When monkeys learn to group visual stimuli into arbitrary categories, lateral intraparietal area (LIP) neurons become category-selective. Surprisingly, the representations of learned categories are overwhelmingly biased: nearly all LIP neurons in a given animal prefer the same category over other behaviorally equivalent categories. We propose a model where such biased representations develop through the interplay between Hebbian plasticity and the recurrent connectivity of LIP. In this model, two separable processes of positive feedback unfold in parallel: in one, category selectivity emerges from competition between prefrontal inputs; in the other, bias develops due to lateral interactions among LIP neurons. This model reproduces the levels of category selectivity and bias observed under a variety of conditions, as well as the redevelopment of bias after monkeys learn redefined categories. It predicts that LIP receptive fields would spatially cluster by preferred category, which we experimentally confirm. In summary, our model reveals a mechanism by which LIP learns abstract representations and assigns meaning to sensory inputs.


The effects of 2 years post-treatment of group selection and 2-aged timber harvests on woodland salamanders and mammals were assessed on stands in high elevation, southern Appalachian northern red oak (Quercus rubra)-flame azalea (Rhododendron calendulaceum) communities, in the Nantahala National Forest. We collected 4 salamander species and 10 small mammal species. We detected no difference in woodland salamander relative abundance between timber harvests and uncut (control) stands. Similarly, relative abundance of all small mammal species, except masked shrews (Sorex cinereus), was unaffected by timber harvest. Masked shrew relative abundance was greater post-harvest in 2-aged harvest stands than in group selection harvest stands or uncut stands. For masked shrews, these high elevation, 2-aged harvests may have provided an optimal mix of residual overstory shading, dense shrub-layer shading from new regeneration, and abundant downed coarse woody debris. Alternative silvicultural practices such as group selection harvest and 2-aged harvests are compatible with goals of providing timber production without altering small mammal and woodland salamander assemblages on the Wine Spring Creek Ecosystem Management Project area.


Quick and reliable detection of bacterial species causing bovine sub-clinical mastitis is pivotal in determination of the antimicrobial treatment to minimize economic losses and ensure re-establishment of cattle health. The performance of conventional bacterial culture examination and real-time PCR based assay while screening cattle for sub-clinical mastitis is evaluated. 156 quarter milk samples (qms) (103 from sub-clinically affected (SCM) quarters and 53 from healthy quarters) were simultaneously subjected to PathoProof mastitis PCR assay and bacterial culture examination. On bacteriological culture examination, 93 (90.29 %) out of 103 qms from SCM quarters showed positive results, revealing either the presence of 1, 2 or 3 bacterial species. However, PathoProof mastitis PCR assay showed presence of one or more bacterial species in all 103 SCM quarters. From healthy quarters, out of a total of 53 qms, 8 (15.09 %) were positive bacteriologically and by PathoProof mastitis PCR assay. Out of remaining 45 (84.91 %) qms, 42 (79.25 %) which showed negative results on bacterial culture showed presence of one or more bacterial species on PathoProof mastitis PCR assay. Overall, in 18 (11.54 %) out of 156 milk samples from healthy and sub-clinically mastitic quarters, both techniques provided identical results. In 78 (50%) qms, PathoProof mastitis PCR assay detected the species identified by bacterial culture, however, it also detected one or more additional species. In 8 (5.13 %) qms, both tests identified different species, while in 52 (33.33 %) qms which were negative on bacterial culture, PathoProof mastitis PCR assay detected one or more species. Thus, common mastitis causing bacteria may be present in large numbers, but are not detected by conventional bacterial culturing. The real-time PCR kit exemplified the advantages over conventional culturing in terms of speed, automated interpretation and increased sensitivity. Hence, this kit proves to be an indispensible parallel component in identification of pathogens. Quick and reliable identification of mastitis causing microorganism is central in management of disease and deciding the treatment with antimicrobials. In future, a similar kit can be designed which is affordable to dairy farmers across the world.


A report published by the Volpe National Transportation Systems Center titled "Vulnerability Assessment of the Transportation Infrastructure Relying on the Global Positioning System" (29 August 2001) states that the civil transportation infrastructure, seeking the increased efficiency made possible by GPS, is developing a reliance on GPS that could lead to serious consequences if the service is disrupted, and the applications are not prepared with mitigating equipment and operational procedures. The findings of the Volpe report suggest, among other things, that systems and procedures to monitor, report, and locate unintentional interference should be implemented or utilized in any application for which loss of GPS is not tolerable. This paper discussed the use of the GPS anomaly monitoring equipment suite (GAMES) to detect and report anomalies in GPS. The paper also discussed systems performance via test results and demonstrated how GAMES could be used for critical infrastructure protection. Data is presented to show the different anomalies that could occur as well as demonstrating how GAMES would handle such anomalies. GAMES give the user a real-time report on how accurate GPS is, and by using the GPS interference and navigation tool (GIANT) the user can predict the accuracy and effectiveness of GPS in the near future. The combination of these tools creates a "system" that can be used to monitor and evaluate the GPS environment and determine impacts on GPS-aided applications. Taking the application one step further, General Dynamics has developed the GPS interference location system (GELS) that ties directly to GAMES. When GAMES detects an anomaly, GILS begins to search for the interference(s) source and passes the collected data to the Web server where the location is computed and reported. This sensor will be described and test results will be presented to demonstrate the applicability and use for commercial as well as military use. By implementing GAMES, GILS, and GIANT, the question behind GPS reliability is a thing of the past, which will allow for increased use and reliance upon GPS. The knowledge gained from the development and application of these tools is one of the fundamental building blocks for this effort. This project developed a proof-of-concept that quantified the capability realized from being able to both detect and locate sources of interference during a GPS anomaly or interference event. This includes determining the benefits of interference identification for a variety of critical civil applications, and providing insights to help mitigate potential adverse impacts. The technical approaches undertaken are outlined, results-to-date presented, and recommendations discussed on how to take this project from proof-of-concept to fielded system.


This article explores the arguments for and against the use of government debt to finance large-scale public investments. Relative to the options of higher taxation or lower other expenditures, debt finance means that both the costs and the benefits of the investment fall on future generations. Debt funded public investments can be an important component of a fiscal stimulus policy package, especially when the effectiveness of monetary policy is limited. While the vision arguments presume socially beneficial investment projects are chosen, political choices often involve projects with low benefit cost ratios. More debt involves higher and higher costs, not only interest costs, but also laxer fiscal choices, a weaker basis for macroeconomic policy to counter future economic shocks, and in extreme cases a loss of policy autonomy. An independent and transparent body to undertake benefit cost assessments of investment projects, and with public release and scrutiny, would support a higher level of debt finance.


The link level performance gain of using multiple antennas in CDMA mobile stations is theoretically investigated and the corresponding capacity gain is evaluated by means of system level simulations. Depending on the channel model, the maximum ratio combiner improves the performance by 4-6 dB when the number of antennas is increased from one to two, and by another 3-5 dB when the number of antennas is increased from two to four. The resulting capacity gain is close to a direct translation of the link level gain. The optimum combiner is capable of completely suppressing a number of interfering rays equal to the number of antennas minus one. In contrast to the uplink, the downlink can greatly benefit from the suppression of a few interfering rays, leading to an additional substantial gain in downlink capacity.


The study was conducted in 19 villages of Bikaner and Churu districts. With the sample size of 316 cultivating clusterbean crop since last 5 years. Results indicated that majority of respondents had medium knowledge. Out of fifteen independent variables, two variable i.e. credit behaviour and economic motivation were found non-significant association and remaining thirteen were found significantly associated with knowledge level of the farmers regarding recommended production technologies of clusterbean cultivation likewise age, education, size of land holding, social participation, farm assets, credit behaviour, achievement motivation, risk orientation, training received, extension participation, progressiveness, source of information utilized, socio-economic status and extent of adoption.


Mineralization of renal tissue was investigated using Von Kossa's method and capillary gap technology. Combining these techniques allowed the simultaneous processing of 100 slides, reduced the volume of 5% silver nitrate required, and produced consistent dark brown to black silver deposits in positive control sections. A 25-fold savings in silver nitrate was achieved. By markedly reducing individual slide handling, technician time also was greatly reduced. Two or three slide sets, each containing approximately 100 slides, can be conveniently stained daily.


We collectively face a constellation of complex and interconnected environmental, social, and economic problems that threaten human and planetary wellbeing now and in the future. Learning that enables students across all levels and settings of education to become change agents for a more sustainable future, is widely expected to play a crucial role. However, "education as usual" with its one-way transmission of information from teacher to passive learners, disciplinary silos, and high-stakes, facts-based assessments, will not suffice to equip learners with the knowledge and competencies needed to address chronic and complex obstacles to sustainability. Forging a more sustainable path forward will require rethinking of traditional educational systems that were designed for different times. It will also necessitate a shift from traditional, teacher-centered pedagogies to strategies that nurture action-oriented, experiential and reflective learning in the face of complexity, uncertainty, and rapid change. In this contribution, the reflections of a British science teacher provide a first-hand perspective on the disconnect between the international discourse on transformative learning for sustainability and everyday classroom practice within the constraints of prevailing educational systems.


The influence of global warming on hazard risk is estimated from the results of the regional climate model by Japan Meteorological Agency and Meteorological Research Institute. The horizontal resolution of the model is about 20km and the model outputs are expected to be useful for the risk assessment of the future. Before beginning the risk assessment, the model output values during 1981-2000 were verified by comparing with observed precipitation data. The verification shows that the precision of the models are generally well in representation of the extreme precipitation distribution of the annual maximum daily precipitation. According to the analysis from the model outputs, the extreme daily precipitation in 100-yr time period will increase in some parts of western Hokkaido, northern Tohoku region, Hokuriku region and Nansei islands during 2081-2100.


