Genital herpes is one of 8 legally reportable sexually transmitted diseases (STD) in China. Using a HSV antigen ELISA kit we detected and typed HSV antigen in 1,148 clinical specimens collected from the genital organs (penis, cervix, vagina and vulva) of 446 men and 702 women in Qindao and divided into 11 different professional and 2 special groups (patients with cervical cancer and pregnant women). The highest positive rate of HSV antigen was found among long-distance transport drivers (48.0%). The second and third high positive rates were among waiters and waitresses in private, restaurants (39.2%) and patients with cervical cancer (38.2%). The positive rates among self-employed retailers and employees in private inns and restaurants were notably higher than those among employees in state-run shops, restaurants and hotels. And, the positive rate among workers was higher than that among peasants. There was no notable difference between the positive rate of HSV antigen among men (24.2%) and that among women (21.5%). But the incidence of HSV-2 infection was much higher than that of HSV-1 infection. The results indicate that some special professional groups have high rates of genital HSV infection. More attention needs to be paid to these special groups in order to control sexually transmitted herpes diseases.


Abstract : Objectives of this research are: (1) to critically evaluate the Kuo and Arakawa Schubert (A-S) cumulus parameterization schemes for numerical weather prediction; and (2) to improve these parameterization schemes to improve precipitation forecasts on the global scale. Major improvements to the Kuo scheme include prediction of cloud top height and incorporation of the effect of entrainment on cloud temperature and mixing ratio profiles. This enables the Kuo scheme to parameterize shallow to medium clouds as well as deep clouds. Tests of the Kuo scheme using a semi-prognostic approach and a cloud cluster model indicate that the improved version verifies better with observation during weaker convective periods. Experimental predictions were made and the results clearly demonstrated the ability of the AFGL model to predict large-scale stratiform precipitation. With incorporation of the modified Kuo scheme, the area of convective precipitation can also be well predicted. However, the predicted convective precipitation area is generally broader and the amount of rainfall smaller than observed which may be attributed to the resolution of the AFGL model in that it cannot resolve the narrow band of the cold front, ther major mesoscale rain-producing system. Implementation of the A-S scheme in the AFGL model also produced a reasonable distribution of convective precipitation but the precipitation area is more concentrated and sometimes is produced in an observed clear area. This result may be caused by the current implementation of the A-S scheme in the AFGL model, in which the cloud base is assumed to be 500 m above the ground surface.


The synthetic retinoids are a new class of drugs which are highly effective in the treatment of a broad spectrum of dermatologic disease. In this report 15 patients with chronic disorders of keratinization and one patient with severe cystic acne were treated with oral isotretinoin. The degree of clinical response and duration of post-treatment remission varied with the different disorders. Acute side effects were predominantly limited to the skin and mucous membranes and were reversible after discontinuation of treatment in these patients. Acute retinoid toxicity and the potential for developing chronic toxicity are reviewed. In an attempt to facilitate the monitoring of dermatologic patients treated with oral synthetic retinoids, we present our current guidelines for the use of these agents.


1920s, sentimentality also came to be considered inappropriate in masculine action stories, which Jacobs investigates at length. By this time, the seduction plot was already seen as excessively sentimental and old-fashioned, but in the later part of the decade comic and modernized dramatic variants of it became predominant, so helping push further aside the jaded sentimental prototypes. In turn, the romance plot was in some cases reworked along more cynical lines, delivering a view of sexuality at once more humorous and more carnal. The rejection of sentimentality thus went hand in hand with the modernization of Hollywood film style and narrative form. In showing how the decisive move from hokum to sophistication was made, Jacobs does for jazz age American film what Ann Douglas has accomplished in Terrible Honesty (1995) for the cultural transformation generated in 1920s 'mongrel Manhattan'. In its meticulous scholarship, sharp analytical eye and comprehensive detail, The Decline of Sentiment makes a fine contribution to the history of cinema.


Venezuela's Hugo Chavez was the first anti-neoliberal presidential candidate to win in the region. "Electing Chavez" examines the circumstances that facilitated this pivotal election. By 1998, Venezuela had been rocked by two major scandals - the exchange rate incidents of the 1980s and the banking crisis of 1994 - and had suffered rising social inequality. These events created a deep-seated distrust of establishment politicians. Chavez's 1998 victory, however, was far from inevitable. Other presidential candidates also stood against corruption and promised a clean break from politics as usual. Moreover, business opposition to Chavez's anti-neoliberal candidacy should have convinced voters that his victory would provoke a downward economic spiral. In "Electing Chavez", Leslie C. Gates examines how Chavez won over voters and even obtained the secret allegiance of a group of business 'elite outliers', with a reinterpretation of the relationship between business and the state during Venezuela's era of two-party dominance (1959-1998). Through extensive research on corruption and the backgrounds of political leaders, Gates tracks the rise of business-related corruption scandals and documents how business became identified with Venezuela's political establishment. These trends undermined the public's trust in business and converted business opposition into an asset for Chavez. This long history of business-tied politicians and the scandals they often provoked also framed the decisions of elite outliers. As Gates reveals, elite outliers supported Chavez despite his antineoliberal stance because they feared that the success of Chavez's main rival would deny them access to Venezuela's powerful oil state.


Viroids are small, non-coding, parasitic RNAs that promote developmental distortions in sensitive plants. We analyzed pollen of Nicotiana benthamiana after infection and/or ectopic transformation with cDNAs of citrus bark cracking viroid (CBCVd), apple fruit crinkle viroid (AFCVd) and potato spindle tuber viroid (PSTVd) variant AS1. These viroids were seed non-transmissible in N. benthamiana. All viroids propagated to high levels in immature anthers similar to leaves, while their levels were drastically reduced by approximately 3.6 × 103, 800 and 59 times in mature pollen of CBCVd, AFCVd and PSTVd infected N. benthamiana, respectively, in comparison to leaves. These results suggest similar elimination processes during male gametophyte development as in the Nicotiana tabacum we presented in our previous study. Mature pollen of N. benthamiana showed no apparent defects in infected plants although all three viroids induced strong pathological symptoms on leaves. While Nicotiana species have naturally bicellular mature pollen, we noted a rare occurrence of mature pollen with three nuclei in CBCVd-infected N. benthamiana. Changes in the expression of ribosomal marker proteins in AFCVd-infected pollen were detected, suggesting some changes in pollen metabolism. N. benthamiana transformed with 35S-driven viroid cDNAs showed strong symptoms including defects in pollen development. A large number of aborted pollen (34% and 62%) and a slight increase of young pollen grains (8% and 15%) were found in mature pollen of AFCVd and CBCVd transformants, respectively, in comparison to control plants (3.9% aborted pollen and 0.3% young pollen). Moreover, pollen grains with malformed nuclei or trinuclear pollen were found in CBCVd-transformed plants. Our results suggest that "forcing" overexpression of seed non-transmissible viroid led to strong pollen pathogenesis. Viroid adaptation to pollen metabolism can be assumed as an important factor for viroid transmissibility through pollen and seeds.


The recent development of RepRap style 3D printers has made additive manufacturing technology available to the public at a low cost. While these 3D printers are being used for a variety of purposes, one of the main applications is prototyping in design projects. The quality of the 3D-printed parts has been a concern in such cases. Many variables within these printers' operation can be varied to obtain optimum print quality. This study explores a setup that uses externally induced mechanical vibrations to the nozzle tip as a potential method to improve the quality of 3D-printed parts. Induced vibration is expected to decrease the porosity of printed parts and enhance the cohesion between print beads, ultimately improving their mechanical properties. The objective is to understand the prints' positional accuracy, porosity, and mechanical properties with the added vibration and then to determine the optimum vibration level to achieve the best quality prints. While previous studies have explored the role of induced vibration on the mechanical properties of printed parts, the novelty of this work lies in the determination of the positional accuracy of those parts and the determination of optimum vibration levels to achieve desired properties. For positional accuracy, the extruder filament is replaced with a pointed-tip pen that can mark the exact location where the printer delivers the material. A comparison between the locations marked by the pen with and without vibrations shows that the errors induced by the added vibration are not significantly different from those caused by the uncertainties of the printer itself. Based on the tensile tests of the printed specimens, it is concluded that the parts printed with induced vibrations have improved mechanical properties. The printed parts' porosity is reduced significantly due to the induced vibrations. Further, this study also explores the optimum motor speeds to achieve a uniform distribution of material. It determines medium motor speeds that provide a maximum vibration amplitude, which is more desirable for a consistent infill.


Repairing articular cartilage defects is a great challenge due to the poor self-regenerative capability of cartilage. Hydrogel-based tissue engineering has been considered an effective strategy. In this study, inspired by mussel chemistry, catechol-modified chitosan (CS-C) hydrogel was prepared under the catalysis of horseradish peroxidase/hydrogen peroxide (HRP/H2O2) for cartilage defect repair in a rat model. The rheological and swelling properties and biodegradation behavior of the CS-C hydrogel were investigated. Besides, the chondrogenic effect of bone mesenchymal stem cells (BMSCs) within the CS-C hydrogel was also assessed in vitro. Moreover, after injecting in rat cartilage defects, the capability of cartilage repair of the BMSC-laden CS-C hydrogel was evaluated in vivo. The results showed that the rheological property, swelling property and biodegradation behavior of the CS-C hydrogel changed with the concentration of CS-C macromolecules. Besides, the CS-C hydrogel had good biocompatibility with BMSCs and could promote the proliferation and chondrogenic differentiation of BMSCs in vitro. As for cartilage defect repair in vivo, through the evaluation of gross observation and histology, the BMSC-laden CS-C hydrogel showed better reconstruction of hyaline cartilage than the untreated group and CS-C hydrogel only. Therefore, CS-C hydrogel laden with BMSC might be a promising strategy for repairing cartilage defects.


