Fertilizer application strategies can impact soil health, mainly soil organic carbon (SOC) and total nitrogen (TN) sequestration, which are essential in mitigating climate change. Many studies have been conducted on the influence of fertilizer use on SOC and TN storage. Results can, however, be variable in different sites because of various management practices and environmental conditions; therefore, we conducted a global meta‐analysis of 953 observations from 143 papers on the impact of different fertilizers (mineral N (NF), manure (Mn) and mixed fertilizers (MNF: combination of mineral and organic fertilizer)) on SOC and TN storage under various cropping systems and environmental conditions in agricultural land. The results showed that MNF led to the greatest SOC and TN stocks. Noticeably, animal Mn sequestered higher amounts of SOC and TN compared to green Mn. In addition, MNF increases SOC in the medium term (10–20 years, 43.71%) and TN in the short term (0–10 years, 40.85%), which could be related to their nutrient's cycles and residence time in the soil. The higher effectiveness of SOC and TN sequestration (12.84% and 27.42%, respectively) under NF was observed at high rates >250 kg N/ha in comparison to low rates of 0–250 kg N/ha. A significant SOC increment was observed with MNF (37.76%) and Mn (19.45%) under continuous cropping (monoculture) than crop rotations. In contrast, TN was higher with MNF (58.31%) and Mn (18.23%) with crop rotations. The subhumid and semi‐arid zones had greater increase in SOC (28.24%) and TN (74.54%) stock in comparison to other climatic conditions. Overall, this study emphasized that MNF could optimize SOC and TN storage in agricultural soils depending upon edaphic and regional climatic conditions.


Krill meal (KM) is a potential feed ingredient to partially replace fish meal (FM) in aquaculture. To better understand the efficacy of krill meal, a 200-day feeding trial was conducted with Russian sturgeon (Acipenser gueldenstaedtii). Four extruded diets in which KM replaced 0%, 10%, 20%, or 30% of FM in the formulation were fed to sturgeons (weight 481 g) for 200 days. Growth of Russian sturgeon fed diets containing KM was as good, or even better, than fish fed a FM control diet. No differences were observed in terms of dorsal muscle composition between the fish fed diets which contained KM and those fed the FM control diet. Fluoride concentrations in the dorsal muscle, liver, and kidney, as well as swim bladder in all dietary groups were below a detectable limit. In the gills, skin, vertebral bone and dorsal scutes, the fluoride content from the KM groups progressively increased with dietary fluoride concentration. In conclusion, KM can be a partial substitute for FM in the diets of Russian sturgeon without affecting normal growth performance. The IJA appears exclusively as a peer-reviewed on-line open-access journal at http://www.siamb.org.il. To read papers free of charge, please register online at registration form. Sale of IJA papers is strictly forbidden.


Light can be used as a management tool to increase milk yield in dairy cows and improve the working conditions for barn staff. It is known that a long day photoperiod, with 16 hours of light and 8 hours of darkness, can increase milk yield in an ongoing lactation. Modern LED lighting can be designed to emit specific wavelengths, opening up possibilities for discussing the most favorable type of light for dairy cows. This thesis investigated the role of light environment and the impact of light intensity, spectral composition and uniformity on dairy cows. In initial studies, a light lab with a controlled light environment and no external light was used. The response to red, blue, and white light of increasing intensity on pupil size was evaluated in five pregnant non-lactating cows. Red light did not constrict the pupil but the other light colors did, indicating that direct stimulation of ipRGCs may be required for a pupillary response to steady background light. A five-week study on 40 pregnant and lactating cows involving 16 hours of blue, red or white light in daytime and 8 hours of dim, white light at night did not show effects of light color during daytime on milk production. Plasma melatonin concentration was higher in dim night light than in daylight for all light treatments. To examine cow movements in light of different intensity, spectrum and uniformity, 12 pregnant, non-lactating cows were tested in an obstacle course in the light lab. A dark environment did not limit the cows' ability to walk through the obstacle course, but they reduced walking speed when subjected to non-uniform, low-intensity red light, indicating the importance of avoiding non-uniform light in dairy barns. Quantification of light environments on four Swedish dairy farms, using a range of measuring methods, showed that the light environment differed between farms, but that light of low intensity and uniformity was commonly used. Light environment is important for dairy cows, as it can affect their physiology and behavior. The light environment can be more objectively described using multiple measuring methods.


Infant rhesus monkeys were (a) fed a diet high in phenylalanine or (b) fed a diet high in p-chlorophenylalanine for the 1st 12 months of life, (c) selected from mothers fed a diet high in phenylalanine during pregnancy, (d) fed a diet low in phenylalanine, (e) maintained as controls, or (f) maintained as pair-fed controls. Tested during the 1st year of life with familiar peers, during the 2nd year with unfamiliar stimulus animals and with a movie film, the 3 groups of phenylketonuric monkeys showed less play and other positive social behavior and more withdrawal and more aggressive behavior than did the 2 control groups. The results support learning data suggesting that phenylketonuric monkeys are more emotionally reactive.


Abstract This paper describes a study of the Chalk aquifer of the Berkshire Downs. Extensive fieldwork provided sufficient information for the development of a mathematical model of the aquifer system. Particular emphasis was placed on the representation of the variation of changing transmissivity with saturated depth and the simulation of streams and rivers; flows from the Chalk to the Upper Greensand were also found to be important in certain locations. Comparisons between field and modelled values of both groundwater flow and groundwater head showed good agreement. The model was then used for predictive purposes with particular emphasis on the use of groundwater for river augmentation.


Two classes of theoretical mechanisms for protein-mediated, passive, transmembrane substrate transport (facilitated diffusion) are compared. The simple carrier describes a carrier protein that exposes substrate influx and efflux sites alternately but never both sites simultaneously. Two-site models for substrate transport describe carrier proteins containing influx and efflux sites simultaneously. Velocity equations describing transport by these mechanisms are derived. These equations take the same general form, being characterized by five experimental constants. Simple carrier-mediated transport is restricted to hyperbolic kinetics under all conditions. Two-site carrier-mediated transport may deviate from hyperbolic kinetics only under equilibrium exchange conditions. When both simple- and two-site carriers display hyperbolic kinetics under equilibrium exchange conditions, these models are indistinguishable by using steady-state transport data alone. Seven sugar transport systems are analyzed. Five of these systems are consistent with both models for sugar transport. Uridine, leucine, and cAMP transport by human red cells are consistent with both simple- and two-site models for transport. Human erythrocyte sugar transport can be modeled by simple- and two-site carrier mechanisms, allowing for compartmentalization of intracellular sugars. In this instance, resolution of the intrinsic properties of the human red cell sugar carrier at 20 degrees C requires the use of submillisecond transport measurements.


RK2 is a low copy number plasmid responsible for spread and maintenance of important properties (including antibiotic resistance and degradation functions) among bacteria. Gene expression in RK2 is controlled by cooperativity among four repressors (i.e. KorA, KorB, KorC and TrbA) to tightly regulate replication, stable inheritance and conjugative transfer functions. KorB (358 aa) has dual roles as a global regulator and as an active partitioning protein. This study focuses on its role as a global regulatory protein and its interaction with DNA, RNAP and other repressor proteins (e.g KorA and TrbA) of RK2. It is shown for the first time that DNA binding by negatively charged protein KorB (-21) is modulated via a balance of charge in the internal region from aa 235 to 245. KorB binds O\(_B\) and silences the genes around, showing that KorB can spread. TrbA and KorA bound to DNA adjacent to KorB do not block gene silencing by KorB and indeed potentiate its repression, suggesting that KorB can spread past DNA binding proteins and thus that they do not act as road blocks. The fact that KorB E237A, which is defective in silencing, cannot repress at a distance when alone but can do so in presence of TrbA, provides strong evidence of looping. The fact that KorA and TrbA do not potentiate gene silencing by E237A, but do potentiate its repression, indicates strongly that gene silencing is because of spreading instead of looping. Full length KorB is required for distal repression. However, only the region 225-255 aa is critical for proximal repression by KorB. The results suggest a model in which KorB organises DNA loosely over a long region through a wrapping in a way that can accommodate other regulatory proteins. This nucleoprotein complex may also be critical for plasmid partitioning.


The Toll-Like Receptor (Tlr) pathway is a central mediator of innate immune responses to pathogens. Tlr signalling in macrophages leads to well documented transcriptional, phenotypic and biochemical changes cumulating in inflammation. The resolution of this inflammatory signal is less well understood, but vital to limit tissue damage, sepsis and chronic inflammatory disease. Alternate splicing of key signalling molecules in the Tlr cascade has been shown to dramatically alter the signalling capacity of inflammatory cells. The production of dominant negative proteins through such splicing events has been documented for few proteins such as Irak-m and Myd88-s, yet it is not known how common this mechanism is. We exploited the FANTOM (functional annotation of the mouse genome) transcriptome dataset to systematically screen transcript variants of the Tlr cascade, Mapk, Pik3, IFN-? pathways. Two hundred and fifty six variant transcripts were identified, including novel variants of Tlr4, Ticam1, Tollip, Rac1, Irak1, 2 and 4, Mapk14/p38, Csf1r, Atf2 and Stat1. Functional annotation of variant proteins was assessed in light of inflammatory signalling in mouse primary macrophages. Splicing arrays were used to examine the expression of each variant transcript in primary and LPS-activated macrophages. We functionally tested the expression of Tlr4 transcripts under a range of cytokine conditions via Northern and qRT-PCR. The effects of variant Mapk14/p38 protein expression on macrophage activation and survival were demonstrated. Our data suggest a surprisingly common role for variant proteins in diversification/repression of inflammatory signalling.