Objective: The aim of this study is to report the relationship between certain single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNP) and blunted nighttime BP fall in hypertensive patients with CAD confirmed by coronary angiography. Figure. No caption available. Design and method: According to the percentage decrease in mean systolic and diastolic BP during the nighttime period subjects were classified as dippers or non-dippers (nighttime relative systolic or diastolic BP decline >= and <10% respectively). SNPs were selected from genome-wide association studies in which genome-wide association exceeded threshold of p<5x10-8. The SNPs were genotyped using IPLEX reaction on a MassARRAY platform. Only SNPs with a genotyping success rate greater than 90% and minor allele frequency were greater than 5%. As a quality control, we re-genotyped a random sample of 20% of the successfully genotyped samples for all genotypes, and the concordance was 99.9%. Genetic Risk Score (GRS18) was constructed to evaluate additive effect of 18 SNPs for non-dipping status. This multilocus score was created by summing the number of risk allels (0/1/2) for each of the 18 SNPs (1 and 2 for heterozygous and homozygous risk allele, respectively and 0 for homozygous non-risk allele). Results: In the present study, 1345 subjects with CHD were included. During follow-up period (median 8.3 years, interquartile range 5.3 to 9.0 years) there were 245 all-cause deaths (18.2%) including 114 CV deaths (8.5%). There were significant differences in the number of revascularizations between non-dippers SBP and DBP and dippers SBP and DBP (48.0% vs. 36.4%, p < 0.01). SNPs of the genes: MIA3, MRAS, PCSK9, SMG6, ZC3HC1 were related to a higher risk of non dipping SBP and DBP status. The association between GRS18 and non-dipping status is presented in Table. Conclusions: In the present study, polymorphisms of genes related to CHD (MIA3, MRAS, PCSK9, SMG6, ZC3HC1) were associated with non-dipping SBP and DBP profile and GRS18 was associated with non-dipping status. In addition, this profile was related to a higher risk of revascularization.


The diffusion behavior of Zn/Al interfaces in their powders sintering was investigated with SEM. The results show that Zn-Al eutectoid microstructure can be achieved through their powders sintering, and the diffusion characteristic between Zn and Al is just a demonstration of Kirkendall effect, by which Zn can dissolve into Al and contrarily Al cannot dissolve into Zn. During sintering, a diffusion-solution zone α′ has formed and subsequently transforms into eutectoid microstructure in cooling process. The superplastic deformation mechanism of Zn-Al eutectic alloy is phase boundary sliding which is controlled by diffusion-solution zone α′. If diffusion-solution zone α′ is unsaturated, it will have much more crystal defects and the combination between α′ and β phase is weak, thus the process of phase boundary sliding becomes easily; on the contrary, if the diffusion-solution zone α′ becomes thick and saturated, the sliding will be difficult.


A minor collapse observed in current-carrying plasma has been investigated in Large Helical Device (LHD). The magnetic configuration with high central rotational transform has ι/2π = 1 surface at the core region and is relatively unstable for the m/n = 1/1 mode (here, m and n are the poloidal and toroidal mode number, respectively). When the beam-driven current exceeds a certain value, the m/n = 1/1 mode grows with a growth time of ˜30 ms and causes a sudden drop of the plasma stored energy and the electron temperature, and it also limits the plasma current itself. A local flattening in an electron temperature profile appears just after the minor collapse. The mode does not rotate and stays at the same spatial location. The possibility of pressure- and current-driven magneto-hydro dynamics (MHD) instabilities is discussed.


For a quadrotor, one can identify the two well-known inherent rotorcraft characteristics: underactuation and strong coupling in pitch-yaw-roll. To confront these problems and design a station-keeping and tracking controller, dynamic inversion is used. Typical applications of dynamic inversion require the selection of the output control variables to render the internal dynamics stable. This means that in many cases, perfect tracking cannot be guaranteed for the actual desired outputs. Instead, the internal dynamics of the feedback linearised system is stabilised using a robust control term. Unlike standard dynamic inversion, the linear controller gains are chosen uniquely to satisfy the tracking performance. Stability and tracking performance are guaranteed using a Lyapunov-type proof. Simulation with a typical nonlinear quadrotor dynamic model is performed to show the effectiveness of the designed control law in the presence of input disturbances.


Large community clusters are becoming increasingly common in universities and other organizations due to the benefits they provide to the researchers in terms of operational costs and resource availability. However, efficient administration, failure diagnosis, and performance debugging on community clusters are challenging tasks due to the sheer diversity of workloads and users. These clusters are typically shared by users coming from various scientific domains and experience levels. Many users have little experience in computing and, hence, often face performance issues—leading to resource wastage. In this paper, we study these dynamics in one of the largest university-wide community clusters (Conte at Purdue University). We perform in-depth analysis of library and application usage patterns, job failures and performance issues. Further, we introduce a set of novel analysis techniques that can be used to identify hidden trends and diagnose job failures in compute clusters in general. We provide concrete recommendations for the cluster administrators and present case studies highlighting how such information can be used to proactively solve many user issues, ultimately leading to better quality of service.


With the increasing prevalence of coronary artery disease, antiplatelet therapy after percutaneous coronary intervention is becoming more important. As such realm is still very dynamic, it is important for clinicians to understand the evolution of antiplatelet therapies and current issues that are yet to be settled in the search for an ideal antiplatelet agent. Electronic searches were done using databases such as PubMed and Cochrane Library with appropriate keywords. Randomized controlled trials and retrospective studies found were then assessed for quality, and their references used to find additional studies. The field of study regarding the antiplatelet therapy is still an area in which much has yet to be found. Although clopidogrel and aspirin are cornerstones of therapy currently, other agents such as ticagrelor offer potential alternatives. This review presents an overview of current antiplatelet therapies and their relative risks and benefits.


Nanotechnology has the potential to revolutionize in poultry industry with new tools for the molecular treatment of diseases and enhancing the ability of animal to absorb nutrients and therefore improving productive performance response of poultry. The essential trace elements play important roles such as nutrients metabolism, antioxidant, component of numerous metalloenzymes and protein. Nanoparticles zinc oxide (Nano-ZnO) is the specially prepared mineral salt having particle size of 1 to 100 nm. It promotes growth can act as antibacterial agent, modulates the immunity and production of laying hens. Using of Nano-ZnO in laying hen's nutrition as nanoparticle size will help and improve the egg production sector. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to give an overview on the potential of Nano-ZnO as feed additives in laying hen diets, in order to explore the mechanism of the effects of Nano-ZnO supplementation on laying hen productive performance and to observe their influence on feed intake, ammonia emissions, digestibility, egg production, and egg quality.


Several recent works propose mobile sink based data gathering approaches to distribute energy consumption in Wireless Sensor Networks. However, mobility based algorithms require the sink to periodically update its location to the network to ensure multi-hop connectivity. This additional information increases the control traffic overhead, and thus energy consumption also increases. In this paper, we propose a distributive energy efficient sink location update mechanism for mobile sink WSNs, along with a preemptive buffering data collection technique. This sink location update mechanism combines MPR based broadcast [2] algorithm with a distributed local repair mechanism, whereby, sensor nodes dynamically control the scope of sink location update messages. In preemptive buffering mechanism, sink's neighbor nodes act as temporary data collection points, referred as roots, to prevent data loss when sink moves out of their vicinity. We show by simulations that our proposal effectively reduces the energy consumption and data losses of the network.


This research was conducted in Auckland, New Zealand between November 2019 and April 2021.  It outlines how emerging disruptive technology might help subject matter experts or professionals increase their Māori and Pacific cultural intelligence and disrupt systemic racism. Bridging Cultural Perspectives looks at how subject matter experts might embed this knowledge so interactions with their Māori and Pacific stakeholders are more empathetic and culturally competent. It also explores the attitudes and behaviours that subject matter experts (SMEs) have that prevent them from becoming culturally competent or empathetic. Phase 1 of this research identified the cultural intelligence challenges faced by subject matter experts and the types of support they needed. The aim was not only to improve their cultural ways of working but to unpack what systemic racism and unconscious bias at work looked like and how they might address these issues. Phase 2's focus was to understand the drivers of systemic racism and to plan, execute, complete and evaluate a digital prototype that would disrupt these drivers. The aim was to achieve mutually beneficial outcomes when working with and for Māori and Pacific peoples. This has resulted in two prototypes – the first is a digital platform for workplaces that uses nudge learning to raise peoples' cultural intelligence through an organisation's digital channels and devices.  The second is a cultural intelligence academy that uses blended learning to raise the cultural intelligence of subject matter experts. Using systems practice, I also created a cultural intelligence framework and two systems maps that chart the deep structures of systemic racism and the behaviours that underpin them.


The availability of increasing volumes of multi-omics profiles across many cancers promises to improve our understanding of the regulatory mechanisms underlying cancer. The main challenge is to integrate these multiple levels of omics profiles and especially to analyze them across many cancers. Here we present AMARETTO, an algorithm that addresses both challenges in three steps. First, AMARETTO identifies potential cancer driver genes through integration of copy number, DNA methylation and gene expression data. Then AMARETTO connects these driver genes with co-expressed target genes that they control, defined as regulatory modules. Thirdly, we connect AMARETTO modules identified from different cancer sites into a pancancer network to identify cancer driver genes. Here we applied AMARETTO in a pancancer study comprising eleven cancer sites and confirmed that AMARETTO captures hallmarks of cancer. We also demonstrated that AMARETTO enables the identification of novel pancancer driver genes. In particular, our analysis led to the identification of pancancer driver genes of smoking-induced cancers and 'antiviral' interferon-modulated innate immune response. Software availability AMARETTO is available as an R package at https://bitbucket.org/gevaertlab/pancanceramaretto Highlights We present an algorithm for pancancer identification of cancer driver genes based on multiomics data fusion GPX2 is a novel driver gene in smoking induced cancers and validated using knockdown of GPX2 in the A549 cell line. OAS2 is a novel driver gene defining cancers with an antiviral signature supported by increased infiltration of tumor-associated macrophages. Research in context We present an algorithm that combines multiple sources of molecular data to identify novel genes that are involved in cancer development. We applied this algorithm on multiple cancers in a combined fashion and identified a network of pancancer driver genes. We highlighted two genes in detail GPX2 and OAS2. We showed that GPX2 is an important cancer gene in smoking induced cancers, and validated our predictions using experimental data where GPX2 was inactivated in a lung cancer cell line. Similarly we showed that OAS2 is an important cancer driver gene in cancers that show an antiviral signature.