Introduction: Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is a liver cancer. In contrast, ferroptosis is a novel iron-dependent and ROS reliant type of cell death that is observed under various disease conditions. Methods and analysis: RNA sequencing data from HCC patients were downloaded from The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) database. Ferroptosis-related long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs) were screened by Pearson correlation analysis. Patients were randomized into training or testing sets in a 1:1 ratio. They were constructed in the training set using univariate-Lasso and multivariate Cox regression analysis and further tested for prognostic values in the testing set. Four lncRNAs were identified. Kaplan–Meier analysis showed that patients in the high-risk group had a worse prognosis than those in the low-risk group. Following differentially expressed genes analysis of these two groups. Functional analysis showed association with oxidative stress response. Cox regression analyses showed that risk score was an independent prognostic indicator. Receiver operating characteristic curve (ROC) and decision curve analysis demonstrated the accuracy of prediction. Four ferroptosis-related lncRNAs based on differential expression of HCC were screened by bioinformatic methods to construct a prognostic risk model and accurately predict the prognosis of HCC patients. Four lncRNAs may have a potential role in the anti-tumor immune process and serve as therapeutic targets for HCC. To lay the foundation for subsequent studies.


【The versatile practical use of electron beam welding which is very high energy density is still in early stage, but in the special welding field, the welding process is used in manufactured goods. The investigation for electron beam welding up to the present was almost achieved not for the mechanical properties of welded joint but for the process itself. On this investigation, the fatigue strength, crack propergation phenomena and hardness of weld metal and heat affected zone of partially penetrated welded joint of HT80 steel by electron beam welding was accomplished. The tensile fatigue strength in weld line direction of the joint was about $25kg/mm^2$ . There still appeared spikes on the tips of penetration, and the crack initiated at the tips of spikes not from the roots. The hardness of the weld metal was higher than it of base metal because of production of martensite by rapid cooling.】


Abstract As a Christian humanist, Colet attempted clerical reform partly by means of preaching. Evidence from Colet's ecclesiastical life as dean of St Paul's suggests that his success was limited by the inappropriate expression of his idealistic ecclesiology, which demanded perfection. Although Colet's passion for preaching was shared and admired by humanist colleagues, his sermons received negative reactions from his cathedral clergy, the Bishop of London and Henry VIII. The intellectual basis for Colet's ecclesiology was a combination of Pauline theology and Dionysian spirituality, which created a vision of Church perfection by means of purification and illumination. However, Colet sought a spiritual and moral revival, not a fundamental change to the structure of the Catholic Church. Colet's humanist success was achieved mainly outside the ecclesiastical world.


The (un)predictability of the crisis and the pluralism in Economics. This paper discusses the predictability of the last global economic crisis relating it to the lack of pluralism in Economics. In order to do so, first is presented a literature review of the development of economic theory in recent years. Then the two main views on the predictability of the crisis are presented: (1) the economic models used to understand the economy did not incorporate bubbles so, the crisis was unpredictable; and (2) the crisis was predictable when applied other methods of understanding the economy.


Initial steps have been taken to measure the mass of water in vapor and liquid phases downhole in a steam injection heavy oil recovery system. A suitable portion of the electromagnetic spectrum has been identified over which the presence of liquid water and vapor can be separated. This is in the near infrared and extends from ~900 nm to 1.8 µm region. A high pressure and high temperature cell has been constructed and tested for stagnant transmissions. Pitting of the optical ports due to the presence of high-pressure (8.5 MPA) and high temperature (300C) water has lead to a redesign of the optical ports, these modifications will be incorporated in the next quarter. The actual determination of the mass of water, either in liquid or vapor, has not been reliably determined, due in part to the pitting problems being addressed in the modification. However, qualitative data has been recorded clearly showing an increase in absorption with increasing number of absorbing molecules, i.e. mass of water.


The experimental results of single event burnout induced by heavy ions and 252Cf fission fragments in power MOSFET devices have been investigated. It is concluded that the characteristics of single event burnout induced by 252Cf fission fragments is consistent to that in heavy ions. The power MOSFET in the "turn-off" state is more susceptible to single event burnout than it is in the "turn-on" state. The thresholds of the drain-source voltage for single event burnout induced by 173 MeV bromine ions and 252Cf fission fragments are close to each other, and the burnout cross section is sensitive to variation of the drain-source voltage above the threshold of single event burnout. In addition, the current waveforms of single event burnouts induced by different sources are similar. Different power MOSFET devices may have different probabilities for the occurrence of single event burnout.


The author offers an analysis of the controversial Israeli Nation-State Law of 2018 and B. Netanyahu's involvement in its adoption. He claims that its ideas manifest Netanyahu's desire to depart from the state-centred, social democratic, and liberal views advocated by Ben Gurion. This desire stems from his strong disagreement with Israel's founder's claim and belief that secularism is a guarantee that Israel does not fall into the same trap as the leaders of the bicentennial Crusades – which ultimately failed. The author of the paper makes an insightful comparison of this law with the contents of Point 13 of Thomas Woodrow Wilson's 1918 plan – a docu-ment from exactly 100 years before, designed to shape Europe after victory in the war against Russia, Prussia, and Austria-Hungary, on whose lands an independent Polish state was to be established.


Abstract The Arkoma basin is an arcuate structural feature located in southern Oklahoma and western Arkansas. It is recognized as a foreland basin of the Ouachita fold and thrust belt and is one of the most prolific gas producing basins in North America. The Choctaw fault is the leading-edge thrust of the Ouachita frontal belt. Several south-dipping leading imbricate fan thrust faults are present in the hanging wall block of the Choctaw. The Wilburton gas field is located in the central part of the basin and produces mostly from the Pennsylvanian (Atokan) Spiro Sandstone. We have constructed many balanced structural cross sections in the Wilburton gas field and adjacent areas to determine the detailed geometry and structural history of the thrusting. The cross sections are perpendicular to the tectonic transport direction and are based on updated surface geology by the Oklahoma Geological Survey, wire-line well log data, and our interpretation of several seismic profiles donated by the EXXON oil company. The restored cross sections suggest about 40% shortening in the Wilburton gas field area. There is a good correlation between the presence of Chamosite clay and the porosity and permeability in the Spiro Sandstone. The original distribution of the Chamosite bearing facies in the Spiro sandstone was plotted on the cross sections to determine the extent of potential reservoir rock. In the Wilburton area, the cross sections suggest a shallow triangle zone floored by the Lower Atokan detachment and flanked by the south-dipping Choctaw thrust to the south and north-dipping Carbon fault to the north. The foot wall of the Choctaw contains duplexes that are located between Springer detachment (the lower detachment) and the Lower Atokan Detachment (the upper detachment). These duplexes contain overpressured Spiro sandstone gas reservoirs. There is a rough correlation between the pressure data in the Spiro reservoirs and the duplex structures. The highest pressure-depth gradients are found in the Spiro reservoirs that were brought to structurally higher positions by the thrust faults in the duplex structures. Structurally lower reservoirs exhibit lower pressure-depth gradients. Therefore, we suggest that the thrusting in the duplex structures may have formed seals that isolated the Spiro Sandstone gas reservoirs.


The landscape of the public sector has changed. Economic recession and the demand for greater efficiencies have created a need to measure and improve employee well-being, whilst attaining individual and organisational goals without additional financial reward. Drawing upon hope theory as defined by C.R. Snyder, particular attention is given to the predictive nature of trait hope over other state-like constructs of psychological capital, including hope, efficacy, resilience and optimism. In literature, hope is recognised for its state and trait-like qualities. It is defined as an active process through which goals can be attained through agentic thinking and pathways actions. Research (Bandler & Grinder, 1979; Woodbury, 1999; Green, 2001: Silbiger, 1999; Pullin, 2002) supports the view that individuals who attain individual goals are more likely to achieve organisational objectives. Furthermore, hope has been found to be an important predictor of psychological adjustment to stressful life events (Michael & Snyder, 2005; Valle et al. 2006) and an organisation which fosters hopeful thinking in employees, can counter the detrimental impact of change fatigue by encouraging employees to work towards a shared goal. Hope as a singular construct is compared to well-being as defined by four questions devised by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) and employee engagement in a survey of 242 employees. To breach the gap in the availability of large or longitudinal data sets relating to hope in the workplace, benchmarking of the same employee engagement and well-being questions is conducted using staff survey data of a large civil service department over a five-year period.
Findings are also benchmarked to the national UK findings of the ONS evaluation of well-being. A decline in engagement as defined specifically by four questions looking at role and purpose, contribution of individual work and perception of motivational support to achieve organisational objectives was found across the five-year period which correlated with the most significant periods of change. Employees who are high in hope report better engagement, are more satisfied with life and are happier at work using new national measures of well-being than those with hope scores below the mean. When taken together evidence suggests a holistic explanation of subjective well-being and future ability for goal attainment can be made through a simple combined application of hope and well-being scales in the workplace.


Background : Poly-pharmacy is an area of concern for the elderly. Poly-pharmacy was initially coined to refer to specific problems linked to multiple drug intake and excessive drug usage. Aim of the study : The study aims to assess practices used by old-age patients to control Poly-pharmacy. Design: Descriptive cross-sectional study design was used to answer the research questions. Subjects & Setting: sample size was 114 elderly patients from elderly patients visiting outpatient clinics monthly. Tools : A checklist to assess poly pharmacies' practices. Results: the majority of the study sample wasn't reading the labels of the medications nor adhering to the immunization system of the old age (79.8% and 78%, respectively). The highest satisfactory level (66.6%) of practice was for the university education, followed by the urban area residents (60%), and finally, in the third level were the secondary level of education 59.1%. Conclusion: The prevalence of polypharmacy and its consequences among the elderly is significantly affected by the level of education. University education was the highest satisfactory adherence to the alternative practices that control poly-pharmacy, followed by secondary education, then primary then illiterate. Recommended: Designing an educational program for the elderly to increase their awareness and knowledge about the phenomenon of drug abuse and its consequences.


