Abstract The Triple Aim unequivocally connects interprofessional healthcare teams to the provision of better healthcare services that would eventually lead to improved health outcomes. This review of the interprofessional education (IPE) and collaborative practice empirical literature from 2008 to 2013 focused on the impact of this area of inquiry on the outcomes identified in the Triple Aim. The preferred reporting items for systematic reviews and meta-analyses methodology were employed including: a clearly formulated question, clear inclusion criteria to identify relevant studies based on the question, an appraisal of the studies or a subset of the studies, a summary of the evidence using an explicit methodology and an interpretation of the findings of the review. The initial search yielded 1176 published manuscripts that were reduced to 496 when the inclusion criteria were applied to refine the selection of published manuscripts. Despite a four-decade history of inquiry into IPE and/or collaborative practice, scholars have not yet demonstrated the impact of IPE and/or collaborative practice on simultaneously improving population health, reducing healthcare costs or improving the quality of delivered care and patients' experiences of care received. We propose moving this area of inquiry beyond theoretical assumptions to systematic research that will strengthen the evidence base for the effectiveness of IPE and collaborative practice within the context of the evolving imperative of the Triple Aim.


The correct development and functioning of the immune system is critical for the defence of the host organism against pathogens and cancers. V(D)J recombination generates diversity of immunoglobulin (Ig) and T cell receptor (TCR) genes by the regulated joining of variable (V), diversity (D) and joining (J) gene segments. Tissue-specific enhancers in the DNA genome activate these genes to undergo recombina-tion by triggering non-coding transcription through the recombining gene segments, following interaction with the respective promoters. How this is achieved is un-known.
The specificity of enhancer/promoter interactions was examined using the murine Igλ chain locus. The transcription factors that bind to the three main promoters were identified by DNase I footprinting. Of these, a factor termed E47 was shown to interact with IRF4 by co-immunoprecipitation experiments. The importance of these interactions was confirmed by mutagenesis where it was shown that mutations of any of the binding sites in DNA for the transcription factors or mutations in the amino acids involved in protein-protein interactions decreased the rate of transcrip-tion. Together, these studies suggest that IRF4/E47 interactions may play a key role in triggering locus activation.
RNA-Seq data from HPV-positive samples and cell lines were analysed to identify putative biomarkers for cervical cancer. Infection with HPVs is the main cause for cervical cancer accounting for 10-15% of cancer-related deaths in women world-wide. It is established that HPVs escape the immune response over decades to es-tablish tumorigenesis but the specific mechanism is unknown. Virus integration into the host genome and deregulation of several genes may play a key role in promot-ing cancer; of particular interest are those transcripts that form the "surfacesome". Among these, particular interest was given to connexin 26 (Cx26), which is classified as cancer-predisposition gene and was found to be commonly down regulated in all samples analysed.
Recombinant adenoviruses expressing the two HPV16 oncogenes were generated and employed to transduce HaCaT cells to analyse Cx26 mRNA and protein levels coupled with dye transfer assays to study the structural behaviour of connexins. The data presented showed that E6 and E7 alter Cx26 protein expression by relocating Cx26 within the cytoplasm from the membrane-bound form. This was confirmed in the dye transfer assay where cell-cell communications were lost


Recently, a new technique for filtering in MOS LSI using switched capacitors has been demonstrated (see ibid., vol.SC-12, p.592, 1977). Basically, the technique involves the replacement of resistors, in continuous active RC filter designs, with an analogous circuit using switches and capacitors in a sampled-analog equivalent. The approach creates a problem, however, in that the switched capacitor structures do not directly simulate the equivalent resistors over the useful frequency range. This leads to the necessity for Z-transform analysis, and causes the sampled analog circuit behavior to degrade from the simplicity of the continuous active equivalent. A solution to the problem of realising the bilinear transformation in a switched capacitor network with experimental verification is given. The solution is presented in the context of an active integrator, but is quite general.


Salient Span Masking (SSM) has shown itself to be an effective strategy to improve closed-book question answering performance. SSM extends general masked language model pretraining by creating additional unsupervised training sentences that mask a single entity or date span, thus oversampling factual information.Despite the success of this paradigm, the span types and sampling strategies are relatively arbitrary and not widely studied for other tasks. Thus, we investigate SSM from the perspective of temporal tasks, where learning a good representation of various temporal expressions is important. To that end, we introduce Temporal Span Masking (TSM) intermediate training.First, we find that SSM alone improves the downstream performance on three temporal tasks by an avg. +5.8 points. Further, we are able to achieve additional improvements (avg. +0.29 points) by adding the TSM task. These comprise the new best reported results on the targeted tasks. Our analysis suggests that the effectiveness of SSM stems from the sentences chosen in the training data rather than the mask choice: sentences with entities frequently also contain temporal expressions. Nonetheless, the additional targeted spans of TSM can still improve performance, especially in a zero-shot context.


Background and Objective: Hyperthyroidism is a common clinical disorder all over world. It occurs at all ages, but is less common before the age of 15 and is an important cause of morbidity in the older age group. Hyperthyroidism is ten times more common in women than men and has a prevalence of 2.5-4.7 per 1000 women. Hyperthyroidism is affecting approximately 2 percent of women and 0.2 percent of men. Even though diagnosis in hyperthyroidism is generally straight forward, its prevalence varies among population. Methods: Study included 75 patients attending outpatient department (OPD)/admitted in tertiary care Hospital fulfilling the inclusion and exclusion criteria. Results: Study include 75 patients of hyperthyroidism in which 61 were females and 14 were male patients with female to male ratio of approximately 4.35:1. Incidence of hyperthyroidism is common in the age group between 31 to 40 years. Graves' disease (76%) was the most common cause of hyperthyroidism, followed by toxic multinodular goiter (18.7%) and toxic adenoma (5.3%). Majority (54.7%) of the patients presented within 12 months of symptom onset. The common clinical manifestations were nervousness (94.7%), increased sweating, heat intolerance and swelling in the neck (90.7%). The commonest signs were goiter (100%), warm skin (90.7%) and tremors (92%). 49.3% of the patients had sinus tachycardia and 9.3% of patients had atrial fibrillation. Conclusion: Hyperthyroidism was common in the third decade and in females. Graves' disease was the most common cause of hyperthyroidism. Commonest clinical manifestations were nervousness, increased sweating, heat intolerance and swelling in the neck. Commonest signs were goiter, warm skin and tremors.


The airway wall remodeling observed in asthma is associated with subepithelial fibrosis and enhanced activation of human bronchial fibroblasts (HBFs) in the fibroblast to myofibroblast transition (FMT), induced mainly by transforming growth factor-β (TGF-β). The relationships between asthma severity, obesity, and hyperlipidemia suggest the involvement of peroxisome proliferator-activated receptors (PPARs) in the remodeling of asthmatic bronchi. In this study, we investigated the effect of PPARδ ligands (GW501516 as an agonist, and GSK0660 as an antagonist) on the FMT potential of HBFs derived from asthmatic patients cultured in vitro. This report shows, for the first time, the inhibitory effect of a PPARδ agonist on the number of myofibroblasts and the expression of myofibroblast-related markers—α-smooth muscle actin, collagen 1, tenascin C, and connexin 43—in asthma-related TGF-β-treated HBF populations. We suggest that actin cytoskeleton reorganization and Smad2 transcriptional activity altered by GW501516 lead to the attenuation of the FMT in HBF populations derived from asthmatics. In conclusion, our data demonstrate that a PPARδ agonist stimulates antifibrotic effects in an in vitro model of bronchial subepithelial fibrosis. This suggests its potential role in the development of a possible novel therapeutic approach for the treatment of subepithelial fibrosis during asthma.


A visible action on a complex manifold is a holomorphic action that admits a $J$-transversal totally real submanifold $S$. It is said to be strongly visible if there exists an orbit-preserving anti-holomorphic diffeomorphism $\sigma $ such that $\sigma |_S = \operatorname{id}_S$. Let $G$ be the Heisenberg group and $H$ a non-trivial connected closed subgroup of $G$. We prove that any complex homogeneous space $D = G^{\mathbb{C}}/H^{\mathbb{C}}$ admits a strongly visible $L$-action, where $L$ stands for a connected closed subgroup of $G$ explicitly constructed through a co-exponential basis of $H$ in $G$. This leads in turn that $G$ itself acts strongly visibly on $D$. The proof is carried out by finding explicitly an orbit-preserving anti-holomorphic diffeomorphism and a totally real submanifold $S$, for which the dimension depends upon the dimensions of $G$ and $H$. As a direct application, our geometric results provide a proof of various multiplicity-free theorems on continuous representations on the space of holomorphic sections on $D$. Moreover, we also generate as a consequence, a geometric criterion for a quasi-regular representation of $G$ to be multiplicity-free.


Since China initiated Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) practice, it has enjoyed increasing popularity amongst educational practitioners as well as professional researchers. This paper undertakes an in-depth and all-around analysis of pedagogical practices of English class so as to ascertain the feasibility and effectiveness of CLT in China. Although China's educational system is centrally-controlled, the top-down intervening policy of CLT fails to improve students' interactive competence. Due to the contextual constraints including excessive class size, limited class hours, Confucian heritage culture, teacher equalizations as well as norm-referenced assessment, current situation of English Language Teaching (ELT) nevertheless is far from aligning with the tenet of CLT. This paper reveals that direct transfer of western–originated CLT practice is infeasible and ineffectual without considering the specific contextual factors in China and doomed to be a failure. Based on this argument, a combination of traditional pedagogy and CLT with an eclectic and dichotomous perspective is proposed and recommended to put into practice in the hope of adapting CLT paradigm to the particular Chinese contexts.


