OF THE THESIS The Mini-Mental State Examination in Iranian Americans by Pega Davoudzadeh Master of Arts in Psychology San Diego State University, 2010 An issue facing the field of neuropsychology is the proper assessment of cognitive function in ethnically diverse populations. This issue becomes of utmost importance when considering by the year 2055, the U.S. will not have an ethnic group in the majority. Most neuropsychological tests have been validated and normed for English-speaking AngloAmericans; therefore, their utility with ethnically diverse populations has not been adequately researched. Numerous studies have found performance differences between ethnically diverse groups and Anglo-Americans on various neuropsychological assessments. Failure to acknowledge the influence of ethnicity on test performance could lead to misdiagnoses by clinicians. Additionally, acculturation factors have been associated with performance on neuropsychological tests, such that the more assimilated individuals from different ethnicities are into American culture, the better they would perform. Psychologists have tried to address ethnic disparities on neuropsychological measures by testing individuals in their native languages. However, few studies have examined the performance of Iranian Americans, a growing population of the U.S., on neuropsychological assessments in either English or Farsi (their native language). The Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) is one of the most widely used neuropsychological tests to measure cognitive function. Due to ease and rapidity of administration, as well as minimal required training, the MMSE is used by a range of health care professionals in varied settings. It has been validated and shown to be reliable in a variety of different languages. However, no studies have compared the performance of Iranian Americans on the MMSE when administered in English or Farsi. Therefore, the aim of the present study was to examine the performance of Iranian Americans on the MMSE when completed in English versus Farsi. The purpose was to see if performance would be comparable for both groups or if cultural and linguistic factors would affect their performance. In addition, factors that have been known to influence MMSE scores, such as acculturation, socioeconomic status (SES), age, and education were examined. Sixty healthy, fully bilingual Iranian Americans between the ages of 20-79 years participated in the study. Each participant was randomly assigned into a language condition. Half of the participants completed the MMSE in Farsi and half completing it in English. Participants then completed the Acculturation Rating Scale for Iranian/Persian Americans and two Scales of Subjective Social Status, which measure perceived SES, in either language, per their choice. Statistical analyses revealed no significant difference between Iranian Americans completing the MMSE in English or Farsi. Age was the only significant predictor of MMSE scores, indicating that MMSE scores significantly decreased as a function of increased age. The present results suggest the scores of Iranian Americans given the MMSE in English do not vary from those given the MMSE in Farsi. In comparison with


A recognition system for connected digits, which uses a statistical classifier to identify words in speaker-independent continuous speech, is described. The system uses the multiple similarity method, a statistical pattern recognition technique. For evaluating word strings, the system uses a scoring method that is independent of the number of words in the strings. It is derived from the a posteriori probability that a subinterval corresponds to a correct word position, giving a word similarity value. The system evaluates a word string using dynamic programming and a parallel search procedure. Experiments for the contextual effect of the training data set, for validation of the search algorithm, and for a large quantity of unspecified speakers including 40 males and 40 females were performed. For connected digits (unknown word lengths test), the string recognition rates were 90.1%-95.1% for two, three, or four connected digits, where the equivalent word (digit) rates were 97.4%-98.4%. >


Europe is facing prolonged austerity and its health systems must adopt new ways of working and funding care, participants agreed at this year's European Health Forum Gastein (www.ehfg.org).

Leaner, more inclusive, better evidence based, and transparent health governance is also essential and decision makers must be held accountable for how their health systems perform.

Speakers agreed that given the strong economic case for investing in health, health ministers should make it more forcibly and lead cross sector action to tackle the determinants of health.

In particular, innovation was needed in the delivery and integration of services. Business as usual will not work, and new ways to support patients, especially those with long term conditions, to self manage disease must be evaluated and implemented, participants agreed.

Amid widespread cuts to services in many countries, the importance of strong primary care, of avoiding unnecessary hospital care, and of providing equitable access to services was underlined. …


Incentive is one of the motivational approach, which has an energizing force that induces or compels and maintain performance of every worker. Thus, it will be of important if the impact of standardized and sustainable incentives is implied to every worker in construction industry. The aim of the paper is to assess the sustainable incentive on worker performances by assessing the relative significance index score for different types of incentives; and identifying the average level of impact for the three groups of incentives for workers' performances. The targeted population of this study were contractors, architects, quantity surveyors, engineers in Enugu state. Data collection was done through a questionnaire survey self-administered on 80 randomly selected construction professionals involved in a nearly completed or recently completed construction projects. This was analyzed using descriptive statistics and analyses of variance (ANOVA). Results of the study indicate a disparity of the ranking of the degree of occurrence and impact among the group. Based on the composite of incentive factors the study established its likelihood of various occurrence of both financial and non-financial incentives. The study recommended that those with highly impacted incentives should be put in place in which it will become a means of conquering the new frontier with a solid sustenance. Finally, the study also concluded that they should implement an efficient, standardized and effective of the three groups of the incentives on workers in order to gear toward fully sustainable commitment, solid participation and loyal performances.


Placement of static voltage compensators and bus compensators in order to enhance the voltage is a common and fundamental issue in the power field. Nowadays, electrical systems are one of the most advanced man-made systems in terms of size, technology and price. Therefore, economical usage and optimization are very important. Developing facilities and increasing network load lead to fragile systems such that there have been some obstacles in the field of power stability due to voltage instability worldwide. One fundamental component of static voltage compensators is bus capacitor which plays an important role in static voltage instability. System loss and voltage profile are very important in optimal resource design. Therefore, placement of the mentioned parts plays an important role in enhancing the voltage stability. In this article, genetic algorithm is used to enhance voltage. Stimulation results have shown that genetic algorithm is very useful.


Fluorouracil (5-FU; Adrucil®) is a pyrimidine analog antineoplastic chemotherapy agent which works by interfering with DNA and RNA synthesis. It has an uncommon toxicity called hyperammonemic encephalopathy. This neurotoxicity is associated with a high-dose administration of 5-FU (2,600 mg/m(2)/week), with an incidence rate of 5.7%, and is not normally seen with the current dose of 1,200 mg/m(2) infused over 46 h. The mechanism behind this neurotoxicity is not known but is possibly due to accumulation of fluorocitrate, a byproduct of 5-FU metabolism. This by-product inhibits the Krebs cycle, which causes impairment of the adenosine triphosphate-dependent urea cycle. By impairing this cycle, ammonia is not converted to urea, which in turn this leads to an accumulation of ammonia. The accumulated ammonia in the brain is metabolized to glutamine, which has been suggested to cause an increase in intracranial pressure and cerebral edema. This case report discusses how a 40-year-old male with colorectal cancer experienced 5FU-induced hyperammonemia and was treated for it and how reducing the dose by 50% led to resolution of this symptom from reoccurring.


on many of our infants with Pierre Robin sequence who present for surgery at our institution. Second, we would like to suggest three other alternatives to changing the endotracheal tube once the infant is successfully intubated, and the LMA must be removed (1) using the fiberoptic scope as a stent (Figure 1), (2) using a tube exchanger (Figure 2), and (3) (Figure 3), armoring two endotracheal tubes after cutting the smaller part of the 15-mm tube adapter. Although we suggest these alternatives, this in no way should detract from the author's success with their technique. A L B E R T O D E-A R M E N D I M O H A N A D S H U K R Y J A M E S F. M A Y H E W Department of Anesthesiology, University of Oklahoma Medical Center, Oklahoma City, OK, USA (email: firstname.lastname@example.com)


The immunogenicity in patients with melanoma of three high molecular weight melanoma associated antigens (HMW.MAA) defined by murine monoclonal antibodies (MoAb) was investigated. For this end sera from patients with melanoma (stage I, IV) and normal individuals were tested by inhibition assay and sandwich assay using antiidiotypic MoAb to anti HMW.MAA MoAb. In inhibition assay, sera were tested for their ability to inhibit the binding of murine antiidiotypic MoAbs to biotin conjugated anti HMW.MAA MoAbs. Some of the sera from patients with melanoma significantly inhibited the binding of antiidiotypic MoAb to anti HMW.MAA MoAb in comparison with that from normal individuals. In sandwich assay, sera were tested for their ability to bind to precoated murine antiidiotypic MoAb and to biotin conjugated anti HMW.MAA MoAbs. Positive findings suggest the existence of anti HMW.MAA antibodies in sera were showed in several sera from the patients, which were less in frequency than that in inhibition assay. These results suggest that HMW.MAA could elicit the immune response in some melanoma patients and also suggest that the assay anti HMW.MAA MoAb in sera will help us to understand the prognosis of the patients and to evaluate the usefulness of treatment with antiidiotypic MoAb as vaccine therapy.


We present a systematic derivation for a general formula for the n-point coupling constant valid for affine Toda theories related to any simple Lie algebra g. All n-point couplings with n ≥ 4 are completely determined in terms of the masses and the three-point couplings. A general fusing rule, formulated in the root space of the Lie algebra, is derived for all n-point couplings.


A 16-month study of estuarine habitats in poly-, meso-, and oligohaline salinity regimes near Charles- ton Harbor assessed the distribution and abundance of megalopae and early crab stages of the blue crab, Callinectes sapidus. Blue crab were sampled with a plankton net and a cylindrical drop sampler. Blue crab were most abundant in plankton collections at night, accounting for 68% of the megalopae and over 88% of the juveniles collected in day and night tows combined. At night, densitie s of megalopae were greatest in surface samples, whereas densities in daylight collections were greater on the bottom. Juvenile densities were greatest on the bottom in both day and night collections, although catch rates at night were more variable than those of the megalopae. This suggests that megalopae, and possibly juvenile stages, experience a diel vertical migration. Results indicate that ingress to estuarine nursery areas occurs at the megalopal stage. Megalopal densities were highest at the polyhaline site, while juvenile blue crab were most abundant in the oligohaline area. Habitat utilization by juvenile blue crab was estimated using a cylindrical drop sampler and Venturi suction pump on three bottom types in the intertidal zone. Densities were greatest over the sandy-mud substrate, although catch rates were much lower than those reported for other geographical areas. These results suggest that juvenile blue crab do not occur in abundance on the marsh surface but remain on the creek bottom, possibly because creek physiography and large tidal amplitudes may restrict accessibility to the marsh surface.