BACKGROUND
A rat-to-primate cardiac xenograft model has been proposed as an alternative to the clinically relevant but more cumbersome pig-to-primate model for assessing the efficacy of strategies aimed at preventing xenograft hyperacute rejection. As in pig xenografts, the rejection of rat hearts was mediated by the binding of xenoreactive natural antibodies (XNA) and complement activation. The present study was conducted to identify target antigens recognized by cynomolgus and rhesus monkey IgM XNA on rat tissues and cells in comparison with pig cells.

METHODS
The reactivity of rhesus or cynomolgus serum on pig and rat endothelial cells (ECs) was studied by flow cytometry, ELISA, and complement-dependent cytotoxicity, after removal of primate XNA by perfusion of pig livers, immunoadsorption on a Gal alpha(1,3)Gal affinity column, and enzymatic removal of alpha-galactosyl epitopes from the cell surface. Rat and pig EC extracts were also immunoprecipitated with primate serum and resolved in sodium dodecyl sulfate-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis. The expression of the Gal alpha(1,3)Gal epitope was analyzed on rat tissues and ECs by immunohistochemistry, flow cytometry, and Western blot, using the isolectin B4 from Griffonia simplicifolia.

RESULTS
Removal of primate XNA or of alphaGal epitopes resulted in a decrease in XNA binding to pig and rat cells, leaving a similar degree of residual reactivity in the two species. At least five proteins of 260, 210, 110, 56, and 50 kDa were immunoprecipitated on rat ECs, with molecular weight similar to several proteins identified on pig ECs. These results suggest that primate XNA recognize similar antigens on rat and pig ECs. Rat cells expressed lower levels of the Gal alpha(1,3)Gal epitope than pig cells. A large proportion, but not all, of primate XNA react with this epitope on pig and rat ECs.

CONCLUSION
This study suggests that the rat is a valuable species for the evaluation of genetic engineering strategies on the vascular endothelium aimed at preventing hyperacute xenograft rejection.


This paper presents a new approach to hierarchical clustering of point patterns. Two algorithms for hierarchical location- and density-based clustering are developed. Each method groups points such that maximum intracluster similarity and intercluster dissimilarity are achieved for point locations or point separations. Performance of the clustering methods is compared with four other methods. The approach is applied to a two-step texture analysis, where points represent centroid and average color of the regions in image segmentation.


This study presents family relationships of teenage mothers in their daily experiences of motherhood. The attentive view of the author enlightens the comprehension of issues related to women, of life experiences characterized by discrimination involving class and gender issues.


Endomyocardial biopsy (EMB), the diagnostic gold standard for myocarditis, has not been systematically performed in the reported case series of Takotsubo cardiomyopathy, although proposed Mayo Criteria specify exclusion of myocarditis. Moreover, there is no specific recommendation for infarct‐like acute myocarditis in the recently published guidelines on the role of EMB. Here we present a thoroughly documented case fulfilling both the proposed Mayo criteria for Takotsubo cardiomyopathy and the World Health Organization criteria for active, virus‐negative, immune‐mediated myocarditis. Since myocarditis can mimic acute myocardial infarction with normal coronary arteries, EMB should be performed to rule out myocarditis in patients presenting with LV apical ballooning syndrome (or Takotsubo cardiomyopathy).


The development of the personal potential of academic staff and higher education applicants as an integrated criterion for the effectiveness and efficiency of university management is substantiated in the article. To give ground to his position, the author proceeded from determination of the effectiveness and efficiency of university activities. The effectiveness of university activities is defined as the degree of compliance with the result secured by the goal it pursued. The efficiency of university activities is a qualitative indicator that determines the degree of use of resources (human, material, financial, etc.) in achieving a particular result. Methodological incorrectness of determination of efficiency of university activities by formal criteria is emphasized. In particular, the diploma of higher education regardless of the level of competence and development of the personal potential of its owner. The impossibility of correct differentiation in the value expression of the results of educational and scientific activities of the university is proved. The necessity of defining and substantiating alternative criteria that would orient the management to ensuring the effective and efficient operation of the higher education institution is kept current. In case of incorrect appeal to quantitative criteria, it is suggested for the management to focus on evaluation of criteria in determining the results of university activities. Assessment scales of such relevance are recommended. They should guide the management of a higher education institution to improve the activities. At the same time, the improvement of results should be achieved not at any cost of resources, but at the minimum permissible without deteriorating their quality. It is noted that only with the use of such methodological approach the efficiency of the university's activity as a guarantee of its competitiveness can increase. The competitiveness of the university is proposed to be considered as an integrated indicator of corporate competence of all participants of its activities, including managers, academic staff and applicants for higher education.
It is emphasized that unlike other resources that are inevitably spent, human resources in the process of their use are self-renewing and developing. Self-renewal and the development of human resources or human capital are better the more developed the personal potential of university participants is. In addition, the level of development of the personal potential of higher education applicants is the current and final result of the university's educational activities. The more advanced personal potential the university graduates have, the more productive they will be in their careers, therefore, more expensive in terms of value and vice versa. After all, the more productive persons with higher education, the more productive the society in which they work is and the more prosperous life in such a society is. In its turn, the development of the personal potential of higher education applicants in the learning process depends directly on the level of personal capacity development of the academic staff with whom they interact. Not only the effectiveness of educational but also scientific activities depends on the personal potential of academic staff.


Purpose of review Adenoviruses (AdVs) infection is a self-limited disease in the majority of immunocompetent children and adults, but can cause disseminated and life-threatening illness in immunocompromised hosts. This article will discuss therapeutic strategies for AdV infection in the pediatrics transplant recipient. Recent findings Currently, there is no FDA approved antiviral therapy for AdV infection. Accordingly, the primary initial therapy would be decreasing immunosuppression, whenever possible. Cidofovir (CDV) is an antiviral drug whose use has been associated with significant reductions of AdV viral load and, in some series improved survival in recipients of solid organ transplant (SOT) and hematopoietic stem cell transplant (HSCT). However, its use is also associated with significant toxicity. Brincidofovir (BCV) is a lipid formulation of CDV, which has an improved oral bioavailability and favorable toxicity profile compared with CDV. However, studies have only shown modest benefit from BCV for AdV disease or viremia. Immunotherapy is a growing field in the management of this virus infection on HSCT patients with promising results. Summary Current evidence support the use of CDV and BCV, as rescue therapy, on SOT and HSCT transplant patients. Immunotherapy had only been proven successful in HSCT patients, as an option for refractory cases or rescue therapy for AdV infection.


Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) are ubiquitous pollutants that result from the incomplete combustion of organic substances. These contaminants are a threat to both public health and the environment because they are carcinogenic and persistent. Luckily, bioremediation can occur because some microorganisms are able to degrade these chemicals into less detrimental metabolites. This study examined the rates of degradation when Mycobacterium species RJGII-135 was exposed to 3 particular low molecular weight PAHs; naphthalene, 1-methylnapthalene, and 2-methylnapthalene. Within a 72 hour timeframe, no significant loss of naphthalene was observed. However, the bacteria were able to degrade both 1-methylnaphthalene and 2-methylnapthalene. This suggests that the additional methyl group aids in the Mycobacterium's metabolism of these specific PAHs. Demethylation was eliminated as a potential metabolic pathway because no naphthalene was measured in the methylated trials. Furthermore, when the microorganism was exposed to all three PAHs of interest, there was no differentiation or preference to either of the methylated naphthalenes. These types of studies are of great importance for the field of toxicology because microbial PAH degradation has the ability to positively impact global pollution clean-up initiatives.


In the showring you have limited time to catch the judges' eye. It you want to stand out from the crowd and make a good impression, you and your horse need to be a neat looking pair. The judge will always favour the better turned out horse and rider. Luckily you don't need the most expensive tack and outfits to achieve this goal.


For the establishment of cellular immune phenomena in hyperthyroidism and the euthyreotic struma 27 patients with hyperthyroidism, 18 patients with euthyreotic struma and 33 healthy control persons were examined with the help of the lymphocyte transformation test as to their ability to the blast cell transformation under addition of watery extract of the thyroid gland. In the cases of hyperthyroidism significantly increased transformation indices were found compared with the controls. Also in the euthyreotic strumae increased values were found compared with the controls. They lay at the borderline to significance. Three different extracts were used as antigen. The transformation indices calculated in these cases were partly significantly different. From this is concluded that not in every watery extract of the thyroid gland the responsible antigen exists in sufficient quantity and/or quality.


This thesis investigates how Swedbank uses performance appraisal interviews as a tool for managing and controlling work performance. Previous studies and literature concerning the two subjects Performance Management and performance appraisal interviews were studied to get a general picture of the field and empirical material was collected through qualitative interviews with managers at Swedbank in Uppsala. The analysis of the collected material showed four themes (goals, evaluation, reward and development) to be important components of the process surrounding the performance appraisal interview. These are also important components of the Performance Management process according to existing literature, this made the connection between the Performance Management system and the performance appraisal interviews clear. Foucault's theory concerning control in the workplace was used to analyze how the performance appraisal interview and its components are used to manage and control work performance. The analysis shows that what Foucault calls "administrative control" is very much present in Swedbank. Every individual's work results are documented and continuously evaluated. Mainly, the organization controls individuals by creating norms for accepted behavior and performance. When norms are not followed, for example if a person does not manage to reach his/her individual performance goal, the organization acts to normalize that person. Coaching and mentoring are examples of techniques used to help the individual reach the goals, in other words to follow the norm.