Abstract Piano teaching should not continue to be limited to the mere cultivation of students' performance skills but should be integrated into curriculum thinking and politics while following the characteristics of the profession. This paper conducts piano teaching experiments through deep learning LSTM algorithm and extracts a series of Civic and Political elements from them as a fitting point of piano teaching and curriculum Civic and Political to discuss, using multiple teaching modes to strengthen the cultural transmission of piano courses to improve students' ideological and moral level and comprehensive quality. The experimental results show that the accuracy of the deep learning LSTM algorithm based on the integration of the deep learning piano course curriculum Civics is stable up to 98.17%, the average false detection rate is stable at 1.97%, the average positive recall rate is stable at 94.7%, and the negative recall rate is 73.2%, and the LSTM algorithm improves the integration degree by 31% compared with the traditional SVMSGD and RF algorithms. It shows that carrying out experiments of deep learning based on deep learning for teaching Civics in college piano courses effectively strengthens the cultural transmission of piano courses and improves students' ideological and moral level and comprehensive quality.


Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) are pervasive neurodevelopmental disorders of early childhood. There is no pathogenesis or curative therapy. Many ASD patients have "allergic" symptoms and food intolerance; moreover, the prevalence of ASD in patients with mastocytosis is 10-fold higher than the general population, suggesting mast cell involvement. A recent paper with data from the Vaccine Safety Datalink showed significantly increased rate ratios for ASD with mercury exposure from vaccines. We, therefore, investigated the effect of HgCl2 on VEGF secretion, intracellular calcium ion levels and viability of human cultured mast cells. HgCl2 induced statistically significant VEGF release from mast cells at 0.1-10 µM (n=3, p<0.05), but without a dose-dependent relationship; viability was unaffected. To study the mechanism of action, we investigated intracellular calcium ions. HgCl2 increased intracellular calcium ion levels within 15 min. Mast cell stimulation by HgCl2, possibly in combination with other triggers such as viruses, stress hormones or toxins at a vulnerable young age to release VEGF, which is also vasodilatory could disrupt the gut-blood-brain barriers and permit brain inflammation contributing to ASD pathogenesis. This work was supported by Theta Biomedical Consulting and Development Co., Inc. (Brookline, MA).


ABSTRACT. We examined the effect of hypoxia (FIO2 = 0.10) on methionine-enkephalin concentrations in brainstem nuclei involved in the integration of cardiopulmonary control in 3− and 21-day-old rabbits. Rabbit pups were confined in environmental chambers for 6 h and exposed to one of four conditions. Control, 21% O2 for 6 h; intermittent hypoxia, 12 cycles of 20 min 21% O2 followed by 10 min of 10% O2; acute hypoxia, 4 h of 21% O2 followed by 2 h of 10% O2; recovery, 2 h of 10% O2 followed by 4 h of 21% O2. Methionine-enkephalin was measured by radioimmunoassay in the nucleus tractus solitarius, nucleus ambiguus, nucleus parabrachialismedialis, and nucleus reticulogigantocellularis. In 3-day-old rabbits, exposure to 10% O2 did not affect methionine-enkephalin concentrations in any brainstem nuclei studied. In contrast, 21-day-old pups demonstrated a decrease in methionine-enkephalin concentration in three of the four nuclei studied when exposed to intermittent hypoxia, as well as an apparent ability to recover from an acute hypoxic exposure (p < 0.05). These data support an age-, nucleus-, and stimulus-specific effect of hypoxia on methionine-enkephalin concentration within specific brainstem nuclei and suggest a possible mechanism for the newborn's increased cardiopulmonary instability under hypoxia.


In this study, two dicationic asymmetrical diamine/copper(II) nitrate salt complexes of the general formula trans-[Cu(NN0)2.H2O](NO3)2 were successfully synthesized using N,N-dimethylethylenediamine and N,N-diethylethylenediamine as asymmetrical diamine ligands. The structure of complex 2 was identified by X-ray single crystal diffraction analysis confirming that the bidentate ligand N,N-dimethylethylenediamine forms a penta-coordinated complex with an H2O molecule located around the copper(II) ion in a trans configuration. It was found that the metal centre is coordinated in a distorted square pyramidal fashion with a t value of 0.274. The desired complexes were fully characterized using, MS, UVeVis, CV, FTIR, TG/DTA, and Hirshfeld surface computational analysis. High level theoretical calculations were also performed in order to investigate the complexes structure, conformers, vibrational frequencies, and their excited states. © 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.


AIMS
To evaluate the efficacy of a behaviour change technique-based intervention and compare two possible modes of delivery (text + visual and text-only) with usual care.

BACKGROUND
Patient delay prevents many people from achieving optimal benefit of time-dependent treatments for acute coronary syndrome. Reducing delay would reduce mortality and morbidity, but interventions to change behaviour have had mixed results. Systematic inclusion of behaviour change techniques or a visual mode of delivery might improve the efficacy of interventions.

DESIGN
A three-arm web-based, parallel randomized controlled trial of a theory-based intervention.

METHODS
The intervention comprises 12 behaviour change techniques systematically identified following systematic review and a consensus exercise undertaken with behaviour change experts. We aim to recruit n = 177 participants who have experienced acute coronary syndrome in the previous 6 months from a National Health Service Hospital. Consenting participants will be randomly allocated in equal numbers to one of three study groups: i) usual care, ii) usual care plus text-only behaviour change technique-based intervention or iii) usual care plus text + visual behaviour change technique-based intervention. The primary outcome will be the change in intention to phone an ambulance immediately with symptoms of acute coronary syndrome ≥15-minute duration, assessed using two randomized series of eight scenarios representing varied symptoms before and after delivery of the interventions or control condition (usual care). Funding granted January 2014.

DISCUSSION
Positive results changing intentions would lead to a randomized controlled trial of the behaviour change intervention in clinical practice, assessing patient delay in the event of actual symptoms.

TRIAL REGISTRATION
Registered at ClinicalTrials.gov: NCT02820103.


OBJECTIVE
Recent studies in animal models and on human cells have shown an effect of sodium chloride (NaCl) on Th17 cells promoting inflammation. The aim of this study was to evaluate the impact of NaCl intake on the risk of development of RA.

METHODS
A nested case-control study was performed using population-based prospective data from the Västerbotten Intervention Programme. The study included 386 individuals who had stated their dietary habits as part of a community intervention programme a median of 7.7 years before the onset of symptoms of RA. For comparison, 1886 matched controls were identified from the same database and co-analysed.

RESULTS
No significant association was found between sodium intake and the development of RA when all of the individuals were included. In analyses stratified for smoking status at the time of the examination, sodium intake more than doubled the risk for RA among smokers [odds ratio (OR) 2.26 (95% CI 1.06, 4.81)]. This was not observed among non-smokers. Additive interaction analysis of smoking and cases with the highest tertile of sodium intake revealed that 54% of the increased risk of developing RA from these exposures was due to interaction between them [attributable proportion 0.54 (95% CI 0.26, 0.82)]. The risk was further increased for the development of anti-CCP-positive and/or HLA shared epitope-positive RA.

CONCLUSION
Although we were unable to confirm our stated hypothesis, our results that high sodium consumption among smokers was associated with the risk of RA may provide new insights into the impact of smoking in RA development.


Inhibitor development is one of the major adverse events associated with increased morbidity and mortality in patients with congenital hemophilia. Recent treatment for them is immune tolerance induction (ITI), which involves the administration of high doses of factor concentrates over a prolonged period, sometimes combined with immunosuppressive agents. We report a case of inhibitor elimination with Rituximab, and high-dose factor VIII concentrates in a 5-year-old boy with hemophilia A. The patient improved clinically, with fewer bleeding episodes. However, he continued to have low immunoglobulin levels, which led to recurrent infections. After an infusion of intravenous immunoglobulin, inhibitor titers increased rapidly and his ITI was deemed a failure. In conclusion, even though it failed in the present study, Rituximab may be an alternative adjuvant therapy to eliminate the inhibitor in patients with hemophilia. The appropriate schedule and long-term side effects need further investigation. pISSN 2233-5250 / eISSN 2233-4580 http://dx.doi.org/10.15264/cpho.2015.22.1.67 Clin Pediatr Hematol Oncol 2015;22:67∼71


This paper develops a framework for quantile regression in binary longitudinal data settings. A novel Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) method is designed to fit the model and its computational efficiency is demonstrated in a simulation study. The proposed approach is flexible in that it can account for common and individual-specific parameters, as well as multivariate heterogeneity associated with several covariates. The methodology is applied to study female labor force participation and home ownership in the United States. The results offer new insights at the various quantiles, which are of interest to policymakers and researchers alike.


The Ethiopian economy is dominated by the agriculture and services sectors, with each accounting for about 43-44 percent of gross domestic product (GDP), leaving only about 13 percent for industry of which manufacturing accounts for about 6-7 percent. The low industrial contribution is attributed to lower participation of private enterprises; thanks to lack of encouraging policy & conducive environment for entrepreneurs. This research proposal aims at investigating inhibiting factors of growth at micro, macro & meta level. Industrial development and entrepreneurship are two side of a coin. Entrepreneurship encompasses the promoters, government and financial institutes. Entrepreneurship development is essential to solve the problem of economic development through creating local employment, balanced area development, decentralization of economic power and diversion of profits from rich to middle class & poor. Many local innovations go unnoticed because of innovator's limitations in commercialize the product. An apex institute may be set up to help and promote commercialization of low cost local innovations. If stakeholders of entrepreneurship work in tandem, SMEs can grow fast


The Hybrid III, which is the only universally used frontal crash anthropomorphic test device, lacks a biofidelic abdomen that can be used for different loading surfaces and loading rates. The Frangible Abdomen, developed by General Motors in 1989, is the only commercially available, dynamically tuned insert. While the Frangible Abdomen has biofidelity under belt loading conditions, it has neither the loading rate sensitivity nor the appropriate mechanical response (biofidelity) for assessing injury from non-belt impacts (e.g., airbags or steering wheels). A loading rate sensitive abdomen that is also capable of assessing injury is currently under development by the General Motors Safety Research Department. In order to develop such a device, it is important to identify the frequency and severity of injury to the various regions and organs in the abdomen to prioritize their instrumentation with the appropriate sensors. In this study, crash data collected between 1988 and 1994, contained in the database of the National Automotive Sampling System (NASS), were analyzed to identify the frequency and severity of injury to the abdominal organs in frontal crashes. Results are summarized and compared with previously published studies. For the covering abstract see IRRD E102514.