Preface. Foreword. Cost analyses of the Arizona health care cost containment system: lessons from an eleven-year evaluation (C.W. Wrighton, N. McCall). Estimating the short-run impacts of an employer insurance mandate on small businesses (R.J. Hanley, J.J. McCoy). State choices for voluntary health reform initiatives (E.H. Killbreth, C. McGuire). Managing the safety net: hospital provision of uncompensated care in response to managed care (J. Mann et al.). Massachusetts medicaid managed health care reform: treatment for the psychiatrically disabled (B. Dickey et al.). Florida's managed competition approach to health care reform (W.B. Vogel , M.K. Miller). Development of the Utah prepaid medical health plan (J.B. Christianson et al.). Cost and quality information and health care market reform (S. Foreman, D. Kenkel and D. Shea). State tax reform and state health reform (L.A. Blewett, V.B. Weslowski).


BACKGROUND
The SYNTAX score (SXscore), an angiographic score reflecting coronary lesion complexity, predicts clinical outcomes in patients with left main or multivessel disease, and in patients with ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction undergoing primary PCI. The clinical SXscore (CSS) integrates the SXscore and clinical variables (age, ejection fraction, serum creatinine) into a single score. We analyzed these scores in elderly patients with acute coronary syndrome (ACS) undergoing primary PCI. The purpose of this analysis was not to decide which patients should undergo PCI, but to predict clinical outcomes in this population.

METHODS
The SXscore was determined in a consecutive series of 114 elderly patients (mean age, 79.6 ± 4.1 years) undergoing primary PCI for ACS. Outcomes were stratified according to SXscore tertiles: SXLOW ≤15 (n = 39), 15< SXMID <23 (n = 40), and SXHIGH ≥23 (n = 35). The primary endpoint was all-cause mortality at 30 days. Secondary endpoints were nonfatal major adverse cardiac and cerebrovascular events (MACCE) at 30 days, and 1-year outcomes in patients discharged alive.

RESULTS
Mortality at 30 days was higher in the SXHIGH group compared with the aggregate SXLOW+MID group (37.1% vs 5.1%; P<.0001), and in the CSSHIGH group compared with the aggregate CSSLOW+MID group (25.5% vs 1.4%; P=.0001). MACCE rates at 30 days were similar among SXscore tertiles. The CSS predicted 1-year MACCE rates (12.1% for CSSHIGH vs 3.1% for CSSLOW+MID; P=.03).

CONCLUSIONS
The SXscore predicts 30-day mortality in elderly patients with ACS undergoing primary PCI. In patients discharged alive, the CSS predicts risk of MACCE at 1 year.


Reasons behind the failure and success of large-scale information systems projects continue to intrigue researchers. In particular in the airline industry very successful (passenger reservation) systems have been built which have totally changed the competitive arena of the industry. On the cargo side however attempts to implement large-scale community systems have largely failed across the globe. Air cargo parties are becoming increasingly aware of the importance of IT and, increasingly, they understand the value that IOS could provide for the total value chain performance. However, whereas in other sectors IOSs have been very successful, there are only fragmented examples of successful global systems in the air cargo community and the penetration of IOS in the air cargo industry is by no means pervasive. This paper describes the genesis and evolution of two IOSs in the air cargo community and identifies plausible explanations that lead one to be a success and one to be a failure. It draws on extensive fieldwork in Europe and in Hong Kong SAR that is complemented by secondary data analysis of relevant trade and company literature. We argue that in these two cases the complex, institutional and technical choices by the initiators of the system in terms of their competitive implications that were the main causes for the systems failure. The paper thus concludes that it was the institutional factors involved in the relationships of the stakeholders that led to the opposite manifestations of the two initiatives, and that such factors should be taken into account when designing and implementing large-scale information systems.


In this study, the expression of CYP26 is examined in relation to retinoid-induced mucosecretory differentiation in human tracheobronchial epithelial (HTBE) cells and compared with that in human lung carcinoma cell lines. In HTBE cells, retinoic acid (RA) inhibits squamous differentiation and induces mucous cell differentiation as indicated by the suppression of transglutaminase I and increased expression of the mucin gene MUC2. The latter is accompanied by increased expression of CYP26 mRNA. RA is required but not sufficient to induce RARbeta, CYP26, and MUC2 mRNA because induction is only observed in confluent but not in logarithmic cultures, suggesting that additional factors are critical in their regulation. CYP26 mRNA can be induced by the RAR-selective retinoid 4-(5,6,7,8-tetrahydro-5,5,8,8-tetramethyl-2-anthracenyl)-benzoic acid (TTAB) but not by the RXR-selective retinoid SR11217 or the anti-activator-protein 1-selective retinoid SR11302. RARalpha-, beta-, and gamma-selective retinoids are able to induce CYP26; this induction is inhibited by the RARalpha-selective antagonist Ro41-5253. TTAB is able to induce CYP26 mRNA expression in only a few of the lung carcinoma cell lines tested. The lack of CYP26 induction in many carcinoma cell lines may relate to previously reported defects in the retinoid-signaling pathway. The induction of CYP26 correlated with increased metabolism of RA into 18-hydroxy-, 4-oxo-, and 4-hydroxy-RA. The latter metabolite was shown to be able to induce MUC2 and MUC5AC expression in HTBE cells. Our results demonstrate that in normal HTBE cells, CYP26 expression is closely associated with mucous cell differentiation and that many lung carcinoma cells exhibit increased RA metabolism and a defective regulation of CYP26.


Salinity is one of the stressful environmental factors which affects life, metabolism, and distribution of aquatic animals. In this study, the effects of different levels of water salinity were investigated on serum biochemical parameters in rainbow trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss) fingerlings. For this, the fish (5.53±0.057 g) were exposed to 0, 5, 13, 20 or 30 ppt water salinities for 60 days; then blood samples were taken from all treatments for hormonal and enzymatic studies. All fish died at 30 ppt water salinity, during adaptation. The results showed that there was a tendency to triiodothyronine (T3) elevation along with water salinity levels, although the changes were not statistically significant (P >0.05). Increase in water salinity significantly increased serum thyroxine (T4), cortisol, alkaline phosphatase (ALP) and protease levels. Among the water salinities, 20 ppt led to a significant elevation in serum alanine aminotransferase (ALT) activity. There was no significant difference in serum glucose and aspartate aminotransferase (AST) levels in the fish reared at 5 and 13 ppt salinities; both treatments exhibited lower values compared to the 0 and 20 ppt salinities. Water salinity induced no significant changes in serum lipase activity. The Results indicate that increase in water salinity causes elevation in cortisol and thyroid hormones, which are necessary for energy supply and osmoregulation. Moreover, rainbow trout may face organ damage in saltwater, particularly at 20 ppt.


OBJECTIVE
To evaluate the safety and efficacy of intraoperative argon/helium cryosurgery in surgical resection of advanced hepatic carcinoma.

METHODS
Eighty-six surgical patients with advanced hepatic carcinoma were enrolled in this study, including 14 undergoing argon cryosurgery for tumor removal and 72 receiving cryosurgery in addition to surgical tumor reduction. Portal vein or hepatic arterial pump placement was performed in 15 patients for chemotherapy.

RESULTS
No death occurred in the operation or during the postoperative hospitalization period in these patients. Improvement of the clinical symptoms was observed in 66 cases (76.74%) and 43 (78.18%) patients showed significantly decreased blood AFP levels after the surgeries. Postoperative CT demonstrated obviously reduced tumor size in 58 cases (67.44%). Of the 70 patients available for the follow-up, 28 survived with a survival rate of 40%. The 0.5-, 1-, 3 and 5-year survival rates were 44/48 (91.67%), 35/48 (72.92%), 28/48 (58.33%), and 20/48(41.67%) in the patients with primary hepatic carcinoma (PHC), respectively, as compared with those of 21/22 (95.45%), 18/22 (81.82%), 13/22 (50.09%), and 8/22 (36.36%) in patients with metastasis hepatic carcinoma (MHC). The 1-, 3- and 5-year survival rates of the patients undergoing surgical tumor resection and cryosurgery were 65/72 (90.27%), 47/60 (78.33%) and 24/58 (41.38%), respectively, significantly higher than the rates of 10/14 (71.43%), 8/12 (66.67%) and 4/12 (33.33%) in the patients receiving cryosurgery only (P<0.05).

CONCLUSIONS
Argon cryosurgery offers an effective and safe option for management of advanced hepatic carcinoma, and its combination with other therapeutic approaches may achieve better clinical effects.


This paper describes the generation and propagation of internal solitary wave in a two-layer fluid system by numerical analysis. Characteristics of interfacial soliton such as wave type, wave height, wave celerity are investigated numerically with respect to an extent of initial disturbance, fluid thicknesses of the two fluids and etc. The difference between the internal wave propagation on sloping beach and flat bottom was also examined. Laboratory experiments were conducted in the wave flume and compared with the results of numerical computation for verification.


The Province of East Java has its own characteristics that differentiate it from any other regions. Dissimilarities in characteristics of a region may encompass issues such as social, economic, cultural, parenting, education, and the environment, so as to cause the difference in case of severe under nutrition between one region to another. Sufferers of malnutrition in one region may be linked and influenced by the surrounding regions. Therefore, we need a statistical modeling that is able to take into account the spatial factor. Statistical methods that can be used to analyze the data and also takes into account the spatial factor are the Geographically Weighted Regression (GWR). This study is aimed to determine the case of malnutrition models in East Java Province using GWR model with kernel adaptive bi-square weighting and comparing it to the conventional linear regression model . The data used in the study are secondary data obtained from the National Socio-Economic Survey and Basic Health Research (2010) conducted in 38 districts in East Java. Estimation is done by using the Weighted Least Squares method that provides different weighting values to each region. The result showed that there are 38 models of the malnutrition case that is different for each district in East Java. The GWR model with bi-square kernel weighting function is better in modelling the case of malnutrition in East Java compared to the conventional linear regression models that are based on the criteria of goodness that is the R-square, Mean Square Error and the Akaike Information Criterion.