[Purpose] Several exercises aim to strengthen the abductor hallucis (AbdH) of the foot arch which acts as a shock absorber. The purpose of the present study was to compare various exercises designed to strengthen the medial longitudinal arch (MLA) by selectively recruiting the AbdH in order to identify the most effective exercise method. [Subjects] Six males and six females participated in this study. [Methods] We selected and compared 5 exercises, which are known to be effective exercises. [Result] The exercise giving the highest EMG activation was EX 2 (64.43% MVIC). The second highest activation was found in EX 4 (40.50% MVIC). EMG values in EX 1 (40.12% MVIC), EX 4 and EX 5 (34.34% MVIC) were higher than in EX 3 (18.59% MVIC). EX 3 gave the lowest EMG activation of the 5 exercises. [Conclusion] The MLA plays an important role in gait and energy efficiency. Therefore, new exercises should be designed and existing exercises should be extended to incorporate new movements.


Enterococcus faecalis is a gram positive bacterium which is commonly found in dental root canal endodontic failure. Neem leaf has several active substances such as flavonoids, tannins and sterols which act as an antibacterial. The purpose of this research is to determine the effect of neem leaf extract on the growth of Enterococcus faecalis in vitro. The research was an experimental research, used the posttest only group design. In this research there were five treatment groups (100%, 80%, 60%, 40% and 20%) and two control groups (control + 2, 5% NaOCl and control – sterile distilled water). The diffusion methods were used with calculates diameter zone inhibition of the Enterococcus faecalis bacteria in media MHA by vertically, horizontally, and longitudinally passing through the disc. This research used statistical analysis of One Way Anova that follwed with LSD Post Hoc test. The results mean of inhibition zone diameter of bacteria of Enterococcus faecalis in the treatment group (100%, 80%, 60%, 40% and 20%) in a row 26,38; 22,77; 19,74; 0; 0 and group control + and control – in a row 17 and 0. The One Way Anova test value obtained p<0, 05 means that there were differences in the effect of the inhibition produced by the neem leaf extract. The Post Hoc test value obtained p < 0,05 in the concentration of 100% with concentration 80% and 60% which means there was a significant difference among Neem leaf extracts. The result of the research showed that extract of neem leaf (Azadirachta indica) has an influence on the growth of bacteria Enterococcus faecalis and there were differences in inhibition zone diameter in a range of concentrations.   Keyword : neem leaf extract (Azadiractha indica extract), Enterococcus faecalis, in vitro


The optimal boundary control problem for (cid:2) n × n (cid:3) infinite order distributed parabolic systems with multiple time delays given in the integral form both in the state equations and in the Neumann boundary conditions is considered. Constraints on controls are imposed. Necessary and su ff acient optimality conditions for the Neumann problem with the quadratic performance functional are derived.


Transformer-based models consist of interleaved feed-forward blocks - that capture content meaning, and relatively more expensive self-attention blocks - that capture context meaning. In this paper, we explored trade-offs and ordering of the blocks to improve upon the current Transformer architecture and proposed PAR Transformer. It needs 35% lower compute time than Transformer-XL achieved by replacing ~63% of the self-attention blocks with feed-forward blocks, and retains the perplexity on WikiText-103 language modelling benchmark. We further validated our results on text8 and enwiki8 datasets, as well as on the BERT model.


Queer, trans and non-binary lives, bodies, relationships, and communities often complicate the taken-for-granted processes through which the state manages those under its power. In this article, we explore the forms of power and harm at play in attempts to quantify people through administrative processes of state data collection about sex and gender, and in the current UK and Scottish context, examine some of the sites for wider conflicts over constructions of sex and gender in public life. We emphasise the need to collect sex/gender data in ways that reflect the intersectional lives of data 'subjects.' We also suggest that governments and public bodies should not adopt a unitary definition of sex or gender in data collection exercises such as the census, or other administrative categories such as criminal justice records, and argue those who lobby to record 'sex not gender' in data collection are engaging in a strategy of concept capture (reducing sex to a binary, biological model that excludes trans and non-binary people) through the co-option of a number of administrative and legal categories across a wide range of social and political fora. We conclude by recommending that public bodies asking about sex and gender should: co-produce questions with the community that is being surveyed; ensure that the wording of each question, and its rubric, is sensitive to the context in which it is asked and the purpose for which it is intended; and avoid attempting to offer any overarching standard definition of sex or gender that would be applicable in all circumstances. To engage in meaningful sex/gender data collection and recording that does not cause harm, governments and public bodies should avoid relying on reductive, over-simplistic and generalistic categories that are designed to fit the standardised norm. In being attentive to individual contexts, needs and interests when formulating categories and records, they can make space for more intersectional experiences to be made visible.


Chika Unigwe's 2007 novel On Black Sisters' Street centres on the lives of four women illegally trafficked from Nigeria to the sex district of Antwerp. Documenting how these characters negotiate the dark spaces of the city, Unigwe highlights the structural inequalities and legislative failures that keep these women in a state of exception. The novel offers a portrait of the contemporary city and the precarious position of those locked out of legal protection of the state. This article focuses on the urban spaces of Sisi, Efe, Joyce and Ama, and how they become commodities of underground migration system. Visible in the windows of the red-light district each night, they are considered persona non-grata by the legal infrastructure that fails to protect them.


Mode division multiplexing is a promising technique that enables highly parallel and compact on-chip optical communications, but its scalability has been hampered by the crosstalk so far. By exploiting supermodes in closely packed waveguide arrays, low crosstalk between waveguides can be achieved when phase mismatch condition is met. This paper considers two techniques to achieve phase mismatch: waveguide non-uniformity and waveguide bending. The aim is to experimentally assess the BER performance on both straight and curved arrays of closely packed waveguides. Experimental results at 10 Gb/s demonstrate the simultaneous data transmission over different waveguides with a power penalty <0.5 dB at BER = 10−9 in straight non-uniform arrays and sharp bends.


In this paper we present a novel approach to learn directed acyclic graphs (DAGs) and factor models within the same framework while also allowing for model comparison between them. For this purpose, we exploit the connection between factor models and DAGs to propose Bayesian hierarchies based on spike and slab priors to promote sparsity, heavy-tailed priors to ensure identifiability and predictive densities to perform the model comparison. We require identifiability to be able to produce variable orderings leading to valid DAGs and sparsity to learn the structures. The effectiveness of our approach is demonstrated through extensive experiments on artificial and biological data showing that our approach outperform a number of state of the art methods.


In recent times, the global community has had to respond to massive turbulences such as the financial tsunami, the 'swine flu' pandemic and what seems like ongoing international terrorism. At the same time, there are the recurrent issues of the ongoing dislocations caused by wars, historic conflicts and tensions. The need for effective programmes of citizenship education is more apparent now than ever. This paper reviews recent research concerned with the citizenship curriculum and  student learning. It draws on international literature to examine how different societies have  responded to the need for school programmes of citizenship education and it will  identify international best practice in this area. It focuses particularly on empirical research  in an attempt to identify those variables that best facilitate student learning of citizenship  knowledge and skills. Based on this review, a new framework for citizenship curriculum is proposed to  meet the ongoing challenges that seem to be a feature of living in this new century.


This study examined the relationship of job stress, Type-A behavior and its two components (time pressure and hard driving/competitiveness) with burnout, health problems, job satisfaction, organizational commitment and turnover motivation among employees in Canada (N = 535) and mainland China (N = 685). Data were collected by means of a structured questionnaire from Canadian employees in Montreal and Chinese employees in Beijing. Pearson correlation and moderated multiple regression were used to analyze the data. Job stress, global Type-A and its two components were significantly related to a number of dependant variables in both countries. Some support for differential effects of Type-A behavior components was found primarily in the Canadian sample. Implications of findings are discussed for cross-cultural research. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.


Deploying autonomous agents in the real-world can lead to risks both to the agents and to the humans with whom they interact. As a result, it is essential for agents to try to achieve their objectives while acting as safely as possible. Thus, learning agents ought to learn not only about the effectiveness of actions, but also about their safety. While action effectiveness is task-dependent, information regarding the safety of actions can be preserved even if the task and/or the objective of the agent changes. The focus of this work is to leverage information from unsafe situations that the agent has experienced in order to obtain safety rules that identify which action from which state can lead to unsafe outcomes. These rules can be used for shielding the agent from repeating the same mistakes, as well as other mistakes that lead to the same catastrophic outcomes. In essence, before each action is selected for execution by the policy, actions which violate one of the safety rules from the current state are masked away and will not be selected. The cumulative set of safety rules can be used even when the agent faces multiple tasks, and can also be shared between different agents, so that mistakes that were made by one agent are not repeated by any of the agents that share the same rule-based shield. The process of learning a rule-based shield online is studied on a multi-task autonomous driving problem. Finally, the application of a rule-based shield to the Proximal Policy Optimization (PPO) algorithm is empirically evaluated and compared with the original PPO, with variants of PPO which use other online-learned shields, and with other baselines from the safe reinforcement learning literature. The results show that safety rules can significantly reduce the number of unsafe outcomes that agents experience, while even improving the cumulative rewards obtained by the agents.


Long distance pipelines are actively pursued by the industry to transport natural gas from remote arctic regions to markets. A chilled gas pipeline is one of the options to minimize the environmental impact resulting from operation of such pipelines. When a chilled gas pipeline crosses discontinuous permafrost areas, differential frost heave can occur. The result is pipe being subjected to potentially high strains, primarily in the axial direction. Reliable prediction of strain demands is one of the key components for a strain-based design process and it is essential for both ensuring pipeline integrity and facilitating life-cycle cost optimization for the design and maintenance of pipelines. The prediction of strain demands resulting from frost heave of chilled gas pipelines involves three fundamental engineering analysis processes. They are gas hydraulic analysis, geothermal analysis and pipeline structural analysis. Not only are these three processes complex, they are also mutually interdependent. To reliably predict strain demands and fully capture the interactions among these processes, TransCanada Pipelines Ltd. (TransCanada) and its partners developed an integrated engineering model on the basis of three well established programs for the three individual engineering processes. This paper will briefly review the integrated model for strain demand prediction.Copyright © 2006 by ASME


UNLABELLED
Rhynchosporium commune is a haploid fungus causing scald or leaf blotch on barley, other Hordeum spp. and Bromus diandrus.

