in combination with Xpert MTB/RIF (Cepheid, Sunnyvale, CA, USA) is limited. We hypothesised adjunct tests could enhance accuracy and/or reduce the cost of tuberculosis (TB) diagnosis prior to MTB/RIF testing, and rule-in or rule-out TB in MTB/RIF-negative individuals. We assessed the accuracy and/or laboratory-associated cost of diagnosis of smear microscopy, chest radiography (CXR) and interferon-&ggr; release assays (IGRAs; T-SPOT-TB (Oxford Immunotec, Oxford, UK) and QuantiFERON-TB Gold In-Tube (Cellestis, Chadstone, Australia)) combined with MTB/RIF for TB in 480 patients in South Africa. When conducted prior to MTB/RIF: 1) smear microscopy followed by MTB/RIF (if smear negative) had the lowest cost of diagnosis of any strategy investigated; 2) a combination of smear microscopy, CXR (if smear negative) and MTB/RIF (if imaging compatible with active TB) did not further reduce the cost per TB case diagnosed; and 3) a normal CXR ruled out TB in 18% of patients (57 out of 324; negative predictive value (NPV) 100%). When downstream adjunct tests were applied to MTB/RIF-negative individuals, radiology ruled out TB in 24% (56 out of 234; NPV 100%), smear microscopy ruled in TB in 21% (seven out of 24) of culture-positive individuals and IGRAs were not useful in either context. In resource-poor settings, smear microscopy combined with MTB/RIF had the highest accuracy and lowest cost of diagnosis compared to either technique alone. In MTB/RIF-negative individuals, CXR has poor rule-in value but can reliably rule out TB in approximately one in four cases. These data inform upon the programmatic utility of MTB/RIF in high-burden settings.


ABSTRACT This paper considers the impact of the adversary system on forensic social work and asks the question, can social workers establish an authentic therapeutic alliance and fiduciary relations within the context of the law? The adversary process of the judicial system presents challenges that are affecting the relationship between forensic social workers and their mentally ill patients/offenders in unique ways. For example, because of the quasi-coercive situations in the forensic setting, interpersonal attributes such as empathy, warmth, and genuineness, which are the essential components of therapeutic alliance and fiduciary obligation, cannot be truly or positively attained. Social works' fiduciary responsibilities become all the more complex when patient's rights to self-determination (autonomy) and informed consent, are disregarded by psychiatric hospitals, doctors, and judges. Therapeutic alliance and fiduciary or trusting relationships are central to social work practice. However, the challenge and intricacies of maintaining therapeutic alliances in the forensic setting are concerns that have been largely ignored in the professional literature. This paper seeks to explore these challenges.


ABSTRACT Computer simulation studies represent an important tool for investigating processes difficult or impossible to study using mathematical theory or real data. Hoaglin and Andrews recommended these studies be treated as statistical sampling experiments subject to established principles of design and data analysis, but the survey of Hauck and Anderson suggested these recommendations had, at that point in time, generally been ignored. We update the survey results of Hauck and Anderson using a sample of studies applying simulation methods in statistical research to assess the extent to which the recommendations of Hoaglin and Andrews and others for conducting simulation studies have been adopted. The important role of statistical applications of computer simulation studies in enhancing the reproducibility of scientific findings is also discussed. The results speak to the state of the art and the extent to which these studies are realizing their potential to inform statistical practice and a program of statistical research.


Cadmium (Cd) is classified as a human carcinogen probably associated with epigenetic change. However, its underlying mechanism and role in epigenetics is still poorly understood. DNA methylation is one of the epigenetic mechanisms by which cells control expression. Our previous in vivo experiment has shown that caspase-8 gene promoter of the rat liver tissue was hypermethylated in Cd at 20 nmol kg−1 for 4 weeks. In the present study, we will disclose whether DNA methylation is also involved in this Cd-stimulated FL83B cell proliferation. When the FL83B cells were exposed to Cd at a low dose (0.085 μM) for only 14 days, cell proliferation and DNMT methyltransferase expression and activity increased, while the mRNA and protein of tumor gene caspase-8 decreased remarkably, along with a significant decrease in cell apoptosis and increase in cell invasion and metastasis. Furthermore, caspase-8 gene promoter in Cd-exposed Fl83B cells was hypermethylated, consistent with our in vivo experiment. A DNA methylation inhibitor, 5-aza-2′-deoxycytidine (5-aza-dC), prevented Cd-stimulated cell proliferation, invasion and metastasis associated with recovered caspase-8 expression. These results suggest that low dose Cd may induce caspase-8 gene promoter hypermethylation, resulting in down-regulation of its expression, and consequently promoting cell proliferation, invasion and metastasis and decreasing apoptosis, both of which would contribute to Cd-induced carcinogenesis.