We have recently identified a population of SSEA-1 + /Oct-4 + /Sca-1 + /lin − /CD45 − pluripotent, very small embryonic-like stem cells (VSEL) in adult murine bone marrow (BM). We found that VSEL possess the ability to differentiate in vitro into all three germ layers including cardiac lineage. However, the input of these cells in regeneration of injured tissues including infarcted myocardium was uncertain. Therefore, the aim of this study was to establish if VSEL are mobilized into peripheral blood (PB) after acute heart infarction and could play a potential role in myocardiac regeneration. To address this question C57BL/6 mice (6- or 15-wk-old) underwent a 30-min coronary occlusion followed by reperfusion and were euthanized at 24 h, 48 h, or 7 days after AMI. PB samples were collected for flow cytometric, confocal microscopic, and RQ-PCR analysis. Sham controls underwent sham surgery (1-h open-chest state without AMI) while controls did not. In flow cytometric analysis, VSEL were detectable in PB on low level under baseline conditions but increased significantly after AMI, peaking at 48 h post AMI both in younger (6-wk-old) and older (15-wk-old) mice (3.33±0.37 and 7.73±1.02 cells/μl of PB, respectively) (Figure 1). By confocal microscopy, sorted PB-derived VSEL were positive for Oct-4 and negative for CD45 in contrast to hematopoietic stem cells (HSC). Furthermore, RQ-PCR analysis revealed increased level of mRNA for markers of pluripotency, such as Oct-4, Nanog, Rex-1, Dppa1, and Rif1, in total PB cells of both age groups of mice at 48 h after AMI. We observed 10.01±1.98, 6.02±1.66, 5.28±1.68, 2.07±0.99 and 3.18±0.49 -fold increase in mRNA level of these genes, respectively, as compared with sham control in 6-wk-old mice. HSCs were also mobilized after AMI and were detected on higher level up to 7 days post AMI (Figure 1A). We also investigated regenerative potential of VSEL injected into infarcted myocardium in vivo . Mice underwent a 30-min coronary occlusion followed by reperfusion and, 48 h later, received intramyocardial injection of vehicle (group I), freshly sorted VSEL (group II) or VSEL predifferentiated in cardiomyogenic medium (group III). At 35 day of follow up, the heart function was investigated by echocardiography. Mice in group III exhibited improved function of infarcted left ventricle (LV) showing higher LV ejection fraction (54.5±3.3% vs. 41.5±3.3% in group I) (Figure 1B). The other parameters including infarct wall thickening fraction and end-diastolic volume also indicated improvement of heart function. This report is the first showing that the pluripotent stem cells (VSEL) are not only mobilized from the bone marrow into the peripheral blood after AMI, but also participate in regenerative processes of infarcted myocardium.


A newly developed Ti:sapphire laser spectrometer is described that performs wideband Doppler-limited molecular spectroscopy at wavelengths ranging from 755 to 895 nm. Spectrometer performance was evaluated by use of the spectra of acetylene, 13C-acetylene, and oxygen. A nearly continuous spectral recording over 300 cm−1 was carried out with a relatively simple frequency scanning system. With a tone-burst frequency-modulation technique, the spectrometer's minimum detectable absorption ΔI/I was 5 × 10−5 at a time constant of 100 ms. The absolute accuracy of the wave-number measurements with a precise wavemeter was 1.5 × 10−3 cm−1 for the 790-nm 13C-acetylene lines.


Orthotopic liver transplantation (OLT) is now considered as a standard procedure for patients with end-stage liver disease. The number of patients listed for OLT using the brain-dead donor continues to outpace the number of OLT performed since early 1990s because the improved results of OLT had made it as a therapeutic means for irreversible liver disease. This scarcity of organs from the deceased donors has resulted in the increased use of the living donor liver grafts. Although the shortage of the brain-dead donor organs is a world-wide problem, the situation is especially serious in our country, where the deceased donor organ donation remains below 2 per million population per year. Now, Korea has the greatest need for living donor liver transplantation although it is more complex and demanding procedure than the deceased donor (whole organ) liver transplantation. Refinements of the technique and good results have rapidly established the position of the living donor liver transplantation in our country's transplant medicine. 2,345 OLTs (1,860 from the living donor and 485 from the deceased donor) were performed in 24 institutes from March 1988 to December 2004, although 5 institutes had performed more than 10 OLTs per year. Definitely, living donors represent a large pool of organs, but there might be a significant cost, mainly donor risk, to draw from this pool. To alleviate some disadvantages of the living donor liver transplantation and to provide organ to the patients who cannot find out the potential living donor from family members, recognition of necessity and nation-wide cooperative participation of organ donation after the brain-death should be propagated and encouraged in our country.


Abstract Collaborative Engineering Environments (CEE) have become really important in Virtual Organizations (VO) because they enable the coordination and collaboration among engineering groups, supported by tools and methodologies that enable intellectual capital sharing and engineering activities in real time, among organizations regardless of their locations. A platform that integrates and facilitates the operation in Virtual Organizations focused in manufactured product development, is an important tool that supports a rapid respond to customers, and improve the communication among its members. This paper present a way to improve business process in a VO based on the development and use of a CEE. The methodology presented in this paper was implemented in a real manufacturing VO, improving the product transfer process: the coordinators of each business opportunity easily manage VO information, and VO partners were totally involved during the process.


Background Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) is one of the most pathogens associated with health care. Molecular typing methods are vital for outbreak investigations of MRSA. The aim of this study was characterization of SCCmec, spa types and multidrug resistant of methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus isolates in Ahvaz, Iran. Methods A total of 50 MRSA isolates were determined by using the phenotypic method and mecA gene. Antibiotic resistance profile and SCCmec types were screened using disc diffusion method and PCR, respectively. For spa typing of MRSA isolates, two molecular typing methods including the PCR-sequencing and high-resolution melting (HRM) analysis were used. Results In the present study, the highest sensitivity of MRSA was to vancomycin and linezolid and the lowest to clindamycin. In the MRSA isolates, 22% were XDR and 78% were MDR. SCCmec type III was found commonly among MRSA. Based on PCR-sequencing and HRM results, 10 different spa types were identified. The spa types t037 and t030 were the most common in this study. Conclusion This study emphasizes the spa variation among MRSA isolates, which may be considered as an important criterion when treating staphylococcal infections. Accurate and early detection of MDR, XDR, or even PDR MRSA isolates strains must be commenced by all clinical microbiology laboratories to reduce the menace of antimicrobial resistance.


Collagen-induced arthritis (CIA) is a widely used mouse model for studying inflammatory arthritis (IA). However, CIA induction protocols differ between laboratories, and direct comparison between protocol variations has not been reported. To address this issue, DBA/1 mice housed in conventional and specific-pathogen free (SPF) facilities were administered various combinations of two doses of collagen type II (CII) in complete (CFA) or incomplete Freund's adjuvant (IFA); some mice were also injected with lipopolysaccharide (LPS) and/or additional CII at specific intervals. Mice were evaluated for IA over the subsequent 2 months. Depending directly on the combination of CII, CFA, IFA, and LPS used, the incidence of IA ranged between 20%-100%, and severity extended from mild to severe even in an SPF environment. Our results demonstrate for the first time in head-to-head comparisons that specific variations in the use of CII, CFA, IFA, and LPS can induce a range of arthritic disease intensity and severity in an SPF facility. Thus, distinct experimental settings can be designed for robust assessment of factors that either exacerbate or inhibit arthritis pathogenesis. Furthermore, by achieving 100% incidence in an SPF facility, the protocols provide a practical and humane benefit by reducing the number of mice necessary for experimental assessment.


OBJECTIVE
To estimate the proportion of accidental drug-related deaths and suicides classified as pregnancy-related from 2013 to 2014 (preimplementation of standardized criteria) and 2015 to 2016 (postimplementation).

METHODS
Based on Centers for Disease Control and Prevention pregnancy-related death criteria, the Utah Perinatal Mortality Review Committee developed a standardized evaluation tool to assess accidental drug-related death and suicide beginning in 2015. We performed a retrospective case review of all pregnancy-associated deaths (those occurring during pregnancy or 1 year postpartum for any reason) and pregnancy-related deaths (those directly attributable to the pregnancy or postpartum events) evaluated by Utah's Perinatal Mortality Review Committee from 2013 to 2016. We compared the proportion of accidental drug-related deaths and suicides meeting pregnancy-related criteria preimplementation and postimplementation of a standardized criteria checklist tool using Fisher's exact test. We assessed the change in pregnancy-related mortality ratio in Utah from 2013 to 2014 and 2015 to 2016 using test of trend.

RESULTS
From 2013 to 2016, there were 80 pregnancy-associated deaths in Utah (2013-2014: n=40; 2015-2016: n=40), and 41 (51%) were pregnancy-related (2013-2014: n=15, 2015-2016: n=26). In 2013-2014 (preimplementation), 12 women died of drug-related deaths or suicides, and only two of these deaths were deemed pregnancy-related (17%). In 2015-2016 (postimplementation), 18 women died of drug-related deaths or suicide, and 94% (n=17/18) of these deaths met one or more of the pregnancy-related criteria on the checklist (P<.001). From 2013 to 2014 to 2015-2016, Utah's overall pregnancy-related mortality ratio more than doubled, from 11.8 of 100,000 to 25.7 of 100,000 (P=.08).

CONCLUSION
After application of standardized criteria, the Utah Perinatal Mortality Review Committee determined that pregnancy itself was the inciting event leading to the majority of accidental drug-related deaths or suicides among pregnant and postpartum women. Other maternal mortality review committees may consider a standardized approach to assessing perinatal suicides and accidental drug-related deaths.


The Committee on Clinical Nursing Research was established in April 1979 at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, not only to encourage clinical nursing research for the provision of optimal care and the development and evaluation of nursing practice, but also to monitor consumer safety vis-à-vis the research effort. The development of the committee and relevant issues are discussed.