Mutants that are defective in brassinosteroid (BR) biosynthesis or signaling display severely retarded growth patterns due to absence of growth-promoting effects by BRs. Arabidopsis (Arabidopsis thaliana) DWARF4 (DWF4) catalyzes a flux-determining step in the BR biosynthetic pathways. Thus, it is hypothesized that the tissues of DWF4 expression may represent the sites of BR biosynthesis in Arabidopsis. Here we show that DWF4 transcripts accumulate in the actively growing tissues, such as root, shoot apices with floral clusters, joint tissues of root and shoot, and dark-grown seedlings. Conforming to the RNA gel-blot analysis, DWF4:β-glucuronidase (GUS) histochemical analyses more precisely define the tissues that express the DWF4 gene. Examination of the endogenous levels of BRs in six and seven different tissues of wild type and brassinosteroid insensitive1-5 mutant, respectively, revealed that BRs are significantly enriched in roots, shoot tips, and joint tissues of roots and shoots. In addition, DWF4:GUS expression was negatively regulated by BRs. DWF4:GUS activity was increased by treatment with brassinazole, a BR biosynthetic inhibitor, and decreased by exogenous application of bioactive BRs. When DWF4:GUS was expressed in a different genetic background, its level was down-regulated in brassinazole resistant1-D, confirming that BRASSINAZOLE RESISTANT1 acts as a negative regulator of DWF4. Interestingly, in the brassinosteroid insensitive2/dwf12-1D background, DWF4:GUS expression was intensified and delocalized to elongating zones of root, suggesting that BRASSINOSTEROID INSENSITIVE2 is an important factor that limits DWF4 expression. Thus, it is likely that the DWF4 promoter serves as a focal point in maintaining homeostasis of endogenous bioactive BR pools in specific tissues of Arabidopsis.


Abatract. The article presents the results of a lexico-syntactic analysis of valency and collocability of English words, related to one semantic group: effectiveness and efficiency . The aim of the research was to study the ability of these words to syntactically and lexically contact with other words, taking into consideration certain difference between their lexical meanings. The objectives included determining semantic variations and analysis of word classes in the left and right contexts. The material, 177,144 words, comprised 700 article titles and abstracts from seven international journals with geological and petroleumrelated specializations. Methods of study involved continuous sampling, classification, and analysis of lexical meanings of relevant words. It was found that the frequency of effectiveness was 40% higher than that of efficiency. Both of them had similarities in syntactic valency: they occurred in identical syntactic structures, however, with different rates of occurrence. The difference is the most obvious in such syntactic structures as N(E)+of+N - characteristic of effectiveness, and V+A+N(E) - specific to efficiency. A typical example of effectiveness was the effectiveness of the proposed method , while that of efficiency - improve production efficiency . Effectiveness collocated more often with method-related notions, whereas efficiency - with processes. The gained data correlate with the definitions: effectiveness has a wider semantic field (which explains a higher rate of its occurrence) and is oriented towards result, while efficiency implies process and has an additional technical meaning. The data can be used in the practice of teaching English as a second language for students with technical specializations and technical translation.


In a distributed wavelength–routed network, a lightpath request is blocked when its assigned wavelength is already occupied by another lightpath request. Conventional studies assume that a wavelength for the lightpath is selected randomly in the distributed lightpath setup method. However, this random selection method causes unnecessary blocks of lightpath requests, even when the arrival rate of requests is low. In this paper, we develop a novel method for assigning wavelengths, based on the first–fit algorithm. In our proposed method, the intermediate nodes forecast the wavelength that will be selected at the destination node, so that the subsequent lightpath requests avoid the forecasted wavelengths. The forecasted wavelength is thus kept available until the corresponding request reserves it, which prevents wavelength conflicts with other lightpath requests. Computer–simulated performance comparison showed that our method reduces the blocking probability by more than one order of magnitude compared to random selection.


The UAV propulsion system that will be operated for long time at more than 40,000ft altitude should have not only fuel flow minimization but also high reliability and durability. If this UAV propulsion system may have faults, it is not easy to recover the system from the abnormal, and hence an accurate diagnostic technology must be needed to keep the operational reliability. For this purpose, the development of the health monitoring system which can monitor remotely the engine condition should be required. In this study, a fuzzy trend monitoring method for detecting the engine faults including mechanical faults was proposed through analyzing performance trends of measurement data. The trend monitoring is an engine conditioning method which can find engine faults by monitoring important measuring parameters such as fuel flow, exhaust gas temperatures, rotational speeds, vibration and etc. Using engine condition database as an input to be generated by linear regression analysis of real engine instrument data, an application of the fuzzy logic in diagnostics estimated the cause of fault in each component. According to study results. it was confirmed that the proposed trend monitoring method can improve reliability and durability of the propulsion system for a long endurance UAV to be operated at medium altitude


AIM
To specify the association between obesity and the frequency of concomitant states, fat metabolic disturbances, and progressive osteoarthrosis (OA) at various sites.

SUBJECTS AND METHODS
The study included 298 patients with manifest knee and hip osteoarthrosis in whom the body mass index (BMI) and waist and hip circumferences were measured calculating the waist-hip index. The association of these indices with the severity of OA and the development of concomitant states was analyzed.

RESULTS
Both women and men were found to have overweight and first-second-degree obesity at equal ratios - 61.6 and 59%, respectively. There was an evident rise in the prevalence of cardiovascular diseases (arterial hypertension, coronary heart disease) and diabetes mellitus with a higher BMI. Stages II-III gonarthrosis was predominant (97.1%) in the obesity group (BMI 30.0-35.0 or greater). With a BMI of > 40, X-ray stages III-IV OA were revealed in 83.3% of the patients.

CONCLUSION
Our findings support the important role of obesity as a risk factor in the development of OA. Fat metabolic disturbances also make a considerable contribution in the development of concomitant states and in the progression of OA of both knee and hand joints.


Results from the 9975 Surveillance Program at the Savannah River Site (SRS) are summarized for justification to extend the life of the 9975 packages currently stored in the K-Area Materials Storage (KAMS) facility from 10 years to 15 years. This justification is established with the stipulation that surveillance activities will continue throughout this extended time to ensure the continued integrity of the 9975 materials of construction and to further understand the currently identified degradation mechanisms. The current 10 year storage life was developed prior to storage. A subsequent report was later used to extend the qualification of the 9975 shipping packages for 2 years for shipping plus 10 years for storage. However the qualification for the storage period was provided by the monitoring requirements of the Storage and Surveillance Program. This report summarizes efforts to determine a new safe storage limit for the 9975 shipping package based on the surveillance data collected since 2005 when the surveillance program began. KAMS is a zero-release facility that depends upon containment by the 9975 to meet design basis storage requirements. Therefore, to confirm the continued integrity of the 9975 packages while stored in KAMS, a 9975 Storage and Surveillance Program was implemented alongside the DOE required Integrated Surveillance Program (ISP) for 3013 plutonium-bearing containers. The 9975 Storage and Surveillance Program performs field surveillance as well as accelerated aging tests to ensure any degradation due to aging, to the extent that could affect packaging performance, is detected in advance of such degradation occurring in the field. The Program has demonstrated that the 9975 package has a robust design that can perform under a variety of conditions. As such the primary emphasis of the on-going 9975 Surveillance Program is an aging study of the 9975 Viton(reg.sign) GLT containment vessel O-rings and the Celotex(reg.sign) fiberboard thermal insulation at bounding conditions of radiation and elevated temperatures. Other materials of construction, however, are also discussed.


A segmentation process which emulates the human method of screening cervical smears is presented. The scheme consists of two distinct stages, one at low magnification using water immersion segmentation, followed by a search based dual active contour method at high magnification. Each technique and the overall method is explained and examples are given.


An ad-hoc network works without any infrastructures. It consists of wireless mobile nodes .In this paper, we propose an ad-hoc network routing protocol, called FR-DSR(Fast Reconnect Dynamic Source Routing), which is an improved DSR.When a route is disconnected, FR-DSR can reconnect fast by using prepared spare routes. During communication, spare routes are prepared by sending route check packets through routes in a cache, and an additional route request packet is sent if a spare route is broken. We show that FR-DSR gives better performance than DSR through simulation experiments.


Background: Breast conserving therapy is an established option for early stage breast cancer. Shorter postoperative radiotherapy (RT) regimens have similar efficacy in lower risk breast cancer, including hypofractionated whole breast RT and Accelerated Partial Breast Irradiation (APBI). Despite similar efficacy results for APBI, RAPID trial showed worse cosmetic outcomes for patients receiving APBI compared to whole breast RT. Larger postoperative lumpectomy cavity volumes and the used dose regimen could have had an impact on cosmesis. There are only few published preoperative APBI pilot studies with different dosimetric schemes treating smaller RT target volumes that would potentially translate into less toxicity. Our study is designed to evaluate the safety and feasibility of preoperative ablative RT in patients with early stage breast cancer. An array of ancillary imaging, blood and tissue biomarker collection is also planned in order to study the radiation response in breast cancer. Trial Design: This phase I study uses a modification of the standard 3+3 Phase I design to identify the recommended phase 2 dose of preoperative SABER for treatment of selected breast cancer patients. Participants will be treated with assigned dose level of preoperative SABER, once a day, for 5 fractions given on non-consecutive days, over a period of 2 weeks. The tested dose levels are: Level I=35 Gy (7 Gy x 5), Level II (starting dose)= 40 Gy (8 Gy x 5), Level III=45 Gy (9 Gy x 5), Level IV=50 Gy (10 Gy x 5). Standard partial mastectomy and axillary surgery will be performed 4-6 weeks after preoperative SABER. Adjuvant systemic therapy will be per standard of care. Exploratory studies will be performed pre/post RT and postoperative, including multiparametric breast MRI, biomarkers in blood (CTC's, SNPs, cytokines, CRP) and tissue (assessment of radiation response, expression of PD-L1, PD1, TILs). Cosmesis and QoL assessment will be performed at scheduled 1, 6, 12, 24 months follow-up. Eligibility criteria: Women, 50 or older, clinical stage T1 unifocal, N0, ER/PR+/HER2 negative, ECOG 0-1, able to undergo MRI with contrast are eligible. Specific Aims: Aim 1. To identify the recommended phase II dose of preoperative SABER; Aims 2.a) to determine the safety, tolerability, Dose Limiting Toxicity (DLT) and toxicity profile of delivering SABER; b) to determine the rate of complete pathological response after preoperative SABER; c) To assess cosmetic results (by MD and patient's assessment) and QoL after SABER and standard partial mastectomy/axillary surgery. Exploratory aims: a) to determine biomarkers in blood and tissue, and multiparametric MRI radiographic changes and associate them with toxicity and radiation tumor response; b) to assess locoregional recurrence, disease-free survival, and overall survival; c) to assess sentinel lymph node biopsy identification rates after SABER. Statistical Methods: In this novel phase I study, escalation to the next higher dose level will occur only if 0 or only 1 out of 6 patients has DLT. Present accrual and target accrual: A total of 12 to 18 evaluable patients will be enrolled. Expected enrollment period is 3 years and time to complete the study is about 5 years. Open for accrual in 06/2020. Clinical trial information:NCT04360330 Citation Format: Cristiane Takita, Isildinha M. Reis, Radka Stoyanova, John C. Ford, Brian Marples, Jose Net, Monica Yepes, Carmen Gomez, Susan Kesmodel. Phase I study to evaluate the safety and feasibility of preoperative ablative radiotherapy (SABER) for selected early stage breast cancer [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the 2020 San Antonio Breast Cancer Virtual Symposium; 2020 Dec 8-11; San Antonio, TX. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2021;81(4 Suppl):Abstract nr OT-19-01.