TAXONOMY
Rhynchosporium commune is an anamorphic Ascomycete closely related to the teleomorph Helotiales genera Oculimacula and Pyrenopeziza.

DISEASE SYMPTOMS
Rhynchosporium commune causes scald-like lesions on leaves, leaf sheaths and ears. Early symptoms are generally pale grey oval lesions. With time, the lesions acquire a dark brown margin with the centre of the lesion remaining pale green or pale brown. Lesions often merge to form large areas around which leaf yellowing is common. Infection frequently occurs in the leaf axil, which can lead to chlorosis and eventual death of the leaf.

LIFE CYCLE
Rhynchosporium commune is seed borne, but the importance of this phase of the disease is not fully understood. Debris from previous crops and volunteers, infected from the stubble from previous crops, are considered to be the most important sources of the disease. Autumn-sown crops can become infected very soon after sowing. Secondary spread of disease occurs mainly through splash dispersal of conidia from infected leaves. Rainfall at the stem extension growth stage is the major environmental factor in epidemic development. DETECTION AND QUANTIFICATION: Rhynchosporium commune produces unique beak-shaped, one-septate spores both on leaves and in culture. The development of a specific polymerase chain reaction (PCR) and, more recently, quantitative PCR (qPCR) has allowed the identification of asymptomatic infection in seeds and during the growing season.

DISEASE CONTROL
The main measure for the control of R. commune is the use of fungicides with different modes of action, in combination with the use of resistant cultivars. However, this is constantly under review because of the ability of the pathogen to adapt to host plant resistance and to develop fungicide resistance.


Leeches have been used in medicine for blood-letting since ancient times. Leeching has varied in popularity over the years. It reached its zenith during the early decades of the 19th century with a gradual decline by the end of the century. Since the 1980s leeches have been introduced to remove blood where its accumulation may interfere with healing, particularly after plastic tissue-flap surgery. The history and current use of medicinal leeches in Australia is examined.


To the Editor: —During my experience at the Erlanger Hospital Venereal Disease Clinic, in Chattanooga, Tenn., with many hundreds of patients being treated for syphilis, I found that many complained of nausea and vomiting immediately after the intravenous injection of neoarsphenamine. The nausea and vomiting were severe enough to deter them from continuing their treatments, with the result that there were many delinquents because of this reaction. Most of these patients continued to have nausea and vomiting even after mapharsen was substituted for neoarsphenamine. I interrogated the reacting patients regarding their symptoms, and they all agreed that the nausea and vomiting were caused by the odor and taste of the drug immediately after the start of the injection and before it was completed. Several different measures were tried to control this, like chewing gum, smoking a cigaret, pinching the nostrils together, smelling perfume from a handkerchief to the


Controlling software systems autonomously has been a challenging research area. Modern autonomous systems are guided by a plan, which is a sequence of actions to take to achieve a goal. Many planning algorithms exist today to produce plans given a problem definition and goal. To ease programmability of autonomous systems, many languages have been developed for defining problems and goals. However, planning algorithms tend to need to be customized not only for the problem definition language, but also for the problem definition itself. This work presents a new problem definition language called PyLOM, an interpreted, object-oriented language. The PyLOM run-time system uses generic algorithms, which do not need to be customized for each problem definition. Thus, PyLOM separates problem definitions from planning algorithms to ease programmability and software reuse. The choice of an object-oriented language also is intended to aid programmability, since prior problem definition languages adopt a functional programming style.


Salmonella Enteritidis (SE) has been the major cause of the food-borne salmonellosis pandemic in humans over the last 20 years, during which contaminated hen's eggs were the most important vehicle of the infection. Eggs can be contaminated on the outer shell surface and internally. Internal contamination can be the result of penetration through the eggshell or by direct contamination of egg contents before oviposition, originating from infection of the reproductive organs. Once inside the egg, the bacteria need to cope with antimicrobial factors in the albumen and vitelline membrane before migration to the yolk can occur. It would seem that serotype Enteritidis has intrinsic characteristics that allow an epidemiological association with hen eggs that are still undefined. There are indications that SE survives the attacks with the help of antimicrobial molecules during the formation of the egg in the hen's oviduct and inside the egg. This appears to require a unique combination of genes encoding for improved cell wall protection and repairing cellular and molecular damage, among others.


Cortical spreading depression (CSD) is a pronounced depolarization of neurons and glia that spreads slowly across the cortex followed by a period of depressed electrophysiological activity. The vascular changes associated with CSD are a large transient increase in blood flow followed by a prolonged decrease lasting greater than 1 h. Currently, the profile of functional vascular activity during this hypovolemic period has not been well characterized. Perfusion-based imaging techniques such as functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) assume a tight coupling between changes in neuronal and vascular activity. Under normal conditions, these variables are well correlated. Characterizing the effect of CSD on this relationship is an important step to understand the impact acute pathophysiological events may have on neurovascular coupling. We examine the effect of CSD on functional changes in cerebral blood volume (CBV) evoked by cortical electrophysiological activity for 1 h following CSD induction. CBV signal amplitude, duration, and time to peak show little recovery at 60 min post-induction. Analysis of spontaneous vasomotor activity suggests a decrease in vascular reactivity may play a significant role in the disruption of normal functional CBV responses. Electrophysiological activity is also attenuated but to a lesser degree. CBV and evoked potentials are not well correlated following CSD, suggesting a breakdown of the neurovascular coupling relationship.


We have developed a non-sequential ray-tracing simulation library, ROot-BAsed Simulator for ray Tracing (ROBAST), which is aimed for wide use in optical simulations of cosmic-ray (CR) and gamma-ray telescopes. The library is written in C++ and fully utilizes the geometry library of the ROOT analysis framework. Despite the importance of optics simulations in CR experiments, no open-source software for ray-tracing simulations that can be widely used existed. To reduce the unnecessary effort demanded when different research groups develop multiple ray-tracing simulators, we have successfully used ROBAST for many years to perform optics simulations for the Cherenkov Telescope Array (CTA). Among the proposed telescope designs for CTA, ROBAST is currently being used for three telescopes: a Schwarzschild--Couder telescope, one of the Schwarzschild--Couder small-sized telescopes, and a large-sized telescope (LST). ROBAST is also used for the simulations and the development of hexagonal light concentrators that has been proposed for the LST focal plane. By fully utilizing the ROOT geometry library with additional ROBAST classes, building complex optics geometries that are typically used in CR experiments and ground-based gamma-ray telescopes is possible. We introduce ROBAST and show several successful applications for CTA.


Purpose: Despite recent developments in the management of trauma patients in South Korea, a standardized system and guideline for trauma treatment are absent.
Methods: Five guidelines were assessed using the Appraisal of Guidelines for Research and Evaluation II instrument.
Results: Restrictive volume replacement must be used for patients experiencing shock from trauma until hemostasis is achieved (1B). The target systolic pressure for fluid resuscitation should be 80-90 mmHg in hypovolemic shock patients (1C). For patients with head trauma, the target pressure for fluid resuscitation should be 100-110 mmHg (2C). Isotonic crystalloid fluid is recommended for initially treating traumatic hypovolemic shock patients (1A). Hypothermia should be prevented in patients with severe trauma, and if hypothermia occurs, the body temperature should be increased without delay (1B). Acidemia must be corrected with an appropriate means of treatment for hypovolemic trauma patients (1B). When a large amount of transfusion is required for trauma patients in hypovolemic shock, a massive transfusion protocol (MTP) should be used (1B). The decision to implement MTP should be made based on hemodynamic status and initial responses to fluid resuscitation, not only the patient's initial condition (1B). The ratio of plasma to red blood cell concentration should be at least 1:2 for trauma patients requiring massive transfusion (1B). When a trauma patient is in life-threatening hypovolemic shock, vasopressors can be administered in addition to fluids and blood products (1B). Early administration of tranexamic acid is recommended in trauma patients who are actively bleeding or at high risk of hemorrhage (1B). For hypovolemic patients with coagulopathy non-responsive to primary therapy, the use of fibrinogen concentrate, cryoprecipitate, or recombinant factor VIIa can be considered (2C).
Conclusions: This research presents Korea''s first clinical practice guideline for patients with traumatic shock. This guideline will be revised with updated research every 5 years.


"Mi'kmaq and Maliseet" Cultural Ancestral Material has been designed to provide images and basic information on "Mi'kmaq and Maliseet" artifacts held in the collections of the Canadian Museum of Civilization. Drawing on objects collected, sold, or donated between 1841 and the present day, this publication provides a fascinating look at the richness of "Mi'kmaq and Maliseet" cultural practice, technological ingenuity, and artistic expression.Objects such as baskets, canoes, clothing, moccasins, and tools are illustrated with a color photograph and accompanied by a brief text describing the object and its provenance. The result is a comprehensive reference tool for Native peoples, researchers, and educators.