Disc- and spherical-shaped sphalerite concretions, containing variable amounts of carbonate, occur in thin-bedded Silurian dolomite of southern Ontario. Seven of these range from 27 to 92 weight percent ZnS and trace element analyses show that the sphalerite is relatively pure. Sulfur isotope compositions of 15 specimens ranged from --1.48 to--5.41 delta 34 Sppm with an average of --3.05ppm. The presence of possible gypsum molds in the concretions, the isotopic composition of sulfur, the high zinc and hydrocarbon content of the host dolomite, and the broader geological environment of their occurrence, together suggest a biogenic-diagenetic process for the formation of the concretions.


A 12-month study of the excretory behaviour of resident and migrant labourers in Gezira, Sudan, was undertaken to contribute base-line information towards the development of a new control strategy. Of 398 observed acts of excretion 70% of urinations and 93% of defaecations occurred in sites far removed from any water body. After excretion only 31% people washed themselves (and only 7.1% actually washed their genital region directly into a water body). People excreting far from water were as likely to wash afterwards as those excreting near a water body. This finding contradicted previous expectations based on the hygienic precepts of Islam. The results show that privacy is a more important consideration than proximity of water in the selection of a site for excretion, and suggest that there is only limited regular contamination by S. mansoni eggs under the observed conditions.


Despite its rather strong and venerable democratic credentials the Philippines is still marred by political violence. Targeted killings and physical harassment by vigilantes, death squads, private armed groups, para-military militias, the police or members of the armed forces as well as violent competition for political jobs cost hundreds of lives every year. One central anchor point of this broad range of violent actors and forms are the locally embedded political bosses. (Defective) democracy provides an ideal frame for the continuing competition between various segments of the highly fragmented elite. The paper shows how the bosses succeeded in controlling most means of political violence employed and were thereby able to advance their interests to an extraordinary extent. Upholding private control over means of violence furthered their interests as a political class even though it weakened the state.


We present the Intelligent Automated Client Diagnostic (IACD) system, which only relies on inference from Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) packet traces for rapid diagnosis of client device problems that cause network performance issues. Using soft-margin Support Vector Machine (SVM) classifiers, the system (i) distinguishes link problems from client problems, and (ii) identifies characteristics unique to client faults to report the root cause of the client device problem. Experimental evaluation demonstrated the capability of the IACD system to distinguish between faulty and healthy links and to diagnose the client faults with 98% accuracy in healthy links. The system can perform fault diagnosis independent of the client's specific TCP implementation, enabling diagnosis capability on diverse range of client computers.


Asian dust events are massive meteorological phenomena during which dust particles from Chinese and Mongolian deserts are blown into the atmosphere and carried by westerly winds across Northeast Asia. Recently, there has been steady increase in both the frequency and the severity of Asian atmospheric dust events. Concern has been expressed regarding the potential health hazards in affected areas. The principal nature of the damage associated with Asian dust events differs between the emission (sandstorm) and downwind (air pollution) regions. In the emission region, the health impacts of dust storms are reflected in the high prevalence of respiratory diseases and severe subjective symptoms. Extreme dust storm events may cause a disaster to happen. In downwind regions such as Japan, analysis of Asian dust particles has shown the presence of ammonium ions, sulfate ions, nitrate ions, and heavy metal compounds that are considered not to originate from soil. Asian dust particles have been thought to adsorb anthropogenic atmospheric pollutants during transport. Therefore, Asian dust events coincide with increases in daily hospital admissions and clinical visits for allergic diseases such as asthma, allergic rhinitis, and conjunctivitis. Although the effect of Asian dust on human health in each region is influenced by a variety of different mechanisms, human activities are partly responsible for such negative effects in many situations. We therefore need to address these environmental problems.


Coupling of cross-organizational business processes in electronic markets is a difficult and time-consuming task. In practice business processes are geographically distributed which makes it particulary difficult for business partners to coordinate their supply chains and customer relationship management with business units. By using formal description languages such as Petri nets for modeling inter-organizational business processes, purely syntactic composition problems of distributed business environments can be solved. However, the missing semantic representation of Petri nets can hamper the interconnectivity of business processes. Usually, several business partners, even if they share similar demands, have their own specific vocabularies. By representing business processes with Petri nets in combination with the Web Ontology Language (OWL) our approach provides flexibility, ease of integration and a significant level of automation of loosely coupled business processes even if they do not share their respective vocabularies.


Abstract The occurrence and concentrations of organochlorine pesticides and polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) were determined in 158 muscle samples of bream (Abramis brama) and roach (Rutilus rutilus), and 84 samples of sediments collected from 10 river and lake sampling sites in 2011 and 2012. The concentrations of DDTs (p,p'-DDT, o,p'-DDT, p,p'-DDE, and p,p'-DDD), HCH isomers (a-, ß-, and y-HCH), HCB, and PCBs (six indicator PCB congeners 28, 52, 101, 138, 153 and 180) were determined using the capillary gas chromatography. The mean concentrations of DDTs in bream and roach were in the range of 11.2-654 and 4.5-121 ug/kg wet weight respectively, and PCBs were in the range of 1.3-75.9 and 1.1-112 ug/kg wet weight, respectively. Mean concentrations of DDTs and PCBs in sediments were 0.5-270 ug/kg dry weight and ⋋0.1-2.2 ug/kg dry weight respectively. The study showed clear spatial differences in the levels of organochlorine pesticides and PCBs in fish and sediments from different aquatic ecosystems. The highest levels of contaminants were detected in fish and sediments from the Vistula River in vicinity of Cracow. The possible risk to the fish meat consumers and ecological risk were evaluated.


Objective: To present the results of a systematic review of literature published between January 1, 1980, and December 31, 2000, that reports epidemiologic estimates of substance-related disorders. Method: We conducted a literature search of substance-related epidemiologic studies, using medline and HealthSTAR databases and applying a set of predetermined inclusion and exclusion criteria to identify relevant studies. We extracted and analyzed prevalence and incidence data for heterogeneity. Results: A total of 19 prevalence studies of substance-related disorders met inclusion criteria for this review. Heterogeneity analyses revealed significant variability across 1-year and lifetime prevalence of both alcohol and other substance use disorders. The corresponding 1-year and lifetime pooled rates were 6.6 per 100 and 13.2 per 100, respectively, for alcohol use disorders and 2.4 per 100 and 2.4 per 100, respectively, for other substance use disorders. We observed variability among countries and also among regions within the same country. In contrast to other drug problems, alcohol use disorders were substantially more common, were more likely to occur among male subjects, and were more likely to be associated with abuse symptoms. For other drugs, dependence was consistently more prevalent than abuse. Conclusions: Studies using rigorous and comparable methodologies report significant variability in rates of alcohol and other substance use disorders. These data suggest that different policies and regional practices are associated with variability in rates of disorders. Policy-makers and health planners require regular, regionally sensitive estimates of prevalence rates to respond effectively to unique patterns of need in their constituencies.


Selecting appropriate datasets is critical in modern computer vision. However, no general-purpose tools exist to evaluate the extent to which two datasets differ. For this, we propose representing images - and by extension datasets - using Distributions of Neuron Activations (DNAs). DNAsfit distributions, such as histograms or Gaussians, to activations of neurons in a pre-trained feature extractor through which we pass the imager s) to represent. This extractor is frozen for all datasets, and we rely on its generally expressive power in feature space. By comparing two DNAs, we can evaluate the extent to which two datasets differ with granular control over the comparison attributes of interest, providing the ability to customise the way distances are measured to suit the requirements of the task at hand. Furthermore, DNAs are compact, representing datasets of any size with less than 15 megabytes. We demonstrate the value of DNAs by evaluating their applicability on several tasks, including conditional dataset comparison, synthetic image evaluation, and transfer learning, and across diverse datasets, ranging from synthetic cat images to celebrity faces and urban driving scenes.


The historic 2008 Democratic presidential primary race between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton posed a difficult choice for egalitarian White voters, and many commentators speculated that the election outcome would reflect pitting the effects of racism against sexism (Steinem, 2008). Because self-reported prejudices may be untrustworthy, we used the Implicit Association Test (IAT) to assess White adults' (1) condemnation of prejudices, and (2) attitudes toward the candidates in relation to voting decisions, as part of an online survey. Results supported the proposed compensatory egalitarianism process, such that Whites' voting choice was consistent with their implicit candidate preference, but in an effort to remain egalitarian, participants compensated for this preference by automatically condemning prejudice toward the other candidate's group. Additional findings showed that this process was moderated by participants' ethnicity and level of prejudice, as expected. Specifically, compensatory egalitarianism occurred primarily among Whites and individuals low in explicit prejudice. Implications for candidate support, aversive racism theory, and implicit compensation processes are discussed. Language: en


Achondroplasia is the most common genetic form of dwarfism inherited as an autosomal dominant disorder. Individuals affected with achondroplasia have impaired ability to form bone from cartilage (endochondral bone formation). Homozygous achondroplasia is a neonatal lethal condition. The vast majority of patients with achondroplasia have a G-to-A transition at position 1138 of the fibroblast growth factor receptor 3 (FGFR3) cDNA sequence, resulting in the Gly-to-Arg substitution at position 380 of the FGFR3 protein. This mutation has been diagnosed by SfcI digestion of amplified genomic DNA. However, it has also been demonstrated that the SfcI digestion protocol does not consistently distinguish between DNA samples heterozygous and homozygous for the G1138A substitution. This study was designed to improve the molecular diagnosis based on the polymerase chain reaction (PCR) and restriction fragment length polymorphism (RFLP) techniques for the FGFR3 G1138A mutation. The newly designed forward primer contains one mismatch (G at position 1136) from the FGFR3 cDNA sequence (A at position 1136), thereby creating a PstI site (CTGCAG at positions 1134 to 1139) in the amplified DNA from alleles containing the G1138A mutation. The PCR-RFLP technique based on the PstI digestion of amplified genomic DNA with a novel forward primer shows 100% accuracy in diagnosis of the G1138A mutation in heterozygous and homozygous individuals.