Abstract Biomass allocation in seedlings and saplings at different stages of growth is important information for studying the response of species to site conditions. The objectives of the paper are: (a) to analyse the relationship between height and biomass in young Norway spruce and European beech trees, (b) to study the influence of the leaf area on ontogenetic growth stages and biomass sequestration capacity on the regeneration of these two species. 96 seedlings (H < 30 cm) and saplings (31 < H < 130 cm) were collected in different light conditions in a case study in the Alps (Trentino province, Italy). Leaf Area Index and shoot/root ratio were used as indicators of the ecological conditions (e.g. light, soil moisture, nutrient status) able to influence the seedlings and saplings growth. Two non-linear regressions were fitted to analyse the relationship between height and biomass and to develop the aboveground and below-ground allometric equations. Non-linear regressions show that sapling or seedling height is a good predictor of above-ground and below-ground biomass with a R2aj above 0.8 for all equations and a R2aj above 0.9 for above-ground biomass of Norway spruce. The results show that silvicultural practices may influence the regeneration patterns and increase the biomass allocation rate influencing stand density and canopy cover.


Abstract This paper builds on earlier studies indicating a need for new management approaches in post-Soviet companies. Clearly, contextual factors have been influencing firms' adaptation to the new environment. Therefore, this paper takes a step beyond internal developments and explores how contextual aspects influence adaptation and change in local companies. Contextual influence may need time to be detected. The observations analyzed in this study cover seven years (1997 to 2003) of the transition period involving four companies from Russia and four from the Ukraine. This study's findings indicate that new management approaches need "space" for testing and adaptation in local companies. The development of "space" is linked to employees receiving clear signals from the market. It is suggested that signs of competition, customer demand, and the market's basic cash flow provide legitimacy for new work methods and approaches.


Vitamin D (Vit.D) and parathormone (PTH) measurements are usually prescribed for phosphocalcic metabolism assessment and, especially for Vit.D, more and more frequently for other pathologies. In order to step up to automated techniques for these analysis in our laboratory, we tested 3 devices: ADVIA Centaur XP(®) (Siemens), ISYS(®) (IDS) and Liaison(®) (Diasorin), which allow to simultaneously quantify Vit.D and PTH. The aim of this study was to evaluate the fidelity of these methods as well as study the correlation between them and the radioimmunological techniques previously used in our laboratory : « ELSA PTH » (Iba Cisbio International) and « 25-OH D » (IDS). The comparison of PTH analysis was performed on a population of chronic renal failure patients undergoing haemodialysis. According to our study, the 3 devices show acceptable analytical performances; anyway the measurements realized on the ISYS analyzer are the ones showing the best results in terms of fidelity, and the closest results to those obtained with the RIA reference techniques.


Several studies have implicated inherited and acquired thrombophilia as etiologically important in neonatal stroke (NS). In few have both mothers and children been tested, and MTHFR C677T and A1298C have not been evaluated in a large group. Between 1997 and 2004 we studied 50 infants and children with NS, excluding those with "watershed" infarcts or global ischemic injury. When possible, we tested both mother and child for the DNA mutations Leiden Factor V, Prothrombin 20210, and MTHFR C677T and A1298C; for protein C, S and Antithrombin III activity levels, and more recently for homocysteine and lipoprotein (a) levels. In mothers we obtained anticardiolipin antibodies (ACL), lupus anticoagulant and Beta 2 glycoprotein antibodies. Prothrombotic factors were identified in 34/50(68%) of all cases; in mother, child or both. More than one factor was present in 14/34(41%), and 3 mothers had 3 factors each. Leiden V was found in 5/40 (12.5%) of mothers and 4/48 (8%) of children; in only one instance was there concordance. Prothrombin 20210 was found in 5/47(11%) of children and only one mother. MTHFR homozygosity forC677T was found in 5/48 (10%) of children and 8/38 (21%) of mothers; compound heterozygosity for 677/1298 and homozygosity for A1298C were seen in 3 children each and 2 mothers each. In combination, 11/48 (23%) of children and 12/38 (32%) of mothers had homozygosity or compound heterozygosity for a MTHFR allele. MTHFR homozygosity was the sole prothrombotic factor identified in 5 cases, 2 of which were A1298C. Of interest, 20/48 (41%) of children were heterozygous for C677T as were 15/38 (39%) of mothers. Protein S deficiency was documented in 8 mothers and 1 child, whose mother was also deficient. Protein C deficiency was diagnosed in 2 children. Lipoprotein (a) levels ≥30 were found in 2/4 tested children and 3 tested mothers. Our observations confirm the high frequency of thrombophilia in NS as well as the frequent co-occurrence of more than one factor. Analysis suggests that mother and child may contribute independently to stroke risk as they are most often discordant for thrombophilic risk factors. MTHFR is common in our population but preliminary data suggests an increased frequency in Caucasians in this group as well as the expected high frequency in Hispanics. Although the numbers are small, homocysteines have been elevated when corrected for age and pregnancy and have correlated with MTHFR homozygosity. Evaluation of both the mother and child for thrombophilia is critical in evaluating etiology, recurrence risks and prevention strategies in NS.


There is a continuing discussion on methodological pluralism in IS research. Several claims have been made both for and against methodological pluralism. The debate focuses mainly on discussing the relationship between research methods and IS research paradigms, especially positivism and interpretivism. Also, the literature analyzes the epistemological assumptions of research paradigms, but pays little attention to a direct association of research methods with epistemology. We argue that the potential for methodological pluralism depends heavily on the epistemological characteristics of the research methods themselves. After analyzing various arguments pro and contra methodological pluralism, we then provide an epistemological framework addressing the relevant aspects in this context. Summary of Arguments Information Systems (IS) research can be described as a rich tapestry of diverse research methods, research paradigms, and research approaches (Section 1). Multi-method research is useful and favourable for IS research. Combining different research methods in the context of multi-method research designs can provide different perspectives on a particular phenomenon (Section 2). Calls against multi-method research designs applying epistemological and ontological arguments, the discussion focuses on the indirect relationship: epistemology-paradigms-methods. We advocate that in discussing the potential for multi-method research designs it is essential to consider the direct relationship: epistemology-methods (Section 3). A disciplined methodological pluralism must discuss epistemological assumptions of the various research methods to be combined in the context of a multi-method research design. An epistemological framework can help to structure and systematize epistemological issues relevant in this field (Section 4).


This paper presents a description of a computer simulator, namely, FBRSim, which simulates the thermal-hydraulics of fast breeder reactors (FBRs). It was design to be used for learning and research purposes. It simulates the temperature field, the heat transfer rates, and the pressure drop in typical FBR fuel assemblies. Furthermore, it simulates the core inlet and exit temperature and pressure. The simulator consists of six main modules, these are: geometrical, radial and axial temperature distribution, pressure drop, heat transfer rates, volumetric source strength, and physical properties modules. The modules carefully selected to help with analyzing and exhibiting all of the important thermal-hydraulic trends of typical FBR. In order to demonstrate the flexibility and advantages of using FBRSim for learning and research purposes, it was used to simulate typical FBR condition using the simulator default data. The simulation results demonstrate that FBRSim can be considered as a powerful learning and research tool, which can be easily used by undergraduate and postgraduate students to simulate and investigate the performance of FBRs under different geometrical configurations and physical and operation conditions.


The implementation of non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) and transmit antenna selection (TAS) technique has considered in this paper since TAS-aware base station (BS) provides the low cost, low complexity, and high diversity gains. In this paper, we investigate performance of two users by deriving outage probability. The system performance benefits from design of TAS and full-duplex (FD) scheme applied at NOMA users, and bandwidth efficiency will be enhanced although self-interference exists due to FD. The main contribution lies in the exact expressions of outage probability which are derived to exhibit system performance. Different from the simulated parameters, the analytical results show that increasing number of transmit antennas at the BS is way to improve system performance.


This article discusses how components in a game world can carry meaning relevant to individual players. The discussion is grounded in work with a massively multi-player online (MMO) proto- type where players in guided play-tests created their own opponents that they battled in groups of three. The opponents are called Manifestations, and can be compared to the "boss monsters" that in adventure and role-playing games pose the greatest challenges in terms of tactical game play, or battle. When creating Manifestations players define how these shall behave in play, and what they say under different circumstances. The game play mechanics in the world is centred on emotions and social relations. One of the design goals in the creation of the prototype was to cater for a system where tactical game play can be closely tied to the potential narrative contents. The Manifestations players created in the play tests were of four main categories; reflec- tions of persons they had complicated relationships with in real life, difficult situations, abstract concepts, or purely fictional entities. In several cases players brought material into the game that had personal meaning to them. These meanings were developed further when players saw how their Manifestation behaved within the rule system of the world. For example, one player created a Manifestation of an anticipated exam, while another made a Manifestation called "Mother". The Mother cast spells called "Focused Aggression" and "Cold Ripple of Fear". It was able to perform acts called "Blame", "Threaten", and "Disagree". The group experimented with tactical choices, while reasoning about the Mother's potential motivations. They managed to overcome the Mother by alternating between giving each other resistance and casting spells, the winning stroke being a rapid series of spells called "Forgive".