The governments of the European Union are facing important challenges that may impact both their need and their capacity to collect taxes. First, ageing will increase some social spending while reducing the potential of some tax bases such as labour. Second, globalisation has the potential to increase the mobility of capital and of high-skilled workers, making it more difficult to rely on them as a source of revenues. Finally, the desire to shift tax away from labour and to make work pay while retaining the social models will force Member States to find alternative robust tax bases. This paper reviews the most recent trends in taxation in the European Union and discusses several tax policy issues in the light of those coming challenges.


We have identified regular thermal patterns over normal knee, ankle, and elbow joints and demonstrate how synovitis affecting these joints may be identified by alteration or loss of the thermal pattern. Sixty healthy volunteers were thermographed on a total of 190 occasions, and 614 out of 618 joints conformed to the normal thermal pattern. Eighty-five patients with synovitis of at least one of the specified joints were thermographed on a total of 339 occasions, and 322 out of 1362 thermograms were abnormal. No joint with clinical evidence of synovitis had a normal thermal pattern. As temperature-based parameters have been found to show marked diurnal variation and relative frequency distributions do not have this drawback, we suggest that quantification of synovitis by thermography should in future be based on abnormalities of thermal pattern rather than absolute skin temperature values.


In the February issue of theArchives, Brusasco et al 1 reported a case of trichothiodystrophy in which findings of hair microscopic examinations changed in the first month of life, with the development of the "tiger tail" appearance on polarized light microscopic examination. The authors make several points that would be helpful to put in a more general context. Although the tiger tail appearance may suggest a hair disorder, it is a relatively common finding in the hair of healthy infants and those with no specific disease. 2 Conversely, it is not seen in neonates, as demonstrated in a recent study 3 where 20 premature newborns (mean gestational age, 36 weeks) underwent regular and polarized transmitted light microscopic examinations of cut and plucked hair samples from the parietal scalp. These samples revealed markedly homogeneous characteristics on polarized light microscopic examination, with hairs demonstrating a gold, blue, or brown hue, with


Abstract. This study presents the first environmental monitoring field campaign of a newly developed Tethered And Navigated Air Blimp (TANAB) system to investigate the microclimate over a complex terrain. The use of a tethered balloon in complex terrains such as mines and tailings ponds is novel and the focus of the present study. The TANAB system was fully developed and launched at a mine facility in northern Canada in May 2018. This study describes the key design features, the sensor payload onboard, and the observations made by the TANAB system. The system measured meteorological conditions including wind speed in three directions, temperature, relative humidity, and pressure over the first few tens of meters of the atmospheric boundary layer. The system also performed earth surface thermal imaging, or temperature mapping, of the underlying surface. The measurements were made at two primary locations in the facility: i) near a tailings pond and ii) in a mine pit. TANAB measured the dynamics of the atmosphere at different diurnal times (e.g. day versus night) and locations (near tailings pond versus inside the mine). Such dynamics include mean and turbulence statistics pertaining to flow momentum and energy, and they are crucial in the understanding of emission fluxes from the facility in future studies. In addition, TANAB can provide boundary conditions and validation datasets to support mesoscale dispersion modelling or Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) simulations for various transport models.


The Federal Open Market Committee indicated in its September 2017 post-meeting statement that it will initiate in October a balance sheet normalization program to gradually reduce its securities holdings. This action will put in place a policy of reinvesting and redeeming portions of the principal payments received by the Federal Reserve from its holdings of Treasury and agency securities. How are these adjustments to the Federal Reserve's securities holdings transacted and who is affected? This paper provides a primer regarding how the Federal Reserve accounts for these securities transactions. It also illustrates the numerous ways that the Federal Reserve's actions can play out across other sectors of the economy, including those that engage directly with the Federal Reserve and those that are involved indirectly as funds change hands.


Upon a wide range of cellular stresses, p53 is activated and inhibits malignant transformation through the transcriptional regulation of its target genes related to apoptosis, cell cycle arrest, and DNA repair. However, its involvement in posttranslational modifications of proteins has not yet been well characterized. We recently reported the novel role of p53 in the regulation of protein citrullination through the transactivation of peptidylarginine deiminase type 4 (PADI4). The PADI4 gene encodes an enzyme catalyzing the citrullination of arginine residues in proteins, and ectopic expression of p53 or PADI4 induced protein citrullination. In addition, various proteins were citrullinated in response to DNA damage, but knockdown of PADI4 or p53 remarkably inhibited their citrullination. Here we generated the Padi4-deficient mice and examined the role of protein citrullination in vivo. When mice were exposed to X-ray (3 Gy), Padi4 expression was induced in thymus of irradiated wild type mice but not in p53-/- and Padi4-/- mice. Interestingly, TUNEL-positive cells in irradiated thymus were significantly decreased in Padi4-/- mice. Gene expression analysis using irradiated thymus tissues revealed several genes related to the immune response were regulated by Padi4. To further investigate the molecular mechanism whereby PADI4 regulates apoptotic pathway, we surveyed PADI4 substrates and found that various proteins such as core histones were citrullinated in response to DNA damage. These findings demonstrated the significance of PADI4-mediated protein citrullination in the p53 signaling pathway. Citation Format: {Authors}. {Abstract title} [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the 102nd Annual Meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research; 2011 Apr 2-6; Orlando, FL. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2011;71(8 Suppl):Abstract nr 217. doi:10.1158/1538-7445.AM2011-217