Space mapping (SM) belongs to the most successful surrogate-based optimization (SBO) methods in microwave engineering. Among available SM variations, implicit SM (ISM) is particularly attractive due to its simplicity and separation of extractable surrogate model parameters and design variables of the circuit/system at hand. Unlike other SM approaches, ISM exploits a set of preassigned parameters to align the surrogate with the high-fidelity EM model. However, application of ISM is challenging if equivalent network model of the structure is unavailable or of poor quality. In this letter, a modified ISM that exploits variable-fidelity EM simulation models is proposed. Here, preassigned parameters are introduced in the coarsely discretized EM surrogate by dividing the substrate below selected components of the structure into segments with different permittivity and common thickness. The proposed method has been verified (also experimentally) using a rat-race coupler and favorably compared with state-of-the-art SBO methods.


OBJECTIVE
This study was conducted to investigate the morbidity pattern of malaria during pregnancy in New Halfa Teaching Hospital, Eastern Sudan, where malaria transmission is unstable.

METHODS
Pregnant (or in the puerperium) women presented with symptoms of falciparum malaria to the hospital during the period of November 2002 to March 2003 were enrolled to the study. Their socio-demographic characters, physical examinations, especially manifestations of severe falciparum malaria were performed and data were recorded. Blood films for malaria, urine, hemoglobin and blood glucose were tested.

RESULTS
Fifty-nine pregnant (or in the puerperium) women with falciparum malaria were presented in this study. The mean +/- SD gravidity was 3.3 +/- 2.1. Fourteen (23.7%) out of 59 patients presented with one or more manifestations of severe malaria according to the World Health Organization criteria. Severe anemia (5), pulmonary edema (4), jaundice (3), hypoglycemia (3) and hypotension (1) were the manifestations of the severe illness. In comparison to non-severe group, patients with severe illness have significantly higher temperature and significantly lower hemoglobin level. The other parameters were not significantly different between the 2 groups of patients. In the severe cases, one patient was presented with missed second trimester abortion and the 6/59 (10.2%) patients delivered prematurely 4 were in the severe form. There were 4 perinatal deaths all in the severe group and there was one maternal death due to pulmonary edema.

CONCLUSION
In this locality not only primigravidae but all parities were infected with falciparum malaria and different manifestations of severity were detected. Higher perinatal mortalities were documented.


An abnormal flux of monovalent cations may be related to the epileptogenic process in man. One possible mechanism for deranged electrolyte metabolism in epileptic brain is an abnormality in sodium, potassium-dependent adenosine triphosphatase (Na, K ATPase). We found the activity of Na, K ATPase to be significantly less in epileptic human corfex than in nonepileptic cortex. Histological changes have been simultaneously evaluated in epileptic brain. A second membrane-bound enzyme, acetylcholinesterase (AChE), was also assayed as a marker for neuronal membranes and found not to correlate with the epileptogenicity of human brain. In addition, the concentrations of the anticonvulsant compound phenytoin have been determined in the serum and cerebral cortex of epileptic and nonepileptic patients. The ratio of phenytoin in cortex to serum concentration is significantly lower in epileptic patients than in nonepileptic controls.


Patients from foreign cultures suffer special stress, as their situation as foreigners fosters diseases and causes conflicts. They must live under ambivalent and contradicting circumstances. This situation is exacerbated by not being understood, by using metaphors and drawing on concepts of disease which differ from those commonly used within their new environment. The result is a therapeutic relationship that becomes speechless. Hospitals, which should organize not disrupt the recovery process, may yet cause that effect.
 The first part of the paper analyses the connection between migration and disease through two clinical stories. Often a foreign patient's explication of his/her own disease is misunderstood by nurses and physicians. The next part of the paper describes the vicious circle of cultural, organizational, and individual factors of disease as the attitudes of caregivers that intensify a patient's disease and the background of the uncertainty of many caregivers. The last part provides practical considerations on how nursing should react to this challenge.


Surface films formed on nonactive metals (nickel, gold, and silver) in propylene carbonate solutions were investigated using impedance spectroscopy. The salts used included LiClO[sub 4], LiAsF[sub 6], LiBF[sub 4], and LiPF[sub 6], and the impact of their concentration on the properties of the surface films was explored. In addition, the influence of the presence of additives such as O[sub 2], H[sub 2]O, and CO[sub 2] in solutions and the potential of formation on the properties of these surface films was rigorously studied. Using simple methods and simulation programs, it was possible to separate the time constants of the impedance spectra, relate them to different parts of the metal-solution interface, and to calculate the thickness of these surface films from the interfacial capacitances. Following variations of the thickness calculated for the surface films formed in the different systems as a function of applied potential and solution composition, it was possible to study the stability of the surface films, their dissolution rates and the influence of different additives on their stability. For a few systems, ex situ Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (external reflectance mode) was also applied. The results thus obtained were correlated to previous studies of Li electrodes in the samemore » solutions.« less


Piperaceae, a Latin name derived from Greek, which in turn originates from the Arabic word babary —black pepper, is considered one of the largest families of basal dicots, found in tropical and subtropical regions of both hemispheres. The species that belong to this family have a primarily pantropical distribution, predominantly herbaceous members, occurring in tropical Africa, tropical Asia, Central America and the Amazon region. The Piperaceae family includes five genera: Piper , Peperomia , Manekia , Zippelia and Verhuellia . Brazil has about 500 species distributed in the Piper , Peperomia and Manekia genera. The Piper genus, the largest of the Piperaceae family, has about 4000 species. Within the Piper genus, about 260–450 species can be found in Brazil. Piper species have diverse biologi- cal activities and are used in pharmacopeia throughout the world. They are also used in folk medicine for treatment of many diseases in several countries including Brazil, China, India, Jamaica and Mexico. Pharmacological studies of Piper species point toward the vast potential of these plants to treat various diseases. Many of these species are bio- logically active and have shown antitumor, antimicrobial, antioxidant, insecticidal, anti-inflammatory, antinociceptive, enzyme inhibitor, antiparasitic, antiplatelet, piscicide


Dickens wrote during the Victorian era in England, a time of industrialization and social changes, while Lu Xun wrote during China's early 20th century, marked by political turmoil and the transition to modernity. The essay explores the socioeconomic backgrounds of the authors, the portrayal of characters and their struggles, the impact of industrialization and modernization, and the reflection of cultural values and morality. Despite the differences in time and place, both authors address social injustices, advocate for compassion, and challenge prevailing norms. Through their works, readers gain insights into the complexities of their respective eras, the universal human experiences, and the enduring relevance of their literary legacies. The comparative analysis sheds light on the cultural values that shaped their times and invites readers to reflect on the past in shaping a better future.


Tunable phase shift up to 360/spl deg/ at 1 THz is demonstrated using electrically controlled birefringence in a vertically aligned nematic liquid crystal (E7) cell, 1.83 mm in thickness. The driving voltage and corresponding field required for a phase shift of 360/spl deg/ at 1 THz are 100 V and 90.5 V/cm, respectively.


Abstract : This report assesses the activities of organized crime groups, terrorist groups, and narcotics traffickers in general in the Tri-Border Area (TBA) of Argentina, Brazil, and Paraguay, focusing mainly on the period since 1999. Some of the related topics discussed, such as governmental and police corruption and anti-money-laundering laws, may also apply in part to the three TBA countries in general in addition to the TBA. This is unavoidable because the TBA cannot be discussed entirely as an isolated entity. Based entirely on open sources, this assessment has made extensive use of books, journal articles, and other reports available in the Library of Congress collections. It is based in part on the author's earlier research paper entitled "Narcotics-Funded Terrorist/Extremist Groups in Latin America" (May 2002). It has also made extensive use of sources available on the Internet, including Argentine, Brazilian, and Paraguayan newspaper articles. One of the most relevant Spanish-language sources used for this assessment was Mariano Cesar Bartolome's paper entitled "Amenazas a la seguridad de los estados: La triple frontera como 'area gris' en el cono sur americano" (Threats to the Security of States: The Triborder as a 'Grey Area' in the Southern Cone of South America) (2001). The selective bibliography includes books, journal articles, and other reports. Newspaper and magazine articles are footnoted. This report also includes an appendix containing brief profiles of six alleged operatives of Islamic fundamentalist groups in the TBA and a diagram of drug-trafficking routes in the region.