In this brief, a linear-matrix inequality (LMI) based strictly-positive-real (SPR) characterization and its application to absolute stability problem for discrete-time descriptor systems is addressed. After giving the definition of SPR, the Cayley transformation is used to establish formulas bridging the admissible descriptor form realizations for SPR and strictly-bounded-real transfer matrices. Based on these, an LMI-based necessary and sufficient condition for a descriptor system to be, simultaneously, admissible and SPR is derived. The obtained result is further applied to the absolute stability problem involving a linear time-invariant descriptor system and a memoryless time-varying nonlinearity. Numerical tractability of the results are illustrated by two examples.


"Technological innovations in Artificial Intelligence have reached a state where human-like robotics are endowed with rich personality and cognitive intelligence, able to engage emotionally and deeply with people. This progress in developing humanoids opens the way for a robot to obtain not just human, but superhuman attributes, such as omniscience and omnipotence, autonomy and self-awareness, freedom and interpersonality. On the other hand, this futurist situation could be considered as a possible threat to Christian anthropology, since it reaches a creation having the likeness of humanity that seem to retain a sense of personhood. This paper attempts to confront these challenges facing Christian theology today through first, revisiting Christian anthropology and the Patristic views on personhood, which look at a human being as an unfathomable mystery. Second, it presents the implications of this theology upon the arguments that consider humanoids as persons, showing that this postmodern issue is not just a crisis in anthropology, but also has its roots in a crisis in knowledge. Finally, this paper affirms that Christians are called to embrace science and technological progress. This can be done when rationalism is led by the intellect, the spiritual cognitive center of humankind. In doing so, humankind reaches epignosis, the correct or divine knowledge, the gift of true perception, or right discernment, which surpasses all rational human knowledge and algorithms, and directs all technological powers to God's glory.

Keywords: Orthodox Church, Patristics, Artificial Intelligence, Humanoids, Personhood, Christian Anthropology, Divine Knowledge"


The world is currently experiencing a trend of power shifting from east to west. The raging epidemic and the continuous development of deglobalization have made the world more uncertain. The world's original governance rules are not enough to solve real problems, and China urgently needs to improve its global governance capability.


This contribution deals with the issues of production and logistics performance of Czech and Slovak companies. The goal of the research was to analyze logistic processes, methods of industrial engineering, methods and evaluation of manufacturing, software tools utilized for measurement and management of performance, which are currently applied in manufacturing companies in the Czech and Slovak Republic. This analysis was done with the utilization of qualitative research conducted in 80 selected manufacturing companies in 2009. The results are compared in the continuity with the conclusions from previous researches on manufacturing and logistic factors of the competitiveness of Czech industrial manufacturers carried out during the period 2000-2001 in the framework of the research project of the Faculty of Economics and Management completed in 2004.


The intestinal epithelium is faced with the complex task of providing a barrier while also allowing nutrient and water absorption. The frequency with which these processes are disrupted in disease can be taken as evidence of their importance. It is therefore of interest to define the mechanisms of altered intestinal barrier and transport function and develop means to correct disease-associated defects. Over the past 10 years, some of the molecular events underlying physiological epithelial barrier regulation have been described. Remarkably, recent advances have shown that activation of the same mechanisms is central to barrier dysfunction in both in vitro and in vivo models of disease. Although the contribution of barrier dysfunction to pathogenesis of chronic disease remains incompletely understood, it is now clear that cytoskeletal regulation of barrier function is both an important pathogenic process and that targeted inhibition of myosin light chain kinase, which affects this cytoskeleton-dependent tight junction dysfunction, is an attractive candidate for therapeutic intervention.


Outcomes of HER2-positive breast cancer have improved significantly with use of targeted therapies. Survival in both early (EBC) and metastatic breast cancer (MBC) has improved along with gains in quality of life. With increasing costs of cancer care, it became imperative that health systems evaluate cost-effectiveness and value provided by new therapies. Methods: We conducted a review of 9value9 utilizing the ASCO 2015, ASCO 2016 (revised) and ESMO framework for all currently available HER2 targeted therapies. We performed a systematic review of cost-effectiveness analyses (CEAs) of these therapies across the neoadjuvant, adjuvant, and metastatic disease settings. We included economic evaluations from published literature and government agencies involved in drug-approval assessments from NICE (UK), pCODR (Canada), and PBAC (Australia). Results: 22 studies evaluating 1-year of trastuzumab (H) in EBC were identified. Of these, 17 found the regimen cost-effective (CE). Three of 22 plus an additional 1 evaluated 9 weeks H, all of which found it CE. NICE and PBAC determined adjuvant H to be CE, consistent with clinical benefit (Table 1). There are currently no academic CEAs of neoadjuvant pertuzumab (P). It has been evaluated in drug-approval processes by NICE and pCODR, both finding cost-effectiveness highly uncertain. In MBC, 6 studies evaluating H for first line were identified. The combination with chemotherapy was CE in 3 of 4 studies, whereas monotherapy and combination with anastrazole were not. A total of 9 studies evaluating lapatinib for MBC were identified. While it was CE combined with capecitabine for second line, in all other combinations it was not. Two studies evaluating P for MBC did not find the regimen CE, despite significant clinical benefit. However, PBAC considers the regimen CE and pCODR recommended funding based on net clinical benefit, whereas NICE did not. No academic CEAs of trastuzumab emtansine (T-DM1) in the literature were identified however cost-effectiveness in second line has been evaluated by pCODR, NICE and PBAC. All groups found it not CE, even with very high clinical benefit (Table 1). Conclusion: While there is consistent value provided by Her2 targeted therapies, there is generally lack of support for these in MBC based on cost-effectiveness analysis. We need to work towards a model that integrates value, clinical benefit and cost to implement new therapies in cancer, including HER2 positive breast cancer. Citation Format: Nixon NA, Hannouf M, Verma S. Value-based approach to treatment of HER2-positive breast cancer: Examining the evidence [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the 2016 San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium; 2016 Dec 6-10; San Antonio, TX. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2017;77(4 Suppl):Abstract nr P3-12-01.


One must take country-specific institutional features into account when analyzing former communist countries' transformation process to new political institutions. We do so for postcommunist Albania, where the political influence of clans that has existed for centuries continues to be prominent, even today. By studying the consequences of clans on the regional and political polarization through estimated vote function, we incorporate both formal and informal institutions. The results show major differences across regions in response to government policies. A proper evaluation of democratization in Albania thus requires looking beyond elections per se and taking this clan-based polarization into account.


The sedimentary and volcanic formations of the Aillik series in the Makkovik Bay area of the Labrador coast are about 25 000 ft (~7620 m) in thickness. They have been folded into a series of northerly-trending folds and are intruded by gabbro, diorite, syenite, and abundant granite. Potassium–argon age determinations range from 1730 to 1830 million years for two gneisses, and from 1500 to 1600 million years for the metamorphosed sedimentary and volcanic rocks and intrusive granite-gneiss and granite. The structural features of the area indicate a single cycle of orogenic deformation for the sedimentary and volcanic rocks, in which the emplacement of synkinematic granite gneiss as domes and other bodies played an important role. One of the gneisses is considered a part of the migmatized Archean basement on which the Aillik series was laid down, and was subsequently involved in the Hudsonian orogenic cycle about 1600 million years ago. The area lies to the northwest of the Grenville Front, and has been intr...


Highly accelerated life testing (HALT) was performed on embedded planar capacitors by subjecting these devices to elevated temperature and voltage aging conditions. The dielectric material of these capacitors was a nanocomposite of epoxy and BaTiO3. The objective of HALT was to model the time-to-failure as a function of temperature and voltage using the Prokopowicz model. This involved computing the constants of the Prokopowicz model, voltage exponent (n), and activation energy (Ea) for a nanocomposite of epoxy and BaTiO3. The results of HALT can be used for the qualification of embedded planar capacitors and for further improvement in the material and the manufacturing processes of these capacitors.


In this paper we consider the plane elliptic motion which occurs if the moving centrode is a circle of radius $r$ and the fixed centrode a circle of radius $2r$. Every point of the moving plane generates an ellipse in the fixed plane. Let a disk of radius $R$, $0 \le R < \infty$, concentric to the moving centrode be attached to the moving plane. If a point $P$ is chosen at random from this disk, then the area and the perimeter of the ellipse generated by $P$ are random variables. We determine the moments and the distributions of these random variables for the case that $P$ is uniformly distributed over the area of the disk.