This exploratory study examined four student characteristics and their effect on successful online course completion for a large population of adult students. The purpose of this study was to determine the influence of age, gender, ethnicity, and financial aid eligibility on successful completion rates for nontraditional adults participating in online technical college courses. The participants in the study were 89,473 students enrolled in online technical college courses offered through the Georgia Virtual Technical College (GVTC), part of the Georgia Department of Technical and Adult Education. Data for these students were analyzed using quantitative methods in order to determine whether age, gender, ethnicity, or financial aid eligibility were significant predictors of successful course completion. The study found that age, ethnicity, and financial aid eligibility were significant predictors of online course completion. Older students, white students, and students not eligible for Pell grants were more likely to successfully complete online courses.


In this paper the problem of target detection and tracking in the presence of clutter is investigated. A new detection feature for target detection and tracking algorithms is introduced. The new feature is based on the complex frequency correlation function, FCF. The introduction of this new feature increases the input vector space of the detection problem, which in turn can potentially enhance the performance of target detection and tracking algorithms. An outdoor measurement campaign (at 35 GHz and 95 GHz) was designed and conducted to examine the usefulness of the new feature in target detection. Based on the acquired data, a simple detection algorithm is proposed, tested, and its performance is evaluated. The algorithm's ability to discriminate between tree trunks and other nearby targets including man-made targets is demonstrated.


- In this paper, we investigated the fusing current of carbon fiber and thermal properties of carbon fiber and metal shielded cable due to over-current. The fusing current value for the metal-coated carbon fiber was 5.3A in 3K, 7.4K and 13.05A in 12K. And if it exceeds 50% of the fusing current was broken with a rapid voltage rise. In the case of carbon fiber shielded cable, the temperature of the PVC sheath increased somewhat in the allowable current range. However, the temperature of PVC sheath rapidly increased to 128.1 in the 2 time allowable current range. This value is 10 higher than the temperature of PVC sheath on the metal screen cable, because the resistance of the carbon fiber is high and heat transfer rate is slow.


Background This speaker presentation will interpret results of an individual patient data meta-analyses (IPD-MA) of a range of randomized controlled feasibility trials with the aim of exploring prospects for exercise and rehabilitation in Huntington's Disease (HD). Methods Participants(n=121) in five randomised physical activity and/or exercise trials engaged in a combination of supervised and self-directed exercise and physical activity interventions with varied emphasis on aerobic, strength, endurance, flexibility and task training across interventions and duration ranged from eight to 16 weeks. The primary outcome in the combined dataset was the modified Unified Huntington's Disease Rating Motor Score (mMS). There were a range of secondary outcomes. Primary pooled effect estimates were examined via a cross-classified linear mixed model. A random effects model was used to account for study heterogeneity. Results There was significant heterogeneity between the studies. Risk of bias was moderate in these open trials; however, the primary motor outcome was collected blind. A favourable motor outcome was associated with individual studies where supervision was an important component of the intervention. There were no effects on motor outcome in the pooled data. Of the pooled effects for secondary outcomes, self-reported physical activity was significantly improved. Conclusions Self-reported physical activity increased following participation in short duration supervised and self-directed exercise and physical activity interventions but this did not translate into motor benefits in HD. Longer duration intervention trials that incorporate supervised components meeting frequency, intensity, time and type (FITT) principles for exercise prescription are required. The importance of a defined intervention, appropriate supervision and related core outcome set (including patient reported outcomes) in HD cannot be understated.


The main activities of the leading sports leagues were described. Sources of revenue and expenditure were identified. The economic performance of professional sports leagues of the United States of America was compared. In the course of the study of economic efficiency of the leading American sports leagues are defined payroll (expense commands on the salaries of players for each team, the total payroll in the League and the average payroll, respectively, for each of the American League. The largest estimates on wages, both in the League and in teams in the National football League, the largest player's contract in the Highest League baseball, the minimum wage in the National hockey League; the highest average wages, a greater percentage of athletes with a salary of more than 1 million. $ (82,85 %) in the National basketball Association were showed. This difference in the maximum income of the League and of average wages is due to several factors: the number of players in the team, the number of games in a season, and expenses on carrying out of competition and training activities.


A proapoptotic kinase plays a critical role in the development of neural tube defects associated with maternal hyperglycemia. This Podcast features an interview with Peixin Yang and Albert Reece, authors of a Research Article that appears in the 27 August 2013 issue of Science Signaling. Neural tube defects are among the most common types of birth defects and can be caused by toxins, vitamin deficiencies, or maternal factors such as diabetes. In vertebrate embryos, the neural plate folds over on itself to form the neural tube, a structure that gives rise to the brain and spinal cord. Incomplete closure of the neural tube causes conditions such as spina bifida or anencephaly, depending upon when and where the defect occurs. In humans, maternal hyperglycemia is associated with an increased risk for neural tube defects. In this issue of Science Signaling, Yang et al. report a mechanism by which maternal diabetes can cause neural tube defects in mice.


GSDME is the only direct executor of caspase-dependent pyroptosis in both canonical and non-canonical inflammasomes known to date in fish, and plays an important role in anti-bacterial infection and inflammatory response. In order to determine the regulation of GSDMEa on antibacterial infection in innate immune response, the CcGSDMEa gene in common carp (Cyprinus carpio haematopterus) was first identified and characterized, and then its function related to immune defense was investigated. Our results showed that the expressions of CcGSDMEa at the mRNA and protein levels were both significantly increased after Aeromonas hydrophila intraperitoneal infection at the early stage than that in the control group. We found that CcGSDMEa could be cleaved by inflammatory caspase (CcCaspase-1b) and apoptotic caspases (CcCaspase-3a/b and CcCaspase-7a/b). Interestingly, only the CcGSDMEa-NT (1-252 aa) displayed bactericidal activity to Escherichia coli and could punch holes in the membrane of HEK293T cells, whereas CcGSDMEa-FL (1-532 aa) and CcGSDMEa-CT (257-532 aa) showed no above activity and pore-forming ability. Overexpression of CcGSDMEa increased the secretion of CcIL-1β and the release of LDH, and could reduce the A. hydrophila burdens in fish. On the contrary, knockdown of CcGSDMEa reduced the secretion of CcIL-1β and the release of LDH, and could increase the A. hydrophila burdens in fish. Taken together, the elevated expression of CcGSDMEa was a positive immune response to A. hydrophila challenge in fish. CcGSDMEa could perform the pore-formation in cell membrane and the regulation on the secretion of IL-lβ, and further regulate the bacterial clearance in vivo. These results suggested that CcGSDMEa played an important role in immune defense against A. hydrophila and could provide a new insight into understanding the immune mechanism to resist pathogen invasion in teleost.


Information fusion offers a promising solution to the development of a high-performance classification system. In this paper, the problem of multiple gait features fusion is explored with the framework of the factorial hidden Markov model (FHMM). The FHMM has a multiple-layer structure and provides an alternative to combine several gait features without concatenating them into a single augmented feature. Besides, the feature concatenation is used to directly concatenate the features and the parallel HMM (PHMM) is introduced as a decision-level fusion scheme, which employs traditional fusion rules to combine the recognition results at decision level. To evaluate the recognition performances, McNemar's test is employed to compare the FHMM feature-level fusion scheme with the feature concatenation and the PHMM decision-level fusion scheme. Statistical numerical experiments are carried out on the Carnegie Mellon University motion of body and the Institute of Automation of the Chinese Academy of Sciences gait databases. The experimental results demonstrate that the FHMM feature-level fusion scheme and the PHMM decision-level fusion scheme outperform feature concatenation. The FHMM feature-level fusion scheme tends to perform better than the PHMM decision-level fusion scheme when only a few gait cycles are available for recognition.


Experimental and theoretical atomic charges and d-orbital populations were obtained for [3,11-bis(methoxycarbonyl)-1,5,9,13-tetraazacyclohexadeca-1,3,9,11-tetraenato(2-)-kappa(4)N]nickel(II) monocrystal (16Ni) using the Hansen and Coppens formalism. Several models of this structure were tested as a function of quality of the fit, convergence of the refinement, value of residual peaks and holes, and Hirshfeld's rigid-bond test. The models with Ni-atomic scattering factors applied for the metal center are significantly better than those with the Ni-ionic scattering factors. The properties of the final electron density distributions are very consistent and similar for all of the models tested. The values of the d-orbital populations for Ni roughly agree with the occupation order of the d-electron levels for square-planar complexes derived from crystal field theory and are comparable with those obtained by the natural population analysis method. Experimental atoms-in-molecules charges calculated for four different models agree quite well for models with different symmetry restrictions and the same scattering factor for the Ni. Both experimental and theoretical methods predict relatively high negative values of charges for the nitrogen and oxygen atoms and also a quite high positive charge for the C(7) atom. The values of rho(r(BCP)) for the Ni-N bonds are in the range from 0.60 up to 0.75e A(-3), with positive laplacian values indicating noncovalent bonding. For the laplacian of the electron density evaluated in the plane of the macrocyclic ring, a typical map for a square-planar complex was obtained with four charge concentrations--3d(xy) orbitals--pointing toward the regions between the M-N bonds and charge depletions directed toward the (3,-1) critical points of the negative laplacian for the nitrogen atoms.


The terminal respiratory units of the gas exchange tissue of the avian lung, the air capillaries (ACs) and the blood capillaries (BCs), are small and rigid: the basis of this mechanical feature has been highly contentious. Because the strength of the blood-gas barrier (BGB) of the mammalian lung has been attributed to the presence of type-IV collagen (T-IVc), localization of T-IVc in the basement membranes (BM) of the BGB and the epithelial–epithelial cell connections (E-ECCs) of the exchange tissue of the lung of the avian (chicken) lung was performed in order to determine whether it may likewise contribute to the strength of the BGB. T-IVc was localized in both the BM and the E-ECCs. As part of an integrated fibroskeletal scaffold on the lung, T-IVc may directly contribute to the strengths of the ACs and the BCs.