The study examined the marketing strategies and profitability of restaurants in Sokoto metropolis. Both primary and secondary data were used for the investigation. Proportional sampling method was used to collect data from 52 restaurants in the study area in 2004. The Primary data were collected using well structured questionnaire. The Analytical tools employed were Descriptive statistics and cost benefit analysis. The study revealed that the cost of starting the business was very high, with the majority (71.2%) starting with more than N100.000.00. The marketing strategies employed by the marketers in order to adapt to market conditions include; preparation of very delicious meals (88.5%), treating customers well (84.6%), setting signboards (78.9%), distributing food to customers location (42.3%), selling food at cheaper rates (17.3%), selling food on credit (11.5%) and advertisement (3.8%). A profit of N766.10 was realized daily by a typical marketer in the survey area. Cost- Benefit ratio indicated that for every N1.00 of invested capital, N1.60 was realized as daily sales revenue indicating that there was 6% turnover. This shows that the market is profitable. It is recommended that the marketers should improve on their marketing strategies, form co-operative societies and the government should provide them with credit facilities in order to enable them procure generators to circumvent the attendant incessant problem of power failure. Key words: Marketing, profitability analysis, restaurants,investment


Toll‐like receptors (TLR) are signal molecules essential for the cellular response to bacterial cell wall components. Different functional effective polymorphisms for the TLR 4 gene (Asp299Gly; Thr399Ile) and for the TLR 2 gene (Arg677Trp, Arg753Gln) have recently been described that are associated with impaired lipopolysaccharide signal transduction. A total of 122 patients with chronic periodontal disease and 122 healthy unrelated controls were genotyped for the Asp299Gly and Thr399Ile polymorphism of the TLR 4 gene and the Arg677Trp and Arg753Gln mutation of the TLR 2 gene. The mutations were identified with polymerase chain reaction followed by restriction fragment length polymorphism (RFLP) analysis. The prevalence of the Asp299Gly and the Thr399Ile mutant allele was 4·1% (10/244) and 4·5% (11/244) among periodontitis patients. For the healthy controls the prevalence was 3·3% (8/244) for the Asp299Gly (P = 0·810) and 3·7% (9/244) for the Thr399Ile mutant allele (P = 0·819). The Arg753Gln mutant allele was found in 2·9% (7/244) of the periodontitis subjects as compared to 4·1% (10/244) in the control group (P = 0·622). The Arg677Trp mutant allele was not found in any of the study subjects. Unlike in ulcerative colitis there was not observed an association between chronic periodontitis and the various mutations of the TLR 2 and 4 gene.


Introduction and purpose of the study. Trends in global development in the context of the global economic crisis dictate new challenges, in particular, the simplification of customs and logistics procedures during the import and export of goods to (from) the territory of countries. Today, the maximum approximation of customs procedures in Ukraine to the European and world standards is gradually being made, their maximum simplification at all stages, the reduction of the influence of the human factor on the results of the customs introduction of the elements of the electronic document flow system in the execution of customs clearance and customs control of goods.The hypothesis of scientific research. It is anticipated that in today's conditions of openness of the Ukrainian economy the necessary condition for the organization of the customs business – in general – and customs control, in particular, is the declaration, identification and control of customs value, which has fiscal and regulatory potential, and accordingly characterized by problematic issues that require new theoretical and practical approaches to its evaluation and control. The purpose of the article is to study the current mechanism of customs declaration of goods in Ukraine.Methods of research: in the process of work, the following methods of economic research were used: system-structural, abstract-logical, comparative and balance, expert assessments, etc.Results: The state of the procedure of customs clearance of goods is considered and investigated. The given results of practical introduction of electronic document circulation with the use of electronic digital signature in the customs business of Ukraine.Conclusions. The creation of a multifunctional integrated electronic customs system is aimed at strengthening Ukraine's customs security, further developing and adapting the information systems of the State Customs Service of Ukraine to the standards of the European Union, creating conditions for accelerating customs control and customs clearance procedures, improving the level of services provided by the state in the customs sphere, restriction of the possibility of committing illegal and corrupt acts.


Annual aerial counts of kangaroos within randomly selected blocks of the western plains of New South Wales showed that the numbers of kangaroos doubled between 1975-76 and 1982, and that the widespread drought of 1982 reduced the populations on average by 43%. Localized reductions of similar magnitude occurred after regional droughts in 1977 and 1980 within parts of the monitored area. The observed trends in kangaroo numbers, with eastern and western blocks treated separately, were correlated with annual rainfall with a time lag of 6 months in the response. The relationships show that kangaroos reach their maximum rate of increase following rainfall 100 mm above the annual average in the east and approximately 50 mm above the annual average in the west. At average annual rainfall kangaroos increase at 25% (greys) and 35% (reds) per annum in the east and at 25% (greys) and 30% (reds) per annum in the west. Rate of increase is zero when rainfall is 100 mm below average in the east and approximately 60 mm below average in the west. When rainfall is below these values, kangaroo numbers decline.


This research uncovered the different type of Chinese and Arab ethnic house. The methods of this research were: Putting forward approach zone theoretically; Applying the approach in both cases studies; Read the application of approach zone in each case study. The result analysis showed that there is fundamental difference which is found in pattern of relationship zone on both case studies. The benefits obtain from this research were : Firstly, discovering the basic types of each case study; Secondly, uncover archetypal differences in the case studies; Thirdly, putting forward the relationship pattern as a new way to analyze the relationship of activities that can be applied on a case study that has a similar character.


Surgical instrument segmentation - in general a pixel classification task - is fundamentally crucial for promoting cognitive intelligence in robot-assisted surgery (RAS). However, previous methods are struggling with discriminating instrument types and instances. To address above issues, we explore a mask classification paradigm that produces per-segment predictions. We propose TraSeTR, a novel Track-to-Segment Transformer that wisely exploits tracking cues to assist surgical instrument segmentation. TraSeTR jointly reasons about the instrument type, location, and identity with instance-level predictions i.e., a set of class-bbox-mask pairs, by decoding query embeddings. Specifically, we introduce the prior query that encoded with previous temporal knowledge, to transfer tracking signals to current instances via identity matching. A contrastive query learning strategy is further applied to reshape the query feature space, which greatly alleviates the tracking difficulty caused by large temporal variations. The effectiveness of our method is demonstrated with state-of-the-art instrument type segmentation results on three public datasets, including two RAS benchmarks from EndoVis Challenges and one cataract surgery dataset CaDIs.


Accelerated bridge construction is one rapid renewal technique being investigated to address the needs of the United States' aging infrastructure under the Second Strategic Highway Research Program (SHRP 2). SHRP 2 Project R04 aimed to develop standards and codes for accelerated bridge construction through the construction of a demonstration bridge. Several design details were important the rapid renewal aspect of the demonstration bridge, but the Ultra High Performance Concrete (UHPC) transverse full-depth deck joint over the pier was the focus of the laboratory testing due to its significance in the negative moment region tensile zone. Three suites of laboratory tests were conducted to evaluate the UHPC deck joints used in the demonstration bridge. Abrasion testing was completed to assess the abrasion resistance of the cast-in-place deck joints with respect to anticipated grinding operations, a constructability test was carried out to assess the placement procedure and feasibility of the longitudinal and transverse UHPC joint intersection detail, and strength and serviceability testing was completed to quantify the cracking moment and ultimate moment capacity of the transverse module-to-module connection detail over the bridge pier. Through this testing regiment, recommendations were developed for the demonstration bridge regarding construction and performance of the UHPC deck joints.


In this contribution, it is argued that Joseph Ratzinger had a profound influence on the Christology and specifically resurrection belief of the Catholic Church. This is evident in the way Ratzinger approached the challenge and relevance of Jesus' question, 'But who do you say that I am?' For Ratzinger, the reality of the incarnatory event means that the Christian faith is about a person, and thus, it is historical as well. In this sense, history for Ratzinger becomes more than just a succession of human events. It also includes God's act in history. Jesus Christ manifested God concretely. In the same light, for Ratzinger, the Church concretely manifested Jesus Christ. Hence, for Ratzinger, thinking with the Church is essential for a proper exegesis or hermeneutics. Because of that, tradition and Scripture are essential to Ratzinger's Christological thought. In the teachings of the Church fathers and the lives of the saints, he finds a concrete manifestation of Jesus' teaching as contained in the New Testament. Thus, his spiritual Christology results from his meditation on the fathers, saints and some contemporary theologians that makes Ratzinger's Christological thought to be both ancient and new. This contribution highlights a Christological approach that values the historical and brings it into conversation with the theological.Intradisciplinary and/or interdisciplinary implications: This research represents intradisciplinary work within the field of Christian Theology, connecting aspects of Catholic Theology to hermeneutical methodology and what is known as a Christology 'from above'. It connects a historical and theological perspective within systematic theology to highlight the ways in which the Pope and theologian Joseph Ratzinger influenced resurrection belief within the Catholic Church.


It is suggested to use integrated indicator for evaluation of state programs performance efficiency. This indicator is the average-weighted value of estimates of achievement of programs target indicators. Estimates of achievement of target indicators are calculated with the help of estimated functions. Results of expert poll and calculations of importance (weight) of all indicators of the Federal Target Program «Research and development on priority directions of scientific and technological complex of Russia for 2007-2013» are given. The offered methodology is applicable for any state program using the program and target methodology of planning.


Abstract This article presents a newly deciphered Old Babylonian fragment of the Epic of Gilgameš. The passages of text preserved on it tell of Enkidu's encounter with the prostitute and of his arrival in the city of Uruk, and clarify the relationship between other sources for the same episode. The perceived difference between the Old and Standard Babylonian poems' treatment of Enkidu's seduction disappears. The extant versions can be reconciled in a single narrative, common to all versions, that holds two different weeks of sexual intercourse. The different narrative strategies deployed in describing them are one of the ways in which the poem explores Enkidu's psychological development as he changes from wild man to socialized man.


STUDY OBJECTIVES
Eosinophilic bronchitis (EB) presents as a chronic cough and sputum eosinophilia without airflow limitation or bronchial hyperreactivity. Its long-term clinical course remains unknown. This study evaluated how frequently EB recurs and whether it develops chronic airway obstruction.

DESIGN
This study was a prospective analysis.

METHODS
Cough severity, FEV(1), provocative concentration of methacholine causing a 20% fall in FEV(1), and sputum eosinophil percentages were serially measured in 36 subjects for up to 48 months. All subjects inhaled corticosteroids until cough subsided.