The testing and performance of a prototype modem developed at NASA Lewis Research Center for high-speed free-space direct detection optical communications is described. The testing was performed under laboratory conditions using computer control with specially developed test equipment that simulates free-space link conditions. The modem employs quaternary pulse position modulation at 325 Megabits per second (Mbps) on two optical channels, which are multiplexed to transmit a single 650 Mbps data stream. The measured results indicate that the receiver's automatic gain control (AGC), phased-locked-loop slot clock recovery, digital symbol clock recovery, matched filtering, and maximum likelihood data recovery circuits were found to have only 1.5 dB combined implementation loss during bit-error-rate (BER) performance measurements. Pseudo random bit sequences and real-time high quality video sources were used to supply 650 Mbps and 325 Mbps data streams to the modem. Additional testing revealed that Doppler frequency shifting can be easily tracked by the receiver, that simulated pointing errors are readily compensated for by the AGC circuits, and that channel timing skew affects the BER performance in an expected manner. Overall, the needed technologies for a high-speed laser communications modem were demonstrated.


Introduction: The oral cavity has been proposed as a reservoir for Helicobacter, pylori(H. pylori) that could be responsible for the refractoriness of gastric infection to triple therapy. The data on the role of dental plaque in the transmission of Helicobacter pylori have varied. Furthermore, there has been few reports on the relationship between dental plaque control and H. pylori infection of gastric mucosa. This study evaluated the efficiency of periodontal treatment as a supplement of triple therapy vs. triple therapy alone, in gastric H. pylori eradication. Methods: In this single blind, randomized clinical trial , fifty patients were selected randomly into two intervention and control groups , each group contained 25 patients. The Urea Breath Test(UBT) was conducted on total subjects in a period of 8-12 months after triple therapy for both groups and periodontal treatment for intervention group. Poisson regression model and IRR was used in order to find a significant relationship between the two groups. Results: Our results indicated that 80 % of those treated with the combined therapy exhibited successful eradication of gastric H. pylori, compared with 56 % who underwent only triple therapy; however; there was not a significant difference between the two groups(P value=0.167) Conclusion: The adjunction of periodontal treatment to eradication therapy appeared not to reduce gastric H. pylori recurrence compared with eradication therapy alone among patients with gastric diseases associated with H. pylori. It seemed, there was not enough evidence in this field ,Therefore, there is a need for to further clinical trials .


Valid screening and diagnostic algorithms are needed to achieve 2030 targets proposed by the WHO's Global Diabetes Compact. We explored anthropometric thresholds to optimally screen and refer individuals for diabetes testing in rural South Africa. We evaluated screening thresholds for waist circumference (WC), body mass index (BMI), and waist-hip ratio (WHR) to detect dysglycemia based on a glycated hemoglobin (HbA1C) ≥6.5% among adults in a population-based study in South Africa using weighted, non-parametric ROC regression analyses. We then assessed the diagnostic validity of traditional obesity thresholds, explored optimal thresholds for this population, and fit models stratified by sex, age, and HIV status. The prevalence of dysglycemia in the total study population (n = 17,846) was 7.7%. WC had greater discriminatory capacity than WHR to detect dysglycemia in men (p-value<0.001) and women (p<0.001). WC had greater discriminatory capacity than BMI to detect dysglycemia in women (p<0.001). However, BMI and WC performed similarly for men (p = 0.589). Whereas traditional WC thresholds for women (>81cm) performed well (sensitivity 91%, positive predictive value [PPV] 14.9%), substantially lower thresholds were needed to achieve acceptable sensitivity and PPV among men (traditional >94cm, derived >79.5cm). WC outperforms BMI as an anthropometric screening measure for dysglycemia in rural South Africa. Whereas WC guideline thresholds are appropriate for women, male-derived WC cutoffs performed better at lower thresholds. In this rural South African population, thresholds that maximize specificity and PPV for efficient resource allocation may be preferred.


It has been reported that when irradiated with laser light non-resonant with the main absorption peaks, porphyrin molecules (4-[10,15,20-tris(4-sulfophenyl)-21,24-dihydroporphyrin-5-yl]benzenesulfonic acid, TPPS) in an aqueous solution become 10,000 to 100,000 times more efficient in light-induced molecular aggregation than expected from the ratio of gradient force potential to the thermal energy of molecules at room temperature. To determine the mechanism of this phenomenon, experiments on the light-induced aggregation of TPPS in alcohol solutions (methanol, ethanol, and butanol) were performed. In these alcohol solutions, the absorbance change was orders of magnitude smaller than in the aqueous solution. Furthermore, it was found that the absorbance change in the aqueous solution tended to be saturated with the increase of the irradiation intensity, but in the ethanol solution, the absorbance change increased linearly. These results can be qualitatively explained by the model in which intermolecular light-induced interactions between molecules within a close distance among randomly distributed molecules in the laser irradiation volume are highly relevant to the signal intensity. However, conventional dipole–dipole interactions, such as the Keesom interaction, are not quantitatively consistent with the results.


Mixed ionic‐electronic conducting (MIEC) membranes have gained growing interest recently for various promising environmental and energy applications, such as H2 and O2 production, CO2 reduction, O2 and H2 separation, CO2 separation, membrane reactors for production of chemicals, cathode development for solid oxide fuel cells, solar‐driven evaporation and energy‐saving regeneration as well as electrolyzer cells for power‐to‐X technologies. The purpose of this roadmap, written by international specialists in their fields, is to present a snapshot of the state‐of‐the‐art, and provide opinions on the future challenges and opportunities in this complex multidisciplinary research field. As the fundamentals of using MIEC membranes for various applications become increasingly challenging tasks, particularly in view of the growing interdisciplinary nature of this field, a better understanding of the underlying physical and chemical processes is also crucial to enable the career advancement of the next generation of researchers. As an integrated and combined article, it is hoped that this roadmap, covering all these aspects, will be informative to support further progress in academics as well as in the industry‐oriented research toward commercialization of MIEC membranes for different applications.


Analysis of the data yielded by the pulsed-field-gradient nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) experiment, which is used to measure self-diffusion coefficients of molecules, is problematic when the diffusion of the probe molecule is restricted by structural barriers. The solution of the diffusion equation for the particular arrangement of barriers and/or boundaries, in terms of the magnetization phase that is measured in the NMR experiment, is generally only achieved by judiciously employing approximations to simplify the solution. Many of these diffusion processes can, however, be simulated using tandem-walk methods. We present here a method in which the results of random-walk simulations of diffusion are used to train a feedforward neural network to predict the interpore-spacing and percentage porosity in cubic-packed spheres. We used stopped training and a resampling technique, which resulted in an ensemble of networks, in order to overcome the overfitting problems associated with limited training data, and to provide estimates of confidence levels for the evaluated parameters.


Observing cells and cell components in three dimensions at high magnification in transmission electron microscopy requires preparing serial ultrathin sections of the specimen. Although preparing serial ultrathin sections is considered to be very difficult, it is rather easy if the proper method is used. In this paper, we show a step-by-step procedure for safely obtaining serial ultrathin sections of microorganisms. The key points of this method are: 1) to use the large part of the specimen and adjust the specimen surface and knife edge so that they are parallel to each other; 2) to cut serial sections in groups and avoid difficulty in separating sections using a pair of hair strands when retrieving a group of serial sections onto the slit grids; 3) to use a 'Section-holding loop' and avoid mixing up the order of the section groups; 4) to use a 'Water-surface-raising loop' and make sure the sections are positioned on the apex of the water and that they touch the grid first, in order to place them in the desired position on the grids; 5) to use the support film on an aluminum rack and make it easier to recover the sections on the grids and to avoid wrinkling of the support film; and 6) to use a staining tube and avoid accidentally breaking the support films with tweezers. This new method enables obtaining serial ultrathin sections without difficulty. The method makes it possible to analyze cell structures of microorganisms at high resolution in 3D, which cannot be achieved by using the automatic tape-collecting ultramicrotome method and serial block-face or focused ion beam scanning electron microscopy.


Professor Chen-Ning Yang, an eminent contemporary physicist, was Professor at the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, New Jersey, from 1955 to 1966, and Albert Einstein Professor of Physics at the State University of New York at Stony Brook until his retirement in 1999. He has been Distinguished Professor-at-Large at the Chinese University of Hong Kong since 1986 and Professor at Tsinghua University, Beijing, since 1998. Since receiving his PhD from the University of Chicago in 1948, Prof Yang has made great impacts in both abstract theory and phenomenological analysis in modern physics. In 1983, he published "Selected Papers (1945 - 1980), With Commentary". It has been considered by Freeman Dyson as one of his favorite books. The present book is a sequel to that earlier volume. It is a collection of his personally selected papers supplemented by his insightful commentaries. Its contents reflect Professor Yang's changing interests after he reached age sixty. It also includes commentaries written by him in 2011 when he is 89 years old. The papers and commentaries in this unique collection comprise a remarkable personal and professional chronicle, shedding light on both the intellectual development of a great physicist and on the nature of scientific inquiry.


Background: Sepsis, or systemic inflammatory response to infection, is a major childhood disease and a common cause of death in children. Despite its importance, a global perspective on the epidemiology and mortality of pediatric sepsis across the world is still lacking. Methods: A non-systematic review of the medical articles published in Medline from 2005 to 2015. Results: Studies suggest that there has been a rise in the number of pediatric sepsis cases along the last two decades, which may relate to the increased survival of preterm and low birth-weight infants and children with severe chronic conditions. Children living in low-income countries represent a vulnerable population for sepsis. Despite several initiatives to improve the diagnosis and early treatment of pediatric sepsis, the mortality resulting from pediatric sepsis remains high, ranging from 5% to 40%. Poor outcomes, however, do not seem to be related to the limitation of resources but to the delay in the recognition and early treatment of sepsis. Conclusions: Educational efforts aiming to increase the awareness on sepsis by the general public and the adherence to the treatment guidelines by healthcare providers may result in significant improvements in sepsis survival. The global attention to pediatric sepsis, however, can only be achieved with the standardization of the definitions and the use of simple and sensitive diagnostic criteria that incorporate the differences in the necessities among different settings and the availability of local resources.