This quasi-experimental, mixed-methods case study examined the effects of perspective taking on the discussion skills of one group of 9 grade World History students. Specifically, this study investigated the impacts of a historical perspective taking scenario activity on student participation in discussions, quality of discussions, student learning from discussions, teacher perceptions of discussions, and student and teacher enjoyment of discussions. The methods used to assess these impacts were classroom observations, frequency counts, teacher interviews, a student focus group interview, and document analysis. Results indicated that the use of a historical perspective taking scenario activity produced a dramatic increase in student participation in classroom discussions. Quality of student responses increased in scenario-based discussions, though not to a statistically significant degree. Students reported increased learning and enjoyment in scenario-based discussions. Additionally, the teacher's perceptions of classroom discussions changed in numerous ways after participating in discussions that used a historical perspective taking scenario activity.


Embedded devices, personal gadgets and networks thereof are becoming increasingly pervasive, mainly due the advent of, and hype surrounding, the so-called Internet of Things (IoT). Such devices often perform critical actuation tasks, as well as collect, store and process sensitive data. Therefore, as confirmed by recent examples (such as the Mirai botnet), they also represent very attractive attack targets. To mitigate attacks, remote attestation (RA) has emerged as a distinct security service that aims at detecting malware presence on an embedded device. Most prior RA schemes focus on attesting a single devices and do not scale. In recent years, schemes for collective (group or swarm) RA have been designed. However, none is applicable to autonomous and dynamic network settings. This paper presents US-AID – the first collective attestation schemes for large autonomous dynamic networks of embedded devices. AID verifies overall network integrity by combining continuous in-network attestation with a key exchange mechanism and Proofs-of-non-Absence. Using device absence detection US-AID defends against physical attacks that require disconnecting attacked devices form the network for a non-negligible time. We demonstrate feasibility of US-AID with proof-of-concept implementation on state-of-the-art security architectures for low-end embedded devices and on an autonomous testbed formed of six drones. We also assess its scalability and practicality via extensive simulations.


Dams that are not designed to withstand major storms may be destroyed and increase the flood damage opportunities downstream. For protecting the lives and land downstream of Cameron Highlands, Malaysia, the current research targeted to estimate the Probable Maximum Precipitation based on the updated rainfall and other meteorological data and predict the Probable Maximum Flood using the Hydrological Model (HEC-HMS) version 4.8. The Geographic Information System was utilized as well in order to identify the geometric and hydrologist parameters. The PMP data is obtained up to 2020 via the application of Hershfield's Statistics and by applying the model mentioned earlier, the Probable Maximum Precipitation values can be predicted. For the calibrating the model, different sets of data were applied in which the Nash-Sutcliffe Efficiency and Percentage of Bias of 0.776 and -0.03% respectively are obtained while Nash-Sutcliffe Efficiency and Percent Bias of 0.861 and 1.47% respectively are obtained for Cameron Highland dams for model validation. The hydrological model in this study was adequately calibrated for Probable Maximum Flood simulation as it is credible to describe the hydrological process in Cameron Highlands.


The concept of the gesture is explored in relationship with its moral significance rather than, for example, its aesthetic significance. It is argued that the concept can be used in order to make clear how morality relates to the body. This is not to suggest that gestures can be neatly defined. On the contrary, they always seem to be ambivalent and somewhat nebular. However, it will be shown that some of their significance might well be related to popular concepts such as 'transparency', 'authenticity', 'integrity' and 'responsibility'. In order to make this clear, the role of some particular gestures in politics and organizational life, most notably 'apology' and 'trust', will be discussed throughout the paper.


Global magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) stability limits in the National Spherical Torus Experiment (NSTX) have increased significantly recently due to a combination of device and operational improvements. First, more routine H-mode operation with broadened pressure profiles allows access to higher normalized β and lower internal inductance. Second, the correction of a poloidal field coil induced error-field has largely eliminated locked tearing modes during normal operation and increased the maximum achievable β. As a result of these improvements, peak β values have reached (not simultaneously) βT = 35%, βN = 6.4, βN = 4.5, βN/li = 10, and βP = 1.4. High βP operation with reduced tearing activity has allowed a doubling of discharge pulse-length to just over 1 s with sustained periods of βN≈6 above the ideal no-wall limit and near the with-wall limit. Details of the β-limit scalings and β-limiting instabilities in various operating regimes are described.


: An improved heap storage technology with the use of CIPC (isopropyl N-(3-chlorophenyl) carbamate) has been developed for short-term storage of potatoes. Effect of tuber maturity and curing of skin on storage losses and processing quality was studied in three potato cultivars harvested at two maturity dates direct/after a curing period of 15 days following dehaulming of the crop to standardize pre-harvest factors to minimize losses. Potatoes from different treatments were stored in heaps with/without CIPC treatment @ 20 mg a.i./kg of tubers. Curing of potatoes reduced losses (physiological + rotting) in potatoes compared to direct harvest at both maturity levels. CIPC treatment significantly reduced losses in potatoes compared to control (untreated) particularly in cured potatoes up to 105 days of storage Processing quality was improved by maturity while curing of potatoes did not record much effect. Reducing sugar (RS) content was significantly higher in immature tubers of Kufri Jyoti and Kufri Pukhraj. While in Kufri Chipsona-1, RS content remained low (<150 mg/100 g fresh weight) at harvest and during storage in heaps and chip colour was acceptable in all treatments in CIPC treated and untreated potatoes up to 105 days of storage. Potatoes of Kufri Chipsona-1 harvested at different maturity levels in North-western plains can thus, meet the short-term needs of the processing industry during February-June.


Incorporation of electron-deficient tetracyanoquinodimethane (TCNQ) into electron-rich thiophene-fused heptacene was successfully achieved for the purpose of stabilizing longer acenes and generating new n-type organic semiconductors. The heptacene-TCNQ derivative 1 was found to have good stability and an expected electron transporting property. Electron mobility up to 0.01 cm(2) V(-1) s(-1) has been obtained for this novel material in solution processed organic field effect transistors.


Recently, the fluorometric detection of biomacromolecules has attracted much attention. In this paper, we report the development of two new techniques utilizing the chemical properties of amino acids or peptides: 1) a fluorescence assay for serine/threonine kinase activity; and 2) "turn-on" fluorescent probes for protein labeling, which could be useful for bioimaging. To develop the novel kinase assay, we utilized the chemical reactivity of phosphorylated serine or threonine. Phosphorylated peptide on resin was successfully labeled fluorescently via base-mediated beta-elimination, followed by Michael addition with novel coumarin derivatives. Protein kinase A and casein kinase I activities were detectable with our method. Also, this method was confirmed to be applicable for kinase inhibitor screening. For the development of the novel protein labeling technique, the selective interaction between "His-tag (His(6))" and "metal ion nitrilotriacetic acid (NTA) complex" was utilized. This interaction is useful for protein purification and immobilization. We designed fluorescent probes composed of a fluorophore and Ni2+ or Co2+-NTA complex. These probes were found to be weakly fluorescent as expected. When His-tag peptide was added, these probes became brightly fluorescent. On the other hand, these probes remained non fluorescent with the addition of angiotensin I (H-Asp-Arg-Val-Tyr-Ile-His-Pro-Phe-His-Leu-OH). These probes will be powerful tools for the bioimaging of target proteins.


Road extraction is a fundamental problem in remote sensing and mapping. Recent advances in Convolution Neural Network (CNN) have contributed significant improvements in automatic road extraction from satellite imagery, albeit prediction gaps challenge post-processing. Some of the gaps are hard to bridge by satellite imagery alone due to dense vegetation, road construction, and building shadows. In this paper, we combine satellite imagery with GPS data to improve road extraction quality. Our dataset includes 100cm pixel resolution satellite imagery and 192-hour taxi GPS traces from the urban area of Beijing. Experimenting with various layers to combine GPS data, our CNN model outperforms the RGB-only model by nearly 13% on mean IoU.


Abstract This article links the development of service user involvement championed in the United Kingdom to two examples in Dutch-speaking qualifying social work programmes: one from Belgium and one from the Netherlands. In both projects, a longer lasting cooperation with more marginalised service users was established. The Belgium project highlights social work lecturers and service users living in poverty, working in tandem to deliver a module to social work and socio-educational care work students. The example from the Netherlands involves young people from a homeless shelter as peer-researchers, working together with social work students. Both projects, one focusing on social work education and on social work research, highlight striking similarities in the positives and challenges of working with service users including how this challenges both groups preconceptions of the other, deepens learning but also creates greater potential for confrontations which need to be managed creatively. The article also identifies the pre-requisites for this to be effective including appropriate resourcing, training, facilitative skills and acknowledges that collaborations can be extremely fragile. However, such projects need further investment, experimentation and implementation on an international scale to share learning and promote creative approaches for the development and learning of social work students.


The establishment of the outer limits of the continental shelf is the act of a coastal State but the breadth of the continental shelf is determined by the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea. This chapter seeks to determine the governing legal framework in cases where a submitting coastal State is discontented with the findings of the Commission. It starts from the premise that the Commission is a technical treaty-created body which cannot make recommendations in isolation of legal considerations. The chapter considers the advisory options open to the Commission prior to examining the applicable principles, where a submitting coastal State may contend that the recommendations of the Commission are inconsistent with Article 76 of the Convention. The Commission has only considered a small number of submissions in comparison to the pending submissions waiting to be considered together with an impressive number of submissions of preliminary data. Keywords: Article 76; coastal State; continental shelf


Lupus nephritis (LN) is a pathologically heterogenous autoimmune disease linked to end-stage kidney disease and mortality. Better therapeutic strategies are needed as only 30-40% of patients completely respond to treatment. Noninvasive biomarkers of intrarenal inflammation may guide more precise approaches. Because urine collects the byproducts of kidney inflammation, we studied the urine proteomic profiles of 225 LN patients (573 samples) in the longitudinal Accelerating Medicines Partnership (AMP) in RA/SLE cohort. Urinary biomarkers of monocyte/neutrophil degranulation (i.e., PRTN3, S100A8, azurocidin, catalase, cathepsins, MMP8), macrophage activation (i.e., CD163, CD206, galectin-1), wound healing/matrix degradation (i.e., nidogen-1, decorin), and IL-16 characterized the aggressive proliferative LN classes and significantly correlated with histological activity. A decline of these biomarkers after 3 months of treatment predicted the 1-year response more robustly than proteinuria, the standard of care (AUC: CD206 0.92, EGFR 0.9, CD163 0.89, proteinuria 0.8, p<0.01). Candidate biomarkers were validated and provide new potentially treatable targets. We propose these biomarkers of intrarenal immunological activity as noninvasive tools to diagnose LN, guide treatment, and as surrogate endpoints for clinical trials. These findings provide new insights into the processes involved in LN activity. This dataset (matching other AMP omics) is a public resource to generate and test hypotheses and validate biomarkers.