RESULTS
Five of the twenty four follow-up subjects (21%) had a recurrent episode of EB 4 to 6 months after disappearance of the first episode of EB (recurrent eosinophilic bronchitis). Progressive FEV(1) reduction > 20% was observed in three of the subjects, including a subject with asthma developing at the ninth month. Nineteen subjects had no recurrence of cough (nonrecurrent eosinophilic bronchitis) and no progressive FEV(1) reduction > 20%. However, sputum eosinophilia recurred between 4 months and 24 months in 10 subjects. Mean values of FEV(1) at the ninth and 12th months of the study were significantly lower in the recurrent eosinophilic bronchitis group than in the nonrecurrent eosinophilic bronchitis group (p < 0.01).

CONCLUSION
These results suggest that repeated episode of EB is associated with the development of chronic airflow obstruction, including asthma.


ABSTRACT Southern Bering Sea fishermen are vulnerable to losing access to key fisheries due largely to policy changes, permit loss, and the expense of fishing operations. Local residents generally do not have fishing rights in many of the high value commercial fisheries. They must continuously shape policy and explore alternative economies in order to stay fishermen. We were contracted by the U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management to study the role of subsistence and commercial fisheries, land use, socioeconomics, and sharing networks in Alutiiq and Aleut/Unangan villages. Through an exploration of these data using innovative social network analysis that presents relationships, social stratification, commercialisation, and other dependencies in the maintenance of fisheries, sharing, trading, and revenue streams, this paper shows that in two of the most socioeconomically valuable fisheries, king crab (Paralithodes sp. and Lithodes sp) and cod (Gadidae), local peoples have had to gain access to these foods by using means outside of what are academically perceived as their traditional subsistence and commercial allocation, resulting in adaptive networks of distribution. This work shows the range of networks surrounding these key foods and their associated vulnerabilities and resilience. Those sharing networks that demonstrate greater interconnectedness are much more stable and resilient.


Despite efforts to redress the problem of social inequity within
 education, data reveals the student attainment gap continues to widen on the
 basis of socioeconomic background, particularly within Anglophone contexts
 (OECD, 2019; Wilkinson & Pickett, 2009). Bourdieu's (1986) concept of 'cultural
 capital' has been one especially powerful concept for understanding the causes
 of such inequity as it relates to social class, and how entrenched patterns of
 privilege within institutions, such as schools, value certain forms of cultural
 capital – and associated ways of knowing, being, and doing – over others. Much
 of the existing CLIL research on social (in)equity has tended to examine either
 the impact of programmatic conditions on dis/advantage (e.g., streaming, access;
 see also Evniskaya & Llinares, this issue), or the role of language for
 enabling more inclusive instructional practices (e.g., differentiation,
 scaffolding). Both lines of inquiry have produced valuable insights on how CLIL
 can contribute to more equitable outcomes, but this paper aims to offer a third
 line, focusing on how greater equity can be achieved through the
 conceptualization of culture within CLIL contexts. Informed by Bourdieu's
 concept of 'cultural capital' which has helped advance class-based
 understandings of inequity, the paper develops a pedagogic framework that
 explicitly accounts for culture when there is a simultaneous focus on both
 language and content, drawing on examples from instructional practice.


Banana: The average price was distinctly lower than in 2005 but slightly above average. Supply was measured. Arrivals from Africa and the West Indies, losing ground, were respectively 7% and more than 20% below the three-year average. Likewise, exports from Ecuador to all destinations were slightly smaller than those of preceding years (strong increase in FOB price and freight cost) while those from Colombia continued to decrease. Domestic demand was fairly dull as is usual in September but the comparatively attractive retail prices and more numerous promotion operations played a positive role. In contrast, export business was fairly dull. Avocado: The 'Hass' market was very difficult during the first two-thirds of the month. Although arrivals were very limited, the range was particularly wide and quality often uneven because of the very large quantities of unsold Peruvian, South African and Chilean fruits carried over from August. Prices remained at rock bottom levels-below cost price-until the very end of the month. In this context, exports of green varieties went mainly to the markets in northern Europe. Orange: The market remained distinctly under-supplied. Firstly, deliveries from South Africa remained much smaller than normal while only very small stocks were available at the beginning of the month; this was particularly the case for sought-after sizes such as 72/88 (cumulated arrivals at the end of August were some 40% down on the two preceding years). Secondly, Argentinian shipments to the EU were nearly 30% smaller than the three-year average as exporters had favoured the Russian market. Prices climbed and were very firm. Grapefruit: Under-supply was distinctly less marked than in July and August but remained significant. Mexico was strongly present. Deliveries from the Yucatan were well up on those of previous years and were completed by the first exports of fruits from the Michoacan to the EU. South African shipments were also larger than average. However, deliveries from Honduras were probably slightly smaller than average and the Cuba harvest was delayed. In addition, no stocks were available at the beginning of the month and commercial channels were empty. As a result, prices remained stable and well above average throughout the month. Litchi: The Israeli litchi export season came to an end three weeks earlier than in 2005, leaving the European market to benefit from shipments from Spain only. The strong decrease in supplies favoured rare heights in the price of Spanish fruits in the absence of any competition. The shortage of produce became more acute in the second half of the month with the end of the season in Spain. Litchi should remain absent from the European market until the start of the Indian Ocean export season. Mango: Mango supplies to the European market in September was based on deliveries from Israel and Brazil, with the volumes from the latter increasing steadily and dominating those from Israel. Demand was fairly slow throughout the month and market releases were smaller, resulting in the maintaining of good prices, especially for fruits arriving by sea. Spain started its shipping campaign with produce midway between sea and air quality. The latter origin has undoubtedly profited from the limiting of shipments from Israel to consolidate the commercial niche initiated two years ago. The air mango market was more difficult, especially during the second half of the month. Pineapple: September was a fairly difficult month for operators on the pineapple market. Poor demand combined with an increase in volumes resulted in the forming of stocks that weighed strongly on the market and on prices. In general, the marketing of pineapple consisted mainly of the management of large stocks throughout the month. The situation was hardly any better on the air pineapple market as business decreased throughout the month. In contrast, although prices did not increase strongly, the situation of the 'Victoria' market


The results are presented of a statistical analysis of the variability of the circle of Willis using univariate and bivariate methods. For this purpose 100 circles of Willis were available. From each circle 19 indexes of arterial size were determined, the basilar artery was measured in two places. Half the circumference was measured. This data yielded no evidence of differences between left- and right-sided vessels in the sample. An important source of variation is the general size of all vessels considered. When the data are cleared from this general size variation, correlation coefficients reveal interesting relations between the vessels. The posterior communicating arteries are strongly related to the ipsilateral carotid artery, whereas a strong inverse relationship exists with the basilar artery and the precommunicating part of the ipsilateral posterior cerebral artery. These relationships can be understood from the expected patterns of the blood flow in these vessels. Similar relationships can be found in the anterior part of the circle of Willis and in the vertebro-basilar junction. In a different manner, based on previous haemodynamic studies, the relation between blood flow and vessel size within the circle of Willis can be demonstrated by relating the ratios of the sizes of afferent and efferent arteries to the sizes of the posterior communicating arteries, an "intuitive" model. The supposed correlations of the outcome of this "intuitive" model with the size of the communicating arteries appeared to by highly significant. It is concluded that the variations of the circle of Willis are related to the individual variations of the blood flow in this arterial network.


Background Over the past decade, there have been resurgences and large-scale outbreaks of mumps worldwide. Little evidence is available on the relationship between meteorological factors and the incidence of mumps. We aimed to explore the effects of meteorological factors on mumps incidence. Methods: A Poisson regression model combined with a distributed lag non-linear model (DLNM) was used to evaluate the association between meteorological factors and the mumps incidence in Guangzhou, China, 2005–2012. Results Nonlinear relationships between meteorological factors, except sunshine hours, and mumps incidence were observed. The relative risks (RRs) of mean temperature, relative humidity and atmospheric pressure were 1.81 (95% confidence interval (CI), 1.41 to 2.32), 1.28 (95% CI, 1.02 to 1.59), and 0.80 (95% CI, 0.67 to 0.95) comparing the 99th percentile to the median of their own, respectively. For wind velocity, the RR was 0.70 (95%CI, 0.54 to 0.91) comparing the 1st percentile to the median. The hot effect and cold effect were larger in females than in males, and the hot effect increased with age. Conclusions Mean temperature, relative humidity, wind velocity and atmospheric pressure might be important predictors of the mumps incidence. Tropical cyclone caused a higher increase in mumps cases. Our findings highlight the need to strengthen the awareness of using protective measures during typhoon days and allocating more attention to the susceptible populations during the summer. The two-dose regimen of mumps vaccine should be included in the National Immunization Program schedule, and the catch-up vaccination campaigns should be promoted among adults.


Objective: to develop technologies for preoperative preparation of the posterior lamellar corneal graft based on our own formulation of the preservation medium for optimal dehydration of the donor cornea and a technique for cutting out an ultrathin flap using an optimized method at the Eye Tissue Bank. Materials methods. In a series of experimental studies, we obtained data on the hydration level of cadaveric donor corneas that were preserved in various solutions at different observation periods. Using 16 corneas, analytical weighing and pachymetry were performed via optical coherence tomography in the experimental (n = 8) and control (n = 8) groups. Morphological and functional characteristics of the corneal endothelium were then assessed. At the next stage of work, ultrathin grafts were formed from 16 corneas after hypothermic preservation in the experimental (n = 8) and control (n = 8) solutions by single-pass microkeratome, followed by microscopy of the samples using a scanning electron microscope. Results. After the first days of preservation in the proposed solution, there was dehydration of 9% cornea in the experimental group in comparison with the samples of the control group. After 4 days of preservation, there was no reliable difference found between the groups (p > 0.05) in the study of the endothelial cell viability of ultra-thin corneal grafts by immunofluorescent microscopy using the «Live and dead» marker. Scanning electron microscopy revealed that corneal stromal collagen fibers, preserved in the proposed medium, retained their integrity. Conclusion. The proposed technology can be recommended for use at eye banks for formation of an ultra-thin corneal graft at the preoperative stage.