Ozone reacts readily with many indoor materials, as well as with compounds in indoor air. These reactions lead to lower indoor than outdoor ozone concentrations when outdoor air is the major contributor to indoor ozone. However, the products of indoor ozone reactions may be irritating or harmful to building occupants. While active technologies exist to reduce indoor ozone concentrations (i.e, in-duct filtration using activated carbon), they can be cost-prohibitive for some and/or infeasible for dwellings that do not have heating, ventilating, and air-conditioning systems. In this study, the potential for passive reduction of indoor ozone by two different clay-based interior surface coatings was explored. These coatings were exposed to occupied residential indoor environments and tested bimonthly in environmental chambers for quantification of ozone reaction probabilities and reaction product emission rates over a 6-month period. Results indicate that clay-based coatings may be effective as passive removal materials, with relatively low by-product emission rates that decay rapidly within 2 months.


We observed the effects of IKVAV self-assembling peptide nanofiber scaffold (SAPNS) on olfactory ensheathing cells (OECs). The IKVAV molecules were triggered to self-assemble to interconnected nanofibers hydrogel by adjusting pH of solution and adding of DMEM/F12 culture medium. Atomic Force Microscopy (AFM) showed that self-assembly hydrogel was consisted of the interconnected nanofibers, which varied from three nm to five nm in diameter and hundreds nanometer in length. The primary OECs were isolated from rat olfactory bulb and purified by differential adhesion twice. At days 12, the purity of OECs was 85% according to immunostaining of P75 NGFR antibody. OECs were cultured with IKVAV peptide. The adhesion, viability and proliferation of OECs were observed with inverted microscope, Calcein-AM/PI staining and Cell Counting Kit-8. OECs cultured on IKVAV SAPNS grew well and the viable cell count was 95%. IKVAV SAPNS can promote the adhesion of OECs and did no hinder the proliferation of OECs. IKVAV SAPNS nanofiber gel has good biocompatibility and bioactivity for OECs. It can serve as a good nerve tissue engineering scaffold.


The majority of cartels that were discovered by the European Commission (EC) over the last 30 years involved firms that engaged in collusion in more than one market. I investigate the impacts of the EC's cartel enforcement on the hazards that firms join and leave cartels in multiple markets. I estimate discrete-time recurrent event hazard models for a set of 126 multi-market colluders that were prosecuted between 1985 and 2014. EC investigations in a market decrease the rate at which the cartel members join new cartels and increases the rate at which they leave cartels in other markets. My results shed light on enforcement efforts against cartels and other forms of organized crime .


The accurate calculation of the unit generation rates and composition of medical waste generated from medical facilities is necessary in order to design medical waste treatment systems. In this work, the unit medical waste generation rates of 95 public and private medical facilities in the Attica region were calculated based on daily weight records from a central medical waste incineration facility. The calculated medical waste generation rates (in kg bed-1 day -1) varied widely with average values at 0.27 ± 113% and 0.24 ± 121%, for public and private medical facilities, respectively. The hazardous medical waste generation was measured, at the source, in the 40 bed hospital of the island of Ikaria for a period of 42 days during a 6 month period. The average hazardous medical waste generation rate was 1.204 kg occupied bed-1 day-1 or 0.33 kg (official) bed -1 day-1. From the above amounts, 54% resulted from the patients' room (solid and liquid wastes combined), 24% from the emergency department (solid waste), 17% from the clinical pathology lab and 6% from the X-ray lab. In average, 17% of the total hazardous medical waste was solely infectious. Conclusively, no correlation among the number of beds and the unit medical waste generation rate could be established. Each hospital should be studied separately, since medical waste generation and composition depends on the number and type of departments/laboratories at each hospital, number of external patients and number of occupied beds.


Abstract In this paper, we introduce a method for survival analysis on data streams. Survival analysis (also known as event history analysis) is an established statistical method for the study of temporal "events" or, more specifically, questions regarding the temporal distribution of the occurrence of events and their dependence on covariates of the data sources. To make this method applicable in the setting of data streams, we propose an adaptive variant of a model that is closely related to the well-known Cox proportional hazard model. Adopting a sliding window approach, our method continuously updates its parameters based on the event data in the current time window. As a proof of concept, we present two case studies in which our method is used for different types of spatio-temporal data analysis, namely, the analysis of earthquake data and Twitter data. In an attempt to explain the frequency of events by the spatial location of the data source, both studies use the location as covariates of the sources.


This study aims to analyze the effectiveness implementation of branch network (outlet) development policies at PT. Bank Negara Indonesia (Persero) Tbk. The analysis techniques using the  McKinsey 7'S model framework approach. The result shows that there are several factors that affecting strategy implementation these are strategy, organizational structure, system and procedure, skill and staff, leadership styles and organizational culture. Strategic implementation are formulated based on Corporate Plan, organizational structure is designed refers to the functions of organization, systems and procedures company has standarized and systematic, leadership style has a high commitment by providing direction, motivation and ability to adapt changing environment conditions and decision making processes involving subordinates and become a good role models, HR Planning and development refers to Human Capital Architecture, standardization capability in order to improve competencies of employees and internalization of corporate culture to achieve company vision. Based on the analysis in this study found some obstacles in strategy implementation : (1) lack of optimal outlet performance in achieving the target; (2) bureaucratic and weak coordination among units; (3) lack of compliance with company's system and procedures; (4) leadership style of top management; (5) resistance to performance appraisal system;(6) effectiveness training program and performance outcomes (7) consistency of corporate culture in units level.

Key Words : Strategy Implementation, Model 7's McKinsey, Bank Network


Empirical relations describing the reactivity of reagents in radical addition reactions and the results of quantum-chemical calculations of the activation energy of these processes are considered. The experimental data obtained for the addition of atoms and radicals to molecules with multiple bonds are analysed in terms of the parabolic model. The following characteristics and factors are shown to affect the activation energy of radical addition: the reaction enthalpy, the strength of the arising bond, the radius of the atom having a free valence, the presence of a π bond adjacent to the reaction centre, the interaction of two polar groups, the multidipole interaction, the steric factor, the non-linearity of the reaction centre, and the force constants of the reacting bonds. The bibliography includes 85 references.


The present contribution discusses the latest ruling of the European Court of Justice in the case of Google, which may have deeper consequences for advertisers relying on AdWords service, as well as for providers of similar services around the globe. The Court ruling may turn out to be even more important for Web 2.0 service providers as it seems to have opened the possibility of applying for a legal protection under Article 14 of the Ecommerce Directive. European judges made it clear that sponsored links services are information society services and that they may fall under the sphere of application of hosting safe haven provided that their activities are of technical, automatic and passive nature understood as a lack of knowledge or control over the data stored. This statement is yet to be applied by French courts that will have to establish whether Google AdWords service is really neutral and hence deserves a special legal treatment.


We have evaluated the orientation dependence in chemical anisotropic etching of single-crystal silicon. Etch rates for a number of crystallographic orientations were measured for a wide range of etching conditions, including KOH concentrations of 30 to 50% and temperatures of 40 to 90°C. Though the etchants all consisted of the same components KOH and water, the orientation dependence varied considerably with change in etchant temperature and concentration. The resulting etch rate database allows numerical prediction of etch profiles of silicon, necessary for the process design of microstructures. Changing the KOH concentration yielded different etch profiles both analytically and experimentally.


The thesis argues that the colonial state in Fiji was founded upon ethno-cultural divisions, which continued in the post-colonial period with the establishment of indigenous chiefly political hegemony. By using a neo-Gramscian analytical framework based on the centrality of the role of ethnicity and culture in the study of colonial and post-colonial societies, the thesis develops three inter-related themes for the analysis of Fiji's political history: the role of colonial culture, the importance of ethno-cultural divisions, and the changing role of the military in hegemony, anti- hegemony and counter-hegemony. The thesis proposes a dynamic model of de- colonisation that conceptualises Fiji's post-colonial political history in terms of hegemonic cycles that sees indigenous chiefly hegemony subside into factionalisation of the indigenous polity, inter-ethnic alliances and coercive indigenous assertion. These cycles operate as a product of conflict between hegemonic, anti-hegemonic and counter-hegemonic forces. The study finds that the hegemonic cycles were interrupted by a failed indigenous coercive phase in 2000 which led to military counter-hegemony and the ouster of the indigenous political order in 2006. The thesis notes that the re-alignment of indigenous political forces, following the latest military intervention, had the potential to re-instate the hegemonic cycles. The neo-Gramscian model developed in the thesis has a projective element and can be used to analyse the role of ethnicity and culture in colonial and postcolonial hegemonies such as in the South Pacific region.


The effects of acid copper chromate (ACC) and hydrothermal treatments were determined relative to the hardness, decay resistance, and dimensional stability of poplar wood. Test specimens, prepared from poplar wood (Populus nigra L.), were first heat-treated under saturated steam in a digester and then impregnated with ACC solution and by a long-term (21 days) dipping technique to reach complete saturation. Impregnated specimens were exposed to white-rot fungus (Trametes versicolor) for 14 weeks, using the Kolle flask method. The weight loss and Brinell hardness were determined after impregnation, thermal treatment, and exposure to T. versicolor. The combination of thermal treatment and ACC preservative on the poplar wood showed improved hardness and decay resistance properties of wood, depending on the treatment time and temperature. The highest weight loss (37.78%) was observed for control specimens, and the lowest (3.03%) occurred in 1% ACC-treated specimens. The highest Brinell hardness on a tangential surface was observed in 1% ACC-treated specimens (6.45 kN), and the lowest was noted in the specimens heat-treated at 130 °C and 180 min (0.52 kN).


Reports on the measurement of the restricted dose mean LET with a cut-off energy Delta =500 eV (L500,D) a few centimetres outside the field edge of a clinical electron accelerator for 6-20 MeV electrons as a function of field size. The results indicate that the L500,D of the scattered radiation a few centimetres outside the field of view is not significantly increased. Despite the multiple scattering that takes place at these points it seems that most of the dose still originates from electrons in the MeV energy region and thus little differences occur in the restricted LET spectrum, as restricted LET is a slow function of electron energy at high energies (ICRU 1970). This result is in contrast with what has been found for 60Co, where a 50% increase in the L500,D has been measured outside the field edge (Makrigiorgos and Antonadou, 1987). Thus, in the case of clinical high-energy electrons scattered from the main beam, no increase in the relative biological effectiveness due to restricted LET differences is expected in the region a few centimetres outside the treatment area.