In the present work, we focus on the bulk rheology of mixtures consisting of surfactant modified silica nanoparticles in water. Depending on the ratio of surfactant and nanoparticle concentrations, significant modifications in the measured rheology are evidenced. A domain where the dispersions behave like viscoelastic media is observed. Outside this domain, the dispersions exhibit viscous properties. The changes in the bulk rheology characteristics are discussed in terms of interaction effects between the surfactant and the particles. The results obtained are seen in the context of diluted emulsions' properties and characteristics.


Correction for 'Seasonal variation in aerosol composition and concentration upon transport from the outdoor to indoor environment' by Anita M. Avery et al., Environ. Sci.: Processes Impacts, 2019, 21, 528-547.


—We introduce a new transformation estimation algorithm using the L2E estimator, and apply it to non-rigid registration for building robust sparse and dense correspondences. In the sparse point case, our method iteratively recovers the point correspondence and estimates the transformation between two point sets. Feature descriptors such as shape context are used to establish rough correspondence. We then estimate the transformation using our robust algorithm. This enables us to deal with the noise and outliers which arise in the correspondence step. The transformation is specified in a functional space, more specifically a reproducing kernel Hilbert space. In the dense point case for non-rigid image registration, our approach consists of matching both sparsely and densely sampled SIFT features, and it has particular advantages in handling significant scale changes and rotations. The experimental results show that our approach greatly outperforms state-of-the-art methods, particularly when the data contains severe outliers.


Received 14 December 2013; accepted 27 April 2014 In spite of the commendations for the use of portfolio assessment, there is still little evidence indicating that such assessment actually supports and encourages student learning. Hence, this research study aimed to empirically identify the effects of implementation of portfolio assessment on student learning and attitudes. Trueexperimental design was used for the study. Participants of the research were nine-grade students. Portfolio assessment was implemented in the experimental group for eight-week duration in the physics course. Findings illustrate that the students assessed by the portfolio constructed more knowledge than the students that did not prepare a portfolio. On the other hand, portfolio assessment did not make any difference in the students' attitudes towards physics. This study concludes that portfolios are not only an indication for student growth but also a learning tool.


The present study was aimed at providing an understanding of the role of omental pedicle transposition in peripheral nerve regeneration by utilizing an established rabbit sciatic nerve regeneration model. Twelve adult New Zealand White rabbits (2-2.3kg) were divided into two groups (n=6) and acclimatized for 3 weeks. Complete blood examination, liver and kidney function tests were carried out during this period. In Group A, an end-to-end of sciatic nerve segment anastomosis was done, while that of Group B, the nerve anastomosis wrapped with omental pedicle was performed. The nerve specimens were collected from both groups for histopathological and ultrastructural evaluation after 16 weeks post surgery. Results showed that omental pedicle transpositioned (Group B) had more newly developed nerve fibres and less scar tissue. Ultrastructural examinations showed neuronal sprouting, whereas directions of regenerative nerve fibres were intraneural, but in the end-to-end anastomosis of group B showed that some of nerve fibres had extraneural.