A simulation study on the Double-layer Beam Shaping Assembly (DBSA) system has been carried out. This study used fast neutron beam resulting from reactions of 30 MeV protons with beryllium target. The MCNPX code was utilized to design the DBSA and the phantom as well as to calculate neutron flux on the phantom. The distribution of epithermal neutron flux and gamma in the DBSA and phantom were computed using the PHITS code. The spectrum of radiation beams generated by the DBSA shows the characteristics that the typical epithermal neutron flux of 1.0 x109 n/(cm2.s), the ratio of epithermal to the thermal and fast neutron flux of 344 and 85, respectively and the ratio of gamma dose to the epithermal neutron flux of 1.82 x 10-13 Gy.cm2. The test of epithermal neutron beams irradiation on the water phantom shows that epithermal neutrons are thermalized and penetrate the phantom up to 12 cm in depth. The maximum value of neutron flux is 1.1 x 109 n/(cm2.s) at a depth of 2 cm in phantom.


VIA is a mobile art project (video-dance and computational music) semiotically translated to photographic media by means of formal constraints derived from selected properties of Rio de Janeiro's predefined downtown routes. Under the constraints of street buildings and the morphology of the routes, questions regarding the influence of the bodily movements of the urban space led to the creation of a dance typology. This typology is related to pedestrians in the area and to the structure of the buildings spans where the performance happened. The dance movements captured in the videos were restricted and regulated by the physical environment and its main features. Here, an intersemiotic translation of a mobile art project to a photographic essay is presented and described. It strongly relates, and tentatively explores, both an artistic research praxis and a theoretical discussion. The essay explores an analogous semiotic effect from the VIA project on the photographic essay as a result of this investigation.


Abstract. Weather conditions and prey abundance impact many birds, but the influence differs between species and regions. I used 18-year data from Estonia, north-eastern Europe, in order to analyse the comparative effects of these factors on the breeding performance and nestling sex ratio in the Lesser Spotted Eagle. All studied reproductive parameters showed strong inter-annual fluctuations but no significant trends. Breeding frequency (proportion of pairs laying) was positively influenced by a warm pre-laying period (temperature in April) and a wet preceding season. These factors are probably associated with the higher occurrence and activity of amphibians that constituted important prey of the Lesser Spotted Eagle in spring. Breeding success (proportion of successful breeders) was determined mostly by the abundance of voles. Productivity (number of fledglings per nest) depended additively both on the spring temperature and abundance of voles in the breeding season; fledging of two nestlings was recorded regularly, mostly in years with high vole abundance. The total offspring sex ratio was slightly, though non-significantly, female-biased. Annual proportion of female nestlings was positively correlated with reproductive parameters and associated with rain in the preceding season, suggesting determination of fledgling sex ratio prior egg-laying. The results help to explain fluctuations in the reproductive performance of the Lesser Spotted Eagle and should be taken into account when monitoring and managing for conservation of this species.


Introduction: Despite significant progress in the treatment of multiple myeloma (MM), the disease remains incurable and typically follows a pattern of multiple responses and relapses. In the relapsed/refractory MM setting (RRMM), outcomes for patients may be particularly discouraging. New treatments that are safe and effective are therefore of urgent need for this population. Since its FDA approval in 1998 for the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis, leflunomide has been used in over 300,000 patients worldwide. Leflunomide is hepatically cleared and has a favorable toxicity profile even when given over long periods. Its primary mechanism of action is inhibition of pyrimidine synthesis by targeting dihydroorotate dehydrogenase, thus achieving anti-proliferative effects on B and T lymphocytes. The anti-neoplastic potential of this agent has been studied in a number of pre-clinical tumor models.
 Leflunomide's immunoregulatory action may be related to functional inhibition of CD4+ effector T cells, including Th17 cells as well as dysregulation of T regulatory cells (Tregs). We found that leflunomide-treated C57BL/KaLwRij mice engrafted with 5TGM1 cells had more robust expansion of CD8+ cytotoxic T cells and subsequent decrease of CD4+ Tregs compared to untreated mice. We have also noted that leflunomide impairs growth of MM cells at least partly through inhibition of PIM kinases and c-Myc signaling. We present here final results from a phase 1 study of leflunomide in patients with RRMM.
 Methods: This single center, single agent, phase 1 dose-escalation trial was designed to determine the maximum tolerated dose of leflunomide in patients with RRMM. The trial implemented a modified rolling six phase 1 dose escalation design. The primary objectives were as follows: 1) to determine the maximum tolerated dose and recommended phase 2 dose of leflunomide; 2) to assess the safety and tolerably of leflunomide at each dose level by evaluation of toxicities. Leflunomide was administered at a loading dose of 100 mg daily for the first three days, then daily in 28-day cycles. The starting dose of daily leflunomide was 20 mg daily, with dose escalation in increments of 20 mg/day, up to 60 mg/day. Dose de-escalation in decrements of 10mg/day was planned.
 Results: A total of 12 patients have been enrolled starting in December 2015 and treated. The median age is 68 (range 48 - 85), and the median number of prior therapies is 5 (range: 3 - 14). Nine patients had prior autologous stem cell transplant. Double refractory (lenalidomide/bortezomib) disease was noted in 9 patients. High-risk cytogenetics were observed in 5 patients including 2 patients with del17p. All 12 subjects were evaluable for toxicity. One subject was not evaluable for response because of non-compliance. Of the eleven patients evaluable for response, the median number of cycles was 3 (range 1- 15). The median follow up was 177 days (range: 42 - 602). Three patients were treated on DL 1 (20 mg) and three on DL3 (40 mg) without incidence of DLT. At DL5 (60 mg), one patient had a DLT with grade III elevation of alanine aminotransferase; an additional three patients were enrolled at this dose level without further DLTs.
 One out of 12 subjects remains on treatment, 8 patients were removed from study due to disease progression, two due to adverse events (bacteremia at 60 mg, possibly related to study drug and angioedema at 40 mg, not related to study drug) and one from noncompliance. The most common toxicities were hematologic. There were 4 patients with grade 1 or 2 neutropenia on the 20 and 40 mg dose levels and 1 patient with grade 4 lymphopenia on the 40 mg dose. Except for the DLT, all non-hematologic toxicities were ≤ grade 2.
 Response: Although not all patients were treated at the 60 mg dose, a clinical benefit rate of 90% has been seen, with 9/10 achieving stable disease (SD). The median duration of SD among 9 patients thus far is 56 days (range: 27-401). In the five evaluable patients with high risk cytogenetics, four of them achieved a clinical benefit. Two subjects had SD lasting nearly one year or longer. In this small cohort, no association between dose and benefit was observed.
 Conclusion: Leflunomide is a safe and well-tolerated oral option for patients with RRMM, with a clinical benefit from single agent dosing. On the basis of our preclinical work showing synergistic inhibition of MM using leflunomide, pomalidomide, and dexamethasone, we plan clinical testing of this drug combination.

 Rosenzweig: Celgene: Speakers Bureau. Krishnan:Janssen: Consultancy, Speakers Bureau; Sutro: Speakers Bureau; Onyx: Speakers Bureau; Takeda: Speakers Bureau; Celgene: Consultancy, Equity Ownership, Speakers Bureau. Forman:Mustang Therapeutics: Other: Licensing Agreement, Patents & Royalties, Research Funding.


Purpose: Gene expression profile (GEP)–based classification of colonic diseases is a new method for diagnostic purposes. Our aim was to develop diagnostic mRNA expression patterns that may establish the basis of a new molecular biological diagnostic method. Experimental Design: Total RNA was extracted, amplified, and biotinylated from frozen colonic biopsies of patients with colorectal cancer (n = 22), adenoma (n = 20), hyperplastic polyp (n = 11), inflammatory bowel disease (n = 21), and healthy normal controls (n = 11), as well as peripheral blood samples of 19 colorectal cancer and 11 healthy patients. Genome-wide gene expression profile was evaluated by HGU133plus2 microarrays. To identify the differentially expressed features, the significance analysis of microarrays and, for classification, the prediction analysis of microarrays were used. Expression patterns were validated by real-time PCR. Tissue microarray immunohistochemistries were done on tissue samples of 121 patients. Results: Adenoma samples could be distinguished from hyperplastic polyps by the expression levels of nine genes including ATP-binding cassette family A, member 8, insulin-like growth factor 1 and glucagon (sensitivity, 100%; specificity, 90.91%). Between low-grade and high-grade dysplastic adenomas, 65 classifier probesets such as aquaporin 1, CXCL10, and APOD (90.91/100) were identified; between colorectal cancer and adenoma, 61 classifier probesets including axin 2, von Willebrand factor, tensin 1, and gremlin 1 (90.91/100) were identified. Early- and advanced-stage colorectal carcinomas could be distinguished using 34 discriminatory transcripts (100/66.67). Conclusions: Whole genomic microarray analysis using routine biopsy samples is suitable for the identification of discriminative signatures for differential diagnostic purposes. Our results may be the basis for new GEP-based diagnostic methods. (Cancer Epidemiol Biomarkers Prev 2008;17(10):2835–45)


In 1993, Sidney Roberts authored a famous article in Intertax on agencies and permanent establishments regarding the OECD Commentaries from a civil law perspective. The article engendered much debate (for example, see Avery Jones et al., "Agents as Permanent Establishments under the OECD Model Tax Convention", European Taxation 5 (1993), pages 154 to 181). It was, however, very long and complex. This is an abstract of the article, which should serve both to refresh the debate and communicate the original concepts succinctly.