With sodium iodide in water and in methyl alcohol at 6.12 meters, the maximum power loss occurred when 7H20+NaI = 2.24 X 1O? and 'YMeOH+NaI = 1.19 X 109. Disregarding the capacity term as a second order effect and performing the indicated calculation it results that eH20/EMeOH = 1.9, the true ratio being 2.3. This, in view of the disturbing factors discussed above, may be considered a mildly successful corroboration. Summary.-An expression is presented connecting power loss in a liquid dielectric with its conductivity, dielectric constant, and the frequency of the field to which it is subjected. This has been tested and verified over a considerable range of frequencies and conductivities. Its application to physiological behavior in high frequency fields is suggested. lJ. W. Schereschewskd, U. S. Pub. Health Repts., 41, 1939 (1926); Ibid., 43, 927 (1928). 2 R. V. Christie and A. L. Loomis, J. Exp. Med., 49, 303 (1929). 3 Helen R. Hosmer, Science, 68, 325 (1928). 4 Kahler, Chalkley and Vaegtlin, U. S. Pub. Health Repts., 44, 339 (1929). cG. W. Pierce, private communication. 6 E. g., Die Theorien der Radiologie, VI, p. 647. 7 R. W. Wood and A. L. Loomis, Phil. Mag., vii, 4, 417 (1927).


A bone marrow transplant recipient with disseminated trichosporonosis was successfully treated with voriconazole. Quantitative PCR assay results for Trichosporon asahii DNA in the sera were well correlated with the patient's clinical course. Based on the in vitro susceptibility test, the organism was susceptible to voriconazole.


A 54-year-old woman on peritoneal dialysis (PD) was hospitalized with peritonitis with a high body temperature, abdominal pain and cloudy peritoneal fluid. She progressively fell into septic-like shock within only 6 hours after onset. The causative bacteria were Streptococcus mitis (S. mitis), part of the normal flora of oral cavity, intestine, female genial tract and upper respiratory tract. S. mitis shows pathogenicity for diseases such as endocarditis, brain abscesses and sepsis in children with malignancy or transplantation. However, S. mitis rarely shows severe pathogenic responses in adults. We report herein a case of fulminant peritonitis caused by S. mitis in an adult PD patient.


The erythrocyte deformability of 28 patients with anemia was evaluated with the laser-assisted optical rotational cell analyzer (LORCA), an image analyzer that converts into numerical form the degree of refraction of a laser beam induced by red cells subjected to a range of torsional stresses. The patients were 10 thalassemics, including three with intermediate forms (1 HbC/beta degree, 1 homozygote beta for Orkin's haplotype VI, 1 beta degree/beta delta Sicilian type) and seven heteroygotes for beta Th; six with hereditary spherocytosis (including 2 with structural alteration of the spectrin beta chain); three with type II congenital dyserythropoietic anemia (HEMPAS), two hemizygotes and one heterozygote for G-6PD deficiency, and six with severe hypochromic hyposideremic anemia. Red cell deformability was reduced in intermediate thalassemia, hereditary spherocytosis and HEMPAS, normal in heterozygous beta thalassemia and G-6PD deficiency, and increased in hypochromic hyposideremic anemia. These results show that erythrocyte deformability can be impaired by an Hb chain imbalance, membrane and cyto skeleton structure anomalies and changes in the red cell area/volume ratio.


The effect of layer deposition temperature on the structure of a series of nominally Si:Co(200A)-Cr(lOA)-Co(212A) trilayers, grown by UHV evaporation has been investigated by grazing incidence X-ray scattering and the Magneto-optical Kerr effect. As more layers were grown at elevated temperature, a loss of Keissig fringe amplitude was seen in the specular reflectivity. Interference fringes in the off-specular 8-20 scans indicated the presence of substantial conformality in the roughness through the system. This, and the level of interdiffusion at the buried interfaces, was quantified by fitting to simulations using computer code which included compositional variation at interfaces when modelling the diffuse scatter. A short lateral correlation length and a low fi-actal parameter were deduced.


Skin hydration can be influenced to a great extent by occlusive compounds. Conventional highly occlusive compounds tend to have an unacceptable appearance. Therefore, the development of innovative occlusive topicals is an essential issue regarding the formulation of cosmetic and pharmaceutical preparations. Solid lipid nanoparticles (SLN) represent a novel carrier system for controlled release of topical cosmetic and pharmaceutical compounds. In addition to their controlled release characteristics, it has been found that SLN have an occlusive effect. The extent of the occlusive effect depends on various factors such as particle size, applied sample volume, lipid concentration, and crystallinity of the lipid matrix. These factors have been investigated in detail by an in vitro test, and the obtained data give insight into their importance.


Currently, iceberg risk mitigation at production facilities in shallower waters (80 to 120 m) on the Grand Banks off the coast of Newfoundland and Labrador is accomplished using iceberg surveillance, towing, water cannons and, in the case of floating facilities, disconnection. Future developments in deeper waters such as the Flemish Pass or the Orphan Basin may be able to utilize compliant mooring and riser systems to allow a floating facility to simply move out of the path of an approaching iceberg without disconnecting. The analysis described here shows that, using simple extrapolation of the observed iceberg trajectory, the risk mitigation provided by facility side-tracking is comparable to existing physical management techniques (iceberg towing and water cannons). Improved short-term iceberg drift forecasting would allow further risk mitigation.


Background and Objectives: Cervical cancer is very common type of cancer in women globally. The objective of this study was to compare the cytopathological findings of the cervical pap smears using the revised 2001 Bethesda system and to compare the cytopathological findings with the clinical features.Material and Methods: A total of 1016 pap smear sent to the Department of Cytopathology at Peoples Dental college general hospital (PDCH), Kathmandu over a period of three years were studied. Relevant history and clinical findings were retrieved for the study. The age, caste, location, gravida of the patient, the nature of complaint of patient to the doctor along with the per speculum findings, per vaginal examination findings of the patient and their relation to the cytopathological findings of pap smears were evaluated.Results: No significant relationship was observed between the (30-39 years) aged women and the available outcome of pap smear (p=0.404). Most of the females were Brahmin and Newars. The statistical analysis showed no significant relationship (p>0.05) between the ethnicity and pap smear result. The number of asymptomatic women in this study was found 22.9%. This study found 20.37% of intraepithelial lesion or malignancy. Trichomonas vaginalis and bacterial vaginosis combinely contributed to 0.7% of the total cases in this study. Three smear cases were detected having malignant epithelial cell which were diagnosed with adenocarcinoma, squamous cell carcinoma.Conclusion: In this study cervical pap smear was able to differentiate inflammatory, benign precursors and malignant cases. So, it is desirable to conduct routine Pap smear screening in women of all reproductive age regardless of race, ethnic background and socioeconomic status.Janaki Medical College Journal of Medical Sciences (2017) Vol. 5(2): 27-34


[1] The atmospheric CO 2 mixing ratio was measured using a continuous measurement system onboard a Gulfstream-II aircraft between the northern midlatitudes and the southern subtropics during the Biomass Burning and Lightning Experiment Phase A (BIBLE A) campaign in September-October 1998. The vertical distribution of CO 2 over tropical regions was almost constant from the surface to an altitude of 13 km. CO 2 enhancements from biomass burning and oceanic release were observed in the tropical boundary layer. Measurements in the upper troposphere indicate interhemispheric exchange was effectively suppressed between 2°N-7°N. Interhemispheric transport of air in the upper troposphere was suppressed effectively in this region. The CO 2 mixing ratios in the Northern and Southern Hemispheres were almost constant, with an average value of about 365 parts per million (ppm) and 366 ppm, respectively. The correlation between the CO 2 and NO y mixing ratios observed north of 7°N was apparently different from that obtained south of 2°N. This fact strongly supports the result that the north-south boundary in the upper troposphere during BIBLE A was located around 2°N-7°N as the boundary is not necessary a permanent feature.


In medical ultrasound the blood velocity distribution in a vessel can be found by emitting a pulsed field into the patient. The field is then scattered by the tissues and the red blood cells, and a single complex sample set is acquired at the depth of interest for each pulse emitted. The signals acquired for showing the blood velocity distribution are inherently non-stationary, due to the pulsatility of the flow. All current signal processing schemes assume that the signal is stationary within the window of analysis, although this is an approximation. In this paper a recursive least-squares lattice filter is used for finding a parametric model for the velocity distribution. A new set of complex coefficients is calculated for each point in time, and it is thus possible to track the non-stationary properties of the stochastic velocity signal. The dynamic characteristics of the non-stationarity are incorporated through an exponential decay factor, that sets the exponential horizon of the filter. A factor close to 1 gives a long horizon with low variance estimates, but can not track a highly non-stationary flow. Setting the factor is therefore a compromise between estimate variance and the filter's dynamic adaptation. Using a lattice filter gives a structure that is easy and robust, when implemented with fixed point arithmetic. The procedure has been tested on both simulated and in-vivo data, and gives spectral estimates quite different from the normal FFT approach. Synthetic data were generated based on the measured time evolution of the spatial mean velocity in the femoral artery. The smooth theoretical velocity distribution is then known and can be compared to the estimated distribution. Using 8 parameters a very smooth estimate of the velocity distribution is seen, more in line with the actual distributions that always will be smooth. Setting the exponential decay factor to 0.99 gives satisfactory results for in-vivo data from the carotid artery. The filter can easily be implemented using a standard fixed-point signal processing chip for real-time processing.