The present studywas designed to evaluate the influence of supplementing different levels of L-Valine (L-Val) to low protein diet on chicks' performance, carcass characteristics , digestibility of nutrients andeconomical efficiency. A total number of 640 unsexed day old Arbor Acres meat – type chickswere assigned randomly into 8 equal treatments containing 80 chicks each (10 birds/ replicate). The first group (control) was fed strain recommendation of CP being 23%, 21% and 19% with 0.96, 0.88 and 0.79% digestible valine during starter, grower and finisher periods, respectively (T1). The 2 group was feddiets with a 3% CPless thanthe control, being 20%, 18% and 16% and contained 0.89, 0.79 and 0.69% digestible valine level during the same growth phasesrespectively, as control (T2). Other six groups were fed low–CP diet (LPD) supplemented with 250mg, 500mg, 750mg, 1000 mg, 1250 mg and 1500 mgL-Val/kg diet, respectively. The study lasted for 38 days. The results were as follows:1The best BWG and FCR during overall growth period was achieved by chicks fed the LPD supplemented with 500 mg Val/kg diet, and control group (T1) without significant differences between them.2Valine digestibility was ranged between 91.17 to 97.03%.3-Control group achieved significantly the lowest abdominal fat percentage as compared to the other groups fed LPD either with or without valine supplementation.4Chicks fed the LPD plus 500 mg Val/kg diet attained the highest means of economic efficiency and its relative value by 103.2% and 114.2% as compared to those fed the recommended protein diet and LPD, respectively. In conclusion, the best level of added Val is 500 mg/kg diet for broilers fed LPDsupplemented with sufficient amount of Methionine, Lysine, Threonine which coincided with the best Val/Lys ratio during starter, grower and finisher periods. Also, it achieved an improvement in economic efficiency and growth performance of broilers.


An ultrafast, high-average-power, extended-cavity, femtosecond BiB3O6 optical parametric oscillator was constructed as a test bed for investigating the scalability of infrared parametric devices. Despite the high pulse energies achieved by this system, the reduction in slope efficiency near the maximum-available pump power prompted the investigation of thermal effects in the crystal during operation. The local heating effects in the crystal were used to determine the impact on both phase matching and thermal lensing to understand limitations that must be overcome to achieve microjoule-level pulse energies at high repetition rates.


Voltage stability problem has caused several blackouts in many countries in recent years. Impending voltage instability has been a significant threat to modern power system's security and reliability. Moreover, the operation and planning of large interconnected power systems is becoming increasingly complex as power demand rises, posing a security risk to the grid. Appropriate efforts to improve power system security and increase voltage stability margin should be planned to keep the system secure. This work investigates the voltage stability of a power system with and without a shunt capacitor. The bus voltage stability index, L index, is used to measure the distance of the power system to its stability limit in order to assign the shunt capacitor. The L-index for a particular load state is computed for all load buses, and the greatest L-index indicates the system's approach to voltage collapse. The system's load ability margin is being traced utilizing a static voltage stability evaluation approach, i.e., PV and QV curve analysis. The minimal power loss approach is used to calculate the optimal capacitor size. The effect of shunt compensation was simulated, and the results with and without compensation were compared. The IEEE-9 bus system was employed in this work, and the system was simulated using MATLAB and Power World Simulator. The result demonstrates that the shunt capacitor enhances voltage stability by injecting the appropriate reactive power.


Corals should make excellent models for cross-kingdom regulation research because of their natural animal-photobiont holobiont composition, yet a lack of studies and experimental data restricts their use. Here we integrate new full-length transcriptomes and small RNAs of four common reef-building corals with the published Symbiodinium C1 genome to gain deeper insight into mutual gene regulation in coral-zooxanthella holobionts. We show that zooxanthellae secrete miRNA to downregulate rejection from host coral cells, and that a potential correlation exists between miRNA diversity and physiological activity. Convergence of these holobionts' biological functions in different species is also revealed, which implies the low gene impact on bottom ecological niche organisms. This work provides evidence for the early origin of cross-kingdom regulation as a mechanism of self-defense autotrophs can use against heterotrophs, sheds more light on coral-zooxanthella holobionts, and contributes valuable data for further coral research.


Reactive chlamydia arthritis is accompanied by the increase of parameters of volume viscidity, elastic of viscidity and static (equilibrium) surface-tension and phase corner of tensiogramm serum of blood, on background of the reduction of relaxation time, that is related with duration of illness, activity of pathological process, tendovaginities. Major role in the development of oculopathy (uveitis, scleritis, keratitis, conjunctivitis, cataract, glaucoma) take part disorders of the adsorption-rheological properties of the blood.


Background: Garlic is known as a medicinal herb with broad therapeutic properties ranging from antibacterial to anticancer and even anticoagulant. Aim: Current study was designed to evaluate antitumor effects of aged garlic extract (AGE) on fibrosarcoma tumor in BALB/c mice. Materials and Methods: WEHI-164 fibrosarcoma cells were implanted subcutaneously on day zero into right flank of 40 BALB/c mice aged eight weeks. Mice were randomly categorized in two separate groups: 1st received AGE (100 mg/kg, intraperitoneally), 2nd group as control received phosphate buffered saline, (PBS). Treatments were done three times per week. Tumor growth was measured and morbidity was recorded. Subpopulations of CD4+/CD8+ T cells were determined using flow cytometry. WEHI-164 cell specific cytotoxicity of splenocytes and in vitro production of gamma-interferon, (IFN-γ) and Interleukin-4, (IL-4) cytokines were measured. Results: The mice received AGE had significantly longer survival time compared to control mice. The inhibitory effect on tumor growth was seen in AGE treated mice. The CD4+/CD8+ ratio and in vitro IFN-γ production of splenocytes were significantly increased in AGE group. Conclusions: Administration of AGE resulted in improved immune responses against experimentally implanted fibrosarcoma tumors in BALB/c mice. AGE showed significant effects on inhibition of tumor growth and longevity of survival times.


In this study, habitat use of the armored catfishes Hypostomus ancistroides and Hypostomus sp. was investigated in 21 streams from the Upper Rio Parana system in Sao Paulo State, Brazil, a pasture dominated region. The abundance of Hypostomus sp. was positively correlated with the amount of riffles and riparian vegetation condition, whereas H. ancistroides abundance was negatively correlated with riparian vegetation condition. Thirteen ecomorphological attributes analyzed by principal component analysis showed that when compared to H. ancistroides, Hypostomus sp. presented a wider mouth and more flattened body, suggesting an adapted body to faster waters. The most abundant populations of Hypostomus sp. were predominantly associated with good riffle availability and good riparian quality, suggesting that populational features of this species may be incorporated in the stream biotic integrity assessment in that region.


Help students get the most out of studying medieval history with this comprehensive and practical research guide to topics and resources. * Covers 100 significant events across four continents, between 410 C.E. and 1485 C.E. * Offers an easy-to-use chronological organization that facilitates research and saves time for students, faculty, and librarians * Includes an annotated bibliography of primary source materials for each topic


Purpose
Over the last two decades, the concept of destination imagery (DY) has gained relevance in the academic literature due to its central role in the tourists' destination choice process. However, there is still much to be explored within this topic, especially concerning DY processing. More specifically, the way external stimuli are processed in tourists' memory is still unexplored. In this context, the purpose of this paper is to examine how DY is processed in individuals' memories upon the reception of verbal stimuli related to food tourism destinations.

Design/methodology/approach
Through an online multilingual survey, imagery elements associated with European and Asian tourists' favourite food tourism destinations were collected. Through a categorical content analysis, tourists' perceptions were classified within Echtner and Ritchie's (1993) tri-dimensional model's dimensions. Results were examined against previous theories on DY. Moreover, a comparative analysis between the imagery of food tourism destinations held by Europeans and Asians tourists was carried out.

Findings
Results show that DY processing, when triggered by a food tourism destination stimulus, leans towards the holistic dimension, which reinforces previous theories on the topic, such as the very definition of destination image (DI), as well as the role of food on destination image. Moreover, differences were found between the type of destinations and the imagery processed by European and Asian tourists.

Research limitations/implications
The study is based on a significant data set, which comprised 1,186 responses, representativeness within the research universe cannot be assured. Although relatively equivalent volumes of data were collected from each of the two continents, there are significant discrepancies among the proportions of respondents from different countries within those two groups. Additionally, our theoretical model requires further validation through hypothesis verification procedures. This work builds theory, rather than testing it. In this context, it opens a research avenue for future studies adopting a more positivistic philosophical stance to research, which could submit the theories provided here to the scrutiny of rigorous, hypothesis testing, quantitative methods.

Practical implications
This paper provides an initial idea for destination managers about which aspects to highlight in their marketing campaigns. This particularly applies to destinations to which ethnic food is a relevant part of the tourist appeal, and whose managers intend to attract repeat visitors.

Social implications
The present study's findings imply a series of suggestions for tourism practitioners. First, they provide an initial idea for destination managers about which aspects to highlight in their marketing campaigns.

Originality/value
The present study represents a first initiative of building a theoretical model of food tourism destinations' imagery processing. Findings also provide original theoretical contributions to the concept of DY and lead to relevant managerial insights, particularly, into destinations aiming at attracting repeat, food-oriented tourists.


This work focuses on the universal scaling laws, which relate scaled diffusivity to excess entropy in fluids and their mixtures. The derivation of the new scaling law for diffusivity proposed recently [A. Samanta, Sk. M. Ali, and S. K. Ghosh, Phys. Rev. Lett. 92, 145901 (2004)] is discussed in details highlighting the nature of approximations involved. Also the applicability of the scaling law is extended to a new class of liquids, viz., liquid metals. The results calculated based on the scaling laws are shown to be in very good agreement with the simulation results for liquid Rb and Cs metals along the liquid-vapor coexistence curve corresponding to a wide variation of temperature and density. The new universal scaling law discussed here is superior to the earlier empirically proposed scaling laws and provides a very simple route to calculate a dynamical quantity such as diffusivity from an equilibrium property such as the radial distribution function.


The importance of introducing Integral concept in fruitgrowing is been revised in this paper.Considering the importance of fruits in Serbia's export, it is very important to start introducing Integral concept of fruits production because internation market will sooner or later impose barriers in front of our fruits growers regarding helth safety and fruits quality. Principles of introducing Integral concept of fruits production are given, which if respected, in many regions of our country would anable establishment of production in accordance with this concept. It is suggested to bring certain legislativ measurs and especialy the book of regulations of Integral production of fruits.