A subgroup of outflow tract (OT) ventricular tachycardias (VT) originates from the aortic sinuses or the main stem of the pulmonary artery. Myocardial sleeves onto the pulmonary artery (PA) and aorta (Ao) have been recognized as a frequent site for the origin of arrhythmia. The aim of this study was to analyze PGP9.5 expression in pulmonary artery and aorta from 100 pigs hearts and relate it to the mechanism of arrhythmia. The pulmonary artery and aorta were obtained from 100 healthy pigs; longitudinal strips of tissue containing each cusp, aortic, pulmonary artery walls, left and right ventricular outflow tracts were excised and histologically analyzed. PGP9.5 was studied immunohistochemically in myocardial sleeves. Myocardial sleeves were found in 88 of 100 Aos (88%) and 20 of 100 PAs (20%). PGP9.5 positivity was observed in 89 of 90 (99%) pigs, which had myocardial sleeves. PGP9.5 immunopositivity can be detected in most pig myocardial sleeves around the PAs and Aos; this finding may contribute to the substrate for OT VTs.

 Key words: Myocardial sleeves, ventricular tachycardia, aortic sinus, pulmonary artery, protein-gene peptide (PGP) 9.5.


Ortiz-Prado, Esteban, Raul Patricio Fernandez Naranjo, Eduardo Vasconez, Katherine Simbaña-Rivera, Trigomar Correa-Sancho, Alex Lister, Manuel Calvopiña, and Ginés Viscor. Analysis of excess mortality data at different altitudes during the COVID-19 outbreak in Ecuador. High Alt Med Biol. 22:406-416, 2021. Background: It has been speculated that living at high altitude confers some risk reduction in terms of SARS-CoV-2 infection, reduced transmissibility, and arguable lower COVID-19-related mortality. Objective: We aim to determine the number of excess deaths reported in Ecuador during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic in relation to different altitude categories among 221 cantons in Ecuador, ranging from sea level to 4,300 m above. Methods: A descriptive ecological country-wide analysis of the excess mortality in Ecuador was performed since March 1, 2020, to March 1, 2021. Every canton was categorized as lower (for altitudes 2,500 m or less) or higher (for altitudes >2,500 m) in a first broad classification, as well as in two different classifications: The one proposed by Imray et al. in 2011 (low altitude <1,500 m, moderate altitude 1,500-2,500 m, high altitude 2,500-3,500 m, or very high altitude 3,500-5,500 m) and the one proposed by Bärtsch et al. in 2008 (near sea level 0-500 m, low altitude 500-2,000 m, moderate altitude 2,000-3,000 m, high altitude 3,000-5,500 m, and extreme altitude 5,500 m). A Poisson fitting analysis was used to identify trends on officially recorded all-caused deaths and those attributed to COVID-19. Results: In Ecuador, at least 120,573 deaths were recorded during the first year of the pandemic, from which 42,453 were catalogued as excessive when compared with the past 3 years of averages (2017-2019). The mortality rate at the lower altitude was 301/100,000 people, in comparison to 242/100,000 inhabitants in elevated cantons. Considering the four elevation categories, the highest excess deaths came from towns located at low altitude (324/100,000), in contrast to the moderate altitude (171/100,000), high-altitude (249/100,000), and very high-altitude (153/100,000) groups. Conclusions: This is the first report on COVID-19 excess mortality in a high-altitude range from 0 to 4,300 m above sea level. We found that absolute COVID-19-related excess mortality is lower both in time and in proportion in the cantons located at high and very high altitude when compared with those cantons located at low altitude.


Experiments were conducted on six newly developed Quality Protein Maize (QPM) lines to assess their lysine and tryptophan levels, and their suitability for cultivation in major agro-ecological zones of Nigeria. The results showed that the QPM lines varied from one to another, with respect to crude protein, zein dry matter, crude zein, lysine and tryptophan (P<0.01). Percentage crude protein varied between 6.22 and 8.75%, while % lysine and tryptophan were in the range of 3.31 to 3.72 and 0.49 to 0.87 respectively. Lysine was positively correlated to zein, while tryptophan was positively correlated with crude protein. There was a Location effect for plant height, while Variety x Location interaction was found for days to 50% silking (P<0.05). Mean grain yields across varieties and locations ranged between 0.25 (Amakama) and 4.50t/ha (Ibadan). ART98-SW6-OB and ILE1-OB appeared to be superior with higher lysine and tryptophan contents. Other agronomic and biochemical details of the QPM were discussed.


In the thesis we researched the effectiveness of game-based learning in the preschool period. Considering specific child development, the importance of games is studied in this period as experts often stress the importance of games as a learning process happening within the child. The importance of an adult participating in the game as a teammate however is not stressed enough. An appropriate role of a teacher in a game that has meaningful rules and is based on creative solutions to physical and cognitive problems, as well as appropriate and inappropriate social and emotional solutions, is important for child's harmonious development.

The purpose of the research was to determine, by means of case study, whether children could develop sociability through game playing, and selected values within it. Action research was used to determine unexplainabilty of the method of games in the development of sociability and selected values within the second age group of preschool children. The case study was carried out in a group of children aged five to six. The project took place in the kindergarten Mojca. The results were analyzed using technical and scientific literature as well as critical analysis of the recorded activities.

We have come to a conclusion that in order to carry out the educational process with the concept of game-movement-development, teachers first need to change their views on learning and teaching. Furthermore, they need to have a good knowledge of child development, such profession also requires constant adaptation and professional development. Changing the game with rules into the method of game is a demanding process. Elements of the method of game, which include created game environment, active role of a teacher, simultaneous participation of all children according to their wishes, and which is partially planned in advance due to well-set rules and therefore appropriately protected, often need to be adjusted according to the daily mood of children. The scope of society and movement was combined with other areas, as we have determined that we cannot affect only one or two selected areas. There are variations in the methods of teaching, therefore developing a method of game is a particularly demanding process. The research also shows that it is only possible to learn about selected values through the method of games in the second age period if teachers set development process goals properly and sufficiently broad, and know how to play their role in the game.


This paper contributes to the debate over public benefits and costs of state-funded voluntary cleanup programs, using evidence from property values in New York City. We value site redevelopment separately from cleanup and examine time to capitalization. Using property fixed effects and controlling for time-varying shocks, New York's Brownfield Cleanup Program added 4% to property values. Off-site gains averaged 5.6% for properties with three units or less and 1.2% for multifamily residences, producing a $579.3 million tax gain that does not exceed the $667.9 million in program spending. Benefits stem from program participation and cleanup, but not from site redevelopment. (JEL Q51, Q58)


Introduction of TiB2 reinforcements into aluminium matrices allows composites to be obtained that exhibit excellent mechanical properties and good wear and corrosion resistance. These composites find applications in the automotive, aerospace and marine industries. In the present work, the in situ synthesis of ultrafine TiB2 particulates in an aluminium matrix was accomplished by reaction synthesis of TiB2 using K2TiF6 and KBF4 (in 120% excess to the stoichiometrically needed) fluxes in pre-melted aluminium. Composites were prepared with different concentrations of TiB2 in (2.5, 5 and 10 wt %) in an aluminium matrix. The holding time of the molten composite in an induction furnace was varied from 10 min to 50 min. The in situ formation of TiB2 reinforcement and its distribution in cast aluminiummatrix composites was analyzed based on microstructural studies, microhardness measurements and wear tests. The exothermic reaction between the halide fluxes starts after 10 min of holding time and completes before 20 min of holding time. The dominant phase was TiB2 after 20 min of holding time, while the formation of Ti3B4 was observed as the holding time was extended. The distribution of the reinforcing phases was studied by analyzing the scanning electron microscopy (SEM) images. An optimum holding time (20 min) of the composite melt was determined based on the dominant wear mechanism, microhardness, and phase composition of the composites.


The Catell and Metzner (1993) finding of higher self-actualization among people with body type/temperament mismatch is important and could be viewed as support for a link of creativity with deviance. Also, there is an error in one of their statements, which is corrected here.


The extraction procedure of coalbed methane is usually different from conventional type of gas extraction. Generally, the CBM extraction procedure is completed within two approaches. First one is drilling on the surface for heading downward through the ground & second one is extracting through the existed underground coal mines. For making the CBM extraction an economic viable, well optimization development should be implemented with carefully. So, an evaluative technique called 'Unit Technical Cost' briefly known as UTC can be one of the better way to evaluate the well optimization development. This optimization technique is evaluated practically based on the two major coal basins of china, known as 'Qinshui basin & Ordos Eastern Margin basin'. The well completion & simulation process can be examined by the parameters that are used in this technique. This paper is tried to give a new research on CBM well development based on using the UTC method for making decision criteria to calculate the optimization level. The calculation is done using the detailed properties of UTC in the well development by establishing the process theory. In this research, the production profiles are evaluated for building up the engineering & geologic parameters where the product price, operating cost & project investment is evaluated for finding the economic parameters. This is found from the optimized results that a horizontal well should be optimized for its economic feasibility in the Qinshui Basin where directional well optimization is better for Ordos Eastern Margin Basin.Keywords: Well optimization, well completion, unit technical cost, technical evaluation, evaluation index


Philosophers of science readily acknowledge that nonepistemic values influence the discovery and pursuit of scientific theories, but many tend to regard these influences as epistemically uninteresting. The present paper challenges this position by identifying three avenues through which nonepistemic values associated with discovery and pursuit in contemporary pollution research influence theory appraisal: (1) by guiding the choice of questions and research projects, (2) by altering experimental design, and (3) by affecting the creation and further investigation of theories or hypotheses. This analysis indicates that the effects of these values are sufficiently complex and epistemically significant to merit further attention.


A potent plant-derived HIV-1 inhibitor, 3,5-dicaffeoylquinic acid (diCQA), has been shown to undergo isomerisation upon UV exposure where the naturally occurring 3trans,5trans-diCQA isomer gives rise to the 3cis,5trans-diCQA, 3trans,5cis-diCQA, and 3cis,5cis-diCQA isomers. In this study, inhibition of HIV-1 INT by UV-induced isomers was investigated using molecular docking methods. Here, density functional theory (DFT) models were used for geometry optimization of the 3,5-diCQA isomers. The YASARA and Autodock VINA software packages were then used to determine the binding interactions between the HIV-1 INT catalytic domain and the 3,5-diCQA isomers and the Discovery Studio suite was used to visualise the interactions between the isomers and the protein. The geometrical isomers of 3,5-diCQA were all found to bind to the catalytic core domain of the INT enzyme. Moreover, the cis geometrical isomers were found to interact with the metal cofactor of HIV-1INT, a phenomenon which has been linked to antiviral potency. Furthermore, the 3trans,5cis-diCQA isomer was also found to interact with both LYS156 and LYS159 which are important residues for viral DNA integration. The differences in binding modes of these naturally coexisting isomers may allow wider synergistic activity which may be beneficial in comparison to the activities of each individual isomer.


A high power factor rectifier is proposed to draw a sinusoidal line current with nearly unity power factor, achieve balanced capacitor voltage and regulate the DC-link voltage. One flying capacitor is employed in the proposed circuit configuration to generate a three-level PWM voltage waveform on the AC terminal. A hysteresis current control scheme is used to track the line current command in phase with the mains voltage. A voltage compensator is employed to achieve balanced capacitor voltages. The effectiveness of the proposed control algorithm is demonstrated by simulation and experimental results using laboratory prototype circuit.


We study the problem of finding large vertex symmetric digraphs with given degree Δ and diameter D. This problem is also called the(Δ,D)-problem or the degree/diameter problem for vertex symmetric digraphs. It consists of finding vertex symmetric digraphs with the order as large as possible for a given degree and diameter. This paper proposes a new general family of large vertex symmetric digraphs. This new family has order

N = (Δ + [D-1/2])! / (Δ - [D+1/2])!

and provides the best values for asymptotic values of the degree and diameter in general. Moreover, the presented family also provides a large number of new values in the table of the largest known vertex symmetric (Δ,D)-digraphs. Furthermore, the new family is used to obtain new large vertex symmetric digraphs by means of known compounding techniques. Finally, the table of the largest known vertex symmetric digraphs is provided, where most of the entries correspond to the work presented in this article. © 2007 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. NETWORKS, Vol. 50(4), 241250 2007


Feeding dietary supplements containing trans-10, cis-12-conjugated linoleic acid (t10,c12-CLA) has been shown to induce milk fat depression in cows, ewes and goats. However, the magnitude of the response is apparently less pronounced in lactating goats. The objective of this study was to evaluate the effects of increasing doses of CLA methyl esters (CLA-ME) on milk production, composition and fatty-acid profile of dairy goats. Eight Toggenburg goats were separated in two groups (four primiparous and four multiparous) and received the following dietary treatments in a 4×4 Latin Square design: CLA0: 45 g/day of calcium salts of fatty acids (CSFA); CLA15; 30 g/day of CSFA+15 g/day of CLA-ME; CLA30: 15 g/day of CSFA+30 g/day of CLA-ME; and CLA45: 45 g/day of CLA-ME. The CLA-ME supplement (Luta-CLA 60) contained 29.9% of t10,c12-CLA; therefore, the dietary treatments provided 0, 4.48, 8.97 and 13.45 g/day of t10,c12-CLA, respectively. Feed intake, milk production, concentration and secretion of milk protein and lactose, body condition score and body weight were unaffected by the dietary treatments. Milk fat secretion was reduced by 14.9%, 30.8% and 40.5%, whereas milk fat concentration was decreased by 17.2%, 33.1% and 40.7% in response to CLA15, CLA30 and CLA45, respectively. Secretions of both de novo synthesized and preformed fatty acids were progressively reduced as the CLA dose increased, but the magnitude of the inhibition was greater for the former. There was a linear reduction in most milk fat desaturase indexes (14:1/14:0, 16:1/16:0, 17:1/17:0 and 18:1/18:0). Milk fat t10,c12-CLA concentration and secretion increased with the CLA dose, and its apparent transfer efficiency from diet to milk was 1.18%, 1.17% and 1.21% for CLA15, CLA30 and CLA45 treatments, respectively. The estimated energy balance was linearly improved in goats fed CLA.


We present a novel algorithm for learning the parameters of hidden Markov models (HMMs) in a geometric setting where the observations take values in Riemannian manifolds. In particular, we elevate a recent second-order method of moments algorithm that incorporates non-consecutive correlations to a more general setting where observations take place in a Riemannian symmetric space of non-positive curvature and the observation likelihoods are Riemannian Gaussians. The resulting algorithm decouples into a Riemannian Gaussian mixture model estimation algorithm followed by a sequence of convex optimization procedures. We demonstrate through examples that the learner can result in significantly improved speed and numerical accuracy compared to existing learners.


Sir, BJOG sets high scholarly standards for women's health. 'Debates' may be used to amuse and entertain. Gynaecologists are experts in gynaecology but know much less about psychology, psychiatry, economics, health policy, aesthetics and other cultural studies, and rely on other disciplines to work with and educate us. We are untrained in arguing and debating, skills acquired and honed by philosophers, lawyers and politicians. However, readers do expect BJOG editors to discern good science and be aware of the need for researchers and authors to avoid, or at least declare, potential bias. Thus, it was unclear: (a) why labiaplasty was picked for a 'debate' that framed a new form of medicalised genital cutting for cultural reasons as 'cosmetic' (and thus legitimate surgery); (b) whether BJOG considers the scant evidence that exists about recent expressions of women's distress with their normal genitals to be entertaining rather than worrying; and (c) why no declarations of interests were reported by protagonists. According to BJOG policy 'a competing interest should not prevent someone from being listed as an author if they qualify for authorship'. Disclosure includes 'relevant financial interests' and 'if there is doubt about whether interests are relevant or significant, it is prudent to disclose' (www.bjog.org/view/0/ Manuscriptlayout.html). The journal also uses the recommendations of the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors who advise that interests should be declared (www.icmje.org/con flicts-of-interest). Dr Matlock has financial and commercial interests in promoting, providing, teaching and trademarking cosmetic genital surgery procedures (www.drmatlock.com; www.innogyn. com/lvr-training; www.nbcnews.com/ id/20896254/ns/health-sexual_health/t/ surgery-where-women-aim-boost-sexlives/#.U7vzgpQ7uM4). A news story also raises 'debatable' issues concerning the breaching of boundaries and professional repute (www.wn.com/david_matlock; www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/ plastic-surgeon-creates-ideal-wife-2227996). Professor Cardozo also performs these surgeries in the 'for profit' sector, and has stated she regards body modification akin to the beautification of 'hairdressing' (L. Cardozo, per. comm.). These approaches sit uncomfortably with traditional concepts of medical professionalism. The UK General Medical Council points out that 'trust may be damaged if your interests affect, or are seen to affect, your professional judgement', doctors must be '. . .honest and trustworthy.. 'and 'make the care of their patients their first concern' (www. gmc-uk.org/guidance/good_medical_ practice.asp). Readers and patients are entitled to know whether doctors might be conflicted when giving advice so as to weigh that information in the balance. Financial interests are particularly pertinent when authors use their professional expertise to persuade in a 'debate'. BJOG appears to have simply accepted the declarations at face value. What if it finds the information it has been given is wrong?


the last few years, the Internet has experienced explosive growth. Along with the widespread evolution of new emerging services, the quantity and impact of attacks have been continuously increases, attackers continuously find vulnerabilities at various levels, from the network it self to operating system and applications, exploit the to crack system and services. Defense system and network monitoring has becomes essential component of computer security to predict and prevent attacks. Unlike traditional Intrusion Detection System (IDS), Intrusion Prevention System (IPS) has additional features to secure computer network system. In this paper, we present mapping problem and challenges of IPS. When this study was started in late 2000, there are some models and theories have been developed. Unfortunately, only a few works have done mapping the problem in IPS area, especially in hybrid mechanism. Throughout this paper, we summarize the main current methods and the promising and interesting future directions and challenges research field in IPS.


According to one argument for the anti-doxastic conception of delusions, delusions are not beliefs because they are not responsive to evidence and responsiveness to evidence is a constitutive feature of belief states. In this paper, I concede that delusions are not responsive to evidence, but I challenge the other premise of this anti-doxastic argument, namely, that responsiveness to evidence is a constitutive feature of belief states. In order to undermine the premise, I describe instances of non-pathological beliefs that strenuously resist counterevidence. I conclude that considerations about responsiveness to evidence do not necessarily lead us to deny that delusions are beliefs. On the contrary, they seem to support the view that there is continuity between delusions and non-pathological beliefs.


Recent advances in modular configurations and replicated archetypes collaborate in order to accomplish write-ahead logging. In this work, we disprove the deployment of forward-error correction, which embodies the extensive principles of electrical engineering. Shave, our new solution for the visual- ization of superpages, is the solution to all of these problems [2, 11, 11, 11, 16, 17, 17].


Polypyrrole was deposited on polyester yarns by vapour phase polymerization technique. Ferric chloride was used as an initiator. In order to determine the effect of the initiator concentration on polymerization process, four different initiator concentrations (0.2, 0.4, 0.6 and 0.8 mol/l) were used. The effect of the initiator in terms of tensile properties, electrical resistivities and morphological properties of the yarns was investigated. The polypyrrole deposited polyester yarns were then weaved in a handloom to form fabric for the investigation of surface resistivity and electromagnetic shielding effectiveness. Scanning electron microscopy, energy dispersive spectroscopy and Fourier transform infrared analyses illustrated that polypyrrole has penetrated into the yarn structure and the highest polypyrrole deposition was obtained at the initiator concentration of 0.6 mol/l. Also, the highest electromagnetic shielding effectiveness value and the lowest surface resistivity were obtained at this concentration.


The images of the panchromatic camera (PAN) of the Indian Remote Sensing Satellite do provide with 5m pixel size the highest resolution of the operational civilian cartographic space sensor usable for three dimensional mapping. But in relation to other space images the radiometric quality is limited by the 6 bit gray value representation. So before starting with mapping a radiometric enhancement is required. The 12 000 pixel of the PAN-camera are composed by 3 CCD-line sensors, each with 4096 pixel. This complicates the sensor geometry because the relation has to be determined by self calibration. 5 control points in the covered area of at least 70km x 84km are required for this. Based on such images the information contents of German topographic 1 : 50 000 could be reached, which was not possible with other space images like SPOT and KVR1000.


Jukseoru as an official pavilion of the government, one of the eight sceneries in Gwndong Area, is located on the cliff over Osipcheon River. This paper interprets form and space of the pavilion with restored old life by analyzing pictures of official party in 18th century in Chosun Dynasty. Every part of the space is occupied by persons by the class and duty: the pricipal guest, nobles, subordinates, gisaengs, court musicians, and guards from the high to the low and from the inside to the outside. Applying the analysis to the Jukseoru pavilion, the noblest lord takes sit on the platform in front of folded screen at main bay under checked ceiling, enclosed by low timber beam. The next northern end bay is a place for subordinates' and servants' waiting for preparation for rice wine. Southern end entrance bay is not a result of later addition but deliberately and originally made for lower place outside the railing of wooden floor: for a waiting woman gisaeng, and subordinates. Outside under the eaves on the platform with bedrock, artificial stone and soil is a place for court musicians, subordinates, and guards. The yard in front of the building is a place for preparing meals by cookers. Every detailed ornamental form is different each other by the place for the occupied class. Existing theory tells that the building, 7 bays gable-and-hipped roof, is a result of structural extention of 2 bays at the 5 bays gabled-roof. However, through the interpretation of old pictures and application to the pavilion, the present Juseoru is not a result of later structural addition, but deliberately designed creation suited to life in hierarchical traditional society.


This paper introduces the concept of time-of-flight reflectance estimation, and demonstrates a new technique that allows a camera to rapidly acquire reflectance properties of objects from a single view-point, over relatively long distances and without encircling equipment. We measure material properties by indirectly illuminating an object by a laser source, and observing its reflected light indirectly using a time-of-flight camera. The configuration collectively acquires dense angular, but low spatial sampling, within a limited solid angle range - all from a single viewpoint. Our ultra-fast imaging approach captures space-time "streak images" that can separate out different bounces of light based on path length. Entanglements arise in the streak images mixing signals from multiple paths if they have the same total path length. We show how reflectances can be recovered by solving for a linear system of equations and assuming parametric material models; fitting to lower dimensional reflectance models enables us to disentangle measurements. We demonstrate proof-of-concept results of parametric reflectance models for homogeneous and discretized heterogeneous patches, both using simulation and experimental hardware. As compared to lengthy or highly calibrated BRDF acquisition techniques, we demonstrate a device that can rapidly, on the order of seconds, capture meaningful reflectance information. We expect hardware advances to improve the portability and speed of this device.


Netflow-based NAT detection module consists of five detection
methods that process extended NetFlow data (IPid, TTL,
PortSequences, SubnetTTL and TCP_SYN) and aggregator. Each of
detection method produces a list of IP addresses and
uncertainty of NAT behind the given IP address. The aggregator
evalutes and correlates these outputs and produces total
uncertainty of NAT behind the given IP addres.


The Danish parliament has decided to establish a four-year pilot scheme for medical treatment with cannabis. We increasingly experience requests from parents for medical treatment with cannabis of children and have the impression that a growing number of parents treat their children with illegally acquired cannabis products for various conditions. We summarize the sparse evidence regarding effects, side effects and long-term effects of medical treatment with cannabis in children and adolescents. At present, cannabis should very rarely be considered as part of medical treatment for children and adolescents.


This study investigated the potential use of molecularly imprinted polymer (MIP) submicron particles for the selective removal of trace 17β-estradiol (E2) in water treatment. Methacrylate-based MIP submicron particles were synthesized, in a one-step suspension polymerization procedure, using ethylene glycol dimethacrylate (EGDMA) as the cross-linker. After template removal, the particles could be used as a smart material for specific binding of E2. The submicron size of MIP particles facilitated uniform dispersion in water for up to 17 days. These particles were meritorious in mass transfer behavior, allowing phase partitioning of E2 molecules in water during a short treatment time. After 1-mL water samples of different E2 concentrations were treated with 20 mg of MIP particles for 2 min, recovery percentages as high as 97% ± 3% were achieved. The specific binding capacity of these MIP particles was determined to be 15 mg E2/g. Nonimprinted polymer nanoparticles were also evaluated for nonspecific binding of E2, using 0.5 mg in 1 mL of water, to attain 64% ± 3% efficiency in 3 min towards general water treatment. A simple capillary electrophoresis method was successfully developed for the characterization of MIP and NIP particles. Apparently the less negative the electrophoretic mobility, the higher binding efficiency and faster binding kinetics the particles would exhibit with E2 due to less hindered Brownian diffusion. © 2010 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Appl Polym Sci, 2010


The crystllization process of metallic glass (Fe1-xCrx)83B17 (x=0.05, 0.10, 0.15, 0.25) was studied by differential thermal analysis, x-ray diffraction technology. Experiment proved the atomic bond force as an important driving force in the phase transition. The crystallization peak shifts towards high temperature with the increase in the concentration of high melting point Cr atom. The main structural unit of as-quenched state of (Fe1-xCrx)83B17 metallic glass contains atomic cluster of local nine-atom structure.


The mine ventilation and safety is one of the most important factors to influence on the coal production.More attention has been paid to manage safety information in scientific, efficient, and real-time way. Therefore, it is important to develop a practical mine safety assurance information system (CSAIS). Based on analyzing the actual management mode for ventilation and safety on mine, the paper studies the structure and function of the mine safety assurance information system based on GIS in detail. Moreover, it also suggests some applications and solutions. By combining with the practical situation, the paper realizes the whole function of the present system.


In a cooperative multi-cell network the uplink signal coming from each mobile terminal (MT) is simultaneously demodulated by multiple base stations (BSs). Both backhaul capacity and BS processing capabilities limit the number of demodulating BSs. In order to fit the information exchange among BSs to backhaul resources we minimize the average number of demodulating BSs, under a constraint on the average outage probability. The BS selection problem becomes more complicated when error control configurations as automatic repeat request (ARQ) and hybrid ARQ (HARQ) with chase combining or incremental redundancy are considered. Multi-cell processing is implemented both by decoding the packet at each BS and by a joint decoding among BSs. We first derive the outage probability as a function of the number of cooperating BSs and the error control strategy. A heuristic approach for BS selection is then developed, to find at each frame which BSs perform demodulation and share the information in the backhaul. Lastly, we show that backhaul usage can be reduced up to 64% with respect to an unoptimized solution.


Music students can be exposed to high sound pressure levels (SPLs) during classes, which can result in hearing damage. However, individual study can also boost their exposure. This short presentation aims to describe the SPLs to which secondary school music students are exposed during individual study, as well as the circumstances in which practice is carried out. The study involved 16 young music students, aged 12-15 yrs old. SPLs were monitored during individual study at school and at the students' homes. Measurements were performed throughout rehearsals over a 3-week period. The results show that music students are exposed to high SPLs during the individual study, with potential for it to increase, depending on the type and features of the rooms used for practice. Students were not entirely aware of the health risks related to exposure to high SPLs during individual practice, and hearing protection was never used by them. These findings denote that hearing conservation programs targeting music students should also focus on the risks to which they are exposed during individual study in different settings.


This paper calls attention to some of the most important and easily recognizable forms of surface wave, pointing out that their essential common characteristic is the evanescent field structure over the wave front, as represented by equiphase planes. The problems of launching and supporting surface waves must, in general, be distinguished from one another and it does not necessarily follow that because a particular surface is capable of supporting a surface wave that a given aperture distribution of radiation, e.g. a vertical dipole, can excite such a wave. The paper concludes with a discussion of the behavior of surface waves and their applications.


In transport, the topological Hall effect (THE) presents itself as nonmonotonic features (or humps and dips) in the Hall signal and is widely interpreted as a sign of chiral spin textures, like magnetic skyrmions. However, when the anomalous Hall effect (AHE) is also present, the coexistence of two AHEs could give rise to similar artifacts, making it difficult to distinguish between genuine THE with AHE and two-component AHE. Here, we confirm genuine THE with AHE by means of transport and magneto-optical Kerr effect (MOKE) microscopy, in which magnetic skyrmions are directly observed, and find that genuine THE occurs in the transition region of the AHE. In sharp contrast, the artifact "THE" or two-component AHE occurs well beyond the saturation of the "AHE component" (under the false assumption of THE + AHE). Furthermore, we distinguish artifact "THE" from genuine THE by three methods: (1) minor loops, (2) temperature dependence, and (3) gate dependence. Minor loops of genuine THE with AHE are always within the full loop, while minor loops of the artifact "THE" may reveal a single loop that cannot fit into the "AHE component". In addition, the temperature or gate dependence of the artifact "THE" may also be accompanied by a polarity change of the "AHE component", as the nonmonotonic features vanish, while the temperature dependence of genuine THE with AHE reveals no such change. Our work may help future researchers to exercise caution and use these methods for careful examination in order to ascertain the genuine THE.


At low thermal power (<5 kW) conditions, nitrogen and carbon dioxide were added as diluents to a premix of methane-oxygen in an atmospheric generic swirl burner. Results indicate that CO2-diluted oxy-methane flames have a wider stability range than N2-diluted flames in terms of overall oxygen concentration in the premix. Bulk flow Reynolds number, augmented by varying the size of the burner exit nozzle, was also found to increase the stability limits of flames diluted with both CO2 and N2, as the increased flow velocity offsets the higher burning velocity of the oxyfuel mixture. A combination of differing transport properties between diluents and the resulting flame chemistry produces a change in the structure of the premixed oxyfuel swirl flame, shown by combustion PIV to affect the observed lean and rich stability limits.

Utilising the results at low thermal power conditions, enhanced-oxygen combustion of a methane-air flame was investigated in a pressurized generic swirl burner operating at higher thermal power (<50 kW) conditions and pressures up to 3 bar absolute. Over a range of increasing thermal powers, it is seen that a relatively small amount of pure oxygen addition can shift the equivalence ratio at which the lean stability limit or rich stability limit are reached compared with the same phenomenon observed for a methane-air flame. Pressurised operation with CO2 dilution up to 15.5 mol% was validated through stability limit and emissions gas analysis, giving further support to the use of exhaust gas recirculation in premixed swirl-stabilized burners for oxyfuel combustion.


To achieve increased rail network safety and reliability, it is important to better understand ballast layer performance under complex and demanding dynamic loading field scenarios, especially for high speed lines on ballasted track. Repeated high-speed loading tests were recently conducted at three train speeds on a full-scale ballasted track-subgrade system, known as the Zhejiang University innovative high-speed rail tester (ZJU-iHSRT). BLOKS3D, a polyhedral discrete element method (DEM) particle simulation code with newly featured parallel computing capability, was used to capture the full-scale ballasted track dynamic responses at those speeds. A proportional–integral–derivative controller was also implemented in the DEM code to ensure identical dynamic loadings were applied in the DEM model as in the physical model. This paper presents the dynamic response findings obtained using the DEM model: 1) Crosstie vibration velocities captured in the DEM model match closely with the measurement obtained from the same crosstie in the physical model; 2) ballast particle vibration velocities recorded in the DEM model provide an overall good match with the data measured from the same location in the physical model; and finally, 3) visualized macroscopic ballast layer dynamic responses reveal the mechanical behavior of the ballast layer under dynamic loading scenarios applied in the ZJU-iHSRT full-scale ballasted track-subgrade system.


In kinetic methods or reaction-rate methods of analysis, the rate of a given reaction is measured and related to the concentration of the sought-for species. The instrumentation in kinetics is primarily designed to monitor the evolution of the analytical signal with time. Unlike in the traditional equilibrium-based approaches, where the signal is measured after the reaction has reached completion, in kinetic methods the signal is usually measured in the first few percent of the total reaction time. Therefore, the advantages and limitations of kinetic methods should be considered in their relations with equilibrium methods. Kinetic methods are faster than equilibrium-based methods since the user does not have to wait for a reaction to go to completion. They are relative methods that depend on changes in concentration and not on its absolute value and they could be more selective than equilibrium methods since the difference between reaction constants could be used to discriminate against an interfering species. The limitations of kinetic methods are a lower precision and a strong dependence on experimental conditions. The main factors that cause these limitations are the measured signal, which is small in comparison with that from an equilibrium reaction, and the dependence of rate constants on temperature, pH, ionic strength, etc. Therefore, the measurement systems used in kinetic methods should be sensitive and the experimental conditions should be kept strictly constant. The best results in kinetic methods are obtained with instrumental systems having a high degree of automation.

The main operations that should be carried out by the instrumentation in kinetic determinations are the mixing of the reactants, measurement of the detector signal in time and processing of data to obtain the reaction rate and concentration. The mixing of the reactants should be done in a time shorter than the reaction half-life and it is critical for fast reactions where required mixing times are of the order of milliseconds. In these cases the mixing is accomplished by mechanical systems that rapidly drive the reactants through a mixing chamber into an observation chamber. For slower reaction the best mixing procedures are based on automated flow analyzers that have different manifolds configurations adapted both to sample processing and to reactant mixing. After mixing, the reaction could be monitored in time either by stopping the flow and recording the signal or by passing the reacting plug several times through the detector and reading the signal after each pass. The measurement of the detector signal, after the reagents are mixed, could be done with a large variety of detectors, but the most commonly used detection systems are photometric and electrochemical. Photometric detection provides a short response time, specificity and the possibility of collecting full spectra very rapidly if photodetector arrays are used. Electrochemical detectors are simple and relatively inexpensive. The concentration of the analyte is determined from the slope of the detector signal. In many routine procedures the slope is determined by measuring the signal at one or two fixed points in time or by determining the time required by the signal to reach a predetermined level. These procedures have the advantage that they are rapid and need no supplementary instrumentation for data processing. Another approach in kinetic data processing, based on computer software, computes a curve that fits the experimental data. The slope or concentration is then extracted from the mathematical expression of the fitting curve.


This paper is a step towards the dynamic modelling and control of complete wind/diesel generation system for islanded areas. It mainly focuses on the control strategy of the grid-side inverter usually used in variable speed wind turbines connected in cogeneration schemes. The considered conversion system is equipped with a geared squirrel cage induction generator (SCIG). The developed control strategy is based on the voltage oriented control (VOC) of a 3-phase inverter connected to a weak grid. The controller's PI regulators are designed using the classical direct synthesis approach and cascade control loops technique in the synchronous dq- reference frame. A grid voltage regulation loop, widely used in D-STATCOM systems is designed to add the automatic reactive power management feature to the inverter. Various simulation results using Matlab/Simulink® software for different system's contingencies such as sudden step changes of the wind power are presented. The reactions of the system to step changes in grid voltage, due to the small size of the considered grid, are also presented and extensively discussed.


Chapter 1. Tips for First TimersEasy to Use and Easy to Do Let the Students Take the Bait before You Set the Hook Strong at the Seams: Joining Academic and Civic Interests Can't We All Just (Dis)Agree? Doing It Right: Reflections on Experience Matching Goals to Students' Interests Setting Service-Learning GoalsChapter 2. Classroom ActivitiesMaking Democracy Matter in the Classroom "Doing" Engagement Understanding and Working with Perspectives Citizens Talking across the Curriculum Getting People's Attention Pedagogy of Collegiality Debating Issues through Opinion-Editorials and Letters to the Editor Building Skills for Social Action Using Readers' Theater Public Achievement and Teacher Education Expanding Civic Involvement and the Learning Landscape through Courtroom Observations Connecting Scholarship and Social Responsibility Motivating Mathematical Concepts with Politics The Do-It-Yourself Interest Groups An Exercise in Community Transformation Using Political Activism to Teach Critical Thinking A Compelling Reason to Study Cities Student Philanthropy as a Vehicle for Teaching the Subject MatterChapter 3. Service Learning and Educating CitizensA Service-Learning Checklist Building the Right Relationship: Collaboration as a Key to Successful Civic Engagement Maximizing the Power of Reflection Moving from Service to Justice Developing the Attitudes and Practices of Civic Engagement with Service-Learning Course Development Improving Literacy through Service Learning Texts and Contexts: Performance, Community, and Service Learning Using Community-Based Learning Modules to Introduce Languages and Culture Developing Citizenship through a Service-Learning Capstone ExperienceChapter 4. Assessing Student LearningUsing the National Survey of Student Engagement to Assess and Enhance Civic Engagement in the Classroom Assessing the Multiple Dimensions of Student Civic Engagement: A Preliminary Test of an ADP Survey Instrument Assessing Student Learning in Service-Learning Internships Chapter 5. Departmental and Disciplinary Approaches to Educating CitizensDepartment-wide Engagement: Creating and Supporting Durable Structures for Campus and Community Change Creating and Sustaining a Culture of Engagement Maximizing Collaboration for Sustainable Innovation Rethinking the Boundaries of the Classroom Infusing Service Learning in Teacher Education Programs Engaging Future Teachers about Civic Education Fostering Service Learning in a Small Department Service Learning in Asian American StudiesChapter 6. Educating Citizens through ResearchImmersing the Student Researcher in Community Using the Research Process to Enhance Civic Engagement Cultivating Commitment: A Role for Ethnography in Teacher Education Involving Students in Campus-wide Assessment of Civic Engagement Increasing Political Efficacy through Community-Based Research Teaching Race and Politics through Community-Based ResearchChapter 7. Overcoming Barriers to Educating Students for CitizenshipFrom Oblivion to Engagement: Dissolving Barriers to Thoughtful Response Creating Classrooms as "Safe Space" Faculty Development for Facilitating Civil Discourse "Writing" the Civic into the Curriculum Reaching Out to Tomorrow's Scientists, Technologists, Engineers, and Mathematicians Using Organizational Writing to Engage Engineering and Business Students Cal Campaign Consultants: An Interdisciplinary Approach to Civic Education, Leadership, and Community Involvement


Real information on the corrosion resistance for such big structures as water gates could not be expected from tests using small plate coupons free from any one of crevice geometry. Specimens chosen for this test were two box like models mainly made of type 316 steel or type 304 steel. The first was a larger one with a size of 1340•~1000•~500 in mm, and the second was a smaller one with a size of 400•~400•~200 in mm, both of which were designed to simulate real configuration of the water gates in terms of shape and welds. These specimens were exposed for 503 days to a natural river site 9km upstream from the sea. For specimens positioned at a level between low and high tide, there occurred hardly any kind of corrosion. On the other hand, for all specimens immersed deep into the water, there occurred several forms of corrosion, for example, inside the rubber/metal crevice and under deposits, as well as dezincification from brass bearing.


Objective During the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic, several studies have found that Internet usage and gaming times have increased among adolescents. Parents' Internet literacy and attitudes toward Internet gaming have been reported to affect children's Internet gaming disorder (IGD). We hypothesized that parents' attitudes toward Internet use and gaming would affect the prevalence of IGD among adolescents. Methods A total of 199 mothers of children who played Internet games were surveyed online to gather information regarding their demographic characteristics, children's Internet use patterns, psychological factors, and Internet gaming literacy. Results Among adolescents, increased Internet usage or gaming time was not associated with IGD, but the presence of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) was. Among parents, anxiety, depression, and family togetherness were not related to IGD, but a positive perception of gaming protected against the development of IGD, whereas a negative perception was a risk factor for IGD. Conclusion Increased gaming time neither causes nor correlates with IGD in adolescents, even though ADHD may be a risk factor for IGD. Parents' positive or negative perceptions of gaming can be protective or present a risk factor, respectively, for their children's development of IGD.


AbstractWhile time and zonal mean budgets of axial angular momentum (AAM) have been presented in pressure coordinates and also in isentropic coordinates, AAM budgets in height coordinates have not been published yet. The results of such an analysis on the basis of the 40-yr European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) Re-Analysis (ERA-40) winter data are presented in this paper, which includes explicitly evaluated vertical eddy fluxes of momentum and mass as new features. As expected, AAM fluxes related to the Hadley cell are dominant. Transient vertical AAM fluxes are directed upward at the midlatitudes. Transient mass transports are not negligible, while triple terms are unimportant. Problems with the global balance of torques acting at the surface are discussed as well as those of mass conservation.