Oxygen tension measurements were made in three tumors: (i) the murine FSaII fibrosarcoma, (ii) the rat 9L gliosarcoma and (iii) the rat 13672 mammary adenocarcinoma using a pO2 histograph. Tumor oxygenation measurements were made while the animals breathed air or breathed carbogen (95% oxygen/5% carbon dioxide). Pentoxifylline or a perflubron emulsion was administered to the animals and tumor oxygen measurements were repeated under both breathing conditions. Both pentoxifylline and the perflubron emulsion improved the oxygenation of the FSaII fibrosarcoma under air breathing conditions but did not alter the oxygen profiles of either rat tumor compared with air breathing alone. Carbogen breathing increased the oxygenation of all tumors. Pentoxifylline administration did not change the oxygen profiles of the tumors under carbogen breathing conditions but administration of the perflubron emulsion increased the oxygenation of all three tumors under carbogen breathing conditions compared with carbogen breathing alone. Co-administration of pentoxifylline and the perflubron emulsion enhanced the radiation response of the Lewis lung tumor to daily fractionated radiation under air breathing conditions with a dose modifying factor of 1.65 and under carbogen breathing conditions with a dose modifying factor of 2.25. Over a range of perflubron emulsion doses, pentoxifylline increased the growth delay of the Lewis lung tumor in a constant manner. These results indicate that pentoxifylline and the perflubron emulsion have the largest impact on the oxygenation of more hypoxic tumors and that administration of the perflubron emulsion/carbogen breathing is the most effective means of increasing tumor oxygenation and radiation response.


When modelling tissue-level cardiac electrophysiology, a continuum approximation to the discrete cell-level equations, known as the bidomain equations, is often used to maintain computational tractability. The bidomain equations are derived from the discrete equations using a mathematical technique known as homogenisation. As part of this derivation conductivity tensors are specified for use in the continuum model. Analysing the derivation of the bidomain equations allows us to investigate how microstructure, in particular gap junctions that electrically connect cells, affect tissue-level conductivity properties and model solutions. We perform two distinct but related strands of investigation in this thesis. In the first, we consider the effect of including gap junctions on the results of both discrete and continuum simulations, and identify when the continuum model fails to be a good approximation to the discrete model. Secondly, we perform a comprehensive study into how cell-level microstructure properties, such as cell shape, impact the homogenised conductivities to be used in a tissue-level continuum model. This will allow us to predict how the onset of a disease or a change in cellular microstructure will affect the propagation of action potentials. To do this, we first derive a modified version of the bidomain equations that explicitly takes gap junctions into account. We then derive analytic solutions for the homogenised conductivity tensors on a simplified two-dimensional geometry and find that diseased gap junctions have a large impact on the results of homogenisation. On this same geometry we compare the results of discrete and continuum simulations and find a significant discrepancy between model conduction velocities when we introduce gap junctions with lower coupling strength, or when we consider elongated cells. From this, we conclude that the bidomain equations are less likely to give an accurate representation of the underlying discrete system when modelling diseased states whose symptoms include reduced gap junction coupling or an increase in myocyte length. We then use a more realistic two-dimensional geometry and numerically approximate the homogenised conductivity tensors on this geometry. We discover that the packing of cells has a substantial effect on conduction, with a brick-wall geometry particularly beneficial for fast propagation, and that gap junctions also have a large effect on conduction. Finally, we consider a three-dimensional cellular geometry and show that the effect of changing gap junction properties is different when compared to two dimensions, and discover that the anisotropy ratios of the tissue are highly sensitive to changes in gap junction parameters. Overall, we conclude that gap junctions and cell structure have a large effect on discrete and continuum model results, and on homogenised conductivity calculations in tissue-level cardiac electrophysiology.


Zinc Oxide nanostructured thin films were grown by a novel plasma assisted vapour deposition method, which aims to combine the versatility of deposition processes that are mediated by plasma with the capability to control particles diffusion and nucleation. For this purpose, the proposed approach spatially separates into two different vacuum chambers the creation of zinc oxide from a metalorganic precursor from the actual film growth, thanks to the extraction of a supersonic jet of plasma seeded by the precursor fragments. The characterization of the reactor in different plasma conditions has been carried out by means of optical emission spectroscopy (OES). ZnO films with different degrees of purity, thickness uniformity, as well as different morphologies can be obtained varying the deposition parameters. The samples profiles have been collected in order to evaluate deposition rates and films uniformity. The as-prepared as well as annealed thin films were characterized by attenuated total reflection Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (ATR-FTIR) to evaluate their chemical composition and purity. According to Raman analyses, the annealed samples are high-purity wurtzite-type crystalline zinc oxide films. Atomic force microscopy (AFM) and scanning electron microscopy (SEM) confirm a surface morphology characterized by columnar structures.


Tne effect of plant density on the growth of seedlings of Spiranthes sinensis Ames and Liparis nervosa Lindl. in symbiotic cultures with Rhizoctonia isolates, effective for these orchids, was investigated using an oat medium containing the decoction of 25 g/l oat grains and loo agar. In high plant densitis, the weigth of individual seedlings increased in proportion to the quantity of medium per plant, but the rate of fresh weight increase was lowered with a decrease in plant density. The point where maximum fresh weight per individual seedling was obtained, i. e. the threshold where the density effect disappeared, was at a very low plant density : 60 ml/plant for S. sinensis and 30 ml/ plant for L. nervosa. The dry weight of mycelia per culturing flask also increased wich a decrease of plant density. It is considered that the effect of plant density on the growth of seedlings is, with respect to the oat medium, mainly dependent on the amounts of nutrients in the medium. Competition among aerial parts did not take part in the effect.


The study was carried out to evaluate antitussive activity of the aqueous and ethanolic extracts from leaves of Chrysophyllum welwitschii (CHRYSOW) in laboratory animals. The present study was designed to observe pharmacological activities of the leaves extract of the plant Chrysophyllum welwitschii. Antitussive activity was performed by ammonia liquor-induced cough reflex rats. Analgesic and antipyretic activities were evaluated by the dose of 250 and 500 mg/kg body weight. The aqueous and ethanolic extracts of CHRYSOW (500 mg/kg) exhibited significant antitussive activity i.e. 77.82% and 65.21% respectively, but lower dose (250 mg/kg) of these showed less activity i.e. 31.70% and 22.80% respectively, inhibition in ammonia liquor induced cough (P < 0.05). The standard antitussive drug dextromethorphan (20 mg/kg) showed maximum inhibition of cough by 94.11%. It was found that both extracts of Chrysophyllum welwitschii showed antitussive activity and obtained percentage inhibition of cough reflex is approximately comparable as standard drug.


Summary form only given. Built upon new data organization and access characteristics, MEMS-based storage devices have come under consideration as an alternative to disks for large data-intensive applications. While not already in commercial production, MEMS-based storage devices have outperformed disks in device-level simulations. Processor-embedded distributed disks improved performance of workloads by offloading application-level processing to the storage. To exploit the potential benefits offered by these emerging storage technologies and offloading models, we propose a processor-embedded distributed MEMS-based storage architecture, and evaluate the proposed architecture with representative database and data mining workloads. Our results show that MEMS-based storage improved the overall performance of these workloads over disk-based systems, and transformed the characteristics of several workloads, impacting the design points for future storage architectures.


The performance of flash analog-to-digital converters is affected significantly by the choice of thermometer-to-binary decoder topology. In this work two different promising decoder topologies, multiplexer-based and ones-counter, are evaluated. Two converters with different decoders, but otherwise similar, are therefore designed. Two test chips are also sent for manufacturing in a 130 nm silicon-on-insulator CMOS technology. The converter performance is evaluated by simulations using foundry provided models. The results show that both decoders can be used in high-speed converters, but the ones-counter decoder is more robust and yield a higher converter efficiency.


Background

Delirium is an important independent predictor of negative clinical outcomes in intensive care unit (ICU) patients. The purpose of this study was to investigate the territorial incidence of ICU delirium, its related risk factors, and short-term outcomes in Shandong Province, China, to provide precise information for territorial patient management.
Methods

A multicenter prospective observational study was conducted. Patients with delirium were defined as any patient with at least one positive CAM-ICU or ICDSC assessment. Demographics, admission clinical data, daily interventions provided to patients and environmental factors were collected.
Results

From May 1, 2018 to Jan 31, 2020, 536 noncomatose patients were ultimately eligible for the study. One hundred eighteen patients (22%) experienced delirium at least once. In the univariate analysis, age (p = 0.009), SOFA score (p = 0.006), a history of cerebrovascular disease (p = 0.044) and impaired renal function (p = 0.003) were risk factors for delirium. Most therapeutic interventions were linked to delirium in the univariate analysis, including enteral nutrition (p = 0.000), artificial airway (p = 0.021), nasogastric tube (p = 0.001), use of restraint straps (p = 0.000), and use of sedative medications, including midazolam (p = 0.003), propofol (p = 0.032) and butorphanol (p = 0.028). Among the patient's vital signs and laboratory examinations performed on the day of assessment, body temperature, BUN levels and CRP levels were risk factors for delirium. Midazolam use, chronic renal insufficiency, physical restraints, nosogastric tube, enteral nutrition, and CRP and BUN levels were factors associated with an increased risk of delirium in the multivariate analysis. The durations of mechanical ventilation and ICU stay in patients with delirium was significantly higher than those in patients without delirium [8 (IQR: 4–14) vs 5 (IQR: 3–10) and 9 (IQR: 4–17) vs 6 (IQR: 4–12), p < 0.05].
Conclusions

Delirium was associated with prolonged mechanical ventilation and a prolonged ICU stay. Based on the findings from this study, we should not only reduce the use of sedatives and analgesics but also minimize invasive operations, including the placement of nasogastric tubes, to recover eternal nutrition for ICU patients and avoid physical restraints as much as possible to prevent delirium.
Trial registration:

This study was registered in the Chinese Clinical Trial Registry (ChiCTR1900021360).


BACKGROUND
This study investigates the influence of overweight and obesity on outcome from vehicular trauma.

METHODS
All Crash Injury Research and Engineering Network patients older than 16 years involved in frontal and lateral crashes between 2000 and 2005 in vehicles with front airbags were included (n = 1,615). Obese, overweight, and normal-weight patients were compared in relation to injury severity score (ISS) and mortality using the Bonferroni method for multiple comparisons and the chi test. Control variables included patient factors (gender, age, and height) and crash factors (curb weight, change in velocity [DeltaV], principal direction of force, and restraint use). Multivariate analysis was performed for both ISS and mortality using linear and logistic regression, respectively. An alpha value of 0.05 was used for all statistics.