Antagonistic and reciprocal interactions are known to exist between adenosine and dopamine receptors in the striatum. In the present study, double immunofluorescence experiments with confocal laser microscopy showed a high degree of colocalization of adenosine A2A receptors (A2AR) and dopamine D2 receptors (D2R) in cell membranes of SH-SY5Y human neuroblastoma cells stably transfected with human D2R and in cultured striatal cells. A2AR/D2R heteromeric complexes were demonstrated in coimmunoprecipitation experiments in membrane preparations from D2R-transfected SH-SY5Y cells and from mouse fibroblast Ltk− cells stably transfected with human D2R (long form) and transiently cotransfected with the A2AR double-tagged with hemagglutinin. Long term exposure to A2AR and D2R agonists in D2R-cotransfected SH-SY5Y cells resulted in coaggregation, cointernalization and codesensitization of A2AR and D2R. These results give a molecular basis for adenosine-dopamine antagonism at the membrane level and have implications for treatment of Parkinson's disease and schizophrenia, in which D2R are involved.


We investigate the participation and effectiveness of paid endorsers in viral-for-hire social advertising. Specifically, we investigate (i) how the financial incentive affects endorsers' participation and effectiveness in paid endorsement campaigns, (ii) what types of endorsers are most effective in generating online engagements (likes, comments, and retweets), and (iii) whether that varies across types of engagements that require different levels of efforts from followers. We conduct a field experiment with an invitation design in which we manipulate both incentives and a soft eligibility requirement to participate in the campaign. The latter provides a strong and valid instrument to separate participation from outcomes effects. Since likes, comments, and retweets are count variables, and since potential endorsers can self-select to participate in multiple campaigns, we use a Poisson lognormal model with sample selection and correlated random effects to analyze variations in participation and effectiveness. There are three main findings. (1) Payments higher than the average reward a potential endorser received in the past do not increase participation, whereas lower payments decrease participation. Neither gains nor losses affect performance. (2) Potential endorsers who are more likely to participate tend to be less effective. (3) Which characteristics are associated with effectiveness depends on whether success is measured in likes, comments, or retweets. These findings provide new insights on how marketers can improve social advertising campaigns by better targeting and incenting potential endorsers.


Background: There is scarce information about what factors might influence the time to the first wheezing episode in infants. Methods: The "Estudio Internacional de Sibilancias en Lactantes (EISL)" included 13,684 infants who wheezed at least once in the first year of life, recruited from 13 centres in 6 Latin American countries (n=12,045) and from 5 centres in 2 European countries (n=1,639). A multivariate Cox regression analysis was performed using as dependent variable the time to the first wheezing episode. The regression included the following factors: gender, parental asthma or rhinitis, infant eczema, mother smoking in pregnancy, cold(s) in the first 3 mo, nursery school, breast feeding >= 3 mo, number of siblings, persons at home, mould stains on walls, university studies of mother, Afro-American ethnicity, and pets at home. An adjusted hazard ratio (aHR) of the pooled whole population and also separately for EU and LA was calculated. Results: Conclusions: Some factors usually shown to be a risk factor for wheezing are not associated to a shorter period of time to the first episode. Furthermore, some delaying or advancing factors are different in Europe as compared to Latin America.


Regions of Interest (ROI) contain morphological features in pathology whole slide images (WSI) are delimited with polygons[1]. These polygons are often represented in either a textual notation (with the array of edges) or in a binary mask form. Textual notations have an advantage of human readability and portability, whereas, binary mask representations are more useful as the input and output of feature-extraction pipelines that employ deep learning methodologies. For any given whole slide image, more than a million cellular features can be segmented generating a corresponding number of polygons. The corpus of these segmentations for all processed whole slide images creates various challenges for filtering specific areas of data for use in interactive real-time and multi-scale displays and analysis. Simple range queries of image locations do not scale and, instead, spatial indexing schemes are required. In this paper we propose using Hilbert Curves simultaneously for spatial indexing and as a polygonal ROI representation. This is achieved by using a series of Hilbert Curves[2] creating an efficient and inherently spatially-indexed machine-usable form. The distinctive property of Hilbert curves that enables both mask and polygon delimitation of ROIs is that the elements of the vector extracted ro describe morphological features maintain their relative positions for different scales of the same image.


India aborted the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) deal at the last moment in November 2018 over its concerns & issues not being addressed properly. This paper tries to evaluate India's concerns and also the cost of not joining RCEP, Dairy sector, economic slowdown, past experience with FTA's (Free trade agreements), China factor, data localization, rules of origin, experience of ASEAN countries with Sino- FTA have been some of the factors responsible for this decision. The main objectives of the paper is to study the Revealed Comparative Advantage Index of Indian exports in relation to RCEP Countries. Though a lot of literature is available where in RCA index has been used to analyse trade vis-a vis other countries and there are some studies which have used RCA index to analyse India's trade with ASEAN countries but no study was done using RCA index for analysing India's proposed trade with RCEP countries. Despite all the concerns it's still in India's favor to go ahead with the deal as RCA index portrays a different picture. The RCA index reveals that India has comparative advantage in many product categories but we have not been able to utilize our advantage and in absolute terms is reflected by widening trade deficits with RCEP countries. Paper also evaluates long term repercussion of this decision and that whether India would miss out becoming part of global value chain & having greater market access through this block. India's experience following protectionist policies did not yield desired results in the past. So, an in-depth analysis has been done to analyze if India has made a mistake by not joining RCEP or her concerns and fears were justified.


To the Editor.— While collections of irritating, autologous, serum uric acid in unusual locations have been reported before, a case of symptomatic gouty tophus of the nose has not been annotated previously to our knowledge. Report of a Case.— A 66-year-old man has been in good health all of his life except for hyperlipoproteinemia and gout. Having known that he had gouty arthritis, he has been receiving probenecid since it was first released for medical use. His practitioner attempted to convert his therapy to allopurinol, but it stirred up his gout so much that the patient refused ever to try the medication again. Gradually over a three-year period the patient noticed that the bridge of his nose had become enlarged and that his eyeglasses no longer fit, causing diplopia (Fig 1). Because of this problem and its interference with the patient's driving, the tophus was removed surgically (Fig 2). Roentgenograms


Among the most compelling applications of Augmented Reality are spatially registered tutorials. The effort of creating such instructions remains one of the obstacles precluding a wider use. We propose a system that is capable of extracting 3D instructions in a completely model-free manner from demonstrations, based on volumetric changes. The instructions are visualised later in an interactive Augmented Reality guidance application, on a mobile head-mounted display. We enable a technology that can be used by anyone in an ad-hoc tabletop setup for assemblies with rigid components.


A.K.M Fazlul Haque, Mir Mohammad Abu Kyum, Md. Baitul Al Sadi, Mrinal Kar, Md. Fokhray Hossain
Abstract - Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS) is one of the standards in 3rd generation partnership project (3GPP). Different data rates are offered by UMTS for voice, video conference and other services. This paper presents the performance of UMTS cellular network using sectorization for capacity and coverage. The major contribution is to see the impact of sectorization on capacity and cell coverage in 3G UMTS cellular network. Coverage and capacity are vitally important issues in UMTS cellular Network. Capacity depends on different parameters such as sectorization, energy per bit noise spectral density ratio, voice activity, inter-cell interference and intra-cell interference, soft handoff gain factor, etc and coverage depends on frequency, chip rate, bit rate, mobile maximum power, MS Antenna Gain, EIRP, interference Margin, Noise figure etc. Different parameters that influence the capacity and coverage of UMTS cellular network are simulated using MATLAB 2009a. In this paper, the outputs of simulation for increasing amount of sectorization showed that the number of users gradually increased. The coverage area also gradually increased.


From May 2006 to December 2007 in Warsaw Hospital for Infectious Diseases one hundred and eight patients chronically infected HBV were treated with lamivudine. Among them 46 (42.5%) were HBeAg (+) and 62 (57.5%) HBeAg (-). HBV DNA levels were analysed in weeks 24, 48 and 72 of therapy using Real Time HBV PCR (Abbott) with a limit of detection of 28 copies/ml. Complete response for treatment was defined as HBV VL of less than 10(2) copies/ml (group A). Partial response was defined as HBV VL ranging from 10(2) to 10(5) copies/ml (group B), and treatment failure was determined by HBV VL above 10(5) copies/ml (group C). Presented results confirmed better response to lamivudine treatment in patients HBeAg (-) than HBeAg (+).


In studies of smooth maps with good differential topological conditions such as immersions, embeddings, Morse functions and their higher dimensional versions including fold maps and application to geometry, especially algebraic and differential topology of manifolds, liftings or desingulizations of maps of appropriate classes to other maps of other appropriate classes are fundamental and important. In this paper, we consider Morse functions such that inverse images of regular values are disjoint unions of spheres, which are extensions of Morse functions with just two singular points on homotopy spheres, and defined and studied by Saeki and Suzuoka in 2000s, and lift them to immersions, embeddings and special generic maps, which are regarded as higher dimensional versions of Morse functions with just 2 singular points before. In lifting smooth maps, we usually lift them to immersions or embeddings and in this paper, as new works, we consider lifts to special generic maps, whose codimensions are not positive. In addition, we construct most of lifts by new methods.


Every year, more than half a million people in Germany experience a stroke or a traumatic brain injury. A high percentage of them leave the hospital with neuropsychological deficiencies of attention, memory, speech or perception preventing them from returning to work. The German rehabilitation system is primarily funded by the statutory pension insurance system and is hospital-based, but only very few brain-damaged patients have the opportunity to be treated there. Hospital rehabilitation programmes often integrate neuropsychological trainings whereas neuropsychologically based outpatient programmes do not exist. Therefore two questions are crucial. First, are those separate neuropsychological trainings effective? Second, are positive effects generalized? Studies concerning these questions are reviewed. Not many of them, however, meet the usual requirements for valid intervention research, and their findings are equivocal. Nevertheless, they suggest that neuropsychological rehabilitation should be undertaken more frequently, which would offer a framework for future efficacy research.