OBJECTIVE. The purpose of this article is to evaluate 2D and 3D image quality of high-resolution ultralow-dose CT images of the craniofacial bone for navigated surgery using adaptive statistical iterative reconstruction (ASIR) and model-based iterative reconstruction (MBIR) in comparison with standard filtered backprojection (FBP). MATERIALS AND METHODS. A formalin-fixed human cadaver head was scanned using a clinical reference protocol at a CT dose index volume of 30.48 mGy and a series of five ultralow-dose protocols at 3.48, 2.19, 0.82, 0.44, and 0.22 mGy using FBP and ASIR at 50% (ASIR-50), ASIR at 100% (ASIR-100), and MBIR. Blinded 2D axial and 3D volume-rendered images were compared with each other by three readers using top-down scoring. Scores were analyzed per protocol or dose and reconstruction. All images were compared with the FBP reference at 30.48 mGy. A nonparametric Mann-Whitney U test was used. Statistical significance was set at p < 0.05. RESULTS. For 2D images, the FBP reference at 30.48 mGy did not statistically significantly differ from ASIR-100 at 3.48 mGy, ASIR-100 at 2.19 mGy, and MBIR at 0.82 mGy. MBIR at 2.19 and 3.48 mGy scored statistically significantly better than the FBP reference (p = 0.032 and 0.001, respectively). For 3D images, the FBP reference at 30.48 mGy did not statistically significantly differ from all reconstructions at 3.48 mGy; FBP and ASIR-100 at 2.19 mGy; FBP, ASIR-100, and MBIR at 0.82 mGy; MBIR at 0.44 mGy; and MBIR at 0.22 mGy. CONCLUSION. MBIR (2D and 3D) and ASIR-100 (2D) may significantly improve subjective image quality of ultralow-dose images and may allow more than 90% dose reductions.


Wireless systems operating in the ISM frequency bands and sharing the same environment are likely to interfere with each other. We address the problem of coexistence between IEEE 802.11 and IEEE 802.15 devices, and we present a mechanism that mitigates the interference between these devices when IEEE 802.15 supports voice traffic. The proposed scheme can work when 802.11 and 802.15 devices operate in non-collaborative mode, ie, independently of one another. The performance of the proposed algorithm is compared to the results obtained through the so-called MEHTA scheme, which is a collaborative mechanism recently presented to the IEEE 802.15 Working Group. Simulation results show that the proposed algorithm gives good performance relative to the MEHTA scheme when colocated interfering devices only are considered, while it outperforms the MEHTA scheme when non-colocated interfering devices are present.


We have tried to assess the effects of various methods in the treatment of mid-shaft clavicle fractures for Evaluating the end effects of midshaft Clavicle fractures diagnosed in the Tertiary Treatment Centre through different surgical procedures.Assess the feasibility and risks of the various treatment modalities in relation to time required for union concerning radiological and clinical outcomes range of movements associated complications about infection, deformity and pain stability at shoulder joint . The results are evaluated according to the DASH score. The study was conducted from October 2016 to March 2018 for mid-shaft clavicle fractures in patients with Open Reduction and Internal Plating Fixation, while intramedullary nailing patients were selected and performed from October 2013 to October 2016 at the Orthopedics Department at Krishna Hospital and Medical Research Centre. The present study is a Randomized, Prospective (in terms of plating cases), Retrospective (in terms of cases with intramedullary nailing), and Comparative and Clinical study. In this research or study, we have resolved that plate fixation for severely displaced communicated midpoint shaft clavicle fractures provides excellent results in terms of rigid fixation, rotational stability and maintenance of anatomical length which intramedullary nailing fails to maintain.


With the mobile Internet development, e-health has become increasingly connected with people's daily life. However, health information on Internet is severely corrupted by misinformation, especially for the aged. It is necessary to analyze the characteristics of health-related misinformation on Internet and to design automated detection tools. In this study, we focus on analyzing common characteristics of reliable and unreliable health-related information on Chinese online social media, and exploring possible detection method using machine learning algorithms. We first collect a dataset containing both reliable and unreliable health-related articles from multiple Chinese online social media sites, with 2,296 reliable and 2,085 unreliable included. Then we analyze their differences with respect to writing style, text topic and feature distribution by both intuitive and statistical analysis. We also manually select 104 linguistic and statistical features that are useful for machine learning classifiers. Lastly, we propose a Health-related Misinformation Detection framework (HMD) that includes a feature-based method and a text-based method for detecting unreliable health-related information. Experiments verifies the performance of our proposed HMD method.


: The author analyzes the results obtained in clinical impedance testing of 2,799 ears by tympanometry and study of the acoustico-facial reflex. Impedance terminology is discussed and classified in an attempt to bring order to the results. Important findings include the high incidence of negative middle ear pressure in older, profoundly hard-of-hearing children.


In technology enabled self-tutoring systems, it could be useful to monitor learners' cognitive and affective states in real time to provide useful feedback when a student faces difficulty or seems disengaged. Biometric sensors such as EEG, GSR and eye trackers have been used to indicate cognitive and affective states of individuals. In order to make EEG relevant and affordable for such HCI applications we need to be able to use consumer-grade devices. We conducted a pilot study using a wearable consumer grade MUSE© headband to record EEG signals. We used the ratio of the frequencies alpha and theta (theta/alpha) to investigate cognitive load and the frontal asymmetry in the alpha frequency band to investigate learners' affective states. We found evidence supporting the use of theta/alpha as a cognitive load metric. However, alpha frontal asymmetry was not indicative of affective states. We discuss the results and possible implications of our study.