RESULTS
Univariate analysis showed no difference in ISSs between groups based on body mass index. Mortality was higher for obese and overweight than for normal-weight patients (20.5%, 16.2%, and 9.4%, respectively). Multiple linear regression revealed a positive association of ISS with overweight (parameter estimate 2.44, p = 0.009) but not with obese patients. Crash factor adjusted odds of dying were 2.08 (CI 1.43-3.04) for overweight and 3.17 (CI 2.14-4.72) for obese patients. Injury-severity-adjusted odds of dying were 1.87 (CI 1.17-3.01) for overweight and 3.89 (CI 2.38-6.45) for obese patients.

CONCLUSION
After adjusting for age, gender, and crash factors, overweight patients (but not obese patients) experienced more severe injuries. Obese and overweight patients experience higher unadjusted and adjusted mortality rates.


Superplastic deformation behavior and texture evolution after equal channel angular pressing (ECAP) of Zn-0.3Wt%Al alloy were investigated in this study. ECAP was conducted at temperatures from to on the plate type specimens of 5 mm thickness and 20 mm width. The specimens obtained by ECAP showed typical texture with basal poles tilted away from the ND toward ED, which is called shear texture. Tensile tests were carried out at for ECAPed specimens under the strain rate of 0.0002/s. After ECAP of the Zn-0.3Wt%Al alloy, elongation was dramatically increased up to 500% at . The effect of ECAP on the anisotropy in the superplastic deformation behavior was negligible.


An international independent review was conducted on the above article by             the editor following a complaint. The expert reviewers agreed that the interpretation             of the results was not correct. The article is retracted as the results were not             adequately proven. [the original article was published in the International Journal             of Oncology 41: 285-291, 2012 DOI: 10.3892/ijo.2012.1430].


This paper has critically documented a vast literature addressing the multi-layered outcomes associated with participating in global value chains (GVCs). In particular, this paper reviews and synthesizes the definitions and quantitative measures of one particular dimension of the GVC analysis that is two-fold: the economic and social upgrading. More specifically, we discuss the economic perspective of upgrading, which is usually associated with "moving into higher value-added stages", and it is commonly assumed to be followed by positive spillovers regarding technology and productivity. This paper emphasizes the important diversity of definitions and measures within the GVC literature, considering it as a reflection, to a certain extent, of the absence of a systematic theoretical apparatus in the GVC literature. The paper concludes with some considerations on the role of policymakers in promoting social upgrading as an important topic in the GVC research agenda.


This article aims to know in real student's understanding of Law No. 5 of year 2018 on combating criminal acts of terrorism. The data collection techniques used in this study use interviews, observations and documentation. Meanwhile the analysis used in this research is a qualitative descriptive. Simultaneous, planned and integrated aspects of prevention need to forward to minimize the occurrence of criminal acts of terrorism. The optimal prevention is done by involving ministries or related institutions as well as all components of the nation through the efforts of national preparedness, counter radicalisation, and deradicalisation coordinated by the National Management Agency Terrorism. To optimize the eradication of criminal acts of terrorism, it is necessary to strengthen institutional functions, especially the coordination functions held with the National Agency for Terrorism counter following its oversight mechanisms. While it relates to the eradication of criminal acts of terrorism in Indonesia is not merely a matter of law and law enforcement but it is also a social, cultural, economic problem closely related to the issue of national resilience So that policies and precautions and pemberantasannyapun are aimed at maintaining balance in the obligation to protect the sovereignty of the State, the rights of victims and witnesses, and the rights of suspects/defendants.


This chapter presents findings from research which we conducted with participants who were current and former art college students, practitioners in different areas of creative arts and design, and therefore workers in a relatively newly named part of the economy, the 'creative industries'. Originally identified by New Labour as a significantly successful new sector, they have subsequently received considerable attention from policy-makers and also academic commentators, in the UK and elsewhere. The list of creative industries cited by New Labour (DCMS 2001) also corresponds closely to the subject areas and activities of many art college courses, indicating how these institutions function as a vocational training ground and entry point for the creative industries. In this chapter, we discuss special issues which our research raised in relation to creative working; the implications of our research findings for vocational learners themselves and for course providers, teachers and institutions; sources of advantage and disadvantage for learners, as indicated by our research, and some further implications for those aiming to assist and expand lifelong learning opportunities.


Since the early 1980s, Australian governments have embraced neoliberal policies as a means of improving the nation's global economic competitiveness. The impacts of such policies in regional areas have been quite profound, leading to socio-economic polarisation, population loss, and the growth of anti-globalisation sentiments. In this paper, we examine the process of regional restructuring that arises from this trajectory in Australia, and examine current policy responses to change under the neoliberal regime. We argue that while many such responses are individualistic, and based upon policies of personal responsibility, self-advancement and entrepreneurship, others are imbued with the language of community, social capital and collective action. The existence of individualism and community within the same policy agenda may appear contradictory, yet it is suggested that neoliberalism brings together these two opposing discourses through a process of what Nikolas Rose calls 'governing through community'. We explore how neoliberalism underpins community approaches to regional development in Australia, arguing that such strategies do little to counter the negative forces of globalisation in non-metropolitan parts of the country.


Recently, many iterative algorithms proposed for various applications such as compressed sensing, MIMO Detection, etc. have been unfolded and presented as deep networks; these networks are shown to produce better results than the algorithms in their iterative forms. However, deep networks are highly sensitive to the hyperparameters chosen. Especially for a deep unfolded network, using more layers may lead to redundancy and hence, excessive computation during deployment. In this work, we consider the problem of determining the optimal number of layers required for such unfolded architectures. We propose a method that treats the networks as experts and measures the relative importance of the expertise provided by layers using a variant of the popular Hedge algorithm. Based on the importance of the different layers, we determine the optimal layers required for deployment. We study the effectiveness of this method by applying it to two recent and popular deep-unfolding architectures, namely DetNet and TISTANet.


Ohmefentanyl {N-[1-2-hydroxy-2-phenylethyl]-3-methyl-4-piperidyl-N-phenylpropanamide, OMF} and mefentanyl {N-[1-(2-phenylethyl)-3-methyl-4-piperidyl]-N-phenylpropanamide, MF} are2 derivatives of fentanyl with more potent analgesic effect and also longer in duration than that of fentanyl. The inhibitory effects of OMF and MF at the dose of 2*ED(50) on minute ventilation and arterial blood PO2 were less than that of fentanyl. The inhibition of OMF and MF on the EEG recorded from FR and NmT brain areas of rabbits was similar to that of fentanyl. The delta-rhythm was increased but theta- and beta2-rhythms were decreased in EEG by OMF and MF.


TlCuCl3 is a quantum spin liquid of S = 1/ 2C u 2+ dimers. Interdimer superexchange interactions give a three-dimensional magnon dispersion and as pin gap significantly smaller than the dimer coupling, which is closed by an applied hydrostatic pressure of approximately 2.5 kbar or by a magnetic field of 5.6 T, offering a unique opportunity to explore both the pressure- and fieldinduced quantum phase transitions and their associated critical phenomena.


While long underestimated, more and more evidence confirms that mechanics play a critical role for brain function and dysfunction. Therefore, computational simulations based on the field equations of nonlinear continuum mechanics can provide important insights into the underlying mechanisms of brain injury and disease. Realistic numerical predictions, however, require models capable of capturing the complex and unique mechanical behavior of this ultrasoft, highly heterogeneous and adaptive tissue. In recent years, contradictory experimental results have retarded progress in this field. Here, we summarize the key characteristics of brain tissue behavior on different length and time scales and propose application‐specific modeling approaches, which are as complex as necessary but as simple as possible. The presented considerations will, on the one hand, facilitate well‐designed future experiments and, on the other hand, help to choose the appropriate constitutive law for a specific application.


The work presented involved testing of the compression strength of square specimens made from threelayer CLT. In one of the test set-ups a uniform compression over the complete square face of the specimen was used - similar to what is defined in the current European test standard for glued-laminated timber. In addition, several other test set-ups involving loading of only parts of the specimens' square surface by line loads was investigated. The use of line loads aimed at investigating the effect of load distribution within the test specimen, and also to investigate possible boundary effects when the line load is applied close to the specimen edge. In practical design, the line load used in the tests, would correspond to the load transfer from a wall structure clamping a CLT-slab. During testing, apart from registering the load and deformation by conventional gauges, a contact-free deformation measurement system was used. The results show that the compression strength – defined according to Eurocode 5 as the load at which a 1% permanent set is obtained – is indeed dependent on the relative size of the load application area, its orientation relative to the surface grain direction and its distance to the edge of the specimen. Other conclusions are that test methods, test evaluation methods as well as design criteria for compression perpendicular to grain in CLT should be revisited. (Less)


Purpose: To evaluate the eventual changes in the number and phagocytic functions of blood monocytes in breast cancer patients during surgical treatment and chemotherapy. Materials and methods: The absolute and relative number of peripheral blood leukocytes and monocyte phagocytic functions were determined at the time of diagnosis (I), following surgery (II), during (III) and after chemotherapy (IV) in 30 patients diagnosed with breast cancer. The control group consisted of 30 age-matched healthy women. Results: The mean number of monocytes was significantly lower in cancer patients at diagnosis, while they increased following surgery reaching the control values. There were no postchemotherapy changes in the number of monocytes. Monocyte phagocytic activity was decreased at the time of diagnosis. Following surgery, the capacity of phagocytosis (CP) recovered to normal values, but the index of phagocytosis (IP) remained decreased. During and after chemotherapy, as well as one year after surgery, the IP still remained decreased. Conclusion: Our results showed that some properties of monocytes' phagocytic activity in cancer patients were decreased at diagnosis, returning back to normal range after surgical therapy. However, time is needed to confirm whether the alteration of IP may provide additional information when monitoring breast cancer patients.