This paper considers error-correcting codes designed to correct a finite set of known two-dimensional (2D) error patterns that can occur in a 2D array of bits. Obvious applications for this type of codes include storage and display devices. The specific codes designed in this paper are cyclic codes that can correct any single occurrences of dominant known error patterns that can occur anywhere in the 2D array. As example codes, rate-0.994 codes are constructed which target eight known 2D error patterns in a 63 × 63 bit array.


Several hydrogels of N-vinylimidazole and sodium styrenesulfonate have been prepared by radical cross-linking copolymerization in aqueous solution, using N,N'-methylene-bisacrylamide as crosslinker. Depending on composition, these hydrogels were neutral, amphoteric, cationic or anionic. Compression-strain measurements were performed on samples as-synthesized and swollen in deionized water or in acid aqueous solutions, with and without salt. It was thus found that the cross-linking densities determined by compression measurements on as-synthesized samples are in good accordance with those calculated by means of the model of polymer networks with pendant vinyl groups. A non-Gaussian parameter (β) was introduced to explain that the elastic moduli (G) of samples swollen at equilibrium are larger than predicted by the Gaussian model. The β values of the neutral or ionized systems increase with swelling and fall into a single curve, which denotes a common behavior. Swelling has two opposite effects on G; on the one hand G decreases because the polymer volume fraction diminish and the system shifts from the affine limit to the phantom one; on the other, β increases and contributes to increasing G. The balance of those two opposite effects determines the variation of G with swelling. The possible contribution of ionic crosslinks to ν e for the polyampholyte and for the polycation wearing divalent counteranions was discussed. A peculiar system is poly(sodium styrenesulfonate), whose cross-linking density is much lower than expected.


The present storage experiment was conducted at Department of Genetic and Plant Breeding, Sam Higginbottom University of Agriculture, Technology and Sciences, Uttar Pradesh during 2016 2017 with chilli seeds (Cv. Byadagi Dabbi). The seeds were coated with polymer in combination with fungicide (thiram) and maintained untreated seeds (control) where T0 is control, T1 polymer @ 3ml/kg of seeds, T2 is polymer @ 5ml/kg of seeds, T3 is polymer @ 7ml/kg of seeds, T4 is fungicide(thiram) alone 2g/kg of seeds, T5 is polymer @ 3ml + thiram @2g/kg, T6 is polymer @ 5ml/kg + thiram @ 2g/kg and T7 is Polymer @ 7ml + thiram @ 2g/kg of seeds. Treated seeds were packed in polythene bag (700 gauge) and aluminium foil pouch (factor P1 and P2) for the assessment of seed germination, seedling length, seedling dry weight, seedling vigour indices, moisture content and seed infection where data was subjected to factorial experiment laid out in completely randomized design. Germination percentage, seedling length, seedling dry weight, seedling vigour indices were high in seed treatment T7P2 as compared to all other seed treatments. However, seed infection and moisture content were lowest in T7P2.


Regional age-adjusted mortality rates of the Federal Republic of Germany from 1976 to 1980 were correlated with regional nutritional data from a national survey on income and consumption. This survey was conducted in 1973 and covered a sample of 50,000 households. The mortality rates due to carcinomas of the stomach, colon, rectum, liver, gallbladder, pancreas, breast, and prostate and the consumption data of 15 nutrients and other compounds are shown for the 11 Federal States. For alcohol, vitamin C and calcium variations range about 20%, whereas deviations in the consumption of protein, fat, and most carbohydrates appear of minor importance. Some of the 45 correlation coefficients significant at the 5% level (out of 210) may have etiologic importance. The associations that coincide in both sexes are alcohol and disaccharide consumption with stomach cancer and protein intake with pancreatic cancer. Because previous habits and consumption may have a stronger etiologic influence than do present ones in the induction of chronic diseases, the utilization of existing information from the 1930s (e.g., Atlas of Ethnic Studies) and the assessment of habits in previous decades by means of case-control studies are emphasized.


does not keep him from a penetrating elaboration of the positions of both French and English. I consider the final article entitled "Howe, Hubris and '72: An Essay on Political Elitism" the best of the lot, despite its impressionistic quality. It was written during the week following the 1972 federal election, and in 35 pages Meisel manages to capture the essence not only of the just-completed campaign and four years of the Trudeau administration but also of the Liberal party's governmental style since World War II. He concludes that what was largely responsible for the Liberals' close call in 1972 (they obtained 109 seats to the Conservatives' 107, while the NDP won 31 and the Creditistes 15) was not the English backlash against their policies on bilingualism, as Trudeau and many others have claimed, but rather their failure even to appear to be interested in dealing with issues that polls showed Canadians to be concerned about: unemployment, inflation, high taxes, and welfare. Such lack of concern he terms hubris—an overweening pride and insolence leading inexorably to downfall—which afflicted the Liberal government in its final years under St. Laurent in the middle 1950s and has continued to characterize the Liberals under Lester Pearson and then Pierre Trudeau. He illustrates his charges of arrogance against the Liberal party by referring to the way it runs the Federal government, the manner in which it recruits to high office, the social background of Trudeau himself, and the general Canadian political culture which reinforces the now ingrained pattern. The article is a tour de force.


This paper, using unique survey data from the banking industry in rural China, investigates the effect of incentive contracts on performance. In the context of China`s economic transition, we find that the incentive contracts have a positive effect on the bank manager`s performance in deposit taking and non-performing loan reduction. This finding is robust when we control for the endogeneity of incentive contracts. Our empirical results present evidence on the positive effects of incentive-based banking reforms in rural China.


PurposeThis study used data envelopment analysis (DEA) models to measure financial efficiency of twelve commercial banks listed in the Egyptian stock exchange (CBLSE), along with evaluating changes to the financial efficiency during the period 2017–2019.Design/methodology/approachThe study used BCC-I, cross-efficiency, super-efficiency models, and Malmquist productivity index (MPI) to assess financial efficiency of the examined banks. The available data from both inputs and outputs were analyzed using R. studio V.I.3. 1056 software.FindingsOut of twelve banks examined, only four banks were efficient under BCC-I model over different years of the study period; however, only one bank (CIB) appeared to be the most efficient compared to other peers in the study sample. Moreover, MPI results revealed decreased financial efficiency during the study period, due to the decreased technological innovation, except for HDB. Tobit regression results confirmed that total assets and total equity are significant factors impacted financial efficiency of CBLSE.Practical implicationsThis study sheds light on the importance of evaluating financial efficiency of CBLSE to all stakeholders, to pinpoint weaknesses in banks' performance, and for evaluating financial policies and investment decisions.Originality/valueSeveral studies sought to implement different models of DEA to assess banking performance in different regions of the world, but very few studies examined financial efficiency of banks. To the best of authors' knowledge, this study is one of those few that addressed financial efficiency of banks in Egypt.


The effective potential (EP) for composite fields in quantum electrodynamics in curved spacetime is investigated. This EP is calculated to the accuracy of linear curvature terms. In the same approximation the Schwinger-Dyson (SD) equations in curved spacetime are obtained. The chiral symmetric solution of the SD equations is found.


We have recently reported a family of hydroxylamine based reagents for the α-oxyacylation, α-oxycarbonylation, α-oxycarbamoylation and α-oxytosylation of carbonyl compds. These reagents have been shown to react with both aldehydes and ketones to generate α-functionalised products under mild, practical conditions in good to excellent yields (Figure 1). It is believed that each of these transformations proceed via a common [3,3]-sigmatropic rearrangement process, which revealed the opportunity to develop asym. variants of each reaction which would significantly add to the synthetic chemist's tool box. This poster will describe the development of asym. variants of these reactions through introduction of chirality in the generic reagent 1 at the nitrogen substituent (R3), oxygen substituent (R4) and the co-acid (HX). [on SciFinder(R)]


When an eigenvector of a semibounded operator is positive, we show that a remarkably simple argument allows to obtain upper and lower bounds for its associated eigenvalue. This theorem is a substantial generalization of Barta-type inequalities and can be applied to non-necessarily purely quadratic Hamiltonians. An application for a magnetic Hamiltonian is given and the case of a discrete Schrodinger operator is also discussed. It is shown how this approach leads to some explicit bounds on the ground-state energy of a system made of an arbitrary number of attractive Coulombian particles.


Massive MIMO (multiple-input multiple-output) provides great improvements in spectral efficiency over legacy cellular networks, by coherent combining of the signals over a large antenna array and by spatial multiplexing of many users. Since its inception, the coherent interference caused by pilot contamination has been believed to be an impairment that does not vanish, even with an unlimited number of antennas. In this work, we show that this belief is incorrect and an artifact from using simplistic channel models and suboptimal signal processing schemes. We focus on the uplink and prove that with multicell MMSE combining, the spectral efficiency grows without bound as the number of antennas increases, even under pilot contamination, under a condition of linear independence between the channel covariance matrices. This condition is generally satisfied, except in special cases that are hardly found in practice.


This study was supported by the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT) by the funded project PTDC/BIA-MIC/28271/2017, under the scope of COMPETE2020 (POCI-01-0145- FEDER-028271) and by the strategic funding of unit UID/BIO/04469/2019.


In a consultation concerning treatment decisions, the doctor and the patient exchange and discuss information.
Ideally, this is shared equally with each party continually evaluating the situation facing them. Information is so central
to the assessment of the patient's condition and options that it assumes key ethical significance and information
disclosure on both sides becomes a key dynamic in negotiating treatment.