Religious diversity within a secular state raises a host of issues, not least the question of how to resolve a conflict between obligations of citizenship and demands of faith. Nowhere is this question more visible than in the ongoing debate over the rights of citizens to submit their disputes to religious tribunals and have the resulting decision enforced by a civil court. This article surveys the right of an individual to civil enforcement of religious arbitration decisions. In particular, it focuses on the level of judicial review courts apply to religious arbitration awards compared to the awards of secular arbitration. It argues that the current standard for judicial review of religious arbitration decisions is flawed for three reasons. First, religious tribunals are subject to less judicial review than secular tribunals due to judicial assumptions regarding the reach of the First Amendment Religion Clauses. As a result, parties to religious arbitration are denied the full breadth of procedural protections of state and federal arbitration statutes. Second, there is a heightened risk of procedural unfairness due to the incorporation of, and deference to, religious procedural law that may not align with standard notions of fairness. Third, there is a greater risk that an agreement will be enforced where a party consented to the agreement under duress, as courts refuse to consider the true weight of communal religious pressure on individual decision making. This article thus suggests a new framework for the judicial review of religious arbitration decisions — in the form of judicial guidelines and legislative amendments to arbitration statutes — that will allow individuals to live according to the dictates of their faith without sacrificing the protections of the secular state.


Purpose To take an idea about the size of an important socioeconomically public health problem, which arefractures of the upper extremitiesMaterial and Methods: All the patients who sustained upper extremities fractures in one year (between 1stJan. till 31st Dec. 2018)included in this study. Data collected from the documents of alsader medical city inAlnajaf, it included the types of fractures, ages , gender, side of fracture ,and causes. Analysis of these datawas done and the results were demonstrated in tables.Results : The total number of the patients were (3067),males 2231 and females 835.The number of fractureclavicle 168, proximal humerus 28, shaft humerus 163, supracondylar fracture 169, elbow fractures 85,forearm fractures 823, lower radius in children 292 , wrist fracture 193 , and hand fracture 310. People in the1st decade were the most 1132 followed by the 2nd decade 949, 3rd decade 421 , 4th decade 256 , 5th decade141, 6th decade 104 7th decade 36 , and above 70 (28) patient. The most common cause of the fractures wasfall in 1263 patient followed by fall from height 810, sport (football) 292 direct hit 243 , RTA 214, and fallof heavy object 155 patients.Conclusion: Children and adolescent are mostly affected. Planes from all the government administrationsshowed decrease the occurrence of such injuries by learning programes to avoid fractures in all ages , inorder to decrease the socioeconomically burden on the community


As hardware becomes increasingly parallel and the availability of scalable parallel software improves, the problem of managing multiple multithreaded applications (processes) becomes important. Malleable processes, which can vary the number of threads used as they run, enable sophisticated and flexible resource management. Although many existing applications parallelized for SMPs with parallel runtimes are in fact already malleable, deployed run-time environments provide no interface nor any strategy for intelligently allocating hardware threads or even preventing oversubscription. Work up until SCAF either depends upon profiling applications ahead of time in order to make good decisions about allocations, or does not account for process efficiency at all. This paper presents the Scheduling and Allocation with Feedback (SCAF) system, a drop-in runtime solution which supports existing malleable applications in making intelligent allocation decisions based on observed efficiency without any paradigm change, changes to semantics, program modification, offline profiling, or even recompilation. Our existing implementation can control most unmodified OpenMP applications. Other malleable threading libraries can also easily be supported with small modifications, without requiring application modification. In this work, we present the SCAF daemon and a SCAF-aware port of the GNU OpenMP runtime. We demonstrate that applications running on the SCAF runtime still perform well when executing on a quiescent system. We present a new technique for estimating process efficiency purely at runtime using available hardware counters, and demonstrate its effectiveness in aiding allocation decisions. We evaluated SCAF using NAS NPB parallel benchmarks. When run concurrently pairwise, 70% of benchmark pairs on an 8-core Xeon processor saw improvements averaging 15% in sum of speedups compared to equipartitioning. For a 64-context Sparc T2 processor, 57% of pairs saw a similar 15% improvement. The improvement was 45% vs. equipartitioning when three selected benchmarks were concurrently run.


In applications of multiple regression, one of the most common goals is to measure the relative importance of each predictor variable. If the predictors are uncorrelated, quantification of relative importance is simple and unique. However, in practice, predictor variables are typically correlated and there is no unique measure of a predictor variable's relative importance. Using a transformation to orthogonality, new measures are constructed for evaluating the contribution of individual variables to a regression sum of squares. The transformation yields an orthogonal approximation of the columns of the predictor scores matrix and it maximizes the sum of the covariances between the cross-product of individual regressors and the response variable and the cross-product of the transformed orthogonal regressors and the response variable. The new measures are compared with three previously proposed measures through examples and the properties of the measures are examined.


Biomedical procedures of long duration cause mental fatigue and attention deficit. We investigated using sound as a means to support sustained attention during prolonged procedures and analysis. In this paper we present tactical audio as support for precise manual positioning of a surgical instrument, and introduce acoustic rendering as an additional information channel and/or warning signal in EEG analysis.


The primary goal of drug safety researchers and regulators is to promptly identify adverse drug reactions. Doing so may in turn prevent or reduce the harm to patients and ultimately improve public health. Evaluating and monitoring drug safety (i.e., pharmacovigilance) involves analyzing an ever growing collection of spontaneous reports from health professionals, physicians, and pharmacists, and information voluntarily submitted by patients. In this scenario, facilitating analysis of such reports via automation has the potential to rapidly identify safety signals. Unfortunately, public resources for developing natural language models for this task are scant. We present PHEE, a novel dataset for pharmacovigilance comprising over 5000 annotated events from medical case reports and biomedical literature, making it the largest such public dataset to date. We describe the hierarchical event schema designed to provide coarse and fine-grained information about patients' demographics, treatments and (side) effects. Along with the discussion of the dataset, we present a thorough experimental evaluation of current state-of-the-art approaches for biomedical event extraction, point out their limitations, and highlight open challenges to foster future research in this area.


The term "sustainability" is high on the European agenda – what implication does this have for the regeneration of our towns and cities? At Staffordshire University an EPSRC funded project is setting out to explore an often overlooked aspect: the problem of vacant industrial buildings and their reuse. Drawing from European examples and early research findings, this article investigates key elements of the process, raises research issues and suggests some ways forward. It concludes that reusing urban infrastructure is a worthwhile step towards a more sustainable city, even though we do not know exactly what the sustainable city entails. © 1997 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment


In this paper, we propose a fast rate control algorithm in frame-layer of H.264/AVC video coding standard. We derive a statistical relation between quantization parameter (QP) and encoded bits of inter-coded blocks. In addition, new complexity estimation is defined to determine weight of complexity of current frame. Using the statistical property and the complexity updating function, we determine the amount of bits as a function of quantization parameter, so that computational cost of rate control is significantly reduced with coding gain improvement and stable buffer management. Experimental results demonstrate the capability of the proposed algorithm.


Grounding textual expressions on scene objects from first-person views is a truly demanding capability in developing agents that are aware of their surroundings and behave following intuitive text instructions. Such capability is of necessity for glass-devices or autonomous robots to localize referred objects in the real-world. In the conventional referring expression comprehension tasks of images, however, datasets are mostly constructed based on the web-crawled data and don't reflect diverse real-world structures on the task of grounding textual expressions in diverse objects in the real world. Recently, a massive-scale egocentric video dataset of Ego4D was proposed. Ego4D covers around the world diverse real-world scenes including numerous indoor and outdoor situations such as shopping, cooking, walking, talking, manufacturing, etc. Based on egocentric videos of Ego4D, we constructed a broad coverage of the video-based referring expression comprehension dataset: RefEgo. Our dataset includes more than 12k video clips and 41 hours for video-based referring expression comprehension annotation. In experiments, we combine the state-of-the-art 2D referring expression comprehension models with the object tracking algorithm, achieving the video-wise referred object tracking even in difficult conditions: the referred object becomes out-of-frame in the middle of the video or multiple similar objects are presented in the video. Codes are available at https://github.com/shuheikurita/RefEgo


Dr. Andrew Hoffman is a board certified endocrinologist who specializes in the treatment pituitary and other neuroendocrine diseases, including acromegaly, Cushing syndrome, prolactinomas and other pituitary tumors. of insulin-like factors (IGF) in normal and in oncogenesis. molecular biology of IGF with an emphasis on long range chromatin interactions.


[1] Sediment samples from ODP Site 1085 were investigated in order to obtain more information on the initiation and development of the Benguela upwelling system during the middle and upper Miocene. In particular, our intent was to establish the causes of the upwelling as well as the response of the upwelling regime to the development of the Antarctic Circumpolar Current. Based on changes in the calcareous dinoflagellate cyst association, we found an initial increase of the dinoflagellate cyst productivity, probably related to the initiation of upwelling about 11.8 Ma ago. Two distinct increases in cyst productivity in conjunction with temperature decreases of the upper water masses reflect upwelling pulses off Namibia and occur at the end of the Miocene cooling events Mi5 (about 11.5 Ma) and Mi6 (about 10.5 Ma). Both cooling events are associated with an ice volume increase in Antarctica and are thought to have led to an increase in southeasterly winds, possibly causing these two upwelling pulses. We demonstrate a decrease in dinoflagellate cyst productivity and enhanced terrigenous input via the Orange River after the Mi5 event. At about 11.1 Ma, the dinoflagellate cyst productivity increases again. The polar cyst species Caracomia arctica occurs here for the first time. This implies an influence of subantarctic mode water and therefore a change in the quality of the upwelling water which allowed the Benguela upwelling to develop into modern conditions. From about 10.4 Ma, C. arctica forms a permanent part of the association, pointing to an establishment of the upwelling regime.


The phase field method integrates the Griffith theory and damage mechanics approach to predict crack initiation, propagation, and branching within one framework. No crack tracking topology is needed, and complex crack shapes can be captures without user intervention. In this paper, a detailed description of how the phase field method is implemented with explicit dynamics into LS-DYNA is provided. The displacement field and the damage field are solved in a staggered approach and the phase field equation is solved every Nth time step (N is refered to as calculation cycle) to save computational time. An N value smaller than 1/400 of the total time step numbers is suggested. Several simulations are presented to demonstrate the feasibility of this solving scheme.


Sliding-window-based low-rank matrix approximation (LRMA) is a technique widely used in hyperspectral images (HSIs) denoising or completion. However, the uncertainty quantification of the restored HSI has not been addressed to date. Accurate uncertainty quantification of the denoised HSI facilitates applications such as multisource or multiscale data fusion, data assimilation, and product uncertainty quantification since these applications require an accurate approach to describe the statistical distributions of the input data. Therefore, we propose a prior-free closed-form element-wise uncertainty quantification method for LRMA-based HSI restoration. Our closed-form algorithm overcomes the difficulty of handling uncertainty in HSI patch mixing caused by the sliding-window strategy used in the conventional LRMA process. The proposed approach only requires the uncertainty of the observed HSI and provides the uncertainty result relatively rapidly and with similar computational complexity as the LRMA technique. We conduct extensive experiments to validate the estimation accuracy of the proposed closed-form uncertainty approach. The method is robust to at least 10% random impulse noise at the cost of 10%–20% of additional processing time compared to the LRMA. The experiments indicate that the proposed closed-form uncertainty quantification method is more applicable to real-world applications than the baseline Monte Carlo test, which is computationally expensive.


When handling mass-produced parts in the automotive industry it is of great importance to take into consideration the geometrical variation that will occur as a result of the manufacturing process used. By using a Computer Aided Tolerancing (CAT) software, effects of geometrical variation are simulated to support robust design. As an additional step, simulated results may be evaluated in a high-end visualization tool to judge a predicted outcome of the final Perceived Quality (PQ). PQ is an overall quality impression perceived by the product user. However, when a new styling concept is evaluated the data used for analysis and visualization will be less mature in terms of component design. Design parameters such as material selection, material thickness, locating scheme, design and position of reinforcements and flanges are rarely defined here. These parameters influence the deformation behavior of a component which is critical for the outcome of the variation simulation. Previously presented methods for variation simulation of non-rigid parts are FEA-based, a method that are strongly dependent on these design parameters for a reliable result. A method of how to handle these uncertainties by using information from earlier design solutions, preferably based on the same platform, and applying them to current styling has earlier been suggested by the authors.

In this paper, the result from a descriptive study carried out at a Swedish automobile manufacturer is presented. The objective of the study was to identify areas where PQ is most frequently evaluated with non-rigidity in components as a contributing factor. This will on one hand indicate where non-rigid variation simulation is most critical for a more reliable prediction of the final PQ. On the other hand, it will support the further development of the above mentioned method, as diverse approaches may be necessary for different areas on the vehicle.


The objective of the present investigation was to evaluate the quality of piquín pepper seed through the accelerated aging test in piquín pepper (Capsicum annuum var. Aviculare) collections from the state of Querétaro and Guanajuato. The collections were made in four locations El Patol, El Cuervo and Higuerillas of the municipality of Queretaro and El Tanque of the municipality of Xichu. The vigor of the seed was obtained by the accelerated aging test which consisted of submitting the seeds 24, 48, 72, 96, 120 and 144 h at a temperature of 42 °C and 100% relative humidity, after this period, the seeds are subjected to a normal germination test at 7, 14 and 21 days. The results in the analysis of variance expressed significant effect in genotypes, being the best time for the count performed at 7 days and at 24 h. At 14 days the best times for the witness were zero, 24 h, 48 h and 72 h. On the other hand, the quality of the seed was registered, which presented significant differences for dry stem weight, the highest values were for El Tanque and El Patol. In dry weight of root, weight of one hundred seeds and speed of emergency stand out the collections from El Tanque, El Patol and El Cuervo. Higuerillas presented lower values in the characters indicated above, a difference that could be attributed to environmental conditions.


Recently weighing matrices have been found much beneficial to engineers working with satellite and digital communications. They have been found to have many similarities with perfect ternary arrays. These arrays have been frequently implemented in digital communications. Complex Hadamard matrices have applications in quantum information theory and quantum tomography. The purpose of this paper is to forward simple constructions for some of these matrices so that they can be used by engineers. This paper introduces a new generalization of matrix orthogonality. It has been shown that several classical as well as Hadamard matrices with circulant blocks can be obtained from generalized orthogonal matrices. The order of new complex H-matrices are 26,36, 50 and 82. Butson H-matrices are constructed from generalized orthogonal matrices. AbbreviationsH-matrices = Hadamard matrices, C-Matrix = Conference matrix


We study classes of locally biholomorphic mappings defined in the $\P$ that have bounded Schwarzian operator in the Bergman metric. We establish important properties of specific solutions of the associated system of differential equations and show a geometric connection between the order of the classes and a covering property. We show for modified and slightly larger classes that the order is Lipschitz continuous with respect to the bound on the Schwarzian, and use this to estimate the order of the original classes.


Results are reported for a collaborative study of a method for the extraction of light filth from spirulina (a blue-green alga) powder and tablets. A 50 g portion of either powder or tablets is dispersed in water, and then boiled with dilute HCI solution. Hairs and insect fragments are isolated by wet sieving on a No. 230 sieve, flotation with mineral oil, and washings of the mineral oil in a percolator. Average recoveries by 12 collaborators for tablets and powders were 70.6 and 70.2%, respectively, for 10 rat hair spikes and 68.3 and 84.4%, respectively, for 20 insect fragment spikes. The method has been approved interim official first action.


I propose new cross-national measures of minority inclusion based on ethnic minority support for government parties. These measures will greatly aid efforts to design political institutions intended to achieve greater minority inclusion and to ameliorate ethnic conflict by allowing for more sophisticated quantitative cross-country assessments of the effect of institutions on inclusion. I further explain how the proposed measure can be estimated to a useful degree of accuracy through multiple methods, including polls and ecological inference from ethnic and election data.


We report the discovery of the first new ultra-cool brown dwarf (BDs) found with the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE). The object's preliminary designation is WISEPC J045853.90+643451.9. Follow-up spectroscopy with the LUCIFER instrument on the Large Binocular Telescope indicates that it is a very late-type T dwarf with a spectral type approximately equal to T9. Fits to an IRTF/SpeX 0.8–2.5 μm spectrum to the model atmospheres of Marley and Saumon indicate an effective temperature of approximately 600 K as well as the presence of vertical mixing in its atmosphere. The new BD is easily detected by WISE, with a signal-to-noise ratio of ∼36 at 4.6 μm. Current estimates place it at a distance of 6–10 pc. This object represents the first in what will likely be hundreds of nearby BDs found by WISE that will be suitable for follow-up observations, including those with the James Webb Space Telescope. One of the two primary scientific goals of the WISE mission is to find the coolest, closest stars to our Sun; the discovery of this new BD proves that WISE is capable of fulfilling this objective.


Models for angiotensin converting enzyme (ACE) inhibitory peptides with varied lengths are proposed based on results from partial least square regression analysis of the potency of known peptides. Modeling was performed using partial least square regression with inhibitory activity of peptides as the dependent variable (Y) and the physicochemical properties of amino acids as the predictor X matrix. Variable importance in the projection (VIP) analysis of individual amino acid residues at each position revealed that the C-terminal tetrapeptide residues of long-chain peptides were more important to their ACE-inhibitory activity than the C-terminal tripeptide residues. The most likely preferred amino acid residues starting from C-terminus are tyrosine and cysteine for the first position, histidine, tryptophan and methionine for the second position with isoleucine, leucine, valine and methionine for the third position, and tryptophan for the fourth position. We concluded that the reported structural requirements of ACE-inhibitory peptides provide useful information that can be used for the development of more efficacious ACE-inhibitory peptides.


High performance of the critical current density Jc in Y1Ba2Cu3O7 films prepared by chemical vapor deposition has been demonstrated. The pinning mechanism in high-Tc superconducting oxides was explored from a viewpoint of the anisotropic behavior of Jc, and the global pinning force Fp was investigated in terms of the flux creep. It was found that the global pinning force on the basis of the flux creep theory well describes the Jc properties in CVD-Y1Ba2Cu3O7 films. The scaling in the form Fp∝(B/Bc2)1/2(1-B/Bc2)3/2 of the unrelaxed state which is not limited by the flux creep was presented.


One of the ongoing problems in American education remains the rush to grab the latest panacea, from "teaching machines" to Outcomes Based Education to the Internet. All too often, those most engaged in the classroom-ordinary teachers, parents, and students-are least or last informed of or involved in curriculum decisions. Curriculum texts, however, make it clear that "key stakeholders," like teachers, parents, and students, "have the strongest interests in planning" (Marsh & Willis, 2007, p. 179). In a democratic nation, since Dewey's work especially, stakeholder participation seems not only natural but essential. This paper offers an example of a small-scale study conducted by university researchers producing thoughtful insights by students and parents into the use of new curriculum materials, graphic novels, in mathematics and science curriculum. Although the university research did not perhaps reflect fully realized qualitative research, similar research, done by administrators and teachers (action research) in their own contexts can be well done and makes sense for school leaders considering curriculum reform in their own particular schools. Moreover, democratic participation has value itself and can result in insights into new curriculum. Following are both a description of the faculty research study and an argument for action research in schools on the same kinds of topics.The University StudySeveral university faculty members and a doctoral student became interested in the potential for graphic novels in the curriculum. Books, articles, and websites multiply as do graphic novels aimed at schools. One scholarly example is Graphic Novels and Comics in the Classroom (Syma & Weiner, 2013). The English Journal has been running articles on graphic novels for a number of years, including "In Defense of Graphic Novels" (Hansen, 2010). Scholastic not only sells graphic novels but offers hundreds of classroom suggestions under "resources for teachers" (http:// www.Scholastic.com/teachers/). While most graphic novels are written for adults or older students, Samet (2010) declares that graphic novels for elementary readers are becoming a force, too. Graphic novels across the curriculum are a growing topic, as well. Kimmel (2013) notes that in particular, "School librarians can introduce graphic novels with STEM-related content...into classroom lessons and units" (p. 40).As to stakeholders' attitudes, Mathews (2011) has conducted a study on graphic novels and preservice teachers, while Lapp, Wolsey, Fisher, and Frey (2011/2012) have done a study on graphic novels and elementary teachers. Despite a number of articles urging parents to appreciate graphic novels, objections remain; Alverson (2014) discussed both censorship and the advocacy of graphic novels by school librarians. Studies of what parents and their children think of graphic novels, using specific examples, remain absent.Selecting a Focus (Forming the Question)First, the researchers looked at information about graphic novels in the literature as above. Graphic novels are clearly "cool" with many young readers as can be seen from the graphic novels sections in book stores. While some scholars argue about the term, most readers agree that the graphic novel is longer than a comic book and tells one story or centers on one theme or subject while being fiction, nonfiction, or even poetry. Graphic novels are a relatively new medium and have become a "hot topic" in education. Students no longer "read" or learn solely from printonly materials. Furthermore, advocates of graphic novels in the classroom argue that graphic novels are engaging to students of all grades and ability levels and engage students in visual literacy (Carter, 2009) and even boost memory (Alverson, 2014). Because of teaching interests, the researchers wanted to learn about graphic novels aimed at elementary mathematics and science. The study involved gathering parents and their children, students in local schools, to review a few graphic novels and discuss them in focus groups. …


Describes the detection principle of a hydrogen peroxide sensor based on the electrolyte metal oxide semiconductor field effect transistor (/sup E/MOSFET) and possibilities of using different types of redox materials as the gate material for the sensor with respect to the sensitivity and detection limit. After discussing the fundamentals of hydrogen peroxide detection and a short description of the /sup E/MOSFET characteristics in terms of its threshold voltage, the basic measuring principle of hydrogen peroxide using the /sup E/MOSFET is shown. The /sup E/MOSFET with electro-active gate materials such as iridium oxide, potassium ferric ferrocyanide, and Os-polyvinylpyridine containing peroxidase, have been studied. These different materials are compared with each other with respect to their sensitivity, detection limit, and stability. The sensitivity of the sensors is improved by applying an external current between the gate and the solution.


Abstract Negative effects on native plant populations are often attributed to invasions by exotic plants, but experimental evidence is lacking to support many of these claims. Lonicera maackii, an exotic shrub with long leaf phenology, has become naturalized throughout the eastern United States. This study investigated the effects of L. maackii on demography of Galium aparine, Impatiens pallida and Pilea pumila, native annual herbs in differing phenological categories. These interactions were examined in two Ohio forest stands. One stand has a history of logging, burning and grazing and a higher L. maackii density, whereas the other stand has little anthropogenic disturbance and a lower L. maackii density. Three types of experimental plots were established: L. maackii removal, L. maackii present and, at the less disturbed stand, L. maackii absent. Seedlings of the annuals were transplanted and monitored for 1 y for survival to reproductive age and fecundity. In the more disturbed stand, survival of Galium aparine and Impatiens pallida and fecundity of all three species were significantly greater in the removal treatment than where Lonicera maackii was present. In the less disturbed stand there was no treatment effect on survival, but fecundity of all annuals was greater in the removal treatment than where L. maackii was present. Also, fecundity of I. pallida and Pilea pumila was greater where L. maackii was absent than where it was present. At both sites fitness (estimated as the product of survival and fecundity) was highest for each species in the removal treatment and lowest where L. maackii was present. These results demonstrate direct effects of the invasive shrub Lonicera maackii on populations of annuals. They suggest that other annuals, particularly those that are shade-intolerant or photosynthesize only in the early spring, will decline in the presence of shrubs with early leaf expansion.


Background: The prognosis of adrenocortical carcinoma (ACC) is heterogeneous. Genomic studies have identified ACC subgroups characterized by specific molecular alterations, including features measured at DNA level (somatic mutations, chromosome alterations, DNA methylation), which are closely associated with outcome. The aim of this study was to evaluate intratumor heterogeneity of prognostic molecular markers at the DNA level. Methods: Two different tissue samples (primary tumor, local recurrence or metastasis) were analyzed in 26 patients who underwent surgery for primary or recurrent ACC. DNA-related biomarkers with prognostic role were investigated in frozen and paraffin-embedded samples. Somatic mutations of p53/Rb and Wnt/β-catenin pathways were assessed using next-generation sequencing (n = 26), chromosome alteration profiles were determined using SNP arrays (n = 14) and methylation profiles were determined using four-gene bisulfite pyrosequencing (n = 12). Results: Somatic mutations for ZNRF3, TP53, CTNN1B and CDKN2A were found in 7, 6, 6 and 4 patients, respectively, with intratumor heterogeneity in 8/26 patients (31%). Chromosome alteration profiles were 'Noisy' (numerous and anarchic alterations) in 8/14 and 'Chromosomal' (extended patterns of loss of heterozygosity) in 5/14 of the study samples. For these profiles, no intratumor heterogeneity was observed. Methylation profiles were hypermethylated in 5/12 and non-hypermethylated in 7/12 of the study samples. Intratumor heterogeneity of methylation profiles was observed in 2/12 patients (17%). Conclusions: Intratumor heterogeneity impacts DNA-related molecular markers. While somatic mutation can differ, prognostic DNA methylation and chromosome alteration profile seem rather stable and might be more robust for the prognostic assessment.


Adult rats were injected intravitreally with all-trans [1-3H]farnesol, with or without co-injection of the squalene epoxidase inhibitor NB-598. Retinas were isolated 16 h later and their lipids were extracted, saponified, and analyzed by radio-HPLC. Most (> or = 90%) of the nonsaponifiable radioactivity was recovered as unmetabolized [3H]farnesol; however, about 6-8% of the radioactivity in control retinas exhibited the chromatographic behavior of sterols, including cholesterol. Unlike the controls, the NB-598-treated retinas exhibited substantial accumulation of both [3H]squalene and squalene mass. Calculations indicate that most of the squalene mass was derived from metabolism of endogenous precursors, with an in vivo biosynthetic rate of 46 +/- 17.5 pmol/retina/h. Retinas from eyes injected with all-trans [1-3H]geranylgeraniol yielded only the unmetabolized precursor in the nonsaponifiable extracts. These results suggest that farnesol can be "activated" in vivo (presumably to the corresponding allylic pyrophosphate) in the retina and subsequently metabolized to sterols and sterol precursors.


The present study compared the emotional state of 12 healthy full term neonates, between 42 and 74 hours of age, during skin-to-skin contact (SSC) and during mother-infant separation (MIS). Assessment of state was done by means of frontal EEG asymmetry. Based on modern attachment theory, it was expected that during SSC infants were in a more positive emotional state than in MIS. Based on the approach/withdrawal model of emotion, EEG asymmetry was predicted to be relatively left-sided during SSC and right-sided during MIS. Contrary to this hypothesis, this interaction between place and frontal region was not found. However, two novel findings were reported: More power was found during MIS compared to SSC. This together with the finding that babies cried more in MIS, could reflect more arousal/distress. More power was found in the right frontal region compared to the left frontal region. This might reflect right hemispheric specialisation for dyadic processing of nonverbal attachment communications between mother and infant.


Superficial skin infections are very common in present day clinical practise. Contemporary physicians find it difficult to treat these dermatological manifestations due to long treatment duration, development of resistance and adverse drug events. Description about skin diseases are seen in Ayurveda classics like Charaka and Sushrutha under the heading of Kushta (skin diseases). Kandu (itching) is one of the primary symptoms in most of the Kshudra Kushtas. Chakradatta described a herbo mineral preparation named as Arkamanashiladi Tailam which acts as Kandughna (reduces itching) and Pamakushtahara (eradicates skin diseases). This formulation contains Arkapatra swarasa (Juice of Calotropis gigantea), Shoditha Manashila (Realgar), Nisa kalka (Paste of turmeric) and Sarshapa Tailam (Mustard oil). Preparation of Arkamanashiladi Tailam carried out according to general method of preparation of Sneha kalpana after the purification of Manashila. After considering all Pakasiddhi lakshnas like Phenodgama (appearance of froth), Shabdahina (absence of sound) etc. final product obtained which is dark brown in colour and stench smell. As there is no Analytical study reports available for Arkamanashiladi tailam to ensure its quality. Hence, in this present study different analytical parameters including Organoleptic characters, pH, Specific gravity, Refractive index, Saponification value, Iodine value, Acid value and Moisture content has been evaluated as per Ayurvedic pharmacopoeia of India. All the parameters were found to be within the reference standards and these can be used for further studies on Arkamanashiladi tailam standardization.


In this paper, we investigate the nonlinear observability properties of bearing-only cooperative localization. We establish a link between observability and a graph that represents measurements and communication between the robots. It is shown that graph theoretic properties like the connectivity and the existence of a path between two nodes can be used to explain the observability of the system. We obtain the maximum rank of the observability matrix without global information and derive conditions under which the maximum rank can be achieved. Furthermore, we show that for complete observability, all of the nodes in the graph must have a path to at least two different landmarks of known location.


The performance of Beidou MEO/IGSO satellite signal acquisition is greatly affected by the secondary code, the NH (Neumann-Hoffman) codes with possible bit sign transition in every millisecond modulated on the signal, which puts a limitation on the coherent integration duration. This paper address the problem of coherent integration over periods longer than one primary code length and the acquisition of secondary code chip position. A unique code sequence method applied in FFT-based model is proposed which can handle both these problems together.


Bashkir (Turkic) definite possessors are invariably coded by genitives. Bashkir quasi-coordinate constructions in which the non-finite clause is headed by the converb in -p normally require coreferential subjects, but are sometimes acceptable if there is coreference between a genitival possessor in either clause and the subject in the other clause. Typically, these prominent possessors are animate, topical, and affected by the event, the possessive relations are inalienable, and the respective possessed nominals are inanimate. However, none of these absolute requirements is obligatory; the possessor's ability to control coreference is determined relatively: it must occupy the leftmost position in the clause and be more salient than other available noun phrases. The ability of genitival nominals in Bashkir to function as prominent possessors is related to their other exceptional properties: Bashkir genitives are used in many contexts where other languages switch to clause-level possessors.


Based on this thesis, it can be concluded that using eHealth interventions on modifiable lifestyle risk factors for neurodegenerative diseases, specifically Alzheimer's disease, appears to be a viable option.

I describe the validation of a new online, fast-to-play self-monitor instrument aimed at four cognitive functions crucial for optimal wellbeing and independent living. In my next studies I describe the 1-year outcome on modifiable lifestyle risk factors in participants who actively used the Brain Aging Monitor. After one year participants showed an overall lifestyle improvement in follow-up measurements that was mainly caused by improvements in exercise, dietary, and sleep outcomes. Added to the positive lifestyle outcomes, I describe the cognitive outcomes from the BAM-COG. This showed a positive change in working memory performance, which was correlated with the overall improvement in lifestyle score and slightly decreased body weight.

Overall, the study described in this thesis provided interesting and relevant data on the feasibility of this type of eHealth field trials that allows dissemination and evaluation of innovations to large populations at lower costs and in a shorter time than more strictly controlled designs. The BAM and BAM-COG results are sufficiently promising to conclude that it is worthwhile to further develop public health interventions to stimulate healthy brain aging by means of eHealth and mHealth innovations.


A study was commenced in 2005 to provide a validated diagnostic test for the detection of Blackcurrant reversion virus (BRV) to be used as an alternative to the conventional test recommended for use in the UK certification scheme. A range of cultivars previously virus indexed and held as nuclear stock (Baldwin, Ben Lomond and Ben Tirran) were grafted with known BRV-positive scions and assessed over the following four years. Data was collected through visual observations and buds sampled and tested with a single round RT-PCR using two new primer sets. For the method to be accepted for use in Scotland the detection rate must be equal or better than that of the existing grafting method. Statistical analysis of our results for the detection of both the European (E) and Russian (R) forms of Reversion disease in the three cultivars provides a validation for this test. We suggest that this method provides a faster throughput test for BRV even when no symptoms are visible on the plants, and so is suitable for adoption into the guidelines followed by both UK and European authorities for detection of BRV in blackcurrant propagation material.


A critical problem in understanding active galaxies is separation of intrinsic physical differences from observed differences due to orientation. Relativistic motion in powerful radio sources produces a significant level of anisotropic emission at all but the lowest frequencies. Obscuration is also anisotropic and strongly frequency-dependent. Combined, these two effects result in complex selection effects for observations in most wavebands, and there are few ways to select a sample that is sufficiently unbiased to test orientation effects as predicted by unification models. Low-frequency radio emission is one way to select an orientation-unbiased sample, albeit limited to the minority of AGN with strong radio emission. We report X-ray observations of a complete, flux-limited sample of 38 high-redshift 3CRR sources, 1


Helicobacter pylori is a microaerophilic motile curve rod that inhabits the gastric mucosa of the human stomach. The organism chronically infects billions of people worldwide and is one of the most genetically diverse of bacterial species. Infection with the bacterium which leads to chronic gastritis, peptic ulceration, gastric cancers and gastric MALT lymphoma has been reported to follow a pattern linked to geographic and socio-demographic factors. However; the infection rate in various populations does not parallel the incidence of morbidity caused by the infection. This has been termed by a number of authors as the 'African enigma' based on an apparently low incidence of gastric carcinoma and other H. pylori-associated morbidities in the continent of Africa. There are various techniques employed to detect H. pylori from specimens. These tests may be invasive or non-invasive. Endoscopy and gastric mucosal biopsy, microscopic examination of histological sections, PCR and rapid urease test are forms of invasive test that could be used. Non-invasive tests such as Urea Breath Test (UBT) make use of the ability of the organism to produce urease; enzyme linked immunosorbent Assay (ELISA), H. pylori stool antigen test, and latex agglutination tests are important non-invasive serological approaches employed to detect the presence of antibody or antigen from a specimen. H. pylori is a very fastidious bacterium. Restraint should therefore be exercised to allow for efficient performance of some of these techniques.


In the present work, post-annealing is adopted to investigate the formation and the correlation of Sb complexes and Zn interstitials in Sb-ion implanted ZnO films, by using Raman scattering technique and electrical characterizations. The damage of Zn sublattice, produced by ion bombardment process is discerned from the unrecovered E2 (L) peak in annealed high Sb+ dose implanted samples. It is suggested that the Zn sublattice may be strongly affected by the introduction of Sb dopant because of the formation of SbZn−2VZn complex acceptor. The appearance of a new peak at 510 cm−1 in the annealed high dose Sb+ implanted samples is speculated to result from (Zn interstitials-O interstitials) Zni−Oi complex, which is in a good accordance with the electrical measurement. The p-type ZnO is difficult to obtain from the Sb+ implantation, however, which can be realized by in-situ Sb doping with proper growth conditions instead.


This article provides a new view of Enterprise association model in agricultural production chains, through a biological metaphor proposal of microbial consortia. It collects various implementation cases of the metaphor as a methodology for organization study and their problems, as well as, nature, characteristics and fundaments of both microbial consortia and agricultural production chains. A metaphor is formulated between this two knowledge fields, based on the principles of general system theory. The document concludes exposing advantages and limitations of this con ceptual methodology for agricultural production chains case.


Unmanned vehicle (UV) displays are often the only information link between operators and vehicles, so their design is critical to mission success. However, there is currently no standardized methodology for operators to subjectively assess a display's support of mission tasks. This paper proposes a subjective UV display evaluation tool: the Modified Cooper-Harper for Unmanned Vehicle Displays (MCH-UVD). The MCH-UVD is adapted from the Cooper-Harper aircraft handling scale by shifting focus to support of operator information processing. An experiment was conducted to evaluate and refine the MCH-UVD, as well as assess the need for mission-specific versus general versions. Participants (86%) thought that MCH-UVD helped them identify display deficiencies, and 32% said that they could not have identified the deficiencies without the tool. No major additional benefits were observed with mission-specific versions over the general scale.


BACKGROUND
Standard treatment of adult Burkitt lymphoma is not defined due to the lack of randomised trials. In this situation, population-based data may represent a useful contribution in order to identify an optimal treatment strategy.

PATIENTS AND METHODS
The aims of this study were to investigate the outcome for adult HIV-negative BL with different chemotherapy regimens, and to assess possible improvement within the time frame of the study. The study population was identified through the Swedish and Danish lymphoma registries 2000-2009.

RESULTS
A total of 258 patients were identified. Since 2000, overall survival (OS) improved significantly only for younger patients (<65 years). Intensive regimens such as the Berlin-Frankfurt-Münster, hyper-fractionated cyclophosphamide, vincristine, doxorubicin, and dexamethasone (hyper-CVAD) and cyclophosphamide, vincristine, doxorubicin, methotrexate, ifosfamide, etoposide, and cytarabine (CODOX-M/IVAC) were associated with a favourable 2-year OS of 82%, 83%, and 69%, respectively. The low-intensive CHOP/CHOEP regimens achieved a 2-year OS of 38.8%, confirming their inadequacy for the treatment of BL. In a multivariate analysis, rituximab was not significantly associated with improved OS.

CONCLUSIONS
In this population-based retrospective series of adult BL, intensive chemotherapy regimens were associated with favourable outcome. The impact of the addition of rituximab remains uncertain and warrants further investigation.


Literature has been an imitator of life for generations on this earth, this literature has voiced the voiceless. Recent contemporary and postmodern literary theories have catered to burgeoning notions of logic that go beyond human survival on the planet. Science fiction is a genre of fiction that encompasses imaginative concepts like futuristic scientific-technological settings, faster than light, past and future spatial time travel, the existence of parallel universes and extraterrestrial life etc. An outbreak of Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by a novel acute respiratory syndrome of coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) occurred in Wuhan City, Hubei Province, China. The outbreak was declared as a public health emergency of international concern by the World Health Organization on 30 January 2020. During this crisis, literature also plays an important role and apocalyptic literature has shown the disastrous consequences if humans didn't stop their behaviour and attitude towards the world. This research project aims to take literature out of the realm of imagination and present the harsh realities of culture. This study revealed how literature represents the truth of the world that science is learning every day, and how certain inventions can have harmful effects if they are not halted in time. This research analysed the novel Oryx and Crake in the light of the COVID-19 pandemic and pointed a convincing glimpse of the future. Snowman (protagonist), known as Jimmy before humanity was overrun by science, is trying to live in a world where he might be the last human Snowman tells the tale of how Crake's scientific ambitions contributed to the abolition of human civilization. The researcher emphasizes how the reel depicts reality and how people are to blame for the degradation of their world.