In teaching writing, contextual learning means learning to unleash the full potential of a student naturally. Students are given the opportunity to apply and develop ideas critically and communicative in the form of written language which can be meaningful for themselves and for those who read it. This thesis aims are: 1) To know the differences in the learning result of Indonesian subject in poetry writing material among the students who learn with contextual approach and the students who learn with conventional approach, and 2) To know the effectiveness of using contextual approach in improving the learning result of Indonesian subject on poetry writing material. This research used a quasi-experimental design. The subject was the fifth grade students of MIN Selat Hulu Kapuas academic year 2012/2013. Class Va as experimental group and class Vb as control group. The taught material is writing poetry. The first data of students' ability is taken from pretest result, while the posttest result is used as research data. The results showed that there are significant differences between the students' learning results of Indonesian subject in experimental group with control group. If seen from the average value of the posttest, the results of learning in the experimental group (75.87) is higher than the average value of the control group (68.13). This difference was also confirmed by the results of the calculations of Independent-sample T-Test which significance value is smaller than the sig. = 0.05 which is equal to 0.002. This showed that the use of the contextual approach can improve students' learning result. Meanwhile, the effectiveness test calculations showed that the average value of g factor in the experimental group showed 0.49 points. This means, the use of a contextual approach in Indonesian subjects is quite effective in improving student learning result in the subject matter writing poetry.


Wireless sensor networks (WSNs) usually employ different ranging techniques to measure the distance between an unknown node and its neighboring anchor nodes, and based on the measured distance to estimate the position of the unknown node. This paper presents an effective Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO)-based Localization Scheme using the Radio Signal Strength (RSS) ranging technique. Modified from the iterative multilateration algorithm, our scheme is unique in adopting the location data of remote anchors provided by the closest neighbor anchors of an unknown node to estimate the unknown nodepsilas position and using the PSO algorithm to further reduce error accumulation. The new scheme meanwhile takes in a modified DV-distance approach to raise the success ratios of locating unknown nodes. Compared with related schemes, our scheme is shown through simulations to perform constantly better in increasing localization success ratios and decreasing location errors -- at reduced cost.


Nonequilibrium photoexcited carrier dynamics in InP:Cu was investigated by two experimental techniques: the time-resolved photoluminescence up-conversion and the transient photoconductivity measurement. Both measurements show that dopmg with copper significantly modifies the photoexcited carrier relaxation in indium phosphide. There are several strong indications that this effect originates from the carrier trapping at metallic precipitates. PACS numbers: 72.40.+w, 78.47.+p, 78.55.-m


Abstract Change is a ubiquitous notion that fascinates and frustrates. The starting point for most attempts at theorizing change begins with the philosophical assumption that stability and equilibrium are fundamental features of reality. Organizational change, therefore, is construed as something exceptional requiring active intervention on the part of actors. Change has to be carefully 'managed' because it is something made to happen to or within an 'organization'. This, however, is not the only way of understanding organizational change. From an alternative process-philosophical outlook, all of reality is change so that it is the phenomenon of organization itself that is a remarkable achievement. From this process outlook, 'organizations' are nothing more than stabilized patterns of relations forged out of an underlying sea of ceaseless change. In this paper, I make a distinction between 'owned' and 'unowned' processes of change. I show that acknowledging the pervasive presence of 'unowned' change processes leads to the adoption of a more benign approach to managing change; one in which 'letting happen' take precedence over active intervention. Managing change then is more about small, timely and quiet insertions made to release the immanent forces of change always already present in every organizational situation. Change then appears unexceptionally as a naturally occurring phenomenon; it does not attract undue attention and does not generate unnecessary anxieties. Obliqueness of engagement is key to managing sustainable change in a world that is itself ever-changing.


The Flora Lake stock is a concordant plug of granitic rocks that was emplaced in a steeply dipping sequence of typical Precambrian "greenstones." It occupies about 51/2 square miles and is roughly elliptical. The long axis of the ellipse strikes northeast-southwest parallel to the regional strike. Near the stock, the country rocks are mostly pillow and massive mafic volcanic rocks which have been regionally metamorphosed (almandine-amphibolite facies). In order of decreasing age, the stock consists of an outer ring of monzodiorite, an incomplete inner ring of monzonite, and a core of granite. Small bodies of metapyroxenire occur within the monzodiorite at the northeast end of the mass. The three major rock zones are characterized by primary flow structures (planar parallelism of minerals) which form strike patterns integral to each zone. Such structures are particularly pronounced in the monzodiorite and monzonite. In all cases they dip steeply, commonly outward. Chemically and mineralogically, each major rock unit is moderately uniform. Spectrographic, X-ray, and petrographic studies of plagioclase feldspar, biotite, pyroxene, and amphibole indicate that the chemistry of the major minerals in the intrusive sequence varies systematically. The Flora Lake stock may have evolved by anatexis and mobilization of basement rock at deeper levels in the crust. The profound distortion of the regional structural trend in adjacent "greenstones" suggests the stock was forcefully emplaced. The general absence of contact (thermal) metamorphic effects indicates emplacement under pressure-temperature conditions compatible with those of the almandine-amphibolite facies of the regional metamorphic terrain. The monzodiorite and monzonite were emplaced as viscous, crystal-liquid mushes. Well-developed flow structure, absence of chilled contacts, paucity of monzodiorite and monzonite dikes, and numerous evidences of strain in mineral grains in these rocks are compatible with the idea that the intruding material consisted of a high proportion of crystals to liquid. Late in the sequence of intrusion, granitic material must have become mobile, essentially completely magmatic, or granite magma was sweated out of more mafic material at depth. It moved upward and pushed its way into the monzodiorite and monzonite, completing the main intrusive activity in the stock.


This article explores the use of two β nucleants to improve the fracture behavior of filled and unfilled homo-polypropylene (PP). The first was based upon an organic quinacridone, whereas the second was based upon the inorganic calcium pimelate. Formulations containing various concentrations of nucleant were prepared using single screw extrusion and then characterized by X-ray diffraction, differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), Izod impact strength, and tensile testing. The quinacridone nucleating agent produced higher levels of β crystallinity and better improvement in strain to failure, whereas the calcium pimelate imparted greater improvement in impact strength regardless of whether the PP was filled or unfilled. No direct relationship between β crystallinity and fracture properties was observed though synergistic enhancement in impact strength was evident. By varying the concentration of calcium carbonate in the calcium pimelate from 10: 1, 5: 1, 2: 1, and 1: 1 weight composition of calcium carbonate to pimelic acid, similar property enhancements were achieved regardless of composition although the 10: 1 sample did produce superior elongation to break. The importance of cooling rate on microstructure within each sample was explored via a through the thickness study using DSC and nano-indenting methods. Variations in the β content through the thickness were related to cooling and found to be independent of sample composition and processing. Elastic properties varied inversely with β content.


ABSTRACT Chemotherapy resistance represents a major issue associated with gastric cancer (GC) treatment, and arises through multiple mechanisms, including modulation of the cell-cycle check point. Several ubiquitin kinases, including RING finger protein 138 (RNF138), have been reported to mediate the G2/M phase arrest. In this study, we investigated the role of RNF138 in the development of cisplatin resistance of two GC cell lines. We show that RNF138 levels are higher in cisplatin-resistant cell lines, compared with cisplatin-sensitive cells, and RNF138 expression was elevated during drug withdrawal following the cisplatin treatment. Using gene overexpression and silencing, we analyzed the impact of altering RNF138 level on GC cell viability, apoptosis, and cell cycle phenotypes in two isogenic cisplatin-sensitive and resistant cell lines. We show that RNF138 overexpression increased GC cell viability, decreased apoptosis and delayed cell cycle progression in the cisplatin-sensitive GC cells. Conversely, RNF138 silencing produced opposite phenotypes in the cisplatin-resistant cells. Moreover, RNF138-dependent phosphorylation of Chk1 was seen in GC cells, indicating a novel connection between cisplatin-induced DNA damage and apoptosis. Collectively, these data suggest that RNF138 modulates the cisplatin resistance in the GC cells, thus serving as a potential drug target to challenge chemotherapy failure. In addition, RNF138 can also be used as a marker to monitor the development of cisplatin resistance in GC treatment.


AID is expressed in mature B cells during activation and in some non-lymphoid tissues during inflammation and malignancy. Elevated COX-2 & PGE2 characterize all the above and may be involved. We here confirm that PGE2 enhances AID in activated human B2 cells (J Immunol. 178:35.4, 2007 abstract) and explore the mechanism. AID was assessed, by immunoblotting and two-color flow cytometry of CFSE-labeled cells, following activation by anti-IgM:anti-CD21:dex + IL-4 + BAFF w/wo PGE2 or agonists/antagonists of PGE2 receptors (EP1, EP2, EP3, and EP4). PGE2 added at physiological doses augmented AID. EP2 was involved on the basis of (a) AID-augmenting effects of an EP2-specific agonist and (b) concordant upregulation of AID and EP2 on replicating blasts. Furthermore, PGE2-mediated elevation of AID was thwarted by inhibitors of PKA, downstream of EP2. To examine whether autocrine PGE2 synthesis contributes to AID, replicating cells were assessed for mPGE2-1 - an enzyme that converts COX-2-generated PGH2 to PGE2. Elevated mPGE2-1 in progeny and COX-2 inhibitor-reduced AID both suggest that autocrine PGE2 promotes AID. Additionally, functional AID (on the basis of IgG+ progeny) was elevated and reduced by exogenous PGE2 and COX-2 inhibitors, respectively. Thus PGE2, elaborated by classic inflammatory cells or generated during activation, augments AID expression/function in EP2-expressing human B lymphoblasts. NIH R01 AI52189; M01 General Clinical Research Center grant RR018535; and Karches Foundation


We encountered the Great East Japan Earthquake on March 11, 2011. The magnitude of the earthquake is 9.0 and it is one of the greatest from A.D. 1900 to now. The earthquake developed large tsunami and many people living on the pacific coast of east Japan died from lung disorder caused by near drowning with tsunami. We also encountered three cases of lung disorders caused by near drowning. All three were females, and two of them were old elderly. All segments of both lungs were involved in all the three patients, necessitating ICU admission and endotracheal intubation and mechanical ventilation. All three died within three weeks. In at least two cases, misswallowing of oil was suspected from the features noted at the time of the detection. Many bacteria were detected from the phlegm